I survived my first camping trip!

[katiekomo]

I should mention on the bus we also spotted our first of many, "leash children". Neither of us have kids yet, so we really don't have an opinion about this phenomenon, but we had a lot of fun spotting and counting them throughout the week! At first, we thought about snagging photos, but then we thought others might find it weird that we were taking photos of their kids... so instead we'd declare (quietly) to each other, "LP! There's an LK (our code for leash kid) at 6 o'clock."Again, I hear that this can be controversial, and we're certainly not in any position to have an opinion-- we just found it a fun way to pass the time as we waited in line or zipped to the next attraction. (For the record, we also counted men in mouse ears, fanny packs and camel toes.)(And the only reason we ourselves didn't add to these counts were: no kids, no men with us, a handy backpack and I wore skirts the ENTIRE time... otherwise, there might have been one more to each of those counts!! )

 

[novdisneydreams]

I'm loving your report

Though I must admit, the swirly faces are freaking me out

 

[katiekomo]

I know! They freak me out a little too... I'll see if I can find a different way to share the photos and still respect DH's request...

 

[katiekomo]

Part Two of June 6th, 2010
Setting up the site wasn’t too hard, but it was SO HOT! By this time it was around 3pm and the sun was beating down on us.

Here’s a shot of the finished tent:

You can see the large rug we put out in front, we also had a smaller rug inside. I’m kicking myself for not taking any inside photos but here’s the basic set-up:
An air mattress on each side of the tent. This gave us each a little space at our head and feet for clothes and personal items. It also gave us each a little pocket sown into the tent for our vitamins. We dubbed this our “bear alarm”. If we were attacked in the middle of the night, the rattling would wake us up! In the middle of the two air mattresses (towards the top where our heads were) we put my (now empty) hard suitcase. This served as a bedside table where we placed our fans, cell phone chargers and (get ready for this) air horn. Yep! My darling “Safety Sam” DH sent us with an air horn. I’m glad to say we didn’t need to use it. Not only for our sake, but for the sake of all the other campers within a mile radius!

LP was smart. She had prearranged each of her clothes and put them into Ziploc bags. So on Monday she pulled out her Monday bag and took it to the comfort station. Meanwhile, I was back at the tent trying to find clean socks & underclothes. Usually I was in such a hurry that that’s as far as I got—so my clothes rarely matched from day to day! Isn’t there a website where people post fashion faux pas from WDW? If so, please post—I’m almost positive I’d be on there!!

Outside of the tent we hung a clothesline:

And our kitchen:

Here’s how we set that up:
I had arranged for Garden Grocer to deliver our food right as we got there. They came on the later side of our time slot, but that was fine. I ordered two of their Styrofoam coolers. In one, I placed all of our dry food (chips, marshmallows, trail mix, granola, etc) in the other, I placed the cold food (hotdogs, chocolate—because it would melt otherwise—hummus, etc). We filled the cold cooler with ice (which we only had to replace twice) and closed both coolers with bungee cords.
Once the food was sorted, we put painter’s plastic on the ground beneath the table (the painter’s plastic was from a tip that I got on this board!). Then we put the two coolers, plus our empty bags on the painter’s plastic. We put our bottled waters, sodas and charcoal on the table, and covered the whole thing with a big, blue tarp. Looking back, I’m not sure why I didn’t just put everything on the table and cover it with a tarp… but it made sense at the time!

Lastly, we hung Christmas lights around the campsite. Here’s a photo of what that looked like at night: (This was also from a tip I read on this board.)

We strung them from the outlet around the tree a few times, then around the tent. By the time I took those photos, one of the strands had burned out, so it’s only lit around half of the tent. We then took a third strand and wrapped that towards the kitchen. This was probably the smartest camping thing we did the whole trip. It was easy finding our tent after a long day at the parks. We didn’t have to search for a flashlight (or carry one with us all day) when we got home. And we kept them on at night, which served almost like a nightlight (inside the tent they provided a little glow).

