H Traveler
Earning My Ears
- Joined
- Jun 9, 2006
- Messages
- 10
I have learned so much from everyone else's trip reports, thank you! I hope our trip report will help someone else too. Enjoy.
Background information: We have been married 7 years. We don't have any children yet, so this trip to WDW was to scope out the territory and have fun as a couple. My husband, Sam, has never been to WDW. My last time to WDW was 10 years ago with my family. We are both in our early 30's. I made advanced dining reservations for all of our lunch and dinner meals and coordinated those with extra magic hours, etc. We had a rough schedule for everyday, just to make sure we didn't miss anything. (Schedule like Morning: MK, Lunch: Crystal Palace, Afternoon: MK, Dinner: Boma, Evening: Hotel). For breakfast each morning, we took along cereal/granola bars and water bottles with mini-drink mixes, which saved a lot of $$$.
All of the times mentioned are approximate, but are as close to accurate as possible.
Day 1 5/10/06 Wednesday
Plane delayed due to bad weather in Memphis, where we had our connecting flight to Orlando. When we finally arrived at Memphis, our connecting flight had already left, so we had to wait 4 hours for the next flight to Orlando, (originally we were supposed to arrive in Orlando at 4:30 pm). I called Disney Dining to cancel our dinner reservation for Spoodles at 7:10 pm. (We were supposed to hang out on the Boardwalk tonight).
Arrived Orlando at 10:30 pm. Took Disney Magical Express bus to All Star Movies Resort and arrived at Midnight. There was only one front desk clerk to help 5 families in front of us. Cafeteria was closed, Disney pizza delivery had ended, so we are not sure what to do for dinner. When we arrived at our room it had not been cleaned. There was one king bed, a single hideaway bed and a crib in the room as well. We called the front desk and they said to come back and they would find us another room. We said that we didnt want to stand in line at the front desk again, so they sent a manager out to meet us at another room. This room was clean and acceptable. We then ordered Dominoes Pizza since they delivered until 2:00 am. The medium pizza with 3 toppings cost $18 delivered. We ate dinner at 1:30 am. We decided that we would not be getting up early for extra morning Magic Hours at the Magic Kingdom tomorrow.
Day 2 5-11-06 Thursday
Got up around 8:00 am. We used the All Star Music bus stop because it was closer to our building, the Mighty Ducks, than the All Star Movies bus stop. We arrived at the bus stop at approximately 10:30 am and waited a long time for a bus.
We did not get to the Magic Kingdom until 11:30 am. We rode Space Mountain and Buzz Lightyear before going to the Crystal Palace for our lunch reservation at 1:00 pm. This was our first experience with the Disney Advanced Reservation Dining System. We had a very difficult time trying to figure out what line to stand in. The hostess directed us to a check-in window where we were given a coaster that lit-up when our table was ready. (Similar to what most restaurants do these days). We waited about 15 minutes to get seated. The characters there were Pooh, Tigger, Eeyore and Piglet. Meeting characters was not on our priority list for this visit, but it was nice to see the children enjoying time with their favorite Disney characters. This restaurant served a buffet. Wonderful looking salad bar and they had Thai food! Yum! Dessert table with soft serve ice cream was good too. Just as we started eating, the rain started coming down outside. Luckily, it stopped right before we left the Crystal Palace. (We brought rain ponchos with us, but they were still in our hotel room today, oops).
We headed over to Fantasy Land to pick-up a Fast Pass for Peter Pan and then rode Its a Small World. Great picture taking opportunities in Its a Small World to try out the new digital camera!
Then we rode Poohs Adventure, Snow White, and saw Mickys Philharmagic, then back to Peter Pan. This Fast Pass system is great! We then went and toured the Haunted Mansion, bought a Christmas ornament souvenir, saw the Hall of Presidents, and toured the Swiss Family Robinson Tree House. Sam and I are both very impressed with the detail and content of the Magic Kingdom. I had planned on riding Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad tomorrow morning first thing so it was time to leave Magic Kingdom for today, go back to our room and change for dinner at Boma in the Animal Kingdom Lodge. (I planned Boma for tonight because the theme park, Animal Kingdom, had extra night Magic Hours today until 8:00 pm. Since there is no direct transportation from resort to resort, we could take the bus from our hotel to Animal Kingdom then a bus to the Lodge and since they are all so close together, that should save some time).
Our dinner reservations for Boma were at 8:30 pm. We were at the bus stop at Magic Kingdom at 5:30 pm. We arrived at our hotel at 6:30 pm. We changed clothes and were at the Music bus stop by 7:00 pm. We took the bus to the Animal Kingdom theme park where we waited for another bus to take us to the Lodge. We arrived at the Animal Kingdom Lodge at approximately 8:35 pm. (This is a 1.5 hour one-way trip to get to dinner at a location very close to our hotel! We are hoping this is a one-time problem and that the bus transportation could not possibly take this long all week!) It was difficult to find the restaurant from the main lobby entrance. (A simple sign saying Boma and Jiko Downstairs would have been helpful). We arrived at Boma to a scene of chaos. People everywhere and one person at the Boma front desk. There was not a line, just a mob scene. Did all of these people have reservations or were they trying to make reservations? We patiently waited behind the mob scene after our long bus ride here. Since we are late for our reservation are they going to give it to someone else? This was a very tense situation, (our second time using Disneys Advanced Reservation program). Finally, we checked-in and they told us they were running 20 minutes behind schedule. We were seated at approximately 9:30 pm. I asked our host if they were understaffed tonight and he said no. He apologized for the wait, but he seemed to indicate that a long wait was normal.
Sam asked the server if they had smoothies. No, just alcoholic drinks. The African buffet was wonderful! We love trying different cuisines so this was a real treat. We tried all of the breads and spreads. There were so many salads we could not try them all. I especially liked the shrimp couscous. The stews were the best. Six to choose from, I chose two and added a little rice to them. Desserts were ok. It was difficult to enjoy dinner with such an ordeal just to get to the restaurant and get seated. Now we are wondering how long it will take to get back to our hotel since the next closest place to transfer buses is Downtown Disney, very far away considering our hotel and the Animal Kingdom Lodge are so close together. We were at the Animal Kingdom Lodge bus stop at 10:30 pm and arrived at our All Star Resort at approximately Midnight.
Day 3 5-12-06 Friday
Today we are finishing up Magic Kingdom and then going to Epcot because the World Showcase has extra Magic Hours until Midnight. We were at the Music bus stop at 7:30 am. We arrived at Magic Kingdom at 8:30 am. The park does not open until 9:00 am today, so we picked out a shaded area to sit while waiting and watching the park opening show at the railroad station. We then headed straight for Splash Mountain. We walked right onto the ride. I brought a trash bag for the camera bag but not our ponchos. I figured, how wet could we get, its just a log ride! And, I dont remember getting wet 10 years ago! Well, there was no point in putting on my make-up today because it all came off on Splash Mountain. (Note to self: Ride Splash Mountain at the end of the day when it is hot and you dont care what you look like, despite what the unofficial Disney guide books say!!!) Then we went on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad to dry-off. Again, we walked right onto the ride. (Gee, I sure like getting to the park when it first opens!) Well, it is still early in the morning and our lunch reservations at the Rose and Crown Pub are for Noon, so I guess we will go ride Space Mountain again! We rode Space Mountain twice, one each side. I think that is our favorite ride at the Magic Kingdom. Then we went on the Transportation Authority before leaving the park. We arrived at the monorail station at approximately 11:00 am.
