Bunch of Brooks Bounce Back.... Third time's the charm! An August Trip Report for a Family of 13!

[canuckgirl]

DAY FIVE, PART TWO: MAGIC KINGDOM

OHANA!!!!!!!
WE had previously been to Ohana on our 2018 trip, and it was one of the highlights, so we were so excited to be going back this time!! Our trip over there had *several* hiccups...

After spending the afternoon relaxing at WL, our plan was to take the boat over to MK, and then the monorail over to the Poly. We gave ourselves 30 mins, which on a normal day, would have been fine, especially since the boat ride is only 8 minutes long. On this day however, a big storm had just finished passing by, and unbeknownst to us, had struck the monorail. We found out the monorail was down, when we reached MK. At this point, the thunder and lightning was done, but it was still *POURING*. This was the time when the MNSSHP was starting, and *everyone* was leaving MK. The Ferry was packed and gone, with hundreds of people in line, since it was the only way to leave MK. Even though we were not dressed/prepared for it, we decided our best action was to WALK, because we were cutting it way to close to our reservation time to wait in line for a ferry or a bus. Because we had planned to hop on the monorail, we had not brought a single stroller or carrier for the little ones. So there we were. With 11 kids, walking in the very hard, cold, Florida rain, carrying/dragging the little ones ALL the way over to the Poly from MK. The construction was also happening, which meant that we had to use the detour around the Poly DVC which took even longer. We were so stressed, basically crying because we are such a big party, and we ended up being an HOUR AND A HALF late to our reservation. We were all SOAKING wet, and were so scared that we were going to lose our reservation, and have no plan for dinner for Winnie's special first birthday dinner.

When we got there, the hostess was so incredibly sweet, and that no matter how late we were that they would help us out and find a way to make it work, and that we would definitely get in to eat. Mom ended up talking to the manager to give her a cast compliment to tell him how incredible the hostess was!

So when we got sat our tables, we were stunned to see that we had a perfect view of the pool, the seven seas lagoon, and the castle!! We were sat at two round tables in the corner. It was perfect!




They brought the bread and salad out first, and the bread was inhaled in 5 seconds (we were so hungry after our unexpected marathon ). The salad was nice and fresh, but we found that the dressing was *very* sweet.


Then they brought out the massive skillets, which had the famous ohana noodles, chicken wings, pot stickers, and veggies. And the skillet with the meat (chicken thighs, steak, and shrimp). The wings were delicious, the noodles were much sweeter than we remembered, and we didn't love them as much as we did in 2018. The potstickers were 50/10, and we got SO. MANY. MORE. We knew that the kids (Teddy and Gus) were sort of picky eaters, and we asked for chicken tenders and fries, and the waiter was super accommodating and brought it out for them, again, Teddy the ketchup king struck gold, with a giant plate of ketchup!!! Disney knows their audience

Here's a look at our food and our view!! (sorry, but by the time the meat skillet came around, we were too deep into our food and enjoying it that I forgot to snap a photo of that one!!)

We will say that we were a bit disappointed in meats compared to the last trip. The chicken is now thighs instead of breasts, and they did have a lot of fat/gristle, and we don't love the dark meat of birds. The shrimp had an odd mushy texture, Mom and Charlie usually love shrimp and can tell the difference between good and bad shrimp. We only ate one or two and left the rest. Our beef was very hit or miss. Some pieces were so tender, lean, cook perfectly, and sooo delicious. But some were so chewy and hard it was almost inedible.

We also decided to get some of the famous Lapu lapu's for the adults! We don't usually ever drink, except for Ryan, who loves beer. So we found them VERY strong, but they were still sweet and delicious, and such a fun, fancy thing to have with the meal! Ethan hated it, so Alicia had to drink the whole thing .


For dessert we had the Ohana bread pudding. She is the real star of the show! Amazing, show stopping, incredible, one of a kind!!!!!!

As always, it was delicious, the combo of the warm bread pudding, the cold ice cream, the hot caramel sauce, IT. WAS. PERFECT. So delicious!!

