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[dagobert]

My girlfriend Claudia and I spent the last semester in the USA, we were studying in a tiny city in Ohio.It was a great time, but we wanted to see a little bit more of that country and did some traveling and after exploring Las Vegas and New York City, we arrived at WDW!.
We arrived there on January 15th, departed on January 26th and had park admission for nine days, so we had a lot of time to do every attraction in all four parks. We also played some mini golf and did some shopping in Downtown Disney.
Here is our trip report:

The Hotel

We stayed at the Pop Century Resort for 11 nights and we enjoyed this hotel a lot. Our room was in the 60's building and was very clean and big, and we had a nice towel animal waiting for us. The entire complex was very nice and clean, and we never heard noises from the neighbors.
The cast members in the hotel were excellent, very friendly and helpful. We got chocolate and a magnet for our arrival, and we felt so special ?
We jumped into the pool only one time, the water was warm, but the wind was chilly!

The Themeparks

The parks were great, especially Disney's Hollywood Studios and Disney's Animal Kingdom. We also loved Epcot, but I have to say that we were a little bit disappointed by the Magic Kingdom.
 
We have been to Disneyland Paris two times and compared to the DLP you realize that the Magic Kingom is much older. The Fantasyland is like a concret desert, it needs more trees, a better border to the Tomorrowland and a nicer theming, especially the it's a small world facade. My girlfriend was disappointed of the Fantasyland, it's her favorite part in Paris.
The Adventureland on the other hand was very well themed, we liked all the palm trees and the green everywhere. We are still arguing about Tomorrowland, while my girlfriend liked it, I was not to excited about it.
The main attractions like Big Thunder Mountain are pretty much the same as in Paris, except Space Mountain, which is more exciting at DLRP. We enjoyed the Stitch Encounter, the new version of Pirates of the Caribbean with Jack Sparrow and the Phantom Manor was also great. In addition TTA, Monsters Inc., Jungle Cruise and Winnie Pooh are also very nice attractions. The other darkrides, like Peter Pan are also a little bit better in Paris, because they are more modern there.

The park we liked best was Disney's Hollywood Studios. The Tower of Terror is one of the best Disney rides ever created, can't wait to ride the DLRP version. The Rock'n'Rollercoaster is also better themed in Florida, but I had the feeling the it was not as fast as at the WDS (still lots of fun!). We also enjoyed the other attrations, like Walt Disney: One Man's Dream, The Great Movie Ride, the Muppets and the stage shows. The car stunt show and Star Tours were the same like in Paris. The DLRP version of the Backlot Tour is a little bit better. One of the highlights of DHS was Fantasmic. Although it was very cold that day, we are glad that we didn't miss it. It was so cold that the Park sold out of plankets, so people wrapped themselves into towels, unbelievable! We were clever and rode back to our room, searching for our winter coats... ?

Disney's Animal Kingdom is also an amazing park. In our opinion one of the best themed Disney parks. As soon as you enter the park you think that you are in the jungle (and it's as humid as in the jungle). The best ride in this park is Expedition Everest (maybe the attraction we love the most, it's so much fun!). We were able to ride it nine times, which is the result of a lot of planning (it was low season, but there were many people – we don't want to think about the high season!) and some goodies from Disney (described below).  Kilimanjaro Safari, Dinosaur and It's tough to be a Bug are enjoyable too. The Finding Nemo Musical was also great.

Epcot is a very interesting park, there is no park like this. Our favorite attractions in Epcot are Test Track, Soarin and the Nemo ride. Mission Space was very intense but great, I have never been on a ride like this – but my girlfriend didn't want to ride again. Universe of Energy was very nice too. World Showcase offers also some cool rides, like Maelstrom or the Gran Fiesta Tour.
Especially the World Showcase is more for grown-ups. My girlfriend loved to look at all the stuff they had in the shops, Japan has a very big selection. We tried some wine and cider, and met an old funny guy who was sitting in the Rose & Crown Pub. He told us that he comes to this pub 3 times a week, and he had a big lists with jokes on it in his pocket (no kidding! Haha). It's nice to meet so many different people in the parks.

Part II will follow tomorrow.

[dagobert]

All Photos have been removed!!!

[dagobert]

All photos have been removed!

[dagobert]

All photos have been removed!

[Soap]

Great pictures!! Thanks for sharing!! Love to go there myself one day!

[miss bell]

hi love the report and pictures...we have never been before and are looking at going was just wondering was the weather really cold when you went and what were the crowds like,as our son dosnt like hot weather and big crowds we were thinking of going off season...our daughter on the other hand loves pools so was it to cold to use them,i think we need to find a middle ground for them both....sorry for all the questions...
    miss bell :tink:  :nemo:

[dagobert]

@ Miss Bell:

Most of the time the weather was nice and it was not too hot and not too cold, just one day was really cold. I have to say that we have not expected so many peolpe in the parks, because it was low season, but most of the time the parks were crowded.

The pools of the Pop Century (I think the pools of the other hotels too) are heated, so it shouldn't be a problem for your daughter. We used the pool one day and the water was warm, the problem was the way from the pool to our room, because it was windy and a little bit chilly.