We took the monorail from Magic Kingdom to Epcot. I love the monorail! No hassles, no traffic, plenty of seating, great views. (I forgot to mention that several times yesterday we had to stand on the buses while in transport). We arrived at Epcot at approximately 11:30 am and got a Fast Pass first thing for Soarin. Then we went off to the United Kingdom for lunch. We were seated immediately at an outside table overlooking the lagoon. It was sunny and breezy and for the first time on our vacation we feel relaxed. The food and service were wonderful. I had the Chicken Pasty with peas and Sam had Bangers and Mash.
We almost didnt want to leave! But, we had 10 more countries to visit today, so off we went! We toured the United Kingdom first. Then we went to France for dessert. Sam had a chocolate stuffed croissant and I had the chocolate mousse. We spent some time looking in shops at Morocco.
We had plans to eat at Marrakesh later in the week, so we didnt stay too long. At the Japan pavilion we watched drummers play at the pagoda building.
(We were disappointed that the unofficial Disney guide book said that the Japanese and Chinese food offered at Epcot was not anything special, those are some of our favorites, so we skipped eating in these countries). At the American Adventure pavilion we were delighted to watch the Voices of Liberty, an 8 person a capella group singing old American favorites. They were wonderful and Im sure Sam wished he could join right in with them! Then we saw the American Adventure presentation in the theater, great! We then went over to the Italy pavilion, found an outdoor table shaded by an umbrella and had a diet coke. (We toured Italy extensively on our Europe trip in 2001 so we did not feel like looking at much here.
We also skipped the Canada pavilion since we were in Ottawa last May for a week). Still relaxed, we decided it was time to go back and use our Fast Passes for Soarin.
We took a boat back to future world. But, before the boat could leave from the dock, it had to wait for the Illuminations equipment to pass. Wow, after seeing all of that, we could not wait to see the Illuminations presentation that night!
Good thing we had Fast Passes for Soarin because when we got to the Land pavilion, there was a sign that said All Fast Passes for Soarin have been dispersed for today, it was about 5:00 pm and Epcot was open until Midnight for Extra Magic Hours. We rode Soarin and loved it! There was so much more they could have done with the simulator to make it a really scary ride, but it was tame and beautiful. We really liked the effects of smell when you flew through an orange orchard or pine trees. However, when flying over the ocean we just wished our feet (wearing sandals) would get wet!
After Soarin we went back to the World Showcase and started touring at Mexico. We rode the El Rio del Tiempo boat ride and the unofficial Disney guide book was right on, there was nobody on the ride! It was a great boat ride with a lot of detail, Im glad we did not miss it. We skipped Norway because the wait for Maelstrom was too long and we were coming back on Sunday for lunch, so we could do it then. In China, we saw acrobats perform and then went to see the 360 degree movie Reflections of China. We love this movie format! What a great way to tour a country!
We were starting to get hungry and our dinner reservations were in Germany at the Biergarten for 7:25 pm. We arrived at the Biergarten at 7:00 pm hoping not to wait until 7:25 to get seated. We were seated in 10 minutes! Now thats more like it! No mob, no long wait, just right. We were seated at a large table with two other groups. A family of 3 from New Jersey, and a dating couple from Tennessee. The buffet was wonderful, with many different selections from German cuisine. (Sams mother is a German national and he knows a lot about German food, language and culture). The band played at 7:00 pm and 8:00 pm, so we effectively got to see both shows, great! We left the Biergarten at 8:30 pm and went straight out to find a good location to watch Illuminations.
Our spot was in front of the Germany pavilion overlooking the lagoon with a stone wall perfect for setting up our mini-tripod for the digital camera. Illuminations starts at 9:00 pm so it was perfect timing. (The only downside was that we had to stand, but I guess we should be getting use to this, standing in lines for rides, buses, etc ) Right before Illuminations started, a very rude man decided to climb over the waist-high fence into the flower bed area next to us and set up his video recorder. There were several announcement made that you were not supposed to do this, plus he was blocking the view of the people behind him at the fence. Luckily, a cast member told him to move mid-way through the show. (I thought he was going to drop his video camera into the lagoon!) Illuminations was the coolest show I have seen, (up until seeing Fantasmic tomorrow at MGM). I think next time we will try viewing from Future World so we can see all of the World Showcase pavilions in the background. The digital camera took some awesome pictures on the night scene mode.
After the show, we went back to the Germany pavilion to shop for chocolate. Even though Epcot was open late for resort guests, it seemed dead, so we decided to head back to the hotel and try to get more sleep for tomorrow. We got to the Epcot bus station at 10:30 pm and arrived at our hotel at 11:30 pm.
Day 4 5-13-06 Saturday
Disneys MGM Studios has extra morning Magic Hours today and opens at 8:00 am. We woke up and got to the bus stop at 7:45 am. We arrived at MGM at 8:50 am. We rode the Great Movie Ride first. We pretty much walked right on the ride. Then we went to see the Beauty and the Beast show. Sam was not very excited about this, but that is one of my favorite movies. The pre-show entertainment was a four man a capella group Four for a Dollar. Sam enjoyed them the most! The show was great, with wonderful costumes and great cast members. The 12x zoom came in handy on the digital camera and I have several great close-up shots of the performance.
After the show we went to Star Tours followed by the Back Lot Tour. Then we went to the Indiana Jones Stunt show. We arrived early, so I found a good seat while Sam got some lunch. We shared a burger and a salad, perfect timing, right before the show started. The props on this show impressed Sam along with sitting right behind the control booth. There was a newly wed couple that sat right next to me before Sam came with lunch. They were chosen to be extras before the stunt show. (I took some pictures of them with our digital camera and sent it too them via email. I love technology!) After the show we went to the Lights! Motors! Action! Extreme Stunt Show. We are so glad we brought our ear plugs on this trip! It seems that every show we go to is too loud. Maybe Disney is catering to the older folks who cant hear as well, but for us, everything was much more comfortable with earplugs.
Next we saw Muppet Vision 3D and Sounds Dangerous. We both liked all of the 3D movies at Disney but Sounds Dangerous was really stupid and was a good napping place. We then went on the Tower of Terror. I had done this with my family 10 years ago and knew what to expect, but I was still terrified and held on to Sam for dear life.