Once our site was set up, we locked the tent (thanks to a lock provided by… you guessed it! DH!!) and we headed to the parks. No lie, as we were walking from the site to the bus stop it started to rain. Talk about amazing timing!! That was another concern of mine as I prepared for this trip-- having to set-up (or break-down) camp in the rain!

As it was LP’s first time ever to WDW, I knew that MK would have to be the first stop.

 

[Disney Bunny]

KK.....

Gotta say I am impressed. You did great for a first camping trip and considering you flew in to boot you gals did a great job.

I have been camping for 29 years. Wish we had done as well our first trip as you did.

 

[katiekomo]

Part Three of June 6th, 2010
We took the internal bus to the Settlement, then the ferry to the Contemporary. LP kept asking how much the different modes of transportation cost and was so impressed that it was all “free”! Once at the Contemporary we took the Monorail to the TTC (I had to exchange my Season Pass voucher with the real thing). Once at the counter I got to do my first pin trade!
When I worked there in 2004, I never really got into pin trading. They gave us a pin for being in the college program (and one for surviving the hurricane season!) but besides that I never had any. I decided that I should dive in this year so I bought a lot of 25 from ebay. It was a good purchase and I was excited to trade! Then I started to think that LP might want to too, so I bought another lot of 25. I sorted out the ones that I thought she’d like and put them in denim pouches (my mom mad little bags from blue jeans. I displayed the pins I liked on the outside and the ones I didn’t in the pouch so I could make fast trades.). I’m so glad I did this! We had so much fun meeting different cast members and looking for “the” pin to complete whatever series we were doing. At one point I was chasing down a cast member because I saw a glimpse of a pin I wanted (the blue “Andy Warhol-type” Mickey). By the time I caught up with him we were both laughing so hard I could barely ask to see his pins! Later we traded with another CM and between the two of us had 4 trades we wanted to make. We kept asking, “is it ok if I give you this one for that one?” Finally he said, “you know I have to say ‘yes’, right? You can give me the ones you don’t like!” We thought that was so funny! Moral of the story, you’re never too old to start pin trading!!
Here is the pin pouch:

Here’s the other side (you can see the blue Mickey I ran for!)(Also, the College Program Pin I got and two other incomplete series’):

And here’s what the inside looks like:

I put the whole denim pouch in a Ziploc bag because some of the pins became detached from their back and fell. It was nice, though because the hard-to-find backing fell into the pouch, so I just had to search for the colorful pin.
I thought 25 would certainly be enough… but I just put in a bid for 100 for the trip DH and I will take in October!! (I might compromise down to 50 if I’m outbid.) One thing's for sure, though-- I'm going to have to ask my mom for a large denim pouch!! (And an FYI: we are not camping in October, though I bet the weather would be super nice! The October trip is a pre-planned off-property vaca.)
I’m trying not to make these too long, so I guess this day will have a part four!

 

[Robert6401]

Great job so far. Thanks for sharing. Looks like professional work, I'm beginning to have my doubts about the "City Mouse" label you put on yourself!

 

[katiekomo]

Haha! Well, I stand by my "city mouse" status... but it is true that I'm a bit of an adventurer. In high school (which ended over a decade ago!) I did camp for a week, but it was in a canvas tent with a wooden floor (which someone else put up for me) so I'm not really counting that.
A TON of research went into this trip, so that helped. Also, (and this was the big kicker) LP has camped at Banaroo a few times-- before she signed on I was a lot more nervous about going alone.
(But here's a "I am woman hear me roar" moment: when we got back from camping I had to put the tent back up in our backyard to air it out-- it was wet because we left early in the morning-- and I did it ALL BY MYSELF! DH was quite impressed!)

 

[rm0530]

Looks like you had a fun time. I'm glad you're writing a report for us. I'm enjoying it!

 

[katiekomo]

Part Four of June 6th, 2010
After the AP exchange, we took the boat to the MK. What a great way to introduce a newbie to the castle!! We walked up Mainstreet and took a left at the castle. I had decided that Pirates of the Caribbean was the best “first ride” for LP to experience first. In a perfect world it would have been Splash Mountain, but I knew that the line would be too long.