Since it was Winnie's birthday, and we had said in our reservation we were celebrating, they brought out some celebration Rice Krispy bars for the kids! They were nothing special to us, but the kids loved them!



Overall, we give the meal an 8/10. The setting, bread, appetizers, potstickers, and bread pudding were all incredible, but the main course meats really let us down. We definitely will be going back, but I hope the meats will be better next time!

After the meal, we shopped around the poly gift shop a bit, then headed home to get a good night sleep for another day at MK!

 

[ThreeBoyMama]

Oh boy, that trip to the Poly! No wonder you guys needed a few lapu lapus! So glad they were still able to honor your reservation and that the meal was (mostly) a success. I admire you all for keeping such a good attitude!

 

[canuckgirl]

Oh boy, that trip to the Poly! No wonder you guys needed a few lapu lapus! So glad they were still able to honor your reservation and that the meal was (mostly) a success. I admire you all for keeping such a good attitude!

Thank so much, I was honestly so worried and upset because this was such a big important meal for us, but the hostess reassured us to never get worked up or upset because they would always find a way to help up, which made me feel so much better about any other future disasters that may arise before another dining experience!

 

[canuckgirl]

DAY FIVE, PART TWO: MAGIC KINGDOM
So after our exciting night last night, we were up an early to go over to Magic Kingdom again!
There's NOTHING like waking up, and opening your door, and seeing this view

Right outside of our door we had the fireplace and the chairs which almost no one ever used, so it felt like our own personal little living room, right inside the lobby! It was absolutely amazing to sit it the big chairs with our morning coffees and enjoy the fire, the music, and the ambiance of the lobby below! We can't stress enough how beautiful this lobby is, and how much we love this resort!!!


We got ready, then headed out to the boat dock to head over to the MK!

For breakfast this morning, we headed over to Sleepy Hollow to get some Nutella and fruit waffles! They are EASILY shareable, and SUCH a great value for such a delicious snack/breakfast! The fruit is always fresh, and the waffles are always made to order, 10/10! We also really loved that most of the fruit was berries, and not all bananas!


Is there *anything* better than breakfast with a view, especially when your view is of the beautiful pink Cinderella castle?!?!

Then we headed over to Adventureland to get on the Jungle Cruise!!! We had an excellent Skipper who had great, new jokes, and was so hilarious!

After Jungle Cruise, it's THE LAW to go and get some dole whip! Today we tried the new-to-us flavour of coconut! It was DREAMY, so creamy, and just the right amount of coco-nuttiness! 10/10 would recommend!


After our Nutella waffles and our coconut dole whip, we still weren't full, so we headed over to the famous spring roll cart! This was another thing we had been dying to try, the cheeseburger spring rolls, and the 50th special spring rolls that had pastrami and pepper jack!



We loved both of these flavours - they were both hot, fresh, and SO delicious!! The 50th ones came with the mustard dip, and the cheeseburger ones came with a mayo sauce, reminiscent of Big Mac sauce! We think that they were both 10/10 for sure, and it'd be hard to choose between the two, but I think the cheeseburger ones are *slightly* better! This has now become a must-get snack every visit!

There was a photo pass guy right outside the sign with only one family in line, so of course we got in line!!!



Then we started to make our way back to the front of the park, but we meandered through the emporium to get there. Once we got to the front of Main Street, we stopped at the ice cream stand to get some Mickey ice creams! We also ended up seeing Mickey and his friends in their EARidescent outfits coming down the stairs of the train station!

Poor Winnie loves Mickey and Minnie, but was tired and hot, and then overwhelmed seeing them in person and so big, that she got upset! But the other kids loved getting to see them up close!

Once we got back to the resort, we got some pixie dust, it seemed like Goofy and Donald followed us back to WL, and we got our own personal meet and greet there! We got some autographs and some photos, the kids were so happy!


It seems like WL is one of the *VERY* few resorts, where characters are walking around casually, very often, I think we saw some kind of character almost every day. Usually you could find chip and dale hanging around!

