December 30th, 2017
December 31st, 2017
January 1st, 2018
January 2nd, 2018
January 3rd, 2018
January 4th, 2018
January 5th, 2018
January 6th, 2018
January 7th, 2018
January 8th, 2018
January 9th, 2018
January 10th, 2018 – Wedding Day!
January 11th, 2018
January 12th, 2018
January 13th, 2018
Every great trip report starts in the days leading up to actually going on a trip! Feel free to skip to the next post, we don’t get to Disney until then… I knew that the week leading up to this trip would be really busy, so we had decided to skip Christmas this year – which broke my heart a little bit since I love decorating so much (I’m typically that person who has multiple trees…). We spent Christmas Day at my mom’s house (where she once again spoiled us by buying us a red KitchenAid stand mixer – something I’ve been eyeing up for years despite the fact I don’t cook), and had a wonderful turkey dinner. On Boxing Day, we did a bit of shopping, although it was mainly last minute things we needed for the trip or pet supplies to last while we were away. We then went to the Olive Garden for unlimited soup, salad and breadsticks haha. December 27th, we both had to work. Since we had been trying to eat through the food in our fridge, and hadn’t bought any new groceries we again went out to eat that night – this time at Famoso. It’s a fantastic Neapolitan style pizza place and on Wednesday nights their prosciutto-wrapped mozza balls are on special – so delicious. We also had a coupon that expired December 31st, so we basically had to go eat there that day haha.
December 28th, we both worked again all day. We had started setting what we needed to take in our spare bedroom a few weeks earlier, but I started seriously packing on this day. December 29th, I was up early to check us into our flight. I was hoping to score an upgrade to first class for a small fee, but no such luck. Luke had to work again that day, but only a half day. It was my scheduled day off, so I took advantage of that and packed like a crazy person! We had so much stuff to take due to this being a two week long trip and lugging all our wedding stuff, so I had to be very creative in how I packed to make sure nothing would get broken and our suitcases stayed underweight. The pets were all really helpful while I packed…
Eventually, I was satisfied that everything was packed and I wasn’t forgetting anything, so we drove our dogs out to my best friend’s house. She was going to be watching them for the first few days (and my mom would be checking in on our cats and degus) before my co-worker Scott moved into our house on January 2nd to act as our pet/house sitter. The worst part of any trip for me is saying goodbye to my puppies
Luke went to sleep at a decent time, while I stayed awake because I decided I needed to clean our house. I think I was just excited/nervous for the next two weeks haha. It was pretty late by the time I finally went to bed. My mom was going to drive us to the airport the next morning, so we had told her our plan of leaving our house at 5:45am. At 5:52am, she called my phone and woke us up – Luke’s alarm didn’t go off. So, it was a pretty frantic few minutes of pulling on clothes, grabbing our last minute items to be packed (cell phone chargers, etc), and then trying to load all our luggage into my SUV as quickly as possible. To make everything even better, this was the weather…
yep, it felt like -47oC with the windchill – which meant we couldn’t load up my Rav4 the night before because we had things which could freeze.
Luckily, we had built in a bit of a buffer so we knew we would be fine, but Luke and I like to be at the airport very early for any flight – it’s the one thing in my life I’m always early for haha. About halfway to the airport Luke realized he had forgot his Brita water bottle in the garage, he had set it down to lift a suitcase into the SUV, and he was pretty sad about it. Florida water tastes disgusting, but those Brita bottles really work well to mask the taste! It was too late to turn around, but luckily we had actually bought a bunch of those bottles to put into our welcome bags for our wedding guests, so I told him he could steal one from there so he wouldn’t be without on this trip.
We arrived at the airport, hugged my mom goodbye and headed inside. Typically when we fly, we book the cheapest flight, but for this trip we decided to spend the extra money and fly direct. There’s actually only one flight per week that goes from Edmonton to Orlando direct, and it’s only on Saturdays. Initially, our trip was going to be from January 2nd – 13th, but once we decided we wanted the direct flight, we extended our trip backwards to December 30th.
We checked in and dropped off our four giant suitcases. I was a little nervous watching them disappear on the conveyor belt as my wedding dress and Luke’s suit were inside one… We were going to take our wedding day outfits as carry-on, but we already had so much to carry, and we decided to take the chance that it would all work out – after all, we were flying direct and our wedding wasn’t until the end of our vacation.
The security line for the US departures was the longest we’ve ever seen it. We had our boarding passes scanned, and then everyone was being directed to the left to join the snaking line. However, I was randomly selected, and asked to step to the right. Luke was told to stay with me, since we were travelling together. I had to place my carry-on suitcase on top of a table, and a security lady opened it up and looked inside. I had nothing to hide, so these additional screenings never bother me. Once she was finished, she told us to follow her and she escorted us to the front of the line. We easily saved 20-30 minutes in line just by being randomly selected! Go us! The rest of security and customs was a breeze, “Where are you going?” Walt Disney World. “What is the purpose of your trip?” To get married!
One of our repeat meals from our previous trip to Disneyland was at the Plaza Inn for breakfast. We again had a reservation for first thing in the morning on the Saturday we were there, and were able to enter a fairly empty park. We checked in to the restaurant, paid up front for our meal (a requirement here – also, hurray for AP discounts!), were handed our Plaza Inn pins and were led to our table. Along the way, we ran into my favourite, Eeyore, so naturally we had to stop for hugs.
