The 3 Girls Do Disney President's Week! A TR with Tons of Pics! *UPDATE* DONE!!!

Great trip report coming here, I just finished reading it and enjoying the pictures, it's really awesome. Glad that you had a great time. Looking forward in hearing more from you.

Thank you so much! I hope you'll stay tuned for Epcot and a couple MK days!!! ;)
 
Day 4 -- Epcot

I must say that Epcot sorta overwhelms me. I know to get to Soarin' first, and I knew we had ADRs for LeCellier for 7-something. I thought we'd do future world, then work our way through the countries starting in Mexico, then ending in Canada for our dinner. It sounded like a good plan to me, but it sorta came a little unraveled somehow. We had a really fun day, despite the deviation! Here's Lily at ASMovies, before we headed out...

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It was early EMH at Epcot this day, so the PLAN was to get there at 8am. Well, I think the long days were starting to wear us down a little, because we didn't get to Epcot till 9:30am! :scared1: So much for magic hours! Now everyone that was there for those was there, along with the rest of the world! Oh well, onward!

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We headed straight to Soarin' for fastpasses. Here's what the FP area looked like...

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Standby was 60 minutes at this time, and our FP return wasn't till 1:57pm. Yikes! I was hoping to be in the World Showcase by then. Oh well, what are ya gonna do? I couldn't see being all the way over in China and having to go back, so we were seriously playing it by ear at this point.

I knew I wanted to go on Living With the Land. On our last trip, my BIL, who's family has a farm, wanted to go on the greenhouse ride. I was like, um, okay. But we all really liked it. So, since it was right there, we got in line. It's a very fast-moving line, and we got on in about 10 min.

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Next we headed over to Nemoland and jumped in line there. It was posted as a 20 min wait, which seemed about right.

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It's a pretty cute ride, we enjoyed it. I was in my own clam-mobile and Lily and Mom rode together. After the ride, we stopped over to see Bruce.

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There was a wait to get the pic with Bruce! I bet we waited 10 min, but I didn't get one last time, and Lily really wanted one!

We had a little bit of a meltdown because Lily really wanted to check out the Nemo gift shop, but I didn't care to because we weren't going to buy anything anyway. Lily is a gift-shop queen, and I just wasn't feeling it. I told her to go ahead and look, but she didn't want to without me (probably because how could I buy her anything if I wasn't there with her!) Neither of us cared for Turtle Talk with Crush last time :confused3, so Lily wanted to skip that. She was so irritated with me for a few after that! At least I got her to pose for a couple pics...

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I think we were all a little cranky, because the next few minutes was a total cluster. It was 11am, and I thought we should do an early lunch, and I thought Sunshine Seasons would be a good choice since we were close. I could totally understand that Mom thought we should try a country, since I'm sure the food in the countries is the best at Epcot. Well, I suggested UK for fish and chips since it was relatively close to where we were, and so we agreed to that. I was totally up for it. We got over there, and the fish place wasn't open till 11:30am. We didn't really feel like waiting, so then Mom suggested Sunshine Seasons after all. As if Epcot isn't enough walking, I felt like we KEPT walking back and forth. Then Mom kept sprinting ahead so she could use her blackberry and call about work or whatever, blah blah blah. At least the weather was nice!

We headed BACK into the Land for Sunshine Seasons, and I was hoping we'd get a second wind after some lunch. On the way over there, I got Lily a soft pretzel with cheese since that's what she said she wanted.

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I had a rotisserie pork chop, which I think was an end piece because it was very tough and dry. The carrots and potatoes were good. Mom had a sandwich, and I got Lily the little chicken leg and mashed potatoes, doubting she'd eat it.

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My dessert was the strawberry shortcake I had been wanting to try. Mom had the key lime pie, then also went back for this chocolate thingy. hehe Lily's was the grapes she's holding above, but we all shared everything.

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The strawberry was pretty good, the key lime was too "fluffy", and the chocolate thing was really good! All in all we liked our meal, but I wish we had eaten in a country. :confused3
 
Day 4, cont...

Here's a few more pics from that area. It really is landscaped so beautifully!
Lily writing in her trip journal...