We got some food for lunch from roaring forks, including this ADORABLE fire pit cupcake!

It was SO good! Chocolately, moist, and the decorations on it were some of the cutest decorations on a cupcake I've ever seen! 10/10, so delicious!

We threw some laundry in the machines, and then we headed out to the pool!
Next up: Pool afternoon and MK evening!

 

[canuckgirl]

DAY FIVE, PART TWO: MAGIC KINGDOM

It was around 4-5 that we were at the pool, which was really nice because I think most people were at the parks or having dinner, so it was really quiet. There was a big storm coming in later that evening so we think people must've been taking advantage of the dry weather at the parks before it started pouring!

Here's a look at the pool and splash pad!

The pool at WL was one of our favourite deluxe resort pools so far! The kids splash pad area is FULLY GATED which is so important as parents with lots of little ones to know that they are safer in an enclosed space. The lifeguards were also very good at keeping the older, rowdy kids out. On several occasions, servers came to take orders if people wanted any drinks or food - we appreciate that they come out, because if you're alone with your kid, but you want something, they're coming around to ask! It was a very nice and fancy feeling thing that they were coming around. The slide in the main pool was not as large/tall as the one at GF or the Poly, but the pool seemed to be a lot bigger. It was always stocked full with towels and life jackets, which were impossible to come by at the Poly. We loved using the pool, and would always make a point to go every day when we go back!

We then left, got changed, then headed back over to the MK for the evening, as they had EMH we could take advantage of!

Once we got over to MK, we headed to 7DMT and got on there!

Then we went on Barnstormer and Dumbo.


After Dumbo, it was time for bed fro the little ones, and so we decided that we would split up the EMH. Ryan and I took the little ones back, and got them down, then Alicia, Ethan, Charlie, Lily, Juliet, and Eloise stayed at MK for a bit! We stayed until just before 11, then headed back to the WL. We rode a few rides, including Splash Mountain and Haunted Mansion, then grabbed some chicken and waffles from Sleepy Hollow for a late dinner.

On Splash we made the plan to all make super serious faces for the camera



When the kids got back we quickly ran down to the dock to grab the boat to MK.... or so we thought! We waited a few minutes for the next boat to arrive while nervously watching the sky because a huge storm was threatening! When the boat arrived we hopped on and waited and waited, but it wasn't leaving and we noticed a crew member talking to a family. The family were staying at Fort Wilderness and has accidentally gotten on the WL boat. The husband and wife were having "words" and didn't seem to be getting along.... to put it nicely! The boat skipper then offered to give them a personal ride and instead of going back to MK, to drop them off at FW first! Which was very nice, except that takes quite a while for this detour and we only had a short time of EMH left.... it would also had felt different if the family had been kind/grateful for this special detour, but they literally didn't even seem to care and didn't even say thank-you to the skipper when he dropped them off!! SO rude! After that, we finally headed back to our original destination of MK!

IT was so special to have a "date night" at MK! We even got a special rainy Mickey magic shot! It was just outside the plaza so the camera was still covered and out of the rain. It poured the ENTIRE time we were there and my shoes were soaked for the next 24 hours, but it was totally worth it!



We rode BTMR, HM, PP and then stopped by Casey's for their special 50th dessert of a Pressed Penny Silk Pie! it was DELICIOUS! super chocolatey and smooth with bug chocolate curls and lots of whipped cream! we meant to get it again (like so many other tasty treats!) but never got around to it.



We finished off the night riding Buzz with not a *single* person in line! There were only 2 other guests in the whole of Tomorrowland! Perfect ending to the day!

NEXT UP: Our 1 and only Hollywood Studios Day!

