Fort Wilderness Campground and Magic Kingdom - April 4

THE HAPPIEST PLACE ON EARTH!

After a long flight the night before, Mackenzie took advantage of sleeping in the next day. I had to get the lazy teenager up at noon. And although I would have loved to sleep in, I managed to get up at 9am. It's an age thing...

We had breakfast at the cabin, because I was smart enough to pre-order groceries to be delivered. Hash browns, fruit, juice and eggs. Yum!

We showered up and were just getting ready to head out the door to explore when my sister, Tami arrived. It was perfect timing. So, we helped her unload her very full car. She brought some groceries too, among other things. We determined quite quickly that we had enough crackers to feed the entire resort for the week. ha ha ha!

Once all was put away, we headed off to see some of the resort and to head over to Magic Kingdom on the boat. Fun!

Fort Wilderness has so much to offer. You can swim in one of two pools, rent canoes, boats, bikes, golf carts, or do Segway tours. You can fish, ride horses, watch movies under the stars, attend sing-a-longs and bonfires and so much more. You could just stay at the resort and have tonnes to do. Oh, and did I mention that they have dinner shows,  restaurants, arcades and stores too?!!!! You can bring your motorhome, pitch a tent or rent a cabin.

Walking trails everywhere

Bridge to one of the swimming pools

By the lake near the Bike Barn

Lots of trees for shade

Great walking/running paths

Go for a horse drawn carriage ride

As we walked around, it became pretty obvious that some of these folks in the motorhomes were real Disney buffs. They had their rigs decorated up in true Disney fashion. I should have taken a few pictures of these. Some people went all out. Mickey figures, lights, banners, torches, you name it, they had it. Kind of creepy actually.

Map of Fort Wilderness - We were in loop 2300 Great spot!

Ok, enough about the resort for now. Let's talk about the first Disney day.

Magic Kingdom! 

A great place to start your Disney Vacation. The epitome of Disney ideas and atmosphere. 

We were excited!

We walked down to the marina were we would catch our boat over to Magic Kingdom. 

Signage

One of the boats

 Views of the lake from Ft Wilderness Marina

Now, because we were Disney resort guests, all of our travel for the next week was free throughout Disney World. No need to worry about car rentals or paid parking, or taking trams to the entrance of any park. Just climb aboard a Disney transportation vehicle, whether it be boat, bus or monorail and be magically whisked to the location you desire. How carefree and wonderful is that? They run such an efficient system. The longest wait time we had was about 15 minutes. For the most part, we hardly waited more than 3 minutes.

So, we get on our boat and head to the kingdom. It was a 5 or 10 minute ride across the lake. You pass by the Contemporary Resort, which was the first resort on Disney property. You pass the Wilderness Lodge and boaters zipping about the lake. Lots of bird life can be seen as well. Very peaceful ride.

Contemporary Resort

Mack and I enjoy the ride

Mack on the boat

 

MAGIC KINGDOM

Let The Memories Begin Mack!

Classic Shot!

Me, Mack and my sister, Tami

For the first day, we focused on Tom Sawyer's Island, Fantasyland and Frontierland.

Tried to find a paintbrush on Tom's Island. I had read on-line that the cast members hide a few whitewash paintbrushes throughout the Island and if you find one you get free Fast Passes for all the rides for your family for that day. So, we went a searchin'... to no avail this day I'm afraid. :(  It was pretty late in the day to be looking, though one of the cast members told us that there were still 2 hidden from two days ago. Some of them are hidden very well.

Oh, well, we shall return!!

Shootin in the Fort

In one of the caves on the Island

Tom Sawyer's has so many fun places to hide and play in. Its great for little kids, and well, those of us that never truly grow up. 

Looking out to Thunder Mountain Railroad from the Island

That night we ventured into Frontierland, Fantasyland and shopped. It was fairly busy until 1/2 an hour before the parade and fireworks started. Then people were waiting on the parade route and for the fireworks. This was the time to do the rides. We went on Thunder Mountain Railroad a few times and Splash Mountain, where Mack and I sat in the front and I proceeded to get SOAKED! The little twerp ducked.  -.-

I do love his expression the first time we went down though. Ha! Ha! Priceless! He looked completely freaked out. Auntie Tami, (sitting behind us) was having a great time too.

Brilliant!

We also did Pirates of the Caribbean, Peter Pan, Its a Small World. Mackenzie thought that he was in hell on that one. That song...

We checked out Buzz Lightyear, and just enjoyed the sights and sounds. It was a gorgeous night.

We cruised Main Street USA, which was beautiful all lit up at night. So magical.

 So, that was our first night in the parks. We had a great time and didn't leave until 1am.
Who needs sleep anyway?
The Disney boat took us on our peaceful journey to the campground. Our little cabin welcomed us back and we were lulled to sleep by the quiet and the singing frogs.

