So, when Luke turned 16, his birthday plans totally fell through. So, last year, for his 17th, I had booked 2 days at Disney during May the 4th for an amazing birthday celebration. Well, Covid ruined those plans. So, this year for his 18th, I wanted to go big because he is turning 18! So, we decided to do an Orlando trip and celebrate Spring Break and Brody's 15th Birthday too!
On Sunday, March 27th, we woke up at 3:30 AM and drove to LAX, because all San Diego to Orlando flights were cancelled. We boarded the plane around 8 AM and headed to Newark for a layover.
Newark sucked! And we were tired and hungry and just wanted to get to Orlando. Luckily our layover wasn't too long and we arrived in Orlando around 8:30 PM.
We uber'd to our hotel, to be put in a room with broken A/C. Also, there was a Wendy's and Chick fil A right across the street, but both were closed. We were starving! So, I got dinner on uber eats from a Columbian Burger place and we got moved to a different room with A/C. The food was great and the room was comfy! We passed out around midnight.
Monday 3/28
We decided to sleep in and take the noon shuttle to Universal. We had our tickets already, so we weren't worred about getting in. Well, we got there and the park was at capacity. Doh! Wth? Then we had to decide what to do. We got into the standby line and I immediately got on the phone with JetBlue to see if we could get a later flight home on Friday, in case we couldn't get in and we could come back on Friday. (our tickets were good for any day that week). So while I waited on hold, and we waited in the standby line, in the hot heat, for 2 hours, the flights couldn't be changed, but we were able to get into the park! Yay! We were so hungry, so we started at Mel's for lunch and kind of planned out our day. We had 8 hours and we were able to do everything we wanted! It all worked out great!
It was HOT! Luckily, we found lines that weren't too long and there was a/c and fans in most of the lines. The Bourne Stunt Show was our first attraction and it was awesome. We got some beads at a Mardi Gras float and then waited in the longest line of the day, Shrek.
We rode Transformers and then went to Diagon Alley. We rode the Gringott's ride and had dinner at the Leaky Cauldron. Mmmmm....butterbeer!
We had a fun, crazy, scary experience on the Simpsons ride. Then we stopped by the Spongebob store and shut the place down after the Movie show on the water. We had such a great day! So glad it worked out!
Tuesday 3/29
We were up early and to Islands of Adventure by 9AM. We walked right into the park and rode Spiderman! It was hotter today than yesterday! I tried to get the boys to ride a water ride, but they didn't want to. They wanted to ride Kong. So, off to Kong we went.
After Kong, we grabbed lunch and headed to Hogsmeade. We rode the Hogwarts ride and Buckbeak. Then we strolled through Hogsmeade and got some frozen butterbeer.
A little thunderstorm rolled in and cooled us off. We took a little detour and rode the train in Dr. Seuss land and rode the Cat in the Hat ride. That also cooled us off and we were able to relax a bit.
The boys really wanted to ride the Jurassic Park ride, so we waited in the very long line and got the front row!
Totally not worth the wait, but they loved it! We were done by 7:00. We grabbed an early shuttle back to the hotel, grabbed Chick Fil A for dinner and got to bed at a decent time. Another great day!
Wednesday 3/30
BEST DAY EVER!
When planning the trip, I reached out to Ashley Eckstein for tips & things we should do to make this extra special for the boys! She called me and told me that she got us a complimentary VIP tour! I was blown away! She is just the best human being on the planet!
So, we were up early on Wednesday to take an uber to the Disney Boardwalk Resort.
We met our tour guide, Meagan, got our temps checked and the she gave the boys their VIP Bday Badges!! We hopped into our luxury SUV and headed to our first stop, Animal Kingdom.
VIP is just so rad. We had her for 7 hours and had our day planned out perfectly. We went to Pandora first and rode the Navi River ride and Flight of Passage. Megan talked to the boys the whole time and shared fun facts and interesting historical facts everywhere we went!
We convinced the boys to ride Everest and they LOVED it! We finished our time at Animal Kingdom with Dinosaur. Next stop - Hollywood Studios.
