We Stuffed our Faces and Searched for the Tronorail, It's Trip Report Time! *11/3

[Queenofallthings]

I shouldn't have read that update before I had lunch....that food looks delicious!!!

 

[Bridora]

That food looked delicious. We have done breakfast there before but I felt really rushed through it. Did they allow you to eat at your own pace?

Yum! I bet it's good at breakfast, too! I didn't feel rushed at all, either.

Fun MK day. Wow, that lunch was expensive. Im with you on only doing it cause we have the dining plan!

It was fun! That was one of the meals that helped make our decision to do the dining plan this year.

I shouldn't have read that update before I had lunch....that food looks delicious!!!

Oops! Maybe I will put up a food pics warning before my next one!

 

[Bridora]

We don’t usually wait until Sunday afternoon to go to Star Wars Weekends. But this time we had. We really found ourselves running out of time this year. We drove our car over to Hollywood Studios, parked , and walked up to the gates. I loved these signs they had out at the ticket windows:

They also had one with Darth Vader riding on the parking lot tram.


Max is a huge Star Wars fan. He grew up watching the movies and playing with the toys….and still does both! He’s made fans of all of us as well. His main goal for Star Wars Weekends was to purchase one of the coin sets.

So we went straight to the store and did that.

Luke had to stop to take this picture:

I think this was the first year he actually appreciated the fact that it is Walt Disney World.


We passed TSM on our way:

Hello 110 min. wait!

At the store, Allison found a cute print of Stitch as Yoda and Luke picked out the Jedi Mickey with R2-MK action figure.

Stitch Yoda is at the frame shop being framed right now, but I’ll take his picture for you when he gets back.


They also had an exclusive DVC Member Star Wars Weekends pin, so we also had to get that. We had all that sent back to the resort and continued on our way.



I love that they offer to sent your packages back to the resort for you. We’ve never had a problem with our items. The very first time we used it, we left without ever picking up our stuff! We called once we had returned home and Disney ended up shipping it right to our house--no charge!


I wish we were going to this:

While we were walking around we saw Sulley & Mike out greeting people. We haven’t seen those guys out in the parks in several years, so we decided to go around and get in line to meet them.


Disney Details:

We saw lots of Star Wars characters out walking around.

The Stormtroopers were interacting with everyone--it was fun! Luke waited in line to meet Jango Fett.

And later Allison & Luke both met Queen Amidala. While she was signing their autograph books a man came up from the exit part of the line and started taking pictures. The Cast Member who was accompanying the Queen had to ask the guy to please not take pictures. He told me he didn’t think someone else should be taking pictures of my kids. I agreed!


Luke decided not to register for the Jedi Training Academy, I don’t know why.


We also saw C-3PO walk past while we were waiting for Amidala.

Turns out, he can talk to you! But we didn’t see that…


Of course, we had to ride Star Tours:

I can't remember why I took these next two pictures, but I'll include them anyway!

We left the park around 6:00. Our plans were to get cleaned up and go back to Magic Kingdom for Evening Extra Magic Hours--they were until 3am that night!

 

[Queenofallthings]

Wow, those are great pictures! I think it's good the CM told that guest not to take pics of your kids

 

[creativeamanda]

That CM was right not to allow someone else to take pictures of your kids! If he wanted a picture, he could have stayed in line, as well!

I know now why I won't see us in your pictures--we were gone from Hollywood Studios well before you got there!

 

[Bridora]

Wow, those are great pictures! I think it's good the CM told that guest not to take pics of your kids

Thanks! He said he wouldn't want that for his kids, or anyone else's.

That CM was right not to allow someone else to take pictures of your kids! If he wanted a picture, he could have stayed in line, as well!

I know now why I won't see us in your pictures--we were gone from Hollywood Studios well before you got there!

That's pretty much what he told the guy, too!

Yeah, we did it kind of weird. But we were up in time for the MK Opening Show & I were so close & it was something I'd been wanting to do for a while, so that was what we did first that day! We kept thinking, we'll have plenty of time to run over to Hollywood Studios...

 

[Bridora]

We pulled back into the BLT parking lot and realized that we had forgotten to use those FastPasses from the earlier BTMRR breakdown to ride Splash Mountain like we had planned. Since the FastPasses were only good for Sunday and since we were right there we decided to go ahead and walk over to Magic Kingdom for a quick Splash Mountain ride before we cleaned up for the evening.