Dinner reservations were early tonight, Hollywood and Vine at 6:20 pm combined with reserved seating for Fantasmic show at 9:00 pm. This was our 5th Disney Dining reservation and we are getting the hang of it. Stand in line to check-in, then wait to be seated. We were seated at about 6:45 pm. This was another buffet style restaurant. Great breads, salads, roast and stir-fried veggies. Dessert was ok. After dinner we decided to take in the last Who Wants to be a Millionaire show before Fantasmic. We think the show is rigged, fun time though. We found our reserved seats for Fantasmic at 8:30 pm. It was neat to see all of the glow-in-the-dark stuff for sale. Fantasmic is by far the most awesome show we saw at Disney. Lagoon on fire, floats with characters, dragon, showing movies on water spray, all very cool. Leaving Fantasmic we started to worry about the trip back to the hotel. Would we have to wait an hour for a bus with this huge crowd leaving? Well, this time Disney did it right and had plenty of busses available after the show. We got back to our hotel at 10:30 pm, the earliest yet!
Day 5 5/14/06 Sunday
Today is the day we explore Future World at Epcot. We were at the bus station at 8:00 am and arrived at Epcot at 9:00 am. Epcot was probably busier than normal today because it is Mothers Day and the Flower expo. Sam rode Mission Space first, then we rode Test Track together, both with minimal waits. We were hungry, granola bars and cereal bars for breakfast are getting old now. We went to the Fountain View Espresso and Bakery and had a fruit filled croissant, yum! Then we explored Innoventions West and were disappointed with the exhibits. We thought they would be geared more towards adults, but we forgot, this is still Disney. We had a late lunch reservation at Akershus in Norway for 1:10 pm, so we still had some time to kill. We rode the Living with the Land boat ride and really enjoyed it. We took some pictures at the butterfly exhibit and looked around the flower expo. We kind of stumbled upon a character photo area with hardly a wait. All of our other observations were long waits for characters, but there were no lines here at all! So, we posed for a few photographs with Mickey Mouse, Chip and Dale. I was worried that the Disney cast members would not take pictures with our camera, but to my surprise they seemed very willing and proficient. Now we are running a little late for our lunch reservation.
We arrived at Akershus at 1:15 pm to another mob scene. Picture about 30 people, half little girls dressed up in princess outfits, the rest hungry parents. It was hot out and no shade in front of the restaurant. The protocol here was: 1) Stand in line to check in, 2) Wait for your name to be called by a very quiet cast member, 3) Obtain a ticket from quiet cast member, 4) Stand in another line with your ticket, 5) Have your picture taken with Ariel, 6) Be seated for lunch. Well, this was a very long wait. We got a Fast Pass for Maelstrom to use after lunch because the wait was too long and we had no idea when we would be seated for lunch. After we figured out what the hold-up was to get seated, taking a picture with Ariel, we decided to skip step 5. The cast member was sad about our request, but seated us anyway. Ahhhh, finally sitting down in the air conditioning, ready for lunch! (Our reasoning for eating lunch here was to sample Norways cuisine, not to be here for the princess character lunch). The cold buffet was wonderful. I ordered the lamb entrée while Sam had the chicken and pasta. I was not impressed with the lamb and I really wished I had Sams entrée. Dessert was good. The princesses were kind enough to stop by our table to say hello, but Sam was not interested in having his picture taken with them. After lunch we rode the Maelstrom and watched the movie on Norway. We could finally relax after all that chaos to get seated for lunch! We explored the Norway pavilion and then decided to go back to Future World and catch Journey into Imagination with Figment and Honey, I Shrunk the Audience. Again, very happy we had our earplugs with us! The last ride today at Epcot was Spaceship Earth in the Geosphere. Somehow I missed this ride 10 years ago with my family. Other than the frequent stops during the ride, it was a good one.
Tonight is a special night because we have dinner reservations at OHana at the Polynesian Resort followed by sitting on the beach at the resort and watching the lagoon night parade float by. Dinner reservations are for 7:50 pm. Since our experience at the Biergarten in Germany was that we could get seated earlier than our reservations, I was hoping to get to OHana no later than 7:30 pm so that we could eat a leisurely dinner before the lagoon parade. We were at the Epcot bus station at 5:00 pm. We got to our hotel room at 6:00 pm and changed into our Hawaiian outfits. We were at the All Star Music Resort bus station at 6:30 pm. We chose to ride the bus to the Magic Kingdom and then take the monorail from the Magic Kingdom to the Polynesian Resort.
We arrived at the Polynesian Resort at 8:00 pm and I knew that we could not possibly be seated, eat a leisurely dinner and catch the parade on the water in one hour. I was very upset. Why does it take 1.5 hours to get to a restaurant/resort using the Disney Transportation System!?! This is not like going to the airport, this is going to a property next door! Now I had to talk to a manager. While Sam checked in for our dinner reservation, I spoke with the manager of the Polynesian Resort and explained to him that I was tired of waiting consistently 30 minutes for a bus to a resort or theme park. (Plus, there are people with children here who dont have an attention span to wait 30 minutes for a bus. People were complaining in the lines we were in for buses, but I have the idea that they were so busy with their children that they had no time to complain to the management. Typically, there is another 30 minute line just to speak to someone at the hotel front desk!) He took my information and said he would look into it. I think I bent his ear for a good 15 to 20 minutes, because Sam had to come down to get me for dinner, we were being seated.
Our hostess was kind enough to seat us by the window where we could just barely see through the trees the parade on the water and the fireworks show Wishes from Magic Kingdom. It was this moment that I almost decided that we were never coming back to Walt Disney World. The food was wonderful. We love Hawaii and the food/ culture there. We tried to enjoy ourselves and decided to walk along the beach after dinner anyway. Another manager, Marco Stanco, came to our table in the middle of our meal and said that they would provide us with a Taxi ride home tonight. That was really nice of them, but it does not compensate for us having to consistently wait so long for Disney bus transportation. After dinner, we went out by the pool and walked barefoot on the sandy beach. Wow, wish we were in Hawaii right now! We sat down on some beach recliners and Sam called his Mom to wish her a happy Mothers day. Then we decided to head back to our hotel. We went to the bell hop at the Polynesian Resort and they paid the taxi cab driver for our fare. We got to our hotel in about 15 minutes.
Day 6 5/15/06 Monday
Today, Animal Kingdom opens at 8:00 am with Magic Hours. We are only doing a half day at the Animal Kingdom followed by Disney Quest in the afternoon. We were at the bus stop at 7:30 am and we arrived at Animal Kingdom at 8:30 am. We took the Kilimanjaro Safari ride first, because we heard that the animals are more active in the morning. There was no wait for the ride. The truck ride was very bumpy and it never stopped for pictures. (It is very hard to take pictures while the vehicle is moving. We prefer going to the zoo instead of a safari any day). After the ride, I was feeling sick to my stomach. Our next ride was Expedition Everest, but I was in no shape to ride, so we skipped it, thinking we would return later in the morning. We went by Dinoland U.S.A. and finally ended up at the entrance to A Bugs Life, sitting on a bench, sipping on an icee drink and listening to a cast member yell Next show in 5 minutes for 15 minutes. I started to feel better and we went on the Dinosaur ride.
We purposely wore our sandals and work-out clothes this morning because we knew we were going to get wet on the Kali River Rapids and we were successful! I was also thankful that I put the camera case in a plastic trash bag then inside the rafts storage compartment, because the compartment was not fully waterproof.
