A Touch of the Magic--2 Days in WDW About This Page:

[TiggerAlli]

Who : TiggerAlli (Me, Allison), 34, 11th visit
TooGoofy4U (DH, Kevin), 33, 10th visit
Why : Because we could!!
When : May 10th-12th

Day 1 “What’s going on” Or “How Flexible can you be?”

We get up at 5:00 a.m. so that DH can drop me off at work by 7:00 and get to his job by 8:00. DH is taking a ½ day today to drop our DD (Dog) at the kennel and do some last minute stuff. This also allows me to leave work at 4:00 since I don’t have any ‘real’ time off at this job yet. I basically am waiting for the day to end (will 4:00 NEVER get here!?!?!).

DH calls me after dropping DD off. This is always a heart wrenching [img]graemlins/pout.gif[/img] experience for us. To explain that, our sweet baby is 8 ½ years old and had never stayed in a kennel before last May. When we lived in Chicago my DMIL loved to watch her for us so she always got to stay with family before we moved here. Top that off with the fact that she is a Maltese (small, all-white dog) and that she is staying in a run that will fit a Mastiff and you get the picture. There was a slight snafu with this as I thought that the kennel closed at 2:00 p.m.. DH rushed over to the kennel only to find out that they re-opened at 2:00 p.m., so he had to sit in the car for about 10 minutes with an increasingly anxious puppy love (can you tell she’s spoiled??) [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img] .

Soon DH was in the car on his way to pick me up on the way to the airport (the other reason that he dropped me off at work). As a side note, DH and I are perfectly compatible in every way except one—being on time. If we need to be across the street at 3:00 DH wants to leave by 2:45 at the latest, on the other hand, I find anywhere from 2:45 to 3:05 to be acceptable. This has and will continue to cause us headaches but neither one of us is changing so that’s life! Anyhow, when he was so relaxed about getting to the airport (flight scheduled for 7:50) I was a little freaked out [img]images/icons/shocked.gif[/img] , especially since I was the one that was getting crazy to get there! Another side note here: I checked us in on-line through Delta.com. It is a very cool [img]images/icons/cool.gif[/img] option that is offered to SkyMiles members and I HIGHLY recommend using this if you can. You can check in anytime from 4 to ½ hours before your flight and print out your boarding ticket at your printer. One less line for us!! WooHoo! Back to the report, he calls at 3:50 to say that he is in the parking lot. I tell him that I just have to shut down/lock up and change and I will be down. Just about this time we start to hear some rumbles in the sky and there are a couple of sprinkles. This turns out to have an effect on our lives for the next 2 hours or so, unfortunately.

Yay! We’re on the road! Unfortunately about 20 minutes into our drive we pretty much come to a complete halt since the rain is pretty much coming down in buckets. No one can drive in rain it seems (what is that about?) so we sit & sit & sit in the traffic. Therefore, the drive that should have taken maybe 40 minutes took us 1 ½ hours. It appears that the storm is over the airport which has us worried, it will turn out that we are wrong about this, luckily! Eventually we make it through Atlanta and the traffic breaks up and it is smooth sailing the rest of the way.

We get to the airport only to find the economy (closer & cheaper) parking is full so we have to circle the airport to get to the park & ride (farther & more expensive). This goes smoothly and we are on our way through security. This goes smoothly as well. We get on the train that takes you from the main airport building to the terminals. At this point DH asks, “What gate are we leaving from?”. I answer “E”. He says, “That’s not possible, that is the International terminal.” [img]images/icons/shocked.gif[/img] My heart skips a beat but I Know that is what I printed out. We pull out the boarding passes and, sure enough, it’s E. At this point the resident plane expert (DH loves WWII history and this leaks into a fascination w/planes and technology in general) says, “Well, it is a 777 so they probably couldn’t fit it at the other gates.” I just smile [img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img] and nod because, 1. He’s probably right and 2. I am happy that I was correct about the gate and that we are going where we need to be! At this point a “celebrating the Golden years” couple gets on the train with us (this age couple will figure into our trip later on as well). The gentleman promptly asks us where we are going. When I tell him Orlando he gives me a look. I explain DH’ theory about the plane size which he accepts without question (and he doesn’t even know DH!). I ask where they are going and he says Paris. His wife says that they are going to 3 different countries (can’t remember which ones) and that they are taking a river boat cruise as well. At this point we arrive at the terminal and we all say our Goodbyes. We wish them a good trip and they tell us to say Hi! to Mickey for them. Smiles [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img] all around! Of course after all this Good Will we end up walking along together for the next 5 or so minutes (why does that always happen?).

[ 05-17-2002, 03:27 PM: Message edited by: TiggerAlli ]

[TiggerAlli]

Who : TiggerAlli (Me, Allison), 34, 11th visit
TooGoofy4U (DH, Kevin), 33, 10th visit
Why : Because we could!!
When: May 10th-12th

Day 1 “What’s going on” Or “How Flexible can you be?”

We get to the gate, stake out a couple of seats, across from, it turns out, the entire Flight Attendant crew. We are a little hungry but we know we have to save room for the traditional first meal at Beaches & Cream [img]graemlins/yuma.gif[/img] so DH goes to get us a Personal Pan pizza from the Hut and a large diet. We eat this not so tasty meal (coldish & Pizza Hut do not go together IMHO) while discussing how sad it is that this is the first type of food that international visitors are greeted with. While sharing our pizza I realize that the Flight Attendants probably shouldn’t be sitting there—they should be on the plane. There is some discussion between them and the gate attendant about the plane not being ‘released’ as it actually was an international flight (from Paris, irony, no?). Time goes on and 7:50 rapidly approaches and departs and we are still sitting there. Finally, they release the plane, everyone gets off and we start boarding. This, of course, takes longer than it should! We are in 2 center seats of a group of 5 (this plane is HUGE). Practically instantly after sitting down we start talking to each other about how tremendously uncomfortable these seats are. They were, no doubt, the MOST uncomfortable seats I have ever sat in. Instant Bum numbness! [img]graemlins/ukid.gif[/img] We finally take off about 8:50 and the flight is very uