I Sneezed My Ears Off! An April TR (Finished 09/04)

[ariane37]

OK I'm a bit behind, sorry!

Jey saw the Fairy Godmother so she did her thing and stalked

I thought she had left the park! Glad she's still meeting there

While I was taking pictures another pair stopped these two awesome and adorable Dapper Day attendees

They have to be the 2 most adorable people I've seen

And rode it. This was the first time we saw some of the new interactive features to the hitchhiking ghosts, getting the "Massachusetts or Bust" sign held up above us.

HM is my favorite ride in MK and I cannot wait to experience all the interactive stuff when we go in Nov. It sounds so awesome!

Yup! Ellen!

You know, there are 3 rides/attractions in WDW I've never done and Ellen is one of them? A couple times DH as suggested it but I always say no because it's so long. We should try it though before we start hearing rumors of it leaving.......

 

[coloredimage]

OK I'm a bit behind, sorry!

I thought she had left the park! Glad she's still meeting there

They have to be the 2 most adorable people I've seen

HM is my favorite ride in MK and I cannot wait to experience all the interactive stuff when we go in Nov. It sounds so awesome!

You know, there are 3 rides/attractions in WDW I've never done and Ellen is one of them? A couple times DH as suggested it but I always say no because it's so long. We should try it though before we start hearing rumors of it leaving.......

We thought she had as well! It says on the app now that the Step Sisters were moved over there (who we also thought were leaving?) and throughout the week we saw The Fairy Godmother, Perla and Suzy, and the Step Sisters there so who knows? We were glad to see her though, and her line was nice and long!

Those two people were adorable. There were some amazing outfits at Dapper Day this year - when we were walking out of Starbucks (maybe the first time) there was a couple dressed as the Dreamfinder and Figment. Jey flipped out because she loves them so much lol. (sidenote: Jey thought it was really funny that CMs kept referring to her as a "dapper" as well, because I was dressed in a dress, even though she was wearing that black romper).

There was some great interactive stuff in HM now! The different things they do are cool, though one of our rides it didn't work because they were tweaking the different interactive features that they started doing.

Ellen is definitely a time waster - it's usually where we go to take a break if it's really hot. But it's so cheesy and we both love Ellen DeGeneres and Bill Nye so much that it's a must do for us. I'm going to be sad when it's inevitably too old to keep and goes away

 

[coloredimage]

Part Two

A little pre-trip report continuing pseudo-rant (mostly joking): Can no one say "Elle" correctly? It's the name of a magazine for goodness sakes! I have to admit that "Elle" is a nickname that I only go by for Disney-related things, but in Disney I tend to use it at Starbucks for my drinks because it's less common. I first noticed in Disneyland that when we went to Starbucks and I gave the name "Elle" the CMs at the counter would spell it right but the baristas would often say "Ellie". The same thing happened so often during this trip (or, in Epcot, the CM wrote "Belle") that I ended up stopping and just getting my real name on my cups.

Anyway, mini-rant complete, let's get back to the trip report!

World Showcase!

We had a lunch ADR at 12:30 so we started in Mexico.

Also we always start in Mexico, I don't know why I said that like it was a thing.

Mexico was a lot brighter than I remembered it being - either that or coming in the spring means the sun is just that much less bright. Or both. I'll go with both.



We walked around and looked at things. Jey found some Dia de los Muertos statues that she absolutely fell in love with (they were beautiful and handmade) but didn't end up buying. I think she took pictures so that she could try and find them later on.

We went on the Gran Fiesta Tour, which is one of our favorites. We both love the Three Caballeros so it's always a must do.

Also, now they've got these cuties so how can you not go on?


We wandered over to Norway and poked around there for a bit too.



We'll be back for you later, Kringla. I promise.

And then we headed over to China.


By this point it was getting close to our lunch time so we meandered over to our lunch location:



We were eating here for the food, not for the princesses, but if it's the only way we can go there then that's it. We were called in about five minutes after our ADR time.

We were waited on by a sweet CM named Maria (seriously, this name just keeps popping up in this TR!) and were quickly up to the cold buffet!



