Too much BBQ on the menu! An Aug 2018 Trip Report *Day 4 continued - 8/14*

[Leesha.Monster]

Following along! Can’t wait to read more. We went in August too! We were at the Poly from the 16-24th.

 

[MinnieWebster]

Following along.

Look how quick I caught up, pretty proud of myself lol! But omg I'm tired just thinking of your travel day I'm all for starting my first Disney day early, but I don't think anyone would have gotten me up again at 6:30. Props to you and DH!

Easy to catch up when I take a month between updates It's terrible. Meant to post several days ago.
I really didn't think it would go well, with flying in the night before and not actually sleeping, but maybe it was the excitement of being at Disney that kept us awake.

Following along! Can’t wait to read more. We went in August too! We were at the Poly from the 16-24th.

Nice! We had a good trip, hope you did too!

 

[MinnieWebster]

As promised, here's our ride photo for EE:
DH makes some pretty funny faces Oh, and we were seated in the second row!!

So after our ride on EE, we went back over to KRR and stored our bag in a locker. Standby wait said 50 minutes, so we scanned our bands to use one of our anytime FP. Good ride, didn't get too wet this trip. Once we got back to the loading zone, the CM asked if everyone on the raft wanted to ride again!! Everyone did, so we kept our seats and headed down the river once more. So fun. DH and I enjoy riding KRR as much as we can when there's not a super long line, but it gets long, especially in the hot FL summers So we were excited by the surprise second ride.
After that trip, we went back to the entrance to scan our planned FP and ride again!! Yay!!

Around 11:30, we were pretty hungry, so we decided to use a couple snack credits to get the chicken fried rice at Yak & Yeti

...These seemed a lot smaller than we remembered from previous trips... Tasty, but not as good a value for a snack credit as we were hoping, given the size.

We then headed over to see if we could make it in time for the 12:00 Nemo. I enjoy this show, DH usually ends up napping. Although I think he managed to stay awake this time, surprisingly, considering how long the day had already been at that point.


Then we headed over to Dinosaur, to take a ride on the Time Rover. Standby wait time was posted at 35 minutes, which was longer than we like to wait for this one. I reminded DH that we still had another anytime FP that we could use, so we scanned our bands and headed inside.

Apparently DH thought he was going to fight off the dino, if you can see him in the far back corner of the Time Rover

We were getting hungry again, and had planned on Flame Tree BBQ for lunch, so we stopped there next. We used a meal credit and ordered the:
Ribs, Chicken and Pulled Pork Sampler
Smoked Ribs, Chicken and Pulled Pork served with Signature Baked Beans and Coleslaw
and picked an alcoholic beverage,
Mandarin Orange Vodka Lemonade
featuring Skyy Mandarin Orange Vodka with ripe flavors of Tangerine and Lemon Zest
And we used a snack credit for an order of french fries with pulled pork and cheese.

The Vodka Lemonade was sooo good. Really enjoyed it! This was a ton of food! I love the fries, the meat was mostly okay. I didn't think the ribs had much flavor, certainly not much barbecue. The chicken and the pulled pork were okay. DH ate the beans and coleslaw.

Next up, It's Tough to be a Bug!
He's such a goof!
He really likes this show, so I tolerate it for him. I don't sit back against the seat-back, and I usually close my eyes when Hopper is using the flyswatter but I do find it funny when everyone starts screaming when all of the bugs leave the theater first

Up next, one of my favorite attractions at AK. But I like sharing pics of that one, so I'm going to end this update here. I'll try not to let another 10 days pass by before the next update, but no promises. Traveling next weekend for a Celebration of Life for my grandmother who passed away last week. And the weather is supposed to be really nice this weekend, so we are going to try to get some stuff done outside this weekend.
Hope everyone has a good Friday!!

 

[disneyAndi14]

We never ride KRR, Andi doesn’t like getting wet, I really like it, my son got his precious Jordan Nike’s wet once on it and you would have thought it was the end of the world

I secretly love how scared some get in ITTBB! I love this attraction

Yummy loaded fries from Flame Tree, we liked those too!

 

[hjeick]

Great start! not sure I could sleep at the airport...but good way to get to rope drop.

