Our Spring Break 2023 trip! - Stays at the Wilderness Lodge & Yacht Club - along with the meals, photos & videos along the way!

[TSR6]

Our trip started with driving from Wisconsin to Florida. We loaded up into the truck and hit the road Thursday morning. Of course this meant a stop at Buc-ee's Thursday night! If you've never stopped at a Buc-ee's, it's the Walt Disney World of gas stations. Fresh brisket sandwiches, snacks, and more - along with cheap gas. It's on par with Costco gas pricing.

After a quick overnight in South Georgia, we hit the road again, stopped at Total Wine in Gainesville to stock the cooler, and next stop - Disney's Wilderness Lodge! This was our home for Friday night, check out Saturday morning.

We checked in, and checked out the room. It was our first stay at Wilderness Lodge! The room was pretty standard for "Disney Deluxe" - we love the updated Deluxe rooms here and at Yacht that include the sliding door that shuts off the bathroom/sink area from the rest of the room. One thing that was unique to Wilderness was the wallpaper in the room that included Bambi, Chip & Dale - and the lighted wall light which was neat. Otherwise, the room felt the same as other Deluxe rooms. Here's a quick tour:

After checking in, we did a quick run to Disney Springs with a welcome drink at the Hanger Bar. We explored Disney Springs for a while, and then headed back so we could visit the Tri-Circle-D Ranch. We got to see a lot of the horses, the cast members prepping the horses for transportation to MK and more - plus we did pay for a pony ride for our daughter as well. It was our first time visiting the new location. The Tri Circle D ranch is a great "non park day" visit.

Interesting to note, a bus had broken down right outside Tri-Circle-D, and we got to see the bus maintenance truck / rescue truck for the first time:

Afterwards, we headed back to Wilderness Lodge for a little swimming time and dinner. Swimming time for the kids, a few pool drinks for the adults...

We had Artist Pointe reservations. It was our second visit to Artist Pointe. Our first visit was amazing, but the kids fell asleep during dinner. Now that they were older, we hoped they would be able to enjoy it, right? ... well, this trip, Artist Pointe was actually disappointing. It was the highest cost meal (minus CRT) - but not our favorite by far. Our drinks did not come out until well after our first course delivered to table, and normally at a meal like this we'd have had more than just one round. The character experience was very delayed as well - we saw Grumpy, Dopey & the Evil Queen right away (Grump at 7:40, Dopey at 7:57, dinner delivered to the table at 8:18 - but we didnt see Snow until 9:05pm - yes, we waited to see her. Yes, we notified our waitress we were waiting for her. No, our waitress was not responsive for most of the meal, unfortunately.

After Artist Pointe, we were able to catch the Electrical Water Pageant at 9:30 - and then we called it a night.
Wilderness Lodge Pros:

• The room was great - standard Disney Deluxe style rooms with a Wilderness Lodge flair
• The pool is ok - we like that it's a smaller area to watch the kids, and the slide is within view
• The outdoor bar is awesome! I would love to come here and just spend a night drinking outside at the Geyser Point Bar
• Room's theming was limited to wallpaper and the wall light - not saying that I expected much more as Deluxe is fairly standard property-wide.

Wilderness Lodge Con's:

• Artist Pointe was a disappointment.
• The hotel uses the mounted dispenser pumps for the H2O product. (Sorry, I love the sample sized bottles, as I actually use the shampoo)
• The lack of Transportation - I'm not sure we could do a full stay here considering how much we use the Monorail & walking paths from the Epcot area resorts, which is our preferred area to stay. We avoid the bus as much as possible.

Wilderness Lodge was a one night stay - I'm going to take a break from the typing tonight, and will include more - but our next stop - we moved over to our room at the Yacht Club Resort for the remainder of our stay!

 

[erinch]

I am in!

 

[Marrila]

I'm looking forward to reading more.

 

[TSR6]

Day 2 - Welcome Home. We moved to Yacht Club...
We transferred first thing in the morning. We drove, so it was easy just to toss our bag back in the truck and move. We knew the room wouldnt be ready, but we had a Cape May breakfast reservation. We really enjoyed breakfast, and the Character experience was much better than the night before - we just had to wait ~5 minutes after we were done for Goofy to come around.

After Breakfast we headed to EPCOT. We rode Guardians again (we first rode it last trip during Hurrican Ian... ). I was in line to rope drop Choza de Margarita.

We did some light drinking around the countries, and are happy to report that Pick A Pearl, which finally re-opened a couple months ago, is back in it's full experience. The price has increased though - it's now $20.

Beverage highlights:

• The Tennessee Lemonade is still one of my favorites.
• A trip is never complete without a Slushy at France.
• Same with a margarita at Mexico... inside or outside.
• Tokoyo Sunrise is another favorite

There was some light rain. This was the ONLY rain of our entire trip - and it made for a rainbow!

Dinner on Day 2 was at the Biergarten at Germany. I didnt take any photos of my plate here, but we enjoyed the food and the BIG beers. The band here was great - we're from Wisconsin so this type of environment is right up our alley.

For the rest of the day, we bummed around EPCOT, and then returned to the Yacht Club Resort to check into our room. Upon check-in, we got a message via the App basically checking in with us and asking for feedback on our room.

I will say, this is where Yacht Club surprised us - We did leave feedback about the room. Our last trip to Yacht Club, we had a standard view room, which overlooked the bellhop stand and the parking circle. For this trip, we decided we'd prefer to upgrade from "Standard" to "Garden view" to avoid that type of room. Well.... our room was on the opposite side of the drive up circle, straight back from the bus stop. We did have a view of trees, and couldnt really see the bus stop - but just trying to paint the picture of where our room was. It wasn't any better than our previous standard view room. We provided that feedback on the form, and the front desk manager called us within ~5 minutes of hitting submit! We declined to move, as our items were already unpacked (did not expect a call - just wanted to leave feedback on how the room was categorized) - but they did a little extra magic elsewhere.

I'll continue through the trip - I may lump some days together in future posts. I also added a photo of a pool beverage to the original post.

 

[Noreen411]

Hi. Enjoying your review, pictures and videos. Looking forward to reading more.

QQ for you…how did you get the videos to post in the thread?

Noreen

 

[TSR6]

Hi. Enjoying your review, pictures and videos. Looking forward to reading more.

QQ for you…how did you get the videos to post in the thread?

Noreen

There is a media button on every post!

More to come soon! Still catching up!

 

[TSR6]

Day 3! - Magic Kingdom

We started the day at Magic Kingdom. We got in during the Early Access hour (at the end of it at least) so we still had to scan to get anywhere outside the main hub.

We did hit a couple rides early, utilized G+ and with the soft opening of Tron, we also got one Boarding Groups.

Tron Review: The queue once you get inside is really cool. The right itself definitely isnt intended for guests of size. I would highly recommend test-fitting outside before getting to the loading station and finding out you don't fit. In the time I was in queue, I saw ~5-6 guests need to get relocated to the standard car due to not fitting on the light cycle cars, and they all seemed rather surprised/shocked/etc. The ride is very cool... but also very short. It seems much shorter than what is posted online for ride time. I'd ride it again, but I wouldn't wait over an hour to ride it.

We were also thrilled that the Walt Disney World Railroad was back up, running and operational. We road the train for the full loop, and the train was actually considered "full" at all the stops - a handful of guests exchanged out at each stop, but they were not able to clear the entire queue each time. Impressive. I'm sure it's due to how long it's been out of service.

After we hit Magic Kingdom, we stepped out quick to have some pre-dinner drinks at the Trader Sam's Patio. We love the drinks there, plus the live music they provide on the patio is a nice atmosphere. With the kids, it's hard to commit to the wait to go inside - we did this during our last trip when we actually stayed at the Poly.

Dinner was Citricos. Absolutely one of our favorite meals during the trip!