That's medwurt (the salami-type slices), goat cheese (what Jey calls "peanut butter cheese"), three types of salmon, asparagus, yarlsburg, and bread. Everything but the asparagus was good! The asparagus wasn't bad, it just wasn't a taste palette that went well with the other food I had piled my plate with.

Before long the princesses came out and they were all out by the time our lunches came. I just compiled my pictures with the princesses into a collage:


After they were all out our meals came. Jey and I got the same thing:


Traditional meatballs with mash and lingonberries. <3 Be still my heart. Not as good as my mother makes but still so yummy.

Jey's went cold because she was trying to creep princess pictures while they were interacting with other guests. She finally had to eat because our dessert was going to come out.

Speaking of our desserts, they were:


This is the trio: rice pudding, apple bread, and chocolate mousse. We both like the mousse. Jey does not like the texture of rice pudding so she wasn't all that enthused about that, but she really liked the apple bread. I thought the apple bread was a bit dense but I liked the rice pudding, so by the end of the meal we had eaten our fill nicely.

We rolled ourselves out of the restaurant and headed back to the wilds of World Showcase, which was getting pretty busy. We still managed to hear "I knew today would be the day we ran into them!" as we were walking towards Germany - my parents' friends Rob and Jo were walking towards us! We stopped and chatted a little bit, took a picture that Rob sent to my mother and I've never seen (lol) and continued on our trips.









At this point we were hot from our walk around the world and decided it was time to try our first taste of the Flower and Garden Festival:


Violet lemonade! So good! It was definitely needed.

We were ready to leave for a short break but before we left we had to make one final stop:


Jey was bound and determined to try Beverly again because she's crazy lol. I was in it for the Fanta pineapple and the Guarana Kuot - which is not as good as Antartica Guarana but it's still pretty tasty (one of my closest friends/former college roommates used to stock our fridge with Antartica Guarana and it's become a staple. Pineapple Fanta's just my favorite next to Orange Fanta).

Sufficiently satisfied and our stomachs sloshing with lots of liquid we headed back to the hotel to change.

 

[LadyGrimm]

A little off topic, but every time I see apple cake I am transported back to a sunny afternoon on a Swedish country road when my husband and I stopped at a roadside stand for some coffee. The lovely lady behind the counter insisted that we must have apple cake, so we did. And it was wonderful. In addition to greatly enjoying your TR, I enjoyed that your apple bread dessert just brought that lovely memory back, too!

 

[coloredimage]

A little off topic, but every time I see apple cake I am transported back to a sunny afternoon on a Swedish country road when my husband and I stopped at a roadside stand for some coffee. The lovely lady behind the counter insisted that we must have apple cake, so we did. And it was wonderful. In addition to greatly enjoying your TR, I enjoyed that your apple bread dessert just brought that lovely memory back, too!

Aw, what a great memory! Apple cake always reminds me of my grandmother. I'm glad you're enjoying the TR

 

[TeresaNJ]

Really enjoying your report! Can't wait to read more!

 

[coloredimage]

Part Three

We left our room by 4:30 and got to the Magic Kingdom fairly quickly. I had to show off my new ears as they made their Magic Kingdom debut:



Which Jey made fun of me for. Fact: I took this same picture with my other ears as well, since I hadn't worn them in WDW last summer - it rained most of the four days I was there that I wore a hat most of the time. You'll see that picture later on.

We wandered through the shops up and down Main Street, just taking our time. We really didn't have a plan. We finally decided to just hang a right and head up to Tomorrowland.

What was our first ride of the day?



We simply relaxed and I took some pictures:





At some point I realized that I still had my sunglasses on. It was sometime around us getting stuck in the complete darkness of Space Mountain. Jey started poking me in the leg because she knew I couldn't see her (my legs are very ticklish and I'm usually very good at getting away from her) so I spent the majority of the time with my tongue out at her.

Yeah, we had hit the overtired wall after two days of not a lot of sleep. Oops.

We wandered some more once we were off and had tried to find Mr. Tom Morrow.

I'm not even sure how we managed this but first we ended up at our favorite bathrooms:


And then wandered over to New Fantasyland. I think we were checking times on the different ride and seeing if anything struck our fancy. Since it was that last big rush before people took their spots for the parade/Celebrate the Magic/Wishes everything was pretty crowded.



