2020: The Year of the Ever-Changing Trip

[Tink0812]

Hello everyone and welcome! Let me start off by saying that I am in no way claiming to be good at writing trip reports. This is the fourth or fifth trip report that I have done, and I only do them for a couple of reasons. I enjoy getting to re-live the trip over the course of a couple of weeks after I return and I love sharing my experiences with others so that they may learn something to help them plan their trips. So, without further ado, let us start with the introductions:

My name is Amber. I am thirty years old and this was my 18th trip to Walt Disney World. My favorite Disney character is Tinkerbell. My favorite park is Animal Kingdom. My favorite Disney resort is Wilderness Lodge although Old Key West is in a close second (this was definitely challenged on this trip). I do not really have a favorite Disney restaurant as I enjoy trying new things and menus are always changing. My favorite ride is Kilimanjaro Safari, and my favorite show is the Lion King show at Animal Kingdom even though we could not see it this time around. Disney World is truly my happy place. I spend a lot of time working as a nurse on a cardiovascular surgical unit. It is a super intense job that has only been made even more so since the beginning of this pandemic. I desperately needed this vacation.

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My DD is 4 years old and this was her 4th trip to WDW. She was 15 months old when we took her on her first trip, and she has been every year since. Her favorite Disney character is Rapunzel, but she also loves Fancy Nancy, Minnie Mouse, Moana, and Belle. Her favorite park is Magic Kingdom. That is understandable because there is so much for her to do there. Her favorite Disney resort is Art of Animation. Her favorite Disney restaurant is Raglan Road (her words, not mine. I really thought she would have chosen Cinderella’s Royal Table). Her favorite ride is Slinky Dog Dash, and her favorite show is the Frozen show at DHS. This was the first trip where she was tall enough for the bigger rides like Kali River Rapids, Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, BTMRR, Slinky Dog Dash, and Splash Mountain.

Next, we have my mom. My DD calls her Gaga. She has been to WDW somewhere around 28-30 times. It’s getting hard for her to keep track. Her favorite character is Winnie the Pooh. Her favorite park is Animal Kingdom. Her favorite resort is Wilderness Lodge. Her favorite Disney restaurant is Whispering Canyon Café. Her favorite ride is BTMR and her favorite show is probably either Country Bear Jamboree or The Lion King show at Animal Kingdom.

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Last, but definitely not least, we have the planner extraordinaire, my dad. He has been to WDW 30 + times (he’s lost count) and loves to plan Disney trips. His favorite character is Tigger. His favorite resort is Old Key West. Like me, he doesn’t really have a favorite Disney restaurant because he likes trying new things and new places. He does have a favorite bar though! It’s definitely the Hole in the Wall bar at Disney Springs. My dad also really liked the Gurgling Suitcase bar at Old Key West and was happy to find that one of the bar tenders from there had been reassigned to Bar Riva at Riviera. His favorite park is Epcot. His favorite ride is Flight of Passage and his favorite show is Festival of the Lion King.


Important Info:
When: December 4th-11th, 2020
Where: Riviera for the majority of the trip but then Art of Animation and Pop Century
How: We live in central Illinois and chose to fly out of Indianapolis, IN



Hang on tight because the explanation for how this trip came about is wild! So, wayyyyy back in the fall of 2018 when we had finished planning our big family WDW trip for May 2019 and long before COVID-19 was even a blip in our minds, we started discussing what vacation would look like for 2020. My parents had decided to take an Alaskan cruise with some friends to celebrate their 35th wedding anniversary. I decided that it would be the perfect time for my daughter and I to take our first cruise, a Disney cruise of course. As a single mother I knew this would take a lot of planning and saving so I started right away and before we knew it, we were booked on a 4-night Bahamian cruise for September 14th-18th 2020 out of Port Canaveral on the Disney Dream. We even had a day at Disney Springs planned before the cruise and a day at Magic Kingdom after the cruise. We were planning to stay one night at Saratoga Springs before the cruise by renting DVC points and one night at All-Star Movies after the cruise.

And then, 2020 hit. When Disney first started cancelling cruises in March and April, I experienced the first thoughts of "oh no, we may not be able to go on our cruise". My parents were experiencing the same concerns about their cruise which was scheduled to take place the week before ours, so they converted their trip into a week exploring Seattle and a few highly recommended areas of Canada.

Then came the May and June cancellations. Sometime towards the end of May I decided to move my cruise back to December. I thought that they surely would have it all figured out by then! So, I reluctantly moved my cruise back to December 7th-11th. I still had the same port, number of nights, ship, itinerary, etc. It was just a Merrytime cruise instead of a Halloween on the High Seas Cruise. We planned some time at Disney Springs and Magic Kingdom in the couple of days leading up to the cruise. What I did not know at the time was that my parents had cancelled their original vacation and were planning an extended weekend trip to WDW for that same time period.

Shortly after I moved everything, the July and August cruise cancellations came out followed shortly thereafter by the September cancellations. My original cruise would have been cancelled anyways which made me feel better about my decision to move. Then, on August 5th, the October cruise cancellations came. It was at that point that I had to take a lot of things into consideration and I started weighing my options and developing backup plans. If the cruise does sail, the itinerary would have to change because the Bahamas still were not allowing anyone in from the US. Character interactions would be severely reduced, dining experiences would be different, and on-board activities would be different. I really started to question if I wanted to spend that much money and not get the full DCL experience. I already had the week off work, and I was not postponing again because we already have a 2021 vacation planned for May. My backup plan was to convert to a week at WDW. The more I talked with people that were booked on cancelled sailings the more I realized that there was a large chance that my sailing would get cancelled last minute, my refund could take up to 60 days, and it may be difficult to even get it cancelled as they are strongly pushing rescheduling. I was worried that if I waited until Disney cancelled the cruise that I would not be able to get all of the reservations that I wanted at Walt Disney World and would end up with a very disappointing vacation. All of that led me to cancelling my cruise on August 5th and converting my trip to an entire week at WDW. Throughout the subsequent months of planning my parents slowly extended their trip a day at a time and ended up spending the entire week there as well.