 

[canuckgirl]

DAY SIX, PART ONE: HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS

We had struggled deciding which parks we would only have a single day at, especially with HS because of Galaxy's Edge, and we've never seen it before! But our problem with HS and why it's at the bottom of our favourites list (it was bumped up to 3rd place with GE) is because of the fact that there are ONLY TWO rides in the WHOLE park that the whole family can go on! That means that someone has to stay back with the strollers, while everyone else goes on the ride, and that the little ones are stuck in their strollers for most of the day. We also are not big on shows (foreshadowing Teddy's reaction to the Frozen show...lol), so there's a limited amount of things that we can all do together.

Still, we were SO SO SO excited about seeing Galaxy's Edge because we're *massive* Star Wars fans, so we were so looking forward to a special day (it just ended up not being the type of special we had in mind... haha). There's nothing quite like this view walking down Hollywood blvd with the Chinese Theatre in the background!



Once we got into the park, we headed straight to the back to GE. NO RUNNING! Haha! Of course, ROTR was down.. LOL. So we made our way towards the Market Area to grab some snacks and take some great pics with a basically empty area!


The atmosphere in this area is SO cool, such a great feeling to be walking around this market with these different stands and seeing the ronto roaster with the jet engine is such amazing imagineering feat!

For snacks, we grabbed the Outpost Mix at Kat Sara's Kettle, and Alicia got the Cold Brew Black Caf.



We found that the popcorn was very divisive. It was kinda like a love/hate relationship, lol! It reminded me of the Lucky Elephant pink popcorn. We didn't get a lot of the spicy flavour coming out of it, and it was mainly just sweet. It was a miss with us - Juliet and Lily finished off most of the bag, but that was just because no one else really wanted anymore than a few pieces. Alicia *loved* the iced coffee, it was a nice strong, but not too strong coffee, and the sweet cream cheese was really good - I was surprised at how much I loved it! I didn't have an opinion on the cocoa puffs, they didn't add anything. I do love cheesecake, and so I think that's why I loved it so much. If you don't like cheesecake I don't think you'll love this!

Once we finished with our snacks, we headed over to see the Millennium Falcon in real life!!!!!!!

It was emotional seeing such an iconic ship and iconic part of the series that we're massive fans of, Ryan, having grown up a Star Wars fan, was choking up! Being there so early, it was so quiet and it was SO nice to get amazing photos with NO ONE in the backgrounds!!





Matching shirts because we're cheesy and cute, and because we're the stars of this report!!!

Ryan and Eloise stayed back with Winnie while everyone else headed onto MFSR, which only had a 10 minute wait!

Teddy playing Holochess was adorable, and he was giving the BIGGEST smiles, which he would soon NOT BE once he got on the ride...

We ended up with Ethan and Juliet as the pilots, and Teddy and I as engineers. My thought process was that if I had him next to me, he could see me and I could hold his hand. In hindsight, I would have put him in front of my as the navigator. I then would have been able to hold him in place, because when the ride was going, he was flopping around EVERYWHERE, WHILE SCREAMING, and I couldn't reach him to console him. It was *more* than a little traumatic for him and me.



It was a fun ride, but way too rough, and only really super fun if you were the pilot, as the other jobs are just pushing buttons.

When we got off, Ryan and Eloise went on, loved it, and then we headed over Savi's workshop to get some lightsabers!

 

[canuckgirl]

Welcome Back! You thought you'd gotten ride of us, didn't you??? Life with 12 kids somehow gets in the way and our poor little TR got pushed to the back burner! We havent forgotten though, and with Disney fever hitting our house HARD we felt we needed to jump back in to our report to relive our best trip ever! So without further ado....

DAY SIX, PART TWO: HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS!

We left off with our (partly) successful ride on Millenium Falcon. Galaxy's Edge really was everything we dreamed and it was wonderful to be able to wander through the land and feel completely immersed in all things Star Wars! Both Ryan and Charlie had saved up and wanted to go to Savi's Workshop to get Lightsabers. We had heard varying reports on the availability of certain hilts/sabers so we wanted to make sure to get there earlier in the day so their choices would still be available! There was a small lineup, but nothing crazy and luckily both their top choices were still available! Ryan got Darth Vader's Lightsaber and Charlie got the Skywalker Reforged Lightsaber.

