Mike & Missy's Grand Adventure! 9/5/09 DCL Western & WDW TR w/ pics! Updated 04/19

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When I last left off, we had just finished our class at Animation Academy! And it was time to go use our Rock N' Roller Coaster FP's, so that's where we headed! For some reason, our redneck ride photo is the only pic I have from this ride...

After RNR, we decided to head over to one of favorite rides in all of Disney...Tower of Terror!
On our way over, we stopped to have a couple PhotoPass pics made...

Even though the wait was only 20 minutes, we decided to go ahead and use the Fastpass that we'd been given that morning.

I LOVE this ride. Even though we've been on it several times before, we still get a little nervous! It's so much fun though. So of course, I had to take another RRP:

I was holding on to Mike for dear life while laughing my head off:

We love the ride so much that once wasn't enough. So, since the stand-by line was still only 20 minutes, we decided to go for it again. And here is our last RRP of the day:

At this point, we'd pretty much ridden what we wanted, and seen what we wanted, with one exception. I thought it would be cool to check out the new American Idol attraction. I'm not a huge fan of the show, but I do like to watch the auditions at the beginning of each season as they are usually pretty hilarious! The next show was starting at 4, and we still had a few minutes to kill, so we decided to check out a few shops. While we didn't find anything, we did manage to kill just enough time, so we headed on over to the AI theater.

As we were waiting, they had "camera crews" out in the audience taping clips for the show we were about to see. They went to several crowds and asked them to scream and yell for a certain contestant. It made the wait go by faster and was fun to watch. After just a few minutes, we made our way inside. I didn't take any picture of the contestants--I thought it was weird to take pics of someone I really didn't know, so I just snapped a couple shots of the stage...

It turned out to be a really good show, and I was glad that we took the time to see it. The girl who got picked from our round was absolutely AMAZING. I can't remember where she was from, but she blew the other contestants out of the water. She was so good that she got a standing ovation after her performance.

After AI, we decided to head back over to Pixar Place to see what the wait was like for the Toy Story characters. I'd been wanting to see them, but the wait was insane when we were ridining Toy Story Mania.

On the way over, we noticed that Mike and Sully from Monsters, Inc. were out, and the line was pretty short. So, we paid them a quick visit:

They are too stinkin' cute.

We then made our way to our final destination over to Al's Toy Barn. Thankfully, the wait wasn't nearly as bad as it had been, so we jumped in line. I usually don't feel weird about waiting to see characters, but it seemed like we were the only adults without kids. I think sometimes people with kids look at us like we are weird or something because we're two adults standing in line with a bunch of kids to see characters. Either way, I tried not to let it bother me too much!! It seemed like it took forever, but we finally made our way up to Buzz and Woody:

By this time, we were pretty tired, so we decided to call it a day and head back to the resort.

 

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As we were leaving the park, we decided to take a nice relaxing ride on the water taxi to get back to the resort. We didn't have any ADR's booked for the rest of the day, so we were able to take as much time as we needed. We made our way to the boat dock, and within a matter of just a few minutes we were on our way back to BWV. It was such a peaceful ride, so I thought I would take some pics along the way. Our first stop was the Swan & Dolphin:

Next came the Beach & Yacht Club:

Then came our beautiful resort:

Since we still had plenty of time, we decided to hit the pool for a little while in hopes of actually getting to make it down the slide. So we headed for the room and suited up. And wouldn't you know that as soon as we got in the water and were making our way to the slide that one of the lifeguards made an announcement that there was a storm in the area, and that the pool was closing! Yes, the curse of the Luna Park pool had hit yet again! I was beginning to think that it just wasn't meant to be for us to actually enjoy the pool and slide on this trip. Disappointed, we made our way back to the room where I sulked for a little while.

We watched a little TV and I surfed the net before I headed out to the balcony for a bit. Since we were so close to the pool, I was able to hear the water runnuing down the slide. So I took a closer look, and low and behold the pool had reopened!!!! So what did we do--We took off fast as lightning and headed for the pool, again!! Thankfully, this time we were able to enjoy the slide until the pool closed. I know those lifeguards thought we were out of our minds-we went down the slide so many times that I lost count!! The elusive slide was elusive no more!!!

