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Christiane Whynott -- July 2005 - Walt Disney World (Offsite)Cast Members -Me (Christiane) : 22 years old; 13th trip to WDW -Calvin (my boyfriend): 21 years old; 3rd trip to WDW -Vincent (my brother): 16 years old; 9th trip to WDW -Mom: 46 years old; 16th trip to WDW -Dad: 46 years old; 16th trip to WDW -Uncle Ned (dad’s brother): 50 years old; 6th trip to WDW Planning: My parents always seem to decide on a whim that they want to go to Walt Disney World. Ever since I was four years old, we’ve tried to go every other year or so. For a while, we went every year, and in 1995, we actually went twice. We used to get season passes because it made the most sense for us because we’d usually get two visits out of them. But as time passed, and I’ve reached higher grades in school, winter trips no longer made sense for us and we started traveling in the summer. Since we live in Ontario, it takes quite a bit of planning to get to Florida. We’ve only driven twice before this trip. It takes 24 straight hours to drive, but we’ve always broken it into three days. We usually fly however, just because it’s more convenient, and we often get good deals on flights. On this particular trip, because it was planned rather quickly, we decided to drive. This decision was much to my dismay, as I find long car rides extremely boring. Thankfully, I received a laptop as a graduation gift and was able to watch movies and play video games in the car, which helped pass the time. We left our house at around 4:00 PM on June 28th. We stayed in a hotel just past Toronto that night. On the 29th of June, we drove from Toronto to Kentucky, which took about 12 hours. On the 30th, we made it from Kentucky to Kissimmee, which took about 14 hours. We sure were happy to walk into our vacation home that night! My mother purchased our tickets before leaving. We all got 6-day Magic Your Way tickets. We were all surprised by how cheap it was to add days to our tickets! I guess Disney really wants you to stay with them! We had previously stayed at the All-Star Sports in 2002 (the only time we’ve ever stayed on property), but this time, because we were six people, a vacation home made more sense. I was a little sad that we weren’t going to stay on property, but I do really like having our own private pool, kitchen, living area and bedrooms. Before the trip, I made a tentative itinerary which we barely followed. Calvin thought I was nuts for planning so meticulously, and in the end, it hadn’t really been worth it. I was disappointed that my mother hadn’t made priority seatings before we left home, and we were unable to eat at many of the restaurants that I had been hoping to try. Since this will probably be my last trip with my parents, I am at least happy to note that, on my next trip, things can be done a little more to my liking. Since my parents were paying for the house and the transportation, Calvin and I had to ride their coat-tails for most of the trip. We did a lot on our own, but I didn’t want to always be away from my parents, and so I had to be happy with the restaurants that they picked out. I was at least able to convince them to try Boma, which everyone ended up loving. Another big disadvantage to staying off property, for Calvin and I, was that we had to wait for my family to be ready every morning. I would have been ready to go to the parks for opening every single day, but my family wasn’t up and ready to go until past 9:00 or even 10:00 some days. Many times, they also wanted to leave the park much earlier than us, and so we had to pay a taxi to get us back to the house, or find a way to meet up with them at specific times (at a restaurant, for dinner, for example). This arrangement somewhat put a dent in our park enjoyment, but we learned to deal with it. Calvin and I still had a great trip in the end, as you will now see. Day 1 (Friday July 1st) – Happy Canada Day Plans: Get our passes and visit Epcot. Today was our first day in the parks. We were going to sleep in and leave late, but I ended up awake at 6:30 AM. Force of habit, I guess. I did pilates by the pool while Calvin swam, and when I was done, I joined him. We took showers, had breakfast, and by the time the rest of the family got moving, we left the house at 10:00. We decided to try and get our tickets at the Swan, hoping that resort tickets would give us free parking. However, we did not read the fine print, which very clearly stated that we could only pick up our tickets at one of the four parks. At the Swan, my mother was informed that we would also need photo ID to get our tickets, something that was also clearly written on the pages we chose not to read. So, we had to come back to the house so that uncle Ned could get his ID. We finally pulled into Epcot at nearly 11:00. Here’s how the day went: The first ride we did was Spaceship Earth. It hasn’t changed a bit, which was nice. That ride has been the same for so long, that it is a Disney staple. I love it. After we got off that ride, we headed straight to The Land, hoping to make supper reservations at the Garden Grill. We were unable to do so, however, because they were booked solid. We were told to come back around supper in case someone didn’t show up. We decided to go down and do Soarin’. The wait was a little over an hour, but it was worth it! What an awesome ride! The only complaint I have is the somewhat boring queue line, that also happens to be very deceiving. You think you are finally there, and then, more lines. But, like I said, the ride was worth the wait. Very cool. It ended up being nearly 1:00 by the time we got off Soarin’, so we decided to eat lunch at Seasons Foodcourt. Calvin and Vincent ran over to Test Track for Fastpasses while the rest of us bought lunch. Our Fastpass return time was 4:45, so we had plenty of time to eat lunch, do Living with the Land, Journey into Imagination with Figment, Honey I Shrunk the Audience and Mission: Space. The only ones who did Mission: Space were Vincent and uncle Ned. The rest of us hung out in the gift shop and the little play area, waiting for them to get off. The Standby line was only a five minute wait, which really doesn’t make sense for a brand-new ride. I guess the death of that little boy really scared people away. Uncle Ned and Vincent got off and said they were nauseas, and neither seemed totally impressed with the ride. Actually, as we watched people get off the ride, they all seemed either sick or bored. It doesn’t look good for Disney or HP; Mission: Space seems to be somewhat of a flop. But, maybe it was just a bad day. After Mission: Space, we did Ellen’s Energy Adventure. It was nearly our Fastpass return time when we got out of there, so we had an ice cream, spent a bit of time in Innoventions East, then did Test Track. It was awesome, as usual, and I’m hoping to get back on before the end of the trip. The only strange thing was that the Standby line was actually faster than the Fast Pass line. But, we discovered this at the end, so it was a little too late to switch lines. We went straight to Canada after Test Track, to wish some Cast Members a Happy Canada Day. We even caught a bit of Off Kilter, and saw some more fellow Canadians. After Canada, we went to Mexico and did El Rio Del Tiempo. After getting off, we looked around the Market Place, then went outside to sit in the food court and have some margaritas. It was supper time by then, and we’d pretty much given up on the Garden Grill, so we headed over to Norway and made a 7:20 reservation for Restaurant Akershus. We had enough time before our reservations to do Maelstrom and then look through the stores. Dinner was awesome! It isn’t every day you get to try Norwegian food, and we got plenty of different little things to eat. The meatballs are unbelievable! A nice plus was that the Disney Princesses visited our table. We got pictures with Ariel, Princess Aurora, Jasmine, Alice in Wonderland and Belle. Alice even wished us a Happy Canada Day, so I guess we’d dressed the part quite well! We finished the day off with Illumination: Reflections of Earth. The show was breathtaking, as usual. I recognized the music from Sorcerer Radio and was often singing along, or at least humming and swaying. The show brought tears to my eyes. I love being in Walt Disney World! Day 2 (Saturday July 2nd) Plan: Magic Kingdom and our Behind-the-Scenes Steam Train Tour! Today was Magic Kingdom day, and it started out very early. We woke up at 6:00 AM so that we could be at the park by 7:15, to be on time for our “Behind the Magic of our Steam Trains” tour. We were the last to arrive, but they waited for us. What an amazing tour! It was, by