Wednesday, October 14th
After finally coming down from our MNSSHP excitement, we managed to enjoy a much-needed, restful slumber. Our section of the resort was blissfully quiet, and we didn’t hear a peep from neighbouring guests all week, which on this morning allowed us to sleep quite a bit later than what we are normally accustomed to (I’m a hard core early-to-rise girl in particular, so “sleeping in” for me generally constitutes anything after 7 am!!!
). We didn’t get up until after 9, and then enjoyed long showers and a leisurely breakfast in the villa before making our way to the Universal parking garage.
Plans for today called for the first portion of the day at Islands of Adventure before switching over to the Studios for Halloween Horror Nights.
We didn’t have any reservations for lunch on this particular day, so on our way through Port of Entry we stopped to book a noontime table for two at one of our favourite IOA establishments, Confisco Grill. It was about 11:15 am at that point, so we had about 45 minutes or so before our seating time. Neither one of us felt much like doing any rides just yet (we were still waking up after our late night!) so we strolled around a bit and enjoyed the gorgeous late-morning sun.
We decided to head over to Marvel to see if we could meet up with Spiderman, as the interaction with him is always excellent. We were surprised and delighted to find that there was a very short line for his meet-and-greet, so we hopped into the queue and were chatting away with our favourite Superhero (well, one of them anyway!!
) within just a few short minutes.
Spidey was chatty and personable and fun as always
. Steve wistfully remarked of how much fun it must be to work as a character at the parks….and vowed that someday he would be strolling Marvel Superhero Island as Dr. Doom (let’s just say he’s much too brawny to be wirey Spidey
).
Somehow, some way, after our session with Spiderman we ended up at the sledgehammer game just outside of the Marvel area
. Steve noted with broad grin that they had ANOTHER new minion hanging up and available to be won.
You can see where this is going
.
For the record, I was the voice of reason.
We have no more luggage space. You have already won me two, I don’t need another. Where am I going to put them all when (if?) I do manage to get them home? Have I mentioned that we don’t have enough luggage space to accommodate another minion?
But it’s TIM, Gina. You don’t have a Tim. You need him, his friends need him. We can’t leave him here.
One $5 bill, three swings of the hammer (just needed the first two, the third was just for fun) and up went a cheer from the small group that had stopped to watch.
Our minion haul had officially grown to 3, and packing to go home had just turned from a chore to veritable pain in the rump. But yet….I was delighted nonetheless
. Go figure!
With Tim in tow, we returned to the front of the park to check in at Confisco.
The greeter confirmed our reservation, and we were quickly ushered to a booth in lovely quiet corner of the restaurant. There were some minion cuddles happening
.
It was fairly busy at Confisco's…..much more so than when we were there in May. I do adore the décor in this restaurant. Its casual and rustic and very much my style
.
We ordered a pair of Coke Zeros to drink, and our server brought them out along with a complimentary basket of pitas with mystery spread:
As we nibbled away on the pitas, my cell phone rang and we were delighted to see it was Jake giving us a call. We both took some time to chat with him individually, first me and then Steve. We usually prefer a three-way chat via speaker phone, but that wasn’t an option right then with others dining around us. He was eager to hear about our adventures at the Disney party, and we were eager to hear what he’d been up to over the last day or so. I was missing my boy a little bit so this was a nice lunchtime surprise
. Tim sat patiently on the corner of our table as we talked, ate, and relaxed:
When our entrees arrived, we bid Jake adieu and promised to let him know all about
HHN later that night. He assured us he’d still be up at midnight and said to call him as we drove back to the resort, if we felt up to another chat.
Ah, lunch
. It was absolutely delish
. Steve had the Confisco burger with cheese:
I had the BBQ pork sandwich (modified a tiny bit to have the coleslaw and onion straws on the side versus on the sandwich):
Two thumbs up all around on this meal…..once again, we were impressed with the quality and quantity of the food, the friendliness and efficiency of the service, and the overall atmosphere. The pork was so tasty (and the sauce on the meat was some sort of peach barbecue sauce, and you could really taste the peachiness….but in a really nice way) and the corn on the cob was done perfectly and
so flavourful. Steve gave equally high marks to his burger and fries, and cleaned his plate (as well as helping me finish mine!!).
By mutual agreement, we opted out of dessert at Confisco’s since we had other plans for that
. We covered the bill ($31.02 including tax, excluding tip…..should have been lower, but our server erred in the discount with our AP’s and gave us the lower Preferred discount versus the one for the Premier passes….we didn’t bother to bring it to her attention) and then made our way to our immediate left:
Croissant Moon
. We love it here
.
After much consideration and a full perusal of the delicacies artfully arranged behind the long glass display cases, Steve opted for his personal favourite, the caramel cheesecake:
While they had so many new and different things that looked mouth-wateringly good, I too decided on a favourite that I rarely can find at any other bakery: the delectable Napoleon bar:
So. Unbelievably. Marvelous
. For whatever reason, we’ve never found the staff here to be particularly friendly, but the sweet treats are so amazing that I would keep coming back regardless (not that they’re rude…..they just don’t seem to be up to the friendliness standards of the other workers within the park). Total price for the two items was $8.41 including tax and our AP discount.
Stuffed full and on a bit of sugar high, we needed to walk off some of our dietary sins. Seuss Landing was next on our agenda!
.
.
. My OCD just couldn't handle that 
…..except for the one above, they’re all blurry and dark. You’ll have to take my word on how excellent the parade was, since I can't back up my praise with a boatload of photo proof. Once again, it lived up to the hype and was well worth the time to watch. We would be found singing the “Boo to You” and “It’s Good to Be Bad” songs more than once over the course of the balance of the week!!
, but my dear Steve turned himself into the spray of water to protect Tim from getting wet 
.
They definitely impact the vacation budget. 
. Fingers crossed that Southwest will come through for you with some awesome flight prices!
But in a cool way, if that's possible 