We did a lot of research leading up to the trip and approached it with an open mind and acceptance of the fact that this trip would be very different from any trip we have ever taken. Having that mindset allowed us to have a great vacation. Will we go back during the pandemic? Probably not. And it has nothing to do with how Disney is handling everything as they are doing a great job. We are experiencing another COVID surge here in Illinois and I have had to convert to night shift and mandatory overtime. Traveling is just getting riskier right now and we would rather wait until everything is back to some sort of “normal”.

 

[Tink0812]

Day 1: Friday December 4th Travel Day
Day 2: Saturday December 5th, Part 1Arrival Day Part 1
Day 2: Saturday December 5th, Part 2 Arrival Day Part 2
Riviera Room Tour Part 1 Room Tour Part 1
Riviera Room Tour Part 2 Riviera Room Tour Part 2
Day 3: Sunday December 6th, Part 1 1st Magic Kingdom Day Part 1
Day 3: Sunday December 6th, Part 2 1st Magic Kingdom Day Part 2
Day 4: Monday December 7th, Part 1 2nd Magic Kingdom Day Part 1
Day 4: Monday December 7th, Part 2 2nd Magic Kingdom Day Part 2
Day 5: Tuesday December 8th, Part 1 Hollywood Studios Part 1
Day 5: Tuesday December 8th, Part 2 Hollywood Studios Part 2
Day 6: Wednesday December 9th, Part 1 Animal Kingdom Part 1
Day 6: Wednesday December 9th, Part 2 Animal Kingdom Part 2
Pop Century Pictures and Details Pop Century
Art of Animation Pictures and Details Art of Animation
Day 7: Thursday December 10th, Part 1 3rd Magic Kingdom Day Part 1
Day 7: Thursday December 10th, Part 2 3rd Magic Kingdom Day Part 2
Day 8: Friday December 11th That's a Wrap!

 

[Tigger's ally]

I'm going to be here to see your thoughts on the Riviera! Oh, and pictures of the little one!

 

[princessbelle2015]

Following along!

 

[Tink0812]

Hello everyone! I hope this post finds you and yours healthy and well. Let’s start with what I consider to be day one of the trip, Friday December 4th. This post will be light on pictures but I promise, things will get picture-heavy as we move along. The day started off like any typical Friday. I got up and took my DD to school. While she was at school, I got my nails done, ran some last-minute errands, and worked on some laundry. Around 11:30am I received an urgent call from DD’s pre-school saying that one of the kids in the 3-year-old classroom tested positive for COVID, so they had to shut the whole school down immediately. Thank goodness DD is in the 4-year-old class or it really could have put a damper on our vacation! Picking her up early wasn’t really that big of a deal but it meant that she had to go with me to my hair appointment and hang out while I cleaned the house and double checked that we had everything packed. Meanwhile, my mom was at work and my dad was doing all of the last-minute preparations for them.

My dad arrived at my house around 2:15pm to load all of our luggage up and help me finish securing the house. We left around 2:45 to go pick my mom up from work. She usually gets off around 4-4:30pm but she was able to make arrangements to get off at 3pm instead. From there we started our drive to Indianapolis. Indianapolis is only about a 2.5-3-hour drive for us, but they are one hour ahead of us (the same time zone as Orlando). We made a pit stop in Terre Haute for pizza at Monicals before continuing to our hotel in Indianapolis. We stayed at a really nice and fairly new Embassy Suites. We stayed in a one-bedroom suite. We arrived at the hotel around 8pm their time so we pretty much just laid our clothes out for the next morning and went to bed. Well, DD had to have some ice cream in bed first. It was a pretty uneventful day but a great way to kick off our vacation.

 

[Tink0812]

Saturday December 5th: Arrival day is finally here. We woke up at 4:30am and quickly got ready. Everyone but my dad had showered the previous night, so it was pretty easy to get ready. I was surprised that DD got up without a fight. It must have been the excitement. We were out the door of the hotel shortly after 5 am. From Embassy Suites to Fast Park was a quick 10-minute drive. The roads were pretty empty at this time of day. For anyone flying out of Indy, Fast Park is a great parking option. It costs just over $7/day which is cheaper than airport parking. Your vehicle will be left in a gated, secure lot. Every parking space is covered as well. A shuttle will take you to/from the airport. Continuing on, we parked the car and boarded the shuttle to the airport. The shuttle was also about a 10-minute drive. Here is a picture of DD on the shuttle. You can tell she is still tired. We wore our matching Disney dresses but chose to wear leggings underneath them and cardigans as it was very cold in the Midwest when we were leaving (around 20 degrees F). It also gave us the option of shedding layers once we made it to sunny Florida.


Once we arrived at the airport, we used the kiosks at the Southwest counter to print our boarding passes and retrieve our luggage. We had checked in online the previous day (you are allowed to start doing so 24 hours prior to your flight time). The check in and bag weighing process went off without a hitch. I had previously used a bathroom scale to weigh my checked bag because it felt pretty heavy but it was only 32 pounds. DD had a child-sized rolling suitcase which weighted a mere 12 pounds.

From there we stopped at McDonalds for a quick breakfast. I had a blueberry muffin and a water. DD had a cinnamon roll and milk. My parents both had sausage and egg McGriddles and they shared a sweet tea. Once we finished our breakfast of champions we continued on through security and found our gate. The security line was really short, and DD did great this time around. It helped that I did not have her take her own carry-on and we did not take a stroller with us as we did the last time we flew (she was only 2 then). We also wore sandals that were easy to slip off and back on.

With everyone settled in at our gate, I set off in search of some coffee. The only thing open in our terminal that served coffee was Starbucks, so I jumped in the massive line. I got a Caramel Brulee frap. My mom got a hot peppermint mocha. DD got a vanilla bean crème frap. My dad is not a coffee person, so he sat this one out. By the time I made it all the way through the line it was almost time to board so we had to drink quickly. About 10 minutes before boarding we took bathroom breaks and finished up drinks. About that time, they announced that our flight would be slightly delayed in boarding because there was some type of leak on the plane. They said it would be a quick fix, 10-20 minutes. No big deal, we weren’t in a hurry anyways. Approximately 30 minutes later they announced that they were unable to fix the leak and had to call in a contracted group of specialized airplane mechanics. They started calling people who had connecting flights up to the podium so they could make the proper arrangements. About 10 minutes later they said they were just going to get us a new plane. We had to change gates but were boarded pretty quickly. Our flight was scheduled to leave Indianapolis at 7:15am and land at MCO at 9:40. It was a straight flight. We ended up taking off an hour late, at 8:15am but landed at 10am so we made up quite a bit of time in the air. Just a few days prior to our trip, Southwest opened up ticket sales to allow all seats to be filled on the plane. They were previously leaving the middle seat empty to help with social distancing. Our plane was completely full. Masks remained on for the entire flight except when actively eating or drinking. They did a modified food and beverage service. Everyone got a cup of water and a small bag of snack mix. Of course we took a pre-takeoff selfie!



DD loves the taking off process. After we took off she played with her toys for a little bit but it wasn't long before she was napping.


We were very happy to find that it was 75 degrees and sunny when we got off the plane. The Christmas décor in the airport was beautiful. Bathroom breaks were our first order of business. DD and I removed our leggings and cardigans as well. Then, we found a bench for DD and my mom to sit on while my dad and I ran (well okay, we briskly walked) to baggage claim to get our luggage. We really miss the days where DME got our bags for us. The baggage claim area was insane. We were very glad that we didn't bring DD down there with us. While we were getting our bags, DD and my mom were having a little photo shoot.




Bags in hand we returned to DD and my mom to begin the hike to the DME boarding area. When we got there, we were met with super long lines. It was about an hour-long process from the time we arrived at the check-in line to when we finally boarded a bus. Of course, they put us on a DCL bus since I was still a little sad about not getting to take our cruise. Guests on our bus were either going to Riviera like us or Art of Animation. Riviera was the first stop, and we were there in about 20 minutes. They did a great job utilizing social distancing on the bus and everyone was, of course, wearing their masks. Families were seated next to each other but there was at least one row in between each travel group.


Once we disembarked the DME, we checked our luggage with Bell Services and hopped a bus to Disney Springs. Side note: staff from bell services were actually waiting at the bus stop when we arrived with luggage carts and everything. It was a super easy process! We had a goal of tackling World of Disney before our lunch reservation. Luck was on our side when we were booking our ADR’s at 60 days out and we were able to score a 2:15pm lunch reservation at Chef Art Smith’s Homecomin’. We arrived at Disney Springs in a timely manner and made it through the temperature check. My dad decided to go visit one of his favorite places, The Hole in the Wall bar next to Raglan Road while us girls set off for World of Disney. There was a long line to get into World of Disney (not surprising since this was a Saturday afternoon) and we ended up waiting 30 minutes just to get in the store. They were having everyone enter on the back side of the building and the line snaked around behind Basin. Inside the store was still crowded but of course we managed to find a few things to buy. The checkout line took another 30 minutes easily. The lines looked a lot longer than they really were because they had markings on the floor six feet apart from one another to help with social distancing. My mom bought a couple of things for her girls at work. DD found a Mickey and Minnie toy to buy. It is very similar to Polly Pockets but is Mickey and Minnie instead.

Let’s go ahead and stop here for today…..I will post the rest of our arrival day shenanigans tomorrow!

 

[Nalshersmom]

Hello everyone! I hope this post finds you and yours healthy and well. Let’s start with what I consider to be day one of the trip, Friday December 4th. This post will be light on pictures but I promise, things will get picture-heavy as we move along. The day started off like any typical Friday. I got up and took my DD to school. While she was at school, I got my nails done, ran some last-minute errands, and worked on some laundry. Around 11:30am I received an urgent call from DD’s pre-school saying that one of the kids in the 3-year-old classroom tested positive for COVID, so they had to shut the whole school down immediately. Thank goodness DD is in the 4-year-old class or it really could have put a damper on our vacation! Picking her up early wasn’t really that big of a deal but it meant that she had to go with me to my hair appointment and hang out while I cleaned the house and double checked that we had everything packed. Meanwhile, my mom was at work and my dad was doing all of the last-minute preparations for them.

My dad arrived at my house around 2:15pm to load all of our luggage up and help me finish securing the house. We left around 2:45 to go pick my mom up from work. She usually gets off around 4-4:30pm but she was able to make arrangements to get off at 3pm instead. From there we started our drive to Indianapolis. Indianapolis is only about a 2.5-3-hour drive for us, but they are one hour ahead of us (the same time zone as Orlando). We made a pit stop in Terre Haute for pizza at Monicals before continuing to our hotel in Indianapolis. We stayed at a really nice and fairly new Embassy Suites. We stayed in a one-bedroom suite. We arrived at the hotel around 8pm their time so we pretty much just laid our clothes out for the next morning and went to bed. Well, DD had to have some ice cream in bed first. It was a pretty uneventful day but a great way to kick off our vacation.
View attachment 544198

Hello everyone! I hope this post finds you and yours healthy and well. Let’s start with what I consider to be day one of the trip, Friday December 4th. This post will be light on pictures but I promise, things will get picture-heavy as we move along. The day started off like any typical Friday. I got up and took my DD to school. While she was at school, I got my nails done, ran some last-minute errands, and worked on some laundry. Around 11:30am I received an urgent call from DD’s pre-school saying that one of the kids in the 3-year-old classroom tested positive for COVID, so they had to shut the whole school down immediately. Thank goodness DD is in the 4-year-old class or it really could have put a damper on our vacation! Picking her up early wasn’t really that big of a deal but it meant that she had to go with me to my hair appointment and hang out while I cleaned the house and double checked that we had everything packed. Meanwhile, my mom was at work and my dad was doing all of the last-minute preparations for them.

