Day 6 Monday July 17th.
Look for the bare necessities
The simple bare necessities
Forget about your worries and your strife
I mean the bare necessities
Old Mother Natures recipes
That brings the bare necessities of Life.
.
And dont spend your time lookin around
For something you want that cant be found
When you find out you can live without it
And go along not thinkin about it
Ill tell you something true
The bare necessities of life will come to you
______________
Today we move over to Old Key West. I love all the DVC properties even though we arent DVC owners
..yet. I wish. In my dreams. If only we could win the lottery then AD couldnt object.
When you wish upon a star
.
We are staying in a one bedroom so that means extra supplies for a full sized refrigerator! A trip to Publix is in order.
BUT
..I must resist the urge to buy copious amounts of the breakfast food of choice by a good percentage of DISers
poptarts.
The Happyhaunts put me on to this. I need to stick to the bare necessities!
But before we checkout of our luxurious hotel in the sky, its EMH at MGM!
And DD wants to ride Rock n Roll and Tower of Terror. BP*
(*before poptarts)
So like the good Disney family that we are, we rise very early
and head over to MGM for 8am.
We drove over and guess what? We had to pay for parking! We werent staying on site so we had to pay. The CM explained that the DTDHilton isnt on property, blah, blah, blah! We were there for EE, which only on-property guests can partake. It was too early to present this argument, so we paid. No worries......AD loves to give Disney his cash, so this will make him happy, right?
The curse of the sort-of-on-site, off site hotel!
We entered MGM just before 8am (they did check our resort keys) and headed to the rope drop to follow the crowd to R&R and TofT. This is where EVERYONE that is there for EMH goes! Its kind of like a stampede. The only thing that was missing was a sheep dog jumping on the backs of people to get ahead of the crowd.
DD decided it was to be Tower of Terror first.
I really dont do elevators
..you see I have this reoccurring elevator dream. Im in a elevator much like the great glass elevator in Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and it turns into a roller coast. Im not kidding. I had these even before I ever saw CCACF.
Im not really sure what it means, but to me it means I dont do elevators. Thus, the Tower of Terror is my greatest nightmare! You couldnt pay me enough to go on that thing. But DD was chanting all the way, (reminiscent of Sponge Bob)......"I'm ready, I'm ready, I'm ready"
DS and I went over to R& R to get fastpasses and went back to wait for the adventurous elevator riders! You can actually go through the dump
..oops, I mean gift shop at the exit to where the cash grab
.ooops ride photos are and sit there and wait.
Suffice it to say that DD didnt lose her poptarts, but almost. She christened it the Tower of Barf.
AD had no comment, except he had to find the smoking area
.fast. As luck would have it, its conveniently located just beside the area when you are walking to R&R.
We then made our way over to Star Tours because DS is a huge Star Wars fan and it was his turn. It was a walk on since it was still early.
On Star Tours, prior to boarding the CM goes over any important information you need to know. However, our CM must have been speaking Gungan (which is the language of Jar-Jar Binks) because I didnt understand one word of the pre-boarding announcement she made. She wasnt mumbling, she was speaking clearly, but mesah no understand what sa was saying? Maybe it was part of the show. I dont know. But I doubt it. Not a good Disney moment.....
Anyway, we all rode and it was fun. DS loved it and wanted to ride again so off they went. Simulators are on the, "OK for me to ride but just once, thanks" list. So, I hung out at the dump
..ooops I mean gift shop to look for some cool stuff for DSs next birthday.
Next was a visit to the smoking area across from Star Tours. To keep AD happy.
We were all getting a little hungry and since it was still breakfast time we decided on getting a bite at the ABC Commissary. It was good and I think one of the few places you can get breakfast at MGM.
After our refuel, we headed over to the Muppets, which is getting a little dated, but still funny. I love the old guys in the balcony, but who are they?
Statler and Waldorf. Statler is the taller, thinner one sitting on the right as we look at them in their box. Waldorf's wife is named Astoria. They are all named after old New York hotels.
Thank You.
We were in full preparation mode for our next show, Who Wants to be a Millionaire and you never know if the Muppets will come up as a WWTBAM question.
Millionaire is a great show and unfortunately for us we only played it once before. It is sadly coming to an end in August. So I was stoked. I wanted to get in the hot seat real bad. I studied up on the Zurgs helpful hints on Millionaire and was ready.
