“There and back again.. and again.. and again..” Day 4 and trip home

[DisneyJade]

Cast: Jade – Disney Planner (1st trip as an adult)
Yorke – Disney Skeptic (1st WDW trip – DL aficionado)

With a good night’s rest under my belt, I woke up ready to tackle early entry to MGM… I wanted to get to those rides we missed the day before. Alas, after 11 solid hours of sleep, I still could not drag Yorke out of bed.

Angry, but not wanting to drag out our fight, I went to MGM by myself – I am not a solo explorer, so I was pretty depressed, but I tried to make the best of it.

Immediately at MGM, I noticed the lines. I knew Saturday would be crowded because it was the weekend before the MLK holiday, but I was spoiled by empty parks…so seeing the lines made me cranky. Once inside the park, though, the crowds were still pretty light. I rode Star Tours and saw the muppets because Yorke wasn’t interested in those rides anyway. The Star Tours special effects were a little dated. Can’t we have a motion simulator that actually flips upside down? Or how about a virtual-reality type simulator? Muppets was classic, and for once, I was actually glad to be on my own, b/c I wouldn’t have seen it with Yorke in tow. After that, I caught the Indiana Jones stunt spectacular. How Cool!! So much more fun than I expected.. and long too! I like long attractions.. makes me feel like I’m getting my money’s worth. But it was sad, because I knew Yorke would have really liked the show and he was missing it. I didn’t have the heart to do RnR or Millionaire by myself, so I headed back to the resort.
Yorke was up and ready to go. He had slept 14 hours!!!! We had a PS for Coral Reef (I’d made it three months in advance b/c I was so excited to dine in the underwater atmosphere). But when it came down to it, I wasn’t in the mood for fish and Yorke wasn’t in the mood for an expensive meal. Plus, we were still pretty tense and a romantic setting didn’t seem appropriate. I cancelled our PS and made a last minute reservation at the Biergarten in Epcot’s Germany pavilion.

The meal helped lift our spirits. See Dining Report By the end of lunch, we were getting along fine. We had planned to go back to MGM to ride RnR together, but our tummies were telling us otherwise. We decided to cruise the World Showcase for awhile. We took a leisurely pace, and York became an Epcot fan!!! (before the trip, he was dreading Epcot – he thought it would be too educational/discovery-channel for his taste.)
Finally, our stomachs were settled and we went to MGM (my second trip there this day!). The wait for RnR was about 30 minutes, so we got fastpasses (Yay! I got to use Fastpass!!) and went to Millionaire. That was big fun, but can someone tell me the trick to getting on the board? I got every single question correct, and I did the whole click-the-right-answer-constantly-before-the-lights-even-come-on. But I still never got up on the board!! What’s the secret??? After Millionaire, we used our FPs and rode RnR. We loved it, but it was too short (again, with the short rides!!) Still, it was easily our favorite roller coaster in all the parks.
It was starting to get dark, so we headed BACK to Epcot AGAIN to catch Tapestry of Dreams (this is two trips to MGM and two trips to Epcot for me… not very efficient touring). We grabbed some hot chocolate and yummy funnel cakes from the American pavilion… then got front row seat for ToD right as it started. The parade was a little short for my taste… and repetitive. But the puppeteers were AWESOME! I’d love to try that sometime. I bet it’s harder than it looks.
I was so tired at this point, that I actually decided to skip the grand finale of our trip… the fireworks over MK. Yorke was such a trooper, though. He tried to convince me to go b/c he knew I would regret it the next day. But I just couldn’t keep going. It was either fireworks and straight to bed… or a quick nap and then all of Pleasure Island. I made the right decision. Missing the fireworks is just another reason to go back! J
Back at the resort, I never did get a nap in, but I packed a little bit and watched some TV. I was still exhausted by the time we went to PI, but it was worth the trip.. and the money! We went to Adventurers Club first, because I remembered it so fondly from my trip with my parents as a kid. But this time, we both gave it the thumbs down. It was SUPER QUIET… because a cast member was putting on a bit of a show, so everyone was just sitting and listening attentively. It was definitely an older crowd… so we bailed out without even having a drink. Then we went to the BET club for a drink, but that wasn’t our scene either. Motion was next on the list… we were getting closer. This club had more people our age, although the music was a little too teeny-bop.
I was tired and tipsy and wanted to leave, but Yorke convinced me to check out the Beach Club. I’m SOOO glad he did!! It was the most fun we had all trip! The music was right up our alley… all 80s and 90s type stuff that EVERYBODY knows all the words too… just fun bounce-around kind of music.

There was a cover band playing for most of the night called “Kabang!”

