A Long Weekend at WDW
Who: Joe and Amanda, 30-somethings, engaged and in love with one
another and Disney
Where: Caribbean Beach Resort
Thursday, Feb. 2
This was a "buddy system" trip, as Joe would call it. He has a
buddy he shoots professional fireworks shows with, as a hobby/sideline,
and this buddy sky dives and had gotten a gig to do a show for a
skydiving event on the Florida space coast this weekend. He called Joe
and asked if he'd please loan him his computer-driven electronic
firing system and come down and help with the show.
Of course, since Walt Disney World would be only a 75 minute drive
away, it was the natural choice to stay there. Anyways, if you buy
Annual Passes every year, you HAVE to go, right?
Thank the lord that Disney fired whatever schmuck came up with the
Annual Passholder "Best Rate" program, and went back to how it used
to be, with rooms available last minute, and good cancellation
policies.
We didn't want to blow the bank so we decided on a Moderate,
preferably Port Orleans anything, but when I called there were only
double beds available at the AP rate. The cast member found us a King
bed over at Caribbean Beach at the discount, though it was still $15
more a night to not have to sleep squished up in a teeny tiny bed. I
think we ended up paying $95 a night + taxes. It would have been $45+
more a night for a King bed room at Port Orleans.
So, we were headed for a resort that is infamously the worst of
Disney's moderates. We were looking forward to seeing for ourselves
if it really was as bad as they say.
Joe got off work an hour early, and we went to the airport and sailed
through security. Not many people flying on a Thursday night, I guess.
We had time to shop for some massage oil (Joe gives AWESOME
massages!!) at the Body Shop, and look at these wonderful hand-blown
art glass octopi that we had to pass on, at $650 a pop.
So, we're walking up to the gate just when they're about ready to
board, and I look over at the line, and say, "Joe, isn't that Deb
Wills?"
Deb is the webmaster for allearsnet.com, my long-time favorite planning
site for online Disney information, and a old-timer at
rec.arts.disney.parks, my favorite usenet destination. I've met her,
briefly, a couple times in the past and I knew she'd recognize me.
Still, we weren't really sure but we ended up in line right behind
her, and Joe scoped out her luggage tag. Yup!
"Deb, it's Amanda! AKA Ginny Faver Princess Buttercup, whatever
my name is now!"
Big hugs and I introduced Joe, who had seen her before at various
r.a.d.p. gatherings in the past but hadn't ever spoken with her, so
she didn't know him.
So, it was a big Disney World fan gathering for a while there, and we
all shared a row on the flight. Deb eventually went to sleep and Joe
and I did the Sky Magazine crossword, that had a bunch of BAD puns for
answers:
What do White House residents use to keep up their socks? Carter
Belts.
What do White House doctors tell their patients? Take Your Madison.
When Deb woke up, I told her she'd really missed out on some
knee-slapping fun.
Landed after a painlessly short amount of time, and went to get our
rental car. We have National's Emerald Aisle Club, thanks to free
offers to join we found at Deb's site, thank you Deb, many years ago,
and Joe had earned a free day's rental coupon. Unfortunately, that
meant we had to go to the counter, which Joe detests, I mean, that's
why we use Emerald Aisle in the first place!
As we walked down the row of rental counters, we saw a line from HELL.
But, phew, it was National's new worse half, Alamo. I'm telling
you, DO NOT USE ALAMO if you have to go to the rental counter, in
Orlando. There wasn't a line for any other agency, but if you had an
Alamo reservation for pickup around 10 p.m. on Thursday, Feb. 2, you
could plan to be in line for well over an hour. Those poor people! I
bet they were all on packages. Joe said, "If that had been us, I'd
just say **** it, and go down there to whatever company that is down
there at the end with no one waiting at all, and say, I want a car."
We got out pretty darn quick, actually, with a great total of around
$86 for our four day rental, with all the fees and taxes etc., using
our free day coupon. Joe picked out a new Monte Carlo, and off we
went.
We've developed a routine where we take the Greeneway aka 417 from
the airport, to exit 11, where get off at South Orange Blossom Trail
and hit the Albertson's grocery store, because they have Tazo Chai
mix, and they're open to 1 a.m. every day. There's a Steak 'n
Shake right there, too, that's open 24/7, and has Joe's favorite
fast food hamburgers, and my favorite breakfast potato has brown
thingies after 11 p.m.
