Category: Travel – WDW 06

Working on getting the photos from Katherine’s karate tourney up at our site reminded me how woefully behind I am on getting pictures posted — the previous upload was for KOA last summer, and those were the only 2006 pics I’d posted (aside from frequent phone pics here).

I did, just because it caught my eye, go through our Walt Disney World photos from last May and got them cleaned up and posted. I really should do the rest … in my copious free time …

A summary of our experience, with observations, using Disney’s Magical Express service.

The idea of the service is twofold. For people coming to Walt Disney World, it’s meant to be a tremendous time-saver and convenience. For Disney, it’s meant to encourage people to stay at the park and to stay at the park. Overall, it seems to be successful in both goals.

The way it works is this. You contact the DME office when you’re making your reservations to stay at a Walt Disney World resort, to sign up for the DME service (which is, at this point, free). You let them know what flight you’re going to be on, and where you’ll be staying. Well ahead of your flight (you have to have done this within 30 days of your trip), you get a package through the mail, explaining the whole thing, and some bright-colored luggage tags for your checked luggage (they send many more tags than you’ll need).

When you check your bags at your departure airport to Orlando, you make sure the checked bags have the tags on them. When they arrive at MCO (Orlando), they get whisked off by Disney package gnomes, shipped to your resort, and taken to your room, usually within a few hours of your having checked in. Meantime, you’ve taken a special Disney bus to your resort, checked in, and are all relaxed, not having had to hoist your bags from baggage claim, lugged them to a rental car pickup or shuttle service, etc.

On the way back, it’s even slicker. If you are flying with one of several large carriers out of MCO, you can check in your baggage and get your boarding pass at the resort, You get a time when a bus is leaving for the airport, and that’s your ride back. In the meantime, you can check your carry-on in at the luggage service for your resort and spend the rest of the day (until your bus trip) doing whatever your want, even after checkout.

Even if you’re not on the list of carriers, you can still check your bags to go back to MCO on the bus, and simply pick them up on the other end.

And here’s how it worked for us:

1. Though they say the packages will come “several weeks” before the trip, ours were more like 2-3 weeks.
2. Checked in with our bags at DIA with the yellow DME stickers on them without any problem.

3. On arrival at MCO, walked down to the baggage claim area as instructed. A very friendly lady directed us to the DME area, which was over a dozen carousels and down a level.

   On getting downstairs, we checked in at a counter, confirmed the bags we had checked, when we were leaving, where we were going, etc., and were given our bus passes. We were then directed over to a queue area where folks lined up for each resort. There were busses outside loading all the time, and clearly they were trying to group folks onto them most efficiently. We waited about 15 minutes here.

   (Note: My folks and Jim & Ginger, who arrived later in the evening, and on a delayed flight, found this step a bit more problematic. The waits were longer, for one thing, and it seemed a bit more confused.)

4. We were escorted to a nice bus and were on our way. It took about 40-odd minutes to get to the park, along which route we were regaled by a Disney video about DME, about the parks, about etc. This kept us entertained on an otherwise not-terribly-interesting or attractive ride from MCO to WDW.

5. We hopped off the bus, went in, and registered. We went up to our rooms and relaxed a bit. We did have our critical stuff on carry-on, including some swim suits, which we made use of to go swimming.

   When we got back to the room, our bags had automagically appeared, and we got them unpacked and were all set.

   (Note: Getting in later, the ‘rents faced a bit more awkwardness with this stage. Even after registering and going to the local Yahoo Bob show, etc., the bags had not appeared in the room. They called the luggage service, where a gent said they had not arrived yet. When they escalated up to find out what was going on, the manager determined that they had, indeed, arrived, and they were bellhopped up to the rooms forthwith.)

6. Even though my folks and us were on different flights, an hour apart, we wanted to go back on the same bus. We called the main DME number and arranged it, though they did it by sort of spoofing the bus reservation system as to which flight back the ‘rents were on, which is flexible but troublesome.

