Sunday, January 3, 2016

Honeymoon Memories

Day 1--12/19/2015 and 12/20/2015--Travel from Portland, OR to Orlando, FL.
-I hate airplane travel. The seats are so tiny and you're crouched over, breaking your back the whole way through.
-We were met with the Disney "Motorcoach" (I love that word) at the airport, which was welcomed, except for the 30 solid minutes of ads all the way to the resort.
 -The Port Orleans Riverside resort is beautiful with picturesque mansions from the plantation eras. The only awkward thing is that the mansions kinda remind me horribly of slavery in our American history and it doesn't help that 99% of the cleaning staff are black. I feel like it's a bad joke to them and us, even if the architecture of the time was gorgeous. Maybe it has a different meaning to those born and raised in the South. The rest of the resort was amazing though with no bad connotations whatsoever.


 
Source: https://assets.hipmunk.com/assets/hotel_image/v1/55b5f791cfcf1e1c7d23185d.jpg

Source: http://wcm.transat.com/getmedia/3c1529e6-f345-472c-afec-2f0148733aa5/Disney-Port-Orleans-Riverside-Room-003-Pool-View.jpg?width=2048

-Thanks to everyone's help, we got to spend a little more than we ever will again. It was frustrating that Disney's Honeymoon registry was set up to book our activities, and then they notified us a few days before we left that they didn't book anything and then they wired us our money and told us good luck. Good thing Kyle and his parents thought to book the room a while back separately. For the other things we wanted to do, they were all booked up, especially the horse-drawn carriage (which made me sad. The lady wouldn't even let me pet the horse). So we got souvenirs, not the original plan, but we're happy. We don't get to go shopping that often for fun.
-I should also add that Disney is the WORST at providing proper clothing sizes. I made the smart decision of not checking to see if my swimsuit from 3 years ago fit... it didn't. So I bought a new one at our resort's "General Store". They only had MEDIUMS. 10 swimsuits of the same kind and NO OTHER SIZES!!
...so I bought it. I was desperate. And the thing about a honeymoon is, you usually only wear white (or so the strange thought stuck with me). Most of what I had was white and would've scared the kids if I got in the pool with it on. It looks like the swimsuit below, but wraps around the back of the neck. The way Kyle and I strapped it on, it felt like the swimsuit had a vice grip around my neck (which was the goal, since I didn't want to flash any young kids and spur any awkward conversations about female anatomy).  It would have fit perfectly if I was 5'2". But we had SO much fun swimming! We haven't gone swimming in a long time!

-I also got a cute little pullover thingy for the pool so I wouldn't feel like I was stripping in front of people when getting down to my bathing suit.  
 

Day 2--12/21/2015--Magic Kingdom.
-NEVER ask the Disney Vacation Club for directions;

Disney Vacation Club (aka Disney timeshares)--
Us: Where's the bus stop?
DVC: It's outside, but let me tell you how you can save some money.
Us: ...by giving us some?
DVC: Not exactly, but in a way...yes.
Us: ...
DVC: You can vacation with us anytime, and it only costs half price to your normal costs!
Us: We can't even afford health insurance...
DVC: But you can afford this! It's only $16,500 over the course of 10 years!
Us: Let us think about it (not)...
DVC: Let us take you to the open house! We'll give you fast passes, drinks, and ice cream!
Us: Ummm... we've gotta go. We'll think about it.
*We hurry away.*
DVC (shouting behind us): We'll even drop you off at the park after!
Me to Kyle Stroud: I just wanted to know where the bus stop was... let's just ask someone outside.
*Facepalm.
-Kyle Stroud and I got spooned by a rather large Indian man in the line to Pirates of the Caribbean, who then proceeded to slip ahead of us (thank goodness) and take flash photography on the ride (argh!).

-A young girl wore a hot pink shirt that said "I love Jesus more than my shoes."

You know how there's a People of Walmart site? There NEEDS to be a People of Disney site. Kyle and I saw some of the WORST fashion choices we've ever seen. It was simultaneously entertaining and painful.
-We made it on 3 rides in the Magic Kingdom; The Haunted Mansion, Pirates of the Caribbean, and Space Mountain.
-We're having tons of fun.

-When we got back, we celebrated with some dinner at the resort's restaurant, Boatwright's Dining Hall, and took our red velvet cake to go and got a bottle of champagne and toasted later.
Day 3--12/22/2015--Animal Kingdom and Disney Springs.

-I've decided that I hate people when they're in large crowds.

-Animal Kingdom is a bit of a zoo... of people.
 
-I've never been so close to a rhino... it was SO cool! I was sitting by the window and there was a baby rhino next to me. I was too tired to take a picture (it was SUPER hot out), but I wish I would have. He was so cute!
-I bought a colored pencil set for kids. I lost my pencils... I was desperate. It worked okay, but for the price we paid, they should've been MUCH better quality.

-I thought I was good at chopsticks... until I tried to eat a large piece of Mahi-mahi on rice. Boy, was I wrong. But the restaurant was FANTASTIC. It was the Yak and Yeti. We had a really great waitress from Portland, OR, and we nerded out about Portland the entire time. It was fun!

-Oh, and I also read to some dinos when we went on the dinosaur ride.

-We also found a Santasaurus Rex!
-We went back for a nap and then took a boat ride.
-We went to dinner at Portobello Country Italian Trattoria. The dinner was pretty good.
-Christmas at Disney is like combining the dreaded Christmas shopping crowd with the dreaded Disney crowd and multiplying it by 10. Going to Disney Springs was so stressful that we could barely get through the stores, much less the crowds outside.
 