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At some point, we got this blue slushy with a snack credit. Yummy!

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Oh, and here's hidden Mickey Lily found (some water on the ground). Lily has gotten good at spotting these!

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We were all feeling pretty good at this point after eating and hanging out for a bit. Thanks to the DISboards, I knew about Club Cool, and I really wanted to try the Beverly, so we headed over.

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Here's Mom and Lily trying the Beverly. heheheheheehe

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Eewwww, it was really nasty and bitter. Lily did like the Mexican soda. I thought some of them were interesting, but I think America makes the best pop! ;)

I really wanted to try Spaceship Earth, since it was closed for refurb last time we were there. My mom had seen it 20+ years ago and said it was lame. I explained that it had been refurbed, and she said we could if I wanted, but she and Lily didn't seem into it. Oh well, we skipped it. I'm going on it next time no matter what.

At this point, my mom wanted to see Honey, I Shrunk the Audience, but for some reason Lily was totally opposed to it. See what I mean about this day being planned pretty poorly? We were pretty aimless at this point, basically waiting for our Soarin' time. Ugh. Well, we decided Mom would go to her thing, and Lily wanted to check out the character spot. Normally I don't care to wait forever to meet the characters (especially since she'd be meeting most of the same characters as would be at Chef Mickey's later in the week), but I decided what the heck.

We got over there and got in a very long line. Luckily for Lil, it didn't estimate how long, but I bet it was an hour. Eewwww. But Lily had an absolute BLAST meeting the characters. Oh, and during the line, we found out that Donald Duck's middle name is Fauntleroy, which I thought was hysterical. :lmao:

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Day 4, cont...

MICKEY!!!! :love:

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And Donald Fauntleroy Duck. He was going around behind Lily's back and she couldn't figure out what he was doing. The CM (totally playing along), yelled at him, "Get out of her backpack!" hehehe Donald had pulled out her wet wipes. It was too funny!! Look at the CM in the pics, she looks p*&^%d that he was in her backpack and was totally scolding him. :laughing:

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After this, Mom met us here, and it was finally time to head for Soarin'. Even with the FP, it seemed like it took forever to get on!!!

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We got front row, which was awesome! No feet dangling!! This is one of Lily's favorite rides, and we all loved it!

Lily and Mom had no interest in Test Track, and I forgot there was a single rider line, so we decided to skip it. Next time! Also, I hate Mission Space, makes me feel blech. :sick: So instead of heading over Mexico way, we decided to start World Showcase in Canada since we were over that way anyway.
 
Day 4, cont...

World Showcase

I must confess, I think WS is beautiful, but I don't really know how to handle myself in this part of the park. Do I shop/buy stuff? Do I eat? Just look around? I have been to the circlevision Canada movie, which is neat, but I hate standing there for it. Just not into it. So I decided my strategy would be to just try to soak it in.

As we were walking through the UK, we saw Mary Poppins! Lily was in total character mode after the Character Spot, so I decided to let her wait to see whoever she could while I "soaked it in". ;)

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Beautiful gardens in the UK!

Here's a cute shot...

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At this point, Lily was absolutely DYING to pick a pearl in Japan, which is something we had planned to do before our trip. Welllll, as a matter of fact, she was bugging me about it pretty much for the whole day already. So we head to Japan.

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Picking a pearl was a blast. We had so much fun! Lily picked 2, and I picked 1. I let Lily pick an extra one because I wanted to give one to a lady who works in the cafeteria at work. She is such a sweet older lady who never gets to go on any trips, so I always buy her a souvenir when we go on vacation. Anyway, here's our pearls...

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Mine was 7 1/4mm, with a greenish hue, Lily picked a 7mm greenish one for Glo at work, and a 7mm pinkish one for herself. The pinkish one is on the right, if you can tell! We picked out settings for them, which they said would take a 1/2 hour to do, so Lily and Mom went to the gift shop. I stepped outside, and what do you know, I see Jasmine and Aladdin at the edge of Morocco! I run over and get in line, and I was the last one they were taking. I called Mom's cell and told them to come out. While we were waiting, I saw the rudest, most obnoxious reactions to the line being closed, I couldn't believe how people were being! This one lady in particular was actually yelling and arguing with the CM for a LONG time, and her DD looked so embarrassed. Those CMs do NOT get paid enough, I would have lost it on that woman!! :mad: Anyway, we didn't let it ruin our mood, and here are the pics with J and A!