After Savi's we found out that ROTR had finally opened for the day, so we booked it over as fast as we could before the lineup got crazy! We of course took advantage of the Rider Swap and Ryan and I took all the older kids on together, while Alicia and Ethan stayed with the 2 littlest ones and waited their turn to ride! Again, I can't stress enough how incredible rider swap is for large families! It makes things so much easier and is completely free! No easy feat in Disney! While we were waiting to ride the kids ran into some Stormtroopers walking around and they even said Hi to Teddy! a dream come true.... though he still wanted to know where Vader was!

ROTR was truly the best ride we've ever been on! It was so immersive and breathtaking. We were all in awe! Ryan even got teary, which mi' sure is something a lot of 40-somethings who grew up with the original Star Wars experienced! Even the queue was so interactive and really made the whole thing like part of the experience! I was so bummed that Teddy was juts a tiny bit too short and couldn't go on because I think he would have loved it! I think Disney did miss the mark a little bit by not making it a family ride, especially since it's just 1 drop and the options for rides for little ones at HS is HUGELY lacking!!!



After we had all ridden ROTR we headed out towards the front of the park to ride MMRR. But since we weren't quite done with Star Wars yet, the kids wanted to hop on Star Tours since it was a walk-on. We waited for them at a shaded table outside of Backlot Express and when they got off we went inside to grab a snack we'd been dying to try for a while! a Wookie Cookie!!!

But of course we couldn't pass by Backlot Express without grabbing a Wookie Cookie!!!We were a little worried since we had seen all over the internet that they had changed the cookie from a regular cookie to the cake-like cookies, and we weren't sure how those would taste (we've heard many people complain about not liking the carrot cake cookie after they made the same change!) But these cookies are absolutely INCREDIBLE!! They were SO insanely soft and pillowy, and the oatmeal with the whip cream icing was such a good balance of the oaty/nutty flavour and the creamy, lightness of the icing. Not to mention how stinkin' cute they look with the chocolate "belt" on top! Definitely a must-try!



Now it was really time for us to head over to the middle of the park to get on MMRR!! Now here's where our seemingly perfect day had gone sideways quite quickly! Like I said previously, the choices for family rides is super lacking, and so we were super excited how this was a family ride! Alicia had mentioned that getting the Genie+ just for this day (since we knew it's a busy park and that we only had one day) would have been a good idea, but so far we'd had pretty good luck with times of rides at the other parks, and even the morning In GE was pretty easy, so we decided against it. In hindsight we definitely should have!

Standby was a 45min wait, so we hopped in line. We noticed pretty quickly that the line was just not moving at all. After we had made it into the part where we could see the Genie+ entrance, that's when we realised why we had been waiting for almost 30 already. It was so ridiculous, because the ratio of the CM letting in Genie+ vs standby was on average 50 to 1, because we had time to count *several* times that this happened. We understand that when you've paid for the LL, you should definitely have a shorter wait, but when we'd been standing there for over half an hour not moving, it started to get super frustrating. It seemed to be that the idea was the second someone started walking up to the LL, they cut off standby and kept LL open for a few more minutes too. We also found it extra hard because the queue for this ride is atrocious! Nothing but a few posters to look at, and we're all just snaking around ropes in the big room. The kids got SO bored so quickly, and even started to ask to leave, and our kids are OBSESSED with the Mickey shorts, so that's VERY telling. It was super unpleasant and was starting to get on our nerves, which ended up changing our moods for once we had finally gotten on the ride. When we did get on the ride we really did love it!!! for about 2 minutes until we got stopped in a giant empty room with nothing on the screen..... for over 5 minutes . and when the ride did start back up again, the ride left the room right away and we missed what was supposed to be a really fun/cool scene in the ride. Like I said, we left pretty disappointed, but I know that our experience was coloured by our awful experience in line. I would be excited to go back and give this ride another chance.... but ONLY with Genie+!