After our sliding adventures were over, we had worked up quite the appetite, so we had to figure out what to do for dinner! As we were leaving the pool, we saw a lady with a pizza box, and it hit us-we were going to have pizza for dinner!!

So we headed over to the Boardwalk and hit up the pizza window.

Unfortunately, the pizza isn't on the dining plan, but that was okay as we knew that we'd have to pay for a couple meals OOP. We decided to go with mushrooms and cheese only on ours. While we waited for our dinner to bake, we found a table right by the water. And not a minute too soon our buzzer went off letting us know that the pizza was ready!!

As we sat there and enjoyed our yummy dinner, we just took in our surroundings and relaxed. It was such a beautiful night, and lots of people were out on the Boardwalk. I took lots of pics as we sat, though most of them didn't turn out so well...I still have to work on getting good night-time pics...

With our relaxing dinner over, we decided to take a stroll around the resort before we headed back to the room for the evening. We were so fortunate to be able to stay in such a beautiful resort, so we wanted to take in every little bit that we could. Of course, I took a few pics along the way...

Finally, we had made it back to our room. It had been a wonderful day with a near perfect ending, and it was time to call it a night. The next day was our last full day in the parks, and we were heading to the Magic Kingdom. Since we wanted to make it to park opening, we hit the hay, with a little sadness that our trip was slowly coming to a close.

 

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Saving the best for last...A Day in the Magic Kingdom, and dinner with friends!​

We were up bright an early this morning, ready for a day in the Magic Kingdom. Our plan was to make it for park opening, which we had never done before.

After a quick breakfast in the room, we were at the bus stop at 8:00 sharp! We wanted to give ourselves plenty of time as this was the park opening that we had looked forward to the most!

And just 20 short minutes later, we were at the entrance to the Magic Kingdom! We found a spot right in the middle of the train station and waited there. One of the first things I spotted was this precious sight:

It was so cool to see him. And he really looked like he was ready for the park to open as well!

The park was already decorated for Halloween, just as it was the last time we were there in 2007, so of course I snapped a few pics of all the pretty-ness...

Since the PhotoPass guys were out, we decided to get a couple shots here since we'd never had the chance before:

And before we knew it, the Mayor appeared to start the opening ceremony!!

Next came the train carrying all the characters who would help open the park!

Within a few magical moments, the park had been opened and we made our way under the train station and down Main Street!!

Since Magic Kingdom is our favorite park, I can never get enough PhotoPass pics, so we stopped for a few shots...

This one turned out to be one of my favorites from the day:

After our pics, our first stop was Fantasyland. Our first ride of the day was It's A Small World, followed by Peter Pan's Flight, then Snow White. Once we had those done and out of the way, we decided to head over and visit my favorite princess, Ariel! We knew that her line could get backed up pretty quickly, so we got there just a few minutes before it opened, and they were already letting people in line.

Thankfully, since we were there early, we pretty much breezed right through the line and before I knew it, I was saying hello to my favorite princess of all!!

She was so much fun, and was really in character! When she noticed my hair, she asked if I was a mermaid too, so I played along and told her yes. Then she told me that I could be one of her sisters. She was too cute!

 

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I had said goodbye to my new sister and were headed out of the grotto, when a CM spotted Mike’s shirt. She told us that Donald was making an appearance over in Frontierland if we wanted to try and catch him. So I bet you can guess where we headed next! We got there at just the right time, as the line was pretty short. I decided to sit this greeting out, since I’d just had Ariel all to myself, I figured I would leave Donald all for Mike. Thankfully, Mike made a good decision with his shirt choice, according to Donald, and he was in a much better mood than when we’d seen him in the AK just a few days earlier!

With two back-to-back character greetings down, we decided to hit up some rides. Since we were so close, we decided to hit up the Haunted Mansion first. It was closed for rehab on our trip in ’07, so we were excited to see the changes. The wait time was only 10 minutes, so we were in and out in just a matter of minutes. After we’d picked up our hitchhiking ghost, we decided to head over to Splash for some mountain fun!! Once again, the wait was very minimal and we were loaded in our boat in no time!!

I usually pack my camera away in fear of getting it wet and ruining it, but this time I decided to be daring and take a couple pics along the way.

Thankfully my camera survived, and I was able to document our ride!!

