Transplanting a Seattleite

We packed up and checked out of Saratoga Springs. We drove (not on the highway) to UO RPR. Checkin had a hiccup — we got in the regular checkin line, were asked what we doing, I said we did mobile checkin, we were redirected to mobile checkin, and there, they said that we had not done mobile checkin. Next time, if you don’t get an email confirm AND see a charge go through, it did not happen, no matter what the web page said.

T. was gloating about Dark Sky going away when he learned that had happened and I now had to use Apple Weather. Poor form. Also, _after_ I told him that’s what I was doing, he interrupted getting out of the car to ask while pointing to the app, is this what you are using _after_ I asked, is this related to what we are currently doing (getting us and our stuff out of the car and into the lobby). Then, he interrupted the checkin process to nag (too early) for the picture he wanted on his key _and would not stop when asked_.

A. and I went into Universal Studios side and did Minions. Long line again, even in Express, but we did make it to Finnegan’s for our 11:30 reservation. I had the vegan shepherd’s pie. After that we did Gringott’s (line was down for a bit, but we did get to ride). We also stopped in at San Francisco Pastry Company to get a chocolate chip cookie for her and a Vegan Elderberry Croissant for me. Our room was ready, so we bailed out to the hotel because it was already 87 and we were feeling pretty wiped out.

We got A. dinner at the concierge lounge (chicken nuggets). Also, there was a massive and very attractive fruit platter under a glass bell in my room when we arrived. Not sure why, but it was awesome.

I did Friday zoom! It was really fun. Lots of people, great conversation.

Also, the very fine gentleman who brought our bags up for us was very emphatic that he was the bell captain. I felt very outclassed, and delivered my usual tip and later speculated to R. that quite possibly word about the tipping scale has gotten ‘round and people are now competing to be the one to collect it. Weird, but suggests that I am now Doing Things Correctly?

AK: The Plan : get up stupid early, go to AK, do Pandora rides, then expedition everest, then Nemo puppet show at 11 am and then go back to hotel for lunch

It worked!

As always, the Pandora boat ride had a longish (45 minutes or more) time showing, but we were done in 30. A. only rode Expedition Everest once. A. had sensory issues with the puppet show, but it was only 25 minutes so we sort of survived. We rode the bus back to the hotel, had lunch there. I put butter on her cheese sandwich from the flight in and cut up an apple, peeled an orange and put some carrots on her plate. She also had some Lay’s potato chips. It took a while, but she ate it all.

We walked over to House of Blues. There was live music, but by that point in the trip, I’d gotten R.’s Kokoon headphones to put over her ears (and the eargasmic plugs in) and that was enough to get her through the meal. I had the wings and a salad and a couple whisky drinks. One of our cheaper meals. Here Right Now, dude with a guitar doing really excellent covers. I had more vegan ice cream at salt and straw — I got a real double this time, not a split scoop and it was much too much for me but R. was happy with it.

I got up really early (6:30 or so) and started breakfast. Despite hitting the button right at 7 am, I did not get a Cosmic Rewind virtual queue. Possibly because I was on cellular and not disney wifi? Not sure! Anyway. I bought us in, and then bought genie and T. set up a LL for ratatouille at 3:30. So that’s gonna be a thing.

We had breakfast and R. dropped A. and I off at Epcot. We got through bag check (my bag has a metal frame in it), the passholder line and into the early entry line for Test Track. After Test Track, we beat feet over to Soarin’, which had a 40 minute wait, but it was okay. We had fun. Then we sat in Sunshine Seasons and I got food — cookie, carrots, apple juice box, chocolate croissant but square, unsweetened ice tea for me. We also got into All the Lines. I set up a mobile order for lunch. I set up a mobile order for caramel corn. We went over to the aquarium and bought stuff in the gift shop and then looked at sea critters. Very fun! At 11, I got us an LL at Living with the Land. Then we went over to eat the lunch, ride Cosmic Rewind, shopped still more, ride Living with the Land, rode the Friendship Boat over to Morocco. I directed A. towards France, to find a shady, quiet spot with her phone and umbrella. Meanwhile, I speedwalked over to Germany, said I was there before I was, arrived, picked up the mobile order, speedwalked over to France, found A. using Find My and we went in to ride Ratatouille. It remains absolutely awesome.

After that, we refilled water bottles, got some caramel corn into A., and walked to park exit. We got on the monorail, then the other monorail, and then went to the Enchanted Garden bar at Grand Floridian. We were 40 minutes early for our dinner at Citricos (yeah, the one I was worried we’d be late for). I had a boulevardier and she had a ton of water. OMG, she just kept drinking water. Which is good!

R. arrived, and we went over to Citrico’s. T. arrived, and we all had dinner. I had the whisky drink that was NOT a manhattan, and that also had tequila in it. So. Tasty. I had the arancini again (split that with my sister last december) and the hamachi (also a repeat) and the apple rose (which I split with my niece last december). I talked to T. about the text from MIL. *sigh* He went back to the park to get one more ride. R. drove A. and I back to the hotel. I rinsed off in the shower, got into night time clothes, started laundry, brushed my teeth and blogged this.

Next up: son’s laundry. Because I suspect he doesn’t have anything clean to wear. Tomorrow is Hollywood Studios and I cannot even express how happy I am to have a sit-down lunch reservation. Goal for the day: ride Tower of Terror. A. was sad we didn’t get to do that last December. Obviously, I want to do the Star Wars Rides and Runaway Railway and Midway, too. We’ll see.

Let’s get a few things out of the way first.

WDW is really expensive. It has always been really expensive, but it is a lot more expensive now than it was 10 years ago, and fucking bonkers more expensive than when it first opened. Do I mean this in nominal dollars? NO! I mean it in real, inflation adjusted dollars. Someone Posted on FB receipts from a Poly stay in the first year or so it was open, and compared it to then current (this was at least months ago, possibly over a year) rack rates for the same dates. I whipped out the CPI inflator to confirm that YES, the Poly — same rooms, same dates — is WAY more expensive than it was when it was new.

I go to WDW a lot, and I am often paying not just for myself and my immediate family, but for other people as well. We bought into DVC … a while ago (look, you can read the play by play of the decision making process over the years in this blog, as well as somewhat detailed trip reports from most if not all of those trips) because I wanted to be able to leave the parks midday for nap and/or pool and return in the evening or whatever, and the geography of WDW is such that that means staying on property. Also, this is the only way to get a unit with a kitchen on property. While I have explained this to people over the years, I’ve always been pretty careful to push back on comments like, “Oh, I bet you save a lot of money that way” (referring to either the timeshare aspect or the kitchen). _NO_, this does not save money. The dues are bonkers expensive. And honestly, we mostly eat breakfast in the room, and breakfast is not a particularly expensive meal even at Disney. There are much cheaper ways to do WDW than what we do. The one aspect of DVC that you could argue is a benefit is that it doesn’t just _retain_ resale value; it _appreciates_, which is hilarious, given that those points do expire eventually. (I’ll be old, climate change, etc. etc.)

Having carefully established that WDW is expensive, let us consider another aspect of theme parks: how many attractions do you get to experience? In this respect also, WDW is _seriously less desirable_ than it once was. I’ve gone back in my trip reports and I can clearly see how Disney has gotten really good at load balancing; many of the tricks that used to work years ago to repetitively go on a good ride over and over and over again have quit working completely (true, pandemic is a feature in this; it’s possible this will loosen up again someday. LOL, no, what are you, delusional?). Parade? Still an hour plus line on _it’s a small world_. Late at night? Peter Pan will still have an hour line. Haunted Mansion? OK, _maybe_ you can get on that one in under an hour if you time it correctly. You used to be able to get into the parks during off season and the first hour of the day (non extra magic hour, or, stay on property and arrive for extra magic) and do 2 or even 3 rides in that first block of time. Nope.

All that said, am I gonna keep going?

Sure! I did, for the first time in a long time, go see what points were selling for (I was looking at the Disneyland Hotel DVC property to see if those sales have started), and what my various points might price at if I were to sell them. Wow. Inflation. Anyway. Also, I’ve cut way back on sit-down dining reservations because they have become laughably difficult to get (I expect this to ease up as capacity restrictions in dining ease up). I’ve also changed my focus for the day — I’m no longer All About the Rides; I’m doing more shows, spending more time taking pictures, more time looking at stuff in shops. That’s an evolution that goes with A getting a little older and being interested in different things, and it is also a reaction to line length.

But I do want to make a few observations about Lightning Lane / Genie. When I was first setting up trips to WDW, it was incredibly difficult (for me, anyway) keeping track of and hitting all the deadlines. 11 month booking window at home resort (7 month otherwise). 180 day ADR window. 60 day FastPass booking window. And if you miss a window, sometimes _you don’t get to do the thing at all_. There were so many awful aspects to this. I had friends and family who would try to plan a trip to WDW, who just gave up entirely because the pre-planning timeline was just too long. I had family who _did_ go to WDW, got there, stood in line for a couple hours, gave up and left because it was miserable. I _told_ them about the planning; they _ignored_ the information; they tried to be spontaneous and it _sucked_. Anyone looking at what’s involved in planning / paying _now_ and says the good old days were better is someone who is absolutely _MAD_, delusional, or who is basically expressing a major personal preference for detailed up front planning.

