Disney Trip Review

Well...we%26#39;re back from our first Disney trip and of course we are missing it already and looking forward to our return.

First - Arrived in Orlando (our first time ever) on Sunday. Rented a car from Alamo. Like other posts have stated, the line was long at Alamo, but everything went fairly smoothly. We have full coverage insurance on our vehicles and were told by our agent it would transfer to the rental. Once at Alamo, I was asked if I wanted to take out replacement insurance. This is insurance that pays Alamo %26#39;X%26#39; amount of $$ a day if the vehicle is wrecked or dented for any reason and is in the shop. After calling the after hours number at my insurance company, I found out this is not included in most insurance policies unless it is specifically added. So, we ended up paying $10 a day for that. We rented a condo at Sunlake Resort offsite (see review at hotel reviews). It was wonderful!

Monday - MGM - Very cool park. There are not very many rides at this park, but be prepared to watch a lot of shows. They had some really cool ones there that we stopped to see including Lights, Motor and Action, and Indiana Jones. They were both pretty cool shows to see and my husband and son enjoyed them very much. Tower of Terror is cool as well as a little scary.. My 10y.o. daughter loved it, I think it was her fave! The rest of us like the Rock n%26#39; Roller Coaster the best. It seemed like it was going to be scary when it took off, but all and all once you get in the ride and the music is playing loudly time goes by all to quickly! We went on this ride several times using the fast pass.

Tuesday - Epcot - This was my husband, son(14) and my favorite park. We all loved Soarin%26#39;. It was a calm ride that was absolutely stunning! It is so cool how you can smell the sites you fly over! Race Track on the other hand was %26#39;BORING%26#39; for all of us. If you enjoy riding go cart s it%26#39;s much more thrilling than what this ride has to offer. Now....Mission Space......I have to admit, after reading everything that%26#39;s posted on these sites as well as all of the warning signs that are posted I was scared to death to get on this ride. After

much prodding from my husband and kids I very hesitantly got on it. Then once I was on, it seemed like everything takes so long to actually board the ride. So, we%26#39;re sitting there in the ride and I%26#39;m praying everything goes okay. Like another poster said earlier, I couldn%26#39;t tell it was spinning at all. You watch a screen that looks like you are floating in space, so other than the pressure on your face it%26#39;s hard to tell you%26#39;re spinning. We got off of the ride and all of us were pleasantly surprised by the experience. NOTE **the next day, my 10y.o. was so sore she could barely walk, I%26#39;ve never ever had hip soreness (I%26#39;m 32) and my right hip hurt so bad I couldn%26#39;t put pressure on it (thankfully it was a day at Clearwater and Cocoa Beach that day) and my husband hurt all over.** Evidently the pressure on Mission Space does more to you than you know. The pressure from spinning was so intense your skin on your face feels completely sucked back. We could only have related it to this ride since we were better on Thursday and the day after Mission Space was the only time we were sore in the most odd of places (other than the obvious feet soreness, etc). We ate at the Biergarten that night (wonderful!!) and watched the fireworks(beautiful!!)!

Wednesday - Clearwater and Cocoa Beach. We had heard Clearwater was the best, so we made the drive. Me nor the kids had seen the ocean. Clearwater was beautiful, white sand beaches, dolphins, etc. However we wanted to see waves too so we lived in the moment and drove to Cocoa! Cocoa was really cool. The kids enjoyed the waves and it was a wonderful relaxing day.

Thursday - Slept in, sat by the pool at the condo, shopping, relaxing day!

Friday - MK - Okay, this may not be the most popular review b/c it%26#39;s not the best review, but this is my thoughts on MK. Although MK was a cool place, in my opinion, it is very outdated. We are a family that enjoys thrills and rides, so of course this wasn%26#39;t our favorite. I do think it was my daughters, but she too would have like to do more rollercoasters. This is a great park for young children and the parades and Wishes were phenomenal! Still, there aren%26#39;t many rides and the ones they do have are very geared toward the younger crowd or like I said, were outdated comparativley. I do not want this to be taken the wrong way because if you have small children this is definately the park for you. :o) I was rather surprised we weren%26#39;t more impressed with what MK had to offer, but all in all we still had fun!

Saturday - We headed home. Call us home bodies, but we were ready to come home. Given, we just bought a house a month before we took our trip; so that was probably it, but we missed home so much!

Any questions, let me know!!! Thank you to everyone on TripAdvisor that helped our trip be such a huge success!!!

Disney Trip Review

Right - where or what is MK

Disney Trip Review

Right where is MK. I cant believe you didnt visit Universal Island or Adventure or Universal Studios. Seriously Disneys parks look like wold white elephats compared to universal. Mychildren are only 6 and 9 and they think Disney is too old. We have visited Orlando many times and gave all the disney parks a miss and not miss it at all. Next tuime you must must visit universal. Your children will love it.

Magic Kingdom

We didn%26#39;t have time in the week we were there to do it all, although we would have loved to. We want to go back and visit Universal, Bush Gardens, Kennedy Space Center and probably Epcot and/or MGM again. :-)

sweetiepie, I enjoyed your trip report. I would definitely suggest the Universal parks for your next trip to Orlando. They seem more suited to your family. Islands of Adventure has a bunch of thrill rides, and Studios has really awesome rides also. Glad you had a good time!

I forgot to ask why you didn%26#39;t go to Animal Kingdom. Personally, Animal Kingdom is my favorite of all the Disney parks. Every age will enjoy the safari ride and the river rapid ride. For faster, more exciting rides there%26#39;s Dinosaur and the new Everest roller coaster. So much fun!!

We only had three day passes and from what we were told about each park by numerous people and months of planning we axed AK. I would like to go sometime, but zoo%26#39;s, safari%26#39;s and rides we%26#39;ve done we were looking for something we had never seen before and Epcot/MGM seemed better suited for us. In the future though I would probably ax MK and do AK. :o)