The 5 trips of My "Disney Free Year" - A Mermaid, A Buzz, A Boat and A Steak - 7/8

[not_Joanna_eggs]

Great pic of you guys hamming it up on Dinosaur. Your DH and you had the best poses.

What's so funny is Queenie and Grumpy had NO IDEA that the picture was even being taken. That was totally natural. And you wonder where we get it from

I'd say you're safe with anything smaller than the size of those backpack-purses from the 90s. Anything of equivalent size or larger you'd probably need to store.

Basically, if you can hide it under your jacket, they'll never know ^_^'

Um... they're called mini-back packs, and I'm not ashamed to say I still have one that I can't bring myself to get rid of.

Greg and I = STONE FACE
And yes... this became a thing for the rest of the ride photos.

Mom claims she was "fixing her earring"

Sorry - I didn't mean to offend - stone face it is. Yeah Queenie's got her story and she's sticking to it. I showed her the photos yesterday and she reiterated that she was "fixing her earring" almost makes you believe her.... almost...

Joanna, I feel we have a lot in common. Except when it comes to Dinosaur. Dinosaur is scary. And not even Clair Huxtable can convince me otherwise.


Thanks for the tip, Panic! And for the awesome '90s reference. My purse is probably a little too big; maybe I'll get a super-attractive little fanny pack or something before I ever venture to Universal. Oh yes, I'm that fashionable.

Um, yeah for me the scariest part of Dinosaur is the freaky puppet that guy from CSI has at the beginning!

Fanny pack? Then you could be as stylish as us!

After ET, there was a little holiday show that totally wigged me out. Why on earth would Scooby, Shaggy, The man in the Yellow Hat and Woody the ‘Pecker be dancing together?

Oh yeah, the man in the yellow hat was rapping

I can't even tell you how this cracked me up when I read this! I saw the same show in October but it was Halloween-themed! And I got some video of it because I was in awe and shock!

Also, I am a big Universal fan -- I love all the rides there -- I hope you got to stop at Margaritaville at some point too (I haven't finished reading your report yet) -- I am a huge Jimmy Buffett fan (see my avatar - is that the right word) -- I like to go to Universal just to go to Margaritaville!

Anyway -- I hope you eventually got to ride Harry Potter -- I went in October and it was great -- but I had to do single rider line just to NOT wait in line for 120 minutes!

Yeah, the combination of characters was just weird.

We love Margaritaville! - We didn't stop at Universal - mainly because when we walked by it was 10 am, which isn't really too early for a margarita on vacation - except it wasn't open yet but when we go to the Caribbean it is a must stop!

And for fun, I thought I would post the picture from October! This show really was ridiculous!

[/IMG]

Haha. I love Woody as a vampire, but Curious George with an eye patch? How weird!

 

[not_Joanna_eggs]

Next we headed to Finding Nemo – we were still incesently using the word Dude from Crush a few days before, so this would just cement our turtle talk vacation.

I just love this show.

It is so cute!

It even impressed Queenie and Grumpy!Since we were so close, we decided to check out the line for Everest.

It was a 100 minute wait so we said yeah no.

I think this says…. If you come at chistmas, be prepared to wait in lines sucker!

After saying no to Everest, we walked by and they were doing last call for Flights of Wonder. So we ducked in.

Okay, Panic is afraid of dead things – I’m afraid of birds. Since she put on a brave face for the Mummy I stuck it out.

I only screamed a bit with the bird flew right over my head. Only a little.

We thought about doing the Safari, but the line was long and with our savannah view, the safari seemed kind of anti-climatic.

So, after Flights of Wonder we wandered a bit, but we were fading fast. What’s the surefire way to perk us up?

Alcohol – who said Alcohol?

We stopped at Dawa Bar for a refreshment.

Good choice!

Ahhh refreshing

 

[norybell]

I'm scared of birds, too. Apparently I'm just one big chicken.

 

[not_Joanna_eggs]

I'm scared of birds, too. Apparently I'm just one big chicken.

No... you're not a chicken - cuz then I'd be afraid of you

Birds are creepy creatures, so in my book you're a weirdo if you aren't afraid of birds

 

[not_Joanna_eggs]

After our drink, we slowly made our way to the exit.

I think it’s broken!

With all the bad pictures of my family that I post, I will just say that this next series is repayment – okay are we even?

In any event, we weren’t quite done yet… We had one more thing to do….

