“All Aboard the Seven Dwarfs Whine Train!” A May 2015/Mother's Day TR! ***TR COMPLETED 2/8!!!

[princessesandpascal]

It's taken me a little while to find time to put up another chapter, but finally I got the chance! School's really ramping up so I'm going to do what I can to get a lot of it pre-written, so I can finish it up in a timely fashion. Since it's been a while, I decided to do an extra-long chapter this time.

Also, exciting news (somewhat): my best friend and I have officially started planning a WDW Graduation Trip for Early Summer 2016! We aren't sure if we're going to be able to go with finances and work dates and the actual graduation ceremonies and finishing finals at different times at different schools, but we're going forward with planning and are hoping that by Christmas we'll know for sure if the trip is a go or not. She's never been to WDW, and I'd love to be with her for her first time there. We've been wanting to go together for years! Anyway, on with the next chapter!

Chapter 17: “Baymax, that’s CHEATING!”, or, Toy Story Gets a Redemption Arc, I Meet a Certain Fist-Bumping Robot, and We Embark on the Search For the Best Mac and Cheese EVER.
Day Five: May 8, 2015.

We started our fifth day in Walt Disney World by SLEEPING IN. And by that, we meant an extra hour of sleep, since there were no more EMHs in the morning for us, but we're still us, so naturally we were still getting there for park opening. After four days in a row of getting up for 8am openings, we were so happy to get that extra hour. Even though we had officially passed the halfway point of our Disney vacation, we were in high spirits with big plans!

But first, breakfast. We stopped at Everything Pop for our usual breakfast of waffles, meat, and strawberries. Since we were in the food court a bit later than normal, we got to watch the Twist!

And also watched all the confused guests just trying to go buy their breakfasts while CMs twisted around them.

After eating, we headed out and hopped on a Hollywood Studios bus, ready to finish up what we hadn’t done yesterday!

This was originally a day that capped off with an evening at Epcot for EMH, but we opted to switch our parks for Friday night and Saturday morning. Our new plans would now send us to the Magic Kingdom that night, and Epcot the next morning. After our slightly bummer EMH morning at Epcot back on Day 2, we were both in agreeance that we didn’t want to deal with the crowds of EMH and would rather have a fresh morning to give the park another chance.

On our AK day’s afternoon break, we’d rescheduled our dinner at Via Napoli to a lunch for Saturday, changed our Epcot FPs for Friday night to ones at the MK (for Splash, Buzz, and BTMRR) and we were excited that somehow, even on the fly, all of our plans had worked out. We were back in business!

But before we got to either of those parks, we had plans for one more morning at DHS! Our main goal was to meet Hiro and Baymax, since Big Hero 6 is one of my all-time favourite Disney movies. We also wanted one more ride on TSM and to try and see one of the shows, do some shopping, and drop in to see the Monsters’ Inc characters. (The more I write this TR, the more I realize that we spent a ton of time in character meets. Those were some of our best trip memories, so I regret NOTHING.)

We got to the Studios just before the park opened, and found ourselves in a surprisingly fast-moving queue into the park. Once we were let in, we high tailed it to Toy Story: we wanted our second chance, darn it!

As we made our way there, a group of women a bit older than me were totally trying to out-speed-walk us to the gates of TSMM. Just as we were about to arrive, they brushed past us and into the queue. We were disappointed to have ‘lost’ (again, we are highly competitive), but then when we arrived at the stairs, the CM was bringing parties of only two into the right side of the queue, so we essentially walked right onto the ride.

And resisted the urge to say ha-HA! WE EMERGED VICTORIOUS.

We didn’t wait very long before we were on the ride. It went perfectly this time, no bugs at all! Whatever ghost haunts TSMM must have been in a good mood, either that or George from Pirates had just been visiting the night before. Here are our scores (I’m on the left):

After a round on Toy Story, the line was already too long for comfort, so we headed right to the Animation Building to see how long the line was for Big Hero 6.

It was about 20 after 9, and Hiro and Baymax appeared at 10:30. There was only one family in line, so we decided to do an animation class before getting in line ourselves. We were escorted quickly into the room with not much wait, where we had a great artist that wanted to find a character no one had done. He quickly polled the room and found that no one had done Pooh, Dale, or Eeyore. The room voted, and we ended up drawing Dale!

(Again, the drawings are at my parents’ house! I’ll include them in the souvenir roundup post at the end of the TR.)

Once we finished with our drawings, we went out to get in the line for BH6. By that point, we were maybe 10 families back, but we didn’t have to deal with the line for quite as long as we would have earlier. We arrived just in time, as not long after we got in line, tons of groups started pouring in. By the time Hiro and Baymax came out, the wait was already at an hour. It took us about 40 minutes in line, but we had accomplished most of what we’d wanted to do by then, so we didn’t mind much.

There was plenty to see in the waiting area, anyways.

Also, Mom remembered to get a photo of the super cute Baymax bow I’d made before we left:

Finally, we were up next.

(I had to go back to our vacation video in an attempt to transcribe the exact conversation because it is definitely one of the best character interactions I’ve ever had in all my years of being the oldest person in a character line. I’d share the video, but most conversation is drowned out by a ridiculously loud recording of Immortals by Fall Out Boy.)

Hiro bounced right up and started talking a mile a minute. “Hey, I have a question for you!” He announced as I awkwardly shuffled alongside him toward Baymax.

“Sure,” I replied. “What is it?”

“Have you played that Toy Story thing, the one down the road, over there?” Hiro asked. I nodded. “So I was playing that with Baymax the other night, right? And you see Baymax’s eyes? They’re equipped with hyper-beams and [some kind of other scientific words that got drowned out by Fall Out Boy]. They mess with the infrared in the game and they made me lose a whole bunch points off my score!”

