Dinosaurs and Banshees! - Sunday May 5, 2024 (part 3)
Over at Dinosaur the line was super short - we got in line at 11:29, and were off the right 16 minutes later at 11:45. Isn't that crazy? I was just happy that the ride didn't break down again 'cause I felt like that was our luck for the last few times.
Fun ride, not gonna lie it's still legitimately scary.
From here, we headed over to Nomad Lounge, to get ourselves on the list (or to eat if there was no wait, but we didn't expect to be that lucky!). They quoted us a 75 minute wait, which actually worked out pretty well - I had a fastpass for Navi River Journey, and then our fastpass for Flight of Passage, so I figured we should be able to do both in that time frame.
Also all the animal footprints right by Nomad Lounge!
We headed into Pandora, stopping for more photos cause they had a photographer out by that weird big plant thing.
Doing the millenial heart! Apparently Gen-Z does a heart with their hands differently? They use like their second and middle fingers, vs the whole hand? It's a bit weird - ask the Gen Z person in your life for a demo. Anyways.
First we figured we'd do Flight of Passage:
Who doesn't love those floating mountains?
10 minutes later we were in the first pre-show room, but something happened and they never showed the video. We stood there for a bit and then went into the second room. Which not gonna lie, I was pretty happy about because I didn't want to have to hear about how we were going to "uh...fly!".
In the second room they played the video but then we just hung out there for a bit.
I sat down.
I was a bit worried the ride was down but a few minutes later they played the second video again -
yes, we stayed seated.
And then we got to ride! And as always, an awesome ride. The water effects on my banshee were REALLY working - my goggles/glasses were soaked. Trevor's water effects were not working as well, which was probably a good thing.
We were off the ride by 12:35, and took some pictures as we headed over to Navi River Journey.
Pretty scenery!
Over at Navi, it took us 5 minutes to get on the ride. And right as we were about to get on (12:48) we got a text saying "hey we're gonna call you in about 15 minutes, start making your way back to Nomad Lounge". I was excited - Navi is just like 5 minutes so I was like, awesome timing!
We had a great ride on Navi - I love the shaman and just the kind of quiet dark nature of it, with the music and such - it's very relaxing.
Hello Shaman!
Right as we got off the ride (12:55), we got the text that our table was ready. Woo hoo! We did both rides and now, food! And we only waited about an hour, instead of the 75 minutes. Nice. When we got there they told us a table inside was ready right away, but if we waited a few more minutes we could sit outside. So we waited for outside.
We were seated at the table furthest away from the check in stand - last time we were seated right by the check in, and this time the completed opposite. We didn't have a great view of the flotillas, but with the breeze and the shade it was super nice. Love Nomad!
And picture limit, so what we ate there will be the next post.
Nomad Lounge Once and Everest Thrice - Sunday May 5, 2024 (part 4)
It's Nomad, so we started with the non-alcoholic drinks. I got the Balinese breeze - Mountain Berry Tea, Simple Syrup, Lemon Juice.
This was good - fruity, but with a little bit of a bitter taste, just enough to be interesting. Not enough to make it a drink you have to sip, which was good, cause it was too hot for drinks like that.
Trevor got the Kiama Mama - watermelon and sprite. I thought this had too much watermelon for me, so it was a good thing Trevor ordered it and not me. Trevor liked this better than he remembered - he said it had the flavor you get closer to the rind of the watermelon (in addition to just regular watermelon) so it wasn't as sweet, and he liked that.
Then, the bread service!
The round breads in front are Brazilian cheese bread (pao de quiejo), then the tortilla chip-looking things are papadam, and the loaf thing in the back is Thai red curry milk bread.
It came with three dipping sauces - coconut curry sauce (the pale beige one), then a guava sauce (right by the coconut curry sauce), and then ginger-pear chutney (on the right). Part of the fun (for me) of the bread service is the trying the different breads with all the different sauces - the cheese bread is delicious, and I really liked it with the coconut curry sauce. The coconut curry sauce was spicy but was a good flavor combo with the cheese bread. The papadam is good with all the sauces, and I liked the milk bread by itself, honestly. Weirdly enough, I thought the guava sauce was too sweet and I LOVE sweet things. The ginger pear chutney was very gingery, and not really my favorite. Always fun with the bread service!
We also got the poke bowl: Steamed Rice, Red Cabbage Kimchi, Edamame, Sesame-chili Glaze
Delicious as always - one of our favorite dishes at Nomad.
And the cuban sliders - also delicious. I like the yucca fries but the sliders are also delicious. Really you can't go wrong with almost anything at Nomad, though we're not huge fans of the churros and I know lots of people are.
Trevor got up occasionally to film the flotillas:
I'm so sad the flotillas are gone now! They were such a fun little aspect of Animal Kingdom.
After lunch, we were heading back to Asia to use our multi-experience fastpasses on Everest! When Kali had gone down, we just kept getting fastpasses for it and watching them turn into multi-experience fastpasses. We ended up with 3 - not too shabby! But as we headed back there, we passed Kevin!
Kevin is like one of my favorite parts of Animal Kingdom.
Back at Everest, we ended up riding 3 times in a row:
Definitely my favorite aspect of rides going down - the only way to ride the same ride multiple times with a fastpass!
Kali River Rapids ended up coming up in the middle of our last ride, but immediately posted a 50 minute wait and no fastpasses, so with it being just before 3 pm, we decided to call it a day at Animal Kingdom and head back to the hotel, rest a bit before our tour, and then head to our fancy fancy dinner.
DVC Tour and the Anniversary Dinner Begins! - Sunday May 5, 2024 (part 5)
Everest selfie!
If you ever get a chance to ride it back to back, I highly recommend it.
As we made our way out of the park, we ran into Kevin again.
Bye Kevin!
