Escape From Craziness to Pandora, Po Boys, and Oppressive Heat - Finished & New TR Link 12/28

[cstorm65]

Day 4 Part 1 - Come On...This is Not Six Flags!

We are now on to day 4 of our trip and this was a morning we were planning on being up early. Yesterday was the 4th of July and people were probably out late, so we got in bed early and had the goal of getting to rope drop at the Magic Kingdom. The theory ended up working as the crowds were not too bad this morning as a bunch of people were probably sleeping!

We were up by 7:00 and getting dressed. We made the morning stop at the food court to fill up our big water bottles before we headed out. We started filling them with as much ice as possible, filling the rest with water, and wrapping them in a hand towel from the room before putting them in the park bag. This was an easy way to keep them really cold until we started getting hot in the parks. We were at the bus stop and 8:00 and a bus arrived about one minute later...score!

We arrived at the Magic Kingdom at 8:20 and were inside the park by 8:30 due to the new opening procedures. DS5 was ready!

We really liked the new opening procedure. Yes, we miss the show at the train station, but the new way is so much less hectic. We spend a few minutes in the Emporium and messing around on Main STreet and got a good spot where we were close to Tomorrowland where we were headed, but we could also see the stage as DS5 wanted to watch the show. It was a great morning in the MK!

https://lh3.googleusercontent.com/8...CRukdmc7jEP81H2giQa8VcRQc5g=w505-h673-no]/img]

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After the welcome show finished we headed here:

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I was the only one riding as DW was getting a child swap pass, but we got in line at 9:00 and they didn’t open the building until 9:05 and it took us another five minutes to get into the building. I was pretty heated and told DW “This isn’t Six Flags...Is it too much to ask to have the ride open at Rope Drop?” It wasn’t that big of a deal, but I just don’t get things that slow us down like that. I mean if it’s a lot of people and it takes time to get in the building I understand, but just not being ready to open. I mean you guys open this ride every day, don’t you know how long it takes!

Sorry to rant, I understand things can happen, but I don’t want Disney to drop to a Six Flags level. And...I’m a Six Flags season pass holder. I’m not trashing on Six Flags, but Disney is and should be held to a higher standard. Ok...I’m done!

While I was on Space DW and the boys went on the TTA

Look here son!

Thank you!

I was finally off of Space at 9:30 and we headed back to Winnie the Pooh. The boys loved all of the things to play with in the queue. We waited about 15 minutes since Space took so long, but the boys were great in line because they got to play with all of the stuff.

We find this ride so hard to get a selfie on, but we try!

So, where were we headed next??

Up Next: “Dip Please”​

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

Holy updates! I am back from our trip and trying to catch up! Sounds like you guys had a good plan for 4th of July.

I'm not sure I have seen the Giraffes sitting before. They are def always standing when we have ridden.

DH1 is out of there!

Glad to hear he was a little more out going.

It is a long walk into the ride

Day 3 Part 4 - Two Words...Bread Service!

One word response..... YUM!

I especially love the green salsa type sauce and then there is also a brown sauce that is kind of sweet. I’m not sure the exact names of all of them, but I love those two.

The green is a mint chutney and the brown sweet sauce is prob tamarind sauce. I love both of those and are probably my favorites!

Well, it would have been plenty, but it didn’t eat a whole lot. You see this boy likes the fake mac ‘n cheese, the heat up for 3 and ½ minutes in the microwave type stuff and when you give him real mac ‘n cheese he acts like you are making him eat mud. I mean we all three tried it a loved it, but it just wasn’t for him!

OMG!!! This is exactly Gwen' problem. She is the same way. Glad to hear she sent' the only one...

She is not a huge fan of the African/Indian flavored food and so she really just eats the rice and loves the bread service.

She should try the Chicken sandwich option. I haven't had it but the tandoori is basically grilled chicken.

I got the Benedict Burger - lettuce, Canadian bacon, fried egg, Hollandaise sauce, and a choice of two sides for $14.99.

Holy burger!

Why is DH1 chewing on? Gwen had a lovey Monkey like DH1 there. She still sleeps with it but it smelled funny and she went cold turkey on the whole thing.

 

[cstorm65]

Holy updates! I am back from our trip and trying to catch up! Sounds like you guys had a good plan for 4th of July.

It was quite nice and relaxing!

I'm not sure I have seen the Giraffes sitting before. They are def always standing when we have ridden.

I don't think had either. It must have been that hot!!

DH1 is out of there!

I don't know where he thinks he's going. Maybe he was saying I've had enough of these character meets!

Glad to hear he was a little more out going.

He got better, it was just a new thing for him and this one was twice as good as the first.

It is a long walk into the ride

I know, but at least outside the scenery is pretty cool!

One word response..... YUM!

I know!!

The green is a mint chutney and the brown sweet sauce is prob tamarind sauce. I love both of those and are probably my favorites!

Thanks! I'm terrible at remembering stuff like that. We just call it the green sauce!

OMG!!! This is exactly Gwen' problem. She is the same way. Glad to hear she sent' the only one...

Yes! We have spoiled him with fake mac 'n cheese.

She should try the Chicken sandwich option. I haven't had it but the tandoori is basically grilled chicken.

We may have to try that. Of course we are going again this summer!

Holy burger!

It was big!

Why is DH1 chewing on? Gwen had a lovey Monkey like DH1 there. She still sleeps with it but it smelled funny and she went cold turkey on the whole thing.

He had a little stuffed animal. We were trying to stay away from the paci as much as we could. I know about stinky blankets. DS5 had a cleft lip when he was born and so he could ever take a paci so we gave him a special blanket and he would suck on it at night. Man was it stinky!!

 

[Glam]

Beautiful family! I'm loving your trip report, also!

You guys are great at pacing the day for your kids and getting them to bed early at Disney. I really want to try to do better at that on our trip in 3 weeks.

 

[cstorm65]

Beautiful family! I'm loving your trip report, also!

You guys are great at pacing the day for your kids and getting them to bed early at Disney. I really want to try to do better at that on our trip in 3 weeks.

It's not easy with so many fun things to do, but we make that a priority. We have bought into the theory that if they are tired and cranky we won't have any fun, which is true. So we might as well take a break daily so that doesn't happen. Thanks for reading along and I hope you have a great trip!

 

[cstorm65]

Day 4 Part 2 - “Dip Please”

After our ride on Pooh we headed back to the Storybook Circus area. This is one of our favorite spots in the early morning. It never seems to be all that crowded at this point of the morning. It was about 9:50 and we were going to meet Goofy & Donald, but since we had 10 minutes we stopped for a ride on Dumbo.

I feel this area was so well done a few years ago when they designed it!

At 10:00 we got in line to meet Goofy and Donald, unfortunately we got inside and they said Goofy was doing something with Max and would not be out for a little while. So, we went ahead and saw Donald.

DONALD PP PICS X 3

After meeting Donald we headed over for a ride on Under the Sea and I somehow managed to not get one picture. After a quick bathroom break and diaper change for DS1 we headed to Seven Dwarfs as DS5 and I had FP’s.

While we rode DW and DS1 had some fun on the Carousel.

Once we got out I went ahead and used DW’s FP for Seven Dwarfs and picked up a child swap pass. She couldn’t ride any of these thrill rides since she had just had surgery before we left. After I finished DS5 took his turn to try and get the sword out of the stone.

Maybe he’ll get it out next time! We headed towards our lunch spot for the day through a Fantasyland that wasn’t very crowded for 11:00 AM in the summer.

We were heading for lunch at one of our favorite places, Columbia Harbour House. It was about 11:10 and we got inside really easily and found a nice table upstairs where there wasn’t hardly anyone else sitting.

I ordered the Fish, Chicken, & Shrimp Platter.

It was good. I wish they just had a fish platter with like three pieces of fish instead of having to do it like this and get a little of everything. The chicken is just typical Disney chicken tenders, but the fish was good as always.

DW got the fish & chicken plate and she enjoyed it. I think she gave the chicken to DS1 and she really enjoyed the fish. Which is saying a lot because she is pretty picky about her fish usually.

DS5 got the kids Mac ‘n Cheese and at every bit of it. I guess it was “fake” mac ‘n cheese since he wouldn’t eat the real stuff at Sanaa yesterday.

DS1 just shared a little from everyone. He had DS5’s apple sauce and chicken from me and DW. He wasn’t really loving the chicken, but he finally started screaming “Dip...Dip...Dip Please”. I went to procure him some ranch dressing to dip it in and once I did he ate it up! And then we had to provide ranch at every other meal after this! We finished up our lunch and had two more rides before it was time to head out for a break, but I’ll get to those in the next update.

Up Next: They Changed Our Bus Stop​

 

[Poohish]

Day 1 Part 3 - The Price Bridging Saga

Since we still didn’t have room we decided to head on out as we had a dinner ADR at 5:00 and wanted to get our 10 day tickets we had purchased converted to annual passes. We got to the bus stop at 3:15 and a bus came about 10 minutes later. Our first Disney bus ride:

DS1 was still quite sleepy after the early morning:

And DS5 was feeling big enough to sit by himself!

Because of where our dinner ADR was we headed to Hollywood Studios to get our tickets converted to annual passes. We were there by 3:45 and headed into the park and then over to guest relations to do the conversion. Of course we were bridging these 10 day park hopper tickets I had purchased from Undercover Tourist at a discount and were hoping to get credit for the full gate price thus saving us some money on the upgrade. There are a lot of stories about cast members not giving you the correct credit that they should and things like that so I was prepared to be nice, but to make sure we got what we were supposed to.

We walked in and a nice cast member named Taylor helped us and after scanning the tickets in she said, “Ok, I’m just working on bridging the price for you.” YES!!!! She told me the total I would have to pay and it matched the math I had done beforehand to know if we were getting what we should. So, after a lot of worrying and reading people’s stories of getting denied the price bridge we got it to work correctly the first time! I also got our tables in wonderland card for the year, which by the way saved us over $175 on this first trip alone which paid for the card and netted us $25. And we still have two more big trips to use it on.

DW and DS5 wanted to show off their annual passes!

We were done in about 30 minutes and headed to the boat dock as we had to head to the Beach Club. We waited about 10 minutes for a bus, but DS1 passed the time looking at the ducks.

Before long this was our view:

We arrived at the Beach Club at around 4:45 and looked around in the lobby because they didn’t allow us check in until 4:55 for our 5:00 ADR since the restaurant wasn’t open yet.

Where were we eating?

Yes, one of our favorite places, and I finally managed to coordinate our visit with shrimp night. I had someone missed on our other two visits that some nights they have fried shrimp on the buffet, so I made sure get that tonight!

Up Next: Crabs, Clams, & Shrimp...Oh Yeah!​

Great pics

 

[lauren_elizabeth]

Joining in! You have a beautiful family! Your boys are adorable!

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

DS5 got the kids Mac ‘n Cheese and at every bit of it. I guess it was “fake” mac ‘n cheese since he wouldn’t eat the real stuff at Sanaa yesterday.

Let me guess, was it basically the same mac n cheese? We got the shrimp mac n cheese last year and the mac n cheese was kind of weird... Def very rich!

Great photo! Glad DW and DS1 got a ride in at the same time.

Donald! Too bad about Goofy. I love DW's shirt!

 

[cstorm65]

Great pics

Thanks and thanks for reading along!!

Joining in! You have a beautiful family! Your boys are adorable!

Thanks!

Let me guess, was it basically the same mac n cheese? We got the shrimp mac n cheese last year and the mac n cheese was kind of weird... Def very rich!

Probably exactly the same!

Great photo! Glad DW and DS1 got a ride in at the same time.

DS1 loves the carousel, so he got a ride in there about every time we took a ride on Seven Dwarves this trip!

Donald! Too bad about Goofy. I love DW's shirt!

I know. It was kind of disappointing, but we'd be around for several more visits so we will just pop back in later.

 

[cstorm65]

Day 4 Part 3 - They Changed Our Bus Stop

We had just finished our lunch at Columbia Harbour House and had two more FP’s to use before we headed out for a break back at the resort. First we were headed here:

DS5 and I had a FP that we used and he loved the ride as usual.

Then we headed over to use our final FP of the morning at around 12:10 at the world famous Jungle Cruise!

Both boys had a great time looking at the animals.

The Jungle Cruise was a hit with the boys, but it was that time of day when we could tell they were getting really tired. So it was time to take a break!

We were at the bus stop by 12:45 or so we thought! We went to the bus stop for Pop Century and stood there for about five minutes when a bus dropped in to let people off. We thought we were headed home but he asked us where we were going. When we told him Pop he said, “oh...they changed that bus stop this morning!” So we had to get everything up off the ground and head over to the new Pop Century bus stop on another row, so it was 1:05 before we had a bus ride home. They had all of the sign correct, I just didn’t look at them and just went where the bus stop was when we were here a couple of days before. Oh well, we still felt good about a break because people were just pouring into the park as we left! Get up early people!! It was an uneventful bus ride as the boys were tired.

