Let's see what this family does flying solo - the POST trip report!

[nilla]

We enter the Haunted Mansion with very little wait, and I'm shaking. This is SUCH a great ride, and right up my alley when it comes to dark, scary stuff, even though it's really not scary at all. Emily has been mildy frightened by the ghost host's appearance in the stretching room in the past, but is ok with it once I explain that he is not really coming down at her, but rather just hanging up there.

I love the mods they made to it last year, with the footprints on the misplaced steps, morphing paintings, and the disappearing heads in the portraits being especially cool. One thing I don't get is how falling out of the window works with the revamped storyline, but I can forget that for now, because the graveyard scene is coming up and the theme song won't be far behind. I really like to try to examine every little thing in this ride. I would love to ride this after closing all by myself, and wouldn't mind seeing it in the light, too. I bought an HM book here last year and was amazed when I found out how they pull off the hitchhiking ghost effect. As Ron Weasely or Flightless Duck would say, it's "bloody brilliant".

It's off to lunch now at the Columbia Harbor House, which has become our replacement for Pecos Bill's Fall Off Your Chair cafe after several close calls with tumbling kids (to paraphrase Bill Cosby, kids fall off chairs like snowflakes at that place) and the beginning of my evil stomach virus last year.

CHH has great quick service food (I get the fish 'n chips), and the theming fits in nicely with Libery Square. The kids make a pin trade with the CM at the door, though Dylan is unresponsive to my pointing out that she has a Troy pin. But Dylan, he's sooo dreamy!

While Kristin and the kids finish up, I head over to Peter Pan to get FPs. Unfortunately, the return time is later in the afternoon, which throws off some of our other plans, such as getting FPs for the Jungle Cruise earlier in the afternoon. I know for next year to make a call to the trip planner rather than just grabbing the FPs anyway if I ever find myself in this situation again. Sorry, Kristin!

After that, it was off to Adventureland, where we went to the Tiki Room (another family favorite) and POTC. The opening sequence must scare Emily a bit, since she gets mad whenever I say, "dead men tell no tales..." when we're riding it. That's my favorite part of the ride, though, which shouldn't surprise you if you were paying attention when I was writing about the Haunted Mansion earlier in this very post.

We closed out Adventureland by climbing up the Swiss Family Treehouse, which does nothing for me, but the kids seem to like. We do spot a Hidden Mickey in the fruit bowl:

Speaking of Hidden Mickeys, Kristin got a bunch of pics of another Adventureland Hidden Mickey that shall remain secret. I spotted it last year for the first time, and she swears she's never seen it documented, so we don't want any of you weasel faced lobsters trying to get your claws on our stinkin' credit! So back off! It will be revealed, all in good time

Sadly, though, these pics are several of the only 24 pics we took that day. You read that right - 24 pictures. I don't know how to explain that. We did get some Photo Pass pics, however, but looking back, I'm astonished we didn't get take more on our own. Oh well, we have two more days in MK, so I'm sure we'll get plenty then.

 

[kristin t]

How long do we have to wait until you post the hidden Mickey? It really is one of the best I've ever seen!!

 

[nilla]

How long do we have to wait until you post the hidden Mickey? It really is one of the best I've ever seen!!

That bubble just burst, Kristin. Check out the second item on http://www.hiddenmickeys.org/WDW/MagicKingdom/Adventure/Tiki.html

I'll be posting the pic momentarily

 

[nilla]

Ok, so Kristin's dream of me becoming a Hidden Mickey legend were killed by 30 seconds of research on my part. For those of you who haven't seen it, here it is, from Iiago's first perch in the Enchanted Tiki Room:

...and a close up:

Feel free to steal all the credit you want

 

[PrincessCaitlin]

Hi!

I am really enjoying you TR! I love how you write!

I am also a huge Splash Mountain fan and Haunted Mansion fan!