My dad arrived at my house around 2:15pm to load all of our luggage up and help me finish securing the house. We left around 2:45 to go pick my mom up from work. She usually gets off around 4-4:30pm but she was able to make arrangements to get off at 3pm instead. From there we started our drive to Indianapolis. Indianapolis is only about a 2.5-3-hour drive for us, but they are one hour ahead of us (the same time zone as Orlando). We made a pit stop in Terre Haute for pizza at Monicals before continuing to our hotel in Indianapolis. We stayed at a really nice and fairly new Embassy Suites. We stayed in a one-bedroom suite. We arrived at the hotel around 8pm their time so we pretty much just laid our clothes out for the next morning and went to bed. Well, DD had to have some ice cream in bed first. It was a pretty uneventful day but a great way to kick off our vacation.
View attachment 544198

My husband's family is from Terre Haute. We love their Square Donuts. I look forward to hearing about your trip

 

[Tink0812]

Okay, we left off with my mom, DD, and I in the check out line at World of Disney on Saturday December 5th....let's continue on with the rest of that day.

The timing worked out pretty good. We left World of Disney around 1:15 and our lunch reservation for Homecomin’ was at 2:15pm. By the time we walked all the way over to Homecomin’ and met my dad, it was 1:30 so we sat on the patio and enjoyed some drinks. My dad had a beer of some sort and my mom and I enjoyed some lemonade moonshine. DD just had a regular lemonade. We were allowed to check in for our reservation at 1:55pm and did so right at that time. We were sat outside at a high-top table. The weather was really nice on this particular day but our table was 100% in the sun so we did get a little toasty. This is about the only time we can say that for this trip.

Of course, we had to start off with the Church Lady’s Deviled Eggs. They were just as good as everyone had made them out to be! DD and my dad are not a fan of deviled eggs, so my mom and I had them all to ourselves. I would highly recommend them. We each had two then took the other two to-go so we could enjoy them later. For the meal, my mom had the Country Fried Steak. She really enjoyed it but it was a very large portion. We ended up taking some back to the resort for later. DD had the fish sticks with macaroni and cheese. She eats fish sticks when she is at her dads and loves them. I can’t stand the smell of them, so I never have them at home for her. The fish sticks at Homecomin’ were very different than what she is used to. It wasn’t actual sticks; it was just little square pieces of breaded catfish. She didn’t care for them, but my dad tried them and said they were good. She loved the macaroni though! I had the Fried Chicken Salad. It was delicious and also very large. For the life of me I cannot remember what my dad had. This was the only day on the trip where I did not write down what everyone had and I’m regretting that now. We were way too stuffed to attempt dessert and about that time we received the message that our room was ready. The bus ride back to Riviera was a short one and we could not wait to see our room. We had reservations in a 1-bedroom villa with a standard view.

We also explored the resort a little and stopped in the gift shop to get a few essentials (milk, water, snacks, etc.). I will complete a separate post with pictures from our room. This room worked out perfectly as my parents had the bedroom while DD slept on the pull-out bed under the television and I enjoyed the murphy bed. Once we were unpacked and settled into our room, we got DD ready for some time at the pool and splash pad. My parents were going to go there with her while I met the delivery guy from Kingdom Strollers to pick up our stroller at 5pm. Originally, I was not planning on getting a stroller for DD. She is very independent, and we have been without a stroller at home for over a year now. My dad was actually the one that brought up the idea of renting a stroller for her again this trip. He was more worried about the crowds and the fact that we may not be able to take as many breaks as we have on previous trips. I eventually decided that I would rather rent a stroller and not need it than not rent one and wish I had. I went with Kingdom Strollers for rental because we used them on our last trip with great success. They are cheap and have good quality strollers. The protection plan is also cheap, and the rental comes with a rain cover and beverage holder. Although Kingdom Strollers always labels their strollers with the renters name in two different places, we always bring our own sign to help us be able to pick our stroller out amongst the sea of strollers in the stroller parking areas. Sometimes we make our own, but this one was ordered off of Etsy.


After I had the stroller, I took it back to the room, and went to meet everyone else at the splash pad. We let DD play for a little while longer then took her back up to the room to get ready for the evening.






Once everyone was ready, we caught a ride on the Skyliner. My dad had ridden the Skyliner just a couple weeks prior when he was on property for a golf trip but this was a first for the rest of us. We loved it! We took the Epcot line and walked to Beaches n Cream for some ice cream. You’re allowed to have ice cream for dinner when you are on vacation, right? We just did the walk-up window. DD had an ice cream sandwich while the rest of us each got a cup of butter pecan ice cream. It was very delicious.


When we finished our ice cream, we walked back to the Skyliner and took a nice peaceful ride back to Riviera. The resort was beautifully lit. On our way back we submitted a mobile order for Primo Piatto for breakfast items for the next morning. We ordered a banana bread, a blueberry muffin, and a cinnamon roll. By the time we got back, the order was ready and we headed up to the room to crash for the night.

 

[Tigger's ally]

For all going to the riv, that Banana bread is the deal of the century. Under $4 and I cut it into six small pieces an all three of us had 2 every morning. So fresh! After I got one on the first day, I kept placing a mobile order and going down to get it every night before bed. Worked great. Girls had a blueberry muffin too that I got a taste of and it was very good as well.

Oh, and I am Tink's dad and that little tink is my grandtinker!. Been on here for quite awhile so we all have probably crossed paths!

 

[Tigger's ally]

I love that one of Natalia laughing as she came down the little slide~

 

[Tink0812]

Let's talk about Riviera! This was our first time staying here and we were definitely impressed. This is not our first DVC resort stay though.We have stayed at Old Key West a few times before and really liked it so you may hear me compare and contrast Riviera to Old Key West even though they are really nothing a like.