At this point, Baymax walks right up to me, and proceeds to blink a foot from my face.

“Well, that’s funny,” I added, after Baymax shuffled away again. “Because we went on it the other night, and we went right past the first game, and then our cannons didn’t work.”

“Baymax!” Hiro shouted. “That’s cheating!”

Hiro and I apparently then had more indeciferable babble that I think was something along the lines of how Baymax has a tough time fitting into and out of the ride car and should be kept away from all competitive Disney rides in general. Baymax shuffled around and blinked and raised his arms and was SO CUTE.

We of course, had to take our photo then.

And in the spirit of Honey Lemon, I made sure to get a selfie in.

And meeting Baymax wouldn’t be complete without a fist bump and a big hug. (He was very inflatable, but didn’t feel like plastic like it seems he would. He’s very soft.) With a quick wave goodbye to Hiro and Baymax, we were finally out of there. I felt a little bad for taking so much time with our long chat about Toy Story, but we didn’t take 80 variations of a group shot with an extended family, so I suppose everything worked out okay. I’m so disappointed that they’re gone now, and I seriously hope with everything in my heart that there’s a permanent home for Hiro and Baymax in Disney very soon. (PUT THEM IN INNOVENTIONS. I DON’T GET WHY NOBODY’S USING BH6 IN EPCOT. IT’S THE EPITOME OF FUTURE WORLD.)

After a lovely visit in San Fransokyo, we decided it was time for a San Fran-snack-y-o. (The fact that it’s been this long without a pun that bad is something you all should be thankful for.) On our way out of the Animation Courtyard, we grabbed a Photopass shot.

Then the photographer said he was doing a magic shot. And this is what showed up.

IN WHAT WORLD DOES THIS MAGIC SHOT MAKE ANY SENSE? I'M NOT EVEN IN THE PHOTO ANYMORE!

Back to our San-Fran-Snack-Y-O, we opted for Starring Rolls.

It’s the morning, but it’s also vacation, so a cupcake sounds legit. Butterfinger, please!

This was HEAVENLY. Rich chocolate cupcake with a thick layer of frosting and butterfinger topping all over it. (That description is from me watching too much Food Network.) Sign me up. We opted to share it while figuring out our plans. We were in an unfortunate time of morning where it was really close to two different shows starting, that we wouldn’t be able to make without rushing our cupcake snack. We ended up going show-less. We were between Indy and Beauty and the Beast, and we also weren’t feeling an outdoor show when it was steadily approaching noon.

(Did I mention it was freaking hot? It was freaking hot. It got hotter and hotter as the trip went on.)

We sat and enjoyed our cupcake and water for a while, and then decided to just wander for a bit. DHS is a weird park for us, since I have a sensitivity to both G-force (ruling out RNR) and Star Tours, apparently. (I rode it in ‘06, ‘07 and ‘09 and all three times experienced a headache and nausea afterwards. I’ve made an executive choice to not try it again for a while.) Neither of us are big on drops for ToT, so DHS leaves us with a lot of wandering and seeing the little things: shopping, a few characters, a couple shows, and enjoying the little pieces of Disney magic in the Streets of America.

As we headed out in that direction, we got distracted. By, you guessed it, the chipmunks. Again. I think we set a personal chipmunk record for this trip. But it was super cute anyways.

Except for when a clearly non-English speaking family pushed their kid toward the ‘munks without waiting in line while I was walking up to them as well. Awkward. Both a CM and Chip both very effectively handled this, while Dale and I looked at each other as he held his hands up to his mouth as if to say, “Oops?”

We had a quick visit, and were on our way. I told them they looked very classy, which was very true.


(continued in next post)​

 

[princessesandpascal]

As we looped around near the backlot, we stumbled upon Mike and Sulley, and since I was eight years old when Monsters Inc was released, I had an immediate desire to hop in the quite short line. They had to break after a few minutes, and I was standing on the outer edge of the line. As Sulley walked out for his break, he turned a few steps past me and jumped back at me, arms up as if to roar, about a foot from my face. Much to the amusement of the small children waiting in line with us.


(I may have screamed a tiny bit.)


(I totally screamed a tiny bit.)


Once I recovered from that incident, Mike and Sulley were magically back from their break, with no recollection of their little moment of scream collection. Back to the theming! Which is absolutely fantastic in this area. It's just as good in the Laugh Floor waiting area.

And so they put that thing back where it came from...

The detail here is underrated for sure. I love it way too much!

While we were waiting, the family behind us seemed to think that we weren’t entitled to wait in line for characters, and the mother of the two little kids behind us took great pleasure in repeatedly and purposely hitting us with her stroller. Whenever we looked back, she gave us a Look and let her kids continue to wreak havoc in our general personal space.

I understand that characters are for kids, but I just hate the way that adults can be treated in line. As an adult, I try to keep my moments with characters pretty quick, and unless they decided to engage with me in a slightly longer moment (here’s lookin’ at you, Hiro), I’m usually in and out quick enough for it to not make much of a difference that I’m there at all. But Mike and Sulley are staples of most millenials’ childhoods, so I held my ground because I wanted my hug, darn it.

After a quick wave goodbye before the kids behind us descended onto Mike and Sulley, we ascended the heck outta there. The Streets were waiting! Welcome to fake New York! It’s been waiting for me!

We stopped pretty suddenly at Cinderella’s carriage, took one look at the line, and said NOPE. I opted for the illegal version.

We found ourselves closer and closer to the Muppets again again, and who could pass up the opportunity for more puns and cheap 3D tricks? Not us, that’s for sure. It was unanimous: more MAAA-ppets!

