We're Following the Leader… to the Disney Institute! (A business/family trip to WDW)
- Thread starter MarbleBob
- Start date
tinkgirlga
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Apr 19, 2011
Day 1 - Saturday, May 21 - Fairyland Caverns
This is one of the areas that I remember most about Rock City from when I was a kid. You walk through the cave and see lots of gnomes mining for gems and then the second half has scenes (glowing in blacklights) from various fairy tales and nursery rhymes. How fun!
The first room sparkles with all the quartz crystals,coral, and whatnot, but it doesn't really translate to the photos.
Going a little deeper, things start to glow...
And then you get to the scenes. There are tons of them, these are just a few. Most of them are the size of a bedroom or large bathroom.
And eventually, you get to Mother Goose Village, which is actually a large room with lots of sprawling scenes on all four sides. Too cool!
Eventually, we made our way out...
We browsed around in the gift shop for a while, and at around 6pm, we had our fill and were ready to depart. I should have got better photos of the entrance area with all the stone buildings. It's really pretty. Check out the Starbucks.
Stephanie took the next driving shift.
We all went back and forth about different meal options. I didn't really care that much, but the kids (for some reason) all had a hankering for Panda Express. Again, trying to keep the meal expenses down to maximize our Disney time, so we obliged. Better than McDonalds and not much more expensive!
We finished up and then drove the last 30 minutes to Calhoun, GA. We stayed in a LaQuinta. They are suites with a couch bed that sleeps 5, so we gave it a try. It was about $100 out the door, so not too bad. We pretty much arrived, hopped in bed, watched TV for a while (no cable/satellite at home) and then called it a night. We normally stay at Marriott Fairfield Inns and Hyatt Places (for the same 5 person reasons.) This wasn't quite as nice as those, but it was perfectly fine. (Stay tuned for a review of Howard Johnson's on the way home. Yuck!!!)
All right I think that about does it for the first series of introduction posts. Next up, we drive to Orlando and do a little Disney outlet shopping on Sunday. And then head to the new Disney Springs on Monday morning. Stay tuned!!!
tinkgirlga
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Apr 19, 2011
Thank you for the Rock City review. I live about an hour from there (in Chatsworth, GA) and it's been years since I've visited. Because of your reminder of how lovely Rock City is, my husband and I are going to put it on our summer day trip list.
PrincessInOz
Thanks for my avatar, Mary Jo!
- Joined
- Feb 8, 2010
What a great night with the family! Nice to see you all enjoying Japan.
Love the pics of the family over time! What amazing memories they are.
Love the pics of the family over time! What amazing memories they are.
toystoryduo
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jun 13, 2003
Great Epcot day! 
Love the pictures of the kids through the years by Spaceship Earth!
Looking forward to the next installment.
Love the pictures of the kids through the years by Spaceship Earth!
Looking forward to the next installment.
MarbleBob
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Aug 20, 2003
Yes indeed. We all do get excited about it. Some day, we hope to make it to Tokyo Disneyland and Disney Sea!
I LOVE the Wilderness Lodge. I bet your photos are awesome!!!
Nice!! So far, I haven't met anyone who read Lee's book and wasn't stoked on it. Cool that you got to do one of their day courses. I hope that I'll have the opportunity to do another DI course in the future.
Rock City is just awesome! Totally worth a day trip!!!!
Thanks. Amazing memories indeed!!!
Great Epcot day!
Love the pictures of the kids through the years by Spaceship Earth!
Looking forward to the next installment.
Thanks! I'm happy that we made an effort to do the Epcot photos through the years, just wish I had started earlier.
MarbleBob
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Aug 20, 2003
Day 5 - Wednesday, May 25 - Part 1: Disney Institute and Contemporary Salsa Challenge
I hoped to be further along with this TR by now, but we've been a bit busier than normal. Life happens…. (AC unit had to be replaced; hail damage to house and insurance claims, Pickle turned 9 last week; getting ready for vacation; etc.) This might be the last update until we return from Hawaii. I haven't abandoned a TR yet and I don't plan to now, so please stay tuned if we go "dark" for a couple weeks.
Today's plan was for Stephanie and the kids to visit Blizzard Beach while I was in class during the day, and then Stephanie and I had a date night planned for Trader Sam's Grog Grotto in the evening.
