DaveInTN’s Off-Site, Off-Topic, Off His Rocker Trip Report - Oct 2010

[mouseketab.....Carol 1,261]

INC started at the Lake Guntersville, AL gathering in July of 2010. There was one person there that kept calling Christy, "Cindy", so from then on, she became It's Not Cindy, or INC!!

[DaveInTN 3,247]

INC started at the Lake Guntersville, AL gathering in July of 2010. There was one person there that kept calling Christy, "Cindy", so from then on, she became It's Not Cindy, or INC!!

 

Frank's exact words were "I don't remember your name....but I know it's not Cindy."  

[GaDawgFan.....Kelly 799]

That's funny.

[DaveInTN 3,247]

I've been going for years and never knew about the calliope...  Never walked through the ranch due to my allergies  :banghead:

 

Well don't bother looking for it in there now.....it has been removed from the barn.  The good news is that it has been used for special occasions in the MK.  

 

I'm in David! Nobody rocks Page 4 of a 3year old TR like me. "I don't feel tardy!"

 

Page 4 works for you.  It really does.

 

Sorry, I meant I never knew it stood for It's Not Cindy.

I was assuming referring to Cinderella? If not, explain. :)

When you drive 4 hours to go to Ikea, come see us! If it's warm, we'll take y'all on a boat ride. There are some pretty campgrounds on Lanier!

 

Would love to come see you....but this guy doesn't do boats.  I do love camping near the water though!

 

This TR is even better the second time around!

 

Thanks for reading twice!

[DaveInTN 3,247]

Wednesday, October 20th (cont)

 

We left off in the last post with the blacksmith shop. From there, we wandered over to Pioneer Hall. 

 

I love this open space.

 

 

 

And then down to the marina to catch the boat to the MK.

 

 

The MK boat that came was one of the small ones. And there happened to be two boats running the Contemporary/WL route that converged upon the Fort at the same time. I don’t think I’ve ever seen 3 of these boats this close to each other before. 

 

 

The standard, required shot which will soon be no more.

 

 

The Discovery Island shipwreck (Hispanola or whatever it is called  ) is REALLY disappearing quickly. 

 

 

 

 

Check out the mast. Surprised it hasn’t completely fallen to the ground yet. 

 

 

The view always makes me hungry for a BLT.   :rofl3:

 

 

We arrived back at the MK, and hopped the train to Frontierland to get BTMRR FP’s again. Here’s a shot of Splash Mountain from the train.

 

 

We rode Pirates.

 

 

And then headed to Tony’s Town Square for our dinner ADR. We checked in, and waited only about 5 minutes before they took us to our table. And it was a great table, overlooking Main Street!

 

 

 

 

 

The waiter brought out bread with dipping oil.

 

 

I ordered the Seafood Fra Diavalo

 

 

It’s Not Cindy had Spinach Gnocchi

 

 

The kids ordered Chicken Parm, Lasagna, and Mickey Ravioli’s. 

 

 

 

 

 

Overall, we were pretty pleased with our dinners. Like most of our TS meals, we were able to use the Tables in Wonderland card and save a bundle. It’s amazing how much we’ve saved with that card over the past year. Like I tell DW, they practically pay US to eat there! 

 

After dinner, we used our BTMRR FP’s to ride in the dark. LOVE that ride at night! We also were able to ride SM while the MSEP was going on (which we had seen on Monday). 

 

 

They think they are funny. And I was just scared again.

 

 

 

We then got a nice position for Wishes along the bridge in front of Tomorrowland Terrace. We were directly beneath the wire, and Tink flew that night! What a view we had of her. It was just magical, and the fireworks were amazing as always. I left the camera in my pocket and just enjoyed the show. 

 

And that was it. 

 

Coming up…we return to F&W 

[h2odivers...Ray 952]

Caught up and to much to comment on.

Loving the TR.

It looks like it was G#%n's B-Day! Happy birthday!!!

The pix of your 3 DDs on SM is funny!

Great scared look. But why is the gal in front of you sleeping?

[DaveInTN 3,247]

Caught up and to much to comment on.

Loving the TR.

It looks like it was G#%n's B-Day! Happy birthday!!!

The pix of your 3 DDs on SM is funny!

Great scared look. But why is the gal in front of you sleeping?

 

Good points, Ray.  I don't know why she was sleeping.  And yes...it was sort of Gwen's birthday.  It was two days early, but I guess she wore the button early.  More coming up on that! 

[DaveInTN 3,247]

More Food & Wine…and Still an Elusive Biotch!

Thursday, October 21st

On Thursday, we slept in and hung around the house a bit in the morning to rest. I hit the grocery store for some food and drinks for our drive home on Saturday, and then we headed over to Epcot for more F&W.

The first thing we did when we arrived was to ride the golf ball. On our last trip I somehow ended up riding the darn thing with the language set to German, so this time I let my daughter program it for me. It is a much better ride when you can understand it, although I’m not a fan of Judi Dench as narrator. She sounds too much like Christiane Amanpour, who I can’t stand. But still, I wasn’t a fan of Cronkite either. I think the ride would be better narrated by Gary Sinise. I’d believe him. I don’t gain much hope for the future of the human race from Damn Judi Dench. 
:wetpants: 
 

Anyways, afterward we grabbed FP’s for Soarin and then rode Captain EO. Being a child of the 80’s, and having seen it back then, I thought I’d enjoy it. Well, I suppose I enjoyed it a little, just to remember how bad it was. Kind of like how I’m curious to know what waterboarding feels like. I’d like to find out, very very briefly, and then be able to walk away and go about my day. But we were there, so we sat through it. And got a chuckle or two out of it. Like when the queen is supposedly “beautified” and it turns out to be Anjelica Huston. Who thought that was a good idea? She looked better covered in snakes.

Ok, so we were batting a thousand. It was time to do what men do when the going gets tough. They go eat. So off to the WS we went. And here is where my brilliant plan was put into motion. Remember how our first foray into Food & Wine turned into Food & Whine? It was too hard sharing items between all 6 of us. In particular, DD14 and DD13 wanted to try everything…and they have adult appetites. I couldn’t blame them for wanting to try things, but it wasn’t working. So, I get them their own wristband gift card and loaded it with enough money for them to try some things on their own. And we sent them on their way, with plans to meet back at Soarin at our fastpass time.

Brilliant! It was SO much more enjoyable for all parties. My two older girls are extremely responsible, they stuck together, managed their time well, still got to ride Test Track and they enjoyed some delicacies. The rest of us ate our way from Canada to Germany.

Here is a shot of the roses along walkway.



Our first stop was Canada. Having never dined at Le Cellier, I was interested in trying the Canadian Cheddar Cheese Soup. And what better to wash cheese down with than a Moosehead!





Next up was England. Fish and chips and a Bass.  :bellringer: 





DD10 of course had to pose for the standard phonebooth shot.



We then wandered over to France.

 

And then I tried another item I love…the Spicy Tuna Roll from Japan.

We stopped at America to get some “kid” food for DD4 and DD10, and watched a little of the drum and fife corps.

Then we went to Germany so I could get one of these.

Yep, that’s the Nurnberger Sausage in a Pretzel Roll, made famous in a very disturbing photo by TCD some time back. Notice how appetizing it looks just sitting on its plate. It was quite good. And I’m glad I gave it a chance. I had vowed to NEVER try one after seeing TCD’s picture.

We then started to leave the German pavilion, and who should we see??

Yes, you guessed it.

It was none other than…the Octo-Ho herself. My dear Ms. White!   :bugeyes:

Woo hoo! And the line wasn’t even that long. So we headed toward the end of it. And it see her motion to the CM manning the line like this.



She was pleading with the CM to close the line! At least that’s the way it looks to me. Doesn’t it look like she’s saying “pssst! That creep is coming! Close the line! Puh-LEASSSEEE!”

And wouldn’t you know it…but as we approached the end of the line, the CM made the pronouncement I have heard so many times now I could repeat it in my sleep. “I’m sorry, but Snow White is going to be taking a break soon. Please come back later”. GRRRRR!!!!!!   :banghead:   I couldn’t believe it. Clearly, I am done playing this thing on the up and up. I try to play by the rules. I get in line like everyone else, but the deck is stacked against me. Why is she hating on me so?!?