far, one of the best things I’ve ever done at Walt Disney World. Not only did we get to see the park before any guests were allowed in, but we got to ride the trains before anyone else AND we got to see the roundhouse, where the four Magic Kingdom steam trains and all the monorails are stored. Seeing the roundhouse was just awesome. Our tour guide brought us right into the roundhouse, and then we walked around to another train (the Roy O. Disney) and saw how it runs and what goes in to making it go day in and day out. We met some engineers (one of whom was our tour guide’s husband) and heard many interesting stories about Walt Disney and his love of trains. For instance, he had a 1/8 scale steam train setup in his backyard in California, from 1950-1953, and on weekends, people from all over the state would go to his house and ride on his train. Also, an interesting bit of trivia: Walt Disney wanted steam trains at the Magic Kingdom in Florida, so he sent his friend Rodger out to find some. However, 18 months before the park’s opening, there still were no trains to be found. Luckily, Rodger came upon a gold mine of steam trains in Mexico, which were brought to Florida and restored. Two of them were ready for park opening day, and a third was ready by Christmas. The fourth arrived soon after. A little known fact is that there was also a fifth train, which, upon purchase, was the shiniest train of all the Magic Kingdom trains. However, once Rodger started to restore it, the whole thing fell to dust. It was completely rusted through, and was only shiny because of forty-seven layers of lacquer! Our tour guide was extremely knowledgeable and I could tell that she really enjoyed her job and was proud to be an engineer on the Walt Disney World Railroad. There are 34 engineers at the Magic Kingdom, and only four of them are women. She filled us with information and both Calvin and I took it all in. It was all so interesting. We left with a beautiful collector pin with a picture of Mickey Mouse driving a train and the words “The Magic Behind our Steam Trains tour” written on it. The pin was designed, originally, by one of the engineers, and was “perfected” by an actual Disney animator. If it had not been “tweeked”, the powers of Disney were not going to allow the train people to have a pin to give to their tours. Initially, the train tour guests received real train track spikes as souvenirs, but after 9/11, all the spikes got confiscated at the airport, as they were considered to be weapons. So, people were getting home, from their trips, and calling Disney to complain because they’d lost their train tour souvenir. Needless to say, a beautiful collector pin was a much better parting gift! The tour ended at 10:30, and a torrential rain storm hit at the exact same time. Rather than walking to Splash Mountain (our decision as a first ride for the day), we decided to take the train. We stood in the train station and watched people coming into the park and just getting soaked! We stayed fairly dry, until we actually got onto the train, which had very wet seats. It stopped raining before we got off at the Frontierland train station, and we made it to Splash Mountain without getting wet. We got fast passes and headed for Big Thunder Mountain. We made it right up to the ride loading area and the ride closed down due to inclement weather (we figure lightning, but we were in the ride, so we don’t really know). We stood in aisle 3 for a half-hour until finally the ride was able to re-open and we got on “the wildest ride in the wilderness”. Of course, it was worth the wait! It worked out well that we got trapped in Big Thunder Mountain, because we got off right in time for our Fast Pass Return for Splash Mountain. We got in the Fast Pass line-up and were on my favorite ride in less than five minutes! We screamed for every drop and drove the people behind us crazy (we were in the front row). The last straw came when we saw our picture at the end of the ride and realized that our hands in the air caused everyone else in the car to be hidden. The people who had been behind us were not happy, so when we saw them grumbling, we ran out of that ride as fast as we could! It was nearly lunch time, and we headed over to Adventureland to do “Pirates of the Caribbean”. Again, barely five minutes wait to get on the ride. After “Pirates”, we walked over to the “Jungle Cruise” and a got a fast pass. We had an hour to wait, so we sat down near the mini boats and had our lunch (which we had packed). After lunch, we still had time, so we did “The Enchanted Tiki Room: Under New Management”. When we got out of the “Tiki Room”, we still had a few minutes before our Fast Pass Return time, so we did a bit of browsing in the shops. The “Jungle Cruise” was fun, as it always is, and our “tour guide” was stupidly hilarious, as they always are. After the “Jungle Cruise”, we headed out of Adventureland. But, before leaving, we stopped for a much anticipated snack: DOLE WHIP! And, it was absolutely as yummy as I remembered it to be! Before, heading out to Tomorrowland, we stopped in front of the castle to catch “Cinderellabration”. It was a lovely show, but it was so hot outside that we both got instant sunburns (and it didn’t help that I had not brought my hat and neither of us had sunscreen on…we won’t be making those mistakes ever again!) After the show, we headed over to Space Mountain to get a Fast Pass. We had almost two hours until our allotted time, so we headed over to the TTA and rode that. After that ride, we did the Carrousel of Progress, one of our favorites. After that, Calvin kicked my butt at Buzz Lightyear. We then had about an hour to kill, so we went over to Mickey’s Toontown Fair and did Goofy’s Barnstormer. We also joined the crowds in Mickey’s house and took some pictures. By this point, we’d wasted enough time and headed back for our Fast Pass time. We waited about twenty minutes before blasting into space! What a rush! I’m still a bit scared of that ride, but I am always happy I went on once I step off! After Space Mountain, we had less than an hour before our supper reservations at Tony’s Town Square. We decided to stroll down Main Street U.S.A. and see if we could find some souvenirs. We got Calvin’s little sister’s gift as well as a few trinkets for myself. We met up with my family at 5:15 for our supper. The food at Tony’s was delicious. Calvin and I shared a house salad and we each had the spaghetti and meatballs, which was just awesome. After supper, we made our way to Fantasyland, but stopped in front of the castle to catch “Cinderellabration” again, since my parents hadn’t seen it. After the show, we went to Mickey’s Phillarmagic which was an absolutely terrific show! My favorite part was the smells that wafted through the room during the “Be Our Guest” sequence. After that show, we did “It’s a Small World”. The rehab is gorgeous and I took lots of pictures. The repetitive song is a lot less annoying now that it plays in different languages. Calvin was quite relieved! Vincent and uncle Ned had raced over to Space Mountain for fast passes before supper and our allotted time had arrived after we got off of “It’s a Small World”. The four of us headed over to Space Mountain while my mom and dad got us a spot for Spectromagic and Wishes. When we got to Space Mountain, we realized it was closed due to technical difficulties and, not knowing when it would re-open, we decided to give our Fast Passes away to people in the Stand-By line and do Buzz Lightyear again, since the wait was only twenty minutes. However, once we got about halfway through the line, THAT ride shut down too, but only for about five minutes. And then, since the Fast Pass line for the ride had filled up, all the Fast Passers were allowed before us Stand By-ers, so we ended up in line for a little over half-an-hour. The three of us rode in one car. I spun the car while Vincent and Calvin battled. Calvin won, again, and now Vincent owes him a Mickey ice cream bar! After Buzz, we met up with my parents on top of the train station. We caught Spectromagic, which was as beautiful as always. Between the parade and the fireworks, I ran down to City Hall to buy some stamps and Calvin and I wrote out three of our four postcards. We hope to mail them out within the next few days so that our friends receive them before we get back! Now,
what to say about Wishes? It was absolutely terrific! The music was
awe inspiring, the narrative too, and the fireworks and lasers on the
castle were breathtaking. I loved the fireworks that looked like
stars and hearts! The show seemed to never end! The whole display
was just beautiful and I’m glad we finally got to see it.