We started with snacks from Anaheim Produce - Mickey Pretzels and Ice Cream. Then it was time for Toy Story Land! We rode Toy Story Mania, the boys rode the LGM ride (Jeremy was suffering from motion sickness) and then rode Slinky Dog! My Favorite!
We got to ride Mickey and Minnie's Runaway Railway and Star Tours. Then we had lunch. After refueling, we hopped back into the SUV and headed to our final park - Magic Kingdom.
We started with Pirates, then Thunder Mtn, Haunted Mansion, Peter Pan, Snow White's Mine Train, Space Mountain, Buzz Lightyear's Astroblasters and finished our time with Meagan with the Jungle Cruise!
Phew! What an incredible time. We loved every minute of being VIP's! And Meagan was awesome!
Then we had the rest of the day to explore and kind of take it easy. We grabbed some dole whips and watched a parade. We went to see the Country Bear Jamboree, followed by some shopping in Liberty Square. We went and got some good photo pass pics, because the ones Meagan took, all turned out blurry (sad). But the photo pass ones turned out great!
We were interupted by a quick thunderstorm, but we were able to ride Small World, Winnie the Pooh and the Teacups. We had dinner at Pinnochio's with a view of Small World and closed the park down!
It was such a magical day! We still can't believe it happened. We took the boat back to the shuttle and it was a beautiful night. So grateful for this day!
Thursday 4/1
HBD Brody!
We woke up dead tired! Our whirlwind VIP day was awesome, but tiring. But we still had one more day to get in and our shuttle left at 8:30 AM. We were spending our last day at Hollywood Studios. I tried so hard to get in the virtual queue for Rise of the Resistance both Wed and Thurs mornings and failed. I still had one more chance at 1PM. Fingers crossed! We were one of the first groups in the park and went straight to Star Tours. Brody was the Rebel Spy! Happy Birthday!
We got to see Muppets 3D and then headed to Galaxy's Edge.
The line for Smugglers Run was long, so Brody and I grabbed some blue milk to enjoy during the wait.
Luke & Brody got to pilot the Falcon, while Jer and I were the gunners. Then we stopped and got some photo pass pics.
After lunch , we got in line for the Batuu Marketplace. It was getting close to 1:00. I was so nervous. So, while Luke & Brody were looking through shops, Jeremy helped me with the countdown and BAM! we got a boarding group!!! We were so excited! But we had 4 hours to wait. So, we headed back to Toy Story Land and rode Toy Story Mania and we all rode the LGM ride this time. We were so tired, so we went to a little theater that had a museum exhibit of Walt's life and a nice movie to watch. We found a table in the shade after that and had some snacks and just rested until our boarding group was called. We got called around 5:30 PM. The ride was amazing! So glad we were able to experience it!
And that is how we ended our day at Hollywood Studios. We were so happy, but so exhausted and we still had a movie to go to at 9 at Disney Springs! So, we uber'd to Disney Springs and I was able to pull off getting us dinner (it was a challenge!). We made it to the movie just in time and the boys loved it!
We had to walk all the way to the uber pick up from the theater and we basically collapsed into our beds when we got back to the hotel around midnight! The boys passed out, but Jeremy and I were up all night because the neighbors were partying. We had to call the front desk and compain. Around 3 AM, they finally quieted down.
We didn't have to leave for the airport until 11, so we took our time getting ready to go in the morning. When we got to our gate, we were told our plane had maintenance issues. 5 1/2 hours later, we finally boarded a plane to Austin. Had a quick layover and then made it back to LA around 10:30 PM. We grabbed the car, some food and made it home close to 1 AM. Home to these 2!
What a trip!
Everything worked out practically perfect in every way. We made some amazing memories and I'm just so grateful we could make it happen. El Guapo was well taken care while we were gone by Tia Sheri. We are so lucky that she was able to do that and that she loves him so much. Cali arrived via airplane earlier in the day to join us for Easter! Happy Happy Happy!
