We headed over to the bus stop and waited for the first bus to show up. I kind of liked the uncertainty of just choosing a bus on a whim for an afternoon adventure.
This day it was the Carribean Beach Resort bus that showed up first. I was excited to go and check out the place, as it's on my list of places I'd like to stay at one of these days. Unfortunately I didn't get off at the right stop. I didn't realize that the check in building was different from the building with the food court and restaurants. The bus stopped first at Old Port Royale. When we got to the next stop we decided to hop off and head back that way. I didn't realize that the Custom House was a separate building. It wasn't a long walk back to OPR though and it was enjoyable. The grounds at CBR were very beautiful, and felt really relaxing. I'm a sucker for any of Disney's beachy themed resorts, so the entire place appealed to me. I definitely want to stay here one of these days.
The decorations weren't terribly amazing though at Old Port Royale. I would have preferred to see how the lobby was decorated. Here are a few of the pictures from around OPR.
We grabbed a bit to eat at the food court. I loved the atmosphere in the food court. Very festive. No food porn pics, but I had a delicious steak and cheese sandwich with some really good homemade chips. I thought that their food court had some better options than I'm used to seeing at POFQ. This would never be a deal breaker for me though, as I usually only eat breakfast at the resort.
I was getting the impression that my friend didn't really want to wander around much longer. I would have liked to wander the grounds and really look around, but we went and hopped on a bus to Epcot. First we made a stop at Sunshine Seasons to ride Soarin and to share one of my favorite desserts. A key lime tart. Yum!!
After that we headed back to World Showcase. Heading to Mexico first to see my favorite guy, Donald. The Mexican pavillion was feeling really festive. It was one of my favorite Christmas pavillions.
About now is when I started to get a bit cranky again.
One of the things on my to do list was to wander around World Showcase soaking up the details. I wanted to really spend some time peaking in all those little corners and rooting through the shops for treasures.
My friend did not. Somehow I never knew that my friend finds World Showcase dull and boring since it doesn't have many rides.
We started to do a little bit of shopping, but I found it hard to ignore the fact that my friend wasn't really into it. I find it hard to shop with a shadow, and I think my friend was a bit bored so she didn't leave me side. After a little while it started driving me a bit crazy and I just gave up. We didn't even step foot into a few of the pavillions.
This was not helping my mood any, and I was trying to keep myself from getting too miserable. She never really said anything, but you can always tell when the people with you aren't really into what they are doing. I could tell, and it took all the enjoyment of pavillion hopping away from me.
Here are a few of the pavillions that I glimpsed at any rate.
Italy:
America:
We did see the American Adventure show. It always gets me a bit choked up. Missing this is not an option.
By now it was getting dark and I couldn't really get any pictures of the pavillions with their holiday decorations. As we were passing through Morocco I noticed that Jasmine and Aladdin were out. I had to stop and say hi for my older niece. Jasmine is her favorite princess. I was actually the last person in line. I had a moment of feeling a bit silly standing there by myself, but it was fun meeting them. Jasmine promised she wouldn't tell the other girls that she was my niece's favorite.
By this point in the trip, all the princesses were beginning to make me feel like a jumbo sized cow. Seriously, they are all so tiny and all told probably weighed about 200 lbs combined.
At 5' 4" I don't usually think of myself as tall, but near them I felt like a giant.
In France I had to stop for one of these even though it was starting to get a bit too cold to be drinking frozen drinks outside:
It was every bit as good as I had been reading about on the boards. I can't wait to have another one of these next trip.
The Canada pavillion was looking pretty festive too, even with it being dark -
After that we headed over to Mexico again for our dinner. Sorry, no porn. It is so dark in there I didn't even try. The menu was completely different from my last visit. I had a delicious Mahi Mahi that was to die for.
We made it out of the restaurant just in time to see Illuminations from a nice spot over by the England pavillion. That's when I learned to absolute best park of staying at the Boardwalk. The wonderful "commute" home from Epcot. We were right near the exit so we were out of the park at the International Gateway entrance in no time flat. No hiking all the way up to the front of the park and to the bus stops. It was a quick walk out of the park, and I think we could have walked all the way back to the Boardwalk in less time than it would have taken us to get to the busses. My BFF was tired though so we went to hop on the boat. There was a line, but Disney had about 3 boats backed up waiting. In about 10 minutes we were on a boat heading back to the Boardwalk. Sweet! A complete 180 difference from the bus hell we dealt with earlier in the week. We were the first stop too so I'd say it took no more than a half hour to get from Epcot to our hotel, and that's mostly because we had to wait for the boat to fill.
When we got back to our room, we had a new poem and taffy waiting for us along with this for my friend's birthday. Technically it was her birthday earlier in the year, but we were using this trip to celebrate.
I don't have any pictures from our evening after this, but we did head out to Jellyrolls after stopping off in the room. We had a fantastic time. Jellyrolls was a blast. I don't know why I've waited so long to visit there. We paid the $10 cover charge and headed on in. It's a much smaller place than I was expecting. When you walk in the stage is directly ahead of you, and there is a bar on either side against the walls. There are high tables with stools along the back wall, and along a railing. You take a step or two down to a lower level where there are more tables and some higher stools lining the railing. It was fairly crowded when we got there, but we found a couple of chairs against the railing on the lower level. I don't know if it was because we weren't at a table, but a waitress never came over to us, so we took turns wandering up to the bar.
The stage had two pianos on it, and the place was already singing along having a great time. If you want them to play a song you write the request on a napkin or slip of paper and bring it up to one of the pianos with a dollar tip. They will only sing a song once per night, so if you request a song they've already played they will call out and ask you to pick something new. (Although one couple tipped them $20 to sing "God Bless the USA" a second time and they did). They will sing just about anything. We heard a bit of country, heavy metal, pop, oldies
you name it. The best songs of the night were when one of the waitresses sang "All I want for Christmas" and a great rendition of "The Rainbow Connection" sung just like Kermit. There are two different sets of piano players and they switched off every so often, so there was never a break in the entertainment. Both pairs were fantastic. In both there was one man who sang more of the ballads and the other would sing more of the uptempo stuff.
We nearly closed the place we were having so much fun. The place stayed pretty full the entire time. It seemed like there were a lot of cast members hanging out, having a good time. At about 1:30 am I had to tell my friend that I couldn't keep my eyes open any longer, so we didn't quite make it until the bar closed at 2 am. We did make it to last call though, so I guess I haven't gotten quite that old yet.
I highly recommend a visit to Jellyrolls for anyone looking for a nice adult evening out. We had a blast there. All the piano players and singers were fantastic, and it was really nice to enjoy some adult time. I used to love Pleasure Island when it first opened, but really for me once they opened it up and it was no longer 18 and older it wasn't quite the same. I realize this is Disney, and kids are a given, but it's nice to have a few spots that are just for adults. Especially in the evening.
Jellyrolls is definitely a must-do again for our next trip.
Fortunately, he directs you, so he actually took my hands in his that last time I met him. Very sweet. 
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