We were back and in our room for a nap by 1:30. DW and I needed a snack, so while the boys slept I went down and grabbed some of the homemade chips and drink refills. DW loves those homemade chips at the Disney resorts.

Before long we all were napping. This is strange for me especially as I rarely nap, but I did this day! We all finally got up around 4:00 and prepared to head to Epcot for the evening.

We were at the bus stop at 4:50 and the screen said the Epcot bus would arrive at 5:03...then it changed to 5:06, then to 5:10, then 5:14, then 5:20, then 5:07, then 5:08, then 5:10, and finally a bus arrived at...5:12. The screens will end up being great I think, but they were still somewhat new at this point and obviously that was a frustrating wait! Any way by 5:15 we were on our way to Epcot.

We were inside Epcot by 5:40 and it was starting to drizzle so we decided to pop into this ride:

DS5 wanted to show his muscles, not sure what prompted that!

DS5 wanted to ride with me so we hopped in, but while I was getting the backpack all situated he selected a language and we got to listen to the entire ride in...Portuguese! It was awful, nothing against the Portuguese language, that is just a ride where you need the narration. Yes, I have a bunch of it memorized, but that isn’t the point! Of course DS5 thought it was hilarious! I missed hearing Judi Dench talk with a British accent! Anyways we had an ok ride I guess you could say since we didn’t know what was being said!

That would do it for our ride on Spaceship Earth. Let’s see what other Epcot rides had lines short enough to ride.

Up Next: Ooh...That Stinks!​

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

We were at the bus stop at 4:50 and the screen said the Epcot bus would arrive at 5:03...then it changed to 5:06, then to 5:10, then 5:14, then 5:20, then 5:07, then 5:08, then 5:10, and finally a bus arrived at...5:12. The screens will end up being great I think, but they were still somewhat new at this point and obviously that was a frustrating wait! Any way by 5:15 we were on our way to Epcot.

Those boards put you on a rollercoaster of waiting. I wonder if they deployed a new bus since the one that was to be there was getting later and later.

It's the gun show! Ha!

DS1 in the space suit is hilarious!

DS1 delivers another awesome face!

 

[cstorm65]

Those boards put you on a rollercoaster of waiting. I wonder if they deployed a new bus since the one that was to be there was getting later and later.

Very possible. Those boards were much better on our Christmas trip, but the summer it just got comical how much they were changing during a wait.

It's the gun show! Ha!

I know! He just wanted to show off!!

DS1 in the space suit is hilarious!

Yes! We thought this was pretty hilarious.

DS1 delivers another awesome face!

He just wants to make getting great pictures hard by making faces. 95% of our pictures he is making some crazy face, but that's a 18 month old for you!

 

[olliesmom]

Really enjoying your TR!! Your boys are both so beautiful and you look like you have so much fun together as a family.

 

[Newcastle]

​

The expression on your face here is priceless !!

 

[cstorm65]

Really enjoying your TR!! Your boys are both so beautiful and you look like you have so much fun together as a family.

Thanks! We love our trips! Thanks for reading along!!

The expression on your face here is priceless !!

I hadn't even looked at that I was so busy laughing at DS5. I was trying to figure out what he was doing I'm sure!

 

[cstorm65]

Day 4 Part 4 - Ooh...That Stinks!

After we finished on Spaceship Earth we headed over to catch a ride here just after 6:00 PM.

The boys love this ride!

After we finished riding Figment we headed over for a stop at Club Cool and DS5 and I were enjoying our soda!

It was time to head back into the World Showcase for some dinner and our first stop was at La Cantina de San Angel.

We just got a couple of things to share. First, we always enjoy the guacamole here and it was good as always.

We also got a kids meal Cheese Empanadas. I ate one of them and the boys split the other and it was actually really good. The crispiness was just perfect and the cheese inside was pretty good. It also comes with chips and queso since its a kids meal so it is really a pretty good size meal, even for an adult.

Finally we got an order of churros for some dessert. I really only like churros if they are crispy and not old and mushy and these were pretty chewy. DS5 loved them though so they all got eaten!

After we polished off our first dinner we headed for a quick swing through the Mexico Pavilion.

And DS5 was in the mood for a muscles picture again!

