April 16, 2010
Day 6, Part 4 In Which We Invent The Head Spinning Stomach Turning EPCOT Future World Challenge!!!
After Illuminations, we excitedly headed to Future World for Epcot's evening Extra Magic Hours. The park was open until midnight. As I've said before, we absolutely swear by EMH nights. When I am planning our trips I try and do as many as possible. I know a lot of people experience large crowds, but it's always been the complete opposite for us. We often feel like we have free reign of the park. I'm sure it's not the same during peak season, but in April or October, EMH has always been the most fun time to be at the parks. The best night we EVER had during EMH was actually the last night of the very trip you are reading about... but that's another story for another day!
Mom really wanted to ride Soarin' (she hadn't been on since 2006!), but I said it would be smarter to head there later on in the night, because that would probably be the one ride with more of a wait earlier on and I knew the fastpasses would be all out. Instead, we went straight to The Seas With Nemo & Friends to visit our pal the Frogfish!
Remember him? We love him so dearly. As soon as we get to Epcot next trip, I am going to run to the Seas and hope I find him there!
Of course first we rode the Nemo ride and of course I cried. Again. That attraction just gets me every time, but I won't get into why since I'm pretty sure I already went on and on about that a few chapters back.
Next, we headed over to Test Track and Mission Space. They were both basically walk-ons. Oh, let me tell you, we had fun with that. And I mean a lot of fun. We created the epic craziness that I later named "The Head Spinning, Stomach Churning Epcot Future World Challenge!" I don't recommend it for the faint of heart. Basically the HSSCEFW Challenge goes like this: Test Track twice in a row, then Mission Space, then back to Test Track, and Mission Space again. CAN YOU HANDLE IT? Probably not, but you know, not everyone can be as awesome as us
We didn't plan to do it, or plan to actually NAME what we were doing, it was just crazy, fun, aimless running back and forth. Bless our crazy thrill seeking selves!! We walked out of Mission: Space that second time and just immediately headed over to the benches and sat down without saying a word to each other. LOL! After a few seconds of sitting in silence (we must have looked traumatized!) we just looked at each other and started cracking up laughing. It was so insanely fun that there was really nothing to say. We just laughed. It would not be the last time on this trip that we had so much fun that we were just completely speechless and just lost it with laughter.
After recuperating on the bench for awhile, I suddenly got hungry so I went over to a nearby kiosk to get some of that delicious Disney popcorn I dream about when I'm home (Did you know you can buy it online? I haven't done it yet, I feel like it won't be the same). It tastes the best on Main Street, but of course at Epcot it's scrumptious too. There was a really nice guy from Japan working at the kiosk and he told me I should wait about 10 minutes so a new batch of popcorn could be made. There was still a lot of popcorn in the machine though, so I said I would just have that. He again told me I should wait, so I said, "Is the popcorn in there stale or something?" He told me no, but it would be better to have it fresh. Well, I guess I was really hungry or something because I told him to just give me the popcorn that had been sitting there. I tasted it and it was fine so I paid and went back over to the bench where my mom was. I told her the whole thing while we ate a bit of the popcorn and then I put it down on the bench for a second. Suddenly a gust of wind came by and the popcorn went flying! LOL! If you recall, the same thing happened to me at MK a few days before! Unfortunately, this time no adorable ducklings came by to eat the popcorn. My mom said, "See... you should have waited the fresh popcorn!"
I turned around and the CM at the kiosk had seen the whole thing and was laughing! He motioned me over and by now the fresh popcorn was almost done. He said, "See... you should have just waited for the fresh batch! This one will be so much better." He refilled it for no charge and you know what, he was right... it was super hot and fresh and tasty and delicious! Patience is a virtue - lesson learned!
After we ate our fresh new popcorn, we headed to Mouse Gears to look around a bit. I have a soft spot for this place because on my solo trip, it was pouring rain and I was walking really briskly through Epcot when my shoe broke! I walked my wobbly, wet, trainwreck with one shoe on behind over to Mouse Gears and bought black glittery Mickey Mouse flip flops. They became my favorite flip flops and I wear them all the time - of course, I was also wearing them this night at Epcot. They are super comfortable and I just adore them.
It was getting really late so we went over to The Land to finally ride Soarin'. I was right, the line had died down big time and there was only a 10 minute wait. My mom was really excited because she didn't remember a lot of details about the ride. She remembered loving it, but not much else. I didn't want to hype it up too much but I did tell her that many people consider this their favorite ride at WDW since I hear that all the time on the DIS.
Unfortunately, we weren't in the front row for the ride - I have to remember to ask if we can wait for front row next time cause it's truly the best - but it was still incredible. I don't care how many times I ride Soarin', it will never ever get old. It leaves me amazed and floored every single time and makes me REALLY want to hang glide in real life. Have any of you ever done that? It must be so scary but I am not one to live life in fear of things so I want to go for it!
At this point, the park was closed so we slowly meandered out. There was almost no one around. I wish I had taken a pic of empty Epcot, but I was just soooo tired even with my afternoon nap. I have no pictures from this entire night and the next morning. It had been quite a night, and quite a trip! I couldn't wait to get back to Pop and put my head on that pillow.
As we boarded the bus, an Epcot CM standing nearby said something so cute to us that I immediately had to tweet it:
Watch your favorite movie tonight: the one on your eyelids. 12:22 AM Apr 17th via txt
Up next: Mayhem at another early Toy Story Mania morning plus a lot of running around and World Showcasing...
4 months, Kara, 4 months...
Great update.....2013 is so far away!!
. It doesn't help that I'm going through my OMG WHEN DID I GET SO OLD AND OMG I DON'T KNOW WHAT I WANT TO DO WITH MY LIFE AND OMG WHY DOES LIFE SUCK SO BAD SOMETIMES phase, so all I wanna do is re-live the late 90s/early 00s glory days.
A Goofy Movie! Love it! 
.
Maybe I should. I worked for a movie theater for a year and I'm still kinda burned out on it. I wanna do the HSSCEFW Challenge next time I'm there! 