My morning started out similar to the previous day. Breakfast was from 7:30 AM to 8:00 AM and then we promptly started with our training course. It's funny, I really don't remember what they served for breakfast that day. Other than "potato barrels" which are just a fancy name for Tater Tots.
So, yesterday focused on establishing vision and values in an organization, and today focused on operationalizing them through communications and training. I really don’t have a lot of photos to share, as again, we were discouraged from taking photos of course content and behind the scenes stuff. But here's something fun that I can share:
They gave out fun tchotchkes as participation prizes throughout the week. It turned out that my shyness wasn't as strong as my desire for acquiring Disney toys.
And I don't know why I keep thinking about Napoleon Dynamite quotes, but when I saw the Mickey Mouse toy, I thought to myself:
With 50 people, it was hard to sometimes get a chance to speak up. At least I didn't wave my hand all around in the air and yell, "Pick me!!! Pick me!!!" Haha!
By the end of the week I had Mickey, Lightning McQueen, Cinderella, Goofy, and Donald. How fun!
We had a buffet lunch again. I don't recall exactly what they served, but I know that fish was one of them because I remember it being pretty good. Wish I had snapped a couple photos.
After lunch, we had a 30 to 40 minute break before our afternoon activity, so I took the opportunity to explore the resort some more. I never had the opportunity to go swimming, but the pool was pretty amazing!
After looking around the pool area for a while, I went and walked up and down the Boardwalk. Such a nice and relaxing place to be, especially during the day when it was fairly empty!!!
The afternoon activity was to head over to the Contemporary Resort to see how Disney "operationalizes" their values and visions. Our bus drove us over and let us in to a back/side entrance of their conference center.
I've never stayed at the Contemporary, but we've stopped by on numerous occasions to have meals and explore. Even so, I never realized just how much conference space they actually have here. It was pretty cool.
So what did we do at the Contemporary? Well, they had a salsa challenge for us. They took us behind the scenes and into the main kitchen used to prepare all of the food for their conference center. They had recently finished serving lunch to around 600 people, so you can imagine that this was a pretty large kitchen!!!
They introduced us to Chef Frank (don't remember his last name), but he was the first chef at Victoria and Alberts, he headed up Boma when it was new, headed up the Wave at the Contemporary, and he also leads the giant conference center kitchen. (I think I remember all that correctly.) He was really cool, his story was cool, and his kitchen was awesome!
So, they broke us into 5 teams and we had to each create a salsa with a bag of secret ingredients and one trip to the pantry. Each person on the team had a role to play. Recipe maker; taster; chopper, shopper, story person, presentation person, etc. The best tasting salsa and presentation would win. Without going into all the details, it was a blast. I truly felt like I was on a combination of Chopped and the Apprentice TV game shows.
After the challenge, we had an opportunity to network again and feast on the various salsas (including some "professionally made" ones.) Chef Frank came out and chatted with us again, and had a dialogue back and forth with one of this facilitators about his personal story, and how they operationalize their values and vision in the various kitchens. It was truly awesome. And then he explained observations about the challenge and selected a winner, which turned out to be our team!!! No prize or anything, other than bragging rights and a photo op.
After the presentation, we were bused back to our conference room at the Boardwalk Inn, and we had discussions and more training material related to the salsa challenge and the various training points that they wanted to get across.
All in all, it was a fantastic day. We finished up around 4:30 PM and I headed back to the hotel room to find Buddy and Princess relaxing in their beds. Turned out that Pickle and Stephanie were having a blast and decided to stay until the water park closed at 5pm. I relaxed for a while, and then chose to go down and wait for them at the bus stop. (You really gotta love Apple's "Find My Friends" app, as it made it easy for me to figure out when they'd be arriving.)
Next up, Stephanie will share how their day at Blizzard Beach went… But please stay tuned, as it might not happen until we get back from Hawaii. Aloha!
I hoped to be further along with this TR by now, but we've been a bit busier than normal. Life happens…. (AC unit had to be replaced; hail damage to house and insurance claims, Pickle turned 9 last week; getting ready for vacation; etc.) This might be the last update until we return from Hawaii. I haven't abandoned a TR yet and I don't plan to now, so please stay tuned if we go "dark" for a couple weeks.
