So far on this trip we'd followed the advice given by both TGM and the UG: avoid EMH's like the plague, especially the evening EMH. If anything, go to a park the day
after it has an evening EMH, because the park is usually slow that morning. And we'd had good success following this advice.
But this day we were going straight against this advice and going to evening EMH at MK. What would cause us to ignore our own experience that week and the advice of 2 excellent resources?
Simple: it was our last day in the parks.
The whole family probably wouldn't be back here until 2008 (and maybe not even then, since DD would be in college at that point and may have other plans).
So we wanted to suck the marrow from the Walt Disney World bones, so to speak, and be in the parks as long as possible. Even if MK was too crowded to experience any attractions, walking down Main Street would still be worth it. So we decided to do evening EMH at MK that day.
But we were still pretty beat from our previous day at Epcot and MGM. DD's ankle was swollen and hurting. DS' toe that he'd injured on Day 3 was holding up OK, but you never know.
We decided that in order to stay at MK until 1:00 a.m., we'd have to take a longer afternoon break than normal. The plan was to do Epcot until 12:30 or 1, then back to the room for a break. After that, it was Downtown Disney for dinner and shopping, then MK EMH.
1 problem: WS didn't open until 11, and DD was more interested in WS than FW. She had the "WS Shopping Bug," big-time! She wanted to sleep in and miss FW. DW wasn't interested in most of what we were going to see at FW (Imagination and Seas pavilions), so for the first time we had a split family schedule: DS and I would go to FW while the women slept in, then we'd meet for lunch.
After my morning ritual of a soak at the Dig Site pool area, I grabbed a couple of rolls from the Pepper Market for a quick breakfast for DS and me. Then I got him up and we drove over to Epcot.
^Don't know how I got this pic, but this is Epcot the way it
should look--no magic wand
Even though we didn't leave until around 8:40, we still arrived in time to see the opening ceremony. Then it was time for the "Stampede to Soarin'"!
We'd already experienced Soarin' 3 times during the week via FP. This was our first time doing it at park opening. Well, I think I have a pretty good idea where the crowd goes at rope drop! CM's did as good a job as possible in holding back the crowd, but it was crazy!
Somehow we avoided being trampled and were in the 2nd group for Soarin'. Got top row again, and it was as much a thrill as before. I could experience this attraction all day long.
(Little factoid: We sat next to a man whose daughter is a CM. He said that the guy hitting the golf ball is Michael Eisner. Sure looked like him, but we only got a brief glimpse.)
After Soarin', we walked over to the Imagination Pavilion to see "Honey I Shrunk" and "Figment."
We were the first ones there! The CM's said they thought they'd be doing the first showing to an empty room. Turned out 5 of us saw "Honey." We still enjoyed it thoroughly. Then we walked over and saw Figment, which we enjoy more than most folks apparently do.
As we were walking over to the Seas pavilion, we realized we'd forgotten about Living With The Land!
We walked in and found a "mere" 20-minute wait, so we decided to do LWTL now. As we found during most of our waits that week, the wait time was actually much shorter and we enjoyed LWTL after about a 10-minute wait.
Then it was off to the Seas pavilion. First we walked in and saw that it was only a 10-minute wait for Crush, so we queued up and experienced it since we'd never seen it before. What a treat! I got the idea that it was mainly for kids and that it was merely a "cute" thing for adults to experience. Big mistake! Both DS and I thought Crush was very funny and we enjoyed it immensely. Can't wait to bring DD and DW here to see it next time.
Then we walked around and looked at the exhibits. The 1 previous time we'd been to the Living Seas, we were having to do Epcot commando-style because we only had 1 day. So our experience at the Seas was like the Griswolds in "Vacation" when they visited the Grand Canyon--just nodded our heads a couple of times at the exhibits, said, "OK, let's go!" and we were off. This time DS and I were able to take our time and this was one of our best Epcot experiences. The dolphins were showing off in the tanks, and DS thought the sharks and rays were cool, too. I don't know how to scuba, but seeing this makes me want to get certified, just so I can do the tour where you get to scuba with the sea life. Very cool stuff.
It was around 11:30 by this time, so I called DW and DD, and they were just coming in and were by the Imagination pavilion. We met at Nemo
and walked back inside and looked around some more. Then we headed for WS and lunch.
We noticed that several folks from the UK were eating fish and chips right along with us. Made us wonder: are fish and chips "UK comfort food," like Americans eating at McDonalds while traveling overseas, or southerners eating at a Cracker Barrel?
Anyway, we thought that the fish and chips must be pretty good if the folks from the UK were eating here, too.
DS and I were sorely tempted to stick around a little longer and walk WS with the women, but we learned our lesson from the previous day about how WS can really take it out of you. We left the van keys with the women to drive back and we headed toward the bus stop to ride back for our afternoon break.
On the way back through FW, we stopped for the afternoon fountain show. It was the 1st time we'd experienced it, and the music and fountain sequences were just beautiful. DS loves Epcot just like he loves all things WDW, and it was a special moment for us to share together.