We loaded up on late night breakfast and burgers and milk and soda and
water and chai mix, and got to Caribbean Beach's "Customs House"
check in desk just after midnight.
This place is pretty confusing. First of all, the check in desk is in
its own building, on the opposite side of the resort from the food and
shopping. Weird. Secondly, the roads are not well marked in and out
of the checkout area, and we had to turn around and back track to find
the way to the rooms.
While we were checking in, we saw a bunch of things about some giant
dance competition that was there that weekend, and saw that our
building area, "Aruba", was the location for the express check-in
for this giant group! OH NO. When we got there, sure enough there was
a series of huge white tents in the parking lot, and busses even that
late at night, spewing out dozens of teenage girls.
Well, dear reader, Joe had a few choice predictions, like, we
wouldn't be there tomorrow, but I'm happy to report we NEVER heard
a single teenage girl the whole weekend. Maybe they wore themselves
out dancing, because they certainly weren't running amok in the
resort.
Joe called his mom back home, but quickly found the phone reception in
the Caribbean Beach Resort is non-functional, because the place has
nothing but huge metal roofs! You really have to get out to the edge
of the room, or go out on the breezeway, to get any signal.
We cracked open the new massage oil, took a shower, had some high-fiber
cereal, because a regular couple is a happy couple, and got to sleep
around 2 a.m., our usual bedtime.
Friday, Feb. 3
Slept in as much as we could today, though there was almost an hour
between 7:30 and 8:30 a.m. where we couldn't fall asleep at all as
the woman in the room next to ours was non-stop barking out orders and
talking out loud to herself, around getting two young boys ready for
the day. I think she was a mom with the dance people, watching two
boys that weren't her own.
There seems to be a problem with connecting rooms and sound proofing in
Disney hotels. We had a studio at Old Key West last year that was
locked off from its adjacent one-bedroom unit, and again, the sound
through the connecting doors was like someone was standing next to you.
I've always been able to hear toilets and people out in the
breezeways at the Value and Moderate resorts, but only these two times
staying in a room with connecting doors have I had to listen to our
neighbors like they were in the room with us.
Thank god the lady and the two boys finally left for the day, as we'd
only been asleep for about 6 hours or less, and it would have made for
a pretty crappy day if we hadn't been able to doze off again.
We finally woke up for good around 10:30, still not much sleep for a
weekend, but it would have to do. I made my coffee and got to have
real milk with it, thanks to the fridges in all the Disney rooms now!
Word to the wise, don't get a gallon of milk, there's no way to
make that big of a jug fit in the fridges they have. At least, we
couldn't find a way, without storing it on its side.
We had considered going to Disney Quest and Downtown Disney today, but
it was raining pretty hard, and usually when it's raining, those two
destinations are at their most crowded. We decided to go off property
to an airfield in Kissimmee instead, to see an old restored WWII
fighter plane Joe flew aerobatics in a couple years ago, and visit
their gift shop.
On the way, we stopped at a nearby Popeye's and had some chicken, and
then on to Stallion 51. These guys make a living restoring
"warbirds", i.e. military planes, and selling them for a million
dollars and up to wealthy enthusiasts. They had four planes in house
today, that we got to see. Joe bought a pin and a reproduction
operations manual for the plane he flew, a P-51 Mustang.
It was still raining hard, and after a brief discussion about wet pants
legs and impending misery in the parks for Joe, I asked him to see if
there was a Sports Authority in a giant big-box store outdoor
"mall" area I could see in the distance, and sure enough, there
was. I talked him into buying a pair of sport rain pants with ankle
closures, and I must say he looks damn nice in them. With those, and
the Tevas (waterproof sport river sandals, I favor the suede/leather
models) I turned him onto last year, he was set to stay out in the rain
all weekend if need be.
We drove to Epcot and parked, and Joe changed into his new rain pants.
We took the monorail over to the Magic Kingdom. It was just about time
for the 3 p.m. parade, but they canceled it due to the rain. Instead,
they put all the characters which would have been in the parade,
including all the Princesses, and took them down the street in the Main
Street vehicles. There was a cute "It's raining so we're doing
this instead" song that played and some of the usual dancers in
between the vehicles in costume-y rain slickers. It was kind of fun,
and I'd never seen it before.
Joe got his hair cut in the barbershop while that was going on, no
wait. Thank goodness they had two new people in there, we haven't
been happy with the cm's for the past year. We got a great lady from
on Joe's hair. She tried to talk him out of getting it cut as short
as he always does, but she was understanding that he didn't want blue
gel and pixie dust on it, especially in the rain today.