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OMG! I could eat Lily up! What a great report. I just love your writing style!
I feel like I'm there with you guys! :rotfl:
 
Day 4, cont...

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So now our pearls were done. Here are the settings. Lily's of course is the L with the pinkish pearl dangling. We will do this at every trip, it really was fun!

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We found the kaki gori stand, and I had been wanting to try this after hearing about it on the DISboards. We got a rainbow one, which had melon, tangerine, and cherry. YUMMY! Looks like a snowcone, but WAY better!

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Next stop, Germany. I am really going to have to try the Biergarten on our next trip!!

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I love this miniature village. I have always loved miniatures.

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Then who do we see, but Snow White and Dopey. Lily was really digging how many characters she was getting autrographs from, so I was happy to stand in the lines for them. None of them were too bad, maybe 10-15 min.

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Then we went over to China. WS is so pretty!

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And we saw Mulan. Mushu had the day off, I guess...

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We walked through Norway, but unfortunately didn't really have enough time to ride Maelstrom (which had been on my list - haven't tried it yet. It was a 50 min wait), or get schoolbread (also on my list). We were getting tired and were slowly making our way back over to Canada by way of the front of WS.

We did stop and ride the 3 Caballeros (sp) in Mexico. It's a cute ride, and there was no wait. The whole inside of the Mexico pavillion is really cool. My pics were a little blurry, so I'll skip them here.

I did get a beautiful shot after we left Mexico. Epcot is REALLY spectacular at night.

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And one with these great flowers...

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FINALLY it was time for LeCellier. We were just exhausted after this day! And when we got to the restaurant, there was a really long wait. We had gotten there 15 min early for our 7:05pm ADR, and we waited till almost 7:30 to be seated. It's so small in the entry, and it was getting really chilly outside, so it was cramped and uncomfortable. Super sadly, I was having a camera SNAFU, so I wasn't able to take pics of our meal. I'm sure you've all seen the food there, anyway.

We all absolutely LOVED the pretzel bread. I also really liked the cheese soup. Lily had onion soup, which was okay. No huge gob of melted cheese on top, which is the best part. :laughing: :laughing: :laughing: Mom had the filet with mushroom risotto, I had the strip steak with cream cheese mashed potatoes and spinach augratin, and Lily had the kids grilled steak. For dessert we had the chocolate moose, ice cream, and I think Mom had cheesecake or something. We all agreed the food was awesome here. My steak was perfect!!! I know we will try to go back at some point, but it isn't necessarily a must-do for every trip, I can't really explain why. Maybe I was just so tired, and the wait annoyed me? I don't know. Anyway, it was very good!!!!!!

We had semi-planned to stay for Illuminations, but we were all so tired and cranky by this point, we just decided to head out and beat the crowd to the busses. Which we did. I was sorry to have missed Illuminations, but there's always next trip!

Whew, after an EXTREMELY long day, we went back to the room and crashed immediately. What a day 4!!
 
I'm enjoying reading your TR! I can't believe you can keep up all this energy for these long park days! Great job!
 
Awesome update! I agree that Epcot can be overwhelming to plan.

No joke! I'm seriously going to have to ponder Epcot before our next trip. I know there's a better way than that! We did have fun, but soo tiring! Thanks so much for the post!!!!

OMG! I could eat Lily up! What a great report. I just love your writing style!
I feel like I'm there with you guys!

You are too kind! I was thinking the same thing when I was reading yours!! ;)

I'm enjoying reading your TR! I can't believe you can keep up all this energy for these long park days! Great job!

Thanks for stopping by, Disneychix!!! I'm so glad you are enjoying. I can't believe I could keep up the energy for these long park days, either!!! Honestly I was getting tired by this point, but my mom, the energizer bunny, was making me feel wimpy because my feet hurt. Glad I'm not the only one who thinks this sounds tiring!! ;)
 
Just read more! Wow! Super updates today! :cool1:
WDW mojo going on!