Well, we still have to find a monkey (stuffed animal) for our friends daughter, so we skipped Expedition Everest to look for monkey. We found monkey in the gift shop right out site of the theme park. I took some pictures of Sam and monkey together and now we have found a new fun thing to do, take pictures of monkey everywhere we go and make a mini photo album to go along with monkey! This really entertained us for the rest of the trip! We got to the Animal Kingdom bus stop at 11:30 am and got back to our hotel at 12:30 pm.
We changed out of our wet clothes and wanted some lunch. We didnt want to wait 1.5 hours to have a meal, so we tried our hotels cafeteria. I had chicken quesadillas and Sam had a burger and fries. The food was very bland and I was thankful to have some sour cream and picante sauce. We then decided that doing Disney Quest would take at least 4 hours and our dinner reservation tonight was at the Flying Fish on the Boardwalk at 6:00 pm. With our past experience with the bus transportation system, we decided to go to Downtown Disney for 2 hours and leave plenty of time to get to the Flying Fish because after dinner we were going to go to the Magic Kingdom and watch the Spectromagic Parade and Wishes Fireworks starting at 9:00 pm and we did not want to miss that! This is our last night at Walt Disney World.
So we got to the hotel bus station at 2:00 pm and arrived at Downtown Disney at about 2:45 pm. We had a brownie sundae at Ghirardelli Chocolate Factory, which did not seem as good as the ones we had in San Francisco some years ago. We looked in the LEGO store and I had a great time using the cameras zoom on the wall of LEGO people. We looked in a few other stores and decided to head over to the Boardwalk.
We were at the Downtown Disney bus stop at 5:00 pm and since the Boardwalk was the last stop of the bus route, we did not get to the Boardwalk until 6:00 pm. The Flying Fish restaurant was a totally different atmosphere, a little stuffy. We made sure to order the crab cakes, which were wonderful, but for $14 each should have been a meal. I had the potato wrapped flounder and Sam had the mahi mahi. The entrees were ok, but weve had better, and there wasnt very much selection on the menu. The interior design was by far the best part of this meal.
Now we needed the fastest way to Magic Kingdom. Our goal is to get to the MK Railroad Station by 8:00 pm to get a front row seat for the parade and fireworks starting at 9:00 pm. We left the Flying Fish at 7:00 pm and decided to walk to the Epcot monorail and take that to the Magic Kingdom. (I would not recommend walking as fast as you can for 15 minutes right after dinner). We arrived at the Magic Kingdom right on time, 8:00 pm.
We rushed upstairs to the train station at took our spot to the right of the castle in front of us. There were already people there who had taken all the tables and chairs and put them front and center. (I told myself there was no way we were going to sit around for over an hour waiting for a parade and fireworks, so I am happy we at least have a spot in front). Sam went to find a funnel cake for dessert, which we found out at MGM studios that the only places you can get funnel cake in Walt Disney World is the American Adventure in Epcot or Liberty Square in Magic Kingdom. (We spent a day and a half just looking for funnel cake!) I put the camera case to my left to reserve a spot at the railing for Sam. After a while, a family with 3 children came bounding up to the railing and nearly stepped on the bag. I told them politely, but loudly to be careful and not step on the bag. (We got here an hour early and we are not giving up our spot!) Sam finally came back with his prize. By now the railing was packed and we squeezed into our spots. Finally, it became dark and the parade began. Wow. A lot of work must have gone into all of those floats! The camera pictures on night scene mode did not turn out as well because the floats didnt stop moving, so the lights were blurred. The fireworks were awesome, but we should have moved down in front of the flag pole for a better view. Whose idea was it to plant 4 trees in the middle of the square? They were blocking our view of the Castle and some of the fireworks. Additionally, Disney did not turn the building lights off at our end of Main street during the fireworks. This pretty much ruined any pictures and was somewhat distracting. I understand they do it for safety, I just wish we would have known that earlier. They turned out all the lights for the parade . Tonight, the bus transportation board read that there were two bus stops for the All Star Movies resort. Hmm, was this due to our complaint or just a coincidence? Anyway, we were using the All Star Music bus, and all the buses came at the same time anyway. We got to the Magic Kingdom bus station at 10:30 pm and arrived at our hotel at about 11:30 pm.
Day 7 5/16/06 Tuesday
Today is our transition day from the Disney All Star Movies Resort to the Hilton Grand Vacations Club. We have 3 more theme parks to visit that are not related to Disney, so we thought we would save some money and stay out side WDW. We decided to pack-up and check out first thing. We had breakfast at the All Star Movies cafeteria. I had a banana nut muffin and orange juice, Sam had milk, banana and a croissant. After breakfast, we checked out and gave our luggage to the bell hop holding it until we came back in the afternoon with our rental car. We tried the All Star Movie bus stop today, and it took only 10 minutes for the bus to Epcot to show up. Unfortunately, the people already in line had been waiting 20 minutes and they were grumbling. It seems like several buses for other theme parks in Disney had come twice over, but no Epcot bus. At the bus stop at 9:45 am, arrived at Epcot at 10:30 am.
We had an hour to kill before our lunch reservation at the Garden Grill at 11:40 am. It was a rainy day today. We had not checked out the Living Seas pavilion yet. The exhibits were ok, but nothing compared to Sea World or some of the other aquariums weve been too. We think maybe Disney should leave the underwater stuff to Sea World and concentrate more on future-themed exhibits. We got to the Land Pavilion at 11:30 am and we were seated for lunch quickly. We had a very leisurely lunch in the rotating restaurant. Mickey Mouse, Chip and Dale, and Pluto were the characters on hand today. We saw them at least 3 times. They were very funny and we had a good time interacting with them. Even though it was raining outside, I thought it would be much more crowded for lunch, but it was not very busy. After lunch we were trying to figure out the best way to pick up the rental car at the Dolphin hotel, very close to Epcot, and going to Disney Quest at Downtown Disney. We decided that the bus ride to Downtown Disney would take too long and waist a bunch of our time today, so we decided to walk over to the Dolphin hotel to pick up our rental car.
It was raining outside, so we put on our ponchos and started the trek. At the International Gateway, we caught a boat the rest of the way to the Dolphin hotel. It was nice to be under some shelter from the rain! We easily found the car rental desk and had our car in less time than it took waiting for a bus! Wow, now this is heaven! We drove over to Downtown Disney with such ease! The teller at the Disney Quest ticket window said it would be crowded today. Sam really wanted to check out the virtual reality games inside, so we purchased tickets anyway. We went inside and we thought it was hardly crowded! We started on the 5th floor and worked our way down. When we finished the 4th floor, we went back to All Star Movies to get our luggage and check into our new hotel. Wow! Our new hotel room was more like a villa! Full kitchen, washer/dryer, whirlpool bathtub, balcony with great view. Now this is being on vacation! We canceled our dinner reservations at Marrakesh and decided to eat at Planet Hollywood. The food was ok, not worth the price, but the interior was awesome! After dinner, we went back to Disney Quest to finish the remaining floors. We loved playing video games without having to insert coins all of the time. We had a great time playing skee-ball and air hockey. Loved the Jungle Cruise and Pirates of the Caribbean. GREAT cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory which we took back to our new hotel and ate on the balcony. If we visit Orlando again, we will definitely stay outside of Walt Disney World and have a rental car.