Wait a second: Mom! Phineas and Ferb have no line! Quick detour time: I’ve never seen their line shorter than 20 minutes, so walking up and waiting five was a huge treat. This cartoon is brilliant, but on a side note, I’d love to see Gravity Falls repped in the parks as well, though. Mabel and Dipper are my faves and I caught episodes of Falls every morning during our trip. But P&F are pretty cool too.

Alright: NOW it’s time for MAA-ppets.

As it was the day before, it was hilarious. The effects in this are definitely outdated but it’s such a classic. I’d love the new movies and new TV show to allow this one a quick overhaul to just modern it up a little bit, but keeping a lot of the silliness of the 3D show that I love. It’s just so ridiculous. I adore it.

We browsed the gift shop afterwards. Mom thought these were hilarious:

Back to the Streets!

(continued in next post)​

 

[princessesandpascal]

I then spotted an entire shop of Avengers merchandise, so I beelined for it. One of the best shop names in all of Disney, IMHO:

You can see me and my crooked Baymax bow speedwalking my way toward it. I ended up purchasing the white Avengers tee:

It’s so comfy and I wear it all the time now. There was another one (the black one I'm holding) that I also liked, mainly because it had Black Widow on it and when does that ever happen? But ultimately, the simple Avengers look won out.

After a spur-of-the-moment purchase, we finished up in the Streets. It was getting close to being time for lunch! We knew exactly where we were headed, and what kinds of treasures were awaiting us inside that white boat...

We’d heard about a CS place while browsing menus on AllEars that had special mac and cheese, so we knew this was going to be our lunch place: Min and Bill’s Dockside Diner!

We barely needed any time to look at the menu. We knew what we were going for.

Mom got the buffalo chicken mac and cheese (minus the blue cheese topping), while I opted for the pulled pork mac and cheese with onion strings. Then we saw the special that was advertised, and decided to split a churro milkshake.

They were all SO good. The buffalo chicken was a bit spicy for me, but the pulled pork was delicious. The churro shake was cinnamon-y and delicious. As long as they don’t get rid of the mac and cheese, this will be a definite re-visit in future trips. We were so satisfied!

Also, I saw a very tiny bird that I wanted to document for some reason. Quality trip report writing!

We decided after our lunch to head out, since we were both kind of tired and really wanted a nap before our night at MK. On our way out, we spotted Stitch with no line, and figured we could get our cute backpack picture now since we missed it at Ohana.

Of course, Stitch went above and beyond, and offered to sign my backpack through a little game of charades. The CM had a sharpie with her and he signed the little pocket! I was very pumped. And then we had to pose it up.


After leaving Stitch, we headed out for our break. The Studios isn’t our favourite park by any means, but we did have plenty of great memories there this trip. With the closing of Animation Academy, we doubt we’ll spend much time there next trip at all.


We caught the bus and were soon seeing this…

It was time for a well-deserved nap!

Up Next: Chapter 17! “They taste better when they’re free!” Pirates, Fireworks, and Something is Closed… a Night at MK!
​

 

[nilla]

Awesome update! Agree 100% on "Youse Guys Moychindice" being one of the best shop names in all of WDW. That accent always cracks me up. Love it on the Great Movie Ride, too!

Your TR makes me wish we waited to meet Baymax and Hiro. Hopefully there will be an opportunity in the future. The Baymax magic shot is...interesting.

We also completely missed the gimmicked mac & cheese. We'll have to look for that next year.

Mike W. is my favorite character costume in all of WDW. Kristin asked one year if he signs autographs, to which he raised his arms to indicate, "yeah, these hands don't really work like that."

Dylan says Phineas and Ferb has gone downhill in recent years, but I haven't seen it in forever, so I have no opinion either way. I do love the older episodes, though. "Squirt that gelatin monster" won me over, I think.

Fantastic TR! Can't wait to read more. Yes, I realize I always say that, then wait a day or two after you update to read more. So I guess I can wait. Anyway...

Good luck on making that summer '16 trip happen!

 

[KathyM2]

DHS is a weird park for us, since I have a sensitivity to both G-force (ruling out RNR) and Star Tours, apparently. (I rode it in ‘06, ‘07 and ‘09 and all three times experienced a headache and nausea afterwards. I’ve made an executive choice to not try it again for a while.) Neither of us are big on drops for ToT, so DHS leaves us with a lot of wandering and seeing the little things: shopping, a few characters, a couple shows, and enjoying the little pieces of Disney magic in the Streets of America.

I could have written that myself. I'm so glad you had such a good time at DHS and managed to enjoy so much time there despite not liking a lot of the rides - I was a bit concerned that DD and I wouldn't be able to fill a whole day there, but you seem to be able to do it no problem.

Min and Bill’s Dockside Diner!

I hadn't heard about this place...gonna go check it out!!

The churro shake was cinnamon-y and delicious.

That sound heavenly!!

 

[princessesandpascal]

Awesome update! Agree 100% on "Youse Guys Moychindice" being one of the best shop names in all of WDW. That accent always cracks me up. Love it on the Great Movie Ride, too!

Your TR makes me wish we waited to meet Baymax and Hiro. Hopefully there will be an opportunity in the future. The Baymax magic shot is...interesting.

We also completely missed the gimmicked mac & cheese. We'll have to look for that next year.

Mike W. is my favorite character costume in all of WDW. Kristin asked one year if he signs autographs, to which he raised his arms to indicate, "yeah, these hands don't really work like that."

Dylan says Phineas and Ferb has gone downhill in recent years, but I haven't seen it in forever, so I have no opinion either way. I do love the older episodes, though. "Squirt that gelatin monster" won me over, I think.