The whole week we were there our longest wait was 25 minutes. That was for (of all things) the Nemo ride going into the Seas with Nemo & Friends. I could have taken her through the gift shop to Turtle Talk, but the last time I was there they still had those elevator things, so I wanted to experience it.
Out of everything (and that includes the entire camping experience) I’m most proud of that fact. It took a lot of research, waking up at 6am and a handy iPhone app to keep the lines down, but I really think it helped LP have a better experience. Also, it helped that there were just two of us adults—no stopping for characters (except for two) and no mid-day melt-downs (that comes later…). Also, she was super “go with the flow” so there wasn’t any “I don’t want to do that” or “what she we do next?” time—as we left one ride we went straight to the next!

But all of that didn’t start until the next day… Sunday night we just traipsed around MK doing rides here and there before the (new!) parade and fireworks.

Here we are right before LP experiences her first WDW attraction:

After that we headed to the Haunted Mansion—two classic attractions for LP to experience! After that, since we didn’t have a plan, we just strolled around MK looking for short lines and letting LP soak in the atmosphere.
We stumbled upon it’s a small world. This was a treat for me! In my three previous trips to WDW, my dad would never let me ride it’s a small world. The song drives him batty and not only did he not want to ride it (maybe they didn’t have ride swap back then?) but he also didn’t want to hear his kids sing it all day! So, three vacations and I never got to ride it! Then I went to work there, excited to finally experience it—only to find it was going under refurbishment for the entire semester I was there!! Again, I was excited to ride it in October when DH and I go, but read that it’s under refurbishment then too!! What the Fort Wilderness is going on with this ride?!? So, on that first night, I was SO delighted to see that the line was short (really, non-existent).

Well, that was a once in a lifetime thing! Uh… probably don’t need to ride that again, probably need to call my dad to apologize for teasing him all that time and probably need to figure a way to get that stupid song out of my head!!

After… that… we decided it was time for a quick dinner. So we headed over to the Columbia Harbour House. I can’t remember what LP had (it was one of the sandwiches) but, boy howdy, do I remember what I had! (Not that it was all that amazing, I just never forget a meal!) The BLT salad—delight! It was just enough of a salad to feel good about what I was eating and the crispy chicken was just fried enough for me to feel good about what I was tasting!

We walked over to the Tea Cups (I always have to ride the pink tea cup… if there isn’t one available, I’ll wait until the next ride!):

Then we walked over to Toontown (possibly for the last time?) and peaked into the judges tent to browse. That’s when LP saw an adorable Minnie Mouse parka! She’s a teacher and just had to have it for carpool duty. Since it was the first night, we decided to wait. But here is the parka:

What you can’t see are the ears the come up from the top! So cute! But we decided to wait… if it was worth having, it was worth waiting.

We headed over to the train station and caught it just in time! We took it all the way to Frontierland and met up with an old pal from my CP days and his new wife. There was a short wait for BTMRR so we rode that. They knew that the back train was the best, so we asked to sit there and I’m glad we did! I remembered that ride being a little tame, but LP and I were screaming the whole time!

We walked over to Adventureland and had my first Dole Whip. Delight!
Then we went on the Jungle Cruise. By this time it was dark so that was another first for me: JC in the dark! The CMs did a great job and LP and I giggled the whole time.

By now it was time to try and find a spot to watch the Main Street Electrical Parade. We did on the porch of the Country Bear Jamboree. So fun! Loved the different floats and such, but that song! Sheesh! It’s as bad as the small world!

We walked to the castle and watched Nightastic. I’m so glad they kept Tinkerbell flying!

We said goodbye to my friends, then headed over for CoP and TTA. Then, finally, we went back to the campsite after a VERY long day.

 

[kaguilbeau]

Great job! What kind of suitcases did you use to make the camping gear in? I know you said you had two, just real curious about how you got all you needed in those bags - if they were duffle type bags, etc.

