Life Stinks! Season Three! Finalized 11/11

[CRUIZEN MAMMA]

Mozart, is the T- rex resturaunt now open? what # would I call for ADR's here, I'd like to take my 9 yr old son here in Dec. do you know if the decorate Downtown Disney for Christmas? I'd like to hit the pin store for some stocking stuffers?

 

[disneyfaninaz]

Mozart, is the T- rex resturaunt now open? what # would I call for ADR's here, I'd like to take my 9 yr old son here in Dec. do you know if the decorate Downtown Disney for Christmas? I'd like to hit the pin store for some stocking stuffers?

I'm not Mozart but I can answer your question.

T-Rex is open, you need to call 407-828-8739 for ADRs.

DTD is decorated for the holidays.

 

[CRUIZEN MAMMA]

I'm not Mozart but I can answer your question.

T-Rex is open, you need to call 407-828-8739 for ADRs.

DTD is decorated for the holidays.

thank you so much for the info, for others who want to know- T-rex is not taking ADR till after Jan 1 ,2009 but has walk up service.

 

[Mozart]

thank you so much for the info, for others who want to know- T-rex is not taking ADR till after Jan 1 ,2009 but has walk up service.

When we went, the walk-in line was very long. We had actually already eaten dinner that night, but we went there to check out their souvenir shop. The line of people waiting to eat stretched a good way out the door. I'd say you were probably talking about at least an hour wait to eat.

 

[Mozart]

I don’t like being late. So, when I committed to being at EPCOT for rope drop in the morning, I meant it. 9 AM rope drop, and there we were, standing in the line at EPCOT at 8:30. The line to get in had nobody in it!

And the amazing thing is this: despite being there 30 minutes early, despite virtually no line to get into the park, despite walking directly to Soarin’ the second the park opened, we still had a 30 minute wait to ride it. When we got off the ride the wait time was up to 95 minutes. This was at 9:40 in the morning. Fortunately we had picked up a FastPass for later before we originally got on so we did get to ride it twice, but that’s another story you’ll see below. First, we went and talked a little Turtle, and visited the coolest purple dragon in the world.

Speaking of a little purple dragon, anyone who knows me and my Disney fascinatin in real life knows how much I love Figment. I just wanted to state for the record on this thread that I sincerely hope they will do something to improve that ride. And sooner rather than later. Figment deserves better.

Okay, so it’s time for us to use our Fastpass and we head back to Soarin. The woman checking the time on the fastpasses takes my ticket and hands me one of those red tags they use to see how long the waits are right now. We get to the part of the line where the guy is taking the fastpasses and he asks me for mine. I reply “The woman at front kept mine.” This did not go over well. After having a brief conversation about how she would not have done that, to which I replied, Well she did, the guy goes to call her and see if she has one. Remember one thing, I am righthanded. When the guy asked me for my fastpass I reached into my right hand pocket to doublecheck that I didn’t have it. But, when the woman handed me the red tag I had apparently gotten confused and put the fastpass into my left pocket which I never use. So, after arguing with this guy for 5 minutes about whether or not I had a fastpass, and backing up the fastpass entrance line, I reach my hand into my left pocket and realized that my Fastpass had been there all along. I then sheepishly pull the fastpass out of my pocket and hand it to the guy.

Yeah, I’m a dope.

After Soarin, it was now 11:00 and Food and Wine were waiting. Just one thing to do on the way. I talked my wife into stopping by Club Cool. We had never stopped here before. I recommended the Beverly to my wife. Unfortunately I couldn’t time it so that I get my camera up to take the picture when she took the drink. However, she did give the expected reaction. No, she did not hit me.

Then it was time to move on to the World Showcase and the Food and Wine Festival. One thing I don’t understand. All these people in EPCOT during the Food and Wine Festival and there are no people in line for the food booths. You always hear about how crowded EPCOT will be because of Food and Wine, but nobody’s in line. They’re all eating at the same old fast food restaurants that are there all year. You have your choice between Fish and Chips and Maple Glazed Salmon. And yet everyone was choosing the fish and chips. I just don’t get it.