Fantastic TR! Can't wait to read more. Yes, I realize I always say that, then wait a day or two after you update to read more. So I guess I can wait. Anyway...

Good luck on making that summer '16 trip happen!

Thanks! My roommate in first year was a huge Disney fan, and once told me that when she was on GMR with her brother, the mobster had a terrible accent and over pronounced everything which made a great scene even greater!

They were really fun. I hope they make a comeback at some point!

As long as Disney doesn't pull a Pecos Bills and change the menu, you definitely should! It's so good.

I admittedly haven't watched it recently, but loved it when it first came out.

Thanks! We are going forward with it until we're stopped.

I could have written that myself. I'm so glad you had such a good time at DHS and managed to enjoy so much time there despite not liking a lot of the rides - I was a bit concerned that DD and I wouldn't be able to fill a whole day there, but you seem to be able to do it no problem.

I hadn't heard about this place...gonna go check it out!!

That sound heavenly!!

Now that Animation Academy and its building are gone, I doubt we'll be spending that much time there anymore. It was a lot of fun, but I don't think it's a two-time park anymore unfortunately. They need to start putting things into the places where they've closed things down.

It's so good! We didn't know it existed till this year.

It was!!

 

[princessesandpascal]

Happy Thanksgiving to all my fellow Canadians!

Chapter Eighteen! “They taste better when they’re free!” Pirates, Fireworks, and Something is Closed… a Night at MK!
Day Five: May 8, 2015

Where we last left off, we were settling down with Disney channel playing in the background to take a well-deserved nap after our morning at the Studios. We hadn’t done much, but had done plenty of walking and the heat was tiring us out big time! After sleeping for a couple hours, we woke up refreshed and ready to hit the MK for the night.

It was dinnertime when we woke up and we were pretty starved, so we decided to grab dinner at Everything Pop. I don’t remember what we got. A pizza slice, maybe? Some chicken? Who knows? (I sure don’t.) We had eaten and were just about to leave since it was just before 6, and we had FPs at Splash from 6:10-7:10. Suddenly, I get a notification on my phone as we’re finishing up.

THIS notification. (I took the screenshot on the bus ride, hence it being 6:30.)

Splash was down, so we had a FP we could use wherever we wanted all night. We were pretty fine with this, so we headed out to the bus stop feeling pumped for the night. We got right on an empty bus and expected to head out… but then we waited. And waited. Squeezed on roughly 8 million people. Added at least two scooters which condensed the 8 million people even closer.

But eventually, they stopped jamming people on like sardines and we were on our way!

Since we had our “any attraction” FPs, and we weren’t interested in waiting until Splash decided it was done having its tantrum, we decided to use them on the moderately long line for Haunted Mansion. Pretty good decision overall: we were happy to get on a ride right away, and apparently took no pictures.

After that, we needed a quick washroom break, so BACK TO TANGLED. As always.

Checking my phone after our break, I realized it was time for our BTMRR FP very soon, so we started making our way to Frontierland. Along the way, we passed by Tiana and Naveen, who waved as they walked by and seemed lovely as usual.

Getting waved at by a princess never gets old.

By the time we made our way back to Frontierland, our FP window had started, so we moseyed on in.

We don’t end up around BTMRR a lot, but every time we ride it it’s a ton of fun. Noisy and rough, but fun nonetheless.

After the ride, we headed back through Adventureland. While there, we stumbled upon Captain Jack’s Pirate Adventure Extravaganza (or whatever the Actual title is) and decided to participate in a treasure hunt. We headed into the cabin and got our assignment from a nice and chipper pirate.

The clues took us all over Adventureland, into the Pirates gift shop, around the corner of the buildings. The missions were super interactive, looking at my Blackbeard map from this mission I can see we went XYZ. We still prefer Sorcerers, I think, but it was fun. We ended up doing the other two missions later in the trip.

On that note, we decided to pick up on our Sorcerer’s game from Tuesday, since they sent us to Adventureland. I also spent a good 20 minutes trying to find the portal we were meant to go to. If I remember correctly, we got the Aladdin mission, which was slightly a bummer, because I always hope for the Emperor’s New Groove one. Yzma is the best.

(Mom’s camera battery ran out about now, so pictures are mostly from my camera and iPhone and are pretty scarce.)

At the end of our mission, Mom decided she wanted a Dole Whip. They aren’t my favourite, so I passed, since I was hoping for a cream cheese pretzel from Lunching Pad in Tomorrowland. But here she is with her prize...

Instead of crossing through the Hub, since everyone was lined up for MSEP, we waded through the crowds from Liberty Square, into Fantasyland, pausing to take pictures of Tangled again…

Until we made it to Tomorrowland. And to my PRETZEL. We happy walked up to the booth, only to find that it closed… ten minutes ago.

I dropped to the ground and wailed, NOOOOOOOO…. okay, I didn’t, actually. I probably dramatically held my hand to my forehead and said my life was ruined. However, since we had FP for Buzz, I got over it pretty darn quickly.

And of course, the ride photos once again weren’t working. Zurg zapped away at least half of our photos from this trip. So annoying.

We went over to the Stitch FP machines and made a FP for the Speedway. To pass the time, we decided to hop on the TTA, just as Wishes was starting! We’ve done this a few times and it’s really cool to come flying out of the building and see the fireworks over the castle. We don’t love huge crowds, so Main Street has never happened for us yet.

LOOK HOW BEAUTIFUL.

By the time we got off the ride, Wishes were still happening, so we watched the rest from Rockettower Plaza.

This is one of my favourite photos from the trip.

After Wishes ended, we went over to the Speedway for our FP+!

