Back at Pop, my girls were having no part of the idea of resting. The weather was beautiful and the pool was all but empty, and they wanted to swim. So the girls and I got changed and headed down for a dip while my mom settled in for a nap.
At the pool, the girls quickly made a couple of new friends, sisters who were taking turns jumping into the pool. The younger one was probably 3 and wearing a life jacket, and I guess Boo decided that if her friend could jump in she could too. She's never done anything like that before; she tolerates her swim classes but left to decide for herself she mostly sticks to sitting on the edge of the pool and playing with the water unless there's a zero-entry or kiddie pool available.
Pocahontas joined in the pool games but Boo was happy where she was. After 45 minutes of jumping in and dog paddling back to the side to do it again, she wanted to call Daddy again so she could tell him what she discovered. The pool activities wrapped up and we decided to get dried off and check out the playground for a little bit. Back in the room I grabbed my phone for Boo and my camera and we headed out again.
I filled my mug and we grabbed an outside table while the girls chatted with DH. Pocahontas got a little teary when she hung up, but she got over the moment of homesickness quickly when Boo resumed her demands for playground.
Both girls really liked the playground area. Rather than woodchips the ground is rubberized padding in some areas and pebbles in others, and the girls kicked off their shoes rather than continually emptying them.
Pocahontas liked the spinning wheel-like things that they have in place of monkeybars.
A funny Disney moment... Do you see the man in the background of the picture? He is a member of Pop's ground crew and his entire purpose at the playground was to use a leaf blower to blow the pebbles off of the rubberized areas and back to where they should be. Talk about attention to detail/upkeep!
We walked around a little to check out the resort, but it was getting to be time to get ready for dinner so we didn't venture too far off the path back to the 50s.
We dressed and hopped a bus back to the Magic Kingdom for dinner at my favorite Disney restaurant, California Grill. We walked over rather than hop the monorail, because the path is right there near the bus stop and it always feels to me like walking up to the monorail is just as long as walking to the resort.
Dinner was wonderful and we watched the sun set and the castle light up for the night while we ate. Then we headed back to the park for the evening's fun. We took the long way around because the girls wanted to ride the monorail, which of course goes the long way around Seven Seas Lagoon before getting to the park. It was a nice, relaxing, quiet after dinner moment, and a good way to kick off a busy evening.
The lines at bag check were ridiculous, not because there were so many people but because there were so few stations open. I think Disney underestimated how many people would be entering the park in the evening to take advantage of the late hours.
It was about 8:30 by the time we got into the park and we went straight up into the train station to get a vantage for Wishes and the Memories castle show. Main Street was packed but there were only a few dozen people on the train station balcony for the show.
I ended up holding Boo through both shows so I didn't get a single picture!
After Wishes, we relaxed for a few minutes and let the girls run around while the herds of people headed for the gate. After about 15 minutes Main Street had cleared considerably and we headed off to hit some rides.
I snapped a couple shots of the second Memories show of the evening from the walkway to Tomorrowland.
I think this is my favorite overlay, so bright and colorful.
Usually Tomorrowland is not the place to start on late evenings. Too many other people do the same. But we had a must-do on the list that doesn't stay open for the full extra magic hours so that's where we went first - Monsters Inc Laugh Floor.
Boo loved this as much as I'd hoped she would! We sat right up front and she giggled through the whole show.
Next we hopped over for a quick ride on Buzz, which was showing a 20 minute wait that turned out to be more like 10. Boo was getting a little drowsy, so I figured now was as good a time as any for a short nap since we wanted her happy for Fantasyland later.
And where better to take a nap than on one of my must-dos, the Carousel of Progress. I'd never been on it and it is such a classic that I wanted to check it out. Sure enough, Boo fell right to sleep almost as soon as we were seated and the rest of us settled in to enjoy the show. It was interesting for the history of it but nothing that I feel the need to fit in every trip. I'm glad we did it, though, because it is definitely not something DH & DS would have enjoyed!
After Carousel, I headed over to check the line for Space but it was still posting a 70 minute standby. DM was ready to take a bit of a break so we settled a still sleeping Boo into her stroller, found a nice table near the Lunching Pad, and DM relaxed with a bottled water while I took Pocahontas for a speed-tour of the Magic Kingdom. In the interests of efficiency I left my camera behind and we went true park commando, so this segment is entirely unillustrated.
First stop was Peter Pan to use our fastpasses. It was 10:30ish and the FP return was almost as long as the standby line with all the people using up their FPs late. Pocahontas likes this ride more every time we go on it. There is always some detail to notice for the first time, and with Peter Pan being among her favorite Disney stories it is a natural must-do.
After that we dashed over to Haunted Mansion, which was posting a 20 minute wait that turned out to be exactly 7. So we rode twice. I missed the hitchhiking ghosts! I was happy to read theirs is only a temporary absence, though. We'll see them again soon, and I'm really looking forward to checking out the new queue.
Next up was Big Thunder Mountain. I don't have a note on the wait time but it couldn't have been more than 20min or we wouldn't have waited. I think it was less, actually. Pocahontas had never been on this one before but she wasn't scared at all. Not surprising, given her love for Everest and RnR.