It was about 7:15 by this time and we decided to take a ride through the Gran Fiesta Tour.

DS1 loved the ride. He just kept yelling “Donald” every time he saw him. I’m sure the people riding in our boat were regretting their decision to get in line near us!

Up Next: “What is Fromage? Well...It Tastes Good!”​

 

[StarWarsMomofGirls!]

The boys love this ride!

My girls love it as well. I always ride through thinking of all the ways the ride could be way cooler.

We also got a kids meal Cheese Empanadas. I ate one of them and the boys split the other and it was actually really good. The crispiness was just perfect and the cheese inside was pretty good. It also comes with chips and queso since its a kids meal so it is really a pretty good size meal, even for an adult.

This is Morgan's go to meal in Mexico

DS1 loved the ride. He just kept yelling “Donald” every time he saw him. I’m sure the people riding in our boat were regretting their decision to get in line near us!

Ha! I would have loved it. So, you never know...

There's a smile!!!! (with no tongue) So cute!

 

[cstorm65]

My girls love it as well. I always ride through thinking of all the ways the ride could be way cooler.

I know. I kind of like the concept, but I just think they don't do much with it!

This is Morgan's go to meal in Mexico

It was really good! I enjoyed it enough I may get empanadas for me some time!

Ha! I would have loved it. So, you never know...

Good to know! He is the loudest human being there is! He has recently been walking around the house with a drum someone (my sister!!) bought him for Christmas! Oh my he's loud!

There's a smile!!!! (with no tongue) So cute!

I know. He has such a great smile if we can actually get him to do it without the tongue!

 

[cstorm65]

Day 4 Part 5 - “What is Fromage? Well...It Tastes Good!”

After we finished in Mexico we looked and it was about 7:30 and we wanted to get around to the bakery in France to get the 2nd half of our dinner and some dessert before IllumiNations starts. We got some nice pictures along the way:

After stopping a few times we made it to America by 8:00 and got one of the American Dream Slushies at Fife & Drum. We like this ok and it is a nice cool drink on a hot summer evening at Epcot. The boys on the other hand just enjoyed the music playing at the theater.

DW also enjoyed the slushie as well as you can see:

We continued making our way toward France and got a nice sunset picture around Japan.

By 8:15 or so we got into the French Bakery that I won’t even try to type the name of and there was actually a table available so we grabbed it and gave the boys a snack. I went up and got us a Croissant Fromage, Creme Brulee, and a Napoleon. Or you can call these rich, richer, and super rich!

The croissant fromage was our second dinner that we shared and it was great and really a great value for only $4.50. DS1 loved it as well! The napoleon was fantastic as always. DS5 wanted this when he went through the line with me...smart guy!! Finally, the creme brulee was ok. The custard was really good, but the sugar tasted burnt so it had been torched a little too long.

Anyways, we headed out about 8:40 and DS got an ice cream from that shop next to the bakery and we headed to find a spot to watch IllumiNations. Once we found a spot DS5 got to dancing in the street to the music. Everyone walking by was chuckling at him, but he didn’t care. It was just one of those fun Disney, carefree moments!

We were able to walk right up to the rail at about 8:45 for a 9:00 show time which was great! We were on the bridge from France to International Gateway area. I think this was super lucky for us to get this spot.

We had about 15 minutes to wait...DS5 was still dancing.

The area was just not super crowded on this night.

Here is a shot of our spot on the rail:

A few pictures of IllumiNations. I don’t take a ton of pictures of fireworks shows anymore, I did on our first trip, but their so hard to take pictures of well and I have just decided I want to enjoy the show, not be so focused on getting photos of it.

DS5 loved the show. He was enthralled. DS1 didn’t love the loudness, but I held him during the show and he was fine. This was a great ending to a great day!

By 9:15 we were walking out and we decided to head through Mousegear to let the crowds thin as much as possible before heading to the bus stop. DS5 had fun trying on the figment hat.

After messing around for a bit in the shop we headed out towards the exit and got a cool shot of Spaceship Earth.

DS5 also had to let us know it was a fun day!

We got to the bus stop at 9:55 and according to my notes a bus came at 10:08, not too bad of a wait, although I did have to stand on the bus and hold DS1 since there were no seats.

Luckily it’s a short ride to POP and we were back by 10:20 and the boys were in bed by 10:50.

Up Next: A Morning Swim​