As I'm writing this it has been just over 36 hours since I left Walt Disney World and the Disney blues are officially setting in, making this the perfect time to write my trip report. Whilst I've previously written my trip reports with day-by-day diary entry type posts, I don't want to bore people with excessive details so I'm rounding it all up into one post instead and then I'll write some separate posts with more in depth reviews of things like the resort and the Halloween party.
Trip Overview
Our trip was for 2 weeks, from September 22nd - October 6th and I was there with my mum and my sister. This was our first holiday together without my dad and brother and it was my first proper Disney World holiday with my sister (the first time we went she was working there and the second time I was working there) so it was a pretty special trip. It was also my mum's first time staying onsite and therefore getting the Magical Express from the airport, and she was so impressed with the efficiency of it all. We stayed at All Star Music, which was perfect for the little amount of time we actually spent at the resort, but I won't go into too much detail here as I'll be writing a separate post all about it soon. Having only ever been in the summer before, it was great to experience the parks at a different time of year and we would definitely go back at this time again. The parks were way less crowded, especially in the first week, with Slinky Dog at one point only having a 30 minute queue and Flight of Passage once having a shorter queue than Navi River Journey. The weather was still pretty hot and was apparently hotter than average for this time of year, but it was still manageable for the most part and we had minimal rain for the whole fortnight. During our 2 weeks we did all 4 parks multiple times as well as Disney Springs, and we had a day at the outlets and the mall. We didn't do any of the water parks as we weren't really interested in them, and my sister went to Universal for a day but me and my mum weren't bothered.
The Parks
Magic Kingdom
Over the two weeks, we went to Magic Kingdom 5 times during the day and 2 times in the evening, not including the Halloween party. Whilst this isn't my favourite of the four parks, it is obviously the most magical and quintessentially 'Disney' so of course we spent both our first and last days there. During those days we managed to get on all of our favourite rides at least once, including Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean and Big Thunder Mountain, and we got a fastpass for Mine Train. We also met plenty of characters such as Mickey, Tinkerbell, and Pooh and Tigger. We watched Festival of Fantasy twice and no matter how many times I watch this parade I still absolutely love it! I love how vibrant and colourful all of the floats are and the music is great. We also saw Happily Ever After twice and I sobbed throughout both times. Not only do these fireworks have such a special meaning to me after my program, they are also just the best night time entertainment I have ever seen in a Disney park and I will never get over how incredible they are.
Epcot
Epcot quickly became my favourite park last summer and it didn't disappoint this trip, especially with the addition of the Food and Wine Festival. I experienced this for a few hours last year but to be able to properly experience it this year was amazing and it was everything I hoped it would be. We got to try some incredible food, with my personal favourites being the Steakhouse Blended Burger from Earth Eats, the Black Pepper Shrimp with Garlic Noodles from China, and the Fritto Misto from Italy. We didn't try many of the drink offerings as it was quite hot and we didn't want to dehydrate ourselves with alcohol but we did try the Chilled Coffee with Godiva Chocolate Liqueur from Belgium and the La Passion Martini Slush from France, both of which were delicious. As well as eating our way around World Showcase, we also went on all the rides we wanted to, including 2 rides on Frozen Ever After and Soarin', and we met all the characters at the Character Spot. I also got to watch IllumiNations for the first (and probably last) time. As much as I love Epcot for some reason I had just never got round to watching its night time show and whilst it definitely isn't my favourite, I really enjoyed it and the fireworks were spectacular.
Animal Kingdom
Animal Kingdom definitely doesn't get enough credit for what an amazing park it is and it was definitely the quietest of the four parks whilst we were there. On our first day there we were able to do everything we wanted to apart from Flight of Passage which we had a fastpass for on another day anyway. We did the safari twice over our two weeks and we were lucky enough to see some amazing animals including a baby giraffe, baby elephant and some hippos out of the water. We also did both of the animal treks were we saw tigers, gorillas and meerkats amongst other animals. Pandora was just as incredible as I remembered and we managed to get on Flight of Passage twice which was also as amazing as ever. We spent one evening there and we watched Rivers of Light which I think is a nice nighttime show but it definitely doesn't compare to the others.
Hollywood Studios
Hollywood Studios was the park we spent the least amount of time in, mostly because it has the least amount of rides that we actually go on. We did all the shows (Beauty and the Beast, Frozen singalong, Muppetvision, Indiana Jones) and met Olaf, Mickey and Minnie, and Pluto but of course the highlight for this trip was getting to experience Toy Story Land. The park was actually a lot quieter than we expected it to be seeing as Toy Story only opened a couple of months ago but the queues really weren't that bad. We did Slinky Dog Dash, Alien Swirling Saucers and Midway Mania and I think I actually preferred the Swirling Saucers to Slinky Dog which is great because it always has a much shorter queue. The only problem is that all three of these rides are tier 1 fastpasses meaning you can only get an advanced fastpass for one of them per day. The good news however is that Midway Mania now has much shorter queues than it used to... we only queued for 20 minutes in standby and managed to get an on the day fastpass for it as well. Of course, we also saw Fantasmic twice during our trip which was as great as ever.
The Food
Would it really be an Amy Beatrice blog post if I didn't talk about food? This trip we were on the Disney Dining Plan which we upgraded to from the free breakfast we got when we booked our hotel. We absolutely loved being on the Dining Plan and we 100% found it worth the money we had spent to upgrade... we worked out that all of our food and snacks was worth almost double what we had actually paid and we got to eat at some incredible restaurants. As well as returning to some past favourites, including Ohana and 1900 Park Fare, we also experienced a load of new places where we had some absolutely amazing food. In particular I loved Teppan Edo, Boma and The Yachtsman Steakhouse. Our only disappointing meal was breakfast at Be Our Guest. There was nothing wrong with the food, but for the same price as a cronut, fruit salad and some pastries at Be Our Guest we had an all you can eat breakfast buffet at Trails End. As we were on the dining plan the cost didn't necessarily matter but if you're paying out of pocket that'd definitely something you should have in mind.
Halloween
Finally, I wanted to talk a little bit about Halloween in the parks. Halloween starts in August in Disney World and I actually got to see some of the decorations before I left last summer but I didn't properly take it in. Magic Kingdom is really the only park that goes all out for Halloween and I loved all of the decorations - from pumpkins and scarecrows to orange leaves and sunflowers all over Main Street. They look so beautiful and instantly make you feel autumnal even when it's still 34 degrees outside. They had an amazing range of Halloween merchandise throughout the parks including ears, t-shirts, sweets, magic bands and much more as well as a load of special Halloween food. Our resort had a delicious pumpkin cheesecake as well as a Coco inspired Dia De Los Muertos spiced cupcake. We also went to a Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party but I'll be talking all about that in a separate post.
So there is the most concise summary of our trip I could give which I realise is still pretty long! Whilst it felt odd to only be there for 2 weeks instead of 2 and a half months, and it was strange to be the one fully experiencing the magic instead of helping to make it, I had an incredible time with my mum and sister and it felt great to not have to leave them half way through the day to go clean tables or fry chicken nuggets! Even though I would definitely love to be a cast member again one day, I had a great time as a guest and I cannot wait to start planning my next trip!
Thanks for reading
Amy xxx