The view you get when pulling up to Riviera is a treat. It is a really beautiful resort. I was never able to capture a picture of the entire front of the resort in broad daylight so this sunrise picture will have to do. This was taken while we were waiting on a bus one morning.

I just love the fountains and the tilework you see when walking into the main lobby as well.



As I mentioned before, we stayed in a one-bedroom villa with a standard view. Our room number was 7747 on the 7th floor. We enjoyed our welcome message on the TV.

When you first walked in you were in a foyer-type area. To your left was a mirror and a door that led to another villa. This was a locked off unit from what we guessed could be a two-bedroom villa. To the right was another mirror, the laundry closet, a large clothing closet, and one of the doors to the bathroom. I didn't take a picture of the laundry closet. It was small but had a nice sized stackable washer and dryer along with a collapsible laundry basket. Below is a picture of a small portion of the larger hallway closet. This is the closet that DD and I shared for our time at Riviera. It had ample amount of space for our clothing to hang (there are more hangers on the side of the closet that is not pictured). We also stored our shoes and luggage here. As you can see, it also came with an iron, ironing board, and vacuum. The extra bedding for the murphy beds were also stored in here and this is where you can find the safe.

If you walked through the foyer you would find yourself in the kitchen and dining room area. The kitchen was fully stocked with dishes and supplies needed to utilize the dishwasher. The full-sized refrigerator and dishwasher were great to have. The only thing we wished we would have had were dish towels and washcloths. Some of the souvenir cups and straws we got were not dishwasher safe. It wasn't that big of a deal though.






Beyond the kitchen was the living room which is where DD and I slept. DD slept on the cool murphy bed that came out below the TV. She loved that thing! She thought it was so cool to have her own little bed. The old-time Mickey cartoon background was a hit too as those are her favorite cartoons right now. I really enjoyed the murphy bed that came down over the couch. Not only was it super comfortable, it had great little cubbies built in to the cabinets up by my head that had outlets built in. I also really loved the artwork above the bed. I am a big Peter Pan and Tinkerbell fan. The coffee table and cube seat you see in the first picture below both opened up for extra storage. DD and I used these as our "dressers" for the week. We put things like our bathing suits, PJ's, and undergarments in them.






Please see the next post for a continuation of our room tour as well as our overall review of Riviera! I'm nearing my picture limit on this post!

 

[Tink0812]

Let's continue with the tour of our wonderful one-bedroom villa at Riviera.....

Next to the large windows in the living room there was a door leading out to our balcony. There was another set of doors leading to the balcony from the master bedroom.

It was a decent sized balcony with a standard 2 chairs and small table. As you can see, we were on the front of the building, overlooking the entrance and the parking lot. That is what a typical "standard view" is like. But we were lucky because if you actually went out on the balcony and looked to your left, you had a great, unobstructed view of Epcot.

No leaning over the rails was even required. Pretty great for a standard view! The night view was even better. We kept saying "if only they were doing fireworks right now, we would have had the perfect view".

Next we have the master bedroom. It had a king sized bed, a dresser, a desk, a TV, a chair, and a small end table. It also had it's own closet which was much smaller than the closet DD and I shared but sufficient enough for my parents to share. It helped that they had the dresser too.

The doors you see on the far right of the room are their entrance into the bathroom. Remember in my previous post where I mentioned that you could also access the bathroom from the hallway off of the foyer. The bathroom was a split design which we really loved for getting ready in the mornings. Walking in from the master bedroom you had a sink with nice sized mirror and vanity and the bathtub (which DD loved). The other portion of the bathroom had the amazing shower (two different shower heads), the toilet, and another sink on a smaller vanity.



The fixtures, tilework, and lighting in the bathroom were all top of the line. Definitely my favorite Disney Resort bathroom by far! That concludes our room tour. Next up: a list of our likes and dislikes about this resort

 

[Tink0812]

So, what did we think of Riviera? As you can probably tell by some of my descriptors used in my room tour, we really enjoyed it! Below is a breakdown of our likes and dislikes.......of course the likes far outweighed the dislikes!


Things we liked about Riviera
1. The resort and grounds were beautiful.
2. Even though it had been open for a year, it still seemed brand new.
3. DD really enjoyed the splash pad. She probably enjoyed it more than she enjoyed the one at Art of Animation on our last trip. That is saying a lot!
4. Great dining options! We really enjoyed Primo Piatto and Topolino's as well as the coffee shop.
5. The one-bedroom villa here felt larger than the one at Old Key West. Square footage-wise there isn't much of a difference, Riviera just makes better use of the space.
6. Easy access to the Skyliner. We used it more than we had really planned on using it.
7. This may go along with my first point, but the artwork here is stunning. My favorite pieces were the mosaics in the area leading to the sky liner.
8. Bar Riva was beautiful, had a great selection, and was both open-aired but also had heaters for when the temps dropped.
9. The soundproofing has to be top of the line. We knew the resort was fairly full and we knew we had neighbors on both sides of us but we never heard anyone when we were in our villa.
10. Bus service as great for the most part. My parents experienced one difficulty that I will discuss later on in the trip report. This was an obvious anomaly.
11. Bell Services is at the top of their game. When I called to have our luggage brought up, they were there in less than 10 minutes. They also transferred our luggage to other resorts without error.
12. The staff was always friendly and had smiles on their faces. I know this is common amongst all resorts on Disney property but I notice it more at the DVC resorts.
13. The split bathroom was great when everyone needed to get ready at once.
14. DD really enjoyed the deep, jetted bathtub.
15. The rainfall shower head was amazing. The other shower head was good too.
16. The multiple murphy beds made the one-bedroom villa a perfect fit for our family. It's always a plus when I don't have to share a bed with my DD. She tosses and turns a lot and always ends up on top of me.
17. We will always love having a full kitchen, even if we never cook on vacation. It's just nice to have the full-sized refrigerator and have the option to cook or reheat things if we want.
18. The little alcove that lead to the neighboring unit was a great place to store the stroller without having to fold it up.
19. Storage in our villa was far from lacking
20. Our "standard view" was definitely NOT standard! It was more than that!
21. The lobby, although small, was beautiful and welcoming.
22. We enjoyed having a washer and dryer in our unit. This is one of the main reasons we enjoy the DVC resorts. This trip we had each brought just a couple pairs of pants and it ended up being cooler than predicted so it was nice to be able to do laundry. It was also helpful to wash our masks. Even though housekeeping would gladly bring us additional towels, it was nice to have the ability to wash our own when needed
23. The resort did a great job of promoting social distancing and enforcing the mask policy.
24. Our room was ready by the 4pm check in time.
25. The elevators, although lacking in number, were quite speedy.
26. Bus stops were close to the building and well sheltered from the elements.




