Wednesday April 18th Part II - Polyday
By the time everyone was dressed and ready, it was time for our 8:30am Ohana breakfast. You didn’t think I would actually go a day without an ADR, did you?
We were seated pretty much right away after check-in. We had the most cheerful and energetic server for the whole trip helping us that morning and I’m kicking myself for not remembering her name. She poured us POG juice (I guess that’s for Passion, Orange, and Guava) which hit the spot but not as much as the coffee did! The food was generic with the usual scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, home frieds, and Mickey waffles. Although, when those same food items are given to you with island names, they taste slightly better.
The character interactions were by far the best we had. I think it was also because all of us were feeling more relaxed and playful. First Mickey came around in his Hawaiian shirt.
DS was very much at home with him, giving him hugs and standing next to him for a picture without needing an adult hand to hold him. Pluto was hilarious. After signing DS’s autograph book (you know how Pluto and Goofy have to sign those books, waaay above their snouts so they can see), he gave the pen back, but placed the autograph book on his snout, then lowered himself to DS so that DS could fetch it.
Stitch and Lilo both came by our table twice! When they both came by the second time, DS was sitting on Grandpa’s lap so they would give a bearhug to both of them, tickling DS. It was great.
DD loved all the attention as well. She asked Mickey where Minnie was and he replied by saying she went swimming! When Lilo came by the second time, I asked her if she was going to be surfing anytime this morning, and she nodded and posed for me!
While we were waiting for our check, DS, DD, and DW were playing around with their leis and they all decided to turn the leis into flower crowns and put them on their heads. Pluto happen to be walking by our table behind DW, saw what was going, and came over to pat DW on her "crown" with his paw. Then he tried to take his lei off (wasn't going to happen without ripping it to shreads
) so that he could do the same thing.
One thing I learned from all of this is character interactions are what you make of it. I think if you make it interesting for the characters, they will definitely respond in kind. I also decided that not having an autograph book for our next trip may be a good thing – trying to get the pages open and ready with the pen just distracts you from the experience.
Now it was time for everyone to get back to the room to get ready for some time at the pool. The kids had been looking forward to this all week, especially DD. And, I had reserved a cabana! On our way back to our room, I took a little detour to swing by the two cabanas and our attendant was already there getting the towels ready. We were going to be in Mauna Loa.
I caught up with the rest of the family and we were ready to go out to the pool.
We had brought a kickboard for DD, but one of the lifeguard immediately and politely informed us that it was a no-no. We didn’t bring any floating devices for DD so we got her one of the lifevests from the Marina. Paid off the bill while I was there as well. The whole experience was relaxing. The fact that I’m using the term “relaxing” so many times just goes to show how much we loved this downtime.
The adults took turns playing with the kids in the pool. DW taught DD how to swim like a frog. DS would slowly walk towards the deeper side of the pool but whenever the water started touching his neck he would say “too deep for me” and turn back around. It wasn’t all that crowded for the morning although they did start handing out wristbands around noon. The kids did not want to try the volcano slide. I asked the fruit plate to be ready around noon.
We also called private dining and ordered items from Kona’s menu to be delivered to our cabana. We had the Kahuna Burger, Kona Club sandwich, and fish tacos. They were all very good. We were so stuffed that everyone agreed our ADR for the evening at Whispering Canyon Café was probably not a good idea as we already had two decent sized meals for the day. So I just went online on my iPad and cancelled the ADR. Once we ate, everyone went back in the pool. Around 1pm, there was a game of “duck scramble” for the kids on the zero entry side of the pool where rubber duckies were thrown in and kids were asked to go get them. DD and DS participated in had a good time.
Next up: More fun on the sandy beach!
That's really cool how well the characters interacted with your family! I bet it makes it way more fun for the actors too, to have people "play."
