Our 2024 Disney World Vacation, Day 1 - Disney Springs

*This post contains affiliate links.  As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases.

We went to Disney World for spring break a couple of weeks ago, making that our third trip as a family.  As most of you know, I’ve been experiencing vertigo and dizziness for nearly nine months, so I was a bit anxious about having issues in the parks or on the rides, and while I did opt to skip several rides, I was able to ride the majority without any issues.  I was soooo grateful for that, but even if I hadn’t been able to ride anything, I would have just been happy to be there.  ;o)

Day 1, was a travel day + Disney Springs, so we were up bright and early at 7:15 AM (which is a little later than previous trips, but we wanted to be able to sleep in as much as possible since we knew we had a lot of super early wakeups ahead of us).

We hit the road around 9 and made the drive down to Florida.  On the way, we did some Disney Princess and Star Wars Mad Libs, we read some fun Disney facts from this book that I had purchased for the trip, and we listened to my Disney play list.  The first half went by pretty quickly.

Midway down, we stopped for lunch at Panera – the same Panera we had stopped at two years ago on our last trip.  While we waited for our food, the kids wanted to recreate the picture that they’d taken two years ago at that same Panera.  This is them now…

And look how little they were the last time we went.  Time flies.

After lunch, we hit the road again, and we had terrible traffic on the second half of the drive.  The second half ended up taking way longer than it should have, so we stopped for another bathroom break on the way.  

While we were on our way down, we got a picture from my mother-in-law because they were keeping Maui for us... they had fashioned a little ramp from the floor to her favorite chair so she didn't have to jump to get up there.  Lol.  We all had a good laugh over it because it was the cutest thing.

When we finally arrived, we were so happy to be out of the car!

We headed to the front desk to check in first.  We can usually check in on the app, but for some reason it was glitchy and I couldn’t do it.  Thankfully, there wasn’t a wait at the desk, and the Disney Cast Member who assisted us was fantastic.  She also gave me a birthday pin to wear on Friday in Magic Kingdom.  :o)

After we checked in, we went to find our room.  We ended up being in the same building as we were the last time, right near the room we were in the last time.  This time we were on the third floor, which I like, though, so we didn’t have to worry about any noise above us.  Last time we were on the second floor, and we could hear the pitter patter of little feet every now and then.  Not a big deal when you’re awake, but not fun when you’re trying to sleep.

When we got to the room, the kids immediately started playing with the new Disney assistant in our room.  It’s an Amazon Show made specifically for Disney World, and it had Disney trivia and all kinds of other fun stuff to keep the kids busy while B and I got settled in and unpacked.  We also oohed and aahed over the Mickey shaped beads and towels.  

 

We all changed clothes after that, and then we walked to get in line for the boat ride to Disney Springs, and we returned the luggage rack on the way.  But first, a picture with my girl!

The boat line was super short and a boat was already there, so we walked right on.  The last time we went, we had to wait 25 minutes (I went back to reference my post because I knew it had been a little lengthy), so this was awesome.

I was a little worried about getting on a boat with my dizziness and vertigo, and while we were waiting at the dock for the boat to load, the swaying back and forth did bother me a little bit, but once we started moving, I was fine again. 

The weather was absolutely perfect – sunny and warm, but not hot at all – and it was a really lovely ride as it always is.

 

Job one when we got to Disney Springs was to get some dinner.  They have many places to eat there, but Jacob had his heart set on Guy Fieri’s Chicken Guy! restaurant.  We’d eaten there the last time we went, and I don’t know if he wanted to eat there out of habit/tradition, or if it had just made an impression on him the last time, but we obliged even though the food is nothing super special.

While Brian and the kids got in line, I stopped by one of the bars and grabbed beers for Brian and me, and then we ate outside.  At Chicken Guy, they have a bunch of specialty chicken finger sauces, so this year we opted for five different ones - Donkey Sauce, Special Sauce, Honey Mustard, Bourbon Brown Sugar BBQ, Buttermilk Ranch.  They were all yummy, but again, the food there is just average.  It’s nothing special.  Jacob was excited, though!  Haha.

After we were done eating, we made our way to the Disney Store.  Olivia had brought along her own camera that prints little pictures on the spot, so she wanted a picture of herself in front of the store with her camera.  While Brian was taking the picture of her with her camera, I grabbed a picture of her, too.

The Disney Store was a ZOO per usual, and we ended up staying in there for probably an hour.  Both kids picked out souvenirs, and I grabbed a mug and a picture frame – my usuals – to add to my collection.

After that, we headed to The Lego Store because, of course, and Jacob bought a small Lego set that we’d never seen before anywhere else. 

 

After that, Brian and I were ready to go because it was getting late, but the kids were adamant about getting some kind of dessert.  We ended up walking all over creation to find something, but surprisingly, there are not many dessert places in Disney Springs.  And there were none of those little dessert carts anywhere.  They have those all over the parks, and I know we’ve seen them at Disney Springs before, but they had zero the night we were there. 

We ended up walking all the way back to the entrance to Goofy’s Candy Company because they have freezers with Mickey ice cream bars and ice cream sandwiches.  We grabbed four of those and then ate them as we walked aaaallll the way back down the other end to the bus stop to take the bus home.

Olivia wanted to ride the boat back, but the boat lines to go back are always insanely long, so we opted for the buses instead since they’re much faster.  We were beat and wanted to get in the bed ASAP.

When we got back to the hotel, we were all business – getting ready for bed and rolling out sleeping bags (the kids always prefer to sleep in their sleeping bags instead of sleeping in a bed together), and then we finally turned out the light sometime around 10:30 which was a bit later than we’d wanted since we had a super early wakeup call the next morning.

The next day was Hollywood Studios Day and it was so much fun, so stay tuned for that!

Happy Monday, y’all!