One time we went with my grandma and got to go through the CM entrance (also the wheel chair entrance) and then ended up being the ONLY family in the stretching room! It was pretty creepy when the voice says "Please move to the center to make room for everyone"

I have never seen that hidden Mickey before! I am glad you showed it because I was really curious as to what it was!

 

[MouseEarsJenny]

Enjoyed reading about your Animal Kingdom day. Somehow, whenever we go to AK, it ends up being ridiculously hot, and we miss seeing any actual animals because we're all too overheated to carry on after hitting the rides. We will just have to make it a priority to see the gorillas this time, too. Great report so far!

 

[Nettaboo]

I am loving your report and your writing style!

 

[nilla]

Thanks for all of the compliments! It makes it easier to push myself to post when I know others are enjoying it.

Jenny - I think you could go to AK in January and it would still be hot. It's just something about that park. Almost makes me want to go on Kali. ALMOST.

I'm hoping to post some more tonight. I'm only on Day 5 of 12 (2 travel days), so there's a lot more to tell.

Have a magical day!

 

[nilla]

Aaaaah!!! Another day, and no updates. Sorry to my avid readers

Hopefully I'll be back tomorrow night. See ya!

 

[nilla]

So far, tonight is the first night since Monday that I haven't been up all night working, so I'm going to start typing quickly before I get any unexpected calls or emails.

Now where were we?

Oh yeah, Day 5 - Magic Kingdom. Or, as Kristin is calling it, Refurb Kingdom, which may be a more fitting name for it this year. Main Street shops? Being refurbished. Exposition Hall? Refurb. The bathrooms across from Pirates? More refurb. None of this, however, can compare to the park's champion of refurbs, the much talked about Fantasyland refurb. Bye bye, Pooh's Playful Spot and Ariel's Grotto - you can still see them over the wall, but it won't be long until the giant crane sitting over there with them dismantles or relocates them for good. You can almost hear Piglet crying for someone - anyone - to help him as he stands stuck near the top of that tree. Yes, lots to wooden barricades and facades in this park this year, and it'll only get worse once the bulldozers roll into ToonTown, whenever that's set to happen.

Turns out Disney just moved the tree, though I'm not sure where it will end up. If anyone at Disney is reading this, I have an open spot in my backyard. I won't even complain about the tire tracks you leave putting it back there. Call me!

Anyway, back in the Refur- um, Magic Kingdom, post-Tiki Room. Emily asks to ride the Magic Carpets, to which we give our standard, "maybe later" response. "The lines are really long, Emily." So it's out of Adventureland and up the urine trail to the Hall of Presidents, stopping to buy Emily a personalized parasol. It's pink with her name, flowers, and a castle. We can pick it up later, but can't get it wet for three days, so let's hope it doesn't rain (*foreshadowing alert*) ! Into the HoP we go, and a Disney Myth is dispelled when it's President Obama and NOT the guy on the penny giving the speech following the introductions. Fortunately, no one in the audience is in the mood to voice their opinions about this, so I don't need to shout out, "it's not really him!" and embarass my whole family.

Though I tend to lean to the left, I did make a crack to Kristin before the trip that it would be funny if someone shouted out "you lie!" during Obama's speech, and Dylan found it so humorous that I was terrified that he would actually do it. I reminded him before the lights went down that he needed to be quiet through the whole thing, but dared not speak of what I was really afraid of. Fortunately, he kept his mouth shut.

HoP is a nice attraction on the same lines as the Carousel of Progress in that it servers multiple purposes: it's interesting, informative, impressive in its detail, and gets you out of the heat and off of your feet for a while.

 

[nilla]

After HoP, we checked the time and noticed it was getting closer to 3:00 parade time, which to us means "shorter lines for the big attractions" time. We head off across Main Street, where crowds are starting to gather, and there entertaining the waiting masses is none other than Push, that super-cool moving, talking garbage can that Dylan hugged a few years back in front of the Tomorrow Land Transit Authority. We also spot "Real, Human Push" not far away. He looks remarkably similar to "Real, Human Talking Tree", whom we saw in AK a few years backs, but maybe they just wear similar outfits. It's amazing how they pull it off, because he's literally standing only about two feet away from the rest of the people, and no one notices him. I guess everyone's attention is on his robot counterpart, so they don't notice him.

