I See a Line, I Wait In It ~ A January 2016 TR - Completed 12/29

[SarahDisney]

That is a really cool picture of the castle during Celebrations and Beth in the reflective.

Thanks It's definitely a unique picture!

I was a few updates behind, eek! Ok, here's me catching up:

Thanks for taking the time to catch up!

Great pictures! I don't remember seeing a Photopass Photographer in that area, I'll have to look harder on my next trip!

Thanks! I think the PhotoPass in front of Gaston's Tavern is kinda hit-or-miss ... sometimes we see someone there, sometimes we don't.

We never did go on this ride Something else to add to the list for next time I guess.

It's kinda like another version of Dumbo, but we like it. The goal is to not get wet (there are spitting camels).

I've never really been into Podcasts, but that's really cool that you recognized those guys and went to talk to them!

Thanks! I'm not a huge podcast person (I only listen to a few), but I really like the DIS Unplugged.

Hmm, I missed this Photopass opportunity as well...

This trip was the first time we saw PhotoPass at Big Thunder Mountain ... it might have been something that had limited hours or something.

I think the next time we go on IASW, we'll be the people who put in headphones and listen to music the entire time so we don't have to hear that awful song!

I think if people find out that you did that, you'll start a trend!

Now I'm curious what his Instagram handle is so I can follow him! Haha.

I might have googled it ... I didn't find anything. In the internet's defense, I wasn't looking very hard. I'm not entirely sure that I want to follow a character handler on Instagram.

So awesome! Way to go!

Thanks! It was definitely a cool moment.

This is cool! I need to try and find this next time!

It took me a while to find it when I first started looking. It's near the beginning and it's not so easy to see.

Hahaha, this made me laugh

That's so awesome you got a chance to witness something like that!

It was definitely something special to see!

Hahaha, you are awesome.

Thanks

Do they have a selection of food you can order there, or is there only one option? Is it the same food you get at the table service restaurants?

There are a few options. It's mostly "fast food" type stuff ... chicken nuggets, burger, hot dog ... stuff like that.
It is different food than the table service ... we actually like the quick service food better.

Hahaha

Great choice!

Thanks!

The castle is so pretty in this one!

Yes! I love it with the lights like that!

The spelling error of pumpkin is driving me crazy in that picture!

I actually hadn't noticed that ... but now that you've mentioned it, that's all I can see. How hard is it to spell pumpkin??

 

[Elevationist]

Everytime I see this, I'm just like "I relate to you so hard right now, Pooh."

With the whole “my camera is terrible at low light” thing my pictures didn’t come out so well,

Stragely, my camera suffers from that same affliction!

By the way … you know how there’s always that one obnoxious jerk who screams “say no!”? That was me. Yeah, I’m terrible.

Oh God. I'm dying.

I also really love that you can see the castle from the ride … it’s one of the things that truly looks beautiful at night

Yes yes yes! I rode 7DMT at night for the first time on my recent trip, and it's SO MUCH MORE BETTER! I'm getting an after-dark FastPass every time from now on!

and that was how I discovered the wonderfulness that is Celebrate the Magic.

R.I.P., Celebrate the Magic. So glad I got to see it before it went away forever!

 

[natebenma]

For example: You got an awesome picture of a jawa standing to the right of the castle!

LOL!!!

That's a Star Wars thing, right?

LOLOLOLOL!!!


Great update!!!

What did you get for food at Cosmic Rays? How was it?

I really, really like the picture with Beth's reflection. And I'm a bit jealous because your pictures of Celebrate the Magic through the window are better than any I have taken. I really have trouble photographing that show!

The fireworks are lovely!

As are the photopass pictures of you two with the castle looking different in every shot.

What a really nice night!

 

[SarahDisney]

Everytime I see this, I'm just like "I relate to you so hard right now, Pooh."

Haha, I love it!!

Stragely, my camera suffers from that same affliction!

Cameras are the worst sometimes. How hard can it be to take good low light pictures?

Oh God. I'm dying.

I really am the worst sometimes.