I got really excited as we went to the bus stop because our stop was the closest one! Woot! I hate walking to the bus stop after leaving the park so that's a nice bonus. We got on a bus pretty quickly and were on our way back to the Contemporary, and I was messing around on my phone, which turned out to be a good thing. I have our credit card set up to give me push alerts every time our credit cards are used, and as I was messing around on my phone, I got a notification that a $300 charge at a grocery store in Missouri had just been made. And you'll remember that we were in Florida, not in Missouri. Since I saw that charge pop up, I was able to immediately go into the app, lock the card, and then called them to report it as stolen. It was all done by the time we were at the Contemporary, which while irritating, was convenient. They did have to cancel my credit card and were mailing me a new one, but luckily I was with Trevor and his card was still good, so we were fine. We did have other credit cards, but this was the primary one. I hate that credit card fraud is so prevalent nowadays but the flip side is that we have lots of really convenient ways to deal with it pretty quickly. We literally had no other follow-on effects from this, just had to stop by the front desk at the Contemporary and change the card on file to Trevor's.
Anyways, that excitement over, we had about 45 min/an hour to rest in the room, and then it was time for our DVC tour. We were doing this entirely for the $200 gift card - I've done some basic research into DVC and the various costs, and for us it doesn't make sense. But I wasn't opposed to spending 30 minutes on a tour for $200, and who knows, maybe I'd learn something new. We went downstairs to the DVC desk (filling up the mug on the way - fill #5, I think ), and did the tour. The CM who worked with us was super nice and friendly - not pushy at all. We went over to Bay Lake Tower and talked in one of the 3 bedroom suites (or something like that, I don't entirely remember). Nothing I learned changed my mind, but it was good to get the details directly from the source. And again the CM was amazing - she gave us fireworks glasses that make lights look like Mickeys, and a Hades headband!
She also took us up to the Top of the World lounge balcony - we didn't get to go into the lounge itself (they weren't open yet) but the view from up there is amazing! That was super neat. And by the time we were done, the gift card was in our email! The tour did go for a solid hour, which was longer than we thought, but not too bad.
After the tour we filled up our mug one more time (#6), and then back to the room for a little bit.
Our gorgeous view.
Our dinner reservation was at 7 pm, at the Bull & Bear (at the Waldorf Astoria), so at 6:30 we were in an uber heading that way. We got there right on time - it's not far from Magic Kingdom. They had a pianist in the lobby - he was playing "Phantom of the Opera" as we walked in, which was a nice touch. (I'm a big musicals fan so always love show tunes "in the wild")
They seated us immediately at our table:
Such a nice touch, with the sign and the rose petals.
We started with bread service: they had a couple different kinds of bread and you picked the one (or two ) that you wanted:
I got the brioche with rosemary (that's the flower looking one) and then the parmesan crusted focaccia. Both were SO good - the focaccia overall wasn't my favorite except for the bit at the top with the parmesan...mmmmm. But overall super good.
Trevor got the brioche and Japanese honey wheat:
The Japanese honey wheat was a bit sweet - also very good.
And of course we had to get mocktails, cause it's us:
I got a berry-based mocktail, though when I tasted it there was a slightly different taste and it took me a while to figure out it was pineapple! Pineapple surprise. Very good though.
Trevor got a more obviously citrus-based one.
I don't remember the specific details on it, but he liked it a lot.
We really liked Bull & Bear, and so far it was living up to our expectations. (yes, that's the picture limit)
Now let's get down to food! We started with a seafood ceviche amuse bouche:
I don't like seafood, and this was delicious. Maybe I like ceviche and don't know it? Trevor was making fun of me and saying "hey you like tuna poke, you like ceviche...maybe you do like seafood!" Though to be fair mostly what I tasted was lime and onion, and I like both of those. And I can't go back now - "not liking seafood" is too much of my personality! Trevor says we should find tuna steak cause I'd probably like that. We shall see.....
Anyways. We got two appetizers: first, the Pasta Explosion, with Pata Negra de Bellota and Parmigianio Reggiano.
Per the server, this is the chef's interpretation of Pasta Carbonara - rich buttery sauce, a slice of parmesan on the top, and then inside is the pata negra de bellota which is very fancy ham/pork. They recommended you scoop one up, press it to the roof of your mouth and then it "explodes" in your mouth. This was (as I'm sure you're surprised) absolutely delicious. Very creamy, very rich - my only complaint was that I wanted more! (and yes I was doing the math of how much each bite cost, considering there were only five...that's probably not the right attitude for this type of a dinner. ) I would say that "explosion" is not how I'd describe it - super delicate pockets of pasta and then it just kind of falls apart and you get the parmesan with the pork...delicious. And I always love a slice of cheese on top of anything. Trevor says it explodes as much as you want anything to "explode" in your mouth.
The next appetizer was the Wagyu Carpaccio (which we also got last time): Shaved Truffles, 18 Month Shaved Parmigiano Reggiano,
Pushed Egg Yolk
This was so good last time I wanted to get it again. The meat is just so tender and comes right apart, and of course so rich. Delicious.
The only bad thing is that 'cause it's so good we end up eating quickly (too be fair I eat fast normally - it comes from being the oldest of 7 kids and a dad who was a teacher so if you wanted seconds of food you had to finish what you had. ), and these places are all about going slow and I literally don't know how to do that. But we had fun eating and then just people watching.
We got more mocktails at this point:
Similar to what we got before but I don't have any notes on them. They were good!
The, the main course! We got the wagyu to split, and then lobster mac and cheese (Trevor loves lobster mac and cheese), as well as the sauce flight. When the steak came, they cut up and portioned out the steak - full service! It smelled sooooooo good as they were cutting it up/portioning it out.
Doesn't that look so good? Yum.
More lobster mac and cheese.