Ok, ok, I know what you're thinking. "Jon, the garbage can moves by itself and talks. What's so hard to understand about that?" And I agree. I love to suspend disbelief as much, if not more, than anyone, but wanted to add a little into this TR for the "smart Disney fans". Not saying the rest of you aren't intelligent; I'm just borrowing at term used to identify a certain type of pro wrestling fan to describe Disney fans who know the ins and outs of what goes on behind the scenes at WDW. Hold on - if you're thinking "no pro wrestling fans are smart", I'm thinking not only are you wrong, but that I'm getting further and further off my point and should really get back to telling you about Tomorrowland.

Sorry. Meanwhile, back in Tomorrowland, Kristin ran up to Space Mountain for Fast Passes while I parked the stroller. It's been two years since Kristin and I have ridden - wait, another digression coming. Hold on...

Flightless Duck, you have a degree in English, so is "have ridden" proper grammar? A quick test using MS Word's grammar check says it is, but it also says "have rode", "have ride", and "done rode" are correct, so there goes my faith in that tool. So for the purpose of this trip report, I will be using the phrase "have ridden", even if it doesn't sound right to me and may be incorrect usage. I just don't care. It's the internet, where spelling and grammar are optional.

Wow, I'm really straying from the story tonight, aren't I? Either I'm delirious from fatigue, or 6 ounces of Pabst Blue Ribbon has hit me unusually hard tonight. So back to the story. For good. I promise.

It's been two years since Kristin and I have ridden Space Mountain due to last year's refurb, and three years for Dylan due to last year's refurb and the prior year's wuss out. Kristin returns with the FPs and we pause to get ourselves some blue rasberry slushies. At that moment, I realized that I just don't understand kids. Everyone knows that if you drink these things too fast, you'll get a brain freeze, and that a brain freeze is just about the most painful instant sensation you can get from eating or drinking something so delicious. What I don't get is how the kids, knowing this, can drink so slowly and consistently avoid the agony, while I end up chugging it anyway and suffering? I mean, are they tasting the same thing I'm tasting? How are they controlling themselves? Is the pain not worth it to them?

 

[nilla]

Apologies are in order again for the lack of photos taken on this day. I really have no explanation. But back to Tomorrowland...we finished our slushies and hit The Monsters, Inc. Laugh Floor comedy show, which Emily and I have never seen. Hilarious! It's like Turtle Talk with Crush, but with the characters interacting more with the adults in the audience than the kids. They really do a nice job with this one, and the animation isn't as choppy as it appeared in the planning DVD, so I can't complain about that anymore.

After that, we decided to try out Stitch's Great Escape for the first time since the infamous "Dylan screams his head off and cries to get out of this attraction" incident of 2006. Emily's the same age as he was then, so it'll be interesting to see how she does. Turns out she did pretty well, though this attraction isn't any better than I remember it. I would've loved to have seen how scary the alien version was before they switched it over to this nonsense.

After Stitch, we rode the Tomorrowland Transit Authority, a family favorite and nice way to get off our feet, even though we were sitting in the last two attractions. Hey, look, I have a photo!

Don't get used to it. There's a lot of day left, and I don't have many more snaps left to show you.

After TTA, we rode the Carousel of Progress, one of Kristin's top five rides, and one that we all enjoy, just not as much as she does. "But Dad, I'm...indecent!" is one of the best lines in any WDW attraction. Emily sings the song fairly regularly. There's NEVER any line for this one, either, so it's got a lot working for it.

I'm expecting Kristin to chime in soon to point out that my chronolgy is all wrong, and it was in fact at this time that we got our slushies, I got my brain freeze, and we went to the Laugh Floor. However, she didn't already click "Submit Reply" after incorrectly ordering the events of our day like I did, so she'll just have to deal with it and enjoy the story as I'm telling it.