Calvin and I will be catching it again, on Thursday, when we eat
supper at the California Grill. We plan on watching the fireworks
from the roof of the Contemporary! We raced out of Magic Kingdom soon after Wishes finished. We got on the first monorail to the TTC but had to wait over half-an-hour for our taxi. It was pretty boring and we were all tired, but I couldn’t be cranky because Wishes had absolutely lifted my tired spirits. I still had tears in my eyes from when Tinkerbell flew through the sky! But, now, at 12:13 AM, I have to get to bed. Day 3 (Sunday July 3rd) Plan: Daytona Beach and Pleasure Island! As well as some possible geo caching! Today was, basically, a non-Disney day. We woke up a little later than usual and had breakfast here at the house. We left the house around 10:30, on road for Daytona Beach. It took about half-an-hour to get to the beach. It was nice when we reached Daytona, but we swam in the ocean for only about fifteen minutes before it started to rain. They didn’t kick us out of the ocean though, so we just kept jumping the waves. For people who live in nearly the middle of Canada, swimming in the ocean, jumping waves and tasting salt water is a real treat. We spent about two hours at Daytona Beach. We really only left after two hours because a huge storm hit and thunder and lightning caused the evacuation of the beach. We had fun while we there though, which is all that really counts. We got to stop at Krispy Kremes, a new favorite of ours. After having a nice donut, I fell asleep and didn’t wake up until we pulled into Celebration. Why were we in Celebration? Geo-Caching, that’s why! Calvin directed my father and we found the closest way to hide our Donald Duck with geo-tag. We found a path that was about 700 yards from the coordinates. Now, as Canadians, we aren’t really sure about yards and feet and stuff, so we didn’t think we had far to walk. So, half-an-hour later, we finally found ourselves on the side of the I-4, searching for a box to hide our Donald. Thankfully, Calvin found it. In the box was about a hundred little trinkets, as well as another item with a geo-tag, so we took it along. We then signed the guestbook and made our way back to the car, through the Florida forest, down the beautiful Celebration boardwalk. Had my parents not been waiting in the car, Calvin and I would have taken more time to enjoy the beautiful scenery of Celebration. What a quaint little town! The houses are so cute; they make me think of the “perfect” American Dream home. White picket fence, two floors, Victorian style home, with garage and driveway in the back. The town has little stores, beautiful parks and a community swimming pool. They had just finished a Fourth of July parade when we pulled into town. I snapped a few pictures, but really, they don’t do the town justice. It was very nice, and I was glad we got to visit it, but I hope to, one day, enjoy it a bit better. At home, we swam and ate leftover salad and spaghetti for supper. The taxi man (Tom) picked us up at 8:30 and drove us to Pleasure Island, our only taste of Disney for today. After getting drinks, our first club of the evening was the Comedy Warehouse. The show was absolutely hilarious, as usual. I laughed so hard, my throat still hurts now! They even made fun of my dad, without really knowing it. They asked the audience to shout out job titles, and uncle Ned yelled “Deputy Fire Chief”. The lady on stage cried, “Fire Chief?”, and my uncle yelled, “No, Deputy Fire Chief”. She laughed and said they would use it. Ends up, they used three job titles (shoe maker, deputy fire chief and construction worker) and played a fake game of Jeopardy (Shmeopardy). The guy playing the Deputy Fire Chief pretended to be such a dope. It was hilarious! He even looked like my dad, with a little beer belly and a funny look on his face! He ended up winning the game too, which was really cool! After the comedy show, my parents headed to the Adventurer’s Club and Calvin and I went to Mannequins. Ends up, the “mannequins” weren’t dancing at the time we arrived, but we stayed and danced on the revolving floor for a while (Calvin almost wiped out when we first stepped on, due to his very strong rum runner!) My parents met up with us because the Adventurer’s Club wasn’t going that night. They left after only five minutes because Vincent had to wait outside (Mannequins only allows people that are 18 years old and older in). They took off, and about ten minutes later, we met up with them at the Beach Club. There was a live band playing, and they were really cool. We danced like crazy until 11:00, when Tom was coming to pick us up. He drove us home, and was very patient with us, since 5 out of 6 us were being very loud and obnoxious, due to a little too much liquor! Back at the house, we somehow decided that we should have more drinks and jump in the pool. It was fun for a while. We splashed and were, again, very obnoxious. Luckily, we had nice neighbors: a family of 11 from Dublin. Uncle Ned actually ran over and introduced himself to them, at midnight! Calvin then ran over, saying he was going to “get uncle Ned”, but never came back! Soon after, Vincent ran over, then my dad, and finally my mom and I went over to try and get them all to come back. When we arrived Calvin was swimming in their pool! They were good sports about the whole thing. I actually think one of the guys pushed Calvin into the pool! We talked with them for about ten minutes, then dragged our drunken selves back to our own house, where we went into the house, dried off, changed and had some snacks. We also danced a bit, to the oldies that my dad won’t stop playing on our stereo! Now it is 1:30 AM, and technically another day, but I am not sleeping yet, so to me, it’s still Sunday. However, unfortunately, it is now Monday. Only four more days left. Day 4 (Monday July 4th) Plan: Downtown Disney, World Showcase, Cape May’s for supper and the Boardwalk at night. This morning, we finally had some “Waffle House” waffles. My parents drove down the road to pick some up. It was a nice breakfast. The only complaint I do have is that I am really not eating very well (taking into consideration my high cholesterol). I try to do good, like eating some veggies at supper and at least one fruit a day. It isn’t easy though. Today, dad, Vincent and uncle Ned went golfing at Disney’s Palm golf course. Calvin, mom and I went to Downtown Disney to do some shopping. We arrived around 11:30 and started out at the World of Disney store. What a huge store! Anything you might want, that has Disney characters on it, is in that store! We lost my mom after about five minutes, and spent ten minutes looking for her. Like I said, the store is HUGE! Once we did find her, we made plans to meet up every few minutes when we knew we could possibly lose each other. We spent nearly an hour in the World of Disney, then went out in the heat to the different Downtown Disney shops. We checked out the kitchen shop and bought a few things there. We checked out the Christmas store and Goofy’s Candy Co. I searched Pooh’s Corner for a Heffalump teddy, but the Cast Member at the cash informed me that they never received any