Summer Vacation at Disney World

Best rides: Mission to Mars at Epcot and Rockin’ Roller Coaster at MGM, not for the faint of heart!

Best nighttime show: Illuminations at Epcot

Best dinner in the parks: San Angel Inn in Mexico at Epcot

Best nightlife: Jellyrolls on the Boardwalk

Quick Tips:

Become an expert at Fast Pass and you will save yourself HOURS standing in line. To use Fast Pass, feed your park pass into the Fast Pass machine located in front of the designated ride. It will give you back a ticket with about a one-hour time frame printed on it. When you return to the ride during that time, you get to bypass the main line and go into the Fast Pass line. This line takes, on average, 5-15 minutes. The catch is that you can only have one Fast Pass at a time. However, there is a catch to that rule. If you wait until 1 minute after your one-hour time frame begins, you can get another Fast Pass issued before riding the first ride. That way, by the time you are finished at ride #1, it is almost time to get on ride #2.

Best Way To Get Around:

The main form of transportation between parks and hotels and parks is the bus, boat, or monorail. All are very regular and usually not too crowded. However, at the end of the day, the lines to get on buses and on the monorail can be long. Just get ready to be patient!

Within the parks, your feet are the only mode of transportation! Wear comfortable shoes, and do not even think about breaking in a new pair of sneakers while you are there!

The Dolphin resort is not as Disney-themed as other resorts on Disney property. This is evident when you walk in and see a huge lobby with tiled floors, hanging draperies, a giant fountain, and a grand piano. The sound of the fountain is soothing, and in the evenings, you can catch a great piano player tickling the ivories.

The rooms here are what I would consider of average size. We had a corner room, so it provided windows and views from two different vantage points. We also had a balcony. In the evenings, you could sit on the balcony and see the fireworks from Epcot. The bathroom itself was small, but it had a sink outside the shower/toilet area, and that was quite helpful. The beds here were first-class. They had pillowtop matresses and down pillows. I was more comfortable here than at home, and it made it difficult to get out of bed in the mornings!

The greatest attribute of the Dolphin was the convenience. We walked to Epcot and MGM. It was just as fast for us to walk as it was to take the boat. By walking one direction around the lake, we got a closer look at the Yacht Club Resort and the Beach Club resort. If we went the other direction, we walked along the boardwalk. Both ways take the same amount of time. We tended to walk along the boardwalk in the evenings, because of the street performers and other nighttime activities going on there.

There is bus service to the parks you can't walk to. The bus picks up outside the hotel at the bus stop. There are a few benches you can sit on to wait, and there are a couple of TVs that play the Disney Channel while you wait. Once you get on the bus, get comfortable, because it can take awhile to get anywhere. The buses that pick up at the Dolphin also stop at the Swan, Yacht Club, and Beach Club before going anywhere else. One thing I found was when we were ready to leave the parks to go back to the hotel, there seemed to be fewer people trying to get onto our bus than the others.

The rooms at the Dolphin rage from $325-$500 a night. This is what is published on the Disney website. However, the Dolphin is not owned by Disney. Because of this, you can find deals on rooms on many travel websites. I booked through the Yahoo travel website and got our room for $150 a night! What a deal! You still get all the perks of staying with Disney, even though the hotel is not owned by them. This includes free transportation on the Disney buses/boats to all the parks, waterparks, Downtown Disney, and Pleasure Island.

All in all, I loved staying at the Dolphin and would definitely stay there again.

Our meal at the San Angel Inn was the best and last meal we had while at Disney. The restaurant is located in the back of the Mayan pyramid in "Mexico" at Epcot. You walk through exhibits on Mexican history, then an authentic Mexican market before you reach the restaurant. The mood here is set by the dim lighting and candlelit tables. Enhance the romantic mood by asking for a table next to the "river" and watch the boats from the El Rio del Tiempo ride float by. Since I am from Texas, I tend to be a big critic of Mexican food eaten in other states. I can honestly say that the margaritas, chips and salsa, and fajitas were outstanding and greatly appreciated after 5 days at Disney. To finish out your romantic evening dinner, stroll outside and grab a seat for "Illuminations," a perfect way to end the day!

La Nouba is a 90-minute version of a circus unlike any I have ever seen. It has high-wire walkers, trapeze artists, clowns, gymnastics, bike riding, and trampoline performances. All this is set to music, and each act flows from one to the next flawlessly. Disney World is the only place to see this show, and it has been rated as one of the best Cirque de Soleil has to offer. The tickets are expensive, but for us, it was worth it. Shows are 5 nights a week at 6pm and 9pm. Call early for the best seats: 407/939-7600.

The description I had read for Jellyrolls prior to going to Disney was a bar with "dualing piano players." With this vanilla-type description, I envisioned a small bar with dim lighting and two piano players playing classical piano pieces. Boy, was I wrong! The minute you walk into Jellyrolls, you are overcome with the very loud singing coming from not only the piano player but also the bar patrons/audience. Coming here for a drink and to visit is not really an option. Crowd participation is a given, and you can't help but join the fun. There are two piano players, but they are on a stage with disco-type lighting. You make a song request by taking a dollar (or more) and a napkin with the song title and placing it on the piano. These guys can play and sing ANYTHING! I was so impressed. They play everything from ‘70s disco to ‘90s rap and anything you can think of in between. While we were there, they even sang Baby Got Back—a cult favorite for ‘90s rap lovers! Of course, while they are playing and singing, they expect the audience to sing along as well. The audience is 21 and older, because this is the requirement for the bar. Most often requested were ‘80s classics, and for a thirty-something like me, it was heaven! My husband and I came here twice during our five-night visit to Disney, and we would go back in a heartbeat. The hours are from 7pm to 2am. Things really seem to get rolling at about 10pm—after the parks close. Plan to stay a few hours to get a full experience. You will be there that long without realizing it anyway!

After a lot of thought and research, I decided to use a car service to get from the airport to our Disney hotel. The big shuttle services were expensive and made multiple stops before getting to our hotel. I decided our time and money were better spent with a personalized car service that could take us from the airport directly to our hotel.

Murry Hill Transportation is the company we used, and I was very impressed. They met us at baggage claim with a sign that displayed our name. They waited patiently, as our bags were the last to come off the plane! They offer a free store stop for you to purchase and snacks or other food/drinks you may want. We stopped at the WDW entrance to take a family picture, and they still got us to our hotel in about 1 hour. It was very efficient and they were very friendly. The cost for two passengers was $80 roundtrip. This did not include the tip we gave the driver. They also offer free car seats or boosters, and there are electric coolers you can rent.

Contact information:
www.transportation2disney.com
407/658-2284