 

[katiekomo]

We each had a duffle bag and I also had a hard piece of luggage. Originally I planed to fly with a foot locker, but that alone was 11lbs! So I scratched that. Although the bags weren't huge, I don't think I could have gone any bigger-- as I was so close to my weight limit! In addition to those three bags we each had a backpack packed to the brim and two large (purse-type) bags that were pretty full too. I thought flying in would be a bigger ordeal than it was-- just took some extra planning (and alot of forgoing comforts-- like, we really could have used an AC unit!) But I was surprised that we really didn't lack for much!

 

[katiekomo]

Part One of June 7th, 2010
The alarm went off at 6am. Despite the fact that my body was exhausted (not only from the long day, but from the fact that I woke up every 30 minutes looking out the window checking for bears ) I got up fairly quickly (I’m usually not a morning person) and headed over to the comfort station. I was glad that it wasn’t very crowded (though shocked there was anyone else awake at this hour) and overall I was very pleased with my times in the comfort station. I did notice that things picked up as the hour went on (and LP went in once around 11pm and said there were naked babies running everywhere being chased by stressed out moms with towels and bars of soap).

We needed to stop over at the Outpost before we left for the day, so we walked over to the bus stop. There wasn’t a bus waiting for us so we thought we’d just walk on over there. It didn’t look very long on the map… Rookie mistake! It is long—but more than it being long, it’s HOT! I hadn’t had breakfast yet and I was starting to get cranky. But we did what we needed to do and decided on a quick breakfast.

I had grand plans of us making breakfast each morning, but things went a little slower than expected that morning. So I made my second rookie mistake and we headed over to the Trails End for a $15 breakfast buffet. Yeehaw! Here’s what I ate for $15:

And really, I didn’t even eat the Mickey waffle, I just got it because I thought it was cute! (Don’t tell my mom—she’ll revoke my clean plate club card.)

Really, though, the Mickey waffle and our delightful waiter were worth the price of admission. When he came to get us the lady said we were at table 16 and he exclaimed, “Oh! You got the best table in the house! And—the best waiter!”

Since we were on that side of the Fort, we took the ferry to the Contemporary, the Monorail to the TTC and the other Monorail to Epcot. While waiting in line for rope drop we stood behind quite the stressed out family. The dad was snipping at the mom and the kids looked very uncomfortable. Contrasted with the family behind us who were chit chatting and really seemed to be excited to be there (not the “we have to suck out all the fun we can in order to get our monies worth” vibe we got from the family in front of us).
This is when the trip sort of shifted for us. We thought we were going just as a fun girl’s trip… but we realized that we were really doing Research and Development for when we bring our kids back. There are three couples that make up our family (plus the parents). We’re all within three years of age, we all got married within a year of each other and we’re all looking to have kids around the same time. We have many plans of “cousin camp” and extended family vacas and we know that WDW will have to be one of those trips. So we started picking up pointers (what to do and what not to do) while we were here.

I had never done a true rope drop before, but I knew a little about where we needed to be in order to ride Soarin’ (which was our first destination). We followed the sea of people to the Land and it was fun to see the CMs clapping and singing. We got to the line and fairly quickly were near the front. The CM asked if there was a party of two and my hand shot up! Sweet! That really only saved us a few minutes, but we felt special. For each ride I never told LP what to expect. So when we sat down she was straining to see the screen and you could tell she didn’t quite know what was going on. So fun when the ride started! I had done Soarin’ in California (before I worked at WDW) but it was still being built when I was there. I kind of thought they’d change it for WDW—maybe through the Midwest, or Southern states before ending at the castle? But we still both loved the ride.

After that we did Test Track—the single rider line. I don’t know what I’m going to do when I have kids, because I love that thing (the single rider line). I guess I’ll have to either suck it up and stand in standby or force them to ride alone and foot the therapy bill later… We loved TT and loved MS (Orange) which we did next.

We headed over to do Sum of All Thrills (really cool) in Innoventions, then Living with the Land. LP likes to garden and really got a lot out of it. My DH is obsessed with our landscaping, so I’m thinking about taking him on the Behind the Seeds Tour when we go in October. If I had some forethought I would have suggested it for LP.

