Day 5 (Dec. 25). I kept taking cold medicine, and although I wasn't feeling great, I felt well enough to go to the parks on Christmas Day. In order to save time we had given up plans for a leisurely pancake breakfast on Christmas morning (another family tradition) but I tried to make breakfast festive by having nice doughnuts and so on for the kids.
We to spend the day at EPCOT. When we got into the boat, it was a little before nine and the driver told us that the park had been open since 7:30 and World Showcase would open at 10 instead of 11 all week. However, the crowds were not really any worse than when we've been there in June or July. (Later I learned that Magic Kingdom closed its doors to non-park guests before noon, but apparently Epcot didn't.)
We (finally!) persuaded my mother to accept a wheelchair this time, and it made things much easier for my mother and for all of us as well because now we moved at the pace of our brisker chair-pushers instead of my mother's rather slow pace.
We first went on Honey I Shrunk the Audience and then Spaceship Earth. The line on Spaceship Earth was a little longer than I liked (25 minutes) but it is a favorite of our daughter's and I couldn't honestly say that we could get a better line later. After Spaceship Earth (am I the only person bothered by the absence of Africans in the pre-history scenes?) we had a snack at the Fountainview Cafe. This is usually one of our favorite places, but it was not up to its usual standards. 
The latte was not as creamy and hot as usual and I had to remind the server to give us our rock candy stirrers. I had a delicious pain au chocolat though, and my husband had a great muffin. My brother had a cheese and raspberry danish that he thought was pretty good and the kids liked their cookies. (My mother can't have too many sweets, so she just had some fruit juice.)
After our snack we went into Ellen's Energy Adventure. My mom doesn't like Ellen, but she managed not to mention this more than two or three dozen times before, during and after the show.
Because the pre-show is fairly long, we opted to have my mom ride in her wheelchair the whole time and that worked out nicely though it meant that some of us didn't get to sit with her. After Ellen's Energy Adventure, everything was getting crowded but the kids did get to ride Test Track one more time in the "Singles" line. Then we decided to "tour" the World's Showcase until our late lunch reservation at Akershus. We shopped a little and enjoyed the Christmas decorations in the different "countries." The kids kept wanting to snack but we restrained them because we wanted them to have an appetite for AKERSHUS. At the same time I confess that I was afraid that we would be faced with a table of cold fish and a lot of food that the kids would find inedible. I was most pleasantly surprised.
The decor at Akershus seems perfect for Christmas. I felt we were in some kind of postcard. Unfortunately, we got a horrible table. They stuck us (six people) in a corner with another big table. People from one table couldn't get up without bothering people from the other table. When we were about to be seated, I remarked to the host that this was not a good table for a buffet. He smiled at me and said, "Yes, I'm sorry," and that was that. It would not have bothered me so much if I hadn't seen them preparing another six-person table in a much better location just then. I felt that he could have offered us that table with just a couple of minutes wait. (We had come early to get a good table, not the first available one.) However, I don't like to make a fuss unless I have to and I figured we could manage in our corner--which we did. It just took a little acrobatic skill not to spill the food getting in and out of your place to go to the buffet.
The food more than made up for the bad table location and the rather slow service from the waitress. (She smiled a lot but was not good about bringing drink refills and my kids joked that she seemed unsure of her own name because she kept looking at her nametag--maybe she was new.) We were told that all the hot food was traditional Norwegian Christmas fare. Everyone loved the roasted pork back--you had to cut away the fat, but what you got was lovely, tender meat. There was also a flank steak dish which was not so tender but delicious, some nice meatballs (not at all like the Swedish meatballs, but good), wonderful baked salmon and some whitefish. The soup was cream of spinach and very tasty. They also had boiled potatoes, mashed rutabaga (pretty good) and delicious penne and ham in white sauce with a hint of nutmeg (I had two helpings of that). I ignored the head cheese, the sausage and a couple of other things on the hot table, so I can't report on them. On the cold table they had meat salad, peel and eat shrimp, several kinds of cold salmon and only one herring dish that I noticed. I only had a couple of shrimp. There were three kinds of bread--a sort of roll, a soft flat bread and a mild rye bread. I tried a bit of each (I'm a great bread eater) and preferred the roll. Everyone--including my picky mother and the even pickier kids--enjoyed the meal. I'm not sure it would be as good on a hot summer day, but it made a fine Christmas Day meal.
