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[Karen101]

Disney Pre-Trip Report July 04/07/2016 to 08/07/2016

Well I've never done a trip report before, but this forum and the members have been so helpful and wonderful that I thought it was only fair to share!

We are now on the Months countdown to our very much surprise trip!  When I say surprise I mean that my daughter and my mother have no idea we are going!  They believe we are going to England for a week and will be none the wiser until the morning of our trip!

So the cast is as follows: Myself, a Disney mad mummy who is 34 and my darling hubby who is 37 a enjoys Disney perhaps not as much as me, but certainly loves the parks.  Our little princess will be 7 on this trip and my mother is a very young 58.  More exciting is that while my mother is a huge huge Disney fan, she is Disney park virgin so this trip will be extra extra special!

We are flying out from Dublin with Aer Lingus on the 4th of July on the 9.40am flight.  Once we get to the airport I plan on doing a big reveal, I have gift boxes for the two of them, with Minnie Ears, various goodies for my DD, a book on DLP for my mother and a new camera for her!  I plan to capture the whole thing if I can and I am pretty sure there will be tears but we shall see!

We are taking the magic coach transfer from CDG to Disney.  I know this method of transport is not to everyone's delight, but I don't know what it is about the coach but I just enjoy the trip, and I do enjoy seeing the other hotels as we drop off.

We are staying at the Newport Bay Club this time around; previous trips have been to Cheyenne and off site, but with this a special trip for my mother I figured we would do something a little more special, we had considered the Disneyland hotel, but the pool at the NPB sold it for us.  We are staying in a Compass Club Family room which will be nice, ive heard lovely things about the rooms, and I promise to report on them.

As a gift from my brother we were given full board plus vouchers!  Which is a lot of food I know!  Since we have American style breakfast and then lunch and dinner plus your pause gourmand vouchers as well!  We have made our restaurant reservations which im very excited about, the only exception being lunch the day we arrive and lunch the day we leave.  We figured we would leave those to chance and see what takes our fancy.  We are delighted though as this time we have reservations at Blue Lagoon, Inventions, BCR and three of the hotels, it will be nice to try out several places!  Lucky for us the parks are open until 11pm while we are there so at least our evening dinner reservations are not until 7pm!

Ive started doing a little shopping, Pennys (aka Primark) have had some great Disney stuff in, for adults and kids so ive been picking up bits and bobs as I go along!

[bad-pink-tink]

the big reveal at the airport sounds fun,  You mum is going to have an amazing trip, especially as you know the park well.

I do Magic shuttle too, getting to the parks and going to the other hotels is all part of the experience.

I was in Pennys last week, the Disney stuff is lovely but I decided to wait and buy stuff when I get to Disney in California. I did get a Harry Potter tshirt though for my Universal Studios day

[Karen101]

I saw the universal stuff as well!! I hope they will have it next year when im heading to Florida ... fingers crossed hehehe

im looking forward to the airport ... it will be such fun to see their faces!

[Zee79]

So looking forward to hearing how the reveal goes! I've been shopping in Primark for my Disney things, going have to go back one last time because hubby put one of my tops in the dryer & now it fits my daughter! I'm not a happy bunny! We are going the back end of July & can't wait.

[daddyof2]

Hope you all have a lovely time, update us when you get back!

[Vikkilou]

Bet the reveal will be ace  were going for the second time at the end of august  we haven't told our boys 4&6 & not going to til we arrive at the airport ( this is partly due to my eldest being adamant he doesn't like to fly tho he can't remember his last time on a plane!! ) going to do them gift boxes to & disney tshirts to put on

[Karen101]

i hope your big reveal goes well Vikkilou

[fairymom]

ah it all sounds brilliant, can't wait to hear the reaction to the big reveal!

That is a lot of food you are right. We found last month when we were over that with the longer park hours we were having dinner at 8/8.30pm. We only had one reservation made, Inventions, for my daughter's birthday. I made it for 6pm before we went but realised there that it was far too early. I tried to change it to later but they could only give me 6.30.
We are going back next month and I've reserved Inventions again (just because!) but this time for 8pm. The CM on the phone sounded a bit surprised when I said it!
Basically, my point is, you may find you need later reservations when you are there because you'll need to stretch things out for the longer days. If Dreams is at 11pm you might find you want something else to eat between dinner and Dreams! You could collect your Pause Gourmande snacks though and save them for later just in case?

I'm loving the Penney's stuff too. I bought 3 Mickey t-shirts a couple of weeks ago and have been wearing them non-stop. They're so light and comfy in the warm weather

[grawns]

So exciting!!! I'm staying out of Penny's as I'm not heading off till March for my DS fifth birthday so anything I buy now will be out of season and worn to bits by then.
That's so much food I'm jealous. You seem super organised. Was it hard to keep the surprise? I think I'm going to burst before March.

[Karen101]

We have made our dinner reservations for 7pm so hopefully that will be okay   and we might actually do that save the muffins or donuts or what ever they are, my mother and I are not that big on sweet things like so my hubby and daughter can have them later if they want.  I would imagine that pair will go for ice cream hahaha

and yes Pennys is bad ... I need to keep away ... but they have oddles of frozen stuff in the market area ... might have to have just one more look!!!

there is 18 days to go now getting super excited!!

I agree Grawns it does seem like a lot of food.  When I booked there was no free half board options so I booked the package without one.  My brother gifted the food package too us and went for Full Board plus even though I told him half board would be more than enough hahaha oh well!!! we are eating in some places I would likely not have done before, such as Rat and Blue Lagoon, simply because we have so much to use up we have saved the buffets for the evenings.  Plus, the breakfast at the Newport Bay is hot as well so bacon and pancakes etc ... ill be like an elephant when I come back!

im getting more organized now.  Just got our seats assigned with Aer Lingus so that's good, but still a little too early to check in yet

it has been very hard to keep it a secret I think im driving my husband bananas cause hes the only one I am talking too about it haha still not long to go now!

[ZoeG]

Oh my goodness that sounds amazing. Can't wait to hear about the big reveal!

That is such a good idea!!!! 

[Karen101]

hopefully it will go according to plan!

[cjebs]

sound like a great trip,

are you not doing buffalo bills for your mum as a first timer?

[Karen101]

Nope we aren't

my hubby isn't a fan sadly but no matter hehe

[Karen101]

Well we area just a little over a week out now ... and we hit a bump in the road.

my lovely DD has managed to break her arm!!  Disaster ... or not.  Okay so it is not ideal, but other than not being able to go swimming boohoo, and being unable to do Space Mountain, Rock and Roller and Indy (which to be honest she was never going to do anyway) I think it is survivable!

So we get a proper cast on Friday, and we will get a safe to fly letter and on we shall go