Lumpys. It was really too bad, because I was really looking forward to getting one out here, since I saw them at the Disney Store in Toronto. In Once Upon a Toy, I found the coolest thing ever: build your own My Little Pony. I was obsessed with My Little Pony as a child, so it took a lot for me not to start setting up my own personal Pony for 18$. We had lunch at Wolfgang Puck Express. I had an awesome baked macaroni and cheese (I should probably have had a salad, but let’s not go there). After lunch, we finished the stores then returned to the World of Disney. Calvin staked out a watch he was thinking of buying, but we saw my mom off before going back and buying his watch. My mom left at 3:00 to pick up the boys from golf, and Calvin and I simply finished up at Downtown Disney then headed to Epcot. We hadn’t realized that it is impossible to go directly to Epcot from Downtown Disney. We had to take a bus to the Grand Floridian, and from there, take a monorail to the TTC, then a monorail to Epcot. I wasn’t too upset about ending up at the Grand Floridian, because I was able to see my favorite hotel and get some pictures. However, waiting for the bus was long, and it ended up stopping at Pleasure Island, Typhoon Lagoon and Wilderness Lodge before arriving at the Grand Floridian. And, by the time we got onto the monorail, stopped for a long period of time at the Contemporary, reached the TTC and hopped a monorail to Epcot, we’d wasted over an hour of possible park time. It was fun though. Disney transportation is always good. On the Epcot monorail, we met a man from Cleveland who appeared to be alone in Walt Disney World. We chatted with him about home and other things for the entire length of the ride. At first, I was a bit peeved about not being able to listen to the monorail audio and not being able to watch the scenery, but in all, it was nice to chat with a stranger. Getting other peoples’ points of view on Disney is always interesting. He seemed to be a real Disney lover, as am I, so chatting with him was really fun. Upon arrival at Epcot, Calvin and I went to find our Leave a Legacy picture. When we did find it, we marveled at how cool it was to have our picture there, at Epcot, where millions of people see it every year. What a fun souvenir! I am even gladder that we did it, now that I saw it! The first thing we did at Epcot was visit the Art of Disney store. Calvin wanted a new drawing. We also looked at all the other wonderful Disney art work (paintings, lithographs, sculptures, etc). He found a nice picture of Steamboat Willie, which I bought for him. After spending a good twenty minutes in that store, Calvin and I went over to the Living Seas. He’d never been to that pavilion and it had been a long time since I’d seen it, so it was like a new experience for both of us. The pavilion has changed slightly; it now focuses mainly on the film Finding Nemo. This change actually makes the attraction a bit more interesting, and much more kid friendly. Calvin and I had a good time looking at “Nemo” and all his friends (sting rays, sea horses, etc.) We also enjoyed seeing the extra cute manatees. One of them was a big gimpy (his tail seemed to have been cut off by some means), which really only added to his cuteness. The two manatees were playing when we saw them, so we had a fun time checking them out. At 6:00, I knew we had to get going if we wanted to have any time to check out World Showcase before 8:00 (we had to be at the Beach Club for 8:30, due to supper reservations at Cape May’s). Since we’d already checked out Mexico and Norway, we skipped right over to China. From there, we did World Showcase one pavilion at a time, mostly checking out the different shops. In Germany, Calvin and I each bought a glass (I got one with a carved Minnie Mouse on it, and Calvin got a carved Mickey Mouse). Of course, we couldn’t pass by the miniature train set-up without stopping for at least five minutes. Calvin, being a train fanatic, loves checking out the layout. Unfortunately, there weren’t any trains running! There was only one engine going through the little village, and one caboose running around in the mountain area. We still enjoyed looking at the little buildings and trees, and remembering how flooded the layout had been the last time we visited WDW in 2002 (due to a lot of rain). In America, due to Independence Day, there was a special show, so we stopped and checked it out for a bit. At 7:20 though, we decided to leave the theatre and continue our way down World Showcase, so as to have time to finish it all up. We reached England at 7:40, so we had to zoom through it (I really only wanted to check out the Toy Soldier store, but ends up there weren’t any Lumpys there either). We made it through the International Gateway at 7:50, and reached the Beach Club, by foot, with five minutes to spare. Supper at Cape May’s was wonderful and delicious, as per usual. You can’t lose with all those wonderful clams and mussels! Everything else, other than seafood, was good too though, of course! One of my favorite parts of that restaurant is the paper on the tables (used as table cloths). They even give you crayons so you can really go to town! I drew a little picture between each plate of food, while I waited to digest a bit. After supper, we’d planned to go to the Boardwalk and take a bike ride. Thunder and lightning filled the sky at 9:30 at night, so we started to worry about rain, but we headed over to the Boardwalk anyway. When we arrived, my dad was convinced we were silly for even wanting to try to ride a four-rider bike in the rain, but I gave them my 20$ anyway. The six of us rode on a four-rider bike until we reached the Beach Club, where we left uncle Ned and my dad (neither was enjoying it much). Calvin had a fun time in the driver’s seat. He pedaled too fast and drove my mom crazy! It was great! We had a good time, and would have been able to go around another time, but due to the Epcot fireworks, there were many people on the walkway, which made navigating with the large bike quite difficult. We had fun though, even if we only went around once. We stopped for a few minutes and caught a few glimpses of Epcot’s Independence Day fireworks, which were absolutely breathtaking. The end of the fireworks sounded like a million gun shots, and I’ve honestly never seen that many fireworks in the sky at one time. It was just beautiful, and I’m glad we were able to see it without having to brave the crazy crowds! The one thing that came out of today’s travels was my plan to absolutely stay in a Disney moderate to deluxe resort before my death! I started out by really wanting to stay at the Grand Floridian, but at the end of the day, I would even like to stay at one of the Boardwalk villas. They look very cozy, and they are only a short walk from Epcot and a short boat ride to MGM. They are very well situated, and have many nice amenities. When we arrived at the house, around 10:30, Calvin, Vincent and I did a bit of swimming then headed to bed. Tomorrow, we will be up early enough, to head out to MGM, and Calvin and I will be having a late night, due to staying out to catch Fantasmic. It’s promising to be a long day tomorrow!