We were going to try and eat lunch here, as Joe had his stomach set on
the corn dog nuggets and tator tots he'd seen at Cosmic Ray's last
trip. When we got there, they had removed the tots and replaced them
with Disney's abysmally mediocre fries, so he was put off and figured
it wasn't worth paying for a meal that came with those and apple
sauce that he won't eat. Casey's Corner sells more corn dog nugget
with no sides for the same price, just about, but Joe wanted a full
meal, so we decided to just bag the MK and take the monorail back to
Epcot, and go get something good.
At Epcot, we went to the Land and saw about getting a fastpass for
Soarin', which is evidently the only way to ever be able to ride it.
Our return time was
convenient, either. We were starting to starve so we split a very good
soft pretzel from a stand outside, and then Joe got some chicken
nuggets from the Mickey D's stand. We sat down on a bench nearby and
munched our snacks, and finished just as the boat over to
approached its dock.
We rode over to
went to see about buying a lamp we wanted, for our new condo we just
moved into together over Christmas. After a disagreement about the
color yellow that we managed to keep from turning ugly, we settled on a
cheery purple and red combo. The lamps are meant to look like the real
cowhide henna-stained lamps from that country, but of course they're
just plastic, and overpriced. But hey, it's a Disney souvenir! The
clerk wrapped it very well for us and had it sent to package pickup at
our resort, where we could pick it up the next day after
We sauntered down to
had some sushi and hot tea. Now totally full, we went and saw the
African-American art exhibit in American Adventure. There's a
wonderful modern sculpture there that looks like a traditional ebony
wood carving of a spirit woman, but instead it's made out of black
leather high heeled shoes, totally cool. The exhibit alternates art
from
first exposure to traditional African art, so that was cool for me to
share with him (he's an Engineering major, I got a degree in
Anthropology).
We browsed through the
except some unimpressive millefiori art glass trinkets. The
gift shop was more fun, with some lovely glass Christmas ornaments. We
put a couple of coins in the fountain in the courtyard and made some
wishes.
Now it was time to head to the front, because I'd forgotten my cell
phone in the car and wanted to call home to my son, Miles, if I could
reach him. Joe rode Spaceship Earth without me once, and then I came
back from the parking lot and rode with him a second time. No answer
at home. Our Soarin' fastpasses were way past return time, but
looking at the time we realized that even with them, we wouldn't have
enough time before ROE to ride it. Oh well, maybe after ROE when Extra
Magic Hours started!
We walked to
Extra Magic Hour wristbands for tonight. I thought maybe I'd get a
snack from the counter service outside and we could sit at a table at
the rail. But the table available had trees blocking the view too
much, and the lines at the restaurant were nuts, so we just went over
to
After the show I tried Miles again, no answer, left a message. It was
Extra Magic Hours so we got pastries from the still-open Kringla bakery
and sat down to eat them all up. I'd taken my Bonine a couple hours
earlier, so we could ride Mission Space, and we headed over there.
Dang it, they have Ellen's Energy Adventure closed for EMH! Test
Track was down for rehab, so that left only
side of Future World tonight. In fact, it felt like "why bother"
for EMH here tonight.
This was my third ride on M:S. I get pretty motion sick pretty easy,
so all three times I've made sure to take medication. The first
time, I took Bonine, and felt a little queasy afterward, and
uncomfortable during the ride. The second time, I took Dramamine and
felt nothing adverse at all and really enjoyed myself. This time, time
number three, I was on Bonine again, and again, it was unpleasant and I
didn't feel so great after. Moral of the story? Dramamine is the
thing for me! Don't get me wrong, the Bonine let me ride at all
without having to go out of there on a stretcher.
We think M:S is a "bust" as an attraction. It's a total walk-on
when Soarin' has a 40 minute wait, tonight. Joe has a point when he
says that if there weren't so many "you may vomit" warnings
before the ride even starts, people might not get as sick. He says the
power of suggestion from constantly being asked to imagine vomiting
while you're in the pre-show and pre-flight areas makes him feel
awful. He says when the ride actually starts spinning, he suddenly
feels much better. He's a bit of an emetophobic!
We walked through Mouse Gears looking for salt & pepper shakers and a
napkin holder. Saw a few likely candidates for the s&p but I wanted to
wait and see the full selection I'd imagine would be at Downtown
Disney's "Disney at Home" store. No napkin holders of any type.
