Originally Posted By stitchcrazy Well I just got back and instead of sitting around whining to myself about being home I thought I should instead do a trip report so here we go! Flew in Thursday morning with husband, husband's cousin and cousin's wife. We were very disappointed to see it was pouring rain. Phooey, even our luggage ended up wet. But we got our rental car and headed towards WDW. After a quick stop at Publix for soda, water and a few snacks we got to Coronado Springs Resort around noon. We were glad to get early check ins for both rooms. My husband & I rested, checked out the hot tub and tried to get some energy back for MVMCP that night. My husband's cousin and wife however had a much different afternoon. They ended up being given 3 rooms before the day was done. The first was already being used (yikes! a good reminder to always lock your important stuff up in hotel rooms just in case), the 2nd was a handicapped room which they wanted a room with a tub and thought it was unfair to take up a room they didn't need and then finally got one in Cabanas on the opposite side of the resort from where we were in Casitas. The great news Thursday was once we got to MVMCP the rain stopped and stayed away the rest of the night! I think the rain earlier in the day kept last minute ticket buyers away as it was even less crowded than when we went to the event last year. We really covered a lot of the park, plus saw Holiday Wishes and the 2nd parade. I was a little sad that we did not make it over to Adventureland at all but I really only do POTC over there and we have our first DL trip coming up in 53 days so I knew I had that to look forward to anyway. Holiday Wishes were the best fireworks! Loved it. It was definitely the highlight of the trip for me. My husband's sister and her husband met up with the 4 of us who'd flown down together and all 6 of us were really impressed. Friday was our "down" day. For the first time ever DH and I decided we would spend a day doing "nothing". We wanted to sleep in after being up late at MVMCP but the people next door who decided leaving the top lock on the door pushed over so that their door would not close shut so their kids could run in and out of the room banging the door every 30 seconds for about 25 minutes straight made sure this didn't happen. Sigh. But we got ready in time to enjoy the breakfast buffet at the Maya Grill - spectacular. Enjoyed the Dig Site pool area and Siesta's pool bar which was good because it was the only day warm enough for the pool. It rained off and on but at least we weren't out at the parks. We ran over to Animal Kindom Lodge to visit our honeymoon spot and pick up some art work for our living room. We were pleasantly surprised to find out a 2 week old baby giraffe is calling AKL home and were able to see it from quite a distance but it was still very neat. That night we had a PS at Raglan Road. We'd gotten spend $50 get $25 free gift cards we heard about through MouseSavers a couple months ago so we really went all out and had a fancy dinner with the other 4 with us on the trip. Lovely restaunt, very good food. One of those places where you want to steal all the decor and bring it home for your own house. Saturday we got up and did the EMH for Animal Kingdom which is our favorite way to use the EMHs. We've found the earlier you get on Kiliminjaro Safaris the better. And this was no exception. Lots of animals out and about including the lion who was pacing and looking a bit snarly atop his rock as opposed to nearly every other time we've been on when he's sleeping and looks more like my cat Buddy than anything else. Everest is looking awesome. DH and I agree being able to see the flat undecorated back of it though from the parking lot and even the road leading up is disappointing. From there we headed back to the hotel briefly to rest before spending the rest of the day at MGM Studios. We had big plans to stay till close but this didn't happen. Again we made last minute adjustments and headed home early instead of staying for Fantasmic which was an easy choice since we'll be seeing the DL one in February. Osborne Lights was awesome again, we did notice this time that going right when it opens is downright dumb. We tried and found it impossible to even enter. Went back maybe 30 minutes later when Fantasmic started and barely anyone was in there. My husband's cousin loved Lights, Motors, Action. I was just glad to see it in nice weather where I could really pay attention. We first saw it in June when it was so hot that being crammed in that stadium was just not fun at all. Sunday was Epcot all day. Got there at opening to hit Soarin, Test Track and Mission Space for the guys. Took a break and rested at the hotel for a couple hours before returning to do World Showcase and watched the Tree lighting. The Tree Lighting was a surprise hit for me and my husband. We happened to be around just before it started and we thought it was really cute. We feel hands down the lights at Epcot are our favorite holiday thing to see at the World. We walked out the "back" after Illuminations and went to Club ESPN to watch the 2nd half of the Packers game. Our waiter was a really super guy and the host that seated us was really nice and put us right in front of the huge TV so we could see the rest of the game. My husband had a run in with a very nasty bartender but our waiter more than made up for it and we could tell there were some pretty tanked up people in the bar area which probably wasn't making the bartender's night the best either. Monday we tried to lay low and left right at checkout. Headed one last time to Downtown Disney and had lunch at House Of Blues and a sundae at Ghiradeli. We finished things off with a round of mini golf at Fantasia Gardens which was one of the only "new" things my husband and I did this trip. It was a very cute course and Fantasia Mickey being my favorite to begin with made me enjoy it all the more. From there we had to drive right to the airport and head home. Its always disappointing to come to the end after so many months of planning and everything but in this case I know I'm very very lucky to have my 1st trip to Disneyland to look forward to in Feb for our 2nd anniversary so it made coming home a little less sad on that front. Overall we really didn't like Coronado Springs. Many aspects of it I thought were very very pretty. Oddly enough there were almost as many things that I thought were seriously ugly...including our bathroom which I thought didn't even really match. Yuck! The bad experience checking in my husband's cousin had kind of set a bad tone for us all to start too. We also had really bad luck with the busses for the first time as well. The resort is super big and we had a hard time navigating the buildings over in Casitas, we could always find our way in the end but I don't think we ever took the same way twice. Ranchos and the Cabanas looked less confusing from walking by at least. We're glad we tried it out but we're pretty sure we won't be headed back. We really like Port Orleans French Quarter and I think we'll most likely stick to going there when we can't swing Animal Kingdom Lodge which we'll always have a soft spot for because of our honeymoon. We didn't like hate CSR, it just isn't our favorite. And there were plenty of good things to more than make up for whatever didn't go as smoothly. Overall it was a great trip and the holidays are definitely my favorite time of year. I love going to the parks so much to begin with and when you toss in the extra stuff for the holidays it just makes everything that much better.
Originally Posted By beamerdog Great report. We stayed at Coronado Springs the year it openned at one of the closer buildings, but I can see how it might be difficult if you were farther away. We rented a surrey/bike and the whole family rode around the resort. Can't imagine doing it on foot. That resort is huge. Sounds like you had a really good time!
Originally Posted By 1Gee1 A very good report! Sorry to hear about the confusion with your cousin. Now, I'm totally confused as to where we should stay next trip! I was thinking we should try CS...but now... ???
Originally Posted By stitchcrazy ^^^I hear you on it being a hard decision for the hotels. We were between CSR & CBR up until the second we booked and my husband and I sat looking at each other while he was on the phone with the reservations people and he just kind of blurted out - Coronado! And I was like good let's just go with that. You will always find someone who really liked a hotel and someone who had a really miserable time of it. If you check out Allearsnet.com they have a ton of reviews for all the hotels too. In the end we picked Coronado I think mostly because we really liked the images of the pool area which is something we always use a lot. But I kept in mind the whole time that I read many bad reviews on The Pepper Market restaurant, about the convention center and some other minuses I saw multiple people mention. So I at least felt warned ahead of time about possible road bumps! Overall we're pretty easy to please and we're hardly the kind to say - well we didn't like the hotel so it ruined our whole trip. Far from it, just we are more apt to say well this didn't really work for us so we probably won't try it again.