 

[MinnieWebster]

We never ride KRR, Andi doesn’t like getting wet, I really like it, my son got his precious Jordan Nike’s wet once on it and you would have thought it was the end of the world

I secretly love how scared some get in ITTBB! I love this attraction

Yummy loaded fries from Flame Tree, we liked those too!

We like it, especially on the hot summer days. It's a nice way to cool off. DH always plans on wearing his sandals on days we go to AK, for that exact reason. So his sneakers don't get wet

Great start! not sure I could sleep at the airport...but good way to get to rope drop.

I really didn't think it would work out when DH said he wanted to fly down the night before, but I managed to get more rest than he did. And rope drop was successful, so it worked out well

 

[MinnieWebster]

You mean we're still at Animal Kingdom?? This is such a long day!!

But long days at Disney mean lots done at Disney And you can't beat that!!

After the fun of ITTBAB, we headed back to Africa to get in line for the 3pm show of FotLK. This is one of my favorite shows at WDW, and we wanted to fit it in at least twice, so that meant watching it the first day. Even though timing wasn't very good and we entered the standby line over 30 minutes before showtime. Which meant a very long wait standing in the heat packed tightly with a bunch of other people
Eventually we made it inside, yay!



I love watching this guy. So impressive!!

Love this show so much! The musical is coming to our city next month, and we got tickets to see it one night. I am so excited! I'm sure it will be awesome.

After the show, it was finally time to leave AK. We stopped at guest relations again on the way out, DH wanted to ask about the expiration of our other tickets, as he had been told they expire 1/14/19, instead of 12/31/19 like they should have been. Half an hour later, the CM's still didn't have an answer for us, so we left and caught a bus to HS. We only waited at the bus stop for a few minutes before a bus arrived, so that was nice.

We ended up separated after getting to HS, DH was doing his normal super speedy Disney walk, and my feet were starting to hurt from the fast pace causing blisters, so DH went to the GR here, to see if the CM's here could sort out the tickets. And I went over to Dockside Diner to use our next meal credit.

DH wanted the Carolina footlong, so I ordered that and the chocolate milkshake. I started eating while I waited for DH to join me. The milkshake was good, although I ended up finishing most of that before DH was able to join me, since it was so hot out it was melting pretty fast. I wasn't very impressed with the hot dog. I think DH liked it.
The CM's at GR were able to fix the tickets so they had the correct expiration of 12/31/19. And they gave DH a couple anytime FP's for the next day at Epcot. Glad to finally have that issue resolved!

We decided to change our expiring TOT FP to something else, which took a little time to find one for ST that started a few minutes from then. So we headed in that direction. After our flight we had a few minutes before the next show started of Indiana Jones, so we entered the theater and found our seats just before it started.





Up next we use our FP's and check out the newest area of the park. How are we still awake?!?

 

[Terra Nova guy]

Hi, joining in. I'm interested to read about your trip. I also had an August trip staying at an All-Star resort (I was at Music).

The Vodka Lemonade was sooo good. Really enjoyed it!

Yes! This was the best QS cocktail I had on my trip. I wish I knew what was in it so I could make it at home!

 

[disneyAndi14]

Marathon day continues for you! Glad you got the tickets squared away. I swear you can get a different answer from each CM.

How fun for you two, getting to see Lion King on Broadway! I would love that!

 

[MinnieWebster]

Oh my goodness. Disney presents The Lion King (Broadway) is AMAZING!!!! Absolutely loved it! The performers did a great job. If you ever get a chance to see it, go!!

 

[MinnieWebster]

The Marathon Day continues!
After watching Indy and his team do their stunts, we went over to RNR and scanned an anytime FP+, since the standby time was posted at 55 minutes. We had decided since we were given 3 anytime FP+ for HS, and DH was able to get a 4th (or 5th) FP+ for TOT, that we would ride TOT and RNR twice each.

