Trip Reports

Dates: November 27, 1997 - November 30, 1998

Participants: Steve & Sherry Simmons

Thursday, Thanksgiving Day

Armed with a 4 day Park Hopper (including entrance to Pleasure Island), we arrived in Orlando about 8:30 in the morning. Picked up our rental car from Alamo (off the airport property) and armed with their map we headed for International Drive (192) to find the Howard Johnson's Main Gate Motel. About 5 or 6 miles after passing the turnoff to WDW we finally found the HoJo's. This definitely gives a new meaning to "Main Gate". We checked in, had their buffet breakfast (yuck!) and then decided to start our day by visiting Pleasure Island. It was there that we first discovered that all the Christmas decorations are up! We walked through most of the stores and then decided to check out the new West End. I was not so impressed with this area. Sure, there will be the House of Blues and the large multiplex theatre and such, but I was not impressed with "another open shopping mall". We went into Virgin Records because I had heard so much about how well stocked they are. Well I came out empty handed. I didn't find any of the artists that I was looking for. And I didn't even see the Lion King CD from the Broadway cast there..??!! Oh well.. We then walked over to Planet Hollywood and picked up a couple of pins to show that we were there. Seeing that we had killed enough time wandering around Pleasure Island, it was nearly time for us to get to the Wilderness Lodge for our Thanksgiving meal at Artists Point. We had made preferred seating for 5:00 p.m. but got over to the Lodge at 4:30. I went up to inform the staff that we were there early and imagine my surprise when we were seated immediately! We decided to have the traditional turkey dinner that was offered and we were not disappointed. Everything was great! The service was just a little lacking. Being only a party of two we were seated near a post. After the meal we wandered around the Lodge for a few to soak up the atmosphere and then attempted to head back to Pleasure Island. This was a trip of many "first's" and as this was the first time that we had gotten off of the main road from International Drive to the three parks, I, of course, got disorientated (o.k., I got lost!). After a few turns and reversals, I found my way back to Pleasure Island. We wandered around the stores to kill time before Pleasure Island opened up. It was then that we found out that we had an extra-added bonus, a concert tonight by Duran Duran. But first, The Adventurer's Club. I was surprised how when Pleasure Island opened that most of the crowd immediately headed for the Comedy Club. We entered the Adventurer's Club, found a table and ordered a couple of Jungle Juice's. Yummy! Great atmosphere and I would have loved to hang out here all evening long. However, Duran Duran was due to hit the stage at 9:00, so we went out into the crowd to catch the concert. Here was my first complaint about Pleasure Island. They could have designed the viewing area in front of the stage on a slope so that everyone can see the stage. Since the area is flat, it is extremely difficult to see the actual performers on stage. However, you can see what is on the large screen…just like watching television at home. Anyway, we watched the concert and then headed back to the hotel…we've got three more days ahead of us. Just one question….. How does one get this #@!!%&#@ wristband off?

Friday……Epcot

We decided to do the parks in a different order than usual. We started off with Epcot instead of the Magic Kingdom. The weather was nice, mid 70's with some clouds. The crowd was average. We got off to a late start (well, late for me). It was about 11:00 when we finally got in. The lines getting into the park were quite long and many people mistakenly got into the entrance line before getting into the lines for purchasing tickets due to the fact that the lines to the entrance were out beyond the lines for the tickets. Once inside, we saw that the line for Spaceship Earth was extremely long so we decided to check out The Universe of Energy. Nope! Quite the line there too, so at that point we decided to head directly out to the countries of the World. That was probably the best choice we could have done. We passed up Mexico and stopped long enough in front of the China pavilion to hear "Dog Boy" tell his story and get a few pictures. This is part of the Story Telling events found in most of the countries. We saw another of the storytellers in front of the Norway area. He was a gnome and telling how Christmas is celebrated in Norway. Then we wandered through most of the stores and finally reached the American exhibit. We immediately went in because we enjoy the Freedom singers. We were not let down as they were at their best. We both loved their costumes and enjoyed the seasonal songs. However we were quite surprised at the noisy crowd. Didn't they realize that they were being entertained? After enjoying the show, we were back out to wander through more stores. We caught the Japanese drum entertainers and since by this time it was mid afternoon we decided to do another first and eat at the Japanese restaurant. Another good choice. The food was excellent! We even surprised both the servers and the cook by speaking a little Japanese (thanks to many viewings of Sho-Gun and a few months overseas). Then we went downstairs so that we could purchase a couple of pearls. This is something that we do every time we visit Epcot and we have almost a dozen pearls of various sizes and colors. Having done that we were off again….this time we decided to sit down and enjoy the movie provided in the French pavilion. Another first time event. Very enjoyable and I loved the music. From there we ventured over to the U.K. area and caught a bagpipe performance before checking out the stores. As we were leaving the U.K. area we were attacked by a band of stilt birds. Don't miss them if you get the opportunity. We had discussed the fact that we wanted to see the Candlelight performance that was going to be held in front of the American Exhibit that night at 6:00 p.m. but we could see across the lake that people had already begun filling up the area at 4:00!!! We didn't want to kill two hours just sitting around so we continued on with our journey. We passed Honey I shrunk the Audience because of the rather long line and ended up going in to the Land to watch the Lion King film (one of Sherry's favorites!). After leaving the Land we went over to the Living Seas. While we were in the exhibit we saw the group of people who were fortunate enough to participate in the Dive Quest. We were reminded of last year when we brought a friend of ours along and he did the Dive Quest. If you can scuba and have a few extra dollars to spend we highly recommend partaking in the Dive Quest. Leaving the Living Seas we walked through the stores and ended up at The Universe of Energy exhibit again. We've been in here on previous trips but not since they modified it. It was "cute" but I enjoyed it before Ellen was added. From there we wandered over to the Test Track. There was so much Test Track merchandise available so I asked what the status of the track was (even though I already knew)…the one Cast Member that I talked to said that they were committed to opening up the Test Track in 1998. Sure, I told him, that gave Disney a window of 365 days….to which the Cast Member said…"yeah but it could be as soon as January 1st" (RIGHT!!!!!). Well, the night is almost over so we decided that since the line was short that we would do Spaceship Earth. We've done it before but not since they kicked out Walter Cronkite and replaced him with Jeremy Irons. Another day done so we head back to the hotel. One last comment about Epcot, check out the sidewalk as you leave. I love the lights in the sidewalk!

