The Waterstraut Waterspout: Corinne's 40th Birthday Extravaganza: Day One

Alright, as August comes to a close, it's time to get around to my birthday blogs! So buckle up for six days (and five nights) of Disney awesomeness. And, some of the grandest-most-specatcular-rooms Disney has to offer.

It all began on Friday, August 6. For the first time since August 2019, we were heading out for a family vacation! And seeing my family in real life! It'd been almost exactly two years since I'd seen my brothers in person, and they were coming down to celebrate me turning the big 4-0.

When we started to plan this vacation, it was back in the Spring. Vaccinations were happening, and there was pent up demand for travel. That made getting hotel rooms at Disney for a big group, at least, hard to come by. All five nights weren't available at basically any resort. So we decided to do a split stay and experience three different resorts in order for us all to stay in the same room.

Up first: The Riviera. This is a new hotel (it opened just before the Pandemic, and though I had been through it, or by it, a few times, I'd never gotten to stay there. So, I was excited about it.

The resort itself is really pretty. Based on the French/Italian Riviera. (Spoiler: these are pictures from my balcony later that evening).

And there are fun touches all throughout the resort. There are the movie posters, I rather enjoyed near the main lobby area.

And of course there is the fancy mosaics outside.

But there's also the hallways.

And there's lots of awesome art work in the hallways.

We were staying in a 3-bedroom villa. Those are all at the ends of the hotel running the whole length of that side of the building. We were on the 8th floor. See that doorbell there? It was for our room! And when you rang it, it played "Be Our Guest". Amazing.

So here we are, in front of our fancy double doors.

So come on in, and check it out.

Now, all these pictures were taken at various times. Despite having the shortest distance to travel, we were the last ones to arrive. I blame Calib, he did not get up at 9 am as previously discussed.

But, anyway, when you walk in the room, there is a bit of a foyer, to your left, you'll find a full kitchen.

Complete with everything you might need.

Even dishes!

And a washer and dryer!

The kitchen area gives way to the living room.

with plenty of seating and a nice cozy couch.

And the giant tv was special just for us too! (You could even watch Happily Ever After on a Loop!)

The couch pulls out for extra sleeping, too.

If you continue down the hallway past the kitchen and living areas, you'll find two bedrooms and two bathrooms.

And the room is so big, it even has another "outside door"

The hall bathroom has pocket doors, and a normal bath/tub shower combo.

Across from that there is a bedroom with two queen beds. Now, there are lots of balconies in the entire room. But, this one shares it with the livingroom area.

This bedroom on the end has it's own balcony..

...and it's own bathroom, complete with a very fancy shower.

If we rewind back to the foyer by where you came in, there is a door to the left..

And that doorway will take you to the dining room.

which is also boasts a giant archway to the living room. And seating for 12 (if you pull up the two extra chairs).

To the left of that is the Master Bedroom. Since it was my birthday, I got the Master Bedrooms every single time (fun!)

We had our own balcony, and a king sized bed (and luckily, our own thermostat - Asa likes it cold!)

And of course the Mickey towel on the bed. It's not Disney without it.

The closets were really nice in all the rooms- with lots of storage.

But the awesomest part of this room for me, was the master bathroom. It was HUGE!

It had a little toilet room..

But the biggest shower you've ever seen.

And a nice big bathtub.

I made a point to take a bath in every single tub in all the rooms- even if I had to squeeze it in the morning of checkout. This was probably my favorite tub though (and bathroom). It even had jets built into the bottom.

And of course just like in the hallways, there was awesome art work all throughout the room. Some of it screamed Disney, some was a bit more subtle.

(There's a tiny Lightning McQueen cruising the roads in this one).

But this one was my favorite...

And like I said- there were a lot of balconies. Three in total-including one really long one you could access from the livingroom or the bedroom.

And the views were spectacular.

Everyone was still getting settled in when we got there..

But poor Hayden had a hard time adjusting to being around people (he came around eventually though).

We were headed out anyway, because we had to get passes squared away for Peyton and Hayden- and it would be easy to do while staying here, because all we had to do was hop on the Skyliner directly from our hotel.

It was the first time the boys had ridden it!

A quick trip over to the International Gateway on our own Skyliner Car felt pretty safe. In early July, I was so excited about my birthday- cases were going down. I thought about eating INSIDE restaurants. I considered Jellyrolls. But, then cases exploded. I'm talking more cases, hospitalizations and deaths for Florida than literally any other time during the Pandemic. I know we're all vaccinated. But the numbers give us pause. Still, I figured we could be relatively safe if we avoiding too many indoor spaces.

And, just before we arrived Disney put back in place a mask mandate for indoor spaces and all ques and rides (they've since scaled back that last part- but still require them indoors). You really have to keep up- because things are always changing!

Peyton, Hayden and Asa went to get their passes taken care of, and Calib and I headed into the park.

After all, we wanted to get a jump on the Food and Wine Festival. It wasn't long until everyone else joined us and we could get some fried cheese at the Greece booth!

Lines were pretty long for the festival booths though, we decided just to mobile order a big meal from the Regal Eagle. It was the first time the boys ate there too!

I'm not sure they enjoyed it as much as Flame Tree, but they did like it.

And I got myself a frozen mint julep!

We also spotted a princess cavalcade.

And apparently this would be the last time I would see a cavalcade in Epcot. As things return to "normal", they've discontinued them- at least in Epcot and you can now find socially distant meet and greets in the various countries.

This was Hayden's first time back in a park since Covid- so he didn't really have the benefit of going when there were less crowds to get used to it. He did pretty well, though. We'd just stand off to the side and look out at the water while Peyton, Calib and Asa ordered food.

We did split some shave ice in Japan, too. Because it was fricken HOT. August in Florida, ya know? It's brutal here. But, nobody lives in Florida for the August heat.