After Tomorrowland (and this is confirmed to have happened next), we got FPs for Winnie the Pooh, where I was nearly floored by the lack of "bonus" Philharmagic FPs coming out of the machine. I had pretty much come to expect them. Oh well, guess we'll just need to brave the massive Philharmagic queues later

We then started to head off to dinner at the Grand Floridian Cafe, walking right down the middle of Main Street, U.S.A. toward the park exit. That is, until Kristin got pulled into Uptown Jewelers to buy a wristlet to match the Dooney and Burke Mickey purse she bought last Fall. We looked at some light boxes, which are on Kristin's "must buy" list for this trip. Dylan and Emily traded pins with some CMs whom we ended up talking to for about 15 minutes afterwards. Out of the store, out of the park, and up the monorail ramp - next stop, the Grand Floridian!

 

[MEK]

Great TR. You had me cracking up on page 1. You have a lovely family and you know how to do Disney right. However, I have to tell you that SSR is very nice and I don't think you would be disappointed. It's my home resort and I really like it there.

Looking forward to more!

 

[nilla]

However, I have to tell you that SSR is very nice and I don't think you would be disappointed.

We'll have to research it more. It'll be hard to pull us away from CSR, but it'll be good to be more informed if we get another offer to upgrade. Thanks!

 

[nilla]

Our monorail trip to the GF led to one of my favorite inside jokes of the trip, and by inside, I mean I thought it was hilarious, while Kristin found it only mildly amusing at first and annoying later on. At one of the interim stops, two older women and a man, dressed for a nice dinner, boarded the monorail, and were instantly dubbed "The Buckinghams" by me. Here's their story:

The Buckinghams may or may not all be related, but one thing is for sure - they like the finer things in life, and have no time for fun, or any of that piffle. Children? Never! They're meant to be seen, not heard, and should certainly not try to engage this high-society bourgeoisie. Mr. Buckingham may have dabbled in some light comedy in his time, but his sense of humor is certainly nowhere close to the kind of silliness that amuses us. He sure reminds me of Ross Buckingham from Howard Stern's "Private Parts", but their matching surnames is a HUGE coincidence, I assure you.

Is all of this true? In my head it is, and it's quite entertaining, I'll have you know. And overwhelming. I'm obsessed with the Buckinghams at this point, and get a huge kick out of the stroller-pushing family that boards their car on the next stop. We're assuming the Buckinghams, based on their attire, are going to Victoria and Albert's, a place that we admittedly would love to try one day when we can ditch these bratty kids. But for now, we'll have to leave the fancy stuff to the Buckinghams and slum it in the GFC with the rest of the families for now.

We arrived at the Grand Floridian and got seated right away. On our way back to our table, I spotted my prey - the Grand Floridian Burger, an "Angus Chuck Burger, Lobster, Asparagus and Horseradish-Chive Hollandaise" as described by AllEars.net. It looked even better than the pictures I had seen online, and I had to have it.

We were seated and ordered, me the burger, Kristin the New York Strip. I ordered what would become my go-to beer on non-Epcot days, the Dogfish Head IPA, while Kristin got her eventual usual, the Berry Berry Punch. A small child a few tables away apparently does NOT like this restaurant one bit, or else something else is troubling him about his situation, because he's screaming. That's ok - as I'm sure most parents will agree, if it's not your own kid, it's easy to tune him out.

Our food comes, and the burger is good, but not fantastic. I enjoyed it, mind you, but would certainly not rave about it. I can't put my finger on what was wrong with it, but it just didn't do it for me like I would've expected. Those who know me can tell you that if I don't love something I eat, there must be something seriously wrong with it. It was a bit messy and difficult to manage, too. Kristin like her meal, but we both agree that we can skip this place on future trips. The decor is nice and the staff was very friendly (as always, in WDW), but we'll try other places before we come back.