Today's plan was for Stephanie and the kids to visit Blizzard Beach while I was in class during the day, and then Stephanie and I had a date night planned for Trader Sam's Grog Grotto in the evening.
My morning started out similar to the previous day. Breakfast was from 7:30 AM to 8:00 AM and then we promptly started with our training course. It's funny, I really don't remember what they served for breakfast that day. Other than "potato barrels" which are just a fancy name for Tater Tots.
So, yesterday focused on establishing vision and values in an organization, and today focused on operationalizing them through communications and training. I really don’t have a lot of photos to share, as again, we were discouraged from taking photos of course content and behind the scenes stuff. But here's something fun that I can share:
They gave out fun tchotchkes as participation prizes throughout the week. It turned out that my shyness wasn't as strong as my desire for acquiring Disney toys.
And I don't know why I keep thinking about Napoleon Dynamite quotes, but when I saw the Mickey Mouse toy, I thought to myself:
With 50 people, it was hard to sometimes get a chance to speak up. At least I didn't wave my hand all around in the air and yell, "Pick me!!! Pick me!!!" Haha!
By the end of the week I had Mickey, Lightning McQueen, Cinderella, Goofy, and Donald. How fun!
We had a buffet lunch again. I don't recall exactly what they served, but I know that fish was one of them because I remember it being pretty good. Wish I had snapped a couple photos.
After lunch, we had a 30 to 40 minute break before our afternoon activity, so I took the opportunity to explore the resort some more. I never had the opportunity to go swimming, but the pool was pretty amazing!
After looking around the pool area for a while, I went and walked up and down the Boardwalk. Such a nice and relaxing place to be, especially during the day when it was fairly empty!!!
The afternoon activity was to head over to the Contemporary Resort to see how Disney "operationalizes" their values and visions. Our bus drove us over and let us in to a back/side entrance of their conference center.
I've never stayed at the Contemporary, but we've stopped by on numerous occasions to have meals and explore. Even so, I never realized just how much conference space they actually have here. It was pretty cool.
So what did we do at the Contemporary? Well, they had a salsa challenge for us. They took us behind the scenes and into the main kitchen used to prepare all of the food for their conference center. They had recently finished serving lunch to around 600 people, so you can imagine that this was a pretty large kitchen!!!
They introduced us to Chef Frank (don't remember his last name), but he was the first chef at Victoria and Alberts, he headed up Boma when it was new, headed up the Wave at the Contemporary, and he also leads the giant conference center kitchen. (I think I remember all that correctly.) He was really cool, his story was cool, and his kitchen was awesome!
So, they broke us into 5 teams and we had to each create a salsa with a bag of secret ingredients and one trip to the pantry. Each person on the team had a role to play. Recipe maker; taster; chopper, shopper, story person, presentation person, etc. The best tasting salsa and presentation would win. Without going into all the details, it was a blast. I truly felt like I was on a combination of Chopped and the Apprentice TV game shows.
After the challenge, we had an opportunity to network again and feast on the various salsas (including some "professionally made" ones.) Chef Frank came out and chatted with us again, and had a dialogue back and forth with one of this facilitators about his personal story, and how they operationalize their values and vision in the various kitchens. It was truly awesome. And then he explained observations about the challenge and selected a winner, which turned out to be our team!!! No prize or anything, other than bragging rights and a photo op.
After the presentation, we were bused back to our conference room at the Boardwalk Inn, and we had discussions and more training material related to the salsa challenge and the various training points that they wanted to get across.
All in all, it was a fantastic day. We finished up around 4:30 PM and I headed back to the hotel room to find Buddy and Princess relaxing in their beds. Turned out that Pickle and Stephanie were having a blast and decided to stay until the water park closed at 5pm. I relaxed for a while, and then chose to go down and wait for them at the bus stop. (You really gotta love Apple's "Find My Friends" app, as it made it easy for me to figure out when they'd be arriving.)
Next up, Stephanie will share how their day at Blizzard Beach went… But please stay tuned, as it might not happen until we get back from Hawaii. Aloha!
amberdc1987
To Infinity and Beyond!!