[The Butlin Boy]

Great pictures Dagobert, I'm looking forward to seeing the rest

[dagobert]

Trip report part II:

Pirates and Princess Party

We also booked the Pirates and Princess Party and we were not disappointed. Actually it was a lot of fun and even the cast members enjoyed this evening very much (you could tell that, because many of them tried to talk like pirates all the time and they loved the fireworks!). The highlight of this event was the meeting with Captain (!) Jack Sparrow and we got a very nice picture with him. The actor was great, he looked like Johnny Depp and he even spoke like him. We were quite nervous meeting him, he is just such a big personality. But he was funny and just like the real one! The fireworks was the best one I have ever seen, it looked like they wanted to blow up the whole castle, very impressive.

Food

We are vegetarians, and we enjoy eating and talking about food. A lot of fun in all Disney Parks is the food, because you can eat like it's your birthday everyday (even two "mousse au chocolat" at once, like my girlfriend did). So here's our humble opinion about WDW's veggie food.
We booked the character breakfast at Animal Kingdom's Tusker House which was really great. We've never been on a character meal before. Our reservation was early (8:00a.m.), but that was a good thing – everything was clean and nice and quiet as we entered the restaurant. The buffet was good and there was a lot to choose from, but we've found it hard to eat when Mickey and Co. are around the corner. They were great, everyone got a picture and a little play time.
The next time in the park we ate at the Tusker House again, but this time for lunch. We really recommend this restaurant, because it offers a good choice for everyone and in our opinion it was the best restaurant where we have been at WDW. It has a lot of ethnical food, and lots of veggie choices. If you ever eat there, you have to try the "Jungle Juice", a nice mixture of different fruit juices.

At DHS it was not so easy to eat in a table service restaurant. We wanted to eat at the 50's Prime Time Cafe, but we didn't like the vegeterian choice on the menu (just one!), so we asked there if it was possible to get something else. The waitress was a little bit confused by our request and didn't come up with anything helpful and in our opinion she was not very friendly, so we decided to spend our money on something else – ABC Commissary, which has a good Asian Salad. The Pizza Planet is also nice, and has a good veggie pizza.

At Epcot there was a lot to choose from, of course. We decided to try the veggie platter at the Tangerine Cafe, and it was excellent, but so much food that we shared it, and it was enough! We had lunch at Tutto Italia, which was good, nothing to complain about the food, but a little bit pricey.

The Magic Kingdom was a little bit disappointing, because all nice table service restaurants offer either character meals or lots of meat. But on our last day we had lunch at the Plaza Restaurant and our meals were very good. I had a vegetarian sandwich and my girlfriend had a Veggie Burger. Both meals were served with German potatoe salad, which was a nice alternative to fries.
The Main Street Bakery is full of people, all the time, but we can understand why, because the Cinnamon Bun is amazing! And also the Sundaes next door.

We ate a lot at the food court in the Pop Century, and they have some vegetarians options, but you can easily adapt many meals so that veggies can eat them (and we liked the price reduction as well!).

Pros and Cons

I read many guides abouot WDW before our vacation. In a German book the author said that Americans know how to behave during lining up compared to Europeans.
We didn't notice any difference between WDW and DLRP. We've met people who were very nice and polite and others who were not so nice, because they are loud, they are not able to line up and they leave their trash in places where they shouldn't. And we had that experience in Paris and as well in Orlando.
We try to be patient and calm while waiting, and usually that works for us and we are not annoyed by other people. But: We had two families overpassing us in WDW while we were taking a picture, which never happened to us before and is kind of rude.
Maybe our expectations were a little bit too high, that could also be true. We had also high expectations concerning the maintenance and cleanness of the parks, but again, there was no big difference compared to DLRP.

Big Pro: The Year of a million Dreams. We won a Dreamfastpass two times!! Big smiles. One at the Animal Kingdom and the second time at the Magic Kingdom. We were very happy, because we thought that we are not allowed to participate (because we thought that you can't win when you are European, that is what the guidelines say). Disney made our day with the Dreamfastpass, we felt like stars (kind of..).

One day during our visit to the Animal Kingdom I thought that I have lost my camera in the park. I was sure that the security man looked at my camera at the entrance (and my girlfriend saw the same thing!) and so I thought that I have lost it. So we asked at the guest relations, but nobody found it. We headed back to our hotel and guess what. Yes the camera was in our room, although I was sure that I showed the camera bag to the security. I think Tinkerbell returned it to our room and this was the most magical experience for us ?

We also liked the buttons that you can get at your hotel, we had a 1st visit button, and cast members were chatting with us a lot more about that button. It was really nice.

We met a lot of characters, but the Magic Kingdom is not the best place for that, it was always a little bit crowded. But still, my girlfriend got a picture with her favorite princess (I didn't join her).

We hope to return soon, but our next Disney vacation will be in Paris. But WDW (combined with the Disney Cruise Line) seems like the perfect place for a honeymoon!

[dagobert]

All photos have been removed!

[dagobert]

All photos have been removed!

That's the end of our trip report. We had a great time at Walt Disney World and we are looking forward to our next Disney vacation at DLRP in September.

[Soap]

Again great pictures and report!! Thanks for sharing  

[miss bell]

thanks for the reply to my questions...looked like you had a wonderfull time, really enjoyed looking at your pictures and reading your report.....once again thanks
    miss bell :tink:  :nemo:

[swity]

I LOVE your pics!I haven't been to WDW so far but after these pics I know that I have to got there!!Thanks for sharing them.

[britje]

Loved your report and pictures! We are going ourselves in June and are also staying at the Pop century so I am thrilled to hear about your good experience!

How did you enter the competition to win those dreamfastpasses? Is that something you can do when you are there or did you enter already on the internet in advance?

Thanks for sharing!