During the course of the day we did do two attractions in the International Pavilion. We rode the Maelstrom and the Gran Fiesta Tour. The Gran Fiesta Tour needs an update, even though it just got one. There’s only room for one “It’s a Small World” at WDW. But, the Maelstrom is just strange. I really don’t get it. After suffering through this nonsensical ride that, the best I can figure out, is populated by short little men in dire need of plastic surgery, you have to wait for the movie to get out while you’re in some quaint fishing village herded onto a ledge with everyone else coming off of the ride. It’s just strange and inconvenient. Don’t worry, we knew enough to skip the movie.

COMING UP…SO WHAT IS THE FUSS ALL ABOUT ANYWAY?

 

[podsnel]

I'm right there with ya on Figment and the world of Imagination- I love that pavillion, but I think that ride needs some work. And don't worry about the fp mix-up and holding up the line- we forgive you.

Of course, we weren't in line behind you.

 

[Mozart]

Brief recap: We’re at the Food and Wine Festival in EPCOT. It’s just after 11 AM on Friday, November 7th. While waiting for my brother (locals apparently can’t get up early for this type of stuff) we start hitting the food booths.

We started the food going to the left, but only got to hit the first couple of booths before my brother called to say they were waiting in Canada.

But the first one we hit featured a shrimp with cilantro salsa. And we reach our first dogbiscuit of the trip. Incredible! There was a good mix of spices, but it wasn’t too hot. The shrimp were good sized, but not too large. Just an overall excellent dish. And this comes from a guy who’s not really all that into shrimp. I don’t like shrimp cocktail at all. But this stuff was wonderful.

We turned around after that one and started heading to the right. About the third booth you come across when doing that is Canada. In Canada they serve a cheddar cheese soup that has quite the reputation. I’ve heard about it here on the DIS boards for quite some time now. My brother and his partner informed me that it has become a tradition that they start every Food and Wine Festival day with a bowl of soup from Canada. We expected nothing less than perfection. It also felt like it was 95 degrees outside so the thought of eating a bowl of hot steaming soup really didn’t appeal to me at that time. But I did so anyway. I now know what all the fuss is about. The fuss is good. A dogbiscuit for the cheddar cheese soup.

The final of the three dishes earning biscuits was the Seared Beef Medallions with Polenta. I believe it was San Francisco that this was from. The steak was juicy and tender but the polenta….oh my gosh the polenta! It was the perfect amount of creamy to make it just melt as it went down your throat. Unbelievable.

Now for the frowny face:
Seared Tuna Loin with Roasted Red Peppers. I almost threw up on this one. I hated it so much that I deleted the picture off of my camera so I could forget about it. The first bite was okay, but that’s because I got the cooked part. On the second bite, I got the raw fish. I don’t do well with raw fish. Yeah, yeah, I know. Why did I order it? Cuz I’m stupid. Happy now?

Our final feature attraction was taking our first trip on Spaceship Earth since the renovation. Getting my wife on this ride is always a pain. She gets Spaceship Earth and Mission Space confused. If I say “the ride in the big silver ball” she knows which one I’m talking about, but if I just say Spaceship Earth her motion sickness begins to kick in right then as she thinks I’m talking about Mission
Space. So, after I coax her onto the ride, we spend the 10 minutes or so treking all through it and we get to the end. Now, for those of you who have not ridden the ride, I’m going to give out a spoiler right now. Skip to the next paragraph if you don’t want to read it…….At the end, when it shows the happy couple living together in the kind of world we’d like to see, the picture that it took of my wife looked drugged and she had her eyes closed. It was priceless. She didn’t seem to appreciate it as much as I did.

Oh, I almost forgot. We did the Samantha Brown thing. My wife went for the Grand Marnier Orange Slush and I went for the Grey Goose Lemonade Citron Slush from France. These are in a booth that is there the whole year round but is $9/drink for a drink that’s not very big. Hallelujah they were good, though! The lemonade tasted like just that…lemonade. There wasn’t the slightest tinge of alcohol taste to it.

On second thought, maybe we got robbed….

THOUGHT FOR THE DAY: One day, I will go to EPCOT and not do anything except ride Soarin' all day long.