Then we went next door to visit the Twilight Zone:

Looks like DH is taking a nap to help him get through the rest of the evening

After our elevator ride, we headed over to ABC Commissary to get some dinner. The lines at the registers were rather long, so I used Mobile Order, but instead of picking up our food at the counter like at most QS restaurants, I was given a "buzzer" and the app said the food would come to me. So DH picked up a couple cups of ice water, and we sat down to wait. It took almost a half hour to get our food, so we were definitely ready to eat.
Which was a good thing, as we had order 2 meals!! So much food!!!! We got 2 orders of the rib platter with a watermelon margarita and a strawberry lemonade slushy.
It was very good. I thought these ribs were better than the ones at Flame Tree earlier in the day, which I had thought were rather dry. DH liked the FT ribs better. I ended up putting most of the fries in a Ziploc bag for later, and took the rest of our drinks with us to our next stop: Fantasmic!



Just love this show! We don't take the time to watch it every trip, but we made sure to get it in the plans this time, since it had been a while.
After the show we went back to TOT to use another FP+.

And then to RNR:

I look like I'm sleeping in this one!

Hollywood scoops had our late night dessert.
A nice cool treat at the end of a long hot day.
Wait. Is the day over?!? Could it be??

 

[Wayland10]

Following!

 

[disneyAndi14]

Wow your marathon day sure looks fun. You did quite a few rides and still had the energy to sit through Fantasmic!

I see the BBQ theme already on day 1

 

[MinnieWebster]

Following!

Wow your marathon day sure looks fun. You did quite a few rides and still had the energy to sit through Fantasmic!

I see the BBQ theme already on day 1

While we were still at ABC, DH said that he'd had enough BBQ already, didn't want anymore the rest of the trip. Funny thing is when we were "planning" meals before the trip, he picked the BBQ most of the time, because it was usually the higher priced items

 

[MinnieWebster]

Is Day 1 over??

Nope! We can't leave before late EMH!!



We had to check out Toy Story Land all lit up, and thought we would see if we could get our first rides on the new rides during EMH.
After getting a few pictures at the entrance, we got in line for TSM. EMH had just started, and standby was posted at a 50 minute wait. We waited only 25 minutes and were on.

Not bad scores for our first ride, although DH always feels he should have done better and should have scored well over 350,000 points
At 11:10pm we entered the line for AS2. I don't remember what the posted wait time was, I think around 20 minutes or so. This wait was really bad. One side or the other kept stopping, so the line was not moving. We tried to keep distracted (awake)

Had a little fun
We ended up waiting almost 50 minutes But stuck it out and eventually got to ride. DH wasn't excited about this one, but we agreed we would do it once to experience it. And once we got off we both agreed that it wouldn't be a ride we would "need" to do each trip. But I'm glad we did it, it was cute. Wasn't happy about having to wait in line so long, but things happen

So after that ride, it was now midnight, and we entered the line for SDD. Posted standby wait time was 45 minutes. We waited a total of 33 minutes before it was our turn to ride. Loved this one!

Of course, EMH were over by the time we rode SDD, so it was finally time to head back to our resort. After the mile-long walk to the bus stop (seriously felt like it was forever. My notes say "5 miles!" ), a bus arrived right away and we were headed back to AS Sports. Arrived at the resort at 1:07am. And that is officially the end of the longest day ever!! I can't believe how much we accomplished on our first day, and that we actually managed to stay awake for late EMH at DHS.

Food totals (if OOP):
Yak & Yeti: $9.05
Flame Tree: $30.61
Dockside Diner: $19.68
ABC: $59.18
Hollywood Scoops: $7.23
Total (if OOP): $125.75 vs QSDP: $104.98 = saved $20.77

 

[disneyAndi14]

Wow, you two stuck it out until the bitter end! I’m glad you got to ride all 3 attractions in TSL! I liked AS2 but would never wait more than 15 minutes for it, now that I experienced it. Thenride is cute but not anything great!

 

[suse66]

Love this ride so much. We got off FOP and back to the FP+ entrance before 8:55am, where we had to wait a minute before we could scan our magicbands for our first FP of the day. Yay for getting to ride FOP twice by 9:25am!! Then we went to Africa to go on our favorite 2 week safari. Standby wait time was posted at 15 minutes, and we waited about that before we were on a truck.
Such a great safari this morning! Several animals were out and about, so we got lots of great pictures.

Awesome start to the day!