And the sauce flight! On the back row (on the tray) from left to right, it's bearnaise sauce, their housemade version of steak sauce, spicy chimichurri made with jalapeno and parsley. Then front row, truffle red wine reduction (3x reduced with truffle shavings and oil) and peppercorn sauce. They specifically recommended mixing the peppercorn and the red wine reduction.
All the sauces were good, and we did enjoy mixing them, but it almost felt like a crime to dip the wagyu in the sauces - the wagyu was so good on its own!
My favorite was the chimichurri, cause you got the flavor from the parsley and a *little* heat from the jalapeno but it wasn't overwhelming. But I also ate a good chunk of the steak without any sauces cause yum.
The peppercorn and red wine mixed together was good, but we didn't love the red wine by itself. And of course you can't go wrong with bearnaise, or their steak sauce.
Trevor loved the mac and cheese. I had a couple bites that were fine flavorwise, unless I got a piece of lobster and then blech - too fishy. My favorite lobster thing (well really the only lobster thing I've ever had) was the langoustine as the amusebouche at Victoria and Albert's, and that wasn't fishy at all, but this was fishy. Trevor loved it though.
I will say splitting the steak was the way to go - made sure we weren't too full and were able to try all the other things we wanted. I don't think I'd get the sauce flight again cause the steak was so good on it's own, but Trevor said he would just cause he liked the variety of the sauces.
Then it was time for dessert. This was our misstep at this dinner - we ordered two desserts and we really should have just gone with one. And I'm about at the picture limit so I'll save them for the next post!
Dessert at Bull & Bear - Sunday May 5, 2024 (part 7)
Ok, desserts! Bull & Bear's signature dessert is "The Lemon" - last time we came we tried to order it but we had gone on a weekday and this was a little post-Covid and they were only doing the lemon on the weekends. Womp womp. But this time, they had it! Yay!
So, I'm not a huge fan of lemon flavor, but this just seemed so interesting, I had to try it. When they brought it, they explained it as a "deconstructed lemon meringue pie". They take a Meyers lemon, make an incision from one end to the other, carve out the internal flesh, turn it into a lemon sorbet and curd, and add a layer of chantilly cream. Then when they serve it, they cut it up into pieces for us, so each bite is like a bit of pie.
The sorbet is the top layer, then the dark yellow is the curd, and the white is the cream. Even the skin is candied and edible, and the stick is a shortbread cookie to provide the "crust" of the pie.
This was so good - so refreshing. Tart and sour, but not tooooo tart or sour - a good balance of the tart and the sweet. It doesn't look like a lot but it was. And I loved being able to eat all of it, skin included - you could feel/taste the texture difference but no problems eating it. It was a bit melty (as you can see) but just such an interesting and creative and light dessert. Very good. The server told us they usually run out as the night goes on, and so we snuck in just under the wire. Also nice of them to put the little Happy Anniversary white chocolate banner on there.
Then the other dessert we got was the Vanilla Napoleon: Caramelized Mille Feuille, Tahitian Vanilla Bean Custard, Vanilla Crème Chantilly, Pineapple Chutney and Coquito Gelato. Our eyes were definitely bigger than our stomach, but this was good too.
The bottom was crunchy mille fueille (puff pastry) with chantilly cream, then pineapple chutney, and then in the middle there was coquito ice cream (similar to egg nog but the puerto rican version) and a chocolate cone. There was a little fire thing where the chocolate cone in the middle melted a bit (I didn't film it, sadly). But yea, this was great. The pineapple chutney was nice and sweet, the coquito ice cream and chantilly cream was sweet so the chocolate added a nice richness/bitterness to cut the sweet. Trevor doesn't really like pineapple in things but in this he liked it. It was a bit hard to eat cause it oozes and breaks apart, and this was definitely bigger than we thought, but it was delicious. Yum.
One of the nice things about Bull & Bear is they do a lot of tableside preparation and we had fun watching not only our dishes but the other dishes prepared for other tables. So interesting to watch as well as delicious to eat.
We definitely like Bull & Bear - it's 100% worth the price for a special dinner.
We ubered back to the Contemporary and were in the room by 9:35. We missed the fireworks, but #worthit. And we still had the view:
So pretty!
This was the first night I took advantage of that massive massive bathtub:
No better way to end the night than with a nice bath in a LARGE bathtub. Amazing. It was so nice.
Overall, a fantastic day ending with a fantastic meal.
Fun with Metrics:
Steps walked: 14093 steps (6.2 miles)
Ride count: 8 (Safari, Everest x4, Dinosaur, Navi River Journey, Flight of Passage)
Savings due to AP discount: $0.00
Refillable Mug Tally: 3 fills today (6 total)
No Such Thing as Monday Blues at the Magic Kingdom! - Monday May 6, 2024 (part 1)
I didn't sleep super well overnight - I blame being EXTREMELY full. But I got up a little before 7 am and was able to book us all our fastpasses, and get us a pretty early Tron boarding group. I was a little worried by how fast the return times were moving out - I got us a Peter Pan fastpass for 11 but was able to modify it to 9:30 am. And by the time I bought our individual fastpass for Seven Dwarfs Mine Train (at like 7:05 am), the earliest available time was like 12:45. So...it may be a busy day.
Overnight sunrise timelapse, try #2!
We were having breakfast (aka cake) out on our balcony. It was fun watching everyone heading to Magic Kingdom - I saw a Minnie Van and saw that they have a Minnie shape on their sunroof! So that's kind of cool. We also saw a Figment bus!
We left the room at 8:12 and by 8:24 we were through security and in front of the tapstiles! So nice to be able to walk to Magic Kingdom. I would say nice to not have to wait in security lines but with the new security scanners that's not a huge pain anymore.
By 8:30, we were taking pictures in front of the castle!