Saturday … The Magic Kingdom

The weather today is going to be chancy. There are reports of possible showers so we grab our ponchos and we are off. We got off to a late start again today…this time because of the Golden Arches….What ended up being the longest wait of the day, we decided to go through the drive through to get breakfast…..almost an hour and the line didn't appear that long!!!!! Oh well…..we get to the Magic Kingdom and begin walking through the stores. When we reach the hub we decide to just start with Tomorrowland and see what develops. Our first stop is Time Traveler as there is no line. In fact we were the last in the theater. Remember to check out what is going on ALL around you when you are watching the film…especially the sign in front of the exposition. From there, since Alien Encounter and Space Mountain are VERY busy we went over to Carrousel of Progress. Once out of that we head through the shops in Fantasyland and end up wandering through Frontierland. A note about the lines in Fantasyland, Sherry noticed that although the lines for Mr. Toad, Snow White and Peter Pan were long, Peter Pan had the longest wait. We were going to go into the Diamond Horseshoe Review but the show had just filled up so we headed up to Splash Mountain. The wait was just under an hour. This was the longest wait we experienced for any attraction in any of the parks. Once finished we by-passed Thunder Mountain because of the crowd and decided to also by-pass Country Bear Christmas show since that had a crowd. Note that every time we went by Country Bear the line was outrageous. Since we were here we made reservations for the Character Dinner at the Liberty Tree Inn. Found out that it is quite easy to make reservations if you are a party of two (remember that folks) but also found out that a table for a party of two can be placed almost anywhere, usually near a post (didn't I mention that before?). Since we had a little time to kill before dinner we decided to check out Tomorrowland again. This time we decide to do Space Mountain since the line has gone down. Took the left side and it was a good ride as usual. Coming out of Space Mountain we headed back for dinner. The dinner was good, as usual, and we ate as much as we could. The only disappointing part was that the characters only made it around once. Last time we ate here we got multiple visits by the characters. With dinner out of the way, we wandered through the Main Street stores and decided to go through the Visitor Center. After that we went back up Main Street, and finally went into Alien Encounter. So many people bringing in their young kids into this. They just don't understand how loud and possibly scary this can be for them. From there we wandered through Fantasyland again, stopping to pick up a few things for friends. Then down to Frontierland and a stop at the Haunted Mansion. We even found the hidden Mickey in the very first place setting on the left side of the table in the room where all the ghosts are dancing. This was the first hidden Mickey that I had looked for as we spent the entire last trip hunting down hidden Mickey's! Sorry, I digress……well, out of the Haunted Mansion and we decided that the day is almost over. We noticed the tail end of the first SpectroMagic parade going through Frontierland. Well, we decide to do the fireworks and the last parade and then head back to the room. We parked ourselves just to the left of the castle on the entrance to Frontierland and were not disappointed. A very nice view of the fireworks. After the fireworks we headed back down Main Street, picked up a package (we purchased something earlier that I didn't want to carry around and the stores now have a feature of either sending the package to your hotel - if you are on property - shipping it home or you can pick it up later) and then settled down on the curb in front of Town Hall to catch the parade. For those of you who want to watch a parade and not mess with crowds, this is the spot! As soon as the final float passed us we were up and heading out the exit. There was almost no one in front of us as we approached the monorail (which was just boarding so we told the monorail people to let it go and then asked if we could sit up front. No problem! And up front we were. At night it isn't as neat as during the day (we were to find out later) and it also helps if your monorail driver isn't new (ours was and he was very nervous!). Anyway, another day done.