After dinner, we went and checked the Easter Egg Display inside the Grand Floridian. They do an amazing job creating these. Here's a video of the eggs at they have at the Grand Flo and at Yacht:

 

[hmccarter]

Our trip started with driving from Wisconsin to Florida. We loaded up into the truck and hit the road Thursday morning. Of course this meant a stop at Buc-ee's Thursday night! If you've never stopped at a Buc-ee's, it's the Walt Disney World of gas stations. Fresh brisket sandwiches, snacks, and more - along with cheap gas. It's on par with Costco gas pricing.

After a quick overnight in South Georgia, we hit the road again, stopped at Total Wine in Gainesville to stock the cooler, and next stop - Disney's Wilderness Lodge! This was our home for Friday night, check out Saturday morning.

We checked in, and checked out the room. It was our first stay at Wilderness Lodge! The room was pretty standard for "Disney Deluxe" - we love the updated Deluxe rooms here and at Yacht that include the sliding door that shuts off the bathroom/sink area from the rest of the room. One thing that was unique to Wilderness was the wallpaper in the room that included Bambi, Chip & Dale - and the lighted wall light which was neat. Otherwise, the room felt the same as other Deluxe rooms. Here's a quick tour:

After checking in, we did a quick run to Disney Springs with a welcome drink at the Hanger Bar. We explored Disney Springs for a while, and then headed back so we could visit the Tri-Circle-D Ranch. We got to see a lot of the horses, the cast members prepping the horses for transportation to MK and more - plus we did pay for a pony ride for our daughter as well. It was our first time visiting the new location. Interesting to note, a bus had broken down right outside Tri-Circle-D, and we got to see the bus maintenance truck / rescue truck for the first time:

Afterwards, we headed back to Wilderness Lodge for a little swimming time and dinner. Swimming time for the kids, a few pool drinks for the adults...

We had Artist Pointe reservations. It was our second visit to Artist Pointe. Our first visit was amazing, but the kids fell asleep during dinner. Now that they were older, we hoped they would be able to enjoy it, right? ... well, this trip, Artist Pointe was actually disappointing. It was the highest cost meal (minus CRT) - but not our favorite by far. Our drinks did not come out until well after our first course delivered to table, and normally at a meal like this we'd have had more than just one round. The character experience was very delayed as well - we saw Grumpy, Dopey & the Evil Queen right away (Grump at 7:40, Dopey at 7:57, dinner delivered to the table at 8:18 - but we didnt see Snow until 9:05pm - yes, we waited to see her. Yes, we notified our waitress we were waiting for her. No, our waitress was not responsive for most of the meal, unfortunately.

After Artist Pointe, we were able to catch the Electrical Water Pageant at 9:30 - and then we called it a night.
Wilderness Lodge Pros:

• The room was great - standard Disney Deluxe style rooms with a Wilderness Lodge flair
• The pool is ok - we like that it's a smaller area to watch the kids, and the slide is within view
• The outdoor bar is awesome! I would love to come here and just spend a night drinking outside at the Geyser Point Bar
• Room's theming was limited to wallpaper and the wall light - not saying that I expected much more as Deluxe is fairly standard property-wide.

Wilderness Lodge Con's:

• Artist Pointe was a disappointment.
• The hotel uses the mounted dispenser pumps for the H2O product. (Sorry, I love the sample sized bottles, as I actually use the shampoo)
• The lack of Transportation - I'm not sure we could do a full stay here considering how much we use the Monorail & walking paths from the Epcot area resorts, which is our preferred area to stay. We avoid the bus as much as possible.

Wilderness Lodge was a one night stay - I'm going to take a break from the typing tonight, and will include more - but our next stop - we moved over to our room at the Yacht Club Resort for the remainder of our stay!

We stayed at the Wilderness Lodge Last week, and we had a very similar experience at Artist Pointe. Sounds like we had the same waitress. A bummer for sure! Our least favorite character meal thus far.

 

[DLo]

Following along . Looking forward to reading more .

