The end of Day 3
Finally
first I want to apologize for taking so long to finish this report. Im starting to feel like Kimmar, but with no good excuse! My reason: my friends and I have started a crochet business, and we had our first craft show recently! We actually sold a number of necklaces, scarves, and hats! The goal is to use our hobby to make money to fund our Disney vacations
Alright. Weve been at WDW for 3 days now, and weve only been to Magic Kingdom for 20 minutes to see Spectromagic. This is definitely wrong. While the goal was to have a non-commando-style trip, I did realize that it is important to get to all the parks in the first couple of days. Otherwise, we start to feel like we cant relax because we are not seeing the parks! Having to wait for bus transportation and lacking the flexibility of a rental car did not help.
I think these choices affected my impression of AKL at firstas I have thought about it more, I realize this had nothing to do with AKL, so I will not let it cloud my opinion of the hotel, which we really did like. The few things that I did not like about AKL were: the glare in the lobby, the fact that you had to go outside to get to The Mara, the fact that some of the rooms were quite a hike from the lobby even if they were all in the same building. The things I liked: the décor/theme, the animals, the room, the food (and we didnt even get around to trying Boma!), and the fact that the hotel is all in one building (we could walk to the lobby without going outside). I would like to stay here again, but I think we need to try some more hotels first. We are hoping to try them all! I think we may be waiting until after we see what happens with the DVC construction at AKL. I do want to go on the Sunrise and Sunset safaris eventually. Well just have to drive out to Boma on our next trip and take that opportunity to see the animals and try some of the other things we missed. Ill probably go over that at the end of the trip report (if I ever get there!).
Okso we are off to the Magic Kingdom to soak in some Disney-ness! We were able to bypass the bus on this trip as my aunt and uncle offered to drop us off at MKactually at the Contemporary Resort, so it was a quick walk into MK.
As we entered the park, they were rounding people up for the Family Fun Day Parade. We decided to skip on through to Adventureland to meet some characters! We were scheduled to attend Mickeys Not So Scary Halloween Party the next night, so we thought we would get a head start on character-hunting!
First, we met Captain Hook, who was having a scurvy time interacting with guests. He sure is a troublemaker! (Unfortunately, that leads to long character lines!) We did get to see some of the Pirate Tutorial. It was a fun time and had a lot of guest interaction. After Captain Hook, it was time to ride the new and improved Pirates of the Caribbean! I thought the new beginning of the ride was great! The projection of Davy Jones on the steam really looked like you were going to go through a waterfall and get wet!
After POTC, we met Wendy. She was hiding from Captain Hook around the backside of POTC. After this, we went over to the Castle front court to see the new show: Dream Along with Mickey. I would say this show was disappointing. It wont be one for the ages. In fact, I think they might regret the new blue costumes. They looked dated even though they were brand new! Sadly, though, it was a step up from Cinderellabration. I hated Cb. I thought it was stupid and didnt live up my expectations in any way shape or form. The new show used exactly the same stage set. (I still dont get the fireworks in the daytime.) It was nice to see some characters beyond the Princesses in the show. I did feel like they were pushing the pirate/princess theme already. The new castle show was PP-themed, the new interactive shows are PP themed (Pirate tutorial, Lets have a ball), and Ive even heard that the Flower and Garden show is PP-themed! Im afraid of being overwhelmed
Next, we rode the Jungle Cruise. Our skipper was Shanti (sp?) who had an excellent sense of humor and sarcasmperfect for the Jungle Cruise! After that, we were back to character hunting. Buzz Lightyear was out in front of Carousel of Progress. Abbey Mallard was in front of the Toontown sign. We made a quick detour at this point through Poohs Playful Spot. We had learned earlier that day from Joe at the Imagineer lunch that there was a tribute to 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (which still exists somewhat behind Poohs). To find it, we had to climb inside the tree. I think a number of parents and children were a bit confused as to why 2 grown-ups were crawling into the tree, but after scouring the walls we found the Nautilus!
You can just make out the shape of a submarine as an indentation in the wall above the entrance to the tree.
Previously, we had heard tales of the glorious Chicken Strips at Cosmic Rays. In July, we gave these a trythey were excellent! Now it was time to put the Pinocchio Haus Chicken Strips to the test
and they were just as excellent! While Sonny Delight was amusing, I think we prefer overlooking the Small World boats or sitting in the Figaro room (hooray for cats!).
Sidenote: With the demotion of Pluto, will they have to change the Planetary Boogie?
We finished off the night with Big Thunder Mountain, Splash Mountain, and the Swiss Family Robinson Tree House. Here's our view:
We try to see the SFR tree house every time we go, because eventually it will be overtaken by Tarzan, like the one at
Disneyland. We stayed for a viewing of Wishes, did some shopping, and went to bed. Tomorrow would be an early day, because we had a Segway Tour scheduled at Epcot! We didnt want another replay of the Princess Storybook Breakfast debacle, so this time we would be prepared for slow Epcot busses.