As usual, I steered myself directly into the side of the track multiple times as they tried to correct me to the right side. But I managed not to ram directly into the back of Mom’s car. Success.

We didn’t know where to go next, so we made our way up toward Storybook Circus. The lights and music were especially cool at night, and as we walked in, a CM popped out from behind the pretzel cart, her hands full of large Mickey pretzels. “Would you folks like a pretzel? We have to give them away since the park is closing soon!”

FREE PRETZELS!

We accepted with tons of thank yous and sat ourselves on the wall nearby to eat, while watching the friendly CM give pretzels to other guests who passed by. They were delicious. I think everything tastes better when it’s free.

After our pretzels, we walked up through New Fantasyland, and decided to pop in and see Enchanted Tales with Belle. I wanted to see the mirror effects and Maurice’s cottage, so we headed in to wait. Naturally, being the responsible 21 year old adult I am, I touched every decoration around us.

We waited about 20 minutes, and then the kids were being chosen for their roles. (The little girl playing the Beast was too precious!) The show was cute, and Lumiere and the mirror were both very impressive, but this was a one time thing for us. If we had kids with us, it’d be a must-do, but I’m glad we went in to see the effects because they were gorgeously done. I think Walt would absolutely love this attraction.

We decided to head back to the room after ETWB, and caught a glimmer of MSEP on the way. We’d stop to watch it another night, so we were happy to scoot by and take a couple photos on the way.

We waited very briefly at the bus stop, and before we knew it, were falling into our pillows, exhausted from a very full day!

Up Next: Chapter Eighteen! “THERE’S NOT ENOUGH TIME!” Racecars and Saving the World at Epcot!​

 

[nilla]

Never thought to ride the PeopleMover during Wishes! Sounds like a great idea. Closest thing to this we ever got was busting through the doors on Test Track during Illuminations, which was really cool.

You are probably the first person I've ever heard about getting an FP for the Speedway

 

[princessesandpascal]

Never thought to ride the PeopleMover during Wishes! Sounds like a great idea. Closest thing to this we ever got was busting through the doors on Test Track during Illuminations, which was really cool.

You are probably the first person I've ever heard about getting an FP for the Speedway

We've done it on most of our trips! The only thing that isn't great about it is the roof-thing over top of the track that blocks a lot of it. Requires some maneuvering.

We picked it up once or twice as our fourth or fifth FP, just to bypass the 10 minutes or so to get on. Mostly we just took it when nothing else we wanted was available!

 

[princessesandpascal]

I'm going full speed ahead on the next few updates to wrap this TR up! I'm getting into dangerously busy territory which is why it's been so embarrassingly long between updates. I'm trying to get the entire TR written (I just have the last day to write) and then I can get updates out to try and wrap this by the middle of November! I've lost a lot of people by letting this go for so long so we're working on it! Here comes Day 6, part one...

Chapter Nineteen: “THERE’S NOT ENOUGH TIME!” Racecars and Saving the World at Epcot!
Day 6: May 9, 2015

We woke up on Saturday morning bright and ready for a morning at Epcot! We tried not to think about the fact that we would be headed home in just a couple days, and focused on all the time we still had in the Happiest Place on Earth. We wanted to make park opening again, but were far more relaxed about it than we were before. We made our way down to grab a quick bite to eat before hopping a bus to Epcot.

We ended up getting there 10-15 minutes after opening, but we were fine with that. Our first stop when we arrived was Test Track!

We hadn’t gotten to ride this since its makeover, so we were cautiously optimistic. I missed the crash test dummies vibe the ride used to have, but it was a lot less loud in line so I was happy about that. We waited maybe fifteen minutes before getting to the Design-A-Car station.

Of course, since I had no idea how the machine worked, and also didn’t pay attention to the time, I spent four minutes and thirty seconds out of my five minutes attempting to shape my car. I spent the next thirty seconds making it the perfect shade of purple. Then the timer ran out and it didn’t accept the flames I’d put on the sides.

WE HAD A NAKED PURPLE CAR.

Luckily the car didn’t make the ride any less fun. I wonder what it's like not to have hair that's nearly as long as Rapunzel's on this ride. It's probably more fun when you're not frantically trying to hold it in place so it doesn't smack whoever's next to you in the face.

We checked the line and it was at 20 minutes, so we went again. (It was not 20 minutes. I tracked the wait time for Lines and it was 37.) We also had the fortune of a huge party in front of us who did not know the concept of a) personal space and b) keeping your entire party together and not having them wandering about into said personal space.

But this time I knew how the car-building worked and we got a lovely turquoise car with flames down the side and little jet things on it. BEAUTIFUL.

I think the flames made it go even faster, personally.

That car did a bit better. It was the fastest in our vehicle, but nowhere near good enough to be on the actual leaderboard. After the ride, we were hanging out in the post-show area and decided to explore it. We took photos in every single photo booth. With the photoshopped aliens, fireworks, and all.

You’re waiting for the photos, right? Well, they aren’t there. I forgot to save them in the fluster of activity after getting home, and they were deleted after 30 days. Trust me when I say they were hilarious. I’m talking me leaning into the window halfway with my legs kicking out, laying on the bench, trying to jump but failing, pretending to scream and run away from the aliens. They were gold. I was so disappointed when I tried to go fetch them for this update, but then I had to remind myself that sometimes a memory has to be just a memory.

I do wish we had photos to remember it with, but we do have this one that we took.

It was one of our trip highlights. We laughed so hard and were probably a ridiculous spectacle. And luckily we still have the memories of how much fun it was!

After finishing up in Test Track, our next stop was Habit Heroes!