Yes yes yes! I rode 7DMT at night for the first time on my recent trip, and it's SO MUCH MORE BETTER! I'm getting an after-dark FastPass every time from now on!

YES!!! Another convert to the nighttime 7DMT club! It really is such an amazing experience!

R.I.P., Celebrate the Magic. So glad I got to see it before it went away forever!

So sad. I miss it already.

Great update!!!

Thanks

What did you get for food at Cosmic Rays? How was it?

Beth got chicken tenders and I got a hot dog (I think). It was okay ... nothing to write home about, but the Kosher food at Disney is certainly edible.

I really, really like the picture with Beth's reflection. And I'm a bit jealous because your pictures of Celebrate the Magic through the window are better than any I have taken. I really have trouble photographing that show!

Thank you!
I've also had some difficulty photographing it in the past, so I'm really glad that my pictures came out so well. Especially because it's gone now

The fireworks are lovely!

Yes, they are ... and I'm glad my pictures came out so nice!

As are the photopass pictures of you two with the castle looking different in every shot.

Thanks! I really love how those came out!

What a really nice night!

It certainly was ... it was a great last night at Disney!

 

[SarahDisney]

Day 8, Chapter 1: Tree of Life Photoshoot
Tuesday, January 12th, 2016​

Tuesday morning we woke up for our last day at Disney (sadface).This day had originally been planned as a “we’ll figure it out when we get there” day (I was planning to nag Beth to add an extra day to our tickets, but we had other options too), but when we decided to skip Animal Kingdom on Friday, we rescheduled everything for Tuesday.

Before we could head out to the park, we had some sad stuff to take care of. We finished packing our suitcases and headed over to Resort Airline Check-In, where after a short wait, we had to convince someone that we didn’t have to pay for our suitcases (we were flying JetBlue, an airline that does charge for baggage, but we had purchased a fare that included one checked bag per ticket). Once we got that sorted out, we went back to the room to finish getting ready for the day, then grabbed some waffles for breakfast and checked our carry-ons (minus our park bags) with luggage services before heading out to the bus stop.

Before we get to the parks … we (aka Beth) did snap a picture of the day’s trivia:

Here’s a secret … I actually don’t know all of these answers. Some of them I do, some I don’t … but if you know all (or some of) the answers, feel free to share them!!

Okay, back to the story. We made our way to the bus stops and eventually caught a bus that took us to …

While we were there, some friends rolled in to see us …

We made our way over to security, where Beth was randomly selected to go through the metal detectors. My response: “Now we’re even.” (For those of you who forget, since I told that part of the story approximately 8,000 years ago, I was selected to go through the metal detectors at Hollywood Studios.)

We didn’t really have many plans for this day – we had FP+ for Mickey & Minnie’s M&G, Finding Nemo (not entirely necessary, but it was a way to “force” us to see the show), and Kilimanjaro Safaris, and we knew we had to see Pocahontas (more on that in the next entry), but beyond that, we were mostly going to play the day by ear. Animal Kingdom has never been our favorite park, so we knew that we would be okay even if we didn’t do everything.

Once we got through the entrance, we made our way into the park, stopping (not surprisingly) when we saw a PhotoPass photographer.

We walked a bit closer to the Tree of Life, and since we were ahead of schedule and didn’t have anywhere in particular to be, we decided to stop when we saw another photographer. This photographer’s name was Ron, and I hate to spoil the end, but … Ron was awesome.

We got some basic, no-frills pictures:

We also got some fun magic shots:

(Beth LOVES Pascal, and we didn’t know that there was a Pascal magic shot, so this was really one of the most exciting parts of the trip … those are genuine smiles, not just camera smiles)

Once we finished that set of pictures, Ron actually directed us over to a different area closer to the Tree of Life, where he took some individual pictures:

This was really a special experience, not only because Ron spent so much time with us, but because he actually separated us and had us take individual pictures. As much as Beth and I love doing things together, people seem to lump us together as one unit, especially when we travel together, and it was nice that this one photographer decided to give us our own individual photos.

Overall, this was such an incredible experience, and it was definitely one of the highlights of the day. Thanks, Ron!

