Disney Debrief, Part One

We're back! Home is just not as magical as the World, but I suppose a week is a good amount of time to spend enjoying the over-the-top-in-every-way charms of Disney World. All the pictures are up in Flickr-- there are five sets in all, with one dedicated to each park and a final one with all of the "other" pictures in it. Since we took over 1100 pictures and finally managed to edit it down to about 500, I had to edit further so that anyone would be willing to sit through our vacation photos. Also, because there are so many pictures, I can't possibly post them all here-- I would like to keep the dozen readers that I have, thanks.

First, some background: GP and I are crazy Disney enthusiasts. Not so much as in, "I love to collect Disney crap, and would love to have a Cinderella wedding dress!" as "I am amazed at the sheer magnitude of this company, and the lengths they go to in order to maintain and build their empire." We both grew up going to Disneyland (me) and Disney World (him), and made our first trip to Disneyland in January of 2007, deciding that we would make an annual tradition out of it-- the crowds are pretty light by Disney standards, so we can go all-out and really get to experience Disneyland in two to three days. Last year, as we drove back from Disneyland, we decided that a trip to the World was in order...and that it had to be longer than a couple days. And thus, after about a year of research and planning (98% done by GP), we set off on our journey to the largest, most immersive Disney park that I've been to (true, Disneyland and Disneyland Paris are the only others on that list, but still).

After a day of travel (San Jose to Houston to Orlando), we hopped onto the Magical Express (yes, Disney has a bus system, and if you stay in one of their hotels, they will pick you up your luggage and deliver it to your room, as well as providing all transportation you'll need on your vacation-- so awesome) and were delivered to our hotel, the Pop Century. GP was excited to finally be there.
Our first dinner was at Citricos, which is in the Grand Floridian-- the nicest Disney World hotel, but since we are both early risers and night owls on our Disney trips, not the best investment. Also, we are poor. The dinner was amazing-- and so was the wine! Our server was one of the sommeliers, and the true highlight of the meal was getting to try a limoncello made with Buddha hands (a citrus) that one of the sous ches had made. He brought it to our table and everything! We felt so fancy, and only a little bit like complete California wine snobs... Oh, and let's not forget the dessert, a warm banana-chocolate torte. Even GP loved it, and he is not a dessert person.

We managed to get a photo of the Grand Floridian's gorgeous interior before we made the monorail/bus trip back to our less-luxurious-but-perfectly-nice hotel.


Not to be outdone, the Pop Century greeted us with a room that now had our bags in it (just the beginning of Disney magic!), as well as a dog-shaped washcloth. And so, excited to begin our first day in the parks, but completely wiped out from the day of traveling (and the bootleg limoncello), we passed out in our 50's-themed room.


Next stop: Hollywood Studios! We did multiple parks on every day (two is the highest reasonable number if one expects to be able to do/see anything), but I think it makes more sense to share stories and pictures that are park specific. That...and I don't really want to have to share exactly how many enormous buckets of popcorn were consumed on this trip.