We were looking forward to this since both Where’s the Fire and The Great Piggy Bank Adventure, two of our Innoventions staples, had been removed only a week before our vacation. We decided something had to fill the competitive void those games left in us, though it was hard to muster that we had to work together instead of lunge after victory. We had just missed the previous group, so we had a bit of a wait, but we had nowhere else to go. We were happy to stand and chat with the nice CM, Ed (who had a blue tag which shows that he’s gone above and beyond as a CM), and the nice family from Jacksonville with two teenage girls who came to the queue not long after we did. After a few minutes and recruiting a family of four with two little boys, we got to go in!

This was SO much fun. We had a really great group that got super into all of the games and everyone was helping each other out exactly like Disney had intended when they created the attraction. The last game, where you tap the cards on the touch-pads to protect the cities, was easily the most fun. We had an amazing time and it was fun doing it as a big group. Definitely something I’d love to do again in the future!

After saving the world from bad habits, we decided to head over to the World Showcase. But first, Photopass!

Also at some point we grabbed an Agent P mission for the UK. I remembered loving these back in 2012, so I really wanted to do just one more this trip.

We briefly passed through Canada with the intention to come back (we didn’t end up coming back, but I suppose considering where we’re from we did return to an authentic Canada, minus the lumberjacks and Martin Short.)

In the UK, I embarked on my mission, while Mom played photographer.

Honestly, I remembered where the dump box was and put the phone in there halfway through the mission. It was a) hot and b) boring, the spark from Agent P is just gone for me now. I think once you’ve done them all it’s just not as fun anymore. Besides, we had places to be… and moved on to Mitsukoshi!

This store is HEAVEN. I love Pokemon, so we all know where I was headed immediately.

I ended up purchasing a Fennekin for myself and a sleeping Pikachu plush for my best friend (translation: cute fire-fox for myself, sleeping yellow Pokemon mascot for my best friend), but I bought them after our lunch at Via Napoli because I needed time to think about whether I wanted Fennekin or Chespin. That’s the kind of adult I’ve become.

We left the shop to watch the drummer for a few minutes before lunch.

It was drawing close to our lunch, so we walked on over!

Up Next: Chapter Nineteen! “This Water Costs WHAT?”, or, Lunch at Via Napoli!​

 

[nilla]

We feel the same way about Agent P...though we haven't played since it was still Kim Possible. Once is enough for us, though I did get a thrill out of seeing Agent P in the motor boat in Japan this year.

I also love Habit Heroes, and agree that the last mission is the best one. It's tough not telling the little kids who are in there with you to step aside and let the pros handle it, though.

Dylan used to have to buy at least one Pokémon plush every trip. Then, I would feel the need to get artistic with it:



Great photos by Mom!

Awesome update, as usual. Looking forward to the mega-post finale!

 

[KathyM2]

Great update as usual. It's funny because people keep talking about Via Napoli and I didn't get a chance to go. There is a place that I saw an ad for just today, in Toronto, called Viva Napoli and I'm thinking I may try it because...maybe it is as good as Epcot lol

 

[BigAlsGal]

Loving your thread!!

 

[Disneymoon09]

Love the TR! What's your Liner chat name? I love Lines, it's my go to for WDW info/questions!

 

[princessesandpascal]

We feel the same way about Agent P...though we haven't played since it was still Kim Possible. Once is enough for us, though I did get a thrill out of seeing Agent P in the motor boat in Japan this year.

I also love Habit Heroes, and agree that the last mission is the best one. It's tough not telling the little kids who are in there with you to step aside and let the pros handle it, though.

Dylan used to have to buy at least one Pokémon plush every trip. Then, I would feel the need to get artistic with it:



Great photos by Mom!

Awesome update, as usual. Looking forward to the mega-post finale!

Exactly! The kids just aren't as fast as us. The world's safety is at stake here, people!

I burst out laughing at that photo! Perfect use of a new little Giratina. I love it!

Thank you! I actually just wrapped the text of the TR, so I just have to post the last couple days. It's definitely drawing to a close, which is bittersweet.

Great update as usual. It's funny because people keep talking about Via Napoli and I didn't get a chance to go. There is a place that I saw an ad for just today, in Toronto, called Viva Napoli and I'm thinking I may try it because...maybe it is as good as Epcot lol

Thank you! That's hilarious, might as well go for it! Via Napoli is one we've tried to hit a couple times and finally got to it. It was definitely worth it.

Loving your thread!!

Thank you!

Love the TR! What's your Liner chat name? I love Lines, it's my go to for WDW info/questions!

Thank you! I don't really use the chat, actually. I just update the wait times when I can!

 

[princessesandpascal]

Chapter Twenty! “This Water Costs WHAT?”, or, Lunch at Via Napoli!

When we last left off, we were approaching the check-in station at Via Napoli for our lunch reservation! We checked in and were seated relatively quickly. This was a new restaurant for us, and our first two realizations were a) it smelled AMAZING, and b) it was LOUD. Everything echoed off the tile floor and the walls and it was incredibly noisy. But this is Disney: we expect noise always.

As we were sitting the waiter said something in a thick-yet-very-attractive accent that I didn’t quite understand, so I nodded and said yes. (This is, for the record, a TERRIBLE thing to do in life.) In our case, this involved each of us getting a delicious glass of strawberry water in addition to normal water. (Something that I thought was a good decision.)

Our waitress came over soon after: I’m assuming the chef showed up as well, but I don’t remember anything specific about his presence. It was probably just a “use your brain and don’t order the canteloupe pizza, you silly tourist with a weird allergy” scenario. We made our choice pretty quickly: arancini for our appetizer and the quattro formaggi pizza to share. I thought Mom would’ve wanted a fancier pizza but she really wanted just cheese. She did ask if we could have the red sauce on it rather than just cheese, which was really good.