My bag today was my Beauty and the Beast popcorn bucket that I'd ordered from Tokyo Disney by way of ebay. It's just so cute - I love it! I didn't bring a lot of stuff so the few things I had could fit in the bucket. I wanted to get some pictures with it in front of the Beast's castle, and also it's just cute. Didn't really match our Haunted Mansion theme today (my ears, our shirts) but oh well.
After pictures, we headed over to Tomorrowland and decided to spend our extra magic half hour at Buzz Lightyear -
Not a long line at all! We wanted to try and be galactic heroes.
Trevor and I took separate cars to try and get our high scores -
Sadly, I only got 656,800.
But I beat Trevor! He got 529800.
We of course went around again.
Only 728220 though.
But I still beat Trevor - 605400.
So no galactic heroes for us today, but I do like how each we're in basically the exact same pose in both pictures. We take Buzz Lightyear VERY SERIOUSLY.
We got off a little bit before 9, and they'd called our Tron group, so over we went!
I know people like riding Tron at night but I don't really have a preference between day and night rides, and if you happen to get an earlier group, there's hardly any line!
We also noticed that they'd replaced the lighting effect stuff in the Tron hallway!!
It had all been pulled off by guests but they put it back or did something else to add the effect back in (hopefully less subject to guest destruction. ) Nice job Disney!
We got in line at 9:02 and by 9:10 we were on the ride. So fast!
Trevor is braver than I am and willing to try taking a picture on the ride.
After Tron, we were heading back towards Fantasyland and our Peter Pan fastpass. But we took the little shortcut that sent us up by Storybook Circus, and we saw some of the Smellephants on Parade!
Super fun looking!
We had a few minutes so we decided to ride the Carousel!
They had a bunch of scrim/whatever you call it around a good section of the carousel - I guess it's under some kind of refurbishment? *shrugs*
Still had a good time.
We were off by like 9:32, so over to Peter Pan we went! I noticed this barrel for the first time -
Aw
The lightning lane line for Peter Pan was thankfully short - only 3 minutes before we were on the ride!
I love the overhead aspect of Peter Pan - more rides like that please!
I didn't take good notes from here - I think we were just wandering? I feel like I booked us a Big Thunder fastpass but....you'll see why I'm not 100% sure on that. We definitely did head over to Liberty Square area, because we found another photographer in front of the Liberty Bell!
Including purely for the novelty.
Over in Adventureland, we saw Aladdin and Jasmine, and they started playing hide and go seek with some kids! That was fun - Aladdin was hiding with one kid, and then Jasmine was seeking with another kid. Spoiler alert - Jasmine is not a very good seeker.
You can't see it very well in the picture but Aladdin and the other kid were just off to the left of the video, to the left of the Sunglass Hut if you're facing it. How fun to be able to wander with Jasmine and play hide and go seek!
Big Thunder was down, so we went back to the hub (don't ask me why - I legit don't remember why). We did get to hear (and see a little bit) the Dapper Dans:
While we were in the hub, and I was playing fastpass roulette (trying to get fastpasses for rides that are down and get the fastpasses turn into multi-experience passes), we caught most of Mickey's Friendship Faire! https://youtu.be/q2liesHeJA0
We've never seen this, and it's kind of cute! It was a fun 10/15 minutes. But then, time for Big Thunder!
So glad we had a fastpass, with the line already at 35 minutes. There was a photographer off to the side, so we stopped there first:
Then, Big Thunder! 7 minutes after taking the pictures with the photographer, we were getting on the ride!
Our train was the I.M. Fearless. And yes, we were riding front row. Not my favorite spot, but hey, gotta switch it up a bit.
Favorite Character Meet and Greet! - Monday May 6, 2024 (part 3)
I think this selfie was at the end of the ride, since we're both wearing our hats, and as we all know, for the wildest ride in the wilderness, BEST REMOVE 'EM!
It was a great ride. Afterwards, the plan was to head to Pirates. We got to see some of the construction on Tiana's!
It looks so good!
And look at this fun photo op.
We also realized that the Adventure Friends Cavalcade was coming, so we hung around for like 5 minutes and got a great view!
It's Mary and Bert and Marie and Max!
That was an unexpected but happy surprise.
We didn't have any plans for the next little bit - Pirates had gone down, and so had Haunted Mansion, so we were just kind of sitting in the shade by Golden Oak Outpost, and I was playing fastpass roulette, trying to get fastpasses for Pirates and Haunted Mansion that would turn into multi-experience passes. I had some luck with it! But we figured we'd head back towards Be Our Guest and take some pictures with my popcorn bucket. We went up the little path by Sleepy Hollow, and ran smack into the line for the Stepsisters Meet and Greet! Of course we had to hop in line for that, especially cause the line wasn't very long. And also, it's a gorgeous little view of the castle there.
7 minutes later, we got to meet the stepsisters!
We always have fun with them - just ask them if they've seen any princes that day and they'll take it from there.
As we kept heading towards Be Our Guest, we saw the tiny world magic shot off to the side of the castle, so we headed there first. But we got distracted by a squirrel.
Hi there!
Then we got our picture - there was basically no line, which was nice.
Definitely more of a fun experience than a nice picture, but still.
Then we *finally* made it back to Be Our Guest, and there was indeed a photographer out on the bridge right there, so we hopped in the *very short* line, and got some photos! The sun actually went right behind a cloud as we started taking pictures, which was really nice timing. The photographer was super nice and took a bunch of pictures of us with the bucket, which was what I was hoping for.
Photos, Snacks, and Smells! - Monday May 6, 2024 (part 4)
More photos!
Trevor is the beast here - showing the "beast" side of the bucket.
After, we went over to the shield/logo for Be Our Guest and I had Trevor take some more photos.
An influencer I am not, but it was fun!
At this point we were hungry so we kept the Beauty and the Beast theme going, heading over to Gaston's Tavern for snacks!