7. About mid-week, we started getting calls in the late evening from the local DME folks saying that they didn’t have hour return flight info, and we needed to contact them at this toll-free number to provide it to them. And, since it was late by the time we were getting back to the hotel, we’d have to call the DME mothership in the morning, and we’d do so, and, yes, they had our info, no problem, we’re set.

   Ultimately, it seems United having changed flight numbers was probably what was doing it. Our flight number changed, so the at-resort DME folks (who have a live setup) couldn’t find the number we’d given them, but the mothership DME folks (who had the computer records) could see we’d given them a number.

   Didn’t cause any real problems, just annoyance.

8. The day before we were to leave, we received an envelope that should have had confirmation of our flights and our scheduled departure time. Instead, it told us that we still didn’t have a confirmed flight time, etc. Margie called again, and confirmed that we did, and that we were scheduled for the 3 p.m. bus.

9. When all rolled around on check-out day, we had our check luggage and our carry-on luggage. The latter we checked in with luggage service at the resort to be picked up when we returned from a morning park visit. The former we took with us to a ticket counter at the Port Orleans (where we were staying) lobby, and checked in much the same as if we’d been at the airport. They took our bags (baggage tagged and noted with the time of our flight so that they could have it shipped there on the right truck), and gave us bording passes, and we were set.

10. We were back to the lobby of the hotel by 2:20 p.m. or so, and hung out, drank some sodas, did last-second shopping. A bit before 3, a Disney Cruise Lines bus pulled up at the end of the port cocher, where the “Disney’s Magical Express” sandwich sign was. We assumed the Disney Cruises was sharing the same bus loading zone as the Disney’s Magical Express (just as they have desks right next to each other in the registration area; the “land/sea cruise” thing is very popular). A DME bus pulled up behind it for a few minutes, but didn’t open its doors, then moved on.

    Around 3, Margie went out and checked — and found out that the DC bus was serving as the DME bus, and there was a sign to that effect — at the front of the bus, which wasn’t visible from the lobby. Swell.

    We hustled out, checked in our carry-on baggage to be stowed below, and hopped on the bus.

11. Watched another “you don’t have to let the magic end now” video on the way back, which was diverting, even if I am not planning on another Disney vacation in the near future (let alone a Disney Vacation Club timeshare kinda thing). We got let out at MCO just under two hours before our flight — which, since we didn’t need to check in anything or even get boarding passes, was quite nice.

12. Bags were waiting for us at the carousel in Denver. Easy peasy.

Overall? I’d highly recommend the service. There are a few hiccups — but remember all the balls they’re juggling in the air: airlines, bus lines, shipping folks, ticketing folks, loca/resortl DME people, central headquarters DME people. There are a lot of places for sand to slip into the gears, especially since not everyone involved is actually Disney. For most people, in most situations, it will work quite nicely.

If, however, you have a travel profile that doesn’t fit into the norm, you might need to monitor the situation more carefully. For example, when we were checking in to leave, we were right behind a woman whose husband was traveling on from there, on a DME-agreeement airline for an international business trip to Singapore, whereas she was flying back home on a non-DME airline. Common sense would have had her reading the FAQ carefully, calling and checking in with the DME people every few days, double-checking to be sure she, and they, understood what needed to happen, and overall taking a bit of responsibility to avoid being surprised. Instead, she just sort of assumed that something designed to automagically accomodate 90% of the people would work without intervention for something a few sigmas away from norm. Caveat traveller.

For a nice premium, you can have an Animal Kingdom Lodge room that backs up on a private savannah, with critters like this eland (and zebras, giraffes, wildebeasts, etc.). Very cool.

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Light fixtures at the Animal Kingdom Lodge.

UPDATE: The picture, alas, doesn’t do credit to the particular accent. The whole building is beautiful inside, highly sculpted, almost organic.

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Dolphin Hotel, WDW.

