From Europe to Africa in America - A Sisters' Expedition

[englishrose47]

Glad your birthday plans went well !!!Nice gifts too!!! I am sure Biergarten is not the top of your list, but I enjoy it !!!

 

[Flossbolna]

It sounds like you had a fabulous birtday with all you friends. Thanks for sharing.

Yes it was!

Bison really isn't common here at all, so we were very excited!!

Jack Wolfskin is a German outdoor clothes brand which is very popular here. They are very recognizeable because their trademark paw print. And yes, that's the exact colour of my jacket! I wanted something bright to cheer me up on grey winter days!

Glad your birthday plans went well !!!Nice gifts too!!! I am sure Biergarten is not the top of your list, but I enjoy it !!!

Actually, I am pretty sure that I will eat a meal at Biergarten on my next WDW visit! Just to be able to report back on it!

 

[rndmr2]

I recently found this TR and am now caught up!

I am really enjoying reading about your trip and seeing your pictures. DH and I ate at WCC in May when we were there, we really liked the food there. I was expecting more "fun" but there really wasn't much except the Ketchup and the "really bad choir" that sang Happy Birthday to my DH. He only had our waitress and one other waiter, but it was funny.

Glad you had a great Birthday!

 

[Flossbolna]

I recently found this TR and am now caught up!

I am really enjoying reading about your trip and seeing your pictures. DH and I ate at WCC in May when we were there, we really liked the food there. I was expecting more "fun" but there really wasn't much except the Ketchup and the "really bad choir" that sang Happy Birthday to my DH. He only had our waitress and one other waiter, but it was funny.

Glad you had a great Birthday!

Hi and I am glad that you enjoy our TR!

I think it really is hit and miss with the action at WCC and I am afraid that I am just not the person with whom they would play: foreign adults without kids... Which I understand, they don't want to take any chances of being misunderstood.

 

[lovealldisney]

Quote:
I love cornbread my family not so much.

Interesting, so it is something not every American family eats!

No I don't think that is something American families eat regularly. I like to make it when I make chilli in the winter. mmmm....
Quote:

Bad squirrel!! My father loves a squirrel who comes to visit their balcony and he puts nuts outside to make it come for visits. They recently replanted their flower plots on the balcony and these were filled with nuts! The squirrel seemed to use them for winter storage!

That's to funny! I hope the squirrel doesn't think he can come inside this winter! Quote:

Katharina also tried Tofutti at a later occassion (made from soy) and I think she liked one better than the other. I think it would be a great option for your daughter if she has some problem with lactose.

I'll have to look for this to. I buy her soy milk now and she loves it. Especially chocolate soy milk.

Oh and guess what grade she got on her German cooking project?? She got an A! I have to say she really is doing well this year in German. She really likes her teacher.

 

[Flossbolna]

That's to funny! I hope the squirrel doesn't think he can come inside this winter!

I'll have to look for this to. I buy her soy milk now and she loves it. Especially chocolate soy milk.

Oh and guess what grade she got on her German cooking project?? She got an A! I have to say she really is doing well this year in German. She really likes her teacher.

I think it still isn't so tame that it would come inside!

I guess, it is more the chocolate than the soy which your DD enjoys...

Congratulations to her fantastic grade! It is wonderful that she is doing so well!

 

[lovealldisney]

I think it still isn't so tame that it would come inside!

I guess, it is more the chocolate than the soy which your DD enjoys...

Congratulations to her fantastic great! It is wonderful that she is doing so well!

My mom loved feeding the critters outside. One squirell would come and scratch at the back door of our house so she would give him his treat.

I agree I think she likes the chocolate more than anything. I would rather her have that than nothing she needs the vitamin D.

I really am glad she is doing so well in her class. I think having the right teacher makes all the difference.

Have a great day Magdalene!

 

[vamassey1]

I had fallen behind but now I'm all caught up.

Loved the tour through the German pavillion. You both do such a great job of explaining everything. I will look at Germany and Norway in a totally different way now.