- Joined
- Feb 27, 2014
I am in love with your report. I can't wait to read more. Y'all have a great time in Hawaii. I hope we get to hear all about it also.
toystoryduo
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jun 13, 2003
Glad your team won the salsa challenge! 
Great pictures of the Boardwalk!
Hope you guys have a wonderful time in Hawaii!
Great pictures of the Boardwalk!
Hope you guys have a wonderful time in Hawaii!
PrincessInOz
Thanks for my avatar, Mary Jo!
- Joined
- Feb 8, 2010
Sorry about the hail damage. Hope it's all resolved now.
Happy Birthday, Pickle.
Enjoy Hawaii!
Love your pano shots!
Catch you when you pick this up again.
Happy Birthday, Pickle.
Enjoy Hawaii!
Love your pano shots!
Catch you when you pick this up again.
Yes, Lee's book remains one of leadership reference books. One of my part time roles before I retired was leadership coaching and training and I used a quote from his book in one of my training presentations. It became a bit of a funny story as I would always find a way to bring some reference to Disney into my leadership conversations.
Wishing you a wonderful vacation.
Congratulations on your team's salsa challenge win! I know you can't say much about your DI experience but it sounds like you are really enjoying it!
kelmac284
Lover of all things Disney since 1975
- Joined
- Jun 25, 2005
Ah I just got back from being gone for 2 weeks and now you all are going LOL. Glad to see I didn't miss too much. Seems like just one day of the trip so that is good. Loved the meet and greets that Stephanie and the kids did at Epcot. That is one of the biggest dissapointments I have in not going is I LOVE Baymax and have several Baymax items and I wanted to meet him so badly. I fear that by the time we finally go he will no longer be there. Joy and Sadness was cute too and would have loved to have met them as well. That is a bummer that so many rides were down but it sounds like you all made the best of it and had fun.
The training classes sound very interesting and fun. Looking forward to the next updates. We have only done one water park and that was Blizzard beach. We were going to go to Typhoon Lagoon this time but alas another thing that didn't happen and we like to go in the fall and I think it is usually on rehab at that time. But who knows. You never know what can happen.
I will admit that I am really missing DW and while I don't want to go again till all of the new things are built, with no real plans for a trip anytime soon it is tough. I have no idea HOW long it will be before we make it back and I feel like I am not even going to know what's going on anymore LOL.
As for our trip we had an AMAZING time. On the flight to Nashville we stopped in Denver and picked up a man who sat right in front of us. It turns out the CMT awards were when we were there and we had no idea. So the man in front of us was Doug Kershaw. He was a singer from the 60's I believe and it was fun listening to him talk and there were also some other people going to perform etc. We really loved Nashville and since we only had 1 day we did the Country Music Hall of Fame and just visited some other fun spots like the American Picker store and Centennial Park. The girls were able to find a spot on the red carpet and were able to see Luke Brian, Jason Aldean, Nicole Kidman, Vince Vaughn and some others. They were super excited and we loved the city. Our first night we also went to Opryland and had dinner and we loved it as well. We realized there is SO much more to see and we are already talking about a return trip. I am hoping if it works out to maybe see Rock City.
We also went to Dollywood which was super fun and very pretty and explored Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge which are your typical tourist type places like San Francisco etc. We also visited the Biltmore Estate in Asheville NC and that was really interesting. We spent a day in Atlanta and went to World of Coke which was super fun and also the Atlanta History Center but I am a HUGE Walking Dead fan and we didn't have time to do a tour but that is another on my list when we go back as well as some other items we missed. We then headed to Alabama and Mississippi and really enjoyed the Gulf Coast and our last city was New Orleans. We spent the most time there and really loved it although the heat and humdity was brutal. It was so cool seeing so much of the city that looked like New Orleans Square.
We had a GREAT time and we loved NO and hope to go again someday but we are already talking about a trip flying into Atlanta and doing a few more things there and then driving to Memphis to see Graceland, back to nashville to do a few things we missed and possibly Dollywood if we go over the Holidays. We would love to see it at Christmas and we didn't get to see a lot going only one day. We then would most likely drive to Charleston as we want to go back there and either leave out of there or possibly back to Atlanta.