I need a better plan. And I am a patient man. Some day. Some how.

After that public humiliation, I needed to duck inside somewhere and collect my thoughts. So we rode the Maelstrom. And tried on silly Viking hats.



And then it was time to get back to the Land for our Soarin fastpasses. Our girls were waiting there for us when we arrived, and we all rode it together. And then we left the park.

We saw the Tron monorail on our way to the parking lot. That is always cool.



On the way back to the house, we stopped at one of the tacky giftshops along 192. This one was particularly eyecatching…and it didn’t hurt that it was next door to a Dunkin Donuts.



Didn’t buy anything, as it was all crap. But it did inspire us to spend the evening shopping for even higher priced crap….at Downtown Disney.

I can’t go to WDW this time of year without stopping by Earl of Sandwich for the Holiday Sandwich. I love that thing! Turkey, stuffing, gravy, cranberry sauce and mayo. Yum!



Not sure what this is....looks like chicken or tuna salad?

 

 

One of the kids' sandwiches.

 

 

One thing to remember when going to EoS. While they don’t take the Disney discount cards (TiW or AP), they DO give a AAA discount of 15%. Those are real savings!



We walked around DTD for a while, hitting some of the shops, but we didn’t buy anything. Feeling too cheap I guess. But we enjoyed ourselves.

 

At that point, I had a major sweet tooth. Ghirardelli is right there, but the last time we got ice cream there I was very disappointed in the serving sizes for what they charge. The sundae dish looks big, but the glass is about an inch thick so there is only like one scoop in there for $7! So, we got in the car and drove to the Beach Club to hit Beaches and Cream.

We decided not to get a table and get the kitchen sink this time. It was such as nice evening, we got ice cream from the window and grabbed a table outside.

It’s Not Cindy and I each got hot fudge sundaes.



I forget what the kids ordered, but 3 out of 4 of them were very happy. One didn’t care for hers. And when you are raising 4 girls and get a 75% approval rating on anything, you run with it.

And that was it for our day. We ran ourselves through the mill again, and everyone was tired. But no one more so than DD4.



Scary, huh?

Next up…our final day, including Please Don’t Let Them Sing To Me.

 

 

 

 

[DaveInTN 3,247]

Please Don’t Let Them Sing To Me 

 

Friday, October 22nd

 

Our last day. 

 

Those words always kinda stink. 

 

But there was no getting around the fact that, bright and early the next morning, we’d be in the car heading north. 

 

But this wasn’t just ANY final day at Disney. This was DD’s 13th birthday!!!   :jumpforjoy

 

And we had a great final day planned. So let’s get to it. 

 

We had a 9am breakfast ADR at Kona Café…so around 8:00 we headed out the door to the Polynesian. 

 

Our wait was only about 3 or 4 minutes, and we were taken to a great table. 

 

 

 

 

We had a SUPER waiter…wish I could remember his name. 

 

DW and I both ordered the Tonga Toast, and of course coffee.   :yay:

 

 

 

The birthday girl and DD14 both got French toast, and the younger ones got Mickey pancakes. 

 

 

After we were done eating, our waiter came and surprised us with this for DD13.    :bday:

 

 

 

And he did it quietly…like a guy that knows how a 13 year old girl operates. I don’t know about everyone’s kids, but our daughter does NOT like attention. And he didn’t bring everyone over to sing…he just put it in front of her and said “Happy Birthday”. We "whispered" singing Happy Birthday to her, and she devoured her cupcake. It was very cool. 

 

We then hopped the monorail to spend the rest of the morning at the MK. When we arrived, we hopped the train for Frontierland to get BTMRR fastpasses AGAIN.

 

 

 

We then made our way to Fantasyland and rode Small World.   :banghead:

 

 

It had just reopened 2 days earlier from being closed for several wonderful, headache-free weeks. I don’t know if they made many changes to the ride itself (nothing notable to me), but they did completely re-do the wait queue area. They reversed the entrance and exit areas, so that there is more inside area to wait in line. You now cross over the ride and down the ramp to board…where you used to exit that way. Anyways, for anyone interested, here are a couple of pics of the new setup. And if you are one that takes any necessary steps to avoid this ride, you can at least view the pics to determine your nearest escape route. 