We decided that, since we were in New Fantasyland, we'd pick ourselves up a LeFou's Brew



I'll be honest, this is the first snack credit we used this trip. We can't justify using a snack credit for things under like 3.50. I had bought our Violet Lemonades earlier that day as a treat and we had meant to go back and Jey was going to repay the favor, but we totally forgot. We are lousy when it comes to snack credits - we never think to use them.

Anyway, we stayed in the New Fantasyland area. Once we finished our LeFou's Brew we decided to go ride some rides we never did.

It was about 7-ish by now and the sun was down. People were getting ready for MSELP so we stayed where the people weren't.

Our first ride?



Yeah. We're 28-year-old women and we rode the Barnstormer without kids. It was so empty that once we rode we could have gone on it again if we wanted to but Jey didn't hear the announcement and got up. We decided we made the right choice, because there was no one in the area at all. We headed over to another favorite we'll only do if the wait time is 0.



Dumbo!







We wanted to get pictures of the park at night from Dumbo but neither of our Dumbos would go high until the very end. So I started taking pictures of myself with my camera.



We hopped in here:


I was looking for a bag that I had seen at Downtown Disney and in Epcot earlier - it's a sketch tote bag that looked like a postcard. I was in love with it. Also I just wanted a big bag because I knew we would have a few days where we would go completely commando mid-week and I needed someplace to throw my sweater in.

They didn't have it but we found some cute things that we looked at.

We said goodbye to Storybook Circus and headed back to New Fantasyland. Little Mermaid barely had any wait so we went on.



After seeing Under the Sea we headed into Fantasyland. This is my absolute favorite image of this entire park:



Carousel + Castle = <3! This image at sunset used to be my icon on the DiS in fact! You'll notice that I take his picture a couple more times throughout this TR. I'm obsessed. I can't help it. It's as bad as my Funwheel obsession (seriously, it's bad - look at my last TR if you don't believe me).

Our next ride is shocking:


Why is this shocking? Oh, well....maybe our first trip together, back in 2007, Jey and I were in the MK during EMH. We were overtired and cranky and she wasn't being helpful. She wasn't giving me any sort of answer about what she wanted to do or anything and I was just annoyed. So we went on the teacups and I spun them. I was mad and made it go faster than I had meant to. Jey got sick and while she forgave me afterwards she has refused to go on it with me ever since. Before this trip the only time we went on was back in like 2013 when our friend Liz went on with us.

It's been 10 years and I still had to promise Jey that I wouldn't spin the teacup.

She still wasn't completely enthused to be on with me alone:


We got off and headed over to Pooh!



Pooh's just so cute, but we haven't been on it in maybe 5 years. So this was a nice treat!





Our final ride of Fantasyland was Small World, a favorite of mine (and Jey's mum)!



I'm in love with this little elephant


It was about 8 at this point, so we decided to go get some dinner. But where would we go?

 

[coloredimage]

Really enjoying your report! Can't wait to read more!

Thanks so much! I see you're leaving in a few days - enjoy your trip!

 

[TeresaNJ]

Thanks so much! I see you're leaving in a few days - enjoy your trip!

Thank you so much!!! I can't wait! Anxiously awaiting to hear where you had dinner, lol!

 

[ariane37]

No shame in being 28 and riding the Barnstormer! When DH and I go to WDW without our kids we always ride Small World, PP, and Under the Sea I don't care that we're two adults (and just a tad over 28 lol) with no kids, we'll ride what we want to

It's been a few years since we've eaten at Akershus - love those meatballs! There are a couple restaurants I'd like to eat at again but we're kind of over the character meals, always kind of wish places like Tusker House still offered one meal sans characters. DS10 still asks for one per trip but it's never the princess ones

 

[coloredimage]

Thank you so much!!! I can't wait! Anxiously awaiting to hear where you had dinner, lol!

Lol! Hopefully our dinner lives up to the cliffhanger!