After that we stood in our longest line (25 mins) to ride into the Seas. Worth the wait I think—especially the end when the cartoon fish are with the real fish! While waiting for Turtle Talk to start, we saw a Scuba diver in the tank, plus the manatees. Again, I didn’t tell LP what to expect and she was shocked when Crush started to interact with the audience!

Then we trekked BACK to the Land for a third time for lunch. I had the Seared Tuna on Mixed Greens. Pretty good.

On the way to the Universe of Energy we stopped by Club Cool. I remembered it being this really neat place where you walk through an igloo and coke is dispensed in all sorts of neat ways… well I almost didn’t find it—and once I did, I was disappointed to see that it’s turned into a glorified gift shop. Ah well, I did get to get LP to try Beverly. That was fun.

We watched Ellen’s Energy Adventure and I nearly fell asleep. Not because it wasn’t as entertaining and witty as I remembered it, but I was getting really tired! Afterwards we did a quick Spaceship Earth (neat changes!) then we took the bus back to the Fort for naps.

 

[clkelley]

Sounds like a GREAT trip so far!!!

 

[novdisneydreams]

What a fun report !!!!!!!!!!!!!!

And the new faces are much better - great idea!

 

[katiekomo]

Part Two of June 7th, 2010
When we got back to the tent, we found that it was in direct afternoon sunlight. So we sweated for 45 minutes pretending to nap. We decided we’d have to get more creative in our nap locales for the rest of the trip.

Somewhat refreshed, we headed back to Epcot—this time taking a direct bus from the Outpost. That meant we needed to take the bus on the Meadow’s side of the street—the one also in direct sunlight with no place to sit:

After a few moments in brutal heat, we realized that the bus stop one south of us (I think for the 1600-1900 loops?) was an easy walk (for real this time!). So we scooted over there to wait in the shade. Good choice!

We walked to Mexico and strolled through the countries. By Germany LP was ready for a beer and I was ready for something cold. I can’t remember the name of the drink I had, but it was frozen, white and included a cherry liqueur.

That’s when we spotted the cutest family. At first we just saw the parents—each wearing mouse ears! They were holding hands and flirting until their kids came and broke that up. I just loved that everyone seemed to happy, so full of magic and so not stressed out (we really saw a lot of stressed out families!).

We continued making our way around and by the time we hit France we were ready for a new drink—we’re both fans of Grand Mariner (and I’m a huge fan of the Goose) so we had to try the orange slush. Although it was yum-o, I wish they would serve it in a different glass—I had sticky orange hands!

As we walked over the bridge to the UK we saw a woman who was roping off an area just off of the bridge. I asked her what the deal was and she said that right before 9pm (when Illuminations was starting) she’d drop the rope. It was 8:40 at that point so we stuck around. And that’s how we got prime viewing for only 20 minutes of waiting! Totally stumbled upon it!

This was LP’s favorite fireworks and although it’s really hard for me to play favorites—I can say I’d love to see it again! I do like that song the best (I think!). The park was closed and LP and I were up for some more fun, so we ducked out of the International Gateway and walked over to the Boardwalk. We found Jellyrolls and staked a front row seat. We ordered two beers and enjoyed the music—until 2am!! Here’s LP on stage:

(I went ahead and disguised everyone's faces... in case they have "Safety Sam" husbands too.)

So now it’s 2am and we’ve been enjoying drinks since around 8pm. And I realize, I really don’t know how we are going to get home! Of course, I had a back-up plan of a taxi… but I wasn’t sure where to catch one! LP kept trying to convince me that we could walk through Epcot. We giggled at how absurd we must be… and found the Boardwalk Hotel (I think that’s the one) . We marched over to the valet and asked the guy how we should get home. He told us to get on a bus headed for DTD where we could transfer to FW. Still giggling and having obviously enjoyed our evening, we walked to the bus and told the driver where we’d like to go, “FW via DTD, please!”. Instead, he took us straight to FW. Hooray! We got back to our tent and I had the best sleep of the whole trip!

Update: I forgot to mention we had sushi in Japan on the way! How could i have forgotten to mention a meal!? The sushi was on par with grocery store sushi... but really hit the spot that evening!