Once our photoshoots were done, it was time for the more important part of the day … coffee. We headed off to Creature Comforts, but got distracted by a bug along the way:

As some of you may remember, when I wrote my 10K recap (approximately 50 million years ago), I mentioned that there were no characters out during the first half of the race. In fact, I had seen a trailer that indicated the presence of a Bugs Life character stop, but no characters. So when we saw Flik, we knew we had to stop and get the picture we had missed out on during the 10K (funnily enough, not sure if you can tell, but … I’m wearing the same leggings in this picture as I wore during the 10K … it was cold and my other leggings matched my outfit even less).

Anyway … more bug pictures. Flik admiring Beth’s medals:

Running Pose:

Once we finished our M&G with Flik and went back to our normal size, we finally made our way over to Creature Comforts. I don’t remember what Beth got, but I got a Grande Unsweetened Iced Coffee with Nonfat Milk. I know this because until about a minute before I wrote this, the receipt was still in my bag. Yeah … I’m gonna throw it out now.

We got our drinks, grabbed paper straws, and went to sit outside of Pizzafari to drink our coffee and eat the waffles we had brought with us.

Before we get to the next part of the story, I’m just going to include something that I call “Sarah’s Rant Against San Francisco.”
Look, I like San Francisco just fine. Cool city. Ghirardelli Square is awesome. Alcatraz is really interesting. But when we got drinks at a museum we went to … the straws were paper. I’m all for being environmentally friendly, but paper straws is where I draw the line. They’re so weird, they feel funny, and it actually kind of affects how the drink feels as you’re drinking it (which can affect your enjoyment of the drink). I don’t like it. I’m against paper straws. I don’t like when I have to use them.
I know that the paper straws at Animal Kingdom is for the protection of the animals. But I still don’t like it.
Moral of the story: I need to bring my own plastic straws to Animal Kingdom. I’ll just be good about throwing them in the garbage where the animals can’t get to them.

Anyway … back to the story. We sat and ate our pancakes (and drank our coffee), and when we were done with breakfast, we made our way over to meet some fun characters.

It’s Dug and Russell! While Up is not our favorite movie, we think it’s an okay movie, and we always enjoy meeting Dug and Russell.

Russell admiring Beth’s medals:

Big hugs:

After meeting Dug and Russell, we still had some time before our first FP+, so we decided to do something very important – we were off to finish our Princess Quest that we started (and completed 92% of) in February 2015.

What is the Princess Quest? You’ll have to wait for the next entry to find out!

Coming Next: Eleven Baskets of Corn. Or Meeko.

 

[rteetz]

Honestly I don't know the answers to all of those questions either. I think I know most of them but am unsure on 2 of them.

Awesome photos! We had a great photopass experience at AK as well. AK must just have all the good photographers.

Love the dug and Russell meet and greet!

 

[natebenma]

Huh! Animal Kingdom when it is not face-of-the-sun hot! All but one (the most recent) of my trips there have been in June, July or August. It is a much, much better park when it is cooler!

I love the character meets you had that morning and love the great experience you had with Ron even more. That is fantastic that he took individual photos.

LOL on just throwing out your receipt for your drink now. I keep all of my receipts, even after I have used them to write my reports. Sometimes they just fade away. Literally!

That is actually a great idea to bring your own straw to AK. On our first snack stop on our trip, we had a lemonade with a Mickey Straw and we thought about bringing it along when we visited other parks.

Great start to your day.

 

[Wood Nymph]

It looks like you had a really nice visit to AK that morning. Ron sounds like he enjoys his job. He took very cute pictures of you. I love the extra magic shots, especially the one with Pascal.

 

[Saphire5742]

You really scored with an awesome photopass photographer. All your photos came out looking fantastic.
Dug and Russell are one of the only M&G's I chose not to do. I could not stand that boy in the movie. He annoyed the heck out of me.

 

[SarahDisney]

Honestly I don't know the answers to all of those questions either. I think I know most of them but am unsure on 2 of them.

These were definitely some hard trivia questions!

Awesome photos! We had a great photopass experience at AK as well. AK must just have all the good photographers.