Since we’d successfully conquered one mountain-- that left only one more for us to tame (Space Mountain was closed for refurb at the time). So guess where we headed next?? I guess we were hitting things just right, as the wait time was once again almost nothing! We boarded the train and were lucky enough to be in the front!! I tried to take some pictures along the way, but the jerkiness of the ride made it a little hard, so this was all I got…

Right after I took this one, the train took a sudden turn and I nearly smacked Mike right in the face with the camera! I guess next time I’ll keep my camera in my bag where it belongs!

After our adventure through the mountains, we decided to head over to Pirates of the Caribbean for a quick ride. Can you guess how long the wait was? Since we’d managed to safely escape the Pirates, we decided to do something we’d never done in the MK before—so we headed over to the Jungle Cruise.

I think by this time, the park was starting to get a little more crowded as the wait times were going up just a tad bit. Either way, we couldn’t complain as we were cruisin’ through the jungle in no time!

It was a cute little ride, but not something I would stand in line for more than 15 or 20 minutes for.

By this time, we’d already been in the park for a little while and we were starting to get hungry. Our plan was to try and eat a little earlier to try and beat the lunch rush. We had already narrowed down our choices to Cosmic Ray’s, Pinocchio’s and a couple other places. And since we were a little closer to Pinocchio’s than everything else, that’s what we decided on. Our decision to eat a little early seemed to have been a good one as there were a ton of tables open. There were several things on the menu that looked good, but both of us decided to go with the chicken nuggets and fries, which were really good!

I wish I’d taken more pics of the restaurant, but this one was the only one I got:

For dessert, I had the usual chocolate cake, and Mike had the strawberry cheesecake, both of which were good.

We really enjoyed our lunch here, and decided that we’d definitely come back on future visits!

 

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As we were leaving Pinocchio’s, we realized that the Move It, Shake It, Celebrate It parade was going on, so we walked to the front of the castle to check it out. There were a ton of characters all around on some very colorful floats. The atmosphere was really fun and upbeat! And of course I took a ton of photos since this was our 1st time seeing it…

All of the performers and the characters were really into it, and that made it a lot of fun to watch! I’m glad that we didn’t miss it!

With the parade over, we decided to head for some more exploring and check out another place that we’d never been before-The Swiss Family Treehouse. Mike had always wanted to see what it was all about, but we’d just never taken the time before. As we made our way from the castle over to the treehouse, I snapped this side shot of the castle, which I thought turned out really nice:

We were then making our way around the Swiss Family Treehouse and seeing what everything was about.

It was a neat little place to explore, but probably not something I’d want to do over and over again. There were some pretty views from the bridges and walkways though!

 

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Sooooo, when I last left off we'd just finished exploring the Swiss Family Treehouse.

We then decided that it was time to head over to Tomorrowland to spend some time on some of our favorite attractions over there.

On the way over, we noticed a Photopass photographer right outside the Tomorrowland sign at the Mickey and Minnie topiaries, so guess what we did. The photographer had an "Earning My Ears" ribbon on her name tag, but she was one of the best that we encountered during our whole trip. She ended up taking a ton of pics, but I won't bore you with all of them...

It turns out that the "Dream Along with Mickey" show over at the castle was going on at the same time, so we had perfect timing with the fireworks, which I thought was really cool...

After moving along from our "photo shoot", we decided to check out the Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor for the first time. This turned out to be a really funny show. For anyone who hasn't been before, as everyone is waiting for the show to start, the camera person will find random people in the audience and put their picture on the screen at the front for everyone to see, along with a funny comment. One lady was caught looking around and the caption said, "I have no idea where I am." We were sitting there laughing at all the silly things they were coming up with, when suddenly Mike came up on the screen with the caption, "this guy feels like randomly dancing." Normally, Mike and I are very shy people, but for some reason, he seems to really open up at Disney. So he gets up and starts busting a move and I'm sitting there just dying laughing. I would have given anything to have captured that on video. The when he sits down the camera is still on him, and he starts pointing to me, so then I have to get up, and I am SO embarrassed at this point, but I start doing one of the moves from Saturday Night Fever. It was totally hilarious, and definitely a moment that we won't ever forget!! Now Mike calls my dance "the Disney dance"!