UPDATE: No, it’s not really a waterslide. Just bigger-than-life decorator accents. The Swan and Dolphin hotels were built by Disney, then sold to a third party; they are hotel/convention centers in the, and have an odd, quasi-official status with the rest of WDW.

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At the Living Seas, Epcot.

UPDATE: The face painting design was called Flower Mask. Katherine got a fun little butterfly finger puppet for helping assemble a puzzle at the Living Seas pavillion. The pavillion itself has been heavily Nemo themed. ‘Nuff said.

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If it’s Tuesday, it must be Epcot day!

1. While in past years, we’ve done Princess Breakfasts — which have usually been hectic, as it’s tough to get to the park before it really opens and sprint across Future World to get to Norway where these shindigs are held.

   So this year we ended up at a Princess Luncheon … which, due to latish start and all, and with an 11:25 a.m. start time, meant that we … well, didn’t sprint, but definitely moseyed quickly across Future World to get to Norway …

   Well. Actually. We got there about 15 minutes early. At which point I remembered, “Hey, I was going to FastPass Soarin’ on the way in.”

   “You’ve got 15 minutes, Dave,” Margie quips.

   So I did sprint over to the Future World, found a map, sprinted to the Land Pavillion, found the ride, ran seven tickets through for FPs, and sprinted back, arriving back in Norway to find everyone seated, and spent the next 15 minutes mopping the sweat off of my face.

   I don’t know how it is that athletics is so big in the South. I really don’t.

   The breakfast was yummy — the Akershus restaurant in Norway is quite nice — and we were right by the Cast door, so Kitten got first crack at all the princesses as they paraded out.

   Ariel had been in a grotto (albeit in her “I got legs and, hey, they don’t feel like I’m walking on razor blades like in the Hans Christian Andersen stories!” outfit) on the way in, so they could take and offer Official Expensive Pictures.

   The first one out the door was — Aurora! Kitten’s favorite.

   Next we got Alice (who, I fear, is not a Princess no matter how you slice it).

   Belle came after, and subsequent to the standard autograph-signing and Kitten pix, I got a photo of myself next to her. She’s my fave.

   We then got Jasmine, who was quite the looker, as usual.

   And then … um … was there another one? No Cinderella, Mulan, Pocohontes, Snow White, nor Mary Poppins … I guess that was it.

   Kitten had fun.

2. We did the obilgatory ride on Maelstrom in Norway. And then the Madness started. Epcot’s World Showcase has stations at each country where you can pick up and color a paper mask that gets a decoration tacked to it at each country (a teddy bear in German, a kite in Japan, etc.). Katherine started this in Norway, and … well, we’ve never done one of those sorts of activities to completion before, but now it became an obsession, the centerpiece of our visit, the sine qua non …

   So when we then proceeded to China, I let the ‘rents and Margie go into the Circle 360 movie there, while we went and did the mask update. Kitten added a new color at each country to the mask, and did a very nice job of it. (Her coloring skills have gotten significantly better in the last few months.)

   Then on to Germany, then Italy, then the US, then Japan, then Morocco, each stop wandering briefly through the shops but mostly tracking down the “Kidcot” station.

3. By the time Morocco had come and gone, it was getting close to our FP time for Soarin’. So we took the boat across the lake.

   Note to visitors: avoid the boats unless you are dog tired, have lots of time, or can see it approaching your spot. The boats run about every 20 minutes, and, frankly, you can walk the third of the lake they chord across in that time or less, and feel like you’re doing something.

   Wandered over to the Land, flashed our FastPasses, cut through the majority of the line, and …

   Soarin’ is a copy of the same ride as in Anaheim’s Disney California Adventure. I hadn’t been on that, though. It’s set up (too complicated to go into how) as though you’re on a large hang glider, flying over a series of California tableaus.

   It is beautiful. It is fun. And it has reestablished to me that Flight is the best super-power one could possibly have.

   Great ride.

   The sole regret was that Ginger wasn’t with us; she was back at the lodge, under the weather. It’s one of her favorite rides.