TIP FOR THE DAY: No matter what, if you're at the Food and Wine Festival, get the cheddar cheese soup. If you're not going to the Food and Wine Festival, change your plans so that you can go and get the cheddar cheese soup.

 

[anc22]

Sounds yummy. I would love to go some day.

 

[anewmac]

hey you went to the food and wine on my bday! Sounds like ya done me proud too!

It all looks yummy! Wish would have done it

 

[dvc4life]

Food and Wine Fest is the BEST!!!!! We had the shrimp you had pictured and we had the soup. Both were excellent!!! But my girls kept laughing at me because I kept saying lets go have Wisconsin Cheese Soup instead of the Canadian Cheese Soup. Duh. But we are closer to Wisconsin then Canada being from Iowa and all. Oh, well, we get a laugh out of it! Guess I had too much wine!!!!

 

[Mozart]

Saturday, November 8th: Embarkation Day

ZIP-A-DEE-DO-DAH! ZIP-A-DEE-A! DISNEY CRUISE LINE, I AM ON MY WAY! CARIBBEAN ISLANDS FOR THE NEXT FEW DAYS! ZIP-A-DEE-DO-DAH! ZIP-A-DEE-A!

Yes, after 13 months of waiting, watching boards, planning, crying over how long it’s taking and virtually pulling my hair out to get everything just right, I found myself driving along that toll road headed directly for the Disney Magic. As excited as I was, what was my gentle spouse doing? Sleeping. Yes that’s right, we’re less than an hour from the culmination of over a year’s worth of excitement and while I’ve been up ready to go since 6 AM, my wife is happily snoozing away as we drive over the bridge and get our first view of Mickey’s boat. How sad.

We arrived at the port around 10:30 and are promptly directed to the porters. We learned something very important on our last cruise. TIP FOR ARRIVAL AT THE PORT: Have a plan for how to tip the porters. On our last cruise one of the porters conned us and we didn’t figure it out until after we were onboard the ship. Basically, I tipped the guy for taking our luggage. When I was on the other side of the car and out of earshot, he asked my wife for a tip by implying that we were going to stiff him. So my wife tipped him as well, thinking that I must have forgotten. When I found out not only was I upset that he had even asked for a tip in the first place (I’m of the opinion it should be an option and not an automatic thing) but the fact that he had basically conned us really ticked me off. Unfortunately we didn’t find out until we had already boarded. So this time I handled the money, and my wife said that if someone asked her for a tip, she was simply going to refer them to me. Make sure you know who’s going to tip beforehand. That’s all I’m saying.

It’s time to head upstairs and we get a #6 boarding pass. I was unhappy. #6? We had always done better than that on the shorter cruises. I noticed that the lines did seem longer for this cruise. There was actually a wait at the Castaway Club check-in line. There was however, no wait for the first time guests. So we played dumb and went through that line. 5 minutes saved. Mission accomplished.

Then….IT happened. It was like I was living in a slow motion world and as it came out of the lady’s mouth it seemed to linger forever. “There has been a slight change in itinerary due to Hurrican Paloma. Instead of St. Maarten and St. Thomas you’ll be going to Costa Maya and Cozumel.”

NNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

13 MONTHS! 13 MONTHS OF DETAILED, DOWN TO THE SECOND PLANNING! 13 MONTHS OF SALIVATING OVER WATCHING THE PLANES AT THE LANDING STRIP IN ST. MAARTEN! Goodbye to the wonderful shopping I’d heard about in St. Thomas. Goodbye to the little bistro waiting for us by the street in Marigot.

GOODBYE TO THE 12 METRE REGATTA EXCURSION!

Have you ever seen a grown man cry? In a cruise terminal? On Mickey Mouse’s shoulder?

Okay, I didn’t do that but came pretty darn close. Thank goodness I had my passporter with me. I spent the next hour in the cruise terminal reading up on excursions in Cozumel. The book had nothing on Costa Maya.

I needed something to remind me that this wasn't the end of the world. This was a Disney cruise after all.

COMING SOON: RUN, KIDS, RUN!

 

[Tink rules]

But no matter where you go... the beer and Palo are still there...