We sat in the same place for Illumination. As long as everyone didn't stand up it had great viewing. We were also able to exit fast.

Sorry the cold put a damper on your MK morning. It was very cold for our trip a few weeks later too.

Congrats on sigining a DVC contract. I hope it comer through.

I'm glad to hear your meal at WCC helped restore the Magic. We had a great meal there too in 2009.

I love Wishes too!!!

And last but not least, Happy Belated Birthday!

 

[Flossbolna]

I had fallen behind but now I'm all caught up.

Loved the tour through the German pavillion. You both do such a great job of explaining everything. I will look at Germany and Norway in a totally different way now.

We sat in the same place for Illumination. As long as everyone didn't stand up it had great viewing. We were also able to exit fast.

Sorry the cold put a damper on your MK morning. It was very cold for our trip a few weeks later too.

Congrats on sigining a DVC contract. I hope it comer through.

I'm glad to hear your meal at WCC helped restore the Magic. We had a great meal there too in 2009.

I love Wishes too!!!

And last but not least, Happy Belated Birthday!

I tend to fall behind on my subscriptions as well! I am glad that you enjoyed the Epcot update! It was fun writing it!

I still haven't heard from DVC, I expect to hear some time next week and am already quite nervous!

I am so glad that I finally hear from someone who viewed Illuminations from that location as well! I always wondered why I never heard from someone else that they were there!

 

[Flossbolna]

My mom loved feeding the critters outside. One squirell would come and scratch at the back door of our house so she would give him his treat.

I agree I think she likes the chocolate more than anything. I would rather her have that than nothing she needs the vitamin D.

I really am glad she is doing so well in her class. I think having the right teacher makes all the difference.

Have a great day Magdalene!

That's a sweet story about the squirrel!

 

[Flossbolna]

Monday, February 1, 2010

This morning getting up early wasn't a problem since we went to bed so early the day before.

We once a again had breakfast from Mara, another child (ETA: sorry, not child but normal!) waffle meal for me and Katharina chose the child (ETA: sorry, not child but normal!) breakfast platter,

a good choice for me, I think. I loved the potatoes, with the bacon and some egg. I didn’t really need ¾ of the egg or the biscuit thing. Was it really a child breakfast platter, it looks huge?

Sorry everyone, Katharina is right! I think we must have been hungry that morning, both meals are adult meals!!

Katharina also got an apple juice with her meal (since she did not get a child meal, this must be from yesterday and she only had it today...) and we were rather amused by it: It stated where all the apples for the juice came from:

Our plan for today was to see more of the MK... We really did not get very much done yesterday. The weather was still cold today, but not as bad as the day before

Once again, getting to the bus stop shortly after 8 am wasn't early enough. We had a long wait for the bus and got the MK by 8:45 am! Still early enough for rope drop and since it was very uncrowded, it really did not matter much where we waited...

Once inside the park we felt much happier than the day before, so we decided to celebrate this with some photopass pictures!

First the one taken with my camera:

And then the official ones – the first one looked so wintery to me that I just had to use this border:

Then off for another ride on Space Mountain – while DLPs Space Mountain is in a totally different league, it is still a very enjoyable coaster! This time I also realized that it has become much darker inside after the refurbishment, I liked that! And I think they made the seats a bit more comfortable as well.

Next stop Astro Orbiter! We did not have to wait at all, but I experienced a new system there. Since Astro Orbitor is on top of the Peoplemover entrance platform, you have to queue up for an elevator. When we entered the elevator, we were all given plastic cards, ours were yellow. When we were at the top we had to wait for the previous ride to be over and then everyone with a yellow card was allowed to board. I think this is a good system to count capacity! Katharina and I shared a rocket and I can tell you that this is very tight for two normal sized adults. We did fit, but suffered some pain! But it is just much more fun to ride this together! I think it is a great ride because of the view. It is also very fast due to the fact that the arms are shorter than on Dumbo. Also, don't go all the way up if it is too fast for you. It will be the slowest when you go as far up that you aren't tilted because then you will be the furthest away from the center. If you go all the way up, it becomes faster and your are titled inside quite a bit. That's a bit scary!