We decided to skip dessert because we were so full. On the way out of Epcot, we stopped at the France bakery to pick up dessert for later and pastry for the next day. This turned out to be a bit of a mistake because by then it was dinner time and everyone who hadn't got a reservation at a restaurant was lining up to get quiches and so forth from the bakery. If I had realized that they sold more than sweet pastry I might have thought twice of it. Anyway, my mom and I stood in line and picked stuff that appealed to us while "the men" went to the rest room and my daughter shopped. After the long line, I was a little disappointed in the pastry. I've had much better at such chains as Au Bon Pain and La Madeleine, and there used to be an authentic French pastry shop in our town (it went out of business after it made the mistake of expanding into a restauraunt) that did even better stuff. However, it was nice to have something a little different for a late dessert and the next day's breakfast.
With one thing and another, we got back to the resort around six. We lit the Hannukah candles with the kids, gave them some Hannukah gelt (Disney money) and rested until around 8:00. Because we had a Moonlight Fireworks cruise, we phoned for a taxi to take us to the Polynesian. This turned out to be another minor mistake because instead of a proper taxi we got some sort of van that had no meter. The driver informed us that it would be $15 each way and gave us his card to call him back when we were ready to leave.
Anyway, we went on to our MOONLIGHT FIREWORKS CRUISE. This time we were all warmly dressed (especially me--once I realized I was getting a cold, I felt justified in giving up self-sacrifice for mother, spouse and children and told them all to bring their own warm clothes or freeze) and the night was milder than that of the last two times we'd been out by the water. We were also able to get some nice warm hot chocolate (not very good, but warm) at the coffee shop at the Polynesian (which, unlike the Yatch Club coffee shop, was nice and close to the marina).
The cruise was great. We started with the water parade (not much to look at, but cute) then went in a circle around all the lagoon area. The boat captain had a lot of interesting things to tell us about the history of the resorts, Discovery Island (which now needs a new name and theme), etc. Not everything he said seemed entirely accurate, but it was entertaining.
We saw the fireworks from the lake in front of the castle. The view was excellent and we could hear the music. On this day when everyone else was struggling to get into the Magic Kingdom, we managed to bypass the crowds and still see the fireworks. Again, it was a wonderful thing for our mother, and the kids enjoyed it too.
After the fireworks we went back to the Polynesian and called the van driver to pick us up. It turned out that we would have to wait for 20 minutes for him to arrive, so we decided to take a taxi-van instead. In this way we discovered that the metered fee from the Polynesian to the Dolphin was only a little over $10 instead of the $15 flat-rate that the van we got at the Dolphin was charging. In the future I will make a point of asking for a metered taxi.
On to Day 6
Back to Overview.
[This message was edited by Emmalyn on 12-30-00 at 01:32 PM.]
We to spend the day at EPCOT. When we got into the boat, it was a little before nine and the driver told us that the park had been open since 7:30 and World Showcase would open at 10 instead of 11 all week. However, the crowds were not really any worse than when we've been there in June or July. (Later I learned that Magic Kingdom closed its doors to non-park guests before noon, but apparently Epcot didn't.)
We (finally!) persuaded my mother to accept a wheelchair this time, and it made things much easier for my mother and for all of us as well because now we moved at the pace of our brisker chair-pushers instead of my mother's rather slow pace.
We first went on Honey I Shrunk the Audience and then Spaceship Earth. The line on Spaceship Earth was a little longer than I liked (25 minutes) but it is a favorite of our daughter's and I couldn't honestly say that we could get a better line later. After Spaceship Earth (am I the only person bothered by the absence of Africans in the pre-history scenes?) we had a snack at the Fountainview Cafe. This is usually one of our favorite places, but it was not up to its usual standards. The latte was not as creamy and hot as usual and I had to remind the server to give us our rock candy stirrers. I had a delicious pain au chocolat though, and my husband had a great muffin. My brother had a cheese and raspberry danish that he thought was pretty good and the kids liked their cookies. (My mother can't have too many sweets, so she just had some fruit juice.) After our snack we went into Ellen's Energy Adventure. My mom doesn't like Ellen, but she managed not to mention this more than two or three dozen times before, during and after the show.
Because the pre-show is fairly long, we opted to have my mom ride in her wheelchair the whole time and that worked out nicely though it meant that some of us didn't get to sit with her. After Ellen's Energy Adventure, everything was getting crowded but the kids did get to ride Test Track one more time in the "Singles" line. Then we decided to "tour" the World's Showcase until our late lunch reservation at Akershus. We shopped a little and enjoyed the Christmas decorations in the different "countries." The kids kept wanting to snack but we restrained them because we wanted them to have an appetite for AKERSHUS. At the same time I confess that I was afraid that we would be faced with a table of cold fish and a lot of food that the kids would find inedible. I was most pleasantly surprised.The decor at Akershus seems perfect for Christmas. I felt we were in some kind of postcard. Unfortunately, we got a horrible table. They stuck us (six people) in a corner with another big table. People from one table couldn't get up without bothering people from the other table. When we were about to be seated, I remarked to the host that this was not a good table for a buffet. He smiled at me and said, "Yes, I'm sorry," and that was that.