So after our ride on EE, we went back over to KRR and stored our bag in a locker. Standby wait said 50 minutes, so we scanned our bands to use one of our anytime FP. Good ride, didn't get too wet this trip. Once we got back to the loading zone, the CM asked if everyone on the raft wanted to ride again!! Everyone did, so we kept our seats and headed down the river once more. So fun. DH and I enjoy riding KRR as much as we can when there's not a super long line, but it gets long, especially in the hot FL summers So we were excited by the surprise second ride.
After that trip, we went back to the entrance to scan our planned FP and ride again!! Yay!!

Some nice pixie dust!

We were getting hungry again, and had planned on Flame Tree BBQ for lunch, so we stopped there next. We used a meal credit and ordered the:
Ribs, Chicken and Pulled Pork Sampler
Smoked Ribs, Chicken and Pulled Pork served with Signature Baked Beans and Coleslaw
and picked an alcoholic beverage,
Mandarin Orange Vodka Lemonade
featuring Skyy Mandarin Orange Vodka with ripe flavors of Tangerine and Lemon Zest
And we used a snack credit for an order of french fries with pulled pork and cheese.

Everything looks yummy!

Up next, one of my favorite attractions at AK. But I like sharing pics of that one, so I'm going to end this update here. I'll try not to let another 10 days pass by before the next update, but no promises. Traveling next weekend for a Celebration of Life for my grandmother who passed away last week. And the weather is supposed to be really nice this weekend, so we are going to try to get some stuff done outside this weekend.
Hope everyone has a good Friday!!

Sorry to hear of your loss.

After the fun of ITTBAB, we headed back to Africa to get in line for the 3pm show of FotLK. This is one of my favorite shows at WDW, and we wanted to fit it in at least twice, so that meant watching it the first day. Even though timing wasn't very good and we entered the standby line over 30 minutes before showtime. Which meant a very long wait standing in the heat packed tightly with a bunch of other people
Eventually we made it inside, yay!

It's a long line even with a FP!

DH wanted the Carolina footlong, so I ordered that and the chocolate milkshake. I started eating while I waited for DH to join me. The milkshake was good, although I ended up finishing most of that before DH was able to join me, since it was so hot out it was melting pretty fast. I wasn't very impressed with the hot dog. I think DH liked it.

The milkshakes looks good!

Up next we use our FP's and check out the newest area of the park. How are we still awake?!?

I have no idea......lol!

Just love this show! We don't take the time to watch it every trip, but we made sure to get it in the plans this time, since it had been a while.
After the show we went back to TOT to use another FP+.

I am the same way.

Of course, EMH were over by the time we rode SDD, so it was finally time to head back to our resort. After the mile-long walk to the bus stop (seriously felt like it was forever. My notes say "5 miles!" ), a bus arrived right away and we were headed back to AS Sports. Arrived at the resort at 1:07am. And that is officially the end of the longest day ever!! I can't believe how much we accomplished on our first day, and that we actually managed to stay awake for late EMH at DHS.

I hope you got to sleep in the next day!

 

[heaven2dc]

Fun filled packed day at the parks! I have never thought to raise my arms in the air on ToT - I barely can stay in my seat and I'm holding onto the handles lol On our last trip to WDW when we rode ToT, we had people in front of us raising our arms all three times and sadly their arms blocked our faces on the ride photo. Next time I'm hoping to get the front row so we can get a good photo!

 

[MinnieWebster]

Wow, you two stuck it out until the bitter end! I’m glad you got to ride all 3 attractions in TSL! I liked AS2 but would never wait more than 15 minutes for it, now that I experienced it. Thenride is cute but not anything great!

I was very glad that we were able to ride all 3 in TSL as well! That was our goal, but we didn't know if wait times would cooperate. Or if we would be able to hang that long AS2 was cute. We wanted to try it once, to see how it was. We will see if we ride it again on a future trip

Some nice pixie dust!

Yes! I don't think I've been offered that before.

Everything looks yummy!

It was very good

Sorry to hear of your loss.

Thank you!

The milkshakes looks good!

I really enjoyed the milkshake. DH didn't get much of it, if any, because he ended up taking longer than expected to get over there, and the milkshake was melting so fast because of the heat.

I hope you got to sleep in the next day!

We don't sleep in at Disney Too much to see/do

Fun filled packed day at the parks! I have never thought to raise my arms in the air on ToT - I barely can stay in my seat and I'm holding onto the handles lol On our last trip to WDW when we rode ToT, we had people in front of us raising our arms all three times and sadly their arms blocked our faces on the ride photo. Next time I'm hoping to get the front row so we can get a good photo!