Next we had to get to Peter Pan before the line got too long. This was a lovely ride as always. It is just a shame that the lines get so ridiculously long!

Then we wandered over to Frontierland where we met Goofy and Donald:

It actually started to sprinkle while we were taking our picture with them and therefore we jumped into the nearest shop. I was seriously considering buying an umbrella because of the rain, which had become a bit more serious by now. Stupid me, I had forgotten my umbrella at AKL. We still had ponchos with us, but did not feel like taking them out (yet). While I was trying to make up my mind whether to buy an ugly overpriced umbrella I came across this beautiful magnet:

Which now is decorating my fridge! By the time this was all arranged, the rain had stopped and we continued our exploration, stopping next at Big Thunder Mountain!

I absolutely adore the theming of this ride. But once again, its cousin in Paris is a bit better... Sorry! We still had a lot of fun, laughing at the guy taking a bath (in this cold and rainy weather!). Katharina had the disadvantage of sitting on the side, which seemed to be more inside on the curves, so after Astro Orbiter and now this, she was in danger of being seriously damaged...

We conveniently had a break at the bathroom to the right of Pirates of the Carribean and I really liked the tiles there:

Also, this water fountain was very pretty:

On to another MK attraction, which tends to get long lines: the Jungle Cruise! I had fun taking pictures while waiting:

We had a very funny skipper and I was highly amused when he told us at the exit: “in case you did not enjoy the tour, my name is Tom from the Carousel of Progress!”

Katharina had early on in her research of WDW made a mental list of snacks she had to try. And I think pretty high on that list were funnel cakes. I totally understood that because this was something I had made sure to try on my first ever WDW visit as well. No funnel cakes here in Germany (even though the concept of frying dough and then dusting it with sugar is very common here as well). So this seemed a good time for a little break enjoying a funnel cake, so we ventured to Liberty Square to the funnel cake production place, also known as Sleepy Hollow:

We liked it, especially because due to the funneling the dough into the fat, it is so crispy. But it also had so large amount of powdered sugar on it, that we felt a bit overpowered by it!

Since we were already in the neighbourhood, we hopped in to “Ye Olde Christmas Shoppe” (I always wonder how you pronounce this, is the “E” at the end silent, or do you say “oldee” and “shoppee”???). Katharina really wanted to get a Christmas ornament as a souvenir. She had gotten a really lovely one in DLP in 2007 and wanted to add to that tradition. But she wasn't successful.

There are some areas of Liberty Square, which have great potential, but it still looks somehow empty sometimes. Not empty because there aren't that many people, but a lack of density in theming. We explored a bit there and took pictures and I think if you compare these with pictures from AK, you might understand what I mean. Still it has a very relaxed feel to it and I really enjoy it there!

Conitnued in next post!

 

[Flossbolna]

Next we went into the Hall of Presidents. I had not seen it since the addition of Mr Obama and since it is such a special WDW attraction, Katharina had to see it as well. I thought the waiting area is actually quite interesting with lots of stuff to look at. I must admit (and I don't mean to be disrespectful) that we were highly amused by this exhibit:

This is the explanation:

We thought that this was very American!!

As is the Hall of Presidents in general. Remember what I wrote about those t-shirts in Epcot? That Germans have problems of public display of affection for their country? That's why things like the Hall of Presidents are very foreign to us, but interesting to experience as part of the American culture nevertheless.

After the Hall of Presidents ended, there was some serious rain happening outside and Katharina and I finally had to get these ponchos out... Since I had brought about 12 ponchos for the two of us for this trip, we really did not have to careful on when to use them... I still have a number of them in my box with travel supplies (together with my Disney pins).

We ventured back into Fantasyland and got in line for Philharmagic. Walking in there was quite a lot of things happening. Some other people had taken refuge in the entrance to Philharmagic as well: a saxophone quartet, which entertained us with some nice music as well as Peter Pan and Wendy themselves!! That was quite some surprise, but there was actually a bit of a line and we did not feel like getting in line. Instead we saw the highly entertaining 3D movie. I think this might even become my favourite 3D movie... I have seen the Muppets so often that they are a little bit less entertaining than they used to be...

After a last stop at Space Mountain to make use of our fastpass (which was pretty unnecessary, the ride was a walk on even in stand by line), it was time for us to head out of the MK. Our plan for today was to visit another resort – one which was seriously considered as our accommodation for this trip but then lost to AKL...

On Main Street we saw some more Citizens – I really need to make a point of spending my morning on Main Street on the next trip!!

I second that, especially as this is something we don’t get in DLP...

We also had to document our ponchos for posterity:

And a few views of Town Square:

And then we headed to the bus stop for that resort we were going to visit for the first time... I let you guess where we went (the PTR might help a bit...)! I might even make this a competition with real prizes, so put your guesses in white!! Katharina, you can't play, even if you claim that you don't remember anything anyway!

Next: Chapter 24: Resort Exploring

 

[lovealldisney]

Hi Magdalene,
Ok I'm going to guess the resort first then come back and make comments about the latest update. I am goin to guess:
POFQ because you and Katharina love DLP and POFQ has that Paris feel to it.

 

[All7OfUs]

Dang, I'm headed out the door to a dentist appt., but will definitely be back to read the massive looking update as soon as I get back. I saw an funnel cake that gives me all the more motivation to hurry back and read!!

 

[Flossbolna]

Hi Magdalene,
Ok I'm going to guess the resort first then come back and make comments about the latest update. I am goin to guess:

Interesting reasoning!

Dang, I'm headed out the door to a dentist appt., but will definitely be back to read the massive looking update as soon as I get back. I saw an funnel cake that gives me all the more motivation to hurry back and read!!

Your appointment or the kids? I hope it goes painless anyway! I did not know that funnel cake pictures were such a great motivation to you!

 

[lovealldisney]

Monday, February 1, 2010

We once a again had breakfast from Mara, another child (ETA: sorry, not child but normal!) waffle meal for me and Katharina chose the child (ETA: sorry, not child but normal!) breakfast platter,

a good choice for me, I think. I loved the potatoes, with the bacon and some egg. I didn’t really need ¾ of the egg or the biscuit thing. Was it really a child breakfast platter, it looks huge?

Sorry everyone, Katharina is right! I think we must have been hungry that morning, both meals are adult meals!!

I would have had to share the meal with the eggs and biscuit that's alot of food!

Katharina also got an apple juice with her meal (since she did not get a child meal, this must be from yesterday and she only had it today...) and we were rather amused by it: It stated where all the apples for the juice came from:

That's interesting! We have plenty of apples here in the US.Why do they need apples from all over the world??

Once inside the park we felt much happier than the day before, so we decided to celebrate this with some photopass pictures!

First the one taken with my camera:

And then the official ones – the first one looked so wintery to me that I just had to use this border:

Once again very nice photo's

Next we had to get to Peter Pan before the line got too long. This was a lovely ride as always. It is just a shame that the lines get so ridiculously long!

One of my favorite rides!

Then we wandered over to Frontierland where we met Goofy and Donald:

Cute!


I absolutely adore the theming of this ride. But once again, its cousin in Paris is a bit better...
Sorry!

Say this isn't so!

Katharina had early on in her research of WDW made a mental list of snacks she had to try. And I think pretty high on that list were funnel cakes. I totally understood that because this was something I had made sure to try on my first ever WDW visit as well. No funnel cakes here in Germany (even though the concept of frying dough and then dusting it with sugar is very common here as well). So this seemed a good time for a little break enjoying a funnel cake, so we ventured to Liberty Square to the funnel cake production place, also known as Sleepy Hollow:

I LOVE funnel cakes! I only have one a year and that is during the Fourth of July along with a deep fried Snickers!

We liked it, especially because due to the funneling the dough into the fat, it is so crispy. But it also had so large amount of powdered sugar on it, that we felt a bit overpowered by it!