After visiting Club Cool (no Beverly
), we walked out to the bus stop and our bus was waiting for us! (DW and DD would be so jealous--they'd had to wait about 30 minutes for the Epcot bus earlier that morning). We got back to CSR around 1:30 and took a big, long nap!
The women returned around 3:00 and got a shorter nap. Then we were up around 4, got ready and drove to Downtown Disney for dinner and shopping.
We had dinner at Cap'n Jacks, then started our shopping at World of Disney.
We'd never been to Downtown Disney before, and we were blown away by the size of this store! We had a
AAA 10% discount, so we put off a lot of our shopping for this store.
I was still in search of a CSR pin and couldn't find one anywhere, so DS and I walked down to Pin Traders.
Lots and lots of pins, and lots of lots of pins for all the resorts--except CSR. Even CSR didn't have CSR pins! Never figured out why this was so, but I left WDW without a CSR pin. Maybe I can find one online, but it's not quite the same as buying it onsite....
We met the women at Ghirardelli
and got a free sample of chocolate with caramel. Very good, but man, do you need water after that sample! We decided they could make a killing by giving free sample of chocolate/caramel, then selling water for $10.00/bottle.
After this we went to the Disney Christmas store and bought an ornament as a memento of our trip. By this time it was 9 and time for us to get to MK for evening EMH! We'd not even scratched the surface of shopping Downtown Disney. We'll definitely allot more time here on our next trip.
After losing our van in the humongous, poorly-lit parking lot (a not-so-magical moment), we were off to MK. So far this trip we hadn't been on the monorail, which we consider an attraction in and of itself. So we finally got to do that.
We got our wristbands and entered Main Street. It was beautifully lit.
I've only seen MK in the dark on a couple of occasions, and this pic doesn't do justice to the wonderful atmosphere set by the lights on the buildings.
We'd done a great job of avoiding crowds for the week, experiencing only glancing blows at high-volume attractions like Soarin' and Everest. But there was no avoiding them now--Main Street was jam-packed!
This, combined with the sticky evening air, made us feel like those little steamed dumplings you see on a Chinese buffet.
Still, we thoroughly enjoyed Wishes.
This was our first time this week seeing it up close and personal. (We'd watched it from the beach at the Poly on Wednesday.) This is always a magical time for our family, and even with the gathered horde squishing us, we loved it this time, too.
We'd put together a rough plan of what we wanted to do first--we were starting in Fantasyland with Pooh! So we battled our way to the castle, commenting that this must be what salmon feel like as they work their way upstream. Finally we made it to Pooh.
We didn't know that FP's weren't available for this evening EMH, and we were kinda worried about the wait times. But we only had to wait 10 minutes for Pooh, and we'd learn that most of the EMH wait times would be very slight or nonexistent.
After Pooh, we walked right into the next showing of Philharmagic.
Our whole family just loves Philharmagic and we were glad we could experience it 1 last time.
Then it was off to Splash Mountain!
Although the listed wait was 20 minutes, it was more like 10-15. Both Splash and BTMRR (which we did next, with only a 5-minute wait) are completely different experiences in the dark. You can't see what curve or drop is coming next. I highly recommend it!
After Splash we were heading to Pirates.
But on the way, DW stepped in a little indentation in the pavement and hyperextended her knee. Ouch! She walked it off and said she didn't need first aid, but was still limping as we headed to Adventureland.
We were quite a sight--DW limping with her knee, DD limping with her ankle, DS hobbled slightly with his injured toe. I felt like the healthiest one--I merely had a strained back! I guess it was time for our vacation to be over--who knows what other injuries would befall us if we stayed another day?
After walking right onto Pirates with no wait, we stopped for a Dole Whip break. We had about 45 minutes left and thought we'd try either Space or Buzz in Tomorrowland before closing. Turned out that both had waits that pushed us past park closing, so that was it for attractions. If we'd known that, we would've experienced Pirates again, but we still had great fun during EMH.
After some brief shopping on Main Street, we headed out. We always stop before exiting and look back down Main Street for 1 last glimpse at Cinderella Castle. We were sad to be going, but we'd had a lot of fun that day and made a lot of memories. On the way to the monorail, we saw Minnie
and DS said, "See ya real soon!"
Monorail to tram to van to CSR, and we were back in our room by 1:30, exhausted but happy after a wonderful day.
Next: Departure Day and Final Thoughts
-- team, so she decided just to sit out M:S, much to DD's chagrin (this would be a trend today, for some reason). So while DD, DS and I headed to M:S, DW graciously agreed to walk over to the Land pavilion and get FP's for Soarin', saying we should meet in Mouse Gear after M:S. 
)
where DW would shop with DD in WS the next day, so we headed out of Epcot for our break.
She thought it was a romantic way to end the evening, and we think we may stay at the BW when we return for an adults-only trip in January 08. 