After that disaster, we decided it was time for a little treat! We headed over to Peevy's Frozen Concoctions to get the famous Frozen Coke!!! We were SO EXCITED because I had seen everyone talking about how incredible it is, and how it's the BEST Frozen Coke on property! We can now truly confirm that it 1000% true! It's not icy AT ALL, so smooth with no icy graininess, and it doesn't separate into chunky ice and coke, and it even still was fizzy! The fact that they topped it with the adorable Mickey was so so cute! Definitely was MUCH needed to fix our spirits and cool us down!



Next up, we headed to... Galaxy's Edge again, for another frozen drink!

 

[Paulaparm]

Now how cute is that!?!?!
Not sure how I’ve missed those…I LOVE frozen Coke. Putting them on my list for next trip!

 

[canuckgirl]

View attachment 846180
Now how cute is that!?!?!
Not sure how I’ve missed those…I LOVE frozen Coke. Putting them on my list for next trip!

Yes, they are the BEST!!! I had actually heard about them through another Disboard TR!

 

[canuckgirl]

DAY SIX, PART THREE: HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS!

After the frozen coke, we headed back towards GE to try some more snacks/treats that we had on our list! On our way we discovered a little hidden gem! Off to the side before we entered Black Spire we saw a CM with a camera hanging around the bay doors with a ton of Lightsabers and he offered us a photo shoot! Never a family to turn down a cool photo op, we said yes and got the cutest pics!




First we got the Ronto wraps from Ronto Roasters! There's no indoor seating here and since it was August in Orlando it was about a million degrees at this point, so we walked over to Docking Bay 7 to sit in the AC while we ate our late lunch. It took a while for us to find seating all together, who was a theme throughout the trip. One of the reasons we want to finally visit during a cooler time is because we'd like to enjoy outdoor eating and easier seating options! The Ronto wrap was everything we dreamed it would be! The wrap was soft and warm, the sausage hot and the coleslaw cold and crispy! 100% recommend!


On our way over to grab some galactic milk, we happened upon some more rogue stromtroopers! So fun to see and interact with them, it was one of our favourite parts!


We had heard all the mixed reviews about the Blue & Green Milks, but of course, couldn't visit Galaxy's Edge without trying it! I'm VERY glad we only bought 2 for 13 people because we all HATED them! Ethan felt bad about how expensive they were so was stuck finishing them himself! All-in-all a great experience here, but if we were to do it again, we would change our schedule, as going back to Galaxy's Edge took a lot of time and we ended up having to skip some stuff we wanted to do.



We left GE through Toy Story Land, but the wait times were absolutely INSANE, so we kept going and ended up back near the Disney Junior Area. Here we had to make a big decision (SPOILER: It was the WRONG one! ) Teddy was hot and not feeling well at all. Since his favourite thing of the trip so far had been meeting Elsa & Anna, we decided to catch the last showing of The Frozen Sing-Along. We had seen it on our 2014 trip and LOVED it and thought Teddy would LOVE seeing the princesses again and the whole "snow" scene and it was a nice place to sit quietly in the A/C for a bit!

Well.... it was a DISASTER! He ended up being TERRIFIED of the snow and thought it was too loud and was just generally miserable. Poor thing! When we got out of the show it was just after 5pm and we decided to go and do the thing we had been talking about EVERY DAY since we booked the trip. Meet Darth Vader! Teddy and Gus are HUGE Darth Vader fans and were SO EXCITED to meet him. I'm sure you can see where this is going.... Darth Vadermeet and greets at HS END at 5pm. It was literally HEARTBREAKING! I felt SO BAD that I had messed that up. It was seriously the one thing they were looking forward to so much and we had missed it for the Frozen show which had been a total mess. We only had the 1 day at HS during our trip as well, so it was extra sad! We find HS a really hard park in general, because although the older kids love the thrill rides and we love GE, there are exactly *2* rides in the ENTIRE park that the littlest ones can go on. so with a big family it doesn't make sense to spend more than 1 day here. We even considered adding park hopper for 1 day just to go back and meet him, but you can only add it for your whole trip, not just 1 day. So sad! It was honestly the only thing we'd change about our otherwise perfect trip!