Sunday - Boardwalk, MGM and the Magic Kingdom

Well, it finally rained and today we thought that we'd start off by going and checking out the Boardwalk. Another new experience. Very nice shops and theme. Really enjoyed it even in the rain. If I had been by myself I would have camped out in front of the ESPN sports bar since they were having the NFL pregame show there. Oh well, we were hungry so we stopped in at the Boardwalk Bakery. Again, yummy! So we walked the Boardwalk over and then it was on to MGM Studios. Oh yeah, I got lost again because there are no signs coming out of the Boardwalk telling you that you are right across the street from the entrance to MGM Studios, so I go out to the main drag and end up looping right around to come back onto the same street…..ending up finally at MGM studios. As I mentioned, it is raining so it didn't seem like many people. We walked in and move up the street through the stores. Went directly to the Muppets 3D…..if you go, stop just after you go through the turnstiles, and check out the window with the sign that says "Be Back in 5 Minutes….Key Under Mat"….then look under the mat! Also when you get in the pre-show area, be sure to look for Walt's favorite Mousketeer….you can't miss her……she's above your head…..you know her as…."a net full of Jell-O". After leaving the Muppets we headed for Star Wars. Pretty quick to get in. From there we moved across the park to the animation tour. Michael was the tour guide and he was so bland. Really put me to sleep. But we did get to see some advance stuff on Mulan. Looks really neat. There were actually a few artists working on Sunday…couldn't see what they were doing because they were across the room. Also the artist who gives the demonstration drew one of the characters from Mulan. When the demonstration was over we asked if we could have the sketch but he declined saying that he could not release anything like that prior to the opening of Mulan. Bummer! After that we walked around for a few, and decided to go down to the Tower of Terror. Again a very quick wait (where we found another hidden Mickey on a cart on the left just as you enter the hotel on a plate of small cookies) and we were up and down and up again and down again. Once out we debated on seeing the Beauty and the Beast show, but since it was still raining we passed on that and headed on out of MGM to get dinner. We ate off property (Olive Garden) and then we decided to do the Magic Kingdom one more time. I love this Park Hopper! Since it was mid-afternoon, there was hardly anyone riding the monorails, so we were right up the ramps, and were able to ride up front on a monorail again. Once inside the Magic Kingdom we immediately headed for the train, rode it around to the second stop, got off and headed for Tomorrowland. There we went on Space Mountain (the right side this time) and Alien Encounter again. The Magic Kingdom was closing at 7 p.m. tonight (and it was now about 4:30), so the lines were very short for both. In fact, they were closing down the loop backs in Space Mountain while we were inside. Then we walked down Main Street during the Spectro Magic parade (we used the stores which were empty to our advantage). We got down to the Main Gate just before the parade ended, so we were first on the monorail again and, yes, we did get up front again. Our thanks to Marc, the monorail driver for an enjoyable trip and he even awarded us with official monorail co-pilot cards! We headed back to the hotel room and packed for our early flight out Monday morning.

Quick ones:

The parks were really decorated for the Christmas season. The cast members that we talked to were all in good spirits and were very knowledgeable. The parks were cleaner than they have been in the past. Even though it was crowded, it was still not that difficult to get around or go on what you wanted. A new terror has been discovered due to the inclimate weather……umbrellas. If you thought that getting run over by strollers or wheelchairs was bad, try ducking out of the way of a child with an umbrella.

I was on the lookout for the dreaded McDonalds cart in the Magic Kingdom and finally caught a glimpse of it as we were headed for Splash Mountain. Was I bothered by it? Not yet. Does it bother me that McD's is moving into the park? Am I upset that I might have to pay Disney prices for McD's fries? Well, considering that I paid Disney prices for a coke ($2.00 for a 20oz bottle - priced at about 99 cents elsewhere else) I guess not.

The official lighting of the Christmas tree in the Magic Kingdom was nice but just who is the Mayor of The Magic Kingdom and how does one get elected to this position?

I enjoyed Spectro Magic Parade but felt that the people in the parade were really not "into it". We really miss the Main Street Electrical Parade.

One Last Question…Anyone going real soon need a tour guide? I am available…..

Steve Simmons

s.simmons@mci.com

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