Background information: We have been married 7 years. We don't have any children yet, so this trip to WDW was to scope out the territory and have fun as a couple. My husband, Sam, has never been to WDW. My last time to WDW was 10 years ago with my family. We are both in our early 30's. I made advanced dining reservations for all of our lunch and dinner meals and coordinated those with extra magic hours, etc. We had a rough schedule for everyday, just to make sure we didn't miss anything. (Schedule like Morning: MK, Lunch: Crystal Palace, Afternoon: MK, Dinner: Boma, Evening: Hotel). For breakfast each morning, we took along cereal/granola bars and water bottles with mini-drink mixes, which saved a lot of $$$.
All of the times mentioned are approximate, but are as close to accurate as possible.
Day 1 5/10/06 Wednesday
Plane delayed due to bad weather in Memphis, where we had our connecting flight to Orlando. When we finally arrived at Memphis, our connecting flight had already left, so we had to wait 4 hours for the next flight to Orlando, (originally we were supposed to arrive in Orlando at 4:30 pm). I called Disney Dining to cancel our dinner reservation for Spoodles at 7:10 pm. (We were supposed to hang out on the Boardwalk tonight).
Arrived Orlando at 10:30 pm. Took Disney Magical Express bus to All Star Movies Resort and arrived at Midnight. There was only one front desk clerk to help 5 families in front of us. Cafeteria was closed, Disney pizza delivery had ended, so we are not sure what to do for dinner. When we arrived at our room it had not been cleaned. There was one king bed, a single hideaway bed and a crib in the room as well. We called the front desk and they said to come back and they would find us another room. We said that we didnt want to stand in line at the front desk again, so they sent a manager out to meet us at another room. This room was clean and acceptable. We then ordered Dominoes Pizza since they delivered until 2:00 am. The medium pizza with 3 toppings cost $18 delivered. We ate dinner at 1:30 am. We decided that we would not be getting up early for extra morning Magic Hours at the Magic Kingdom tomorrow.
Day 2 5-11-06 Thursday
Got up around 8:00 am. We used the All Star Music bus stop because it was closer to our building, the Mighty Ducks, than the All Star Movies bus stop. We arrived at the bus stop at approximately 10:30 am and waited a long time for a bus.
We did not get to the Magic Kingdom until 11:30 am. We rode Space Mountain and Buzz Lightyear before going to the Crystal Palace for our lunch reservation at 1:00 pm. This was our first experience with the Disney Advanced Reservation Dining System. We had a very difficult time trying to figure out what line to stand in. The hostess directed us to a check-in window where we were given a coaster that lit-up when our table was ready. (Similar to what most restaurants do these days). We waited about 15 minutes to get seated. The characters there were Pooh, Tigger, Eeyore and Piglet. Meeting characters was not on our priority list for this visit, but it was nice to see the children enjoying time with their favorite Disney characters. This restaurant served a buffet. Wonderful looking salad bar and they had Thai food! Yum! Dessert table with soft serve ice cream was good too. Just as we started eating, the rain started coming down outside. Luckily, it stopped right before we left the Crystal Palace. (We brought rain ponchos with us, but they were still in our hotel room today, oops).
We headed over to Fantasy Land to pick-up a Fast Pass for Peter Pan and then rode Its a Small World. Great picture taking opportunities in Its a Small World to try out the new digital camera!
Then we rode Poohs Adventure, Snow White, and saw Mickys Philharmagic, then back to Peter Pan. This Fast Pass system is great! We then went and toured the Haunted Mansion, bought a Christmas ornament souvenir, saw the Hall of Presidents, and toured the Swiss Family Robinson Tree House. Sam and I are both very impressed with the detail and content of the Magic Kingdom. I had planned on riding Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad tomorrow morning first thing so it was time to leave Magic Kingdom for today, go back to our room and change for dinner at Boma in the Animal Kingdom Lodge. (I planned Boma for tonight because the theme park, Animal Kingdom, had extra night Magic Hours today until 8:00 pm. Since there is no direct transportation from resort to resort, we could take the bus from our hotel to Animal Kingdom then a bus to the Lodge and since they are all so close together, that should save some time).
Our dinner reservations for Boma were at 8:30 pm. We were at the bus stop at Magic Kingdom at 5:30 pm. We arrived at our hotel at 6:30 pm. We changed clothes and were at the Music bus stop by 7:00 pm. We took the bus to the Animal Kingdom theme park where we waited for another bus to take us to the Lodge. We arrived at the Animal Kingdom Lodge at approximately 8:35 pm. (This is a 1.5 hour one-way trip to get to dinner at a location very close to our hotel! We are hoping this is a one-time problem and that the bus transportation could not possibly take this long all week!) It was difficult to find the restaurant from the main lobby entrance. (A simple sign saying Boma and Jiko Downstairs would have been helpful). We arrived at Boma to a scene of chaos. People everywhere and one person at the Boma front desk. There was not a line, just a mob scene. Did all of these people have reservations or were they trying to make reservations? We patiently waited behind the mob scene after our long bus ride here. Since we are late for our reservation are they going to give it to someone else? This was a very tense situation, (our second time using Disneys Advanced Reservation program). Finally, we checked-in and they told us they were running 20 minutes behind schedule. We were seated at approximately 9:30 pm. I asked our host if they were understaffed tonight and he said no. He apologized for the wait, but he seemed to indicate that a long wait was normal.
Sam asked the server if they had smoothies. No, just alcoholic drinks. The African buffet was wonderful! We love trying different cuisines so this was a real treat. We tried all of the breads and spreads. There were so many salads we could not try them all. I especially liked the shrimp couscous. The stews were the best. Six to choose from, I chose two and added a little rice to them. Desserts were ok. It was difficult to enjoy dinner with such an ordeal just to get to the restaurant and get seated. Now we are wondering how long it will take to get back to our hotel since the next closest place to transfer buses is Downtown Disney, very far away considering our hotel and the Animal Kingdom Lodge are so close together. We were at the Animal Kingdom Lodge bus stop at 10:30 pm and arrived at our All Star Resort at approximately Midnight.
Day 3 5-12-06 Friday
Today we are finishing up Magic Kingdom and then going to Epcot because the World Showcase has extra Magic Hours until Midnight. We were at the Music bus stop at 7:30 am. We arrived at Magic Kingdom at 8:30 am. The park does not open until 9:00 am today, so we picked out a shaded area to sit while waiting and watching the park opening show at the railroad station. We then headed straight for Splash Mountain. We walked right onto the ride. I brought a trash bag for the camera bag but not our ponchos. I figured, how wet could we get, its just a log ride! And, I dont remember getting wet 10 years ago! Well, there was no point in putting on my make-up today because it all came off on Splash Mountain. (Note to self: Ride Splash Mountain at the end of the day when it is hot and you dont care what you look like, despite what the unofficial Disney guide books say!!!) Then we went on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad to dry-off. Again, we walked right onto the ride. (Gee, I sure like getting to the park when it first opens!) Well, it is still early in the morning and our lunch reservations at the Rose and Crown Pub are for Noon, so I guess we will go ride Space Mountain again! We rode Space Mountain twice, one each side. I think that is our favorite ride at the Magic Kingdom. Then we went on the Transportation Authority before leaving the park. We arrived at the monorail station at approximately 11:00 am.