Things we disliked about Riviera
1. The gift shop was much smaller than what we were used to even for a DVC resort
2. Being that the gift shop was much smaller, it had a smaller selection of food/drinks. We had previously ordered groceries in advance through Garden Grocer but being that we weren't staying in this resort for the entire week and that you now have to be available to meet the delivery person yourself, Garden Grocer just wasn't going to work for us on this trip. Instead, we were hoping that the gift shop at Riviera would have the large selection of grocery items that the gift shop at Old Key West had. Unfortunately it did not. We were able to get a few things but had to compromise on a couple of things.
3. One of the things we enjoy about Old Key West is that the villas are split up into different buildings and even different neighborhoods. This gives you a greater sense of peace and seclusion. Riviera has all of the villas in the same building, very similar to a large hotel. We kind of missed the secluded feeling at Old Key West but understood that the vibes were definitely meant to be different.
4. This is just a minor thing and it really is more of my mother bear coming out but as you are walking up to the sky liner there is a pond quite close to the walkway. There are signs advertising the presence of snakes and alligators but no fence surrounding the pond. I noticed that the other bodies of water on Riviera property are properly surrounded by either fencing or dense shrubbery so as to keep those snakes and alligators in their habitats and away from guests. This pond did not have the fencing or shrubbery. I could very easily see how snakes and alligators could make their way onto the walkway and was surprised that it was setup that way, especially since there was a larger body of water on the other side of the pathway that those animals may want to make their way to.
5. There were only two banks of elevators in the entire resort. One for each "wing" or "tower" whichever you want to call it. It made for some lengthy walks to/from the elevator. Making it more difficult was the fact that, due to social distancing, only one party was allowed on the elevator at a time so you often times had to wait awhile.

 

[Tink0812]

We have finally arrived at our first park day, Sunday December 6th. This was our first Magic Kingdom day. We almost chose not to do a park on this day because we have heard how horrible the weekend crowds have been. I'm glad we kept it! It wasn't any more crowded than any other day.

Park hours were 8:00am-8:00pm. Our alarms went off bright (dark?) and early at 5:30am. My dad took his shower and got ready then we got everyone else up. While my mom and DD ate breakfast, I took my shower and got ready for our first park day. All of the pastries we got from Primo Piatto the previous night were absolutely delicious and made for a very easy breakfast. Once everyone was ready, we left the room right at 6:30am. There were a handful of people already at the bus stop when we arrived. The first bus to MK arrived at 6:50am. They had advertised that the buses were going to start running one hour prior to park opening so this bus was a little early. DD and I did not having matching outfits for every day but I at least tried to dress us along the same theme so that if we got separated at any point, it would be easy for me to describe her. Today we had matching outfits of black shorts, black cardigans, and pink t-shirts. My t-shirt said "Happiest Mother on Earth" and hers said "Happiest Daughter on Earth". They had all sorts of Disney characters and icons on them. A great Etsy find!

We were greeted with quite the long line for temperature checks when we got off of the bus at MK. It moved pretty quickly once it got started though. They started letting people through the temperature checks around 7:10am. We were through security by 7:15am. I will say that I like the newer way of doing security. It is definitely faster although who knows how that affects accuracy. By the time we made it through security, the ropes had dropped, and we headed straight to 7 Dwarfs Mine Train. DD was able to use her MagicBand without any assistance this year. It definitely helped that they are no longer using the fingerprint part of it.




Not without a few sunrise pictures of the big Christmas tree and the castle first!



They actually started running the 7 Dwarfs Mine Train at 7:30am even though the park wasn’t scheduled to open until 8am. Later in the week we had spoken with a cast member who said that they look at the park reservation numbers for each day and if the numbers are high, they drop the ropes early and do start running a few select rides early to help with the crowds. We went to MK three different times this week and found that opening happened differently each day. The rides that were selected to be opened early were different each time as well, but 7 Dwarfs Mine Train was always one of them.

We made it through the line for 7 Dwarfs quickly. This was the first time that DD was tall enough to ride and she really enjoyed it. For her first roller coaster, she did pretty well. She had a death grip on my arm the whole time. She never did want to do it again while we were there but still says that she liked it. After 7 Dwarfs we were able to ride Peter Pan and Dumbo. We walked straight on to both of them and had them done before the scheduled park opening of 8am.




From there we did Barnstormer, Under the Sea with the Little Mermaid, Winnie the Pooh, and the Carousel. Barnstormer was the only new one for DD and she did not like it. She said she felt like she was going to fall out the entire time and she didn’t like the way it jerked her around. I was glad that it was a short ride because I didn’t really care for it either. I know that I had done it several times when I was much younger but didn’t remember it being that jerky.