A LeFou's brew
as well as the Grey Stuff cupcake and a cinnamon roll with extra frosting (pro tip - always ask for extra frosting ).
It was nice to be inside, in the A/C, with yummy snacks. We finished up and then did one more photo shoot-type shot:
Trevor channeling Gaston!
We had about 10 minutes before our Space Mountain fastpass started, so we starting making our way over there. We did stop at the popcorn stand right by Gaston's Tavern, but we discovered that Magic Kingdom will only do popcorn refills in the actual popcorn bucket - they won't give you the refill in the paper cup. That was a bit of a bummer - I was gonna buy a popcorn refill (cause it was just the right size) but they couldn't do it. Bummer! The other parks will, but not Magic Kingdom - not sure why. *shrugs*
We kept heading towards Storybook Circus, passing the gorgeous Little Mermaid castle:
Love it.
In Storybook Circus, we decided to stop and do the actual Smellephants on Parade experience:
How could we resist, when they were casting noses of all ages? They had a CM out and he gave us the map and stickers, and once we matched the scents to each elephant we could come back and get our "prize".
You didn't need to smell the elephant to know what scent was supposed to go there (cause they were painted to resemble the thing that their scent was of), which was good because of the 8, we could really only smell 2: caramel apple and popcorn (though the popcorn smelled like caramel popcorn). The others we couldn't smell at all, or could only smell really faintly. So that was kind of disappointing, but at least the elephants look super cute! And we did get to explore Storybook Circus a bit, which we never do:
Fun little calliope! And the completer sticker was neat too. I'm glad we did it but I wouldn't plan your day around it or anything.
My Phone Took a Brief Detour - Monday May 6, 2024 (part 5)
The Space Mountain fastpass line was a bit backed up - took us about 15 minutes to get on.
Selfie! I was wearing my Beauty and the Beast popcorn bucket and was desperately trying to not bang it around. Not the best thing to take on Space Mountain!
You can kind of see me holding it up there and trying to keep it safe. We also got the left side which we don't normally get, so that was kind of fun.
When we got out, and after we'd tapped for our photos, I realized that my phone had fallen out of my pocket into the ride vehicle. Uh-oh! Definitely freaked out a bit but the CM was super helpful and sent us up a little back staircase/ramp area where the CM at the loading area had and it was able to get it back to us ASAP. So nice and helpful! Really appreciated that.
It was a little before 1 pm and we were heading over to Pirates, since it had come back up. That was definitely a walk on, which was nice.
Back row selfie!
This photo op did not work at all - because we were in the back row we briefly turned on the popcorn bucket (it lights up) and were looking in it, but you couldn't really see. Oh well! Worth a try. Still such a horrible place for a photo.
Next, Haunted Mansion! Not too bad a line, but I did notice this cool figure in the wire work above the LL entrance:
It's a bat! Never noticed that before...oops.
We tried the same thing with the popcorn bucket as we tried to do on Pirates...worked slightly better this time!
And yes, I immediately turned the light off as soon as the photo op was over.
The ride was stopping a lot - like every 10 seconds? I was only bummed because we didn't end up stopped in a cool place (aka, not in view of the hatbox ghost).
As we left the mansion, we of course stopped for pictures!
(picture limit)
From Seven Dwarfs to Beauty and the Beast - Monday May 6, 2024 (part 6)
Yes! We're all facing the right way! Woohoo.
Next, Seven Dwarfs Mine Train! We were about out of the window, but we just made it. Unfortunately, the line was SUPER long. Like backed up outside the tapstile, and then fully backed up from the tapstile to the cave and onto the ride. We ended up waiting about twenty minutes, plus an extra minute cause we asked for the last row and had to wait one extra round. #worthit
We were sitting for a little bit by the cottage, waiting to unload, so I filmed one of the other cars running.
At this point, it was 2:20. We were hungry, and the plan was to go over to Trader Sams, see if we could get lucky and get right in, or if not, head over to the Grand Floridian and the Enchanted Rose lounge while we waited to get called in to Trader Sams. So over to the boats we went!
The boats are nice but not speedy - we waited about 10 minutes for a boat, and then another 10 minutes for the boat to actually leave. But it was nice on the water! We got to the Poly a couple minutes before 3 pm, and there was indeed quite a line. So we got on the wait list and were quoted a 2 hour wait. Oh well - over to the Grand Floridian we went!
We got to the Grand Floridian at 3:10 and I realized I'd screwed up - Enchanted Rose didn't open up until 3:30. Oops! So we just sat in the lobby and enjoyed the air conditioning and the piano music from the lobby. Once it opened, we let the rush die down and then got seated with a lovely view of the hotel.
Hello backlit Trevor!
We ordered our drinks and then realized I'd screwed up...again. They didn't serve food until 5 pm! Blargh. Oh well. Neat coasters though!
I may or may not have stolen a set.
They did serve some small snacks so we got homemade beef jerky to tide us over:
This was good - chewy, nice smokey flavor, a little bit of spice, not too dry or too strong.
As for drinks, I got a virgin blueberry mojito with sprite instead of club soda so it would be a bit sweeter.
This wasn't as sweet as I thought it would be, though generally sweeter than other virgin mojitos, and the mint was less overpowering, so it was good.
Trevor got the Rosemary Cooler: Lemonade, Vanilla, and Rosemary. I really liked his - the vanilla made it sweeter and the rosemary worked with the lemon in a way I didn't think it would. Good drinks! And we enjoyed sitting and talking and enjoying the a/c.
Decorations and FOOD! - Monday May 6, 2024 (part 7)
After about half an hour, we were done with our drinks and decided to look around before heading back to the Polynesian. It's such a pretty bar - I just wish it was based on the animated movie vs the live action, cause I like the animated one better.
Still pretty though.
Pretty upholstery on the chair!
I liked this piece a lot - I'm a sucker for castle artwork.