To me, that says something about WDW right there. The restaurant was very nice and the food was good, but we won't come back. There's just too much quality elsewhere in WDW to pass up for something we rate as "just good".

Wow, that kid's still screaming. Poor parents.

Speaking of kids, our kids decided to be pains at this meal. Emily "needed" to go to the bathroom several times (we only took her once), which usually means she's bored. She somehow broke the thing that hangs from the bottom of your pin lanyard, and I have no clue how to fix it. Dylan isn't eating again, but we give them a pass since they were so amazingly good at Jiko the previous night. See, kids - be good in clutch situations, and you can suck in lesser situations. Anyway, we're done, so we can leave. Plus, Dylan was good enough for at least a moment so we could get this picture:

Handsome guys, I tell you, but HOLY CRAP, that kid at the other table is STILL screaming. He's been yelling for at least 45 minutes straight. The dad finally takes him out of the restaurant. I'm glad I wasn't at that table!

We leave the restaurant right after and notice our old friends, the Buckinghams, sitting in the lobby. Apparently they did NOT get seated right away. We decide to hit the gift shop prior to heading back to the Magic Kingdom, a place we would make our home for the next hour...

 

[nilla]

While leaving the GFC, we noticed that the skies were starting to get alarmingly dark. Kristin wanted to walk around the lobby a bit before we left. She thinks the GF is beautiful, which it is, but I would NEVER want to stay here. Sorry, but it's just waaay too stuffy for me. It's more suited for people like the you-know-whos, who ARE staying here, by the way, even if only in my mind. We walked up to the gift shop to try to exchange Emily's broken medallion, and the CMs, being the customer service gods they are, did it without hesitation. We looked outside, and it wasn't just raining now, it was pouring. Total downpour. Guess we're not going anywhere.

Dylan found some light-up ball in the store he wanted and we looked at some pins. Then the shirts. Then everything else. This place is starting to get congested, since obviously, no one is leaving in this weather.

The rain, rain, rain fell down, down, down, and now it's starting to get windy. Oh my gosh, the palm trees outside are almost at a right angle. This is some storm. I would show you how bad, but you see, we didn't want to take pictures on this day for some reason. So you just have to imagine it.

The torrential downpour continues outside, and I'm getting tired of being here. We step out of the gift shop (finally), and I immediately notice the Buckinghams seated in the exact place they've been for the last ninety minutes. What I would give to be a fly on the wall of that conversation - I'm sure it's all stocks, golf, chamber music, and fine wine, and it's apparently riveting enough to keep them entertained in that same seat for over an hour.

We're now wondering whether or not we should head back to Magic Kingdom at all, but eventually, the storm starts to die down. We head out to the monorail area, and while we're no longer seeing any rowboats or bicycling witches, the weather is still not that nice. My brilliant idea is to hop on the monorail and ride it until the lightning stops, and the rest of the family is on board. We climb on and do a full loop, and we're still seeing lightning. By the time we get back to the Grand Flo, either the lightning doesn't seem as bad as it did before, or we're just so sick of riding that we pledge to go back to the Magic Kingdom in spite of the rain.

 

[nilla]

We got to the Magic Kingdom, armed with ponchos (which I refuse to wear) and hoping everyone else went home. Heading down the ramp from the monorail I realized that Crocs completely SUCK on the wet surface. I love the things normally, and have racked up many a mile in WDW wearing them. They're my footwear of choice for our Disney vacations. However, right now, I'm terrified that I'm going to take a dive. It's that bad.

We back in the Magic Kingdom now, but not before first being cut off in line by some women who then couldn't figure out the Key to the Kingdom system. For gosh sake, if you're going to play line commando and jump in front of me, please don't be completely incompetent when you get to the front of the line. I even offered to help, but she tuned me out.