Soarin' had a 40 minute wait, still, and no fastpass during EMH.
There was nothing else for us to do here tonight, so we went
"home".
We were really beat, and my feet hurt like hell. I gave myself a deep
tissue massage on 'em and got them to where they felt usable again,
then fell asleep with the t.v. while Joe puttered around eating cereal
and calling his mom on the phone.
Saturday, Feb. 4
Today was supposed to be the day of Joe's friend's fireworks show,
but the constant rain storms had caused it all to be cancelled, and
Joe's buddy called us to break the "bad news" some time
yesterday. Oh well! We weren't sorry, it meant a full day at WDW we
hadn't counted on, and we were glad we'd been kind of "tricked"
into making this trip at all.
No noise this morning, thank God, from the connecting room next door.
I think I did hear our neighbor's door close, but whether it was just
the maid, and they'd checked out, or they were quieter today, or we
just slept way more heavily, I don't know. But thanks for small
favors!
I've been trying to get to breakfast before they quit serving it, on
these trips with Joe, for a year now, and rarely succeed. This
morning, he'd encouraged me to make a reservation for Boma, where
I'd tried to go twice before and we never made it out of the room on
time. Animal Kingdom Lodge is my favorite resort, and I missed it and
wanted to just darken its doors a bit this trip, too. I am really
craving staying there again, but I don't want to unless my son Miles
is with me, because he loves it so much, too. Maybe next summer.
We actually got up and out on time, and got seated right as everyone
else was starting to clear out, but the buffet stayed nicely stocked up
until and even after we left, so no fears if you duck in at the last
minute. Our waitress was on drugs, I think, or just really bad,
because she kept disappearing and forgetting things, and sitting down
at the table next to us every time she came by. Another waitress
finally had to take over a bunch of her duties. I wanted Joe to give
her 10% for a tip but he 15%-ed her. And that's really radical for
me, because I normally tip 20%. But you know, if you make me get up and
wander around the restaurant looking for anyone to help us after you
said you'd be right back 15 minutes ago... Maybe she was in the
potty, I don't know, but if you're going to disappear, tell someone
so they can cover for you.
The food was good, Joe especially enjoyed the "bear claws", a soft
handmade mini honeybun with cinnamon type thing, and I really liked the
sticky buns with nuts and the chocolate croissants. The pastry here is
the best thing, though they do a decent job with the meats and eggs,
too.
Too much money later (but thank you, baby!), we went up to the lobby
where I showed Joe some of the architectural features here that make it
my favorite resort. We browsed the gift shop for a moment, and Joe
nixed the $70 salt & pepper shakers from
We were off to the Animal Kingdom now, to try and get on Everest. Last
weekend had been the Annual Passholder and DVC Member preview, and I
fully expected it to be closed, or mobbed, so I didn't have very high
expectations.
On the way from the parking lot, I finally got a-hold of my son and had
a nice 15 minute chat. He informed me that he still doesn't want to
do any "scary" rides at Disney World. You think he'd be mad that
I go sometimes without him, but he is not as into it as me, and one
trip every year or other year or so is fine with him. He doesn't
like any of the coasters or anything with a drop, though oddly he used
to love them when he was just tall enough first to ride. It was only
after he turned 5 that he started being scared of them. I think when
he's around 10'ish, or certainly as a preteen, he'll come around
and want to start trying everything.
We went through the Asia trail first, and had a great time just sitting
on benches in a couple of locations, looking at some details in the set
we'd not noticed before, and listening the sounds of the birds and
the wind in the trees. This place is just SO beautiful.
Walked over to Everest, and what do you know, it's fully open except
for the Fastpass system not being up yet. Only a ten minute wait! We
barely had time to enjoy the queue, which was neat, but not as nice as
the one at Kali River Rapids, in my humble opinion.
For our first ride, we got seated at the center of the train, and
really enjoyed it. There's a nice, smooth opening hill and banked
curve, before you hit the big lift hill. Then there's a part where
you go backwards in the dark that's really really intense! The
intensity took me by surprise. The big drop at the end wasn't too
stomach churning because it quickly leads into a banked turn and rise,
which feels great. I really enjoyed it.