I’d been meaning to take a picture of the guard house, so I took that opportunity to do so:

We got in the park and over to Splash Mountain without any problems. The kids & I hopped into the Fast Pass line and pretty much went straight to our log!


After that we went back over to BLT to clean up and rest a bit from our busy day. We weren’t too worried about the time because Magic Kingdom had Evening Extra Magic Hours that night until 3am. I love those nights! There is something so Magical about being in the parks when it’s dark and the crowds are light. All the lights are twinkling and you feel like skipping or dancing everywhere you go instead of walking. Ahhhhh…


It was around 8:20 when we walked back over to Magic Kingdom. As we walked under the Train Station and out onto Main St, we noticed how PACKED it was. People must have been getting ready for SpectroMagic, I guess. They had walkways set up like normal, but instead of walking down the sidewalks of Main St, we were directed backstage. Cool! Well, except for all those people! We walked down in front of Tony’s and then took a right around the corner to go out a gate and walk behind Main St. It was pretty interesting to see the backs of those buildings. They had atmosphere music playing back there, too, which I though was a nice addition. We came out somewhere around the Tomorrowland Terrace Noodle Station, I think.

We were pretty hungry by then, so we had to go to the Pinocchio Village Haus, since we hadn’t been there yet. It’s one of our favorite places to go. We usually luck out and get a table in the window that overlooks It’s A Small World. Remember how I said earlier that we found ourselves running out of time a lot this year? Well, we also found ourselves not getting to do a lot of our favorite things. That included sitting in the window and waving at people who have just boarded their Small World boats. Boo. We found a nice little room that was mostly empty to enjoy our meals. Max & kids had pizzas and I had a salad.

Cold chicken does not make for a great salad.


Earlier in the week we had been on a pretty packed bus and were standing. As happens at Disney, a baby started crying. Poor Max had a bit of a headache already and it seems there was nothing that could be done to comfort the baby, since the poor thing cried until it got off the bus. From then on, it was known as, ‘the baby from the bus’, and anymore crying that we heard that week was coming from that baby, which had followed us to where ever it was that we happened to be. I think we even accused Max of being the ‘baby from the bus’ at one point! Unfortunately, the ‘baby from the bus’ followed us to our nice little mostly empty room where we were enjoying our meals.


When we finished up there, we headed back out into Fantasyland. We rode Cinderella’s Golden Carousel before going to Mickey’s Toontown Fair. I was so worried that we had already been to Toontown for the last time without realizing it on our trip last year. Fortunately, it had not been closed for the Refurb yet!


By that time it was 9:40 and we were ready for Goofy’s Barnstormer!

We let the kids run around on Donald’s boat for a while:

Then we went through Mickey’s house and to the Judge’s tent to meet Mickey. We were in line to meet Mickey at 10:00. We had a good time with Mickey & Minnie! Mickey was getting a bit upset with Minnie, who was talking to Luke a bit too much for his liking. We were all still laughing at that when the kids put their autograph books down to pose for a picture. Allison’s book is pretty big and somehow Mickey stepped on it and almost went down! He caught himself, luckily, and was able to compose himself for a picture with the kids & then one with Max & me, too. I was recording the autograph session, so hopefully I got the whole thing on video! We still haven’t watched it all yet.

When we came out of there Wishes was going, so we watched the fireworks while we walked over to Minnie’s house. We took some extra time to look at all the neat little things she’s got in every room. Allison got a sewing machine for Christmas this past year, so she enjoyed seeing Minnie’s sewing machine. We checked the messages on Minnie’s answering machine and raided her kitchen before we went outside to tour her gardens. There weren’t that many other people in Minnie’s house, which was good, because last year it was a mad house in there and we didn’t get to enjoy it as much.


After Minnie’s house, Allison & I got in line to meet the Fairies. That was something we both wanted to make sure we did after she missed meeting them last year. Max & Luke decided to just hang out around there and wait for us. The line was so slow moving. It seemed like it took forever to get in. Allison was able to use that time to fill in some things about our days in her Guide to the Magic for Kids book, though. When it was our turn, we shrunk down to Fairy (pixie?) size and entered Pixie Hollow. All the fairies signed autographs for Allison & took several pictures with her. There was a Photo Pass Photographer in there, too, to capture it for us. The fairies also spent time talking to Allison, which was neat! We didn’t feel rushed through the line at all.