No shame in being 28 and riding the Barnstormer! When DH and I go to WDW without our kids we always ride Small World, PP, and Under the Sea I don't care that we're two adults (and just a tad over 28 lol) with no kids, we'll ride what we want to

It's been a few years since we've eaten at Akershus - love those meatballs! There are a couple restaurants I'd like to eat at again but we're kind of over the character meals, always kind of wish places like Tusker House still offered one meal sans characters. DS10 still asks for one per trip but it's never the princess ones

I wish those places offered non-character meals as well. We like those places but sometimes we have to make the tough choice of "do we need this many character meals?" per trip.

I love all the rides for kids! lol. Especially at night; there's something about Fantasyland at night that's just, well, magical!

 

[Araminta18]

I wish those places offered non-character meals as well. We like those places but sometimes we have to make the tough choice of "do we need this many character meals?" per trip.

Me three! I loved eating at Cinderella's Royal Table, but it was just me and my husband and I'm not super in to meeting the characters. Would be nice to be able to have a meal there without the characters and hopefully with fewer kids running around screaming (I know it's Disney, but perhaps perhaps you may want to step in when your kid is running around full-speed yelling, rather than just staring at your phone. No, I'm not bitter, why do you ask? )

 

[coloredimage]

Part Four

So, what did we have for our totally awesome dinner?

The fanciest thing we could, of course!



Er, or, you know, churros bites and nachos at Pecos Bill's. Because that's healthy. It was a simple meal and we weren't really hungry so it was actually a bit more than we had bargained for. I did manage to get a bit of chocolate on my Dewback t-shirt but I was able to use my water to get the majority of it off and once I got back to the hotel later that night I just used my stain stick to clean up the rest.

After dinner we headed to Big Thunder, rode it at night (<3 favorite) then waffled about whether or not we should go on Splash. We decided against it because it was a bit chilly and neither of us wanted to get wet. We went on Pirates instead and Jey did get a bit wet.

We wandered back to Fantasyland somehow, I don't really remember what our trajectory was that night? Regardless, we went through that way thinking it was safest (they were setting up for the second parade? - maybe that's why we were there?) way to get out to Main Street. We went the Tomorrowland side of the castle, down past the wishing well and Merida's hidey-hole.

The water spouts were still dripping from the fireworks from Celebrate the Magic (which was ending) and we basically laughed and splashed through the water.

While we were in the area we took some pictures around the Hub at night.




(this is currently my desktop background)







We left with a sea of people and...

...and there was nobody at our bus stop?

Confused but totally fine with it we waited maybe five minutes for a bus and were back at French Quarter by 11:30. This was the night we figured out we could walk through the parking lot and into our room. It saved us a good three minutes' in walking so huzzah!

We got some drinks, showered, and went to bed.

 

[Araminta18]

P

We left with a sea of people and...

...and there was nobody at our bus stop?

Confused but totally fine with it we waited maybe five minutes for a bus and were back at French Quarter by 11:30. This was the night we figured out we could walk through the parking lot and into our room. It saved us a good three minutes' in walking so huzzah!

We got some drinks, showered, and went to bed.

First off, awesome pictures! Second off, aren't the bus stops for POFQ the best?! We never had huge crowds at the end of the night either--it was AWESOME. I initially was going to book a value to save money, but a friend recommended FQ and I'm so glad we did. There were never very many people at the FQ bus stop, and I have to admit to a bit of excitement/relief at getting on our bus and passing these insane lines for some of the other resorts.

 

[Kiersten]

Can't wait to read more! Your trip sounds like fun!

 

[amberg93]

I just binge read and it sounds like you were having a great time

I loved your Dapper Day bound.

Also, your TR is making me miss being at the French Quarter. Staying in building 4 last time was so great, just cutting through the parking lot and up the little courtyard is great. Though then you miss fun things like music in the lobby or whatnot, but it's beautiful outside so it's worth it.

 

[coloredimage]

First off, awesome pictures! Second off, aren't the bus stops for POFQ the best?! We never had huge crowds at the end of the night either--it was AWESOME. I initially was going to book a value to save money, but a friend recommended FQ and I'm so glad we did. There were never very many people at the FQ bus stop, and I have to admit to a bit of excitement/relief at getting on our bus and passing these insane lines for some of the other resorts.

Thanks! FQ is definitely my favorite hotel now after this stay! There was only one day the buses were slow, and only one other when we had to stand and that was because it was so late.