I've never rode Maelstrom either, and I too missed out on the schoolbread. :lmao:


I passed on the shaved Ice in Japan, because I thought it would be just like a snowcone. Now I know to try it. :confused3 Who knew?

I would love to try LeCellar, I don't think my gang would like it at all. Too adventureous for them :sad2:.
 
Just read more! Wow! Super updates today!
WDW mojo going on!

I've never rode Maelstrom either, and I too missed out on the schoolbread.

I passed on the shaved Ice in Japan, because I thought it would be just like a snowcone. Now I know to try it. Who knew?

I would love to try LeCellar, I don't think my gang would like it at all. Too adventureous for them .

Yeah, I was on a roll yesterday!! :rotfl:

Try that shaved ice next time, it's very intensely flavored. The melon is REALLY melony. Is that a word? :rolleyes1

I think your crew might actually like LeCellier, if they like steak and very good mashed potatoes, you're all set. Plenty of other good places to get a steak, though, I guess.

Thanks for sticking with me! I have a pretty brutal work weekend coming up, but I'll get started on our Magic Kingdom days (the best!) asap! ;)
 
And thanks for sticking with me. Yes, my crew loves steak. Hmmm, on Le Cellar now.
 
Loved the pearl idea. How much was it to do? and how much are the settings? TIA

Hi there! :wave2:

The pearl picking was SO much fun, and a must-do for us from now on!! It cost, between $17 and $18 to pick a pearl as I recall. The setting for the "L" was less than $20, and the other 2 were $10. Next time we do it, though, I am going to get a carriage setting that I have seen recently on the boards. A lady said she got hers for E-bay for like $5. It is a Cinderella carriage, and the pearl sits in it. It is BEAUTIFUL!

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OKAY!! After that looonnnggg hiatus, I'm finally ready to start working on Day 5, that is, our first full

Magic Kingdom Day!!!! Wed, 2/18

Don't you hate it when regular life gets in the way of reliving your Disney memories? Anyway, MK!!!

This day, Mom decided she wasn't into heading to the parks early. She wanted to stay back and do some work, which was fine with Lily and me. Better than her making her calls at the Magic Kingdom!!

Lily and I headed out early, and actually managed to get to the park at rope drop!!!! For those of you who don't know, they do a show at park opening where they sing "Good Morning", the train comes in with a bunch of characters on it, and you yell, "OPEN THAT PARK!" It was SOOO fun!

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Woohooooooo!!!!!!!!

I had a plan to go straight to Fantasyland when we got in. Here is everyone pouring into the park. Once we all disbursed it wasn't crowded at all!

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We booked it over to Peter Pan's Flight, and my only regret for the day was that on the way over, behind the castle, we saw Lady Tremaine, Anastasia, and Drizella signing autographs and we didn't stop because I was in such a hurry to get to Fantasyland. In retrospect we had PLENTY of time and that was mean of me to commando past those cool characters. :sad2: What a mean mother. Ugh. If we see them next time, we are stopping no matter what!!!

We did stop for just a moment to get a pic in front of Cinderella's wishing well. That lady was standing there forever and would not get out of my picture!

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We got to Peter Pan's Flight...

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5 minute wait!! We rode, then got a fast pass for later, since it's one of our favorite rides. I knew Mom should ride it later, and once that line gets going, it never lets up!

Next we ran over to Pooh...

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5 minute wait! We stopped at the gift shop and got Lily a stuffed Pooh in his pajamas, because we had dinner at Crystal Palace that night, and we had to show Pooh how much we love him! ;) We also looked for a Dopey mug for our aunt Janie, because she loves Dopey, but we struck out there. (Lily and my mom did end up finding her one at the gift shop at AllStar Movies :). )

Next stop, Snow White's Scary Adventure...

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The standby wait posted was "0" minutes. hahahaha We are LOVING this rope drop thing at this point!!!!

Then we rode It's a Small World...