The new system: 2 months for ADRs. Same day for LL / Genie, with the additional wrinkle of if you are staying on property, try to hit that 7 am. But it acts like they release things later in the day, so it’s fine to use it even moment to moment in the parks. The downside about 2 months for ADRs is that there are a fuck ton more people prepared to do detailed meal planning 2 months in advance than there are people prepared to do meal planning 6 months in advance. The upside, however, is that _you don’t have to plan your meals 6 months in advance any more_. You might say, oh, well, that’s just for sit down, but you know, try being me, married to R, and traveling with other people with other food allergies. WDW’s advice is pretty fucking clear: sit down restaurants have a lot more flexibility in terms of accommodating food allergies. It was _hard_ trying to engage in collaborative meal planning 6 months in advance. 2 months in advance is considerably more manageable (altho to be fair, I mostly know what people like at this point so I have stopped asking for as much input anyway; also, they are much clearer on the planning process, which helps, too).

TL;DR: WDW is now charging _in money_ for things that you used to pay for _in time_. None of this was every available to the population at large. WDW has _always_ been a largely inaccessible, luxury experience.

Here’s the WaPo article someone sent me a link asking for an opinion. Mostly, it’s a good survey of what I’ve been seeing on the FB DVC group. There are some people who are disillusioned — there have _always_ been people who became disillusioned by WDW and stopped going, just like there are always OB/GYNs retiring from catching babies, and K12 teachers who decided they are Done Teaching and so forth — and there are more people who are like, LOL, come on, it’s always been nuts.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/travel/2022/03/07/disney-world-disneyland-ticket-prices-fees/

I do feel like it’s time to start building theme / amusement parks again, or at least more gates at existing ones. Sesame Place is opening soon (LegoLand NY opened last spring). My kids are too old for those; we’ll see where it all goes. UO has been About to Add a Gate since forever. Maybe it’ll happen and take some of the pressure off.

ETA: I meant to say. One gets to go on _fewer_ rides at WDW, but _wow_ the quality of the rides these days. I’d rather get Flight of Passage once than Expedition Everest a dozen times. I’d rather get Rise and Runaway Railway and _no other ride the whole trip_ than Space Mountain until I feel like throwing up would be an improvement. Also, if you really need a volume ride and a good experience, just single rider Smuggler’s Run until you’d prefer to take a nap.

ETAYA: The WaPo article quotes a tweet comparing StarCruiser hotel to the $10K gold Apple Watch. To which I respond, Accurate! But the value judgement — but not everyone can do that! — is such bullshit. _No matter what the cost_, StarCruiser is 100 rooms, booked exclusively as 2 night stays. That is a _very_ limited resource. Not everyone can do that, no matter what you charge. Specifically, probably less than 75K people a year can do that.

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/business/tourism/os-prem-bz-disney-guns-arrests-20210614-cxzlhbr4qzew3e4eazeh3ityk4-story.html

That link may or may not work at all, and if it does, it may be paywalled. I have recently (a few months ago) subscribed to the Sentinel, and their subscriber only reporting is quite good; I recommend it.

Len Testa of the Unofficial Guides is quotes a few times in the article, which is otherwise largely a summary of good local reporting: pulling official arrest and other records from 2020 and previous years and comparing them. I had seen this headline in the daily newsletter (and elsewhere) but it took me a couple days to get around to reading it to find out whether it was a “genuine” increase in guns in the parks or if it was an artifact of the increase in security screening that occurred with covid. Prior to covid, there was no security screening at Disney Springs, and much of the increase in arrests was at Disney Springs. The article also cites national sources to show that gun purchases / background checks for gun purchases rose substantially in 2020 as well.

I have been wondering if Disney Springs would ditch the screening once we got past Covid (or at least once we got to a point where Florida wasn’t going to do anything further about it); this article does not get into that aspect of it at all, however, my overall impression of the situation is that expecting Disney Springs to go back to the Before Times in terms of no security screening is probably delusional.

Forbes has a secondary article based largely off this article at:

https://www.forbes.com/sites/suzannerowankelleher/2021/06/14/disney-world-spike-in-concealed-firearms-pandemic/

Park opened at 8, which meant getting up earlier. Fortunately, I’ve gotten the breakfast routine down, so that’s something. I had bread pudding for breakfast — basically french toast, but premade and just nuked it.