Thanks! I think that AK is definitely a park that deserves good photographers ... so many great backgrounds (I mean, can you really ever have too many Tree of Life pictures), and it's awesome that there are great people there taking the pictures.

Love the dug and Russell meet and greet!

Huh! Animal Kingdom when it is not face-of-the-sun hot! All but one (the most recent) of my trips there have been in June, July or August. It is a much, much better park when it is cooler!

Oh yeah, it's definitely nice to visit Animal Kingdom and not be boiling to death!

I love the character meets you had that morning and love the great experience you had with Ron even more. That is fantastic that he took individual photos.

Thanks! It definitely was a good picture day!

LOL on just throwing out your receipt for your drink now. I keep all of my receipts, even after I have used them to write my reports. Sometimes they just fade away. Literally!

I keep my credit card receipts. Starbucks receipts ... those are just something that I keep around for the funnies.

That is actually a great idea to bring your own straw to AK. On our first snack stop on our trip, we had a lemonade with a Mickey Straw and we thought about bringing it along when we visited other parks.

Bringing a Mickey Straw is an even better idea than just bringing any straw! I think I have a Mickey straw around the house somewhere ... I'll have to bring that with me next trip!

Great start to your day.

Definitely

It looks like you had a really nice visit to AK that morning. Ron sounds like he enjoys his job. He took very cute pictures of you. I love the extra magic shots, especially the one with Pascal.

Thanks! It was definitely a good Animal Kingdom morning!
And the Pascal magic shot is our favorite too

You really scored with an awesome photopass photographer. All your photos came out looking fantastic.

Thanks!

Dug and Russell are one of the only M&G's I chose not to do. I could not stand that boy in the movie. He annoyed the heck out of me.

I get that. Russell is kind of annoying. But I actually love Dug
SQUIRREL!

 

[afwdwfan]

Here’s a secret … I actually don’t know all of these answers. Some of them I do, some I don’t … but if you know all (or some of) the answers, feel free to share them!!

What???? You shared trivia, but no answers??? That's cruel!

Ok, guessing on a few, but I'll go with
1. Dame Judy Dench
2. C
3. A
4. A
Bonus: More than I care to count.

I need to bring my own plastic straws to Animal Kingdom.

You rebel!

Looks like a nice laid back morning at AK. That was awesome of Ron to put the extra effort in with your pictures!

 

[fallonkendra]

I’m all for being environmentally friendly, but paper straws is where I draw the line. They’re so weird, they feel funny, and it actually kind of affects how the drink feels as you’re drinking it (which can affect your enjoyment of the drink). I don’t like it. I’m against paper straws. I don’t like when I have to use them.
I know that the paper straws at Animal Kingdom is for the protection of the animals. But I still don’t like it.
Moral of the story: I need to bring my own plastic straws to Animal Kingdom. I’ll just be good about throwing them in the garbage where the animals can’t get to them.

This! I am so with you on the paper straw thing! I eat/drink things really slowly, so the straw always gets soggy on me by the end - yuck!

Looks like you had a really similar morning to us at Animal Kingdom! I find it so funny that we were in the same parks on the same day so often, and didn't end up seeing each other once!

 

[FantasiaMagic]

Hi Sarah! It's been awhile since I've been on the Dis, but I'm back. I am all caught up with your TR! I loved that you and Beth did 2 princess meals in a row! I also loved the full day you two spent in MK. So many great rides, attractions and characters! Also, I love the charm you got for your Pandora bracelet. they are all so pretty, but so expensive, or I would have more lol.

Looking forward to reading the end of your TR!

 

[SarahDisney]

What???? You shared trivia, but no answers??? That's cruel!

Ok, guessing on a few, but I'll go with
1. Dame Judy Dench
2. C
3. A
4. A
Bonus: More than I care to count.

I didn't know all the answers when I posted it.
I do now. I looked them up. You got 3 of the 4 questions correct. I think.

You rebel!

I've always been a troublemaker

Looks like a nice laid back morning at AK. That was awesome of Ron to put the extra effort in with your pictures!

It really was a great laid back morning, and Ron was fantastic!