No, it wasn’t shopping…but we did that anyway…

We had to get a jalapeno pretzel! Of course I thought I took a picture, of it, but I guess not. Yummy as always!

Afterwords, we checked out the view from our balcony.

Nothing like a good zebra butt to say Merry Christmas!

It was almost time for Greg to leave, so we made sure he was well stocked before he left!

Mmmm Chocolate!

Then it was time for Greg to go home. Bye bye buddy!

His heartfelt goodbye was met with…

Um guys? Seriously, I leaving like now….

That was today?

Adios Buddy - We’ll miss you.

Apparently some of my luck was rubbing off on him because he almost missed his ME – it was there when he went out – yikes!

After Greg left, we relaxed for a while and played some Epic Mickey. We’re not addicted. No not us!

Soon, we piled back in the car. A little note, we got a 6 seater SUV instead of a mini-van because it was cheaper and we didn’t think it would be bad. The back seat was so hard to get in and out of that eventually Panic and especially I just gave up. Me getting out was always an adventure. So we made poor DH (a.k.a.) the tallest person in our group. Sit back there. He’s such a trooper!

We headed to the Boardwalk

 

[not_Joanna_eggs]

At the Boardwalk, we took advantage of the free valet parking with tables in Wonderland. This was our first time doing it, and it worked out pretty well (this time)

We were a bit early for our ADR, so we went around and looked at the gingerbread stuff in the lobby.

It smelled sooooooooooo good!

Then Minnie and Mickey came in and the masses decended on the lobby, since we were still having WWOHP flashbacks, we skdoodled as fast as we could.

Adios mice!

On the way to the boardwalk, Panic met a friend with a similar disposition.

Ahhh....Shark!

First we went into the store to check out the selection of wines and other fun things.

Princess bag where are you? I saved all my pennies for you…..

No princess bag in sight.

So we headed out to the boardwalk.

Dance party break!

The moon was gorgeous that night,

We still had about 30 minutes until our ARSs, so we decided to head around the lake.

Since we’d already seen the decorations at the swan, we headed to the Yacht club.

 

[not_Joanna_eggs]

Our trek to the Yacht Club was slow…

We were entranced with the moon.

Are you sure none of us are werewolves?

Finally we made our way to the Yacht Club.

We were very picture happy this night!

The Yacht club had a huge train / village display for Christmas.

There was a madrigal choir performing when we arrived, so we stopped and listened to them for a while.

I don’t know this sail boat tree just seems lazy to me. It’s the yacht club so let’s just throw a bunch of boats on a tree and call it a night

Then we headed over towards the Beach Club

The Christmas décor changed no-so-subtly

The carousel was pretty impressive

Do these count as hidden mickeys?

Do you think anyone would notice if I took a big ole bite outta this thing?

This horse made a break for it.

 

[meeko_33785]

Isn't Finding Nemo the Musical great? It really was a highlight of our last day at the Animal Kingdom.

Enjoyed seeing the pictures from the Boardwalk, Yacht and Beach. Brings back memories of when I was there last month.

 

[not_Joanna_eggs]

Isn't Finding Nemo the Musical great? It really was a highlight of our last day at the Animal Kingdom.

Enjoyed seeing the pictures from the Boardwalk, Yacht and Beach. Brings back memories of when I was there last month.

We were totally impressed with Finding Nemo the first time we saw it, and the 2nd time was just as impressive. It kind of makes me sad we never got to see Tarzan Rocks, because I think Nemo is awesome, and I read people who loved Tarzan more!

I really liked the boardwalk and beach club's display. We hit up all of the deluxe resorts, and theirs were my favorites - bar none.

 

[not_Joanna_eggs]

Next, we headed back to the boardwalk for our ADR at the Flying Fish.

Ohhh so many choices!

Quick, someone order a cocktail!

DH got the daily special – Tilapia fresh from the Land pavilion! It was excellent.

Queenie and Panic both got the potato wrapped red snapper.

Queenie liked hers, but Panic’s was over cooked, so she wasn’t a fan.

I got the ravioli special – mushrooms and goat cheese. YUM!

Grumpy got the scallops. He loves scallops – and these were no exception

After dinner we were FULL

but we went to the boardwalk bakery to get some treats to go anyway!

What? You didn’t think I’d go to the boardwalk and not get a piece of chocolate peanut butter cake did you?

Key lime pie

heaven

NUM!

We went back to the room and played…. Epic Mickey duh!

Apparently, i was bored during someone else's turn on the wiimote, but hey look I found a hidden mickey on our ceiling!