We got out from there and met back up with the boys. It was 11:05. We took the little walkway from Toontown to Tomorrowland. I wonder if they will keep that open after the expansion? It’s a nice little walkway and it’s never crowded. I don’t know what we did until 11:45, but that’s when we rode Carousel of Progress. I may have left some things out of my handy-dandy notebook, but I’m still worlds better that last year!


Carousel of Progress is one of those attractions that we can’t help but love & try to go on every year. At the end of each scene, when the music starts playing and the theatre begins to rotate, I always wave good-bye to the guys up on stage, much to the embarrassment of my kids! Fun!


We rode the TTA next, at 12:25. Evening Extra Magic Hours had finally started! We stopped for drinks at the Lunching Pad (love that name!) while Luke made a few phone calls.

I don’t think we did much else, maybe nothing else, but hang out there and have our drinks, when Allison told us her neck was hurting. Now, when Allison gets tired, her neck hurts. And she was tired. Do I need to post that Darth Vader link again?


Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo!


Here we were, ready to party in the Magic Kingdom until 3am, and Allison was ready for bed. She was going to try to stick it out, but we could tell she really was tired. We decided that she & I would take the Monorail back to BLT, making sure to let Max know when we made it back. The boys would stay and party it up. Well, 1:00 am must have been the time that everyone else decided to leave because that Monorail ramp was backed up! There was a Monorail in the station that left and I think we may have made onto the next one, even, but we really should have waited for the next one. We were squished onto that car like sardines! We were squished onto that car with people who were going to the TTC and we had to fight our way out of that car at the very next stop at the Contemporary. We were glad it was a short ride! Max & I were texting back & forth about our different adventures. They went on Pirates of the Caribbean and I’m pretty sure they did some others, too, but I can’t seem to remember. While they were doing that, Allison was getting ready for & going to bed. It didn’t take her long at all to fall asleep. I waited up for the boys, who finally left after they tried to ride BTMRR and found out it was broken down. They didn’t stay until 3:00, either, but it was probably 2:30 or so!


Monday: Memorial Day, and a Yak & Yeti 6:15 ADR were awaiting us!

 

[nessz79]

I'm in and loving it!! Subscribing!

 

[MaryAz]

Great updates!! I love EMH at MK!! My Avery always tires out before I am ready to leave...

 

[heaven2dc]

Loved the update! The latest I've stayed at MK was in Dec 2008 until 11 p.m. I wanted to stay later but my foot was in a brace and just couldn't do it. Although it was my first day of the trip and I didn't arrive to MK until after 6 p.m, 5 hours was long enough. Next trip it will only be open til 10 p.m., I believe, on our second day so we hope to make use of the whole day!!

Isn't MK more magical at night?!! Your DD really did last a long time even if she couldn't stay til 3 a.m. It's such a nice weary sleep after being at the parks all day

 

[racefanof88]

Hey B. I'm all caught up here again. I have to agree with you on how fast time seems to go by at Disney. When we first started going we would go for 5 nights and we were able to fit everything in; now going for 7 or 8 nights we can't seem to get everything done we want to do. When Pinocchio Village Haus changed their menu Dale stopped wanting to eat there. I miss it .

 

[MHTeacher]

Carousel of Progress is one of those attractions that we can’t help but love & try to go on every year. At the end of each scene, when the music starts playing and the theatre begins to rotate, I always wave good-bye to the guys up on stage, much to the embarrassment of my kids! Fun!

Me too!

 

[princess_momma]

great updates! i can visualize it all so much since i was just there. i can smell the apple pie from philharmagic and see the twinkling lights at night that make you want to skip around the magic kingdom.

oh and ps i'm SUPER jealous you got mike AND sulley. when we went to meet them, only sulley was out. i felt like someone had given me a pb&j sandwhich without the pb.

thanks for using so much detail!! can't wait for more.

 

[RachelNinja]

WOWWWWW, I can't imagine staying at MK until 3am! Haha, I'm tired by 10pm. But how fun was that to see the park when it's so dark! I can't wait to stay on property and take advantage of EMH!

 

[wdwgirl03]

Great updates! So glad you were able to visit Toontown before it closes. That still bums me out it's going to be gone soon.

Star Wars Weekends looks like fun!

Those pictures of the Disney details near the Mike and Sulley meet and greet are really cool. I got really confused at first because I thought you were at DHS and was like wait a second, is that the Monsters show?! Then I actually read the rest of it.

 

[Bridora]

I'm in and loving it!! Subscribing!

Thanks! I'm glad you're here!

Great updates!! I love EMH at MK!! My Avery always tires out before I am ready to leave...