With the show being over and a sore tummy from so many laughs, we decide to try out another first...the Astro Orbiter. I'd always wanted to ride just to see what the views were like from up there. I have to admit that the line for this ride is really odd. I hate how you have to stand there at the bottom, then everyone in your group has to cram into the elevator only to get to the top and have to wait again. The views were pretty cool though...

Mike almost looks scared in this one:

I have to say that I was a little disappointed in this ride. I just thought that it was kinda lame, and definitely not worth the wait...just my opinion though--I'm sure there are lots of others who love it.

After our ride in space, we decided to take a nice relaxing ride on the TTA. This is definitely one of my favorite things in the MK!

We were able to see some of the work going on as part of the Space Mountain rehab:

Our nice relaxing and refreshing ride was over way too soon, and as we exited we decided that it was time for a little competition on Buzz Lightyear.

I didn't even think to take a pic of the score, but I'm certain that I get my butt kicked, just as I always do. And of course the ride wouldn't be complete without a RRP:

Now that I'd officially been beaten, we both decided that it was time for some yummy tropical goodness that's a must on every trip...So we headed straight for Aloha Isle, where we picked up one of these lovely concoctions to share...

We found a seat on the bench across the way and savored every bite of that yummy goodness!!

 

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Once we'd litterally sucked every last bit of our float down, we decided to take a little trip down Main Street and check out some of the shops there. I honestly don't remember which ones we went into, but we did stop along the way to take a pic here and there:

Mike would probably kill me if he knew I posted this one, but since he doesn't DIS, then I'm going to do it anyway:

Since we were finally finished loafering around at the front of the park, we decided to catch the train over to Toontown since we still had some time to kill before our 6:00 ADR at Crystal Palace.

We really weren't sure exactly what we wanted to do in Toontown, but I remembered that the Fairies were now out, so I wanted to try and see them. When we got inside, you could definitely tell the difference in the wait times between the Fairies and the Princesses. In the past, the line for the Princesses was always backed up, but not this time--and not compared to the line for the Fairies at least. The wait time for the Fairies was posted as 30 minutes, and we had about an hour to kill, so we decided to go for them. Well, what was supposed to be a 30 minute wait turned into what seemed like forever. I think the way that they only take a few people at a time through is what slows up the process. Either way, we ended up waiting nearly a whole hour for them. Thankfully, we made it through just in time to see all of them before we had to head back across the park for our ADR. Mike decided that he didn't want his picture with any of them, so he stood back and watched as I visited with each of them. And you'll have to forgive me, because I can't remember any of their names, except Tinker Bell of course.

Tink was really cute--she was asking me about my shirt, which as you can tell is Pooh. She said, "Now you have a bear on your shirt"!. She was the most fun of all!

Finally done with the Fairies, we hoofed it back down Main Street towards CP. Turns out, we were right on time for our ADR!

I was really excited about this meal since Pooh is my fave. We'd eaten here for breakfast a couple of times, but this was our first for dinner. I'd heard good things about the food, so we were anxious to try it for ourselves! We did end up waiting just a few minutes before we were finally seated, but it really wasn't long at all. And before I knew it, my friends were already making their rounds:

Unfortunately, I didn't get a pic with Tigger this time. He posed with Mike, then totally ignored me and went to the next table! Kinda weird, but oh well. Sweet Piglet made up for it though!

The came the best for last!!

I hate to sound negative, but I have to be honest here...I was really disppointed in the food. I barely ate anything. Yes, I am a pretty picky eater, but I can usually find something on a buffet that I like--but not this time. And to make it even worse, Mike didn't care for it either, and he eats mostly anything. We decided that we definitely wouldn't go back for dinner. I'm glad we tried it though, and the experience with the characters is the main reason we go anyway!

 

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With our tummies barely full, we headed out and decided to scope out a spot for Wishes. The last time we'd seen it, we watched from a sidewalk on Main Street, but this time we found a spot right in front of the castle, just a little ways back. I guess it's what they call the hub?? As we were waiting, I noticed all the Halloween themed statues that they had positioned all around the circle, so while Mike kept our spot I got up and took a few pics...

Before long, it had started to get dark, and the castle began to light up. Sitting there, relaxing while watching the colors change was one of my favorite parts of the day...

And I bet you can guess what happened next...the show began!! I was so happy to finally be seeing Wishes again!!