We moved on out of Fantasyland and into Tomorrowland where DD drove my dad in the Indy Cars at Tomorrowland Motor Speedway. This was her first time experiencing this attraction and she loved it. She just thought it was the coolest thing that she was able to drive a car. She couldn’t reach the gas pedal so my dad had to do that part for her but that was probably for the better. While they were doing that my mom and I were getting a little shopping done. Then we all went over to Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin. This is a family favorite, and we love a little competition. DD was actually able to participate this time and racked up way more points than I thought she would. Although she has ridden it on each of her previous three trips, she was just never tall enough to be able to operate the gun and see the targets. Coming off of the ride we ran into Buzz Lightyear himself. He was out waving to guests on the stage across Tomorrowland by Space Mountain.

Feeling pretty accomplished with all that we had done already, we decided it was time for a snack break. My parents shared a soda and some popcorn while DD had churros and I enjoyed a pretzel with cheese. My dad bought a popcorn bucket that he never used again. With bellies full we set off to Adventureland to ride Pirates of the Caribbean. The line was ridiculous, so we took a peek at the actual wait time on the app. It was up to an hour, so we decided to skip it for now and try again later. Splash Mountain only had a 10-minute wait, so we headed there next. This was a first for DD. She enjoyed the ride itself but wasn’t a big fan of the large drop. I’m glad they had the splash turned down due to the cooler weather because I think DD would have hated the entire ride if it wasn’t. This really surprised me because she loves swimming, splash pads, and pretty much anything involving water and getting wet.

Let's stop there for now! Stay tuned for the rest of our day at Magic Kingdom!

 

[JAMIESMITH]

I haven't paid a lot of attention to Riviera Resort (our last trip was in 2016), but you've gotten my attention. It looks like a really great option!

 

[Tigger's ally]

I haven't paid a lot of attention to Riviera Resort (our last trip was in 2016), but you've gotten my attention. It looks like a really great option!

I know there are a lot of people that don't like the smallish lobby, but the way the resort is laid out, once you get your room it spreads everyone out which I like in a vacation club resort. The food is either up on top floor with Topplino's or down on floor one with PP and Bar Riva. The rooms though are where it shines. Love the artwork and it is almost like they took the best things in all the resorts and incorporated them in the Riv with the two murphy beds, the nice kitchen area and a wonderful split bathroom (Yes indeed, that soaker tub is a jet tub!). I will still say OKW is my favorite as I just like the vibe (laid back, golf, jimmy buffett, river ride to springs) but this won't be our last stay at the Riv either. I will always remember getting up every morning and seeing my little grandtinker still asleep with Mickey! You can even see the sun coming up and she is still out!

 

[Tink0812]

I know there are a lot of people that don't like the smallish lobby, but the way the resort is laid out, once you get your room it spreads everyone out which I like in a vacation club resort. The food is either up on top floor with Topplino's or down on floor one with PP and Bar Riva. The rooms though are where it shines. Love the artwork and it is almost like they took the best things in all the resorts and incorporated them in the Riv with the two murphy beds, the nice kitchen area and a wonderful split bathroom (Yes indeed, that soaker tub is a jet tub!). I will still say OKW is my favorite as I just like the vibe (laid back, golf, jimmy buffett, river ride to springs) but this won't be our last stay at the Riv either. I will always remember getting up every morning and seeing my little grandtinker still asleep with Mickey! You can even see the sun coming up and she is still out!

View attachment 545311

She really did love that bed! I forgot to mention above that it has it's own little light too (you can see the switch on the right hand side of the picture) which she thought was the coolest thing.

 

[Tink0812]

So, what did we think of Riviera? As you can probably tell by some of my descriptors used in my room tour, we really enjoyed it! Below is a breakdown of our likes and dislikes.......of course the likes far outweighed the dislikes!
View attachment 544982

Things we liked about Riviera
1. The resort and grounds were beautiful.
2. Even though it had been open for a year, it still seemed brand new.
3. DD really enjoyed the splash pad. She probably enjoyed it more than she enjoyed the one at Art of Animation on our last trip. That is saying a lot!
4. Great dining options! We really enjoyed Primo Piatto and Topolino's as well as the coffee shop.
5. The one-bedroom villa here felt larger than the one at Old Key West. Square footage-wise there isn't much of a difference, Riviera just makes better use of the space.
6. Easy access to the Skyliner. We used it more than we had really planned on using it.
7. This may go along with my first point, but the artwork here is stunning. My favorite pieces were the mosaics in the area leading to the sky liner.
8. Bar Riva was beautiful, had a great selection, and was both open-aired but also had heaters for when the temps dropped.
9. The soundproofing has to be top of the line. We knew the resort was fairly full and we knew we had neighbors on both sides of us but we never heard anyone when we were in our villa.
10. Bus service as great for the most part. My parents experienced one difficulty that I will discuss later on in the trip report. This was an obvious anomaly.
11. Bell Services is at the top of their game. When I called to have our luggage brought up, they were there in less than 10 minutes. They also transferred our luggage to other resorts without error.
12. The staff was always friendly and had smiles on their faces. I know this is common amongst all resorts on Disney property but I notice it more at the DVC resorts.
13. The split bathroom was great when everyone needed to get ready at once.
14. DD really enjoyed the deep, jetted bathtub.
15. The rainfall shower head was amazing. The other shower head was good too.
16. The multiple murphy beds made the one-bedroom villa a perfect fit for our family. It's always a plus when I don't have to share a bed with my DD. She tosses and turns a lot and always ends up on top of me.
17. We will always love having a full kitchen, even if we never cook on vacation. It's just nice to have the full-sized refrigerator and have the option to cook or reheat things if we want.
18. The little alcove that lead to the neighboring unit was a great place to store the stroller without having to fold it up.
19. Storage in our villa was far from lacking
20. Our "standard view" was definitely NOT standard! It was more than that!
21. The lobby, although small, was beautiful and welcoming.
22. We enjoyed having a washer and dryer in our unit. This is one of the main reasons we enjoy the DVC resorts. This trip we had each brought just a couple pairs of pants and it ended up being cooler than predicted so it was nice to be able to do laundry. It was also helpful to wash our masks. Even though housekeeping would gladly bring us additional towels, it was nice to have the ability to wash our own when needed
23. The resort did a great job of promoting social distancing and enforcing the mask policy.
24. Our room was ready by the 4pm check in time.
25. The elevators, although lacking in number, were quite speedy.
26. Bus stops were close to the building and well sheltered from the elements.