 

 

 

 

We then watched Philharmagic, and rode the carousel.

 

 

 

And then made our way back through Frontierland

 

 

 

And rode BTMRR and Splash Mountain. Those were a blast as always. Then we rode Pirates, and headed toward the exit. We again rode the monorail back to the Poly. 

 

 

 

 

Back at the Poly, we tried on funny hats.

 

 

And then we headed “home” to rest for our birthday evening….which is coming up in the FINAL installment of this report. 

 

 

[DaveInTN 3,247]

Finale 

 

Friday, October 22nd (cont)

 

Around mid-afternoon, we drove to Epcot for dinner. I had made a reservation at Via Napoli, the relatively new pizza place at the Italy pavilion, for DD’s birthday dinner.   :jumpforjoy

 

This is a really beautiful restaurant! 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

We got a nice table near the window, and ordered our starters…the Arancini - Fried saffron risotto balls filled with mozzarella and meat ragu. 

 

 

These were good…but to be honest didn’t blow me away. They had a nice flavor, but it was a much milder flavor than I expected. 

 

We also ordered a house salad. This was nice.

 

 

And DW enjoyed some sort of peach-wine drink. She said it was good.

 

 

For dinner, we got two pizzas. We ordered the ½ meter pepperoni pizza.

 

 

And we also ordered an individual sized Pizza Margherita. 

 

 

Both pizzas were EXCELLENT.  The individual pizza was enough to feed 2 people, and the margherita was very nice. The pepperoni pizza was ridiculously good. Nice spicy pepperoni, and a very thin and delicious crust out of the wood fired ovens. And the ½ meter size is huge!

 

DD4 really enjoyed the pizza.

 

 

 

 

We will definitely come here again. 

 

But after our dinner was finished, we had an “issue”.   :bugeyes:

 

We noticed our waitress approaching, accompanied by 2 of her colleagues. And they were carrying this.

 

 

Now, I had noted on the reservation that this was DD’s birthday. But we didn’t order a special cake or anything (at least not from Via Napoli…stay tuned). And we of course didn’t ask for them to sing. But here they came! 

 

They sang what I can only assume was Happy Birthday in Italian. It was pretty cool if you ask me. But DD was mortified! She survived though, and although she’d never admit it, I bet she enjoyed it somewhat. I mean, from what I was told, one of the guys singing was quite the dish. Something about smouldering eyes? Whatever. But in any case, it happened, and I thought it was great. 

 

So, we left Via Napoli and headed toward the International Gateway. The plan was now to walk to the Boardwalk…and specifically, our destination was the Boardwalk Bakery. 

 

On the way, we passed that freaky cat that always hangs out near France. She looked lonely, so we stopped to say hello.

 

 

I swear that cat always smells like cigarettes and kitty litter. 

 

And then we walked to the Boardwalk. We did a bit of shopping, and then found a table near the water. I went into the bakery to get what I had ordered several days before…a Mickey Cake!

 

 

 

 

The cake was a white cake, with chocolate genache and a white chocolate Mickey face. The genache was good, and the cake looked just like I wanted. Overall though, I thought the cake itself was quite dry. Not as good as I had hoped…although DD loved it. And that’s the most important thing. We’ve never been away from home for one of our kids’ birthdays before, so we wanted to do a special cake. This fit the bill.   :toot:

 

And after that, we walked all the way back through Epcot to the car and drove back to the house to finish packing and preparing for our morning departure. We hit the road the next morning around 6:15, and had an uneventful journey home. We hit It’s Not Cindy’s parent’s house for dinner at 4:30 CT…and were home safely about 15 minutes after finishing our dinner with them. 

 

An uneventful drive doesn’t make for good trip report material…but it’s exactly how I wanted it to go and I thank God for it.   :angel2-smiley:

 

And that’s that…our unplanned, last minute, off-site non-Fort trip. It’ll be a while before we can return to the Fort…so this trip will hopefully hold us over until that time. 