It wasnt to be. I did place 6th on the board once, but we only had time for two contestants. Oh well. Back to the computer version for me!
Then back to R & R for our fastpasses.
Or their fastpasses.
There isnt any way in Disney Im stepping foot on that baby. Call me a baby. I dont care. I dont do coasters. And Im perfectly happy to be the one to sit and watch and the stuff.
Thats me. Im very popular with my coaster riding friends. No need for lockers, strollers or scooters.........to store your stuff. I'm there!
I dont have to ride. And Im OK with that.
DS didnt want to ride either, so he waited with me. It was taking quite awhile even with the FPs so we decided to check out the dump
..ooops I mean gift shop and watch the cash grab
..ooops ride pictures for AD and DD.
AD loved it! DD on the other hand needed a smoke
.fast!
After R & R it was getting pretty toasty out and we had to check out of the Hilton, so we decided to leave.
Once out of the Hilton, we headed over to Publix for the bare necessities and a few cell phone calls from aisle 3 to aisle 10 by way of Canada!
Then to Old Key West to check in.
We really like OKW and it was our second visit, but ADs first. When planning the trip a lot of thought was put into which on site hotel to stay keeping in mind ADs on-site quirk!
AD is an avid golfer, so we decided a nice golf view at OKW would do it. No food courts, nice and quite. And a full service kitchen, plus washer and dryer. I contacted my DVC friend and rented points from him to lessen the strain on the wallet. AD will be pleased.
When we arrived, our room wasnt ready so the nice CM gave us some alternate choices. I really wanted the golf view, so we decided to wait. We were also taking advantage of the
Disney Dining Plan for this part of the stay, so she happily gave us our room key with our
DDP credits. We decided to get a bite at Goods to Go.
I, of course had read all about the DDP and decided to conserve credits by sharing lunches. Believe me, you get ample food and this works well for us because we arent big eaters and rarely eat desert.
After lunch and an adult beverage at the Pool bar while the kids checked out the arcade, we decided to see if our room was ready.
I wanted to change our ADR for that night and Customer Service didnt appear busy only one person ahead of me so I got in line. I waited, and waited and waited and waited. No movement! The lady ahead of me almost passed out from the wait.
I know you all know, but please people if you decide to plan your whole trip to the finest detail, do some of it ahead of time. Try the internet. Thats what we are here for! Or use the phone. There are more people to assist you. Both families were planning full 7 day itineraries right there! They were Disney newbies!!!
I know, because I listened! (I do that sometimes
..
)
I invested way too much time at this point to leave the line, and the medics had arrived to resessitate the lady waiting in front of me (only kidding) so I continued to wait and wait and wait
until our room was ready.
Fellow DISers you would have be proud of me when it was my turn. Cancelled and re-booked my ADR in approximately 20 seconds. This was partly because the CM was an accomplished typist. Also because I knew what I wanted BEFORE I got in line.
I think I heard applause after I walked away from the counter.
Sooooo, we got to our golf-course-AD-approved room and relaxed for a bit.
Dinner plans were to visit Jiko that night. I was excited because our first family Disney trip was shortly after The Animal Kingdom Lodge opened and AD and I have been to Jiko. It is one of my favourite all time restaurants.
We arrived at AKL just before our ADR time. Refilled our old mugs and went for a swim
.only kidding.
Just trying to keep you awake!
As mentioned we love Jiko. We love the CMs at the AKL. They are so interesting to talk to. We love the food, the wine, the atmosphere! And we had a extra-ordinary fabulous meal.
For two DD credits per person.
Confession time: We actually paid cash for the kids. They dont eat much. If this bothers you even a little, consider this: Disney knows. Despite the many threads regarding this issue, believe me they have worked it out. They are wwwaaayyyy ahead of the game with regard to the DDP. Think big picture. Plus, they got it back
..youll see if you read on to day 9
After dinner we walked around the Lodge and looked at the animals. We met some very interesting CMs from South Africa who chatted with us for a bit about the animals and their home countries.
Tomorrow was going to be an early morning, so we decided to leave and head back to OKW for some happy cokes on the balcony!
Up next: HAPPY DISNEY BIRTHDAY TO THE ANTI-DISNEY!!
I also did the na-na-na-boo-boo too! Especially at Soarin'. 
!!