The powder sugar is what makes it so good though! mmmmmmmmm.... Next time just shake some off.

Since we were already in the neighbourhood, we hopped in to “Ye Olde Christmas Shoppe” (I always wonder how you pronounce this, is the “E” at the end silent, or do you say “oldee” and “shoppee”???).

The E is silent the only long E sound is in the Ye.

Katharina really wanted to get a Christmas ornament as a souvenir. She had gotten a really lovely one in DLP in 2007 and wanted to add to that tradition. But she wasn't successful.

I hope she was able to find one on your trip!

Next we went into the Hall of Presidents. I had not seen it since the addition of Mr Obama and since it is such a special WDW attraction, Katharina had to see it as well. I thought the waiting area is actually quite interesting with lots of stuff to look at. I must admit (and I don't mean to be disrespectful) that we were highly amused by this exhibit:

No offence taken.

This is the explanation:

We thought that this was very American!!

As is the Hall of Presidents in general. Remember what I wrote about those t-shirts in Epcot? That Germans have problems of public display of affection for their country? That's why things like the Hall of Presidents are very foreign to us, but interesting to experience as part of the American culture nevertheless.

I would like to say that MOST Americans are very patriotic. We love our country, you and Katharina need to be here during our countries independance day July 4th! Not in a big city but in rural America that is where I think you'll see the heart of the American people. You need to come celebrate with us down in Bellevue we go every year. ( I mean no disrespect to big city people please don't take it the wrong way we live in a big city but choose to be away during that time. )

We ventured back into Fantasyland and got in line for Philharmagic. I think this might even become my favourite 3D movie... I have seen the Muppets so often that they are a little bit less entertaining than they used to be...

I really like this too! I think that the Muppets needs to be redone.

After a last stop at Space Mountain to make use of our fastpass (which was pretty unnecessary, the ride was a walk on even in stand by line), it was time for us to head out of the MK. Our plan for today was to visit another resort – one which was seriously considered as our accommodation for this trip but then lost to AKL...

We also had to document our ponchos for posterity:

These are all cute, I like the last one best!

And then we headed to the bus stop for that resort we were going to visit for the first time... I let you guess where we went (the PTR might help a bit...)! I might even make this a competition with real prizes, so put your guesses in white!! Katharina, you can't play, even if you claim that you don't remember anything anyway!

I secretly think Katharina knows so she can win the prize!


Up next: Resort Exploring

Nice update Magdalene! Looking forward to what resort you went to!

 

[vamassey1]

Yum! Best way to start the day-Mickey waffles.

Wonderful Photo Pass pictures. Looks like a much better morning in the MK with lost of rides. I really enjoy the Jungle Cruise with all the corny jokes but the skipper makes all the difference.

Yum Again! Funnel Cakes.

Liberty Square looks so empty. Where are all the people?

I always say I'm going to spend more time on Main Street but haven't yet. Someday. . .

 

[glennbo123]

Sorry that you had a rainy afternoon, but it looks like you made the most of it.

Regarding the resort....I am going to guess Port Orleans French Quarter. It was either that, or Coronado Springs. I saw on your PTR that both of you had Boatwrights as a restaurant choice, so maybe you visited POFQ and then went to Boatwrights for dinner? Oops, no...I just saw your ADR list and I think you have Boma scheduled for this particular evening. Well, I don't really have a reason for the guess anymore, but I'll stick with POFQ.

 

[All7OfUs]

Lovely update! My favorite picture is the last one with you 2 "celebrating" in your ponchos.

Mmmm... time to make funnel cakes again! (As if Taco Bell wasn't enough daily calories today)

OK, I"m going to say:

CSR. You seem to say quite a bit about that one- and you had quite nice things to say about it, too. Perhaps you went there on your way back to AKL? I don't know.... there were basically 2 I could have chosen.

 

[englishrose47]

Hi Magdalina !!Great updates !!!As you know we did the Hall of presidents in October !!It's not a Favorite of mine but is okay!!!

I am gonna gues the resort as Boardwalk!!