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I have never understood why lots of my fellow DISers get annoyed by IASW, I have always loved it. But to be honest, this was my 2nd time on it this trip (the first time being on our first night), and it was just a teeny tiny bit annoying! hahaha:rotfl: Now if I keep going to Disney every year as I'm planning, I bet by 2012 I won't be able to take it anymore!!! heheheh

So there you have it. Fantasyland in 1/2 hour! Granted, we didn't ride Dumbo, the teacups, or the carousel, but not too shabby!!!

A couple more pics of Fantasyland.

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Such a cute area!!!

Lily and I were getting hungry at this point, and no trip for us is complete without a trip to Sleepy Hollow, so we headed over to Liberty Square to have a super-healthy breakfast...

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Mmmmm, funnel cake, tinkerbell twist, and a cappuchino float. Lily REALLY likes ordering the tinkerbell twist, but it is really sour, and after drinking 1/3 of it she was done. The cappuchino float was super-duper yummy, but I didn't really want all that ice cream in the morning, but we suffered through it (:rolleyes: ), then when it was down into the cup, it was really good all mixed up with the coffee. This was 3 snack credits on the dining plan.
 
Day 5, cont...

After our refreshing, light breakfast :lmao: we cruised over past the Haunted Mansion. It was a 10 minute wait. OMG!! Now Lily was not wanting to ride it, because she knew we would have to ride it again when my mom finally got there, but I begged her, saying, "Please don't deprive me of this chance to ride haunted mansion with a 10 minute wait!!!" She gave in, and we rode!!!

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I took the pic on the way out, and by then the posted wait was 20 min. Lily was pretty funny on this trip. She didn't think the haunted mansion was that scary this time, and with everything she thought was less scary, she kept saying, "Oh, they changed it since last time". Like on the haunted mansion, she thought the scary guy's voice was quieter (that was the part that freaked her the most on our first trip). I told her nothing has really changed, she's just older and braver this year, but she is convinced that they changed a lot of the rides to make them less scary! :laughing:

Next we headed over to Frontierland to get some fast passes for Splash Mountain. I knew she wouldn't go on it (she went on our last trip after being bribed, and HATED it!), so I got 2 fast passes for myself for later when Mom got there. I doubted Mom would want to ride it, either. They don't know what they are missing! I LOVE that ride!

When we got to Splash, there was a 20 minute stand-by wait, and I tried the "PLEASE don't deprive me of the chance to ride Splash with a 20 minute wait" plea, but she wasn't falling for it this time! I tried! :confused3 So I grabbed the fast passes and we headed over to Adventureland to ride Pirates!!!

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10 minute wait!! I was in heaven with these short wait times!! Man, is that a great ride. Thankfully, they didn't ruin it at ALL with the addition of the stuff from the movie. Certainly doesn't hurt to see Captain Jack a few times! Lily gets really freaked by the part where they are shooting the cannons, and she was bent over blocking her eyes at that part. Ironically, a huge puff of air "hit" her on the back, as if she got shot by a cannon. I have never noticed that happening before! She was fine, though, as soon as we got out of that area.

I think at that point it was 11-11:30am or so, and Mom called and said she'd be heading over soon. So Lily and I decided we had time to ride Aladdin's Magic Carpets...

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There's that Pooh we had gotten earlier.

The line for Aladdin was long, I think about 30-40 minutes, which makes sense because of how it loads. I had never ridden it and was not that excited about it, but it turned out to be really fun. You get a nice view, and it was very relaxing. I was thinking I wouldn't mind hanging out up there for about a 1/2 hour. The lady with her kid in front of us told us her son likes to go up and down a lot, "hope that's okay". I didn't know what she meant, then I realized the people in the front are in control of how much up/down action your car does. Innnteresting! He was little, so we weren't up/downing tooo much, all good. I think Lily was jealous, maybe a little p*^%^d that SHE didn't get to control it, but oh well. We were having SUCH A MAGICAL DAY!!!

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After the ride, we hung out in that area for a little bit waiting for Mom, thinking she'd be coming very soon since we waited all that time for Aladdin. Lily enjoyed trying to get spit on by the camel.

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And I enjoyed watching unsuspecting people getting spit on by the camel. It is TOO funny watching people who aren't expecting it!!!