Back inside finally, and we're looking to run a gauntlet of favorites, starting with It's a Small World. The park is very, very uncrowded right now, and for good reason, as a steady (though bearable) rain is falling. We can't go through or around the castle due to the Spectromagic ropes, so we head up through Adventureland, and I make a note of the bridge leading in as another place that Crocs are just no good on when wet. We rode IASW, then finally hit Peter Pan, with Dylan and Emily being ride partners, and Kristin and I riding behind them. It's nice when we can ride together and fun to watch the two of them on their own.

After PP, we decided to head over to Space Mountain, but were blocked by the Spectromagic parade rope near Winnie the Pooh. Really? The parade's going to run in the rain? Probably not, though a CM tells us it could, so we can't go that way. We try to think of a good alternate route when the thunder starts booming again, so I suggest making a pit stop at the Haunted Mansion. Double purpose, since it's not only close, it's also really cool walking up to the place in the rain and lightning.

After HM, we learn the early parade is not going to happen and head over to Space Mountain by way of Adventureland. I pass a woman on the bridge who nearly slips walking across. "Crocs are horrible in this!" I tell her, and she wholeheartedly agrees. We finally make it over to SM, Fast Passes in hand. Dylan and Kristin ride first, while Emily and I wait in the gift shop. For how dead this park is, there's still a big line for this ride, even with FPs.

Dylan and I ride next, and I'm struggling to figure out what was actually changed in last year's refurb. Ok, so there's a video game the stand-byers can play in the queue now, but other than that, not much. Dylan and I reminisce about the first Year of a Million Dreams, when we got picked to go into the control room. VERY cool. We ride, and I really enjoyed it, maybe even more than before. One thing I noticed is that this is a LONG ride, as far as coasters are concerned, and you really have no way of knowing where you are in relation to the end while you're riding. Dylan is in love with it again.

We exit and meet the girls, who managed to see Wishes while we were inside. We learned that Spectromagic would, in fact, run at 11:00, rain or no rain. Since most of the crowds have gone home, we had no trouble finding a curbsite spot on Main Street. The parade starts - just what I'd want to do, ride in the rain in a float covered in light bulbs, while wearing a costume that's also covered in light bulbs. The things these people do for our entertainment...we sure do appreciate them all!

The rain started coming down pretty heavy, and the family next to us offered to let us use one of their umbrellas. Little did I know it was ripped, and I nearly took a spoke right in the eye (it poked me in the forehead, about an inch away from disaster). After a little while, they left, and the grandfather got up out of his wheelchair and walked away. Ok. I'm not asking. They let us keep the ripped umbrella, and even better, Dylan got to watch the rest of the parade sitting in a wheelchair, rather than on the wet curb.

The parade was definitely trimmed down to at most half the floats, but Cinderella did wave directly at Emily twice, which made her night. We got to see a lot of the characters for extented periods since they all stopped right in front of us. Soon after, we learned why - in the rain, the floats couldn't make it up the slight grade at the end of Main Street and needed to wait for a tow from a buggy. The effort was impressive.

Following the parade, we headed out, wet and tired, but satisfied from a unique day at the Magic Kingdom. I almost bit it again on the slippery concrete, but managed to make it back to CSR with my knees intact. It's back to Epcot tomorrow for World Showcase, so fortunately, we will get to sleep in.

Speaking of sleep, man, it's late! I'm off to bed and will try to pick up with Day 6 tomorrow. Good night!

 

[kristin t]

My drink of choice was 'Very Berry Punch' - not berry berry punch. I would highly recommend it!!

 

[nilla]

My drink of choice was 'Very Berry Punch' - not berry berry punch. I would highly recommend it!!

I realized that before I went to bed last night. Sorry, and thanks for the correction!

 

[MEK]

You taught me something I never knew - I had no idea that EE was pretty wicked from the back seat. I generally don't like the back seat because the back of any train throws you around more. Plus the front of the ride is soooooo cool (as Kristin's pictures show), but I may now have to rethink my opinion of the last row!

I also forgot to tell you that I think you kids are adorable!!!!!