We decided to go do Dinosaur and come back later to ride one more time,
if it was still open. Stopped at Restaurantasaurus and Joe enjoyed
some Mickey D's chicken nuggets and fries, sitting up in the front of
the place in a cut-open old Airstream camper. A pack of young boys was
sitting nearby eyeing us for a while, and I was wondering why until we
got up and they descended upon our seats like a flock of eager seagulls
on a bucket of chum. I guess I'm not the only guest that digs eating
in the Airstream!
Dinosaur said 20 minutes but it was more like 5. We find that they
always overestimate the wait time for that ride, or maybe it's just
how you hit it. The front of the line waits 20 but you can walk into
the end of a group in the pre-show and only wait 5. The ride was fun.
I have to say, after a dozen times on this attraction, it finally
doesn't scare me anymore. We took a really cute photo, up in the
front row, but we already have one from this ride so we didn't buy
it. There's new giant soft rubber dinosaurs in the gift shop, by the
way. Miles has three and I will add to his collection next time I go,
I think. We were buying too much junk for the condo this trip to add
toys to the list, but I'll put it at the top on our next visit.
We went back to Everest, and the line was a little longer, but not more
than a fifteen minute wait. We asked to ride in front, and they had a
separate "front of the train" line they put us in that soon had
several couples behind us, with the same idea.
The front of this ride is kind of wild, because there is nothing in
front of you, like, no fake train engine etc., it's just your feet
and a wall of fiberglass and air. It was even more fun this time, and
I got a great view of the tracks switching for the backwards drop,
though Joe was too busy watching some other show element to notice. I
think this is the spot where they use a projection of a Yeti shadow to
show you how the tracks got all ripped up, which sends you hurtling
backwards.
I had to stop in the gift shop on the way out, and see if they had a
pin, but they didn't! They sold out of the Annual Passholder/DVC
preview ones, they said, and none of the open stock pins had arrived
yet. I did find a little stuffed cutesy looking Yeti for Miles.
We decided not to do anything else here this trip, and headed back for
the resort, because our lamp was supposed to be at package pickup after
now, when there would still be time to rectify the situation before we
left the next evening.
It was a totally painless package pickup! That really surprised me.
Maybe they've gotten better, but I've NEVER not had a problem, or
an insane wait, before.
We checked out the food court, nothing special, and bought a pin for
the Caribbean Beach Resort. I have a pin for every resort I've
stayed at, except Ft. Wilderness, because I've never found one from
there I like, yet, and Shades of Green, because they didn't have one!
We put the lamp back in the room and put on our jackets and went out
right at sunset to rent a boat from the resort marina. We got a Boston
Whaler for half an hour with our
helm for most of the ride up to the end of the resort and back.
Looking at all of the "islands" which is what the resort calls the
various sections, I decided if we ever have to stay here again, I'd
try for a water view room in Jamaica.
You do NOT want to stay in the "Trinidad South" section. It's an
entire lake away from the rest of the resort, and you'd have to have
a rental car to get to the food court, or ride the bus. No thanks!
The rest of the sections were ok, including "Trinidad North", which
is a third of the
food court.
Epcot is right across the road from here, in fact, you are just a stone
throw from the back of American Adventure when you come out of the
resort and turn onto
that with that proximity, you might be able to find some good spots to
see the fireworks from Illuminations every night, specifically the
beach right in front of the Old Port Royale pool/food court.
We mulled over ordering a pizza from Papa Johns and eating it in the
room for dinner tonight, but decided not to waste all that time, and
try Disney Quest's pizza, on a hope and a prayer it wouldn't be
full of garlic. Joe detests garlic and it rips up my stomach.
We drove over to Downtown Disney and parked the car on the
and put our new Premium Annual Passes to use with our second trip to
Disney Quest. We found, to our delight, that the pizza here is great,
and enjoyed a pie and some Ms. Pacman, then I tried to recapture the
glory of my youth when I could beat the entire Moon Patrol game and get
into the top three for scores. I seem to have lost my old knack. I
just need a full day on the thing, and I know I can beat it again! Let
me at it!
We did the design your own coaster thing next,
Joe talked me into going upside down as much as possible, and we got
two warnings from a machine and one from a cast member as to were we
aware we would be going upside down eight times? Yes, we understood,
and I have to say it was really fun. I had taken my Bonine earlier,
just in case, but I'm not sure would have needed it. The "ride"
is very smooth.
We cut a cd next of our new hit single "My Dog Gets More Dates Than I
Do" and decided next trip, I want to wait in line, no matter how long
it takes, and do the animation instruction class where you draw a
Disney character on a computer screen. Joe wants to make a mixed up
toy to take home and torture the cat with, with a cat head and hot
wheels legs and a dinosaur body.
