All in Vacations
Our fourth day at Disney World was our “break” day. We always strive to have a somewhat laidback day in the middle of a big Disney trip. Unlike trips past, we opted to still make it to the parks somewhat early, but leave after lunch. Brad’s parents are morning people, and while at Disney we tend to be too.
Back in June of 2022, we took a trip to Dollywood with my family. Then we headed to Nashville to celebrate birthdays for both Melody and my niece Caroline. We did the American Girl Party, and we stayed at the TownePlace Suites and had the American Girl Hotel Experience too. However, we did have to find a hotel to stay in between those two trips. It didn’t make sense to drive back to Huntsville just to drive back to Nashville the next day. So we booked a room using our Hilton points in Franklin, TN. We decided to stay at the Hilton Cool Springs.
Our third day didn’t go quite as planned, but we also all went in different directions at different times. Generally we spent the morning at Magic Kingdom, and we spent the evening at Epcot. Bob planned to play golf that morning, so he did not plan to come to Magic Kingdom. We had plans to meet up with him at some point in between Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios. Where things went in a different direction is when I woke up not feeling so great. I had a headache and still had some vertigo issues. I ended up sleeping in and set an alarm to make sure I would make it to Magic Kingdom in time for our dining reservation for a late breakfast. However, Brad, his mom, and Melody went ahead and went to the park in time for rope drop. I did get up and buy Rise of the Resistance for all 5 of us, and Genie+ for the 4 of us doing Magic Kingdom. I booked Big Thunder Mountain first thing since that was a must for Melody.
On our second day, it was our first FULL day at Disney World visiting the parks. We spent the morning at Epcot and the evening at Animal Kingdom. We did open the park, but we made sure we didn’t exhaust ourselves and didn’t close the park. Follow along below.
Our first day at Disney actually consists of two nights and one day. This trip was such a fun trip, so let’s dive in!
For Spring Break, we went to Disney World with Brad’s parents. We opted to drive to save money. We started our trek after school on Friday. We had originally planned to check Melody out once we were packed and ready, but she had a field trip that afternoon. So I check her out from the field trip, and we headed out.
It has been over a month since our return from Disney, but I am finally getting to posting all about our fun trip! Brad does not entirely agree, but I must say that this was one of my least tiring trips to Disney World in quite some time. I did get to sleep in one day while he got up early to take Melody to Magic Kingdom (more on that soon), but the trip overall went so smooth.
Well let’s just continue the app reviews with another one this week. My April cruise was the first cruise I had been on in over 6 years! So some things were bound to be a different. A big difference came with the Carnival App. Carnival no longer provided paper copies of “The Fun Times”. Instead, everything you needed to know about you could find in their app. You cannot really explore their app from home, so I was sure to take A LOT of screenshots to share!
When visiting Dollywood, we were sure to download the Dollywood App to help us navigate the park. While the park isn’t in need of navigation quite like at Disney World, there are some tricky areas. The app can also be useful in finding out wait times, height restrictions, and just general information. It is a great tool to help make your day a little bit easier. We also stored our season tickets in the app. By doing so, we did not have to go get a physical pass card made. Although this can be troublesome if you ever find yourself without internet. But you can also add it to your wallet in your phone to make it easier too. Another negative here is that with Bring-A-Friend tickets, they do not go away once used. So that can be a bit frustrating.
At my mom’s previous job, she would travel a lot for work. She would go to Pigeon Forge often, and one of her favorite places is The Chop House. So on our trip back last summer, we ate dinner there one evening.
Back in May and June of 2022, we went to Pigeon Forge to visit Dollywood. During our trip, we found a cute ice cream/coffee shop on our daily drive to Dollywood from our cabin in Sevierville. The ice cream portion is called Sweet Frogs. It is a traditional FroYo place. But connected to it was a coffee named Smoky Mountain Espresso. It is located on Veterans Boulevard connecting Sevierville to Pigeon Forge. They did have a drive thru, but we went in each time. We literally visited daily. I loved that they had a dole whip flavor!
When we went on our cruise back in April of 2022, we stayed the night before at Homewood Suites in Cape Canaveral. We arrived early enough that we decided to wait and eat nearby. Unfortunately a few places closed early that night, but we stumbled upon Gator’s Dockside.
When we went on our cruise in April 2022, we decided to stay near the cruise terminal to make the morning easier. My mom had went on a cruise the month before, and I they stayed at the Homewood Suites in Cape Canaveral. It was literally less than 5 minutes to the terminal. The room itself was great and spacious. And the free breakfast the next morning was also nice. I highly recommend it if you are taking a cruise out of Port Canaveral.
As I have mentioned in previous posts, my mom and I took a cruise back in April 2022. We decided to try the Carnival Liberty cruise ship. It offered the best price, and we really liked the idea of getting to go to a private island. It wasn’t Half Moon Cay, but it was still somewhere private and fun. So now I want to share all about the ship!
We went to Pigeon Forge this year for fall break. Brad was unfortunately traveling for work. So we made it a girls trip including my mom. We found a good deal on a fun hotel, and we used our season passes for Dollywood to give us some additional fun. Emily’s family also was there for a part of a trip giving Melody someone to play with at times. We had a lot of fun, and I have a lot to share! Here is day four!
We went to Pigeon Forge this year for fall break. Brad was unfortunately traveling for work. So we made it a girls trip including my mom. We found a good deal on a fun hotel, and we used our season passes for Dollywood to give us some additional fun. Emily’s family also was there for a part of a trip giving Melody someone to play with at times. We had a lot of fun, and I have a lot to share! Here is day three!
We went to Pigeon Forge this year for fall break. Brad was unfortunately traveling for work. So we made it a girls trip including my mom. We found a good deal on a fun hotel, and we used our season passes for Dollywood to give us some additional fun. Emily’s family also was there for a part of a trip giving Melody someone to play with at times. We had a lot of fun, and I have a lot to share! Here is day two!
On our cruise back in April, we opted to stay in a nicer room since it had been so long since we had cruised together. We opted to do an ocean suite. It is in between a junior suite and a grand suite. It definitely did not have as much room as the grand suite we stayed in years ago, but it was still much nicer than most of the rooms we have stayed in. Having the balcony and extra room during our cruise was really ideal too.
We went to Pigeon Forge this year for fall break. Brad was unfortunately traveling for work. So we made it a girls trip including my mom. We found a good deal on a fun hotel, and we used our season passes for Dollywood to give us some additional fun. Emily’s family also was there for a part of a trip giving Melody someone to play with at times. We had a lot of fun, and I have a lot to share! Here is day one!
I am going to update this page as I blog about our trip to Dollywood in late May/early June of this year. I wanted to keep everything in one place to make it easier to find!