 

I’d like to leave you all back precisely where this trip report began.  

 

 

 

And why have I posted this again? 

 

Because that picture embodies what this is all about. 

 

Musket Mickey.  And the Fort Fiends. 

 

Sure, my family and I hit all the parks, including the 5th theme park, we ate so much we could have fueled our van all the way on bottled Ohhhh-HANA, we had a great time with each other and we made memories that we will all cherish forever. But what moment on the trip ranks right up there for me? Our visit with Debbie and Donnie…two wonderful Fiends that I am blessed to call friends. And we got together on the best porch in all of America. Yeah, Disney is great, but I can’t see myself wanting to return year after year to stay at some hotel and do parks from morning to night. After now staying off-site, away from the Fort, I really do feel we have something different. We are so lucky to have the Fort, but more importantly, we are blessed to have each other. 

 

Long live the Fort Fiends, and long live Musket Mickey! 

 

 

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

Thanks for re-posting this report!

 

It was even better the second time around.

 

And, it serves as a good reminder about how fast time flies, and why we should enjoy as much time with our families as we can.

 

You got any more?

 

TCD

[DaveInTN 3,247]

Thanks for re-posting this report!

 

It was even better the second time around.

 

And, it serves as a good reminder about how fast time flies, and why we should enjoy as much time with our families as we can.

 

You got any more?

 

TCD

 

Nope.  No more.  There won't be any more DIT trip reports for a while. 

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

Nope.  No more.  There won't be any more DIT trip reports for a while. 

 

Now that is a sad bit of news.

 

How about a stay-cation trip report?

 

TCD

[MetalDad 33]

Now that is a sad bit of news.

 

How about a stay-cation trip report?

 

TCD

 

Or, just grab someone else's random old TR and just change the names to match your family, sharpen up some of the commentary, it's good with us!

[alexwyattmommy 181]

MetalDad has a very good idea.  You should run with it.

 

None of my kids ever liked the hoopla over birthday dinners at restaurants either.  I am glad your daughter had a great day.

[DaveInTN 3,247]

Or, just grab someone else's random old TR and just change the names to match your family, sharpen up some of the commentary, it's good with us!

 

Hmmm, you might have a million dollar idea right there.  

[PureTcrazy...rita 380]

I hate to see it end. I have enjoyed following your earlier reports and seeing a younger DIT family! You are certainly right about the Fiends!

[h2odivers...Ray 952]

Bravo! Bravo!

Hate to see it end.

Via Napoli looks great. It's going on the short list.

I love the trip to the bakery for Gwen's birthday.

Awesome cake.

Thanks for sharing your memories.

[GaDawgFan.....Kelly 799]

Are the Snow White stories really true or exaggerated?

Yum. Via Napoli.

I'm sad this is the last old report.

[DaveInTN 3,247]

Are the Snow White stories really true or exaggerated?

 

 

They are true....for several trips, every time we tried to get in line to see her we were told she was going on break or done for the day.  It was ridiculous.  It got to the point the kids would want to try getting in line even if they were not interested in seeing her, just for the laugh. 

[DaveInTN 3,247]

I hate to see it end. I have enjoyed following your earlier reports and seeing a younger DIT family! You are certainly right about the Fiends!

 

You want to see an even younger DIT family?? 

 

Here's the girls from 2004....2 years before Stella was even born. 

 

[momof3kids-Yvonne 595]

Sad to see this one come to an end. I really enjoyed getting the perspective of staying off site and going to the parks.

The girls have definitely grown, but their smiles are still the same.

Rachel and Drew do not like the waiters coming over to sing "Happy Birthday". Jessica on the other hand loves being the center of attention. For the longest time they believed us that the waiters just knew it was their birthday. Then last year Rachel caught me mentioning something to the waiter on Jessica's birthday. This year Rachel decided she did not want to go out to eat for her birthday.

[jjbescher 17]

Dave - I know you have a cruise trip report that you could repost.

[DaveInTN 3,247]

Dave - I know you have a cruise trip report that you could repost.

 

I do have a cruise report!  But that one was originally posted here at FF.net so is already available to read.