No real plans for WHEN that will happen esp since the plan for now is to try and go to Europe next summer but it is def something on our list.
Anyway have a GREAT time at Aulani and can't wait to hear more on this report and of course eventually on the Aulani which is another on my bucket list.
The training classes sound very interesting and fun. Looking forward to the next updates. We have only done one water park and that was Blizzard beach. We were going to go to Typhoon Lagoon this time but alas another thing that didn't happen and we like to go in the fall and I think it is usually on rehab at that time. But who knows. You never know what can happen.
I will admit that I am really missing DW and while I don't want to go again till all of the new things are built, with no real plans for a trip anytime soon it is tough. I have no idea HOW long it will be before we make it back and I feel like I am not even going to know what's going on anymore LOL.
As for our trip we had an AMAZING time. On the flight to Nashville we stopped in Denver and picked up a man who sat right in front of us. It turns out the CMT awards were when we were there and we had no idea. So the man in front of us was Doug Kershaw. He was a singer from the 60's I believe and it was fun listening to him talk and there were also some other people going to perform etc. We really loved Nashville and since we only had 1 day we did the Country Music Hall of Fame and just visited some other fun spots like the American Picker store and Centennial Park. The girls were able to find a spot on the red carpet and were able to see Luke Brian, Jason Aldean, Nicole Kidman, Vince Vaughn and some others. They were super excited and we loved the city. Our first night we also went to Opryland and had dinner and we loved it as well. We realized there is SO much more to see and we are already talking about a return trip. I am hoping if it works out to maybe see Rock City.
We also went to Dollywood which was super fun and very pretty and explored Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge which are your typical tourist type places like San Francisco etc. We also visited the Biltmore Estate in Asheville NC and that was really interesting. We spent a day in Atlanta and went to World of Coke which was super fun and also the Atlanta History Center but I am a HUGE Walking Dead fan and we didn't have time to do a tour but that is another on my list when we go back as well as some other items we missed. We then headed to Alabama and Mississippi and really enjoyed the Gulf Coast and our last city was New Orleans. We spent the most time there and really loved it although the heat and humdity was brutal. It was so cool seeing so much of the city that looked like New Orleans Square.
We had a GREAT time and we loved NO and hope to go again someday but we are already talking about a trip flying into Atlanta and doing a few more things there and then driving to Memphis to see Graceland, back to nashville to do a few things we missed and possibly Dollywood if we go over the Holidays. We would love to see it at Christmas and we didn't get to see a lot going only one day. We then would most likely drive to Charleston as we want to go back there and either leave out of there or possibly back to Atlanta.
No real plans for WHEN that will happen esp since the plan for now is to try and go to Europe next summer but it is def something on our list.
Anyway have a GREAT time at Aulani and can't wait to hear more on this report and of course eventually on the Aulani which is another on my bucket list.
annegirl
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Mar 12, 2008
Loving this report! That leadership training sounds so cool. I am going to have to look into the book. And so cool you got to go to coffee with him! Amazing experience.
I just caught up on everything and can't wait to read more. Looks like such a fun trip.
I just caught up on everything and can't wait to read more. Looks like such a fun trip.
Disney Khaleesi
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Mar 11, 2014
I've been a longtime lurker on all your TRs, but just popping in to say that you're one of my favorite TR writers and that I love this report! I hope you have a great trip to Hawaii!
MarbleBob
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Aug 20, 2003
Hi all,
Thanks for all the comments and feedback. I'll respond after we get home and settled in.
In the meantime, were finishing up our last day at Aulani and head home tomorrow. It's been a wonderful two weeks in Hawaii, and Aulani was the icing on the cake. Such an amazing place!!! I'll start up a new TR for Hawaii an Aulani after I finish this one. In the meantime, here are a few photos from my phone and GoPro. See ya real soon!
Thanks for all the comments and feedback. I'll respond after we get home and settled in.
In the meantime, were finishing up our last day at Aulani and head home tomorrow. It's been a wonderful two weeks in Hawaii, and Aulani was the icing on the cake. Such an amazing place!!! I'll start up a new TR for Hawaii an Aulani after I finish this one. In the meantime, here are a few photos from my phone and GoPro. See ya real soon!
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