They were SO FANTASTIC!! They covered everything from Bon Jovi to Green Day and countless others. Every member of the band could play all the instruments AND sing. So they kept rotating, which was very impressive. We were having so much fun, we stayed way too late and drank way too much.

We grabbed some gyros from the PI street vendor and stumbled back to the resort around 2am. Uh-Oh!!! Our towncar will be here in six hours!!! That’s when the last of the trip unraveled. Back at the room, Yorke realized he’d lost a couple hundred bucks at PI (or maybe he spent it without realizing it), so he was suddenly in a foul mood. I was cranky too b/c we still had so much to pack, and I was paranoid we would sleep through the alarm. We proceeded to get into our second major fight of the trip

(I won’t go into it, but it involved a lot of name-calling and sleeping in separate beds).

Trip Home:
Surprise surprise!!! We slept through the alarm!

I somehow woke up right at 8am… when we were supposed to meet the towncar. Yorke ran down and asked the driver to wait while we threw our stuff together. We were so harried, we left behind some clothes and a set of keys. But at least we made it to the airport on time. (big tip to the towncar driver for waiting for us for almost a half an hour.
Once at the airport, America West strikes again!!! (see pretrip and Day 1) Our flight was delayed for an hour, and we almost missed our connection. Then, after a mad dash through the Phoenix airport to catch our flight to Tucson, THAT plane was delayed too!! Did I mention I hate this airline?


Well, that’s it!!! I enjoyed writing this trip report.

I hope you enjoyed reading about our antics… and I hope you got some useful information about WDW in between. I’d love to answer any questions you have. Don’t forget to check out my resort and dining reports!!

 

[nativetxn]

I read all of the installments of your trip report and enjoyed each one. Sounds like you had a pretty good trip despite the spats with your SO.

I love touring the parks solo, it's fun. I'm glad you had some time to yourself to enjoy MGM as a solo.

Thanks for posting this, I'm going to post links to your reports on the adults and solo travelers board, hope you don't mind.

Katholyn

 

[DisneyJade]

nope, i don't mind at all! thanks!

 

[VolcanoJen]

Hi DisneyJade!

Just wanted to tell you that I really enjoyed your trip report. It was so sweet of you to type up all of your memories for us to dig into, and it was so *honest* of you to include the "not-so-magical" moments for us as well.

It's so awful when you fight with your significant other during vacation. We put a lot of pressure on ourselves to make our hard-earned, expensive trips to WDW absolutely perfect, don't we? I'm a rather addictive travel planner myself, and after reading your trip report, I've really decided to investigate something I think my DH would appreciate: Spontaneity! This trip, I'm going to try (and it's hard!) to refrain from planning out every last possible minute, and I think I'm actually going to try sleeping in a little bit myself. It's vacation, after all, and WDW shouldn't *ever* be a stressful place! Of course, like most of us here, I get pretty stressed out that we won't be able to pack it all in, so I'm sort of a whip-cracker, but I'm going to try to "tame the lion tamer" inside me!

You were a real champ for forging ahead and trying to make the most of your vacation in spite of your quarelling. My heart really broke for you while I read your report sometimes, and I too have experienced that awful rock in your gut when you're in Disney and trying to have a wonderful, perfect time, but you can't because you're fighting and bickering with the person you love the most. Isn't it just awful when you both clam up and won't talk, and there you are in the middle of "It's A Small World" or something? In retrospect, I hope you'll be able to laugh about it. I remember a time with DH at Epcot years ago and we were fighting, and I was sitting on the Friendship launch at the front of the boat and him in the back, and I was just crying myself silly, the CM piloting the boat was really nice to me and told me that he bet a Mickey Ice Cream Bar would cheer me right up! It did, and DH and I laugh sometimes about that stupid fight we had in The Most Magical Place on Earth!

I gotta say this though: that Yorke of yours sure is a sleepy thing, isn't he?

Thanks again for your wonderful report (complete with annotations and really amusing use of Smilies!!).

- Jennifer

 

[vald1977]

Thanks so much for taking the time to write such a great trip, resort, and dining report! I hope you are able to go back soon and see the things you missed. Maybe if you have a longer stay next time, you will eliminate some of your sleep issues ! Thanks again for sharing with us.

 

[zurgswife]

Hope things are better for you and Yorke now....

 

[DisneyJade]

and thanks for the response!

VolcanoJen, I would definitely "plan" some spontenaity. Looking back, I would have rather missed some attractions and had a more laid back time... than fit it all in - but have to do half of it by myself b/c I was making my other half crazy. And truth be told, if I hadn't made him go Commando the first half of the trip, he probably wouldn't have been so sleepy and cranky for the second half.

As an epilog, we got back last Sunday and didn't even SPEAK again until Friday (usually we see each other every day). We haven't talked about the trip, but I think it's going to be one of those vacations we each remember "in our own way."