Oh, I can just hear the music playing now..."and all our Wishes"...

And this was the one that turned out the best:

We then slowly made our way out of the park. It was a bit of a bittersweet feeling--we'd just seen such an amazing show, but yet it was our last night in Disney...I snapped a few pics as we walked out...I love seeing the park all lit up at night:

So this is where I started to cry:

 

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With heavy hearts, we slowly made our way to the bus stop to catch our last ride home...

It was an uneventful ride back, and even though the bus was full, it was mostly quiet. I guess everyone else was sharing in our sadness, too!

Within a few minutes we were back at the BoardWalk. While Mike went to check on our account, I took a few last shots of the beautiful lobby that I failed to get earlier in the week.

Once everything was in order, we made our way back to the room to finish our packing. It was nearly midnight by the time that we were finished. So, we finally hit the hay for our one last sleep in Disney. We'd be rising early in the morning to check out and pack the car before we headed over to Chef Mickey's for our last meal in Disney.

 

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Breakfast with the Gang, and heading home!​

Even though breakfast wasn't until 10:10, we were still up pretty early this morning. We had to pack up all the things that we'd used to get ready, then head downstairs to check-out before finally packing everything back into the car. Since we were heading home after breakfast, it only made sense for us to take our own car over to the Contemporary.

By the time we made it to check in, we were still a few minutes early.

So of course, we were given a pager and told that it would be a few minutes before a table would be ready. I've noticed that no matter how early or late you are to Chef Mickey's, you still end up waiting. But that's okay, since it was our last morning in Disney, I wanted to take as much time as we possbily could. I enjoyed watching the monorail come and go as we waited.

But it also made me think of the sad accident that had happened not long before our trip. I was also bothered by all the birds that were just flying around inside the resort. I know Disney can't do anything about it with the way the monorail comes through, but I've always been afraid of birds, so having them swooping all around made me a little nervous.

Within about 10 minutes or so, we were finally taken to a table which was in the far corner with a cool view. We could see Bay Lake along with the resort pool. As we waited for our server to take our drink orders, I snapped a few shots of what we could see.

Before we knew it, we'd loaded our plates, and the characters were all making their rounds. One thing that I like about Chef Mickey's is that there is usually someone who will take a pic of Mike and I together with the characters. First came the chef himself:

Next was one of Mike's favorites:

Then came the Goofster:

And somewhere in between all these, we managed to re-load our plates:

I only took a pic of one plate since we mostly ate the same thing. And I have to admit that I was pretty impressed with the food here. We'd eaten here a few times before, but only for dinner, so this was our first time trying it for breakfast. My favorite was the cheesy hashbrown stuff!
After we'd refilled, Minnie came by, followed by Pluto:

We were finally stuffed, so we settled our bill and headed out. I was really glad that we decided to switch up on this trip and try breakfast. I've always enjoyed the character interaction, and the dinner food was always good, but we really liked the breakfast as well!!

Since we were so close, we decided to walk over to Bay Lake Towers and take a look around. I hope we didn't break any rules by doing this, but as we were walking around taking pics, we kept crossing paths with this same couple, and they kept looking at us like we weren't suppose to be there. I tried to ignore it...it wasn't like we were trying to get to the pool or the Top of the World lounge...we were just checking things out for heaven's sake!

You gotta love these views:

The pool looked really cool...

After taking in all the beautiful surroundings of the resort, we figured it was time to head on out. We made our way back across the bridge to the Contemporary and back down to the lot to the car. We decided that there were still a few things that we wanted to get in Downtown Disney for everybody back home, so we headed there for a bit. I think we spent a couple hours in the World of Disney, which is easy to do, before we finally wrapped up our shopping. We had one last stop to make-at the Ron Jon store to pick up a shirt for my nephew before we were finally on the road home.

It may have taken forever, but I can't believe I'm finally finished with my report. Thanks to everyone who has stuck around. I hope that this was at least somewhat enjoyable! Since starting this report, we actually made a trip back down at the beginning of March for the Princess 1/2 Marathon, which I plan to write a short TR on as well--so keep a watch out for that, as I plan to try and start it soon. Again, thanks to everyone who read and posted, all your comments were great...and it was a lot of fun re-living all our wonderful memories with all of you!