We took the monorail from Magic Kingdom to Epcot. I love the monorail! No hassles, no traffic, plenty of seating, great views. (I forgot to mention that several times yesterday we had to stand on the buses while in transport). We arrived at Epcot at approximately 11:30 am and got a Fast Pass first thing for Soarin. Then we went off to the United Kingdom for lunch. We were seated immediately at an outside table overlooking the lagoon. It was sunny and breezy and for the first time on our vacation we feel relaxed. The food and service were wonderful. I had the Chicken Pasty with peas and Sam had Bangers and Mash.
We almost didnt want to leave! But, we had 10 more countries to visit today, so off we went! We toured the United Kingdom first. Then we went to France for dessert. Sam had a chocolate stuffed croissant and I had the chocolate mousse. We spent some time looking in shops at Morocco.
We had plans to eat at Marrakesh later in the week, so we didnt stay too long. At the Japan pavilion we watched drummers play at the pagoda building.
(We were disappointed that the unofficial Disney guide book said that the Japanese and Chinese food offered at Epcot was not anything special, those are some of our favorites, so we skipped eating in these countries). At the American Adventure pavilion we were delighted to watch the Voices of Liberty, an 8 person a capella group singing old American favorites. They were wonderful and Im sure Sam wished he could join right in with them! Then we saw the American Adventure presentation in the theater, great! We then went over to the Italy pavilion, found an outdoor table shaded by an umbrella and had a diet coke. (We toured Italy extensively on our Europe trip in 2001 so we did not feel like looking at much here.
We also skipped the Canada pavilion since we were in Ottawa last May for a week). Still relaxed, we decided it was time to go back and use our Fast Passes for Soarin.
We took a boat back to future world. But, before the boat could leave from the dock, it had to wait for the Illuminations equipment to pass. Wow, after seeing all of that, we could not wait to see the Illuminations presentation that night!
Good thing we had Fast Passes for Soarin because when we got to the Land pavilion, there was a sign that said All Fast Passes for Soarin have been dispersed for today, it was about 5:00 pm and Epcot was open until Midnight for Extra Magic Hours. We rode Soarin and loved it! There was so much more they could have done with the simulator to make it a really scary ride, but it was tame and beautiful. We really liked the effects of smell when you flew through an orange orchard or pine trees. However, when flying over the ocean we just wished our feet (wearing sandals) would get wet!
After Soarin we went back to the World Showcase and started touring at Mexico. We rode the El Rio del Tiempo boat ride and the unofficial Disney guide book was right on, there was nobody on the ride! It was a great boat ride with a lot of detail, Im glad we did not miss it. We skipped Norway because the wait for Maelstrom was too long and we were coming back on Sunday for lunch, so we could do it then. In China, we saw acrobats perform and then went to see the 360 degree movie Reflections of China. We love this movie format! What a great way to tour a country!
We were starting to get hungry and our dinner reservations were in Germany at the Biergarten for 7:25 pm. We arrived at the Biergarten at 7:00 pm hoping not to wait until 7:25 to get seated. We were seated in 10 minutes! Now thats more like it! No mob, no long wait, just right. We were seated at a large table with two other groups. A family of 3 from New Jersey, and a dating couple from Tennessee. The buffet was wonderful, with many different selections from German cuisine. (Sams mother is a German national and he knows a lot about German food, language and culture). The band played at 7:00 pm and 8:00 pm, so we effectively got to see both shows, great! We left the Biergarten at 8:30 pm and went straight out to find a good location to watch Illuminations.
Our spot was in front of the Germany pavilion overlooking the lagoon with a stone wall perfect for setting up our mini-tripod for the digital camera. Illuminations starts at 9:00 pm so it was perfect timing. (The only downside was that we had to stand, but I guess we should be getting use to this, standing in lines for rides, buses, etc ) Right before Illuminations started, a very rude man decided to climb over the waist-high fence into the flower bed area next to us and set up his video recorder. There were several announcement made that you were not supposed to do this, plus he was blocking the view of the people behind him at the fence. Luckily, a cast member told him to move mid-way through the show. (I thought he was going to drop his video camera into the lagoon!) Illuminations was the coolest show I have seen, (up until seeing Fantasmic tomorrow at MGM). I think next time we will try viewing from Future World so we can see all of the World Showcase pavilions in the background. The digital camera took some awesome pictures on the night scene mode.
After the show, we went back to the Germany pavilion to shop for chocolate. Even though Epcot was open late for resort guests, it seemed dead, so we decided to head back to the hotel and try to get more sleep for tomorrow. We got to the Epcot bus station at 10:30 pm and arrived at our hotel at 11:30 pm.
Day 4 5-13-06 Saturday
Disneys MGM Studios has extra morning Magic Hours today and opens at 8:00 am. We woke up and got to the bus stop at 7:45 am. We arrived at MGM at 8:50 am. We rode the Great Movie Ride first. We pretty much walked right on the ride. Then we went to see the Beauty and the Beast show. Sam was not very excited about this, but that is one of my favorite movies. The pre-show entertainment was a four man a capella group Four for a Dollar. Sam enjoyed them the most! The show was great, with wonderful costumes and great cast members. The 12x zoom came in handy on the digital camera and I have several great close-up shots of the performance.
After the show we went to Star Tours followed by the Back Lot Tour. Then we went to the Indiana Jones Stunt show. We arrived early, so I found a good seat while Sam got some lunch. We shared a burger and a salad, perfect timing, right before the show started. The props on this show impressed Sam along with sitting right behind the control booth. There was a newly wed couple that sat right next to me before Sam came with lunch. They were chosen to be extras before the stunt show. (I took some pictures of them with our digital camera and sent it too them via email. I love technology!) After the show we went to the Lights! Motors! Action! Extreme Stunt Show. We are so glad we brought our ear plugs on this trip! It seems that every show we go to is too loud. Maybe Disney is catering to the older folks who cant hear as well, but for us, everything was much more comfortable with earplugs.
Next we saw Muppet Vision 3D and Sounds Dangerous. We both liked all of the 3D movies at Disney but Sounds Dangerous was really stupid and was a good napping place. We then went on the Tower of Terror. I had done this with my family 10 years ago and knew what to expect, but I was still terrified and held on to Sam for dear life.
Dinner reservations were early tonight, Hollywood and Vine at 6:20 pm combined with reserved seating for Fantasmic show at 9:00 pm. This was our 5th Disney Dining reservation and we are getting the hang of it. Stand in line to check-in, then wait to be seated. We were seated at about 6:45 pm. This was another buffet style restaurant. Great breads, salads, roast and stir-fried veggies. Dessert was ok. After dinner we decided to take in the last Who Wants to be a Millionaire show before Fantasmic. We think the show is rigged, fun time though. We found our reserved seats for Fantasmic at 8:30 pm. It was neat to see all of the glow-in-the-dark stuff for sale. Fantasmic is by far the most awesome show we saw at Disney. Lagoon on fire, floats with characters, dragon, showing movies on water spray, all very cool. Leaving Fantasmic we started to worry about the trip back to the hotel. Would we have to wait an hour for a bus with this huge crowd leaving? Well, this time Disney did it right and had plenty of busses available after the show. We got back to our hotel at 10:30 pm, the earliest yet!