What's bad is that was our only Magic Kingdom EEMH night....and we usually are able to stay the whole time. In years past, though the kids actually took a nap in the afternoon, but this time we didn't nap, so that's probably the difference!

Loved the update! The latest I've stayed at MK was in Dec 2008 until 11 p.m. I wanted to stay later but my foot was in a brace and just couldn't do it. Although it was my first day of the trip and I didn't arrive to MK until after 6 p.m, 5 hours was long enough. Next trip it will only be open til 10 p.m., I believe, on our second day so we hope to make use of the whole day!!

Isn't MK more magical at night?!! Your DD really did last a long time even if she couldn't stay til 3 a.m. It's such a nice weary sleep after being at the parks all day

Thanks! I hope you get to stay all day on your next trip! Something we always talk about doing, but never do it to just sit and people watch after park closing, and then wander out slowly once the crowd has thinned.

She did last a long time! We're just never ready to leave.

Hey B. I'm all caught up here again. I have to agree with you on how fast time seems to go by at Disney. When we first started going we would go for 5 nights and we were able to fit everything in; now going for 7 or 8 nights we can't seem to get everything done we want to do. When Pinocchio Village Haus changed their menu Dale stopped wanting to eat there. I miss it .

I know! Why is that? I guess by now we've done so much & hear about so much on the DIS that our list of things we want to do just keep getting longer & longer & longer!

Me too!

Isn't is fun?

great updates! i can visualize it all so much since i was just there. i can smell the apple pie from philharmagic and see the twinkling lights at night that make you want to skip around the magic kingdom.

oh and ps i'm SUPER jealous you got mike AND sulley. when we went to meet them, only sulley was out. i felt like someone had given me a pb&j sandwhich without the pb.

thanks for using so much detail!! can't wait for more.

Ahhh, you were just there! I can't believe, actually, that you've been and are back already!

yeah, I realized, though after I wrote that update, that we met them separately. When we first went by Mike was out. We were the last or next to last people to see him before he left & Sulley came out. So after meeting Mike we looped back around and got in line for Sulley...

WOWWWWW, I can't imagine staying at MK until 3am! Haha, I'm tired by 10pm. But how fun was that to see the park when it's so dark! I can't wait to stay on property and take advantage of EMH!

Maybe you can go back in the afternoons and take a nap/rest up and then go back out and stay until am hours!

Great updates! So glad you were able to visit Toontown before it closes. That still bums me out it's going to be gone soon.

Star Wars Weekends looks like fun!

Those pictures of the Disney details near the Mike and Sulley meet and greet are really cool. I got really confused at first because I thought you were at DHS and was like wait a second, is that the Monsters show?! Then I actually read the rest of it.

Thanks! Yeah, the kids are really upset, too, but I think we'll all enjoy exploring the new stuff!

It was fun...we were following Star Wars Celebration V stuff over the weekend...jealous and wishing we were there!

Ha ha! Sorry to confuse you, but I have been known to mix up some ride names and such!

 

[Bridora]

After that late night, we all slept in the next morning. It was Monday, May 31, Labor Day. A quick peek out the windows confirmed that we were still in the Happiest Place on Earth:

Our destination for the day was Animal Kingdom. On the agenda: Everest! (first time for both kids, second time for Max & me), and a Yak & Yeti ADR for 6:15pm (first time for everyone) We also wanted to do the Safari (duh) and Kali River Rapids.


Last year, on our day there, Animal Kingdom was a m.a.d. h.o.u.s.e. I am not kidding. It almost took the smile right off my face. Ok, it did, but it returned as soon as we decided to abandon Animal Kingdom for the deserted-in-comparison Hollywood Studios. And we are not those people who don’t like Animal Kingdom, we love it!

We were sincerely hoping that AK would be nicer to us this year. The good news: it was, but it was still crowded!

I’m not sure what time we got into the park, but I do remember seeing a lot of other people entering the park as well. Max & I decided, in the spirit of Animal Kingdom, to go on a quest, a quest to find the legendary Rainforest Café turnstile. And find it we did! We tried to slow our walks and pretend to look over some merchandise on our way through the gift shop. I’m sure they still knew why we were there. We breezed through that turnstile and entered the park. I do believe we headed straight for Everest and at 12:50 received Fastpasses with a return time of 4:40.