After watching that for a few, we headed back over to the area where Splash Mountain and Pecos Bill's is, because being in that area, I thought that would be a good counter service lunch. Lily was hoping for some fries with cheese sauce like at Cosmic Ray's, and I knew they have a similar topping bar at Pecos Bills, so I figured we could get that. When we got back over there, I called Mom, and she was not even on the bus yet. Arrrgghhh! So we just waited around. Sometime during this waiting around, Lily lost her backpack with her jacket and her autograph book!!!!:scared1: More about that later...

FINALLY! Mom shows up. I was a little snarky, because I was super-duper tired by this point and my whole eat-lunch-early strategy was out the window. She gets there at 12:30pm, ready for lunch! OMG, has the woman learned nothing from my touring strategy thus-far?

Well, we go in to Pecos Bills, and they are routing us through the restaurant all the way over to El Pirata y El Perico. Apparently Pecos Bills is closed for refurb, but you couldn't tell, you just thought you went the wrong way. It took us a few to figure it out. El Pirata was SWAMPED, ridiculous, and all they had was burgers (no topping bar, nothing special at all). Weirdly I thought we saw some people with taco salads over on the other side, so I have no idea what the heck was up. But by this time I was pretty irritated.

We walked out of there and saw a little stand called "The Outpost". They were serving mostly chicken stuff. The line was LONG! My mom, bless her arrive-at-12:30pm-ready-to-eat-lunch heart, offered to stand in the line, and Lily and I went in Pecos Bills and got a nice quiet dark table (they were still letting you sit in there). It only took about 15 minutes for her to wait in the line, and by that time I was nice and relaxed and feeling a LOT better. She came back with this stuff...

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This was a really OUTSTANDING chicken sandwich.

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Mom's was I think a veggie wrap of some kind. She liked it.

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I'm not sure where the pic of Lily's chicken nuggets went, but I'm sure that's what she got. Then we got fries, apple slices, and choc chip cookies. This was 3 counter service meals.

Now when I was scouring the DISboards trying to decide on good counter service meals at the parks, the Outpost certainly didn't cross my radar. I was pleasantly surprised, though. The food was very good, and it was nice to sit in the nice, dark, quiet Pecos Bills and get a rest. OKAY, feeling MUCH better!!
 
Day 5, cont...

By this point, it was almost 1:30-2pm, and I thought we should maybe just go and find a good spot for the parade, which started at 3pm. After what an amazing time we had at the Animal Kingdom parade, I thought it would be worth it to stake out a good spot for this one as well. We headed over to Liberty Square and got a spot in front of Ye Olde Christmas Shoppe. I spied an area where we could sit on the border of a landscaped area, but they kicked us out because it was a handicapped area. :confused3

We moved down and still had a great spot, and it was around this time that we discovered the missing BACKPACK. Oh no, Lily was in TEARS, and so was I practically, because she had so painstakingly spent all that time at Epcot yesterday getting ALL those autographs, not to mention the ones she got from Animal Kingdom! :scared1: :sad1: UGH!!!!

There was still plenty of time before the parade, so I stayed at our spot and Mom and Lily went to try to find it at the restaurant. NO LUCK. :sad2: They came back empty-handed, which REALLY bummed me out. But Mom did ask a cast member where the lost and found was, up front at City Hall, and I was fairly certain it would turn up at some point. I was sure anyone who found it would turn it in to someone.

While waiting for the parade, we played a pretty fun game Lily made up. She would say, "Orange pants", then we'd all yell out whenever we saw someone with orange pants. Then we changed it to different colors/articles of clothing, then "Princesses" (as in little girls dressed up). It passed the time and was fun. AND got our minds off the backpack. You can find someone with just about any color/article of clothing if you're looking! :rotfl:

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Soon enough, it was time for the PARADE!!!!

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Okay, now we are parade lovers, and Lily and I LOVED the previous Dreams Come True parade (especially the song). We were bummed to find out ahead of time (from the DIS, of course), that they had changed it. I was determined to give this new parade a fair shot, though, so I was all open-minded.

The verdict -- this new parade is NOT my favorite. For some unknown reason, it stops for a LONG time for these dancers to do a long, boring dance. Luckily, we were at the spot where it stopped, so we got to see the whole long, boring dance. But I don't know what the people just ahead must be thinking while this long, boring dance is going on, stopping the parade. So annoying! I just do NOT get it. :confused3 :confused3 :confused3

Here are the people doing the long, boring dance. It was really kinda freaky because you could see them sweating, and their facial expressions, I felt awkward because they were right in front of us for sooo long. Just weird!

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Finally that was over and the rest of the parade could continue!!

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Those were some of my better pics of the parade. After the dancers, the rest of the parade was nice, similar to the old one, but I missed the people on bikes, and especially the song. Oh well, one that could easily be skipped till they update it again!
 
Day 5, cont...

After the parade, we decided to split up so I could head back to Splash Mountain to use my fast passes, and Lily and Mom could go back to Fantasyland and use the fast passes we had gotten for Peter Pan's Flight, then do whatever else they wanted to do over there.

After we split up, I could not get that dang backpack out of my mind, so I decided to ask around. I asked a lady at a little kiosk close to where we had been, and she said, excitedly, "was it a little drawstring pink bag with a jacket and an autograph book in it?" YES, THAT's IT! She told me the people who found it turned it in at the pirates gift shop. I headed to the pirates gift shop, and sure enough they had had it, but they had already taken it up to City Hall. DARN the luck, but at least I knew where it was!

I could have just waited to collect it later, but I wasn't going to relax about it till it was back in my hands, so I decided to walk up front and get it, then take the train right from the front of the park back to Frontierland. Before heading to the front, I snagged a couple fast passes for the Jungle Cruise (I had Lily and my tickets to get 2). Walked up front, got the backpack, got on the train, and it dropped me off right next to Splash! What a great plan! Thanks, DISer who gave me the tip about riding the train from the front of the park to Splash!

Here is a pic of the castle from Main Street at about 4pm.

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FINALLY, it was time to use my Splash Mountain fast passes!

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VERY fun ride, but I got SOAKED by those jets at the beginning of the ride, not even by the hill. For some reason, after the first ride, I wasn't really in the mood to use my other fast pass. I guess I was probably anxious to let Lily know I found her backpack!

I called Mom, and they were just finishing up in Fantasyland (they rode Peter Pan, the teacups a couple times, and It's a Small World), so I suggested we meet up at the Haunted Mansion and ride that (again, for Lil and me!). On my way over there, I took what I think is a brilliant pic of the Haunted Mansion from somewhere in Frontierland (I think)!!

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We rode, and the posted wait was 20 minutes. Not too bad for that time of day! The ride was just as much fun the 2nd time!

Next we headed back to Adventureland. Jeez, a lot of back and forthing, I'm getting tired just writing about it!! Well, we wanted to make sure Mom got to ride some of her faves, even though she slacked and didn't come with us in the morning! But at least Lily and I got to ride some of the greats twice, so it was worth it.

Lily and Mom decided to go up in the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse.

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I don't remember what the snarky face was about, but Lily really LOVED the Treehouse. I skipped it because I was REALLY tired, my feet hurt, and the thought of huffing it up the tree did not really appeal. After they went up, Lily kept talking about wanting to live in a treehouse like that, which is exactly how I felt about it when I was a kid. I was so glad she had fun and her full-of-energy Nana took her up!

I think it was at this point that I was starting to feel sinusy/yucky/run down/exhaused. But I was able to keep going fine. We headed to the Jungle Cruise for the girls to use the fast passes I had scored before getting the backpack. Great idea on my part, I must say, because that line is always long. I think the stand-by time was 50 or 60 minutes! :scared1:

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I was more than happy to let those 2 have the fast passes, because last time I rode the cruise director really got on my nerves. I'm sure it was just him, and I will definitely go on it again, but I wasn't heartbroken to miss it. The girls enjoyed it.

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Next we headed back to Pirates and rode it again, with a 10 minute wait.

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My mom bought Lily a pair of pirate Mickey Ears in the pirate gift shop.

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Mom and Lily went back up the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse (at Lily's request), then we hung out and watched the night come on in Adventureland. It was a cool vibe.

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