 

[Luv2Roam]

Doing the parks by yourself is not a bad thing. And we were at MGM the same day as you! (Riding RnRC and ToT over, and over, and over, and ...)
We kind of lucked out on Saturday. It was our last day and our flight left at 7 p.m. We figured on leaving the park around 3:00.
We went to Epcot had breakfast. Rode the boat to MGM.
We have AP's, and at all parks that morning, the system was down for guests with AP's. It wasn't reading any AP's at any parks most of the morning.
We jockeyed a few FP's around between RnRC and ToT. Then all of a sudden the system wasn't reading our AP's to get FP's! Well, it was because the system wasn't working when we entered the park, so it wasn't acknowledging we were there to use the FP machines!
Because the system wouldn't read our AP's we just kept getting as many FP's as we needed (manually by the CM's).
Wasn't major. But allowed us to keep on riding rides until we ran out of time! It was great since that was our last day!

 

[airhead]

Really enjoyed reading your report!

airhead

 

[BigTigg'r]

Thank you so much for sharing your experience. It is difficult when you have different types on the same trip. I once went with seven other adults and the trip planner was demonic about schedules and wake ups and meals. After two days there was going to be revolt, so we told him to calm down and relax, that it was a vacation for him too and the last three days were much better. It is good to go with a plan but flexibility is key. I hope that your experience turns out to be more positive than negative and that it does not keep you both from returning to the World!
Your honesty in reporting the good and the difficult is truly exceptional,
thanks again.

 

[pnelson]

I've always said that you should vacation with someone before marrying him/her because vacations can make or brake a relationship. I don't know-Yorke sounds very high maintanance to me!

 

[stego]

Boy, my hat is off to you!
I'd hope that you would have had a better time, especially with someone you care so much about. It's wonderful to share the experience with the people you love, and being together for it makes it so special.
I look back when I first went in 1976, with my mom, stepfather and brother.
I went with my buddy in 1992.
I returned in 1998 with my buddy and my son, who was 3 at the time.
Then in 2001, I went with my own family, son, buddy, and my fiance.
They were all different in their own ways.
I gather you'd been reading on the dis boards, and by others sharing that there's quite a bit to see and do.
I remember in 1992 we saw all of disney-mgm by 330pm.
The last time we went to mgm, we got there at 9am, and left at 930pm.
We didn't go to see two attractions-just not enough time.
I'm sure you explained to your companion about what you wanted to see and do-and the time and planning it would take to do so. My own experience is this-reading about it and actually doing the world are quite a bit different.
I know your intentions were in the right place with going with him, and sharing in the magic. However, if you do want to see and do so much-it does require a plan of attack-and there are a number of circumstances that can contribute to falling behind schedule. Believe me, I know. I remember going in 1999 during spring break with my 4yo son and buddy, and getting at the mk at 8am. We got on the last tram to the parking lot at 1030am.
Of course we didn't get to do everything, it was spring break.
I swore-never again at spring break! Main street exiting-well, it was a sight to see after being there 14 hours. I know, what a bad parent-lugging your kid around for 14 hours-but believe me, we had a great time. My son is quite the trooper. My buddy and I were sitting on the benches next to donald's boat in toontown around 830pm, and my son was just running around. He did fall asleep on my shoulder while we were waiting on the monorail, though.
I think your companion's idea of vacation is sleeping-and resting, and not trudging around theme parks. I would venture that he wanted to hang in there, for your benefit, but when reality kicked in, well, even the best of us have our bad days. I went to the disneyland resort last may, and by the third day, I hit the wall around 1pm. I was just wiped! Of course, while I was passed out, my wife, son and friend were down at the pool, waiting for me to come to so we could hit disneyland again. After about 1 1/2 hours, they sent her up to wake me up. My son was good until 10pm that night. He is 7 now.
Anyway, thanks again for sharing. I do hope that in the future that if you go with him, that you'll have a better time, and can communicate to one another what you can realistically handle.
Then again, it could just very well be that he's just not a disney nut like the rest of us, and that is ok, too.

 

[maxie]

My DH and I were at WDW on our honeymoon this past September and had 1 big fight. I think it started over something silly to do with his driving. We ended up going back to the hotel (we were at DQ) without eating. Later after we cooled off we headed back to DD to eat and visit DQ. Wouldn't be too upset about fighting on the trip - lots of people do!!
Especially on a trip like WDW when you are going steady all day.
I think for your next trip together consider your different styles. Perhaps you'll need a longer time at WDW so it can be done more leisurely and your SO won't get so grouchy. Or take another couple along so that you can break into pairs if someone one wants to stay back at the resort.