Day 5 (Tuesday July 5th) Plan: MGM all day and Fantasmic at night. This morning, we got up at a reasonable time (around 8:00). We ate breakfast at the house then headed over to MGM. We arrived at the park at 10:30. Calvin, Vincent and I went straight to Sunset Blvd. to get a fast pass for Rockin’ Roller Coaster. We were then going to wait for my parents to get in line for Tower of Terror. However, our plans changed when we discovered that Rockin’ Roller Coaster was not open. So, we grabbed fast passes for Tower of Terror instead and then waited for my parents to come back. Our fast pass return time was 11:30, so when uncle Ned and my parents showed up at 10:45, we went directly to the Beauty and the Beast show (since it had just started). I hadn’t seen it in a while, so it was nice to catch it. The costumes are just beautiful. When we got out of the show, at 11:15, we only had fifteen minutes to wait for our fast pass time, so I went to the bathroom while everyone just sort of waited around. When I got out of the bathroom, my parents informed me that Calvin and Vincent ran over to Rockin’ Roller Coaster because it had just opened. I went to meet them and the three of us got in line. I realized I ought to inform my parents of what was going to happen, because we’d probably be in line for about twenty minutes. I ran back out and told them we would wait in line, do the ride, then go over to Tower of Terror. Uncle Ned decided to join us and my mom and dad decided to go over to Lights! Motors! Action! to get some fast passes for us. Since we had caught the ride just as it was opening, we only waited in line for about twenty minutes. I was petrified by the time we’d reached the loading area, because I’d never gone on Rockin’ Roller Coaster before, and have only been on one roller coaster that goes upside down, in my entire life. When we got into the car, I had tears in my eyes, because I knew what was coming! However, by the time the ride was over, I was happy that I’d gone on. Calvin told me I would be! It is very exhilarating, especially the initial take off, and going upside down is barely noticeable. I’ll definitely do it again, some day! After that, we went over to Tower of Terror for our fast pass return time. There, we also waited about twenty minutes in line. That ride has only gotten better with time! I didn’t particularly count, but we dropped and got shot up at least five times (both ways). It was just awesome! I couldn’t even keep my feet grounded because we were flying so fast. On the first shot up, Calvin’s pin on his hat (which was in his hand) hit me in the mouth, so in the picture I have my hand over my mouth, from the shock (I didn’t actually get hurt, thankfully. I could just imagine my parents reaction when I told them that I chipped a tooth on Tower of Terror). However, the funniest part of all was when we looked at our picture and saw two people in the elevator with us who had brought reading material. The woman had a book and the man had a newspaper and they made it look like they were reading as we were being dropped and shot back up! They are sitting in the elevator, all nonchalantly, reading their material, while the rest of us scream our heads off. Calvin said, “Well, I guess we’ll be decorating their living room wall for a while”, because it was pretty certain that they were going to be buying the picture, since they did such a neat setup! After Tower of Terror, we picked up turkey legs and fries on Sunset Blvd. and then headed over to Lights! Motors! Action!, to wait in line and hope to get into the 1:00 PM showing. Thankfully, we did get in. We were pretty high up, and in front of a post, but we still had pretty good seats, none-the-less. We enjoyed our lunch before the show started. And, what a show it was! Very cool effects! It was especially cool how they explained everything, like for instance, how the backwards driving is actually done by someone sitting backwards in a car! I also liked the Herbie splitting half. My favorite stunt was when the car shot out of the front of the building and drove down through the big seafood truck. Very cool! The only complaint I have about the show is the disorganized way we were herded in and out of the stadium. It was over a hundred degrees outside and we were stuck out in the sun when there were plenty of queue lines under the stands. I don’t understand why they didn’t let us in the queue lines, so as to wait in the shade. Otherwise though, the show was cool. Calvin, as a fast car movie lover, adored it, and I was most excited about seeing it because he was so excited about seeing it. Had I been without him, however, I may have only gone to see it because it was something new. Next time I come to Walt Disney World, for instance, I would only go see it again if Calvin wanted to, but personally, I wouldn’t make it a point to see it. It just isn’t really my thing, that’s all. But, all in all, it was a good show. We all went to the Great Movie Ride after the show, which is always a fun time. We lost our tour guide in the Western scene. One thing I really like about the Great Movie Ride is the movie montage at the end. I don’t know why, but that little show always makes me happy. I like trying to figure out the movies that flash across the screen. It’s cool that they’ve updated it a bit since 1989 (ex. Armageddon, Independence Day, Lion King are now all part of the montage). Vincent, Uncle Ned and my parents headed over to Epcot after the ride, but Calvin and I stayed at MGM. We decided to go over and do Muppet Vision 3D. The cast member was very impressed when she saw me go over to look for the key under mat. She said, “Oh, you are one of the cool people who knows about that!” Calvin took a picture of it. I was so proud for knowing about that little secret! After the show, we checked out Pizza Planet, because neither of us had seen that restaurant before. We didn’t get anything to eat, but we did try to win an Elmo teddy bear at one of the “claw” games. We lost our dollar however, no big surprise there! We thought it might be the kind of game where you “win every time”, but for a dollar, I really didn’t expect to win. So, I wasn’t too sad when I didn’t, needless to say! We went and did the Backlot Tour after that. It’s changed a bit since the Lights! Motors! Action! show arrived at MGM. It’s a bit a shorter. One cool thing that happened however is that Calvin and I got to be part of the show! We ended up getting cut from one show and were the first in line for the next show. I sort of stomped my foot and mock frustration, but the cast member nearby huffed at me and said, “I can’t believe you are pouting at Walt Disney World. You messed with the wrong person, princess”. He left and came back and told Calvin and I to follow another cast member. We knew we were in trouble! Ends up, Calvin was the mechanic and I was the captain. He got to sit in the little booth and get totally soaked, while I had to steer the ship and get semi-soaked. We had to wear rain suits and huge goulashes. It was quite hot in those outfits, but we didn’t complain much because we knew we were lucky to be part of the show! It was definitely one of the best parts of the day, if not the entire trip! We had to meet my parents at the Hollywood & Vine restaurant for 5:30, so after the Backlot tour, we had just enough time to catch the Voyage of the Little Mermaid show. Very cute and fun, as I remembered it to be. It too was a show I hadn’t seen in quite a few years, so it was nice to catch it. It was also nice to be in the air conditioning, because from 5:00 to nearly 6:00, we were stuck outside in the heat! We showed up early for the reservations, figuring my parents would be early and then maybe we’d get in early. Ends up, my parents showed up at exactly 5:30. I had just decided to check in with the hostess when they ran up to the restaurant. Ends up that our reservation was only for 5:50! Calvin and I were a bit peeved about sitting around, wasting an hour and boiling in the sun, but