A. and I discussed the merits of taking the walking path vs. the monorail and opted for the walking path. I’m glad we did, because it meant we could do the health and security checks with _no_ _one_ around. We have also definitively determined what sets of the detector so by leaving her migraine glasses case at the hotel (and her metal water bottle) and holding the umbrellas way out in front of us, we don’t have to have my bag searched. Yay!

We did 2x Space Mountain, then Buzz, then Astro Orbiter. PeopleMover is still in refurbishment. We got a pastry (the pink and purple iced Cheshire Cat tail), a hot cocoa and a coffee (I only had the coffee) between Buzz and Astro Orbiter, then went off to do Under the Sea. After that, we were tired, so we headed back, but stopped to buy some things in the lobby of the movie theater (which is where the candy shop moved to) and also I bought her a Loungefly backpack that looks like the Inside Out dream unicorn, and a tote bag with the Skyliner on it with lots of characters in the various cabins. I unloaded the stuffing from her backpack and had her wear it, and popped the bag with the candy into the new tote so it was not too much trouble getting it all back to the hotel. We had lunch at the hotel. I got a shower and another coffee and tried to nap but mostly failed. I had a 45 minute phone call with J., which was awesome.

I’ve been keeping up for real on Duo the last couple days. Before that, I was not getting through all 6 languages, but doing at least something every day so I didn’t have to use the streak repair. It rained pretty hard in the afternoon.

Dinner tonight is back at City Works.

ETA: Dinner was excellent. Tonight’s server is a recent arrival from Philadelphia. It’s been a bit of a shock to go from tight controls in the city to (outside Disney, obviously) a much looser environment in Florida.

I stopped and got a purple ube (vegan) doughnut at an Everglazed. It was Awesome.

R. dropped us all off at Epcot yesterday, and dropped A. and I off today a little before 9. As with yesterday, they let us in before official open. T. took the bus over, got on the bus more than an hour before open, arrived in lots of time and was allowed to do some rides before open. Kinda cool?

Since A. and I walked in right when they were officially opening the queue for Mickey and Minnie’s Runaway Railway, our wait to get on was maybe 20 minutes, possibly less. Very fun! It is very reminiscent of Efteling’s Symbolica in a variety of ways, but especially the pink ballroom where Daisy is teaching us how to dance. Very fun! Excellent refurbishment of the space.

I had woken up early to get a boarding group, so we have now done Rise of the Resistance on both coasts! Super exciting. We were group 49 this time, and got on and off before noon. We did Toy Story Mania (formerly Midway Mania) between the railway and Rise, and then we went to Black Spire Outpost and got a Ronto Wrap (allergy friendly version) and a coke so we could sit down in a shady area with fans. It was awesome. A. seemed to think the pork tenderloin was actually chicken and I didn’t bother to correct her a second time. I had to wipe the slaw and peppercorn sauce off it because she objects to mayo, but she was also willing to try some of the sausage / hot dog / tube of pork and spices. I’ll see if there is a way to order it without sauce; I think she would eat an entire one herself if so.

We came back after Rise, because we are wimps and it got pretty warm. We have a dinner reservation at City Works Brewery and Pour House at Disney Springs. She had some apple slices, carrot sticks and celery bites with saltines and peanut butter (she has discovered she loooooooves Jif. Sigh. I tried! But natural is not what this kid likes, apparently).

ETA: City Works was phenomenal. A. had the kids grilled cheese. T. had a plain hamburger and fries. He had the sundae; A. had the snickers peanut butter pie (R. finished it). I tried to order fish tacos, but the cole slaw there has dairy, so no good for that or numerous other options; I had the kung pao cauliflower with added chicken and it was amazing. I had a couple burnt orange old fashioneds. R. had some build your own beer flight. I would go back every night for the rest of our stay except we have other reservations and so forth. Highly recommend; our server was Christian and he was super helpful with complicated dietary constraints.

We flew from BOS to MCO. Totally. Full. Flight. Kinda freaky. Everyone was really well behaved, tho, so I guess we’re gonna find out whether masks and ventilation are actually Good Enough.

We drove in and parked in the garage; economy lot is still closed. Security was very quick. Food choices were poor — I wound up getting a croissant and some glazed munchkins for A., and a PB&J bagel from DD for me. Not awesome. Oh well!

We stopped at the BK in MCO after we got off the flight. A. has not had fast food in a while, or even much in the way of snack food choices. She was raving about how awesome it was. I found it all very salty, which was predictable.

Half my Garden Grocer order was missing. Seriously. Half. I left voicemail and got a call back. Hopefully this will be better tomorrow!