Day 5 5/14/06 Sunday
Today is the day we explore Future World at Epcot. We were at the bus station at 8:00 am and arrived at Epcot at 9:00 am. Epcot was probably busier than normal today because it is Mothers Day and the Flower expo. Sam rode Mission Space first, then we rode Test Track together, both with minimal waits. We were hungry, granola bars and cereal bars for breakfast are getting old now. We went to the Fountain View Espresso and Bakery and had a fruit filled croissant, yum! Then we explored Innoventions West and were disappointed with the exhibits. We thought they would be geared more towards adults, but we forgot, this is still Disney. We had a late lunch reservation at Akershus in Norway for 1:10 pm, so we still had some time to kill. We rode the Living with the Land boat ride and really enjoyed it. We took some pictures at the butterfly exhibit and looked around the flower expo. We kind of stumbled upon a character photo area with hardly a wait. All of our other observations were long waits for characters, but there were no lines here at all! So, we posed for a few photographs with Mickey Mouse, Chip and Dale. I was worried that the Disney cast members would not take pictures with our camera, but to my surprise they seemed very willing and proficient. Now we are running a little late for our lunch reservation.
We arrived at Akershus at 1:15 pm to another mob scene. Picture about 30 people, half little girls dressed up in princess outfits, the rest hungry parents. It was hot out and no shade in front of the restaurant. The protocol here was: 1) Stand in line to check in, 2) Wait for your name to be called by a very quiet cast member, 3) Obtain a ticket from quiet cast member, 4) Stand in another line with your ticket, 5) Have your picture taken with Ariel, 6) Be seated for lunch. Well, this was a very long wait. We got a Fast Pass for Maelstrom to use after lunch because the wait was too long and we had no idea when we would be seated for lunch. After we figured out what the hold-up was to get seated, taking a picture with Ariel, we decided to skip step 5. The cast member was sad about our request, but seated us anyway. Ahhhh, finally sitting down in the air conditioning, ready for lunch! (Our reasoning for eating lunch here was to sample Norways cuisine, not to be here for the princess character lunch). The cold buffet was wonderful. I ordered the lamb entrée while Sam had the chicken and pasta. I was not impressed with the lamb and I really wished I had Sams entrée. Dessert was good. The princesses were kind enough to stop by our table to say hello, but Sam was not interested in having his picture taken with them. After lunch we rode the Maelstrom and watched the movie on Norway. We could finally relax after all that chaos to get seated for lunch! We explored the Norway pavilion and then decided to go back to Future World and catch Journey into Imagination with Figment and Honey, I Shrunk the Audience. Again, very happy we had our earplugs with us! The last ride today at Epcot was Spaceship Earth in the Geosphere. Somehow I missed this ride 10 years ago with my family. Other than the frequent stops during the ride, it was a good one.
Tonight is a special night because we have dinner reservations at OHana at the Polynesian Resort followed by sitting on the beach at the resort and watching the lagoon night parade float by. Dinner reservations are for 7:50 pm. Since our experience at the Biergarten in Germany was that we could get seated earlier than our reservations, I was hoping to get to OHana no later than 7:30 pm so that we could eat a leisurely dinner before the lagoon parade. We were at the Epcot bus station at 5:00 pm. We got to our hotel room at 6:00 pm and changed into our Hawaiian outfits. We were at the All Star Music Resort bus station at 6:30 pm. We chose to ride the bus to the Magic Kingdom and then take the monorail from the Magic Kingdom to the Polynesian Resort.
We arrived at the Polynesian Resort at 8:00 pm and I knew that we could not possibly be seated, eat a leisurely dinner and catch the parade on the water in one hour. I was very upset. Why does it take 1.5 hours to get to a restaurant/resort using the Disney Transportation System!?! This is not like going to the airport, this is going to a property next door! Now I had to talk to a manager. While Sam checked in for our dinner reservation, I spoke with the manager of the Polynesian Resort and explained to him that I was tired of waiting consistently 30 minutes for a bus to a resort or theme park. (Plus, there are people with children here who dont have an attention span to wait 30 minutes for a bus. People were complaining in the lines we were in for buses, but I have the idea that they were so busy with their children that they had no time to complain to the management. Typically, there is another 30 minute line just to speak to someone at the hotel front desk!) He took my information and said he would look into it. I think I bent his ear for a good 15 to 20 minutes, because Sam had to come down to get me for dinner, we were being seated.
Our hostess was kind enough to seat us by the window where we could just barely see through the trees the parade on the water and the fireworks show Wishes from Magic Kingdom. It was this moment that I almost decided that we were never coming back to Walt Disney World. The food was wonderful. We love Hawaii and the food/ culture there. We tried to enjoy ourselves and decided to walk along the beach after dinner anyway. Another manager, Marco Stanco, came to our table in the middle of our meal and said that they would provide us with a Taxi ride home tonight. That was really nice of them, but it does not compensate for us having to consistently wait so long for Disney bus transportation. After dinner, we went out by the pool and walked barefoot on the sandy beach. Wow, wish we were in Hawaii right now! We sat down on some beach recliners and Sam called his Mom to wish her a happy Mothers day. Then we decided to head back to our hotel. We went to the bell hop at the Polynesian Resort and they paid the taxi cab driver for our fare. We got to our hotel in about 15 minutes.
Day 6 5/15/06 Monday
Today, Animal Kingdom opens at 8:00 am with Magic Hours. We are only doing a half day at the Animal Kingdom followed by Disney Quest in the afternoon. We were at the bus stop at 7:30 am and we arrived at Animal Kingdom at 8:30 am. We took the Kilimanjaro Safari ride first, because we heard that the animals are more active in the morning. There was no wait for the ride. The truck ride was very bumpy and it never stopped for pictures. (It is very hard to take pictures while the vehicle is moving. We prefer going to the zoo instead of a safari any day). After the ride, I was feeling sick to my stomach. Our next ride was Expedition Everest, but I was in no shape to ride, so we skipped it, thinking we would return later in the morning. We went by Dinoland U.S.A. and finally ended up at the entrance to A Bugs Life, sitting on a bench, sipping on an icee drink and listening to a cast member yell Next show in 5 minutes for 15 minutes. I started to feel better and we went on the Dinosaur ride.
We purposely wore our sandals and work-out clothes this morning because we knew we were going to get wet on the Kali River Rapids and we were successful! I was also thankful that I put the camera case in a plastic trash bag then inside the rafts storage compartment, because the compartment was not fully waterproof.
Well, we still have to find a monkey (stuffed animal) for our friends daughter, so we skipped Expedition Everest to look for monkey. We found monkey in the gift shop right out site of the theme park. I took some pictures of Sam and monkey together and now we have found a new fun thing to do, take pictures of monkey everywhere we go and make a mini photo album to go along with monkey! This really entertained us for the rest of the trip! We got to the Animal Kingdom bus stop at 11:30 am and got back to our hotel at 12:30 pm.