the Stars and Motor Cars parade had just started, so we perked up and went and watched it. The restaurant took us at exactly 5:50 (they were very timely), but Calvin and I watched the end of the parade before meeting up with my parents again. It was a nice parade, the cars were really cool and it was nice to see all the characters. I hadn’t purposely planned to see the parade, since parades aren’t really Calvin’s thing, but I was glad we caught it “by accident”, since we hadn’t seen it the last time we came down. Dinner was great, and after a very filling meal, everyone but Calvin and I went back to the house. He and I had priority seating at Fantasmic (because we ate at the Hollywood & Vine), and we weren’t giving that up! Since it was only 6:30, we went and checked out the Animation Tour. I hadn’t realized it changed so much, but the little studio show, with Mushu, is a nice change from the Back to Neverland sequence that MGM had for so long. The show was short and sweet, and the interactive games after the show were fun. We were a very small group to catch the show, so playing the games wasn’t a big hassle. Calvin and I found out which Disney characters we most resembled: I’m Belle and he’s Timon! We even got to put our voice over character voices, and do some painting on the computer. We walked out into an Art of Disney store, which we did not even know existed at MGM! Since it was past 7:30 at this point, we made our way, slowly, down Hollywood Blvd., looking through the shops, as we headed toward the entrance to Fantasmic. We arrived at the show an hour early, and skipped over the priority seating barrier to catch a better spot right in the middle of the theatre. Since we were just the two of us, it was easy to find room on a second row bench. I got some popcorn and we snacked and chatted until the show started. Fantasmic blew me away, as it had the first time I saw it! Calvin loved it too. The music is great and the story is inspiring and the projection on the water is just awesome! That is the part Calvin liked the most. We got out of the show at 9:30 and made our way to our taxi spot, where we only waited about 10 minutes for Tom, our taxi guy who’s been driving us around all week. He cost us 20$, but at least he knew where our house was and he made conversation with us. Back at the house, Calvin and I went for a swim, and now we are going to bed. Day 6 (Wednesday July 6th) Plan: We have to stop at a store so Calvin can get a new pair of sandals (someone stepped on his shoes by accident and pulled a strap right out of the sole, so now he’s got one busted sandal), then we are heading over to Animal Kingdom for the day. Animal Kingdom is sure a big walking day! It is no doubt that, of the four parks, Animal Kingdom is the biggest! We arrived in the park at 10:00 AM and left at 5:00 PM, and the only thing we did not do was the Festival of the Lion King. First thing in the morning, we headed over to Kilimanjaro Safaries. From the beginning of the line to the end of the ride was about an hour. Of course, as always, the wait is worth it. There were many animals out, even in the blistering heat. The best part, for me, was the two baby elephants! They were absolutely adorable! Of course, some of my favorite African animals, the giraffe and the zebra, were there as well. The safari did no disappoint. Directly from the safari, we decided to get Fast Passes for Kali River Rapids. It was 11:15, and the Fast Pass return time was 12:05, but we decided we’d just head over to Dinosaur and then return for Kali River Rapids. However, just before going to get our Fast Passes, a man stopped me and asked me if I wanted six Fast Passes for Kali River Rapids, good as of 11:15! So, of course, I took them! We were then able to do the ride right away, which was perfect. Did we get wet? Well, yeah. I wouldn’t have minded getting wetter however, because it was such a hot day. It seemed like, in the past, you’d get absolutely soaked on that ride. So, the wetting factor was a bit disappointing this time around. We walked over to Dinoland U.S.A. after Kali River Rapids, and we took the new walkway which will one day lead to Expedition: Everest. The construction of the new ride is coming along. The mountain is all up, but some of the sides aren’t on yet. There are a few visible tracks, but by the looks of the pictures, the tracks won’t be visible in the final cut. I took many pictures of the ride in the works. We are all very excited to come back, because we know that, by then, the ride will be open! Before reaching Dinoland, we realized that the Tarzan Rocks show was about to start in fifteen minutes, so Calvin and I ran to get Fast Passes for Dinosaur while everyone else went into the Tarzan theatre. Our Fast Pass return time was 12:20, which was perfect timing for when we’d be done at Tarzan Rocks. The show did not disappoint either. It was bittersweet this time around, knowing that they are probably going to retire the show before I am able to come back to Walt Disney World. Since Animal Kingdom opened, Tarzan Rocks has been my favorite show. I love the Phil Collins songs for that movie, and I really just love the movie very much. It’s sad to think it will soon be gone, but at least I got to see it one last time. Before going to Dinosaur, Vincent got some Fast Passes for Primeval Whirl. The time was 1:10, so we were able to do Dinosaur (always a “blast”), then go eat lunch at Flame Tree BBQ (as requested by my Sorcerer Radio friends) before riding it. Maybe we shouldn’t have ridden it right after eating such a hearty meal, but we did none the less. Ends up we had perfect timing, because we’d just stepped off the ride when it shut down. We actually saw the cast members going up and helping people that were stuck on the ride get off the ride. I’m just glad we got to ride it. It spins a lot and it is nothing fancy, but I enjoy it! My parents, uncle Ned and Vincent headed back to the house after doing Hester and Chester’s, and Calvin and I chose to stay in the park. As soon as they left, he and I headed back to Asia to walk through the Anandapur Jungle Trek. We saw the tigers and the bats, and many different kinds of birds. We took our time, followed the maps, and had a relaxing walk through the Asian jungles. After we finished there, we returned to Africa and rode the train to Conservation Station. We checked out some stuff in Rafiki’s Planet Watch, then went outside and petted the goats and sheep. They were all really hot and tired, so they were just lying around, loving the fact that people were going around petting, rubbing and brushing them! Some people got a real kick out of seeing these farm animals, and Calvin and I enjoyed ourselves, but it isn’t like we don’t see those kinds of animals all the time! We took the train back after that and did the African walk-through jungle tour. We saw the gorillas and other animals. Again, it was a nice, relaxing walk. The only drawback was that we had realized how tired the sun and heat were making us on the train, so we really dragged our butts through the path. We realized we needed some air conditioning, badly, so we decided to go over and do It’s Tough to be a Bug. The wait said five minutes, so we practically ran into the waiting area. We ended up waiting nearly twenty minutes, for some strange reason, but we were happy to be in the air conditioning. The only hard part was standing there for so long, because not only were we mentally tired, but physically, our legs were killing us! You sure do have to do a lot of walking in Animal Kingdom! We realized that today! After the show, it was only 4:30, so we decided to go over to Camp Minnie-Mickey and catch one of the shows. Pocahontas and her Forest Friends was starting at 4:40, so we pulled into that theatre and caught that show. It wasn’t air conditioned, but it was still nice to sit down, at least in the shade, and enjoy a nice show that I haven’t seen since the park opened. When the show let out, we were going to see the Festival