 

[Robert6401]

Was the Sushi from "Tokyo Dining?" The wife and I are sushi fans and we have a ressie for Tokyo Dining in a couple of weeks. Supposedly their sushi is better than Teppan Edo's??? Anyways, great report so far, very detailed.
Since it sounds like you are like us and enjoy a bit of the nightlife, you have to try "Looping the Loop." That's what the bartender at the Grand Floridian called it. Anyways, we took to boat over to the contemporary, and then took the monorail around to all the different resorts and had a drink at each one. The little bar at GF was probably our favorite. The bartender was great and it is smaller and more intimate. They were just about to close because we were the only ones in there, but a wedding ended downstairs and everyone from the wedding came up and made it worth their while to stay open. By the end of the night, we were honorary members of the wedding party! We had a blast and it's a great way to take in a bit of the atmosphere at each of the resorts. We had my parents with us on that trip so they baby-sat, but I reccomend trying it before you have kids

 

[Tri-circle-D]

It has already been said, so I am just repeating that you really did a great job with this trip! Flying and tent camping takes a lot of planning, and it sounds like you had everything covered.

Part One of June 7th, 2010
The alarm went off at 6am. Despite the fact that my body was exhausted (not only from the long day, but from the fact that I woke up every 30 minutes looking out the window checking for bears ) I got up fairly quickly (I’m usually not a morning person) and headed over to the comfort station. I was glad that it wasn’t very crowded (though shocked there was anyone else awake at this hour) and overall I was very pleased with my times in the comfort station. I did notice that things picked up as the hour went on (and LP went in once around 11pm and said there were naked babies running everywhere being chased by stressed out moms with towels and bars of soap).

You have discovered a great secret of the Fort - - hit the comfort stations early. The majority of folks at the Fort are not rope-droppers, and the comfort stations are basically empty before 7 am. This is important when it is hot out, as even with AC, things get steamy and humid in there once the showers are constantly running.

LP's experience matches a frequent complaint from my DD's. There are often young children running wild in the women's comfort stations. I can assure you that this did not happen when the TCD DD's were toddlers. We just hosed them off at the site.

You are doing a great job on this report- keep up the good work.

TCD

 

[katiekomo]

Sorry, I can't figure out how to do multiple quotes the right way (also known as the TCD way-- you're, like, my TR hero!)

"Was the Sushi from 'Tokyo Dining?' The wife and I are sushi fans and we have a ressie for Tokyo Dining in a couple of weeks. Supposedly their sushi is better than Teppan Edo's???"

The sushi was from Yakitori House-- a quick service. Literally looked (and tasted and cost) the same as what you get at a grocery store. Not the best, but did what we needed at the time. Let me know how your sushi experience goes-- I'd like to take DH for some sushi in October (but it's during F&W, so there might be better, fresher options?).

"Since it sounds like you are like us and enjoy a bit of the nightlife, you have to try 'Looping the Loop.'"

LOVE it!! I think this will have to be something I do with DH in October-- this is right up his alley.

"It has already been said, so I am just repeating that you really did a great job with this trip!" AND "You are doing a great job on this report- keep up the good work."

Ah! Stick a fork in me! I'm ever so honored by the compliments! Not just TCD's but many of those that I've seen post witty comments and great TRs are actually reading (and posting nice things about) my TR! Well, I am just beside myself!

"This is important when it is hot out, as even with AC, things get steamy and humid in there once the showers are constantly running."

I noticed this even with just our two showers running-- I thought they could have cranked up the AC by... well... alot!

"I can assure you that this did not happen when the TCD DD's were toddlers. We just hosed them off at the site."

Nice! I read this to DH (who doesn't really "get" DIS boards, but politely listens to my excerpts) and he laughed out loud! That's SO his parenting style!

 

[katiekomo]

Part One of June 8th, 2010
Well, we hit snooze twice on Tuesday, but I’m proud to say we got up after that and were able to make our hot dogs and still be at DHS before Rope Drop. (After popping a few advil.)