A. had intense feelings upon arrival in the 2 bedroom at BLT. We have been staying everywhere but our home resort for a while, and now memories are happening. Yay?

We did Fancy Friday, rather than go into MK.

Last day in the parks!

Amazing morning. We got up, had breakfast, walked over to DCA. Lines were fine. I got an 8:40 FP for Guardians, and it had a short line so we walked over to standby it then FP it. While there, I realized the mystery replacement FP was in fact from last night’s missed Soarin. So after two rounds of Guardians (we got two new songs: Parliament’s Who’s Got the Funk and whoever that does Free Ride — that was the worst by far. Parliament is better than everything but Steppenwolf), we did standby on Monsters Inc because the line was short. Then we rode Soarin. This all happened within the first 2 hours the park was open.

We sat on a bench and poked at phone/ipad. We saw JJNK in line for Soarin from our bench — that was pretty cool. We decided to just hang out, and then go into Grand Californian and have lunch at the Hearthstone Lounge when it opened at 11. She had grilled cheese and fries; I had a manhattan, an iced tea, and a pepperoni pizza. It was awesome. Then we ubered back to the hotel and hung out there for a few hours. I had an FP for 3:40 with dinner at 5 at Storytellers Cafe.

The FP was for the cars ride. R. joined us on it — it had been down a couple hours just before, but was up for us. I forgot to get A.’s hat and she lost it on the ride. Ooops. We walked over to the shop by the Inside Out ride and bought another copy of the exact same hat. Then we arrived 20 minutes early for dinner.

Dinner was great. We hugged JJNK goodbye and walked back. We packed up and brushed our teeth and got ready for bed. Really nice last day. We even stopped and did pin trading on the walk back.

A. had set her alarm for 6, but then did not want to get up. I said fine reset for 7. She was up in ten minutes. We were down to breakfast before it opened, so I got tea, juice, filled water. bottles. I got mickey waffles made before anyone else, and we left before anyone else was done. Woot! We walked (and were passed) by many to security, where the line was not too bad. T. found us when we were halfway through the Disneyland line, to tell me that he did not have a valid ticket. The story came out slow. I tried to buy a ticket through the app. It would only show me SoCal resident offers. So I went on the website, bought a 3 day parkhopper with maxpass, and got it done in time to enter the park when we got front of line. Whew.

We waited for line drop. We paused briefly where we had excellent cell service at 7:59 to wait for the longest minute of my recent life to hit the button. We got boarding group 56. We got in line for Smugglers Run. We waited most of an hour, but rode it together. My daughter was a gunner; my son and I were engineers. We got 8730, Pirate status. We got pics of all three of us sitting at the holo chess board.

We separated. A. and I waffled a lot on what to do next. We did Fortune Red. We tried to get on the train. We got popcorn. We tried for the train again and she had a meltdown. We decided to leave. We got R. to pick us up. There was filming on Main Street and Esmerelda was not working. I do not know if those were connected. We bought fudge at the Candy Palace. R. took us to Coco’s for lunch. I had the asian salad. It was really pretty good, better than I had expected. A. got a plain chicken breast and fries. While we were eating lunch, our boarding group number approached, so we got back to the park. We went to the bathroom in the fresher, then met T. at the ride and boarded together.

You can find detailed reviews of the ride elsewhere. It had been a tough day for my daughter, and my son was pretty confused by getting onto the transport, off the transport, and then being sent to the detention center by Stormtroopers. He did not want to leave, but he did not care for that part of the story. My daughter was really into it (kept saying, This Is Legit!), but then was really disappointed when it ended, and felt like the ending was weak.

The queue theming is okay; I did score a bunch of items with the datapad.

Using a shaky-shaky for the transport as part of the extended pre-show was pretty cool. Basically the Gringott’s or Haunted Mansion elevator idea taken to a whole new level. The cast members processing us into detention are super into it, which is awesome. Honestly, probably the very best role for a cast member permanently frustrated by misbehavior in queues. Finally, you get to tell the guest what to do and make it stick.

Once you are in the cargo pod piloted by the droid, you are essentially running through more SF corridors and rooms, on an Ellen’s Energy Adventure pod (but somewhat smaller). Eventually, you slot into something that makes the pod part of what is basically a Star Tours experience: you are now in the escape pod (have not left the cargo pod and still have the droid), getting back to crashland on Batuu.

We went back to the hotel to rest after (T. stayed in the park).

Dinner was at Ballast Point. We took an Uber. A college friend of R. joined us. They stayed late while the rest of us went to The Void and did Star Wars.