 

[norybell]

That train at the YC is awesome!

I've had the bacon-wrapped snapper at Flying Fish twice, and didn't like it either time. It sounds like such a good idea...but the fish never tastes that good. What a waste!

 

[Princess_K]

Just caught up on your last few updates! The Nemo show has been on my to-do list for the last 3 trips, and for some reason, we never find the time to go. But I swear we'll do it next time!

That's awesome you got to see so many resort decorations. But I definitely agree about that sail boat tree....kinda strange! But I guess it does kinda fit the theme?

 

[wdwgirl03]

The Forbidden Journey ride in Wiz World of HP is apparently where all of the people are at all times... ever. SO let's talk about the good, the bad, and the ugly. Not necessarily in that order.

The BAD:
The queue process in Universal is no good. When I retire, I'm going to move to Florida, Greg is going to drive one of the Friendship boats, and I'll be a Process Improvement consultant for queues... and I will start with Universal. The line for this ride isn't so much of a line as it is a mass of fuming fan-peeps. It's a living breathing glob of people that are all complaining about how long the line is in between screaming "like oh my gawd this is soooo cewl!" There's no marking to indicate where it ends let alone STARTS. When we were there... it started in Jurassic Park. IN Jurassic Park. I was next to a dinosaur. The real big deal was that you couldn't bring your bag onto the ride... and there was no signage about the lockers. So when people carting around their 15 billion dollars worth of HP memorabilia got to the point in the line where you ENTER the castle and there's only 60 more minutes to go... they had to get out of line and get a locker.

Fortunately, that was not me. That was other people.

The single rider line (yay) lets you skip most of the waiting... but you miss all of the castle (boo). There is apparently cool stuff in the castle that we missed out on because we're impatient... and also not crazy.

I won't give too much away about the ride itself... but if you are at all claustrophobic, you might have a few minor panic attacks. You get pretty close to some walls and... other things.

The ride spits you out into a gift shop. Normally this is fine, even welcome... this was MADNESS. Movement was not an option, being pushed around and feeling like you're the last bit of toothpaste in the tube of someone who doesn't want to buy another tube of toothpaste... that's what you got.

THE GOOD:
The castle is way cool from the outside. Exact replica.

Most of the staff that day were Slytherin. ^_^

As we waited in line, there was a little show going on right across from us. Music from the movies and the like. We couldn't see too much because of all the people, but we could still hear it and be entertained.

Single Rider line for the WIN!

The inside of the castle is AWESOME! We only got to see the moving and talking pictures but they were incredibly well done. PLUS they didn't always say the same thing every time.

You get to see the Sorting Hat right before you get on your Flying Bench (tm). It's pretty cool. I wish it would've said different things every time it activated, or even bantered with the crowd a little a la "Looks like we've got a Gryffindor who's ready to ride" or "Look out, that one behind you definitely belongs in Slytherin." But no, he just did a little rhyme about how lucky we are and to be careful.

THE RIDE TECHNOLOGY IS AWESOME. Imagine the technology of Soarin' - a flying bench - with the technology of Spiderman - physical rooms & items plus screens that only intensify the feeling of movement. Sometimes, you go all the back, like you're lying on the bench. The characters are all recognizable and happy to see you. The monsters - of course there are monsters - are pretty freakin' real. (THE UGLY goes into detail, but contains spoilers)

In the end, you save the day or something or other.

The giftshop at the end has awesome stuff. The scarves were clearly the biggest hit. The way they're designed is almost like college pride gear. I, of course, got a Slytherin scarf. An easy way you know you should be in Slytherin, is that if you get a Slytherin scarf and see someone else wearing one you don't think "Oh hey! We're in the same house!", you think "Psht, how pretentious."

THE UGLY
*SPOILERS*
There's a dragon. It gets close to you. Very very close. And then it breathes fire! Colored fog/steam but still Super Cool Effect. And it looked GOOD.

There are spiders. Gigantic spiders. They get close to you. They spit on you. ;_; This part made me a little claustrophobic. The spiders were ugly. At some parts, I felt like I had to lift my feet so I wouldn't touch them... a ridiculous movement since I'm only 5'2".

There are dementors! THEY ARE HUGE. They get close to you. Apparently if you sit on the far left, one of them sometimes is just close enough that its cloak will brush you.

FINAL THOUGHTS
So there you have it. Overall, if you're a fan of the series, it's definitely worth it. I almost wish the ride wasn't scary though. It was, kind of. I would've liked more of a "Fantastic Journey" than a "Forbidden" one.

But hey... maybe I'm just getting old. ^_^'

I give it a 4.5 out of 5.

Excellent review. Having been there in August and experiencing the madness (though not quite to the extent you guys did) I agree with a lot of the points you made. The whole queuing system definitely could've been designed better and the lockers were annoying. I like the Flying Bench tm. LOL! But really that's kind of what it is...that would be so awesome if the sorting hat said stuff like that! You really should go work for Universal.

Loved all the other updates too. Yay for getting to see all the Christmas decorations at YC/BC.

 

[not_Joanna_eggs]

That train at the YC is awesome!

I've had the bacon-wrapped snapper at Flying Fish twice, and didn't like it either time. It sounds like such a good idea...but the fish never tastes that good. What a waste!

The train was really neat, there was so much to look at, I could have spent hours. There were disney and non-disney bulidings alike. The YC display was the best non-edible one we saw. But really, if it's not edible, what's the point?

I agree - I actually think that is why FF gets a bad rep. I've always ordered something else, and it has always been fantastic, but somehow their "signature item" just doesn't cut it.

Just caught up on your last few updates! The Nemo show has been on my to-do list for the last 3 trips, and for some reason, we never find the time to go. But I swear we'll do it next time!

That's awesome you got to see so many resort decorations. But I definitely agree about that sail boat tree....kinda strange! But I guess it does kinda fit the theme?

Definitely try to squeeze in Nemo. We would always skip it for other things too, but once we finally saw it we were hooked. It is so well done! Hope you get to it.

Yeah, the sail boat tree seemed really lazy. Other resorts had trees with things just stuck to them - like AKL had wooden animals, but they were more to scale with the tree so it didn't look quite so out of place. I wonder if they used to have a bigger tree and down-sized but didn't get new decorations.

Excellent review. Having been there in August and experiencing the madness (though not quite to the extent you guys did) I agree with a lot of the points you made. The whole queuing system definitely could've been designed better and the lockers were annoying. I like the Flying Bench tm. LOL! But really that's kind of what it is...that would be so awesome if the sorting hat said stuff like that! You really should go work for Universal.

Loved all the other updates too. Yay for getting to see all the Christmas decorations at YC/BC.

There were a lot of things at universal that we felt could have used a good process improvement overhaul. But then again, that's what pretty much all of us do - process improvement - so we'll try to improve the process wherever we go. We're really quite obnoxious actually

The decorations were really cool. Though, we got the impression that things had been way scaled back - which was a bummer.

 

[not_Joanna_eggs]

When I was asked Tuesday night when we needed to leave, I optimistically said 7 am – because today was MK day. The park opened at 8, and we’d noticed the parks getting more and more crowded as the week progressed. I knew we had to get there early.

Yeah, yeah, I’ll be up…. Checking my email… just tell me where to go.

Srsly, you got me up for this?

Mmmm…. Coffee

Given our track record, I thought maybe I’d stepped into the Outer Limits or something, because we were walking to the bus by 7:15.

We better not have to watch 5 DTD busses go by this time….

Could it be? Could I hope? Was there an opening ceremony in our future?
Can you feel the enthusiasm? We had to restrain them!

The little recording thingy was broken on our bus, so the bus driver had to do it “old school” Yeah, he was like singing and everything. It made me miss the recording :laughing

As we’re pulling up I see the Lilly Bell (steam engine) stopped around the corner. The show hadn’t started yet!

So we made our way to the gates, without a real sense of urgency.

And when we got to the front, what did we see?

The Opening Ceremony. And you (okay, I) thought it couldn’t be done!

I got a bit of crap, “I thought you said it wouldn’t be crowded…”

But even this was NOTHINNG after the WWOHP, so we weren’t concerned.

So after we were able to enter the park we headed down Main Street.

Can you tell I was excited about the Christmas Decorations?

 

[Princess_K]

Woo hoo! You made it to a rope drop! Is this a good time to admit that we rarely make it to them?...usually just DHS because the TSM mad dash cracks me up

 

[norybell]

Congrats on making the opening show! Now tell the truth...was it a bit anti-climactic?

The YC display was the best non-edible one we saw. But really, if it's not edible, what's the point?

This makes me wonder...how often do they redo the edible ones? Do they really make them fresh every year, or is some of that chocolate and gingerbread actually a few years old? Hm.