We took the boat (kind of sorry we did as I was COLD!!!) over to the
Marketplace side, to do some shopping. Our first stop was the Art of
Disney store. Years ago, I'd seen copies of the WDW attraction
posters that are in the tunnels at the
go under the railroad tracks. I think they were around $25 then,
unframed, but a fairly large size. Too large for anywhere I'd want
to put them, at the time. But now we have our new condo, and we have a
long hallway that's perfect for five or six of them. Joe's plan is
to get a couple each time we go, and put spot track lighting down the
hall ceiling. It will be our own "tunnel"! But, alas, I could not
find them for sale anywhere where they used to be! Queries to cast
members led nowhere, until finally we had found a lady in the fine art
shop at Epcot who knew to send us here.
It seems that Disney is experimenting with going to print-to-order
posters, and we had a fine selection to choose from on a computer kiosk
here at the Art of Disney store. They didn't have all of the
attraction posters that you see at the MK, but the cast member helping
us seemed sure that they would be adding more designs soon. We ordered
a
be ready for us to pick up in about an hour and a half.
We were sad to find that there's no more Disney at Home store here!
Booo!!!! The home goods selection now is really really paltry, just a
corner of the World of Disney store. All the cool stuff is gone. We
decided on a salt & pepper set, finally, Mickey and Minnie in a car.
No napkin holders of any type for sale.
Then we stopped at Ghiradelli's and fought a capacity crowd for a
dirty table to eat a couple of sundaes at. Joe loves their cookie
dough flavor, and I love their hot fudge! The waiter said on cold
nights like this, all the seating gets filled up. It really wasn't
as bad as it was last May/June when we were here. That was nuts, how
crowded it was. I think late night it's always packed, and they
could expand to be about twice the size they are.
A trawl through the "under $10" discount store yielded a Mickey
hand bathrobe holder for the back of our bathroom door, that's all
done up in the "scattered" pattern that's been around for a long
time. We call it "Severed Mickey".
Picked up our finished posters, nicely rolled for us in a sturdy tube,
and waited for fifteen minutes on a COLD COLD COLD and windy dock for
the last boat of the night back over to the
Back at the room we had our usual routines and were asleep by
Sunday, Feb. 5
We never ever get out of the room on checkout day by the proper
checkout time. Usually there's maids banging on our door five
minutes after. Today we got a break from feeling like hotel criminals,
as no one seemed to notice that we waltzed out at
We wanted to check in for our Southwest flights online, because
otherwise you get crappy boarding passes. I knew there was a
convention facility at Coronado Springs, so I figured they'd have a
business center with internet and a printer. We drove over there,
looking forward to seeing this resort for the first time, and a quick
ask at the front desk confirmed they had what we needed right down the
hall past the food court.
We were delighted to discover that anything travel related is free of
charge at the
and print out our boarding passes at no cost, in about two minutes.
Sweet! I wish every resort would offer this, as all the airlines are
starting to go to online check-in, though if you have an airline that
offers assigned seating, it isn't that big of a deal to utilize it.
It's getting to the point where internet access and a PRINTER
(that's really the issue) are as much of a hotel guest need as ice.
We decided to give the Pepper Market food court a try for lunch, and
Joe proclaimed, over a hand-made non-frozen crust pizza with no garlic
in the sauce that this was the best food court on Disney property. He
said he doesn't mind the 10% surcharge for the "waitress" if it
means the food doesn't suck. My fajitas were just ok, tasted like
something I could make at home, and I'm not that great of a cook.
The Chinese food looked absolutely horrid. The best offerings I think,
and what I'd get next time, were at the salad station.
There were few fellow guests while we dined, because the lunch hour had
just started. So I was surpised at how long of a wait it was for our
food and for the "waitress" to bring our drinks. We barely managed
to ever get one drink refill out of her. If the place had been slammed
with guests, or even half-full, I think it would have taken 45 minutes
or maybe even an hour to eat lunch there, which, for a food court is
unacceptable in my book.
Still, a quick look out at the pretty lake and the
better-than-Joe-expected architecture of the Casitas section, with the
nice lobby and free business center access and the good pizza, plus the
fact that Miles is dying to swim in the pool with the pyramid and
jaguar water slide, I think we have bumped up Coronado Springs to the
top of our new-resorts-to-try list!