Since Teddy was still running warm and not feeling well, Ryan offered to take him back home to WL while the rest fo us stayed to park close! It was hard splitting up, but it ended up being the right decision as once he was back in our cool room with food and drinks he liked, he was feeling much better and back to his usual self! Ryan also brought the lightsabers back with him since it was a pain dragging them around all day (Hey, Disney! Please bring back the resort package delivery!!)



We then headed down Sunset Boulevard towards ToT! Since I couldn't ride and was watching the little ones, we decided it was a good time to stop for a snack. We headed to Anaheim Produce for some frozen lemonades and Mickey pretzels! The frozen lemonade was perfectly tart and sweet and so icy cold, just what we needed to cool off! The pretzel was also huge and soft and salty. It really was the perfect snack and it was great because there is a ton of covered seating behind Anaheim Produce and we had no trouble finding a table to rest and eat while we waited for the kids to finish at ToT.



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Maisie was the youngest one who went to ride. She had ridden in in 2018, and was terrified, but for some reason wanted to torture herself again. There was no change in her feelings towards it, and she still very much hated it and now vows to never ride it again! But, like a good parent I got a hilarious video, so here it is for all to enjoy!

After ToT we headed over to RRC. I've actually never ridden it before and was super excited since I love Arrowsmith! We of course, got a rider swap and Ethan and I waited while Alicia, Charlie, Lily, Juliet & Eloise rode first. There is some shaded seating near the entrance to Lightning McQueen Racing Academy with a bathroom nearby and room for the kids to run around, so it ended up being a nice spot to wait! I was NOT prepared for how fast RRC was! haha! I guess I thought it was "disney' fast... but it's actually CRAZY fast and I held on for dear life the whole time! We got "walk this way" our song, which isn't my first choice, but it was still super fun!



After we were done on Sunset Blvd, we headed over to Toy Story land because it was about 8pm, and the lines were shorter than they were in the afternoon. We had an hour left until park close, and so everyone went in line for SDD, except for Alicia and Lily who got the rider swap and stayed with the strollers. They were lucky because they found a table that had an umbrella, and the sky started to look pretty dark, and in the far distance we could see lightning in the sky. The rain started coming down, but it was just ligh. We were all really worried that we wouldn't get to ride it because while we waited during the hour long wait, the whole time CMs were radioing back and forth talking about the storm approaching, and a message kept playing over the speakers warning guests that there was a storm approaching, and they might shut down the ride at any moment, after we waited for so long! We were so lucky that we got on, even though it was drizzling!

Lily and I (Alicia) were so worried that they would close down the ride before the others came back. Thankfully it was still open when they came back, and the park was quiet, so we started fast walking/running to the line to hopefully get on before it shut down. We were successful and got on! The rain started coming down harder when we were going around, and shortly after Lily and I got off, they shut it down! We were so lucky!

Here we made a choice to split up - Alicia and I really wanted to try some food items from Woody's lunch Box, and the other kids saw that RotR had only a 25 minute wait. Juliet stayed with Alicia and I (along with the stroller/Winnie/Gus) and Ethan, Charlie, Lily, Juliet, Eloise, Maisie, and Mabel all headed over to GE again, and we decided to meet out front of the Chinese theatre when we were all done. At Woody's Lunchbox, we got the Totchos and the Strawberry Lunch Box Tart. The totchos were super yummy (I mean, how can you go wrong, fried tater tots and toppings?!) and the pop-tart was super yummy! The pastry was nice and flakey, and the filling was really sweet and tasty too. Definitely would go again! The heavens opened up while we were eating and once we were done, we saw that Toy Story Midway Mania was a walk-on so we hopped in line for our last ride of the day! Gus had so much fun!

After the ride, we headed back to the main section of the park, met up with the other kids, and got in line for the bus home!

We had some up and downs, but it was still a really fun day at Hollywood Studios!

Next up... Teddy's birthday and the MNSSHP!