of the Lion King, if it happened to be starting shortly, but it was only playing at 5:30, and we needed to be at Animal Kingdom Lodge for 6:00, so we decided to take off early for the hotel. We stopped by the character viewing areas first, hoping to get a picture with a few of the characters. We ended up getting a picture with Chip and Dale, and we tried to get in the Mickey Mouse line, but we got kicked out (he was leaving after the people in front of us got their picture taken). That’s when we decided to exit the park and head to Animal Kingdom Lodge. We took a bus to the nearby hotel, and when we got there we still had over half-an-hour before meeting my parents. We decided to check out the premises. We went outside and looked at some of the animals that were out. We then made our way to the pool and took a secret swim. We both happened to be wearing our bathing suits today, so it worked out well. We just wanted to cool down, but the pool was almost as hot as outside was, so the sneaky swim didn’t cool us down one little bit. We got out at 5:45, dried up with towels we found lying around, got dressed and headed in to wait at Boma for my parents. Supper was at 6:20, and they took us right at our priority seating time. The food was absolutely delicious. It was really cool to try a new kind of food: African. We took our time and really enjoyed each item on our plate. When we finished eating, we went outside to see the safari again, only this time we saw the zebras, animals we hadn’t seen in the late afternoon. We left around 7:00 and headed over to Bonanza Golf for a round of mini-putt. We each put in a dollar for the winner, and the winner ended up being uncle Ned. We all had fun though, and everyone made a hole-in-one except uncle Ned and I. Back at home, around 9:30, we all had a drink while we swam around in the pool. We contemplated the fact that we are leaving in less than two days. No one, especially me, is happy about having to leave, but, vacations can’t last forever. Tomorrow is our last day in the parks, so we are doing Magic Kingdom, and my parents might go over to Epcot for a little bit too. Calvin and I want to finish up the rides we didn’t get to do, and at 9:00 PM tomorrow night, he and I have a romantic supper at the California Grill. We hope that our food will come slowly, so that we will still be there when the fireworks start. If not, we’ll just watch them from the top of the Contemporary. I guess we’ll just have to wait and see tomorrow.
Day 7 (Thursday July 7th) Plan: Today is our last day in the parks, so we are doing Magic Kingdom, and my parents might go over to Epcot for a little bit too. Calvin and I want to finish up the rides we didn’t get to do, and at 9:00 PM tonight, he and I have a romantic supper at the California Grill. We hope that our food will come slowly, so that we will still be there when the fireworks start. If not, we’ll just watch them from the top of the Contemporary. Today was our last full day in Florida. We started the day with breakfast, care of uncle Ned, at Ohana’s, in the Polynesian. The food was wonderful, and all brought to our table for us. The best part, however, was that we finally got to see Mickey Mouse! On our last day, we finally saw the main Disney guy, and even got pictures! After breakfast, we walked over to the Transportation and Ticket Center to take a monorail. We took the wrong walking trail on our way into the Polynesian and ended up doing some “bush-wacking” to get to the hotel. We made sure, therefore, to follow the marked trail to the TTC on our way back! We took the monorail to Epcot and did Test Track again. My parents really just wanted to take a monorail ride, so doing Test Track was the excuse. We arrived at Epcot around 11:00 and left around 12:30. Test Track was worth the monorail ride and one hour line-up, as usual! I mean, we decided to go all the way to Epcot JUST to ride it, so it is obviously one of our favorites. We took the monorail back to the TTC and, from there, hopped a monorail to the Magic Kingdom. Once we arrived, we all jetted directly to Stitch’s Great Escape, to get Fast Passes, since none of us had done it yet. The Fast Passes were for 3:45, and it was only 1:00, so we split up and decided to meet back at Stitch at our Fast Pass return time. My parents wanted to finish up Tomorrowland, and Calvin and I wanted to do Fantasyland. So, he and I went straight to the Many Adventures of Winnie-the-Pooh ride. We couldn’t get another Fast Pass until 3:00, so we decided to wait in the supposed 40 minutes line. In the blistering afternoon sun, the wait felt more like an hour. Of course, with my love for Pooh, the wait was worth it, even if the ride is only two minutes long! Calvin ended up getting some great photos of the inside of the ride, which was nice. After Pooh, we carried on through Fantasyland and decided to do Snow White’s Scary Adventure, since its wait time was only 20 minutes. Thankfully, the wait was, in reality, less than 10 minutes, which was great. The “dark” rides are fun, but waiting out in the heat is not. We decided to do Peter Pan’s Flight after Snow White, but when we arrived at the queue for Peter Pan, the wait was 70 minutes. Neither of us could handle that, so we decided to skip Peter Pan for a bit and come back when it was cooler. We chose, instead, to go and do the Haunted Mansion. We knew the line was outside, but it was a ride we had missed on our first day in Magic Kingdom, and we were prepared to wait it out. Unfortunately, as we arrived in Liberty Square, we received some terrible news. The Haunted Mansion was closed, and not just temporarily, but for the entire day. And, the cast members explained that there was absolutely no way that the ride would be opening that day because something was broken. What was most broken, however, was my heart. We’d skipped the Haunted Mansion on our first day, knowing we’d have time to do it on our next trip to Magic Kingdom, and in the end, we were forced to miss out on it entirely. The cast members “hoped” it would be open tomorrow, but for us, tomorrow was too late. I was pretty sad. I even shed a few tears. I don’t like missing rides, but missing a classic ride is just awful. My spirit almost dropped entirely when we stopped at the Liberty Square fruit market, to get a big pickle. I couldn’t find them anywhere, so I asked a cast member and she said that the bucket for the pickles had been leaking in the morning, so it had been taken away. Hence, no pickles. However, she went to talk to one of her superiors, who then went to talk to her superiors, and after about ten minutes, one of them showed up with two big pickles, free of charge (due to making us wait for ten minutes), for both me and Calvin! I was pretty impressed, so the sadness of missing the Haunted Mansion lifted because, after all, who can be sad when hey have free pickles?! With free pickles in hand, Calvin and I walked over to the Hall of Presidents, but we’d just missed the 2:30 showing, so we ran over to the Liberty Belle, just in the nick of time (they were shutting the gates as we ran up, but let us two on last). We rode through the “rivers of America”, enjoyed our pickles and the scenery. When we got off the boat, we were just in time to catch the 3:00 showing of the Hall of Presidents. We even ran into my parents in the fruit market. They too had snagged some pickles from the unknown, behind-the-scenes place, but they were paying for theirs! Calvin and I still lucked out! We left them behind, since they were going to watch the parade, and went over to the Hall of Presidents. As Canadians, the only real value of this show is the awesome animatronics. The way George Washington and Abe Lincoln stand up and sit down is just amazing! I also find it interesting that, at any given time, you can look at any one of the presidents and they will be moving either their foot, or their hand, or something. It’s so cool and lifelike! After the Presidents, we headed over to Tomorrowland for our Fast