It took a LONG time (years!) before I was comfortable enough on TOT to let go of the handles. Now I enjoy raising my arms.
Aww, bummer that others ruined your ride photo! We have asked for the front row a few times, as DH likes sitting in the front the best. Hope you get a good photo next time!

 

[MinnieWebster]

Wow, sorry I've been MIA on this TR! Continuing on...

After our marathon first day, which ended with EMH at HS and we were able to ride all 3 attractions in TSL (very cute land, love it!!), we made it back to AS Sports just after 1am. Most people would plan on sleeping in the next day, get some rest. Do we? NO! We are up at 6:30am, out the door and waiting for a bus by 7:15am.
Surprisingly awake, after the day before
Bus arrives to take us to Epcot, we were the only ones on the bus. Of course, then we had to go over to Music and Movies to pick up more people, but we eventually made it to Epcot!
We don't normally rope drop Epcot, because they don't really let you in early and we don't usually have too much trouble getting FP+ later in the day for rides we want to do. But with our plans later in the day, it just worked out that it would be better to start the day at Epcot than somewhere else.
Turns out they have changed the rope drop procedure at Epcot, which I really hope they do not keep. It was terrible.
After being let through the tapstiles at 8:35, everyone was held just before reaching Spaceship Earth. So we are barely into the park. At 8:45 the JAMMitors show up and put on a little concert.

8:55 the "rope" was dropped and everyone was allowed into the park. Of course the CM's tell everyone to walk, don't run, but very few people actually listen, and it was like a gun went off for a race. Everyone took off to where they were going first. We wanted Soarin' first, so we headed that way, DH quickly outpacing me, but I do my best speed-walking to keep him in sight. Of course, with so many people running, I couldn't stay close enough to prevent people getting between us. No big deal, I'll pass them and catch up to DH in the queue. Except as I'm doing this (saying "Excuse me, my husband is just ahead"), one father makes some not so nice comments about me cutting him and his son. I did not like that rope drop, as it seemed to encourage people to run to the attractions, instead of being held at ropes under the FW East and West signs like they used to, and then everyone was walked in from there. Or if they let you go it wasn't as far to get to the attraction.
But anyway, we made it on our first flight at 9:10am. Decided to ride a second time, standby was posted at 15 minutes. Actual wait was less than 5. 3rd flight, standby still said 15 minutes, we waited about 5 again. Standby still said 15 minutes and it wasn't yet 10:00, so we decided to take a 4th flight, wait time was just over 5 minutes that time. 4 flights on Soarin' by 10:05am with a 9am opening. Pretty good!
Up next we headed over to FEA, hoping it would still be low waits, like we had heard reports of as long as you're over there before 10:30am. We made it to the standby line at 10:20, posted wait time was 15 minutes. I think that's about how long we ended up waiting, so not bad at all!
Some blurry pictures, but we enjoyed the ride!
At 10:40, the wait time said 20 minutes, and we were hoping to get something to eat nearby which didn't open until 11am. I didn't really want to go back toward FW only to have to come back a few minutes later for food, so we decided to test the 20 minutes standby wait at FEA again. It ended up being a 30 minute wait, which still wasn't too bad. The line was starting to get long though!
We made it over to Lotus Blossom Cafe after that, and ordered the Orange Chicken - with Steamed Rice and the Milk Cap Lychee Tea - lychee iced tea topped with a creamy milk cap with a hint of Himalayan salt.

DH liked the tea and we both thought the food was good.
Up next we stopped in Mexico on our way back to FW to ride Gran Fiesta Tour. We enjoy relaxing on this boat ride! It's so cute. Love Donald!

We still have the 2 anytime FP+ that the CM's gave DH for all the hassle of fixing our other tickets, so we decide to use them on Test Track since we don't have too much longer before we have to head over to MK for a lunch reservation. Standby wait times were posted at 45-50 minutes, but we were able to use both FP+ in a little over an hour. Shortly after 1pm we headed over to the monorail, to get to MK for the rest of the day.

Coming up, our lunch reservation and a fun afternoon!