Tomorrow - Hollywood Studios and Fantasmic

April 3rd - Off to Orlando

Well, we headed off at 6:40am local time, ready to face the long journey to our much anticipated destination, Orlando, Florida! Everything went really well until we boarded the plane in Toronto for the final leg of our flight. Then is started to snow. And snow, and snow...

waiting in Toronto airport

Needless to say, we had to de-ice and so did 25 other planes. Humph! So, we sat on the tarmac for 2 1/2 hours, just long enough to watch Narnia- Voyage of the Dawn Treader. It was good! However, after sitting in tight quarters with crying kids and grumpy people, I was glad when we lifted off. We had been travelling all day by now don't forget. It was 8:30pm our time when we got into the air.

We arrived in Orlando at 2:15am and the airport was quiet. Our luggage all arrived. Yippee!!
We had to walk to a different terminal to get to our Disney Magical Express Bus. A great free service provided to Disney World Resort guests. You give them your flight info and they track the flight and pick you up in a nice air conditioned bus when you arrive. If you arrive within certain hours, you don't even have to get your luggage, they do that too! We had to get our however as we were very late getting in. They even make arrangements to take you back to the airport if you require it.

                                                   Mack waiting on the Magical Express Bus

Mack outside Fort Wilderness 

We arrived at Fort Wilderness Campground and checked into our cabin at 3am. Man, were we tired! 

I had pre-ordered some groceries from 'Garden Grocer' on-line and the Disney cast had them all put away in our cabin before we got there. That was really, really nice.

 Garden Grocer was a very convenient way to have some food in the cabin when we arrived so late. I wanted to make sure that we had something there for breakfast. You can order anything from them. Great service and the products are good quality, at least the stuff we ordered.

Our cabin was so cute! I quickly took a few photos (before we had a chance to mess it up) and then 

headed straight to bed.

The Loop we were in.

Home Sweet Home! #2317

Our porch

(Ok, I took the outside pictures the next day in the light.)

Dining/Livingroom

Kitchen/ Dining Room

Bathroom

Bedroom w/bunk beds

Mack's domain

Loop 2300 was the smallest loop of cabins. I requested this loop because of its location in the resort area and because it was smaller. Only having 30 cabins in it. It was a great location for buses and to one of the pools. You can make a specific request 9 days before your check in date. They don't guarantee that you will get it, but they do try their best. We were fortunate to have our request filled.

We loved our cabin immediately! Very cosy and comfy! I would stay in one of these again anytime.

Next blog - Fort Wilderness Info

Before the Big Adventure

So it came to be that Mackenzie and I would take a trip to Florida to visit my sister and see Disney World and Universal Studios. This trip has been in the works since August 2010. I started looking up  places to stay and what to do on the web. In the end, after much planning and collaborating, we decided to stay on Disney property at one of its many resorts for the first 7 days of our 18 day holiday. The next 7 days at my sister's time share and the last few days recovering at her home by the pool. It was looking to be a great trip!

We decided to keep the trip a secret from Mackenzie until Christmas, which was no easy task let me tell you. There were so many times that I almost let slip some part of our trip to him. I waited very impatiently until Christmas morning to spring the news on him. I was excited after all!

Christmas finally arrived and we went about opening our gifts. There was no clue to the Florida trip at all... Mickey Mouse wrapping paper, Toy Story keychain, Spiderman candy, 3 pairs of shorts, etc. You get the idea. Mackenzie just opened his gifts, but never really put it all together. After the gifts were opened, we had breakfast and Mack started to help Papa with his scratch lotto tickets. I went to the tree and took out one last small box (that I had just planted there). I announced that there was still one gift for Mack in the tree and gave it to him to open.

Inside he found the first of many clues to a treasure hunt. He groaned at this. I'm notorious for making my kids work for their presents, and besides, treasure hunts are fun!

Here are the clues that he had to follow. Read from right top and down and then left top and down. I messed up when I scanned this and I'm too tired to do it again. So it starts at the one that reads, 'To find this last present...'

This returned him to the living room where he found a treasure chest, 20-25 minutes later. I think that it took him 15 of those in Mikeala's room. hahahahahahaha

Inside was a letter as well as some Disney trading pins and a lanyard (which I bought off ebay, much cheaper than buying from Disney store), tickets to Cirque du Soleil - La Nouba, Universal Studios tickets, and some Harry Potter lighting tattoos.

Mackenzie reads his Christmas letter to Papa

Here is the letter:

It was a lot to take in let me tell you. Mack was a bit overwhelmed at first, but after a couple days, the excitement built and we started counting down the days to the big adventure!