Pass return time. On the way, I stopped and picked up a funnel cake, which Calvin and I scarfed down before going into Stitch’s Great Escape. Stitch’s Great Escape was cute and alright, but not as scary as Alien Encounter. I don’t understand why they decided to change this ride, since, to me, Alien Encounter seemed very popular and was still raking in the guests when the Disney Company decided to overhaul the ride and make it Stitch themed. It is definitely not as scary anymore, and the only part I really liked was when Stitch comes up behind you and breathes on you and it smells like the chili dog you hear him stealing from one of the backstage workers. Otherwise, I wasn’t too impressed with the Stitch ride. Alien Encounter was entirely better, and I don’t think Disney should have changed the ride just so that it could encompass a well-loved new character. My parents left at this point and Calvin and I stayed behind. We headed over to Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain, with the intention of Fast Passing one of them and riding the other. Splash Mountain’s Fast Pass Return time was 7:55, and we knew we wouldn’t be staying that late, so we grabbed a Fast Pass for Big Thunder Mountain instead, because it was good between 5:00 and 6:00. We got in line for Splash Mountain and it took us nearly an hour and a half to get through to the ride! Splash Mountain is my favorite ride though, so I didn’t complain too much about the wait, except that it was VERY hot to be standing outside, that long, in the sun. A funny thing happened to us while on that ride. A young couple, appearing to be on their honeymoon, was in line in front of Calvin and I. He and I ended up at the end of the car and they ended up in front of us. Calvin sort of paid attention to them, and learned that they were planning on making out during the big drop, so as to make the picture cute for themselves. So, in return, Calvin and I decided to make a funny face. We stuck our hands over heads, moose-antler style and stuck our tongues out. The picture turned out to be hilarious, but I think the young couple was sort of pissed at us for doing that. Unfortunately, we ran into them two more times before leaving the park. We’re lucky we didn’t get our butts kicked! Because we’d waited so long in line for Splash Mountain, it was pass 6:00 by the time we got off the ride, which meant that we’d missed our Fast Pass Return time for Big Thunder Mountain. However, by some strange twist of fate, the cast member at the roller coaster let us on anyway! We were happy about that, because both of us love Big Thunder Mountain very much! (As an aside, I have since been informed that you can be late for your fast pass time and they will always let you on; you just can’t be early). After the roller coaster, it was 6:30. We decided to head over and do Peter Pan, no matter what the wait was. When we arrived, the wait was 60 minutes, but Calvin said we should do it anyway because, after all, it was the only ride left that we hadn’t done, plus we still had 2.5 hours until our supper reservations. When we got to the front of the queue, I asked the cast member if I could have one of the necklaces that help them figure out the length of the queue lines, and he let me. Ends up we were only in line for 30 minutes. I’m glad we did Peter Pan’s Flight because, even to this day, it is one of my most favorite Magic Kingdom rides. We had planned on leaving after Peter Pan, but because it had been shorter than expected, we decided to head over to Tomorrowland and try and get on Space Mountain. Unfortunately, the line was an hour long, so we decided to do the TTA instead. We got into our car on the TTA and no sooner had we sat down, did the ride close! Someone, in one of the dark areas of the ride, had jumped out! The ride ended up motionless for about twenty minutes. I’d just about had enough and was ready to leave when the ride started up. Calvin was happy because, in the end, it was really him who wanted to ride the TTA. It is one of his favorite things at Magic Kingdom (I think that is because it is so like a little train!) After the TTA, it was pas 7:30, and we knew it was time we headed over to the Contemporary. We spent a bit of time on Main Street. I bought a bag full of Jelly Belly jellybeans, and I searched for a book I’d seen at Downtown Disney and was regretting not buying. We didn’t find the book though, so we said goodbye to the Magic Kingdom, hopped on the front of the monorail, and went for our 9:00 reservation at the California Grill. We were still a bit early for our reservation, so we did some browsing in the Contemporary’s shops. I ended up finding the book I’d been looking for, and it was the last copy the store had! Calvin bought it for me for my birthday, which was great, but it still has a downside: I can’t actually look at it until my birthday, which is still two months away! But, anticipation is always part of the fun! We decided to go check in at the restaurant a half-hour early, which ended up being to our advantage. They had a window-side table for us, ready, at 8:30, so we went up and chose to start our meal early. We had drinks until 9:00, bread until 9:30, our salad until about 9:50, and our entrees soon after. “Wishes” started when I was halfway through my pork tenderloin, so I put it aside and enjoyed the show. The best thing about eating at the California Grill is not the food, but the atmosphere. When the fireworks were about to start, the audio for the show started playing in the restaurant! Calvin and I were so impressed. Not only were we able to enjoy looking at “Wishes” for a second time, but we were also able to hear the entire show! It was all very romantic, and I can’t deny that tears filled my eyes more than once during the twenty-minute show! After dinner, we kissed and cuddled on the observation deck of the contemporary. We danced to the music that was playing on outdoor speakers. We stared down at the Magic Kingdom and dreamed of the next trip we will be taking to this wonderful place. Calvin promised me we will be coming back one day, and I am absolutely holding that to him! All in all, it was a wonderful ending to the best Walt Disney World trip I’ve ever been on! Our taxi guy picked us up at 11:00, promptly, and we were in the house by 11:30. Now it is nearly 1:00 AM, and we have to get up at 5:30 to head out by 6:00. It’s just awful that we are going home tomorrow, but Calvin promised me that I would be back here again one day. He promised. So, I am holding him to that because, after all, a promise is a promise, plus we missed the Haunted Mansion, and that just simply will not do! Tips: -Always be flexible with the people you travel with. It makes the trip that much more enjoyable. -Don’t always rely on Fast Pass. The queue lines can be really awesome if you take the time to enjoy them. -Take time to smell the roses (figuratively and literally). Walt Disney World has an awesome atmosphere. Enjoy all the theming and background music. It truly adds to your trip. -Try new restaurants and new foods. We tried Boma and all ended up loving it! African food isn’t something that is readily available where we live, so it was nice to try something new. -Get to the parks early. We didn’t do this enough, but I know that it is definitely worth it. -See Fantasmic, Illuminations and Wishes. They help you see the true Magic in WDW. -Do a tour. Doing the Steam Train tour was the highlight of our vacation and we are going to now make it a point to try a different tour on every trip from now on. Future WDW vacation plans: Since our vacation, Calvin and I are now engaged. Our wedding day is July 7th, 2007 – it is exactly two years from the day we had our romantic dinner at the California Grill. We didn’t plan it to fall this way, it was only coincidence, but I think it fits quite well! We will be returning to WDW for five days in August 2007, as part of our honeymoon. Christiane Whynott
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