We soon realized that while our waitress was nice enough, it was the nearby busboy, Daniele, who made the meal special for us. He was very attentive and kind, checking in on if we needed anything even more than our waitress did. He was lovely to have around!

Almost as lovely as THIS ARANCINI.

This was absolutely delicious! I’d had arancini before when my university’s dance club had their end-of-recital banquet at the local Italian place, but Mom had never tried it. She was skeptical about cheesy fried risotto balls, but I converted her. So amazing!

And of course, this bad boy showed up.

This was the first time I’d ever had to eat pizza with a knife and fork because there was so much sauce and cheese on that crust that it was falling apart! It was some of the best pizza I’ve ever had. So fresh and flavourful! AND IT WAS HUGE.

After finishing an impressive portion of the pizza and consuming some normal water, we got our bill, and I came to the horrified realization that the guy that had seated us and offered us that strawberry water failed to mention that IT COST SIX DOLLARS A GLASS. SIX DOLLARS. FOR WATER WITH STRAWBERRIES FLOATING IN IT. SIX FLIPPING DOLLARS.

(For the rest of the day I kept repeating “six dollars? six dollars for water???”)

Via Napoli: Final Thoughts

Food: 10/10. We are still raving about this pizza!!! The Arancini was the highlight though, so delicious.
Service: 8/10. Our waitress was nice but hardly even showed up at our table. The busboy, Daniele, was much more attentive and we loved him. Also, SIX DOLLAR WATER. (This didn’t actually affect the service score, I just needed to mention it again.) Daniele would not have given us six dollar water.
Atmosphere: 7/10. Very cool, but very noisy. We could barely hear each other over the table.

Overall: 8/10
Will we be back?: Absolutely!! This is one of our new favourite places in Disney!

After lunch, we just headed back to the room to rest up before our big EMH night at the Magic Kingdom! First, however, we needed to go back to Mitsukoshi.

We also decided to get a pistachio baklava in Morocco. We intended to take it back to the room with us, but then apparently they didn’t have to-go containers, so we had to eat it right then, which was SUCH a hardship. It was delicious. And only one bite of dessert. And we didn’t get dessert at Via Napoli, so it was fine. It’s vacation!

We stood with a gorgeous view while we ate it, at some of those little tables by the water.

We wandered our way out of the park and soon were hitting up the resort for a good, long nap!

Up Next: Chapter 20! “She Bought TWELVE Pretzels?!”, or, We Begin Our Marathon Magic Kingdom Night with Princesses and Disappointment!​

 

[KathyM2]

Great update! VN is definitely on my list of places to try next time!

 

[401Disney]

I'm all caught up!!!!!

I have to say that your interaction with stitch made me smile so much. When I went to Disney for my 25th birthday I met stitch in Tomorrowland and I had my birthday button on and he saw it and asked me how old I was so I told him. Then he proceeded to mock me and pretend to be an old man!!! It was hilarious!!! Then when we went to take pictures with him he kept putting his hands up into mine and my wife's faces!! He is easily one of my favorite characters to meet. I think he's tied at the top with Gaston for sure.

That pizza you guys grabbed at Via Napoli looks so delicious!!! I miss that place. I agree tho 6 bucks for water with strawberries in it is highway robbery for sure.

 

[princessesandpascal]

Great update! VN is definitely on my list of places to try next time!

Thanks! It was delicious!

I'm all caught up!!!!!

I have to say that your interaction with stitch made me smile so much. When I went to Disney for my 25th birthday I met stitch in Tomorrowland and I had my birthday button on and he saw it and asked me how old I was so I told him. Then he proceeded to mock me and pretend to be an old man!!! It was hilarious!!! Then when we went to take pictures with him he kept putting his hands up into mine and my wife's faces!! He is easily one of my favorite characters to meet. I think he's tied at the top with Gaston for sure.

That pizza you guys grabbed at Via Napoli looks so delicious!!! I miss that place. I agree tho 6 bucks for water with strawberries in it is highway robbery for sure.

Thanks for following along! Stitch always is one of the best characters to meet. So funny and he always does some kind of antic to make ti special! Gaston is fun as well, we did meet him on this trip as well.

It was! The pizza was great and the water was absurd.

 

[princessesandpascal]

Who's ready for a big update!? (I decided to combine both halves of our MK EMH night since the Via Napoli update was so tiny! Enjoy!)

Chapter 20: “She Bought TWELVE Pretzels?!”, or, Our Marathon Magic Kingdom EMH Night
with Princesses, Disappointment, Rude Guests, Even More Princesses, and Unidentified Roaches!

Where we last left off, we were taking our pre-MK afternoon nap. That night was 2am EMH and we intended to close out: we ended up getting pretty darn close to closing the park out, and we would have if not for an Incident that we will get to at the end. (It’s a funny incident, don’t worry.) I changed into leggings because the sun had done a number on my legs earlier and they were not feeling like wearing shorts that night. (Not because it was cold, because it was definitely not cold. More like a too hot, legs brushing against each other, chub rub, situation. And we had run out of body glide. YIKES. So leggings it was.)

Before leaving, we stopped in the gift shop so I could pick up a pin I’d looked at that morning before heading to Epcot. It’s a Flynn Rider pin that looks like his wanted poster: luckily, google exists, so here’s a picture of it:

It’s my prized possession now.

We hopped a bus at around 6:30 and were strolling into the Magic Kingdom around 7. Our first Fastpass started then, which was Meet Rapunzel and Cinderella at Princess Fairytale Prison. I mean… Hall. Princess Fairytale Hall.

“But Shannon, didn’t you already meet them on Day Four?”

Yep. But we had these FPs since the beginning, so let’s go again!