This! I am so with you on the paper straw thing! I eat/drink things really slowly, so the straw always gets soggy on me by the end - yuck!

Yes! I want to be able to enjoy my drink at my own pace and not worry about a soggy straw!

Looks like you had a really similar morning to us at Animal Kingdom! I find it so funny that we were in the same parks on the same day so often, and didn't end up seeing each other once!

I really can't believe it ... I know there are a lot of people in the parks and the likelihood of running into someone isn't that high ... but we really spent so much time in the same parks and it's weird to me that we didn't see each other!

Hi Sarah! It's been awhile since I've been on the Dis, but I'm back. I am all caught up with your TR! I loved that you and Beth did 2 princess meals in a row! I also loved the full day you two spent in MK. So many great rides, attractions and characters! Also, I love the charm you got for your Pandora bracelet. they are all so pretty, but so expensive, or I would have more lol.

Welcome back to the dis (I hope you had fun on your trip a few months back!), and thanks for taking the time to catch up!
I'm so with you on the Pandora charms ... they're so pretty, but there's no way that I can afford more than one a trip (and the only reason I can afford one each trip is because I buy so few other souvenirs!).

 

[SarahDisney]

Day 8, Chapter 2: Eleven Baskets of Corn. Or Meeko.
Tuesday, January 12th, 2016
​

When you last saw us, we were headed off to find the final princess that we needed to complete our Princess Quest. But what exactly was that Princess Quest?

In February 2015, Beth and I completed the Frozen 5K, which was part of Princess Half Marathon Weekend. Since it was a princess-themed weekend, we decided to go on a quest to get our picture taken with all of the princesses. There is some disagreement as to what constitutes a princess, so we used the official Disney Princess franchise, which includes 11 princesses: Snow White, Cinderella, Aurora, Ariel, Belle, Jasmine, Pocahontas, Merida, Mulan, Tiana, and Rapunzel.

We got 10 of the 11 princesses …

… but we didn’t make it to Animal Kingdom on that trip, so we missed out on Pocahontas. This was the day we planned to rectify that situation.

We went over to where Pocahontas was meeting (in this little semi-isolated spot between Discovery Island and Dinoland USA … we had met Daisy there on a previous trip), and we did have to wait a bit before going down to meet her. Thankfully, we had some fun CMs there to chat with. We talked a bit about the races and running (and pizza) … it was a nice chat and these CMs were great at helping us pass the time. Finally, we were sent down to meet …

We had a nice chat with Pocahontas…

As with many of the other characters, we talked about the races. Pocahontas expressed an interest in perhaps running a runDisney race one day, since we made them sound so fun. She was wondering if they would accept 10 baskets of corn as her entrance fee. I pointed out that the races are pretty expensive, so they may want 11 baskets. Pocahontas had a counteroffer … Meeko. I did agree that Meeko was worth the cost of race entry. So if you ever hear about someone trying to use a raccoon to pay for a runDisney race … it’s probably Pocahontas.

We enjoyed meeting Pocahontas, and it’s always nice to introduce someone new to the fun of runDisney.

Princess Quest 2015 was officially complete! (Even if it took us until 2016 to complete it)

Next on our agenda was yet another M&G … but this one doubled as our first FP+. That’s right, it was time to meet our favorite mice at …

Did I mention that this stop required a slight outfit modification? Beth and I had both purchased adorable shirts that were part of Lauren Conrad’s Minnie Mouse Collection at Kohl’s, with the intention of wearing them when we met Minnie Mouse on the day of the 10K. Since we didn’t end up going to a park after the 10K, we changed Minnie Mouse Shirt Day to Tuesday. However, when we woke up, it was super cold, so we put on sweatshirts … but for our Minnie Mouse pictures, we removed the sweatshirts and wore what we had planned to wear on Friday – Minnie Mouse shirts & 10K medals.

Pictures:

Hugs:

Chatting:

At this point, we had been in the park for over an hour and had yet to go on a single ride. So, what did we do next?

Yes, that’s right, we did another character M&G. If you’ve gotten to day 8 of this TR, you really shouldn’t be surprised by that.

