I keep saying this, but I was really surprised how much I liked MK. When I visited as a snotty teenager, I sneered at all its differences from
Disneyland and considered it the inferior park. But now that I’m a snotty adult (and I visit Disneyland so frequently that I’ve actually – gasp! – been known to be bored there), I love its combination of familiar and different. And I love that we can visit attractions that Disneyland has shuttered or replaced, like the fort on Tom Sawyer Island or Swiss Family Treehouse.
DH took lots of gratuitous shots of Big Thunder Mountain Railroad – it is just gorgeous at WDW, especially with the beautiful Florida skies.
Another thing you can’t do at Disneyland anymore is get a hand-embroidered hat (well, OK, hand-and-machine embroidered, rather than all-machine-embroidered). We bought two the week before they switched out the machines at Disneyland, so we bought two at WDW in the same spirit (I think I’ve heard they’re going all-machine-embroidered at WDW too ...). We are so impressed by the talent and coordination it takes to do these well.
After we’d seen every nook and cranny of the fort on Tom Sawyer Island, we rode the monorail back to Epcot for dinner at San Angel Inn. This is another place that seems to receive mixed reviews, but the steak we split was delicious. It’s a different cut of meat, so we weren’t expecting a Le Cellier steak – it was more chewy but really flavorful.
I wish we’d been able to get pictures inside the Mexico Pavilion because the atmosphere was perfect – we got a table right by the water, under the volcano, the mariachis were playing, and the place was bustling. Add in the low light, the flickering candles, the hyper little girl trying to climb over the railing.... bliss!
After dinner we stood in the marketplace and watched the mariachis. It’s not my favorite style of music, but I love the combination of musical talent and showmanship – it seemed that nearly every member of the band got a solo or to lead a song. It was lovely to stand and listen with DH’s arms around me, and when they finished I got to shake their hands! On our way out we stopped at the booth where they decorate the Animales Fantasticos—those colorful wooden animals. DH had been fascinated by them during our entire trip.
We saw that one of the women was working on a cute little armadillo and decided it would be a fun souvenir if we bought it right then, before it was finished, and had them ship it to our hotel. Then we would have a surprise when we opened it at home and saw how it turned out! I won’t make you wait until Day 13: The Reckoning to see how it turned out....
In progress...
Finished!
Once again, we decided to blow off our evening entertainment plans (this time, IllumiNations) and go to Downtown Disney for Ghirardelli sundaes. You can see where our priorities are.... On the way out we were asked to do a survey. I love taking surveys because then I get to blab about my opinions even more than I already do. However, it felt like a pretty silly thing to do on our honeymoon, considering I’d taken a
Sunshine Rewards survey nearly every day for the past year to earn money for our honeymoon—especially since Epcot’s didn’t pay anything!
Foxy Lady!!!
When we got to Downtown Disney, I decided to do the trick where you buy all the souvenirs you saw in the parks at the World of
Disney Store so you can get an Annual Passholder or Disney Visa discount on them. But apparently this is a well known tip, because half of what I wanted was out of stock! I’d decided my big souvenir would be the three Disney Parks cookbooks (never mind that they’re prolly all available at my second home, a.k.a. Disneyland), but World o’ Disney only had two and told us the first one had been discontinued. They were also out of the Mickey parts dog toys (I totally shoulda taken a picture of these – so cute! ) we wanted to get for our kitty-sitter’s dogs. We found them at the pet store, though.
Then we muscled our way to a table at Ghirardelli with our delicious sundaes (why didn’t I take pictures—why?!). I got what used to be called a Cable Car Sundae (hot fudge and butterscotch), and DH got a banana split because I told him to.
We started to drive back to AKV, but DH was bound and determined to get me that discontinued cookbook. He said he’s seen it at Coronado Springs’ gift shop, so we pulled off. Sure enough, they had a huge stash of them, and that book turned out to have a lot of the same recipes as the spendy coffee table cook book I got at World o’ Disney. So we returned the spendy one and I had all the Disney Parks recipes I could ever want. What a great guy!
Next up:
The Worst Day of Our Honeymoon....(but “worst” is relative when you’re talking about WDW...)
) before you got to the canyon.
Thanks!
(burp!)
I am so excited to hear this! We're going back in February for our anniversary - I will be sure to bring bigger pants.... 