Rapunzel very much enjoyed my new pin. She was also very short.

Cinderella was nice, but not as lovely as our Cinderella from the other day. We were in and out quickly and felt indifferent about it. She was a very bubbly Cinderella, which was nice. And the photos turned out pretty cute!

We were at the tail end of our Princess FP, so by the time we were out of the Hall, it was time for FP#2: The Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, round 2!

By the time we got on, it looks like the sun was setting.

We decided it was time for a snack, since we didn’t have dinner at Pop, so we headed toward Tomorrowland. I think we rode the teacups here, though we have no pictures.

Finally, it was time to get my elusive cream cheese pretzel from The Lunching Pad. We got in line, waited anxiously, mouth watering at the cream-cheesy goodness, when we were two people from the front of the line… and proceeded to watch in horror as the CM took all twelve pretzels from the display and gave them to a guest buying them for her whole family.

The woman in front of us was waiting for one too, and we looked at each other in horror, and then scooted out of line. Well, there goes that.

Dreams crushed, we decided to go get some actual dinner. We’d wanted to check out Peco’s Bills in Frontierland, so we crossed through the hub and made our way over there. We both decided on the pulled pork sandwiches, with one of us getting fries to share and a strawberry lemonade, and while we were waiting, of course we made friends:

This CM was very interested in my hitchhiking ghost pins. I was one away from finishing the collection of three!

We got our food pretty quickly and then made our way to find a seat. Because Peco’s Bills is darker than a stack of black cats, here’s how the food picture turned out:

They were SO good! Unfortunately, since the menu change, all I can do now is hope that Tortuga Tavern picks up the slack and starts serving the pulled pork on their new menu.

After our meal, we walked into Adventureland and spotted a near-empty line for the carpets, so we decided for a late-night spin.



This ride is phenomenal at night. It reminded me of the trip in 2007 when we were on Dumbo during Wishes. All the lights in Adventureland and the rest of the park were so gorgeous at night!


When we got off the carpets, we realized the MSEP was coming soon, so we decided to go into Frontierland, find a place to watch, and from there we could quickly slip over to our FP+ at Splash Mountain! We found a great spot standing on the stairs of the Diamond Horseshoe just as the parade was beginning.

Next to us there was a family with two little girls, and the dad was taking turns holding each of them on his shoulders to see a bit clearer. One of them was so excited, calling out each character’s name in delight when they waved in our direction.

The parade was fantastic: we were so excited to get a great spot so close to it beginning. As soon as it ended, we headed off to Splash to get in the FP line! And... look what we got!

THE RED CARD!

I had attempted to plan out the timing of getting in line with cresting the drop during Wishes, which happened once before and was absolutely amazing. I don’t know how we did it, but as we emerged from the ride, just before the drop, the first two “shooting stars” flew over the castle! WE DID IT!

I look more terrified than ecstatic.

Of course, we didn’t end up really watching them, as we were stuck waiting to unload for the majority of Wishes inside the Zip-A-Dee-Do-Dah scene. But when we came out of the ride, we watched the rest from Frontierland, and made our next FP+ from their machines! We chose Winnie-the-Pooh, and headed right over to Fantasyland.

We got to Fantasyland and decided to duck into the Castle Couture gift shop to look at the CMs’ pins and browse around a bit more before our FP! While we were in there, a couple came racing in and asked the CM to take their picture: because he proposed during Wishes! All the female CMs immediately flocked over to look at her ring. It was really sweet!

And on an exciting note for me, I spotted the last Hitchhiking ghost on one of the CMs lanyards and hurried over to trade for it. I finally had all three! Photo to come at the end of the TR...

Then, we went over to ride Pooh, which was fun as usual. But we have no pictures of it. But it’s in the notebook, so it definitely happened.

After Pooh, we decided to get ice cream from Storybook Treats. After we picked up our strawberry shortcake sundae, we turned to walk back out of the queue area. And I guess (unbeknownst to me) either the ear of my Stitch backpack or the keychain part of Mom’s backpack brushed across the arm of a woman waiting in line. Well, this woman opened verbal fire on me. Screaming about disrespectful and rude kids, how we’re just absorbed in ourselves, how dare I knock her over with my backpack. (I did not knock her over, it brushed against her arm. I would’ve felt it if it’d actually hit her, which it did not. Besides, we’re Canadian. We would’ve apologized. The reason the bag would’ve touched her at all was that she was standing in the path we needed to exit through, so if she hadn’t stood where she was supposed to it would’ve brushed her as I walked by.)

I have the emotional capability of about a five year old in tense situations, so naturally I started to get really upset as we walked away. She was still screaming at us as we left, so Mom sent me to the wall outside Pooh and went back to say something that I’m still not sure of. I guess her husband was trying to calm her down while she just stood there screaming at Mom because she still blamed me for hitting her on purpose with my backpack.

This woman, I swear, was the freaking conductor of the Seven Dwarfs Whine Train.

Mom came back after a bit, but I was too upset to eat much of the sundae at all by that point. We just sort of sat there and picked at it for a little while, and then went off to do something else.

The standby line for the Speedway was nonexistent, so we walked right in. While we were waiting for the cars to come in and empty out, the CM asked us what we’d been up to this evening. We gave a generic answer: some rides and stuff, but he said “No, I want a play by play of EVERYTHING you’ve done tonight!” So we laid out our evening and said everywhere we’d been and all the fun things we’d done, and it made both of us feel a lot better when we were still shaken from The First Incident. I don’t know if he saw that we were upset and wanted to lighten the mood or if he was just being nice, but it really, really made a difference. We were back to smiles!

And of course, nothing helps get frustration out like manically driving a go kart.

(continued in next post)​