She decided the weather was too cool for Splash so I gave away our fastpasses while we were in the area and we moved on.
Pirates was posting a 5 minute standby. This was the only ride all trip where the actual wait was longer than the posted wait, but it was still only about 10 minutes. It has been a long time since I rode this without a camera in hand because it is my personal test-gallery for low-light shooting, and it was nice to just sit back and enjoy the ride.
The Jungle Cruise only had a 10 minute wait so we decided to take a quick turn before heading back to Boo and DM. I'd never ridden this at night before and it really looks/feels different in the dark. Somehow both more and less believable and more campy, like being in a really cheesy jungle adventure movie.
On our way back to Tomorrowland we stopped for that classic Magic Kingdom must-do, a Dole Whip float. DM had never tried one so I had to get one for us to share. Pocahontas ordered a root beer float and we set off on a leisurely walk across the park while we sipped on our goodies.
Upon getting back to Fantasyland, we saw that Buzz had virtually no line so we dropped off the floats at DM's table, checked in on the still-sleeping Boo, and went for another round of shooting aliens. Once we were all together again we took a quick bathroom break and noticed that Space was now posting a 10 minute wait, so a reluctant Pocahontas and I headed over for one last just-us ride before waking Boo up to do Fantasyland.
Space Mountain is a storied and intimidating ride for Pocahontas. DM took the kids and I to WDW for Pocahontas 6th birthday, and for weeks before that trip Pocahontas had me measuring her every morning to see if she was tall enough for Space. DS loved the ride from the first time he was on it (at 7) and she wanted to try it for herself. She just barely made it, so on her birthday she rode it for the first time. It scared her so badly that she cried all the way back to the hub!
Needless to say it wasn't something she rode on our next trip, just 5 months later. And on our 2009 trip it had just come back up from the extended rehab and was still out of commission frequently. She said she wanted to try it again, but we could never seem to catch a time when it was running. DH & DS ended up riding while I was with in Fantasyland with the girls, and they waited through a half-hour outage to do it. So one of her goals for this trip was to finally ride it again and get over her fear.
At 1am on a day that started at 7:30, however, she wasn't so sure about that goal. So I did the bad mommy thing and talked her into coming with me even though she was nervous. And she LOVED the ride. She's taller and the new seats are nicer, so her head doesn't bounce around the way she remembered from her first ride, and she finally got to see that it really isn't as fast or scary as RnR. We debated a second go-round but Boo was starting to wake up so we headed back to Fantasyland instead.
If you've never been in Fantasyland in the wee hours of the morning, you really should try it some time. It turns into a ghost town! The tea cups, carousel, Dumbo, even Peter Pan... All walk ons. Pocahontas and DM rode the tea cups while Boo had a snack and I played with my camera.
Then I tucked the camera away again for some walk-on commando time. We hit Philharmagic first, to let Boo wake up a bit more before hitting any rides. She adored Philharmagic. I knew she would, because Donald is one of her favorites and she loves music of all sorts, but this was the first time she actually kept the 3D glasses on and watched a whole show!
Then it was off to Dumbo for two rides in a row, then to the carousel. I sent DH a picture of Boo on the carousel from my phone at 1:30am.
DM wanted to do Peter Pan so we rode that again, and of course with Small World right there we had to do that too. Boo loves "the baby ride". Then back for one last turn on Dumbo before calling it a night, because Boo just couldn't get enough of the elephants. On that last ride Goofy was on the ride too, in the elephant in front of us with a little boy who was beside himself with excitement.
Since it probably won't be there on our next trip, we decided to ride Snow White one last time and I was pleasantly surprised that it didn't scare Boo the way it did Pocahontas when she was younger.
Finally we started making our way out of the park. It was a few minutes after two, the girls were getting hungry, and we'd done everything on our list and then some. I LOVE late nights at the Magic Kingdom!
It was here that we ran into the one and only hiccup of an otherwise lovely night. In the times guide it says that certain restaurants are open "until park closing". Nowhere is it mentioned that what they really mean is "until park closing or 1am, which ever comes first".
The only place still open and serving food on our way out of the park was Main Street Bakery, but they were sold out of all their savory offerings and only had a limited selection of pastries left. The girls just wanted a snack so we made do with a couple bananas and a bag of popcorn from the cart in the hub, but I do wish the guide had been more clear. I'd have picked up chicken strips & fries to-go from Cosmic Rays on our way through just to have it if the girls got hungry later.
Pocahontas had me take this picture because she knew her brother would never take her at her word about us being in the park so late!
I think this was the first night there wasn't even a mention of swimming once we got on the bus. We were all happily exhausted, and we were asleep practically as soon as we got back to the room.
). I already told DH that this year for Christmas we're upgrading my camera body to the A55, because I'm drooling over the ability to use the screen as a viewfinder like on point & shoot digitals and the HD video capacity.
And now that I've exposed just what a dork I really am, I'm going to go back to working on the next installment. 
We're planning lots of early mornings since we're going in August (gotta beat the heat!), but maybe after our midday break we could try to stay out til 2am!