In keeping with the title of my TR, the next thing we did was eat! Restaurantosaurus was the CS choice of the day, but I couldn’t really find anything that sounded good to me, so I skipped eating that one. It was pretty crowded in there, too, but we were lucky to find a table in one of the little rooms. It began to rain while we were in there, and we were glad to be inside.

This looks like a double cheeseburger with bacon, fries and I’m going with “cheesecake in a glass”

Some of our surroundings


Looks like the kids were not interested, again, in having their food photographed. I’m sure it was just a bit embarrassing for them! We finished up our food and gave our table away to another family.


Back in Asia, the Stand By line for Kali River Rapids was longer than we wanted to wait, and the Fast Pass Return time would interfere with our Yak & Yeti ADR. We made a quick trip to Africa to check on the Safari situation. We had the hardest time trying to get Fastpasses. Several of the machines must have been either broken or out of tickets, but we finally did get some. Max chatted with a CM who was loading the machines just to make sure we could use our Fast Passes after the printed return time just in case we were still at Yak & Yeti at that time. He also asked her about the crowds, because it seemed more crowded there than it had been anywhere. She told him the park usually cleared out in the afternoons, but it was pretty ‘afternoon’ to me… Regardless, we decided after that to leave Animal Kingdom, give Hollywood Studios another shot, and return to Animal Kingdom that night for our ADR & Extra Magic Hours.


It was 3:00 when we arrived at Hollywood Studios:

We had two things in mind:

And

Both kids had done Tower of Terror last year, but neither one had yet conquered Rock 'n' Rollercoaster. We were very excited for both!


Tower of Terror had a 20 minute wait posted, no big deal, it ended up being a walk-on! Love that!


At 3:35 we were eyeballing the posted wait time at Rock 'n' Rollercoaster, 60 minutes. The CM said it might be a little bit less, so we went ahead and got in line. It was sprinkling a bit during that time, so we were glad to be undercover. The time in line really went by pretty quickly. Soon, we were watching the cars pull up and stop briefly before speeding out onto the track. The kids were getting excited…I was hoping they wouldn’t get sick! We ended up being seating close to the middle of our Super Stretch Limo and we had a great time on our way to the concert! The kids loved it! Allison did say that she kept her eyes closed during most of the ride, though!


We decided to head out of the park then, and drive back to BLT to get ready for our Yak & Yeti ADR. It was around 4:30. On the way out, we noticed this guy on the streets:

Luke went up to him & knocked on his can.


He said he was working undercover.

He was pretty funny! We enjoyed talking with him for a bit, then walked out to the car. (We had driven over to HS and were parked close enough to walk.)


That’s when the Prius decided to play a prank on us. Max backed out of our parking space and then the Prius refused to go forward. I tried to keep calm & level headed (because I think one of us should be at all times, I mean, what good would two freaking out parents be?) as the Prius beeped long and steady at us and flashed us a message that said something along the lines of: make sure the car is in park before powering off, the battery cannot charge otherwise! Yikes! It seemed like forever, and I don’t really even know what he did, other than assure me that he had absolutely put the car in Park before he turned it off, and to try to back up some more, but pretty soon we were in ‘Drive’ and driving out of the parking lot.

We made it back to BLT, cleaned up, and drove back to Animal Kingdom by 5:30. We had a 6:15 ADR at Yak & Yeti. We took our time on our way over, and were glad to see that a lot of the crowd had thinned. Next time I post, I’ll have a lot more pictures, I promise! I think we were a bit put out, again, by the Animal Kingdom crowds, and didn’t take many pictures earlier. Of course, we didn’t do that much there earlier, either! At Hollywood Studios, we were there mainly just to ride (so we could say we’d ridden something that day!) and then get back for our ADR. Getting back for, or doing things around our ADRs was becoming the theme of our vacation…

 

[jundland]

I didn't do anything to the car........it was just tired of being out in the heat I guess, not my fault, really. (I would give you a smiley thing here but i don't know how)

 

[heaven2dc]

Love your TR! I closed my eyes too on RnR my one and only time - it was too scary for me Plus it gave me a headache but maybe I'll try it with my sons on our upcoming trip.

That is too weird about the Prius - cars sometimes have minds of their own.

 

[princess_momma]

Wow, you are a strong woman!! I never would've been able to leave DHS and go back to AK!! But it does sound nice been able to park hop and all that. Man, I need an AP!!!

Do you guys use anything like touring plans or tour guide mike or do you just go with wherever? I've never seen AK crowded at all!! Crazy. I wonder why people are always there when you are!! Must be the cool thing to do!!