We also found some chipmunks before I even had a chance to take off my sunglasses, so we took some selfies 🙂
Chip, Dale and Eeyore loved Luke’s shirt, and made a big deal out of it haha.
Of all the character meals we’ve done at Disneyland and Walt Disney World (and it’s actually quite a few), none of them compare to this one for number of characters. Most character meals have four, sometimes five characters – this one typically has nine or ten. We had already seen three before even sitting down.
The food here is pretty basic breakfast fare. It’s a buffet, but the cast members tend to serve you, you just let them know what you’d like.
I had a made to order omelet with bacon, ham and cheese to start. I tend to stay away from eggs, they don’t always agree with me, but I just can’t help myself when I see an omelet station! I also had a glass of apple juice.
The omelet was obviously fresh, as I watched it being made. It was more eggs than I wanted to eat, so I didn’t finish it all, but I did enjoy it. There was a lot of bacon and ham, and a generous serving of cheese on top.
I grabbed a second plate with some bacon, ham and a piece of chicken-fried steak with country gravy.
This stuff was all ok. Nothing was spectacular, but I don’t eat come to Plaza Inn at breakfast for the food.
Luke’s first plate contained hash browns, sausage, scrambled eggs and bacon, along with a yogurt/granola/berry parfait and a small plate with a chocolate pastry and some fruit.
Again, this was all ok. Disney bacon is always good. The hashbrowns weren’t great, but everything else was fine.
Our first visitor to our table was T-I-double-Gah-er, who was his usual bouncy self!
Next up was a villain, Mr. Captain Hook.
Max was next (Luke’s faces are hilarious in these pictures)
One of my favourites, Winnie the Pooh stopped by to see us next.
Eeyore then stopped by, and even though we had already taken pictures with him when we first entered the restaurant, we had to get some more 🙂
The 8th character we saw was the Fairy Godmother
We noticed we had time before the next character stopped by, so we headed over to grab more food. I grabbed a slice of french toast and a Mickey waffle, and a small plate of fruit (strawberries, watermelon, orange slices, grapes and honeydew melon), along with a little jello cup. Luke grabbed a second plate as well, but I have no idea what he had since I forgot to take a picture.
I like the french toast here, I had it last time we ate at Plaza as well. It’s nothing special, but the warm syrup is a nice touch. Mickey waffles are a classic staple when eating breakfast at Disney, and they all taste the same. I’ve realized over time that I might be allergic to honeydew, it always makes my mouth feel funny so I only had a small bite of that. I enjoyed the rest of it though.
I decided to run to the bathroom, thinking I had enough time before Piglet made his way over to our table. However, the bathroom is outside of the restaurant, so I just missed him by the time I got back. I saw Piglet about to head outside to visit with the people out there, so I ran over and managed to get a few selfies with him.
Minnie Mouse is technically the host of this meal, but she was not making her way around the restaurant and instead was standing outside by the main entrance. They were having guests get their picture with her before entering the restaurant, and then coming around trying to sell those pictures. Don’t even get me started on how much this bothers me – I paid $1500 for my Premier Annual Pass, over $30/person to eat breakfast, and now you want me to pay another $30 for a picture with Minnie Mouse. No, just no. This is taking the greed to a whole other level. I did insist on stopping to get a picture with Minnie before we left, and I asked the photographer how to get our picture. He kept telling me I would need to pay for it but I kept resisting, but eventually he let me know that I could go to the Photopass store on Main Street and they would be able to load my pictures on to my account for free since I had photopass included with my annual pass. So – anytime a Disney restaurant wants you to purchase photos, mention this and see if the cast member will confirm that this is an option.
The total cost of this meal was $62.28 after tax. This included a 15% discount thanks to my annual pass.
On the last day of our Winnipeg trip, we headed to the Village Diner with Luke’s sister and brother in law. This place used to be located in the Osbourne Village Inn, but relocated to it’s current location on Sargent. (**I just googled this place, and apparently it has now closed permanently, which is really too bad!). The location was a bit sketchy, I’m pretty sure I saw a pimp ride by on his bicycle while we ate, but the quality of the food (and the price) more than made up for that.
Luke and I decided to each order something, and share a Turkey Poutine – white and dark turkey meat, mozzarella, turkey gravy, cranberry dijonnaise, $9.50. I’m not a huge cranberry fan, so I asked for that on the side. This was a very large portion, and a really fantastic poutine! The fries were great, the gravy had lots of flavour and they were not cheap with the turkey or the cheese.
I decided to go for the Club Mansion – hot white and dark turkey, cheddar cheese, leaf lettuce, tomato, braised pork belly and cranberry dijonnaise on multigrain $9. I again asked for the cranberry on the side, and asked for no tomato. This was a huge sandwich, I wasn’t expecting three pieces of bread (which is silly – it’s called a club, which traditionally always has three pieces). It was good, but I would have just been happy eating that poutine.
Luke ordered the Elvis – grilled peanut butter, bacon and banana sandwich with hashbrowns and fruit $8.50. Luke loved this – I’m not a big peanut butter fan so I didn’t try it, but I did steal some of those awesome hash browns haha.
I really hope Google is incorrect and that this place is still open, or that it finds a new place to open – the food was great and the price is so reasonable for the amount of food you receive!