 

[anewmac]

awww man you poor thing. I could only imagine how you felt. I would have done the same probably. To bad you didnt have any of us Double Dippers numbers we all could have named a few excursions from Costa Maya since our cruise was SUPPOSED to go there and it got canked 75days out.

 

[MaryAz]

I was thinking about you when we heard about the changes. All that planning......Glad you brought the Passporter!

 

[Mozart]

While we were waiting in the terminal, we got our first glimpse of it. The crazed father who decides to drive his his family to the edge of vacation insanity. As we were sitting over by the bathrooms in the terminal, we hear someone yelling “C’MON C’MON RUN RUN RUN! GET OVER HERE! NOW!” We look to our left and there is a father urging his family to hurry to him. You see, Mickey Mouse has entered the terminal for pictures and his 10 year old children have to be the first in line.

I never noticed that the floor of the terminal is one big map.

From a distance, watching the chaos that would next unfold must have been something like the New Jersey Wal-Mart incident over Thanksgiving weekend. People were pushing, fighting for spots, stepping in front of other people and just generally ill-behaved. Nice start to the cruise people. If this is the way you are for a picture that can be repeated many times over the course of the next week, I can’t imagine how you’ll fight over the hammocks at Castaway Cay.

So, that's where the stabilizer is!

In my mind at this time, there was an ethical decision being made. On our last cruise, we had ended up with an extra boarding pass. As we entered the terminal this time, we had been given a #6 boarding pass. I knew fully well that in my backpack lied a #2 boarding pass left over from our last cruise. What to do, what to do. On the one hand, we did have the extra boarding pass that we didn’t use last time and it was only fair that we got to use it after all. On the other hand, we were a lot later than normal getting here, and we basically would be cutting in line. In the end, honesty won out. I was very disappointed in myself for that. Like I said previously, cheating is the best way to take advantage of other people.

Finally, after waiting for the #6 group to be called, we then skipped ahead of everyone else and someone accused us of cheating. We decided that we didn’t want to bother having our picture taken as we boarded and walked right through the line. Some guy looked at us as we did and said “Hey! No cutting!” I turned around to say something really sarcastic but thought better of it. No point in making enemies on this trip before we even get on board. Besides, knowing my luck he would turn out to be a tablemate of ours.

This is the part where we cry!

And finally we get to a point that I’ve seen repeatedly come up. The gangway. The walk across it. The approaching of the ship for the first time. The crying that so many people seem to do at this point in time. I could understand it. It just felt like a great weight had been lifted off my shoulder. I had spent so much time planning, reviewing, researching that as I boarded I understood for the first time why one would start to cry.

Did I cry? No. I’ve said it before. I am a man’s man. There’s no crying on cruises. (At least, not yet.)

UP NEXT: YOU SEEM NICE, BUT YOU’RE JUST NOT GOOD ENOUGH FOR US.

 

[Zoom]

Hey Mozart, I saw you guys at the terminal, i should have said Hi and taken you guys with us since we got boarding pass #2 . Like you, we were also a bit disappointed about the changed of itinerary but what can we do right?! We've been to Cancun ( which is pretty much the same as Cozumel and Costa Maya), plus 2 Mexican Riviera cruises ( DCL and Carnival) so right now we're Mexico'd out....Dh said whatever vacation i'm planning for next year make sure it's not Mexico . I also have my passporter with me but you're right it didn't have much about Costa Maya.

I've actually seen you quite a few times, we were also on the same dining rotation, you guys were in a table of 8 or 10 right? We're lucky to have a 4 top table for the 3 of us, we're not anti-social, its just that sometimes its nice to have your own table.

 

[anewmac]

Love the pushing in line for a pic with a mouse.. he's gonna be on ship all week people. And glad you took #6.. Karma would have have come back to ya somehow!

 

[lovesDCL]

Mozart...I hope everything is ok...It's been a while since you posted...Hope you enjoyed the holidays and are just getting back on track!

Hope to read more of your TR soon

 

[chepic]

Mozart, looks like you ate well on my birthday!!! The shrimp look good.

Can't wait to see more of your installments.

che

 

[cheeringmom]