Day 4--12/23/2015--Epcot.
-I love how understated and elegant the Christmas decor and music is. That mixed with Disney music and decor makes me happy.


-We went on the Land ride. We were a but sad that we couldn't find the Ellen ride, but enjoyed this one nonetheless. It's really cool what Disney's doing with agriculture and it was fun to see the greenhouses and fish tanks decorated with holiday baubles and garlands.



-I need to learn to live in the moment more. The day was lovely and there weren't many crowds. We got there before the World Showcase opened (opened at 11am) and went on a few rides and enjoyed the lack of people.

-Everything in Epcot Japan is SO CUTE. Kyle was in charge of the wallet because I just ran rampant.
 ALL OF THE MIYAZAKI STUFF, AND THE CUTE KITTIES, AND THE INCENSE HOLDERS, AND THE ART SUPPLIES!! AHHH!!
-I'm really upset that they replaced the armory exhibit in Norway with a Frozen exhibit. That movie is HORRIBLE.
-We also saw a really adorable miniature town with a train track! I love miniature worlds! So cute!
 -Today was really nice and I loved getting to speak a little french in Epcot France. Although, I miss the real thing. We also had delicious Lobster Bisque.

-We also went to Epcot England to get a beer at the pub where Kyle and I split our first beer together.

-Apparently the only busier time of the year than Christmas is New Years, and on that eve, there are over 90,000 people at Disney World. @_@
-I love that Epcot has a Holidays Around the World celebration that shows off all of the different cultures' and religions' celebrations.

Day 5--12/24/2015--Hollywood Studios and Disney Springs.
-I hate the sun, but I'd love to live in golden age Hollywood.
-The Great Movie Ride had ALL the nostalgia. I loved going through all the old movie scenes.
-There should be more bookshops in all of the Disney parks rather than just a few books in each store.
-We went to Mama Melrose's Ristorante Italiano for lunch. It was delicious, but a long wait, even for reservations. It's a good thing we made reservations or we never would have gotten in.
-The Tower of Terror is SO MUCH FUN and reaffirms my fear of sketchy hotels.
-The Aerosmith ride makes me feel like a rocker in the 70s and I love it!
-We went to the House of Blues restaurant and had the BEST FOOD EVER. Their bread pudding had banana, white chocolate, and caramel in it. It was AMAZING.

Day 6--12/25/2015--Magic Kingdom. 
-We opened the door that morning and I shook my head and closed it. It had to be about 95 degrees with a TON of humidity. We decided to stay in and go to the park that night.
-I cannot do puzzles as fast as I think I can. I bought a 1,000 piece Pirates of the Caribbean puzzle to do in the hotel (since there's no dog or cat to mess it up), and only finished putting together the border pieces and some of the lettering.

-The Disney hats are super small. We bought Mickey and Minnie Christmas hats and they barely fit on our heads. I took them back the next day after wearing mine while doing the puzzle. It stuck straight up the whole time. I felt like a wizard... a puzzle wizard. WORTH IT.
-It's nice going to and from Disney Springs in a nice little boat. It's soothing.
-Although the crowds weren't so fun.
-I love ALL THE IRISH THINGS!! Kyle had to stop me from buying everything at the store at Raglan Road that night. -Raglan Road is the BEST Irish pub ever and the Irish dancers (who were all actually Irish except for one from Virginia) were AWESOME! Although, I wouldn't want to be sitting behind them... this one lady stared wide-eyed, hoping not to get hit in the face behind the lead dancer.
-We sat next to this awesome couple from Scotland with their daughter (around 9 years old) who went up to step dance with the dancers. We each exchanged stories about our weddings (they got married in Florida in 90 degree weather and we got married in Oregon in the snow. We showed them our snowy picture and they loved it! I show everyone.:P). We told them we're looking at jobs in Canada, England, and Ireland... they told us to just skip them all because Scotland is better. Lol. They said that there's a relatively big video game industry over there, so here's to hoping!
-I also got Kyle an "Irish Drinking Team" cap with a bottle opener on the rim. I think he looks dashing in it, does he not?
-Magic Kingdom was SO UNCROWDED!! There were lots of people leaving by the time we got there, which was around 9:30 pm.
-The castle was dressed up in lights so much that it looked like an ice castle. It's so beautiful.
-It was super cool, around 70 degrees, which was the coolest it had been our whole vacation.
-We waited in line for 40 minutes for the 7 Dwarves ride while a 9 or 10 year old girl dubbed us evil and not evil the whole time with her Mickey Mouse light saber. It was awesome. It is difficult to read in the lines at night though... there's very little light. Kyle squished his balls on the ride because the seat was so small and yelled, "MY BALLS!" in front of little kids. I felt bad for how much I was cracking up at his expense. He did a dance to fix himself when he got off the ride while the ride person laughed. It was pretty funny.

-We waited only about 10 minutes for the Peter Pan ride and found Ariel! Yes, you read that correctly.
-We went on Mickey's Philharmagic and got splashed by the magic brooms (spoilers!).
-We literally walked straight through Pirates of the Caribbean to the ride. There was not a single person in the boat ahead of us, which was cool, cuz we got to pretend they were dead when Barbossa said "dead men tell no tales". It added an extra cool creepy factor.
-We got ice cream before we left, went home, and then crashed.
  
Days 7-9.5--12/26/2015 to 12/28/2015--Read "Honeymoon Hellride Back Home" to Read What Happened On Our Way Back.
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