It would not have bothered me so much if I hadn't seen them preparing another six-person table in a much better location just then. I felt that he could have offered us that table with just a couple of minutes wait. (We had come early to get a good table, not the first available one.) However, I don't like to make a fuss unless I have to and I figured we could manage in our corner--which we did. It just took a little acrobatic skill not to spill the food getting in and out of your place to go to the buffet.The food more than made up for the bad table location and the rather slow service from the waitress. (She smiled a lot but was not good about bringing drink refills and my kids joked that she seemed unsure of her own name because she kept looking at her nametag--maybe she was new.) We were told that all the hot food was traditional Norwegian Christmas fare. Everyone loved the roasted pork back--you had to cut away the fat, but what you got was lovely, tender meat. There was also a flank steak dish which was not so tender but delicious, some nice meatballs (not at all like the Swedish meatballs, but good), wonderful baked salmon and some whitefish. The soup was cream of spinach and very tasty. They also had boiled potatoes, mashed rutabaga (pretty good) and delicious penne and ham in white sauce with a hint of nutmeg (I had two helpings of that). I ignored the head cheese, the sausage and a couple of other things on the hot table, so I can't report on them. On the cold table they had meat salad, peel and eat shrimp, several kinds of cold salmon and only one herring dish that I noticed. I only had a couple of shrimp. There were three kinds of bread--a sort of roll, a soft flat bread and a mild rye bread. I tried a bit of each (I'm a great bread eater) and preferred the roll. Everyone--including my picky mother and the even pickier kids--enjoyed the meal. I'm not sure it would be as good on a hot summer day, but it made a fine Christmas Day meal.
We decided to skip dessert because we were so full. On the way out of Epcot, we stopped at the France bakery to pick up dessert for later and pastry for the next day. This turned out to be a bit of a mistake because by then it was dinner time and everyone who hadn't got a reservation at a restaurant was lining up to get quiches and so forth from the bakery. If I had realized that they sold more than sweet pastry I might have thought twice of it. Anyway, my mom and I stood in line and picked stuff that appealed to us while "the men" went to the rest room and my daughter shopped. After the long line, I was a little disappointed in the pastry. I've had much better at such chains as Au Bon Pain and La Madeleine, and there used to be an authentic French pastry shop in our town (it went out of business after it made the mistake of expanding into a restauraunt) that did even better stuff. However, it was nice to have something a little different for a late dessert and the next day's breakfast.
With one thing and another, we got back to the resort around six. We lit the Hannukah candles with the kids, gave them some Hannukah gelt (Disney money) and rested until around 8:00. Because we had a Moonlight Fireworks cruise, we phoned for a taxi to take us to the Polynesian. This turned out to be another minor mistake because instead of a proper taxi we got some sort of van that had no meter. The driver informed us that it would be $15 each way and gave us his card to call him back when we were ready to leave.
Anyway, we went on to our MOONLIGHT FIREWORKS CRUISE. This time we were all warmly dressed (especially me--once I realized I was getting a cold, I felt justified in giving up self-sacrifice for mother, spouse and children and told them all to bring their own warm clothes or freeze) and the night was milder than that of the last two times we'd been out by the water. We were also able to get some nice warm hot chocolate (not very good, but warm) at the coffee shop at the Polynesian (which, unlike the Yatch Club coffee shop, was nice and close to the marina).
The cruise was great. We started with the water parade (not much to look at, but cute) then went in a circle around all the lagoon area. The boat captain had a lot of interesting things to tell us about the history of the resorts, Discovery Island (which now needs a new name and theme), etc. Not everything he said seemed entirely accurate, but it was entertaining.
We saw the fireworks from the lake in front of the castle. The view was excellent and we could hear the music. On this day when everyone else was struggling to get into the Magic Kingdom, we managed to bypass the crowds and still see the fireworks. Again, it was a wonderful thing for our mother, and the kids enjoyed it too.
After the fireworks we went back to the Polynesian and called the van driver to pick us up. It turned out that we would have to wait for 20 minutes for him to arrive, so we decided to take a taxi-van instead. In this way we discovered that the metered fee from the Polynesian to the Dolphin was only a little over $10 instead of the $15 flat-rate that the van we got at the Dolphin was charging. In the future I will make a point of asking for a metered taxi.
On to Day 6
Back to Overview.
[This message was edited by Emmalyn on 12-30-00 at 01:32 PM.]