There were a lot of things at universal that we felt could have used a good process improvement overhaul. But then again, that's what pretty much all of us do - process improvement - so we'll try to improve the process wherever we go. We're really quite obnoxious actually

Actually (and I say this in all honesty), the thought of visiting a theme park with a couple of process improvement people (process analysts?) sounds TOTALLY FUN.

 

[Panic Attack]

Actually (and I say this in all honesty), the thought of visiting a theme park with a couple of process improvement people (process analysts?) sounds TOTALLY FUN.

We like the term Process Improvement Engineers (or Process Excellence Engineers) mostly because the initials spell out PIE ^_^

 

[not_Joanna_eggs]

Woo hoo! You made it to a rope drop! Is this a good time to admit that we rarely make it to them?...usually just DHS because the TSM mad dash cracks me up

It's okay, in 8 trips this was the 2nd time I made rope drop - and the first time was totally by accident!

When we normally go, it just isn't worth it. But wow was it worth it this time!

Congrats on making the opening show! Now tell the truth...was it a bit anti-climactic?


This makes me wonder...how often do they redo the edible ones? Do they really make them fresh every year, or is some of that chocolate and gingerbread actually a few years old? Hm.


Actually (and I say this in all honesty), the thought of visiting a theme park with a couple of process improvement people (process analysts?) sounds TOTALLY FUN.

Yeah, rushing to get to the show would not be worth it. But the lack of crowds that accompanied being there for the opening show - now that was the highlight of the trip!

You know, I was thinking that exact thing, especially as I was reading someone's TR from Christmas '09...and the horses seemed the same. If you really think about it, it would be a waste to make the whole thing new every year.

Well, I might be biased, but I think this particular group of Process Improvement Engineers can be kind of amusing. We do tend to go overboard, but it occupies our time.

We like the term Process Improvement Engineers (or Process Excellence Engineers) mostly because the initials spell out PIE ^_^

See, everything is better if it's edible! Even you

 

[not_Joanna_eggs]

When we got to the Hub, we split up. Panic and DH headed to Tomorrow Land and Queenie, Grumpy and I headed towards Fantasy Land.

This was the one park that I had a clear strategy for – I knew what rides to ride when and had a method to my madness. And it worked out amazingly – we pretty much never waited in line.

Panic isn’t a fan of the Fantasyland rides, and DH doesn’t care, so we hoped to take advantage of them not being with us and hit up a few.

Conversely, Queenie and Grumpy don’t do roller coasters, and I refuse to ride space mountain again because, well, um… I like my spine. Last time I rode it I’m pretty sure it was millimeters away from detaching. It took me like a week to start walking correctly again.

So, all that to say we spit up, so the next part will be broken into two sections

Joanna, Queenie and Grumpy

As we headed through the castle, all the people disappeared – I presume they all headed to the Mountains. Queenie asked where we were headed, I said “Peter Pan” and responded “really, I thought we’d be going to a big ticket ride” I responded that this was the only time of day there wouldn’t be a 45 minute line… She seemed unconvinced, so when we hit Snow White, and the posted time was 0 minutes – we hopped on. I’m pretty sure we were the first people of the day.

Mirror, Mirror on the wall…. Who’s line is the shortest of them all?

After Snow White, we headed to Peter Pan… This one had a line…. Of 3 families!

How dare you be in front of us!

Okay, maybe there is something to this early morning thing…

Soon we were boarding our pirate ships…

And sailing to Never Never Land.

By this time it was 8:15. I kid you not. Since none of us are fans of the Pooh ride, or ISASW we decided to head to head to the Haunted Mansion.

The posted time was 5 minutes.

but the line was EMPTY

Like no one ahead of us, no one behind us

We get into the stretching room, and we were the ONLY people in the room. It’s creepier when there’s no one else there!

We got into our Doom buggies, and headed out in search of some Happy Haunts

Once we exited HM, it was about 8:30, and the park was still EMPTY

We hadn’t heard from Panic and DH yet, so we headed towards Pirates

I tried to get Queenie to go on Country Bear Jamboree, but no dice.

Soon we were at pirates – another walk-on, though there were more people than at HM.

Davy Jones!

This ride is so politically incorrect, and besides the Captn’ Jack additions, it doesn’t really fit the movies – I hope they do more updates.

Apparently this guy has hair on his legs. How gross!

So for those of you counting, in 30 minutes we rode 4 (different) rides.... not too shabby.

Meanwhile….