 

[starousse]

Following along

 

[PAsFab5]

Following along-thanks for sharing your trip!!!!

 

[footballmouse]

 

[TSR6]

Day 3 - Pool & DAK! (Sorry for the delay..)
We started the day in the Yacht Club Pool, because you HAVE to dedicate some time just to the pool when you have such a cool pool & slide. The sand bottom pool is a really cool feature - the kids love the slide too - I just wish the slide's stairs were still "contained" in the pool area. Our kids are younger - I don't mind that they go up the stairs by themselves, but I like them to be within view. That's the only dislike on the pool.
After the pool, we hit Animal Kingdom. Some main points:

• Safari - because is it really a trip to DAK without it?
• Everest - Unfortunately my kid declined to ride (one too short, one declined) - so the adults solo rider'ed this one.
• Flight of Passage & Na'vi River Journey
• Met Kevin - my daughter has a matching dress, so that's a must.
• Thirsty River Bar & Dawa Bar

Dinner was at Tiffin's. It's also the only place on on property where you can get the Kungaloosh Spiced Ale. If you know what Kungaloosh means, you also might be familiar with my image under my username...

Tiffin's was absolutely amazing.

How can you beat this backdrop for a beer photo?

After dinner, we got word that some school friends of the kids were over at EPCOT, so we did cut out DAK visit a little short - but truthfully, the only additional plans we really had were to do the walking paths, and possibly go visit Planet Watch.

My beer photo was at 7pm, and the next photo I took after the bus ride back to Yacht, a quick stop in the room, was at 8:12 in line for a Slushie in France. Not bad timing...

It was the night time extended hours for Resort Guests, and we arent a big fan of the Harmonious show, so we hit Frozen, Gran Fiesta, Test Track and Spaceship Earth. Had a beer or two along the way, and... isn't this just beautiful???

 

[Counting Stars]

Yes! That is a really pretty picture, makes me miss Epcot... Thanks for sharing.

 

[footballmouse]

Nice pix with the palm tree in the foreground.

 

[TSR6]

Day 4 - EPCOT & Studios

We just hung around at EPCOT long enough to park hop to DHS. We did get a Guardian's Virtual Queue - but unfortunately my son decided he didnt want to ride again, so I rode solo.

Studios:
We had Olga's Reservations at 3:30'ish - the kids thought it was neat inside. It's still neat inside, and for those who havent gone - you're going here for some drinks and the theming. Don't go here hungry, the snacks here are not worth it. For us, it's a one-and-done get a drink, and leave. I'm not sad if we dont get reservations - but if it's available we'll go if that helps rank my feelings on Olga's.

The Mandalorian. Oh my gosh, this was so cool. He was walking around Galaxy's Edge with the child. I took photos of him, and we were able to talk a photo with him as well.

Build A Droid - This was following our Olga's reservation, so we spent the afternoon in Galaxy's Edge. Now, I've never really looked at the droids until our last trip - during Hurricane Ian, kids were playing with these in the hall during the story. They looked cool, so we decided our next trip, we'd do it. We bought out own backpacks ahead of time from Amazon. They're clear backpacks, and only around $12-15 depending on the current price. I was hoping they'd build R2 units, and of course they both built BB-8 style units. They're neat, and actually work surprisingly well. There's also an app you can download for them too. The whole "building" experience is really picking out the pieces (colors), snapping a couple pieces into place, and closing the motor unit into the ball. There were only two screws on the entire unit that needed to be put in place. They also have cast members there to assist if you're not handy - but it's super easy.

We hit a handful of rides - Rise I had to skip, child meltdown... he thought he was scared from the ride from our last trip (he enjoyed it), but it was easier to just ask for a refund of the LL. Slinky Dog, Alien Swirling, and Toy Story Mania..

Dinner - We had Fantasmic Dining Package reservations at Brown Derby.

With Fantasmic recently returning, plus all the changes they've put in the show - interest is at an all time high. I'd totally recommend a dinner package. It was a "sold out" crowd!