This was, by far, the craziest of all Rope Drops that we experienced. Probably because TSM is so new, so popular, so easily enjoyed by everyone and so dang good! We followed the masses to the ride. While we were walking I told LP—don’t drop anything—you might get trampled! Seriously—whew! Out of all my “crowd experiences”—that ranks #2 most intense. All those people shoulder to shoulder focused on the same goal: to pull a fake cannon and hit a target. (The first most intense was being in France when they won the World Cup in 1999.)(Or was it 1998?)

We made it to the back of the line by 9:03am. And it still took 25 minutes to get to the front. No wonder it’s such a popular ride! We were immediately hooked and got FPs when we exited.

(I adored the theming of the line and the area… AND the real little green men!!!)

Next up on the plan was ToT and RnR. We walked over there only to find an hour wait for ToT. So we went to RnR to ride the single rider line… only to see if was closed! Boo-urns!

We walked over to The Great Movie Ride. After about 5 minutes of watching the big movie screen we were informed that the ride was experiencing difficulties. What the Fort Wilderness was going on with this park?!

Next on our touring plan was The Voyage of the Little Mermaid. So we watched it. I barely remembered seeing it 6 years ago, but I thought I remembered being impressed? Well, this time I was NOT. Sure, there were some neat things… but not really worth the price of admission (which was nothing).

We were close to our two hour mark for being able to get a new FP, so we had a Diet Coke/French Fry break at the stands on the way to ToT. The woman who took my order had a college on her nametag so I asked if she was on the College Program. She said she was and I told her I was a former CPer and that I lived in Vista. She perked up and told me she was at a party at Vista the night before and “wow, it was crazy!” Ah, the memories!

We went to get FPs for ToT, but the wait was only 20 minutes. What luck! Again, I didn’t tell Laura what to expect. She knew that there was a drop, but thought it would just go up and down. When the cart started to move forward she was so confused! Then the drop came we all screamed so loud! Then she started to laugh, thinking it was over. Then the screams came again! This happened four times total. It was SO funny!

Off to RnR for the single rider line—still closed! But we could get a second FP, so we did. Then Muppets in 3D. One of my classic favorites, but now that I’ve seen some of the newer ones, I can’t be as impressed with the 3D effects. I’ve heard that they are amping it up? Then One Man’s Dream and Narnia (which should be named “the ultimate preview… but not much else”). We walked over to the Backlot Tour and stopped into the Sci Fi Dine In so LP could see it. Backlot is another that I could skip next time. Since when did they have pre-recorded track? Yuck.

At some point we saw my favorite character… I don’t remember when, but this seems like a good place to include a photo:

I was really upset to hear that they were changing Star Tours… until I rode it again. Yet ANOTHER ride that’s less cool than I remember. So now I’m excited to see an updated version.

While we were in line to experience Star Tours, we experienced a full on adult melt-down. I guess the outside part of the line backs up to where the Star Wars training is going on? (We saw the backs of little kids in robes with light sabers)(probably not a wise spot for that.) We saw some Storm Troopers waiting to go stage, there was a CM telling people to keep moving (although this was part of the queue, there wasn’t anyone in front of us—so you’re supposed to keep walking). The mom behind us told her daughter to get on the rail and sit next to where the Storm Troopers were. The CM told them they had to keep moving. The daughter started to move, but the mom told her to get back up there for the photo. Then a second CM told them to keep moving and the mom got really upset and loudly complained that Disney doesn’t let you take photos and proceeded to sulk for the rest of the line (about 10 mins). Whether the mom or the CM was right (although, from my perspective it looked like the CM was right-- courteous, but having a job to do of keeping people away from the Storm Troopers who were about to go onstage) I felt so bad for the daughter who had to stand with a sulking mom for ten minutes. Hopefully they enjoyed the ride and her day turned around. LP and I vowed to never let a missed photo op cause a pouty face. This caused some missed photos, and for that I apologize to everyone reading.

Both FP were ready, so first we did TSM again (delight!) then RnR (either I’m getting older or they made that ride more intense—I remembered it being more tame?). We were pretty much done with what we wanted to do there… so we decided to go off-property for lunch. Great choice!