View attachment 544983

Things we disliked about Riviera
1. The gift shop was much smaller than what we were used to even for a DVC resort
2. Being that the gift shop was much smaller, it had a smaller selection of food/drinks. We had previously ordered groceries in advance through Garden Grocer but being that we weren't staying in this resort for the entire week and that you now have to be available to meet the delivery person yourself, Garden Grocer just wasn't going to work for us on this trip. Instead, we were hoping that the gift shop at Riviera would have the large selection of grocery items that the gift shop at Old Key West had. Unfortunately it did not. We were able to get a few things but had to compromise on a couple of things.
3. One of the things we enjoy about Old Key West is that the villas are split up into different buildings and even different neighborhoods. This gives you a greater sense of peace and seclusion. Riviera has all of the villas in the same building, very similar to a large hotel. We kind of missed the secluded feeling at Old Key West but understood that the vibes were definitely meant to be different.
4. This is just a minor thing and it really is more of my mother bear coming out but as you are walking up to the sky liner there is a pond quite close to the walkway. There are signs advertising the presence of snakes and alligators but no fence surrounding the pond. I noticed that the other bodies of water on Riviera property are properly surrounded by either fencing or dense shrubbery so as to keep those snakes and alligators in their habitats and away from guests. This pond did not have the fencing or shrubbery. I could very easily see how snakes and alligators could make their way onto the walkway and was surprised that it was setup that way, especially since there was a larger body of water on the other side of the pathway that those animals may want to make their way to.
5. There were only two banks of elevators in the entire resort. One for each "wing" or "tower" whichever you want to call it. It made for some lengthy walks to/from the elevator. Making it more difficult was the fact that, due to social distancing, only one party was allowed on the elevator at a time so you often times had to wait awhile.

I can't believe that I forgot to mention my absolute favorite part about this resort!!! I was saving it for the last item in the "likes" category and then totally forgot about it. THE LIGHTS! Look up, each and every light fixture throughout this entire resort is absolutely beautiful. I especially liked the ones in our room! Gorgeous and just my style!

 

[Tink0812]

Let's keep on rolling! We left off after just finishing Splash Mountain on Sunday December 6th.

From Splash we decided to go check out the show times for the Country Bear Jamboree. There was only 2 minutes until the next show, so we jumped in line. As always, it was a good time. They did a great job promoting social distancing in the theatre which also helped DD to be able to see the entire show without having to look over or around other people. When we came out of Country Bears, Chip and Dale were out waving at guests. I tried to take a picture but we were in a large crowd of people and had to keep moving so it didn't turn out well. We also got to experience our first cavalcade, the Toy Soldiers marching with the band. Since we were close by, we did the Magic Carpets of Aladdin next. My parents sat this one out. Then we made the trek back to Fantasyland to do It’s a Small World which was a 30-minute wait at that time. We only actually waited about 20 minutes.

By the time we got off of It’s a Small World, it was time to walk up to main street for our lunch reservation watching a few of the character cavalcades along the way. While the times of the cavalcades are not published and seem to be random, we figured out that they do them all back-to-back. There is only about 5-10 minutes between each one and they typically do 3-4 each time. I videoed the cavalcades while my mom took pictures. This time around we saw Santa Claus and some of the princesses.



Lunch was at 12:50pm at The Plaza. This is on of our go-to restaurants. While the menu is drastically reduced, we were all still able to find something that we really enjoyed. My mom had the meatloaf with mashed potatoes and green beans. She had a red sangria to drink. My dad had the club sandwich with fries and a beer. DD had the PB & J, fries, and cookies with milk. I had the cheesesteak with fries and a water. It was delicious as usual.

After lunch we decided that we were ready for a break. We had intended on stopping in some of the shops on our way out of the park, but the lines were obnoxious, so we decided to wait until another day. Pulling into Riviera we noticed a very special bus out in front of the resort. A couple days before our trip, Disney had announced that characters were going to start appearing at the resorts. We were surprised to see Goofy and Pluto hanging out on the verandahs. They were waving and posing for pictures!



Waving to Goofy and Pluto complete, we returned to our room to get ready for more time at the Splash Pad. The grown ups enjoyed some drinks from Bar Riva while watching DD run around the splash pad. I actually think she liked this splash pad better than the one at Art of Animation. We made sure to leave in plenty of time for everyone to get showered and dolled up for dinner.

Dinner was at 8:10pm at Topolino’s Terrace in the Riviera. My dad actually went up there about an hour early for drinks and to enjoy the view from the terrace while us girls got ready. It was a chilly night, but we all went out on the terrace to take in the view for a few minutes. The pictures really don't do it justice! This resort is just so beautiful at night.




For dinner, my mom and I both had the filet which came with truffled mashed potatoes and mushroom puree. It was amazing. It definitely rivals the steak at the Boathouse. My dad had the Tomahawk veal chop served with potato-torpedo onion gratin and lemon-veal jus. DD had a grilled chicken breast with fries and vanilla gelato. We were so stuffed after dinner that we were glad we were just a short elevator ride away from our room. It didn’t take long before everyone was snoozing.

 

[Tink0812]

For all going to the riv, that Banana bread is the deal of the century. Under $4 and I cut it into six small pieces an all three of us had 2 every morning. So fresh! After I got one on the first day, I kept placing a mobile order and going down to get it every night before bed. Worked great. Girls had a blueberry muffin too that I got a taste of and it was very good as well.

Oh, and I am Tink's dad and that little tink is my grandtinker!. Been on here for quite awhile so we all have probably crossed paths!

I found our picture of the delicious (and cute) banana bread! This is two loaves.