Our next destination was Epcot, because Joe wanted a pin that was being
released today. It commemorates the original Epcot Future World, with
all of the symbols from the original pavilions on it (very cool pin!).
I remembered that the Fountain View Café, one of my old-time
favorites, closes daily at
there before they close for like two years. Joe looked at his watch
and figured that if he sped over there and dropped me up close to the
front before parking, I could run in ahead of him and get there with
about five minutes to spare.
The parking lot attendant looked disgusted when Joe rolled down his
window and said he wanted to drop me off up front, but she grudgingly
pointed to the handicapped covered bench area next to the monorail
track up ahead and we took off in that direction. We got to where we
had to turn down the last row of non-handicapped parking spots, to make
a loop and come back to the drop-off, and there were like dozens of
open parking spots! So I said, screw it, just park, and Joe said you
run ahead, I'll catch up. I took off, but he caught up with me
before bag check, and we ended up making it into the Fountainview about
ten minutes before it closed.
I shouldn't have bothered. The coffee now is Nescafe, the people
working the counter were the rudest, most unhappy cast members I saw
the whole trip, and they were cleaning up long before closing, they
were out of almost everything, and they couldn't wait to tell people
"we're closed" right at 1 p.m. They refused to sell a drink to a
lady who was just joining a couple who had *just* purchased lunch
there, like 1 minute after
Why the hell does a coffee shop close at
know exactly how I could take this place, expand it, and keep it open
until
with the horrid Nescafe. That location, especially if it took over
about a quarter of the seating area below and behind it, is so prime!
There's no way guests wouldn't stop all day and especially all
night long for coffee and pastries, and they need a "big salad"
lunch place so badly here.
Anyways, enough ranting, but let's just say Joe's comment when we
left was "That place sucks."
We had a great time talking to a cast member at the pin stand, bought a
couple of pins, and spent fifteen minutes looking through the pin guide
they had up at the register, with me showing Joe things I had in my
collection already, things I want, and talking about pricing and the
whole now-burst pin "bubble" that was around a couple of years ago.
Joe has gone from "I hate pins" to "Would you please buy that one
and put it on your board?" which means, I can't admit that I want
to collect pins now, totally, so can you please pretend it's yours,
but it's really mine? LOL I actually love the idea that it's our
collection now, because it turns out Joe's collecting parameters are
just about the same as mine! The pin has to be about an actual
attraction, resort, event, etc., that we've experienced on a trip.
No character pins. It's such a thrill to have a pin buddy! Miles is
into them, too, so I guess we're a pin-crazy family. Next time we
come, Joe wants to load up a lanyard with extra Disneyland Moonliner
pins he bought years ago, and trade with cast members. I can't wait!
Pins are really fun if you can stay away from the speculators.
Soarin' seemed to be down, at least it wasn't showing up on the
wait time marquee at all, and we didn't feel like staying at Epcot
for hours waiting for a Fastpass, so, we just gave up on seeing it this
trip.
I badly wanted to hear the music from Ellen's Energy Adventure, I
love love love it!! The best way I know to do that is to ride it, so
away we went. A Japanese tourist in line behind me, waiting to get
into the pre-show, worriedly asked me how long of a wait it would be.
I explained that they would let everyone in at once in just a minute or
two, into a large theater, and then from there it would be about a 45
minute ride. She said, "You could be the tour guide!" I said,
"You should tell them that, here, but tell them to pay me some real
money to do it, too!"
We sat right over the wheel mechanism and it was the only time I've
ever felt any vibration or shimmy. I'll avoid the vehicle's
corners next time, as one of my favorite things about these are they
way they glide so silently and smoothly through the dark.
There was nothing left here we wanted to do, so we drove over to the
Polynesian and went to their gift shop. I also wanted Joe to check out
the menu at Ohana, and see if he'd want to ever eat there. He seemed
decidedly uninterested.
We took the monorail to the
kind of attraction here, and lucked out with our timing. We got onto
the train right at
tail of the afternoon parade was pulling away, which meant we could
literally walk right onto the attraction! I'm sure within 15 minutes
there was a wait again, so that worked out great.
By the time we got out of Splash, Big Thunder had a 30 minute wait, no
thanks, and we wanted to save our Fastpasses for The Many Adventures of
Winnie the Pooh, which was on the top of Joe's must-see list for
here, today. He loves it as much as Miles and I do! It really is an
awesome attraction. Joe asked me to put the t.v. special it's based
on in our Netflix queue, so he can better understand the storyline in
the ride.