This looks more like Sleeping Beauty than Beauty and the Beast, which works for me.
We then headed towards the dock to catch the boat over to the Poly. It was a nice little walk, and when we got there, there was a boat waiting for us! We hopped right on. It's always nice when the transportation is waiting for you when you arrive.
Over at the Poly we headed over to Trader Sam's to check on where we were on the wait list...we were hoping they'd call us soon. We were hungry! They told us there were still several parties ahead of us, so we looked in the gift shop and just kind of hung around for a bit til we got called back. They called us at about 5:30, so a 2 and a half hour wait. I'm not sure getting on the list at open is the best way to go...but at least we finally made it in at a time when the kitchen was open!
We were seated at a table in the back:
For a while we were just enjoying the ambiance while we had the table all to ourselves. They told us they'd be seating another couple at the table shortly, which honestly considering how in demand this place is, I'm ok with.
We ordered the Schweitzer Falls for me: Tropical Juices and Sam’s Gorilla Grog topped with Sprite
Actually I ordered the Skipper Sipper but she brought me the Schweitzer Falls, which neither of us realized until I actually ordered the Schweitzer Falls (after I finished this drink ) and so she brought me the Skipper Sipper then. Anyways. This was good - basically tasted like pineapple.
Trevor got the Polynesian Punch: Lyre’s Spiced Cane Spirit, Orange, Pineapple, Passionfruit, Guava, Hibiscus Ginger Beer, Soda Water
Trevor liked this - he doesn't really like the zero proof spirits, but he only tasted it a little bit. I really liked this one. I think it's my favorite non-alcoholic drink at Trader Sam's (spoiler alert in case you were wondering how I liked the Skipper Sipper and Schweitzer Falls. )
Then, food!! First, the Kalua Pork Tacos.
I thought these were DELICIOUS. They didn't skimp on the filling, and even though the pork may look a little bit dry, it absolutely wasn't. Definitely my favorite thing.
We also got the Chicken Lettuce cups:
These were fine - good, nothing spectacular, but good.
Disney Springs and Fireworks - Monday May 6, 2024 (part 8)
Next up, the Kahuna Tuna Sushi Roll.
This had tuna both on top and in the middle. Trevor liked it, but it was a bit too fishy for me. Another solid entry.
This was when I ordered a new drink - ordered the Schweitzer Falls and got the Skipper Sipper. Tropical Juices, Organic Agave Nectar, Falernum, Mint, and fresh Lime Juice topped with Soda Water
Yum. Though I do wish that they had non-citrus based drinks - they all taste a lot of pineapple and it'd be interesting to have variety.
We kept going on the food though - Pan fried dumplings!
Another solid, but not amazing entry.
And the last dish? Thai Chicken Flatbread with Bacon and Peanut Sauce
This was delicious, and very cheesy, which was a huge plus for me. Cheese is the best. I didn't really taste the peanut sauce but that may just have been the piece that I got. Trevor thought this was too cheesy. He's wrong.
We spent about an hour in Trader Sam's, enjoying the food and the drinks and all the fun special effects. We shared a table with a nice couple who was staying with their family at one of the bungalows! They weren't really Disney people (it was one of their sibling's family's who had the DVC points and invited them to stay with them at the bungalow - I want family members like that!), but they were enjoying their stay. It was fun talking. Also I totally spilled pork juice all OVER my shirt which I didn't realize until we got out of the dim light in Trader Sam's. That wasn't embarrassing at all. Oops!
Where to now? A bit of the spur of the moment decision to head to Disney Springs! Gideon's had posted online about the Halfway to Halloween celebrations - specifically, the special hand pie and the frankencookie, and I really wanted to try the frankencookie. So we headed to the bus stop.
But on the way, fire!! Trevor's such a pyromaniac.
The bus pulled up right as we got there, though we stopped at the Grand Floridian before heading to Disney Springs. It was fun actually - there was a cute little family on the bus with a super friendly little boy. He was all energetic and laughing and Trevor started making faces at him, and then he tried to make the faces back which was hilarious. Trevor made an elephant noise by holding air in his mouth and blowing it out slowly and that blew the little boy's mind til he figured it out, but he couldn't imitate it because he was laughing too hard to hold air in and blow it out slowly. It was so cute! They got off at the Grand Floridian and the little boy was waving to us as they walked away.
We got to Disney Springs at 7:10, and Trevor headed right to Gideon's to get in line while I ducked into the Vera Bradley store and got a bag from their new Beauty and the Beast collection and then got distracted by looking at the Pandora store charms. I finally joined up with Trevor at about 7:40 in the Gideon's line -
Not too far from the front! Also yes, I do know that Trevor is a saint to wait in the line while I shop.
At 7:55 we were in the store, but we had a new concern - sunset was at 8:04 and sunset is when they bring out the dark coffee cake cookies. We weren't gonna try and time it but with being THAT close, we figured we had to try - we love the dark coffee cake cookie. We let two groups go ahead of us, and then we were up, but they brought out the dark coffee cake right as we were both at the register - woohoo! So we were able to get some of them, and yes- they still had the frankencookie so we got those too. Woo hoo!
After the cookies we went back to the Pandora store and I bought a couple charms, but it took rather longer than I thought and so it was 8:30 when we left. Our goal was to get back to the hotel in time to watch the fireworks from our balcony...would we make it? We started booking it over to the Uber pickup place and hopped right in our waiting Uber, to make it back at 8:47 --just in time! We walked in our room at 8:50 and found my ears decorating some towels on the bed!
Such a cute little touch.
Trevor ran down to Contempo Cafe to fill up the mug (fill #7!), and then it was time for fireworks!