We changed out of our wet clothes and wanted some lunch. We didnt want to wait 1.5 hours to have a meal, so we tried our hotels cafeteria. I had chicken quesadillas and Sam had a burger and fries. The food was very bland and I was thankful to have some sour cream and picante sauce. We then decided that doing Disney Quest would take at least 4 hours and our dinner reservation tonight was at the Flying Fish on the Boardwalk at 6:00 pm. With our past experience with the bus transportation system, we decided to go to Downtown Disney for 2 hours and leave plenty of time to get to the Flying Fish because after dinner we were going to go to the Magic Kingdom and watch the Spectromagic Parade and Wishes Fireworks starting at 9:00 pm and we did not want to miss that! This is our last night at Walt Disney World.
So we got to the hotel bus station at 2:00 pm and arrived at Downtown Disney at about 2:45 pm. We had a brownie sundae at Ghirardelli Chocolate Factory, which did not seem as good as the ones we had in San Francisco some years ago. We looked in the LEGO store and I had a great time using the cameras zoom on the wall of LEGO people. We looked in a few other stores and decided to head over to the Boardwalk.
We were at the Downtown Disney bus stop at 5:00 pm and since the Boardwalk was the last stop of the bus route, we did not get to the Boardwalk until 6:00 pm. The Flying Fish restaurant was a totally different atmosphere, a little stuffy. We made sure to order the crab cakes, which were wonderful, but for $14 each should have been a meal. I had the potato wrapped flounder and Sam had the mahi mahi. The entrees were ok, but weve had better, and there wasnt very much selection on the menu. The interior design was by far the best part of this meal.
Now we needed the fastest way to Magic Kingdom. Our goal is to get to the MK Railroad Station by 8:00 pm to get a front row seat for the parade and fireworks starting at 9:00 pm. We left the Flying Fish at 7:00 pm and decided to walk to the Epcot monorail and take that to the Magic Kingdom. (I would not recommend walking as fast as you can for 15 minutes right after dinner). We arrived at the Magic Kingdom right on time, 8:00 pm.
We rushed upstairs to the train station at took our spot to the right of the castle in front of us. There were already people there who had taken all the tables and chairs and put them front and center. (I told myself there was no way we were going to sit around for over an hour waiting for a parade and fireworks, so I am happy we at least have a spot in front). Sam went to find a funnel cake for dessert, which we found out at MGM studios that the only places you can get funnel cake in Walt Disney World is the American Adventure in Epcot or Liberty Square in Magic Kingdom. (We spent a day and a half just looking for funnel cake!) I put the camera case to my left to reserve a spot at the railing for Sam. After a while, a family with 3 children came bounding up to the railing and nearly stepped on the bag. I told them politely, but loudly to be careful and not step on the bag. (We got here an hour early and we are not giving up our spot!) Sam finally came back with his prize. By now the railing was packed and we squeezed into our spots. Finally, it became dark and the parade began. Wow. A lot of work must have gone into all of those floats! The camera pictures on night scene mode did not turn out as well because the floats didnt stop moving, so the lights were blurred. The fireworks were awesome, but we should have moved down in front of the flag pole for a better view. Whose idea was it to plant 4 trees in the middle of the square? They were blocking our view of the Castle and some of the fireworks. Additionally, Disney did not turn the building lights off at our end of Main street during the fireworks. This pretty much ruined any pictures and was somewhat distracting. I understand they do it for safety, I just wish we would have known that earlier. They turned out all the lights for the parade . Tonight, the bus transportation board read that there were two bus stops for the All Star Movies resort. Hmm, was this due to our complaint or just a coincidence? Anyway, we were using the All Star Music bus, and all the buses came at the same time anyway. We got to the Magic Kingdom bus station at 10:30 pm and arrived at our hotel at about 11:30 pm.
Day 7 5/16/06 Tuesday
Today is our transition day from the Disney All Star Movies Resort to the Hilton Grand Vacations Club. We have 3 more theme parks to visit that are not related to Disney, so we thought we would save some money and stay out side WDW. We decided to pack-up and check out first thing. We had breakfast at the All Star Movies cafeteria. I had a banana nut muffin and orange juice, Sam had milk, banana and a croissant. After breakfast, we checked out and gave our luggage to the bell hop holding it until we came back in the afternoon with our rental car. We tried the All Star Movie bus stop today, and it took only 10 minutes for the bus to Epcot to show up. Unfortunately, the people already in line had been waiting 20 minutes and they were grumbling. It seems like several buses for other theme parks in Disney had come twice over, but no Epcot bus. At the bus stop at 9:45 am, arrived at Epcot at 10:30 am.
We had an hour to kill before our lunch reservation at the Garden Grill at 11:40 am. It was a rainy day today. We had not checked out the Living Seas pavilion yet. The exhibits were ok, but nothing compared to Sea World or some of the other aquariums weve been too. We think maybe Disney should leave the underwater stuff to Sea World and concentrate more on future-themed exhibits. We got to the Land Pavilion at 11:30 am and we were seated for lunch quickly. We had a very leisurely lunch in the rotating restaurant. Mickey Mouse, Chip and Dale, and Pluto were the characters on hand today. We saw them at least 3 times. They were very funny and we had a good time interacting with them. Even though it was raining outside, I thought it would be much more crowded for lunch, but it was not very busy. After lunch we were trying to figure out the best way to pick up the rental car at the Dolphin hotel, very close to Epcot, and going to Disney Quest at Downtown Disney. We decided that the bus ride to Downtown Disney would take too long and waist a bunch of our time today, so we decided to walk over to the Dolphin hotel to pick up our rental car.
It was raining outside, so we put on our ponchos and started the trek. At the International Gateway, we caught a boat the rest of the way to the Dolphin hotel. It was nice to be under some shelter from the rain! We easily found the car rental desk and had our car in less time than it took waiting for a bus! Wow, now this is heaven! We drove over to Downtown Disney with such ease! The teller at the Disney Quest ticket window said it would be crowded today. Sam really wanted to check out the virtual reality games inside, so we purchased tickets anyway. We went inside and we thought it was hardly crowded! We started on the 5th floor and worked our way down. When we finished the 4th floor, we went back to All Star Movies to get our luggage and check into our new hotel. Wow! Our new hotel room was more like a villa! Full kitchen, washer/dryer, whirlpool bathtub, balcony with great view. Now this is being on vacation! We canceled our dinner reservations at Marrakesh and decided to eat at Planet Hollywood. The food was ok, not worth the price, but the interior was awesome! After dinner, we went back to Disney Quest to finish the remaining floors. We loved playing video games without having to insert coins all of the time. We had a great time playing skee-ball and air hockey. Loved the Jungle Cruise and Pirates of the Caribbean. GREAT cheesecake from the Cheesecake Factory which we took back to our new hotel and ate on the balcony. If we visit Orlando again, we will definitely stay outside of Walt Disney World and have a rental car.
With a car, I feel like one of the locals!