Can't wait to read more! Your trip sounds like fun!

Thanks so much!

I just binge read and it sounds like you were having a great time

I loved your Dapper Day bound.

Also, your TR is making me miss being at the French Quarter. Staying in building 4 last time was so great, just cutting through the parking lot and up the little courtyard is great. Though then you miss fun things like music in the lobby or whatnot, but it's beautiful outside so it's worth it.

Oh, I'm so glad you like my TR It was a blast (and I wish I was still there!!)

Thanks!

I really enjoyed building 4, it was the perfect location. We ended up spending way more time just wandering around the grounds of this hotel than we have at any other and I totally fell in love! Spoiler: we tried very hard to not watch Princess and the Frog on the lawn one night and failed spectacularly.

 

[coloredimage]

Vamos!

We were up by 8 am on the 18th. I was up around 7:45 so I was almost ready by the time Jey was up.

Now, today was a bit of a weird day for us. We had plans, originally, for an entire day at MK, but at some point in our changing plans we lost our AK day. During our travels the previous two days we decided to change our plans around and this day was one of our more flexible days.

The one thing we couldn't change was our morning in Magic Kingdom, because we had a meal planned.

So once we were both dressed we headed to Magic Kingdom and got there around 10 am. It was the first of two times I was randomly selected that day - that's 3 times in MK in a row for those that lost count. My bracelets made the thing go off? I commented to the security guard that sometimes the metal in my chest makes them go off but she assured me it was my Alex & Ani bracelets and let me go.

We were running a tad bit late so we headed to Haunted Mansion first. The projections at the end were down to add more of the interactive features which was sad. Once we were down there we headed back to the front for some coffee and to just enjoy the morning!

















We literally just spent the morning wandering and taking pictures so this is my "walking and taking pictures" post basically lol.



It was a weird time for us, because we only had about an hour before lunch by the time we finished our coffees but it just wasn't enough time to actually do much of anything so we just enjoyed the atmosphere around us.





At some point during our time waster wandering session Jey had to use the restroom and what better place to then the Rapunzel bathrooms?

I spent the time playing "find the Pascals"









Afterwards it was time to head to our lunch!

 

[coloredimage]

Part Two

It was time for an early lunch!

Where were headed?

I'll give you a hint:


Good enough hint?

We were in and had ordered very quickly and went to find a seat. It wasn't that crowded but it took us a minute to find a seat because we were wanting to sit someplace very specific:


We've eaten in the other two rooms before and were excited that we managed to get into the West Wing!

It took a bit for our food to come but it was there before long:


I got the turkey sandwich and the Master's cupcake. Jey got the croque monsieur and the lemon cupcake. We had both gotten these meals before so we knew what to expect but it was still nice and filling without being too much.

When we finished eating we meandered around, just enjoying the different sights of the restaurant.





Right after lunch we had a FP for Mine Train. Last time we had gone on this it had e-stopped twice and it was not a fun experience - in fact it was painful. But this time was way more fun!

(ignore the fact that these are obviously taken from the website - I just wanted to show them to you guys:


We had decided that we were going to head out of Magic Kingdom after this and we were headed out of the park...except we got distracted:


See, two things: Move It, Shake It is the only park parade/party we hadn't gotten pictures of and....I'm kind of in love with Nick Wilde. And since they added Nick and Judy to Move It, Shake It it was one of my only priorities. I was so excited when we stumbled on it!

Jey adores Judy so it was a win-win, really.

I mean, Judy is pretty adorable:


Now, sit back and enjoy the Move It, Shake It spam.















(this is around the time Nick noticed that I was very obviously creeping on him and every so often would turn and pose for me)



















After the Nick and Judy spam I had to get a quick picture of one of two of my favorite brothers:


And then we headed out of MK for the time being!

 

[ariane37]

Awesome pics of Nick and Judy!! First time I'm seeing them in the parade and I can't wait to see them in Nov. I SO wish they'd do a M&G. WHY aren't they
BOG is one of our favorite restaurants and the West Wing is my favorite room We've eaten there a total of 7 times and managed to sit in the WW the majority of our visits.