Fantasyland was a ZOO, with even a big wait for It's a Small World,
so we just got our Pooh passes, and walked over to ride the TTA.
Tried to go on
through the show building and then, it had gone down, and they were
sending all the people in line back out the front door. Oh well!
Guess we'd only make it onto one of the three "Mountains of the
Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin had a nasty wait, too, so we
decided to head over to the
behind the castle, stopping to make wishes at Cinderella's wishing
well. I realized on the down slope that the Cinderellabration show was
about to begin, and that sharing one of the little black iron benches
facing up the walkway would be a great place to watch it together. I
got Joe to save our seat, and ran down for some caramel popcorn and a
soda to split.
People kept crowding in in front of Joe and I, so we couldn't see,
but thankfully leaving within 45 seconds each time, until we figured
out to just stretch our legs out and block the space, then we were left
in peace. It was fun watching the fireworks shot from the castle
turrets, which of course was the draw for Joe here, NOT the
Princesses' pretty dresses. I just like sitting on that walkway.
Each side of it are on top of my list of favorite spots in all of Walt
Disney World.
Haunted Mansion didn't have too long of a wait, maybe 15 minutes, and
we enjoyed that, as always. The Doom Buggies are good for spooning ;-)
Exiting, Joe almost got dumped onto the floor when the buggy suddenly
jerked to the right as he was climbing out. I've seen an older guest
fall here. I think they must have a lot of problems in that area, with
exiting safely. There's not much room for error, as the moving
walkway is very short in distance, and goes at a good pace.
We walked over to the Splash area to see if Big Thunder was open, and
for some reason it had an even longer wait (40 minutes) but Splash was
almost a walk-on at 10 minutes! Joe thinks it's weather related. It
was getting kind of chilly today, as the sun went down, and probably no
one wants to get wet in the winter. I know in hot weather, Splash
always has a longer wait than Big Thunder. We went for our second
ride, which unfortunately was marred by Brer Bear making a commotion
downstream like five times. It seemed like we stopped more than we
ran.
Now it was time for Pooh, and we had a great ride in the front row of
our honey pot. This is such a sweet natured attraction, and I adore
the bouncing ride vehicle effect.
Next, I really still wanted to ride Buzz, so we headed that way,
stopping at Cosmic Ray's for dinner, first. Joe finally gave in and
got his corn dog meal and made me eat the apple sauce, I had bbq ribs
that were fairly good.
Buzz didn't have a terrible wait anymore, I guess everyone had left
the park to go watch the Superbowl. It was just after kickoff time,
now, and the MK was emptying out. We saved the universe from Zurg, and
I got a decent score (to me that means anything over Space Cadet).
It was now, sadly, time to leave!! No!!!! I don't wanna!!! Joe
stopped at Casey's to get MORE corn dog nuggets, and then we were
back on the monorail to the Poly and out to the car. The Superbowl was
is full swing at this point, and the lounge outside Ohanas was jammed
with men watching it. I didn't see one woman, which seemed strange.
Out of the two of us, I'm way more likely to want to watch football
than Joe, and his mom is the biggest sports fan of all.
We got gas on property, always the cheapest, if you can believe it.
The stations outside the park are the highest in the state, I think.
But the prices at the Hess stations on property are absolutely discount
prices, by any comparison, and they're clean and efficient.
Flight was pretty uneventful, I think we got home by
All in all, this trip was one of my favorites with Joe, because it was
the one where we weren't grieving over an impending separation.
There'd been times it was so bad, the last 24 hours were practically
ruined, and as the relationship progressed it just got worse and worse.
There was one trip last September, where I just broke down and
didn't know how on earth I was going to ever be able to continue to
do it, seeing it Joe for just a couple of days and then having to be
apart again for two weeks or more at a time. It majorly sucked, but
now, here we were, able to come down here together, and go home
together. That was bliss.
This was also nearly the least number of attractions I've ever done
on a trip. We did far more shopping than I usually would, and the
Disney Quest visit ate into park time. But I'm not complaining.
There was nothing I was sad about not doing by the time we left, except
maybe It's a Small World, and the draw-a-character area in Disney
Quest, and I'm sure Joe would say he wished we'd got onto Space and
Big Thunder mountains in the MK. Oh, and it's been a while since
we've seen just plain old Wishes, and not Hallowishes or Holiwishes.
Hey, that's what AP's are for, right? I guess we'll just have to
go back!