4. I sprinted off across Future World to see if I could FP Test Track. No such luck — all sold out, and a longish line. So I grabbed FPs to Mission Space (which we ended up not using, nobody but me having any interest in the thing). Then we aite ice cream.

5. From there, we headed back to the World Showcase, to continue our mad pursuit of mask decorations. We’d learned there was a “special treat” for kids who got all eleven of them, so we (well, I) vowed to redouble our effort. First Canada (which is, I think, the most beautiful of the World Showcase areas, and where Ginger rejoined us), then the United Kingdom (where Margie embarrassed me with Mary Poppins), then France (where most of us then sipped Kir Royales, and Katherine got an unexpected photo op with Aurora).

6. We had late (8:30) dinner reservations in Italy, at Alfredo’s, which was going to overlap the fireworks show at 9:00, alas. Margie and Jim headed over there to see if they could get earlier reservations, while we circled the lake the opposite direction in pursuit of the final mask decoration.

   Epcot was having its big flower and garden event, and I wanted to stop by some stores at the the top of the World Showcase to see if they had any interesting swag. No such luck, but Kitten had a very nice birthday experience.

7. At last! The last stop! Mexico!

   And Katherine got her last mask decoration, and got … a kind of cheesy mini-poster of various Disney characters. Big whoop.

   But everyone had much fun with the “take a digital picture and sent an e-postcard to a friend” kiosk, so we made do.

8. With both Jim and Margie on the case, I expected that not only would be get dinner immediately, but they’d whisk us all over on a helicopter and roll out the red carpet. Or maybe let us ride Segways there …

   … well, not quite. But they did discover that “reservations” at the World Showcase restaurants means you have priority seating — when you show up, no matter what time you asked for, you are put on the wait list for the next tables (vs. the long line of schmucks on “stand-by”).

   So we did wander over to Italy, and get seated at the Alfredo restaurant in about ten minutes, which was great.

   This Alfredo’s restaurant is an extension of the original Alfredo’s in Rome which, well, is where the whole “Fettucine Alfredo” thang came from. Which is what I had, even though the veal stew also looked to die for.

   The food was faboo, the service professional and competent, the ambience — well, one of the disadvantages of eating at Disney is that there are lots of kids. Often tired kids. Often tired kids with parents who don’t give a rat’s ass about whether Junior’s screams, grunts, and other shrill vocalizations (which are the only way Junior can get anyone’s attention, or even a chuckle) are bothering anyone else.

   After a full dinner, we didn’t have room for dessert, but Kitten wanted something, and she’d been behaving, so we ordered some yummies. And then the staff brought out a chocolate birthday mousse for Kitten … and we just had to eat that, stuffed or not …

   See, when Margie had been making her final reservations, she’s spoken to a very nice lady who’d made a note on all the various events that it was Katherine’s birthday. So the restaurant knew, and Katherine also returned home early in the trip to find an autographed picture of Princess Aurora (with birthday wishes and a balloon) waiting in our hotel room. Fun.

9. It was getting darkish as we exited, so we wanted back over to the top of the World Showcase (and so quickest to the exits) to wait for the firework show, IllumiNations. We actually got quite nice seating standing.

   It was a very nice show (despite the nattering/wrestling British parents and kids behind us), Interestingly, though thought of as a fireworks show, fireworks is a small part of it. There’s laser lights, a big video globe, a huge flame generator in the middle of the lake, water fountains — a whole multi-media thing, most of which keeps the cost way down for Disney (though I’m sure it’s not cheap).

10. When the show was over, we hot-tailed it back to the bus depot. We were amazed to find the line for our bus not only filled the queue area, but extended again as long behind it. And no other queue we could see was that long. Yikes. Obviously a bus routing problem.

    The traffic control gremlins fixed that, though, assigning several extra busses to our line, so that we actually got out of there in 15-20 minutes, and were back to the hotel, Kitten in my arms, for a good night.

Actually posted on 6 June, but backdated to the day it happened.

Waiting for fireworks …

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