As you can see, we went to meet Baloo and King Louie. As we were waiting on line, there was a youngish couple in front of us with their super cute daughter. They looked really familiar to me, though, and I couldn’t figure out why … I eventually figured out that they were in front of us on line when we met Pooh & Tigger at Epcot on Sunday. So that was kind of a funny coincidence (we hadn’t talked to them on Sunday, so I didn’t say anything to them about it).
As we were waiting on line, Baloo saw Beth’s medals and got very excited about them! To which my response was that this is the only time a character will ignore a cute kid and get excited to see an adult. Seriously … adorable kid right in front of us, and Baloo was only paying attention to Beth’s medals. I love it.

Eventually we got to the front of the line and got some pictures:

(Yes, Baloo is doing his running pose … he’s so funny)

Once we left the jungle, we made our way over to Dinoland U.S.A. Finally, time for some rides!

Our first stop:

Yes, another character stop. But it’s Goofy and Pluto!
I have to say … I was not particularly okay with the Xmas trees still being up on January 12th. But their tree actually did have some cute dinosaur ornaments:

Once we were done with Goofy and Pluto, we finally made our way to our first ride of the day (and no, I’m not messing with you this time):

I happen to like Primeval Whirl. It’s a cute little carnival ride that’s actually really well themed. I always enjoy it.

This trip I spent a lot of time taking pictures on rides. It was just something I wanted to try. What I really wanted to do was get all of the rings/signs that you see going up on Primeval Whirl. The only problem is … my camera kinda has this problem where there’s a lot of dust under the screen and it’s really hard to see the screen in the sunlight (and my camera doesn’t have a viewfinder). And as you can see from the above picture, it was kinda sunny. So the picture taking was a challenge.

How did I do? Here are the results:

I think I did pretty well. I don’t think I would have done any better even if I had been able to see the screen. I’m really proud of my attempt.

I also got this picture later in the ride:

We had time for one last attraction before our next FP+, so we decided to take a spin with everyone’s favorite spinning dinosaur …

TriceraTop Selfie:

Like Dumbo, one of the things I love about this attraction is the views.

Bye Bye!

Coming Next: Big Blue World

 

[rteetz]

Great character meet and greets!

I don't know if I've ever met Pocahontas.

Safari Mickey and Minnie are always fun.

Primeval whirl is fun but I'd also like to see something else done with that area.

 

[FantasiaMagic]

Great picture of Pocahontas! I haven't met her in a long time, I was very young when I last did that M&G. Congrats on completing the Princess challenge. That is something I definitely want to do one trip, but I would probably have to do it alone, or with only a couple of people, it could be a lot of running around trying to see all the Princesses!
I love all the other meets you did as well - you and Beth got so many done in such a short amount of time.

Looking forward to reading more!

 

[Wood Nymph]

Since we didn’t end up going to a park after the 10K, we changed Minnie Mouse Shirt Day to Tuesday. However, when we woke up, it was super cold, so we put on sweatshirts … but for our Minnie Mouse pictures, we removed the sweatshirts and wore what we had planned to wear on Friday – Minnie Mouse shirts & 10K medals.

Your Minnie shirts are really cute. Its a good thing that you had a chance to finally wear them with the real Minnie in the picture. January in Orlando can be pretty chilly.

 

[amazingact21]

Hello! I have been slowing trying to catch up on your report. I've made it to page 10 so far and just finished reading both 10k recaps. I wanted to say that I loved all the runDisney updates. I feel like you really captured how fun, friendly, and exciting a runDisney race can be, and you made me really miss participating in one! It was such a bummer to read that it rained for the first part of the 10K; I was glad to see the weather cleared up by the end for you guys.
Okay, I will continue to read tomorrow. Slowly but surely, I'll catch up!

 

[KathyM2]

Whew! Trying to catch up around here!!! So much has happened lol. Love your pics from dinner of the castle show...what a great idea!! Also..have I mentioned I love the race medals and want some? Gotta work on getting down there for some RunDisney lol. Looks like a great day at AK...sometimes maybe it is good to try to loosen up on the planning...sigh!! Maybe next time. Also..best Flik Pics!!