It's such a nice experience watching the fireworks from the balcony, and seeing Tinkerbell fly. We could hear the echo of the sound from Magic Kingdom, so at times it felt almost slightly out of sync, but rather than being irritating it was just kind of cool. And we got to see all the fireworks cruise boats bobbing out on the lagoon, which was kind of fun to see.
Was the night over? You'll have to wait and see...
Magic Kingdom at Night - Monday May 6, 2024 (part 9)
After the fireworks as we were just enjoying the view, we saw the Electric Light Parade over in front of the Poly and the Grand Floridian. No sound - and honestly at this point I wasn't even sure there was sound!
I was freshly re-energized after watching the fireworks, and Magic Kingdom was open til 11. And it was about 9:30ish. So...we made the last minute decision that since we're close, we might as well go and close out the night at Magic Kingdom, use our last multi-experience fastpass and see if we could do the Jungle Cruise.
Definitely one of the nice things about being at the Contemporary - this picture was taken 10 minutes after we decided to go and left our room.
First stop? Jungle Cruise! We headed over there immediately, intending to just wait it out, but it was a literally walk on. Woot!
We were on at 10:03 pm.
We got held up waiting to go back to the dock and so the Skipper starting asking us what our favorite ride was that day. The first group said "Jungle Cruise", and then the second group was a couple where the one said "Jungle Cruise of course" and the other person in that couple said "we rode it earlier today". It was super funny - the Skipper was great. And then she brought it around at the end - you know how they usually do their "get out" joke? She directed it specifically at that guy - it was funny. (That's around minute 12 if you want to watch the video )
After Jungle Cruise, we decided to use our multi-experience fastpass on Big Thunder, so over we went. We passed Tiana's on the way-
You could even see fireflies in the trees! I don't know if it shows up on the video though. So cool.
Big Thunder had kind of a long standby line so I was glad for the fastpass.
It was a great ride into the wilderness, as always. We didn't lose our hats or glasses, cause we removed 'em, as instructed.
Afterwards we weren't really sure what to do, so we just kind of wandered up into Fantasyland. We did a quick stop at the Tangled toilets, and I noticed tis poster for the first time ever!
Hi Ulf!
We saw Winnie the Pooh had a pretty low wait, so we headed over there. It had been a bit since we'd ridden!
It said 15 but it was a walkon - which was nice 'cause it was about 10 min til the park closed and I was hoping for one more ride after this.
We got off at 10:56 - does anyone else really like the music on the ride? I love the whole "rain rain rain came down down down" section.
Anyways! 10:56, 4 minutes til the park closed, where were we going? The carousel of course! Can't close out a night at Magic Kingdom without the carousel.
We got on at 10:59 pm, and we both went for a horse on the outside:
I don't know why but I really love the Carousel at night and singing along with the music. It's just so nice at night to watch Fantasyland all lit up with the music playing...the whole thing.
Then we were done, and it was time to make our way back to the hotel. So pretty!
I also really like how if you end in Fantasyland you can walk out through the castle - I realize I take this picture every time but it just makes me happy.
Anyone else ever think about winning a night at the castle suite? Wouldn't that be amazing? So jealous of anyone who has gotten to stay there.
As we got to the exit, we saw Mickey and Minnie dancing on the train station and waving goodbye to everyone, which was super cute to see. Such a nice little touch.
We hopped on the resort monorail, with basically no line, and were back to the room by 11:30 pm. Love it! I enjoyed the giant bath tub again (soaking my feet at the end of a long day is always helpful). Trevor decided he was hungry so he went down to Contempo to microwave his lobster mac and cheese from last night, and got another refill of the mug (fill #8).
Overall, a fun Magic Kingdom day - both in the park and at the resorts. Finally got to experience Trader Sams! It's so fun watching all the fun drink experiences, and the food was delicious. And then a quick Disney Springs jaunt for cookies (and of course a few other goodies. ). Tomorrow, Epcot and Hollywood Studios!
Fun with Metrics:
Steps walked: 25310 steps (9.7 miles)
Ride count: 14 (Buzz x2, Tron, Carousel x2, Peter Pan, Big Thunder x2, Space, Pirates, Haunted Mansion, Seven Dwarfs, Jungle Cruise, Winnie the Pooh)
Savings due to AP discount: $56.80 (merch discount )
Refillable Mug Tally: 2 fills today (8 total)
Is there a prize for going to Gideon's the most amount of times in one trip? - Tuesday May 7, 2024 (part 1)
We woke up to yet another gorgeous morning.
That view never gets old!
Trevor had tried again for a sunrise timelapse - it sort of worked.
Our plan today was Epcot and Hollywood Studios, but with a brief detour to Disney Springs so we could get the Halfway to Halloween "hand pie" from Gideons, cause 1. it was all sold out when we went the night before and 2. Trevor really wanted it. And obviously I'm not going to say no to another Gideon's run!
We thought about going directly to Disney Springs, but they don't let you in until 9 and it was still before 8, and we got super lucky and got an early boarding group for Guardians, so we decided to be crazy and go to Epcot and then uber to Disney Springs. At 8:19, we were hopping on the monorail at the Contemporary and at 8:55 we were tapping in at the front gates:
Yes, I absolutely forgot how it's kind of a pain to take the monorail to Epcot. Oh well! We boogied on over to Guardians and enjoyed how that virtual queue line is basically empty first thing in the morning - 10 minutes later we were on the ride!
We got "One Way or Another" for our song - not bad! Honestly the only ones I'm not a particular fan of are "Disco Inferno" and "September", so anything else is all good.
We were off the ride by 9:23 and heading towards the Uber pickup area at Epcot, which felt kind of far out there. I was trying to time the "confirm" button so that the driver would be there when we got there (or at least we wouldn't have to wait too long), so when it said that drivers were 2 minutes away, I hit the button. And then once it got confirmed, guess how far away the uber was? 10 min. Whomp whomp. There's no shade at the rideshare pick up area, so blargh. And yes I am one of those people who tracks where the car is and so I got to watch the uber drive away from Epcot and so now they were 13 minutes away. The driver called and apparently the app was buggy and he thought he'd declined it but it accepted it and he didn't know that he had? Or something like that. *shrugs* But eventually he arrived and 10 minutes later dropped us off at the west side of Disney Springs. It was about 10 to 10 (so still technically "rope dropping" Gideons. ), but it's definitely a longer walk from the west side (by Cirque de Soleil) to Gideons than from the Marketplace side, or at least it feels that way. Trevor walks faster than I do so he went on ahead to get in line.
I caught up to the line here:
We were waaaaaay back alongside Morimoto Asia - the line had gone down the side of Gideon's to the corner, and then turned the corner, and that's where we were. So pro tip, get to Gideon's early if you want to rope drop! But since this was our main plan for the morning, we were ok with it. It was super hot already though - Trevor went to Joffrey's and got us a strawberry lemonade.
This was pretty good! Definitely helped us stay cool. We ended up switching off - one of us waited in the line in full sun (cause I didn't have my sun parasol with me), and the other waited in the shade off to the side. Not a bad plan! It actually worked really well.
At around 11 I went to the Ganachery and got a chocolate chiller again. So good!
If you've never had one of these, I highly recommend. Just a fancy chocolate milk really, but delicious.
At 11:35 we were about 5 groups from the front of the line, but then all of a sudden they stopped letting people in - it sounded like someone had passed out inside! The paramedics came and everything. But after about 10 minutes they left (without a person on the stretcher - phew!). The heat was no joke - Florida is rough yo. Glad the person was ok!
They started letting us in and at 11:51, only 2 hours later, we had cookies and hand pies for Halfway to Halloween!
Aren't these fun? They were yummy.
Ok, treats acquired, we hopped on a bus back to the Contemporary. Disney Springs bus service being what it is, we didn't actually leave until about 12:15. We got back to the Contemporary at 12:38, and the bus stop said the next bus to Hollywood Studios was at 12:48, so just enough time to run our Gideon's bag up to the room! Trevor actually volunteered to do it himself, and me being lazy, I was totally onboard! But after about 5 minutes when he hadn't returned, I got a bit nervous, and then he called me - his magic band wouldn't work to let him in the room, and his phone/bluetooth key wouldn't work either. So I ran up, and had all the elevator luck I needed - they were waiting for me when I got there (which was a relief - the elevators are definitely the long pole in the tent!), and so I let Trevor in and we ran back down to the bus stop and made it just as the bus pulled up. Woot! We even had time to spare - the bus still had to unload and then load in a scooter, so we would have had a few extra minutes.
1:05 we were at Hollywood Studios, and it was time for lunch! Where to go?
Woody's Lunchbox! I realize you're all shocked but man we love that QS. We got the Turkey Sandwich kid's meal, plus milk, to split. Also another one of my protips - the kids meals are plenty of food, especially in the heat. And this sandwich was indeed delicious. We even managed to get a table without having to wait too long, which is always nice.
The plan afterwards was to head to ride Rise of the Resistance with the fastpass we bought, but literally right as we finished, Rise went down. Whomp whomp. It was kind of irritating - we just wanted to ride Rise. Oh well. We went over to Galaxy's Edge to kill some time, and were looking in the Dok Ondar's store.
The animatronic must have been having troubles, as it was hidden behind this curtain.
Trevor bought some kyber crystals, and then we realized they'd released a new edition/version/whathaveyou of the Spira gift cards, so of course we had to buy one of those -
This one is bronze, so now we have the silver, gold, and bronze.
These are such fun gift cards - metal and heavy duty. They're the ones we always carry with us on our trips, cause no way am I gonna inadvertently throw these away!
We also stopped by Ronto Roasters and grabbed a Ronto wrap.
We haven't had a ronto wrap in a while, so this was fun. It was a bit spicier than I remembered; Trevor said it also seemed a bit drier, but overall, yum. Rise was still down so we opened up the kyber crystals Trevor bought, to see if he got any of the rare ones:
No dice on getting the rare ones, but still fun to try.
We then headed over to the marketplace to look around a bit, and ran into Mando right as he was leaving/heading backstage. Bummer we didn't get to meet him again but still nice to see him. And then we got the notification that Rise was back up! Woo hoo!
Lots of B mode today - the Kylo animatronic on the bridge didn't move at all (it's supposed to turn around and look at you), and then the other Kylo animatronic also wasn't working (the one where he's supposed to get sucked out) so it was Kylo in a ship on the screen. And then in the room with the AT-ATs, the laser cannons on the head of the one stayed upright - they didn't come down to point at the ride vehicle. Still a fun ride, but a bit sad to see all the B mode - makes me glad we were able to ride Rise at the beginning when everything was working (even the cannons at the end of the car). Hopefully they can fix it and get it back to how it was when it first opened!
As we left the ride, we ran into a couple photographers, so of course we stopped.
I've never seen (at least that I remember) a photographer by this particular ship, so that was neat.
And just throwing in that fun photopass animation.
We started heading out of the park and towards the skyliner to head back over to Epcot, stopping to get an icee on the way cause it was HOT.
We got our own gondola on the skyliner, which Trevor liked -
By 3:35 we were back in Epcot - we wanted to check out the Passholder lounge in Morocco! Course, on the way to Morocco we passed the France booth and of course we had to stop and get the Croissant with Goat Cheese, Herbs, and Roasted Garlic.
This was super yummy - warm and cheesy and garlic-y.
Once we got back to Morocco and found the lounge, I thought we would have to wait (cause there were reports of a waiting list) but we got right in.
It was nice inside - lovely air conditioning, some water and snacks, and after doing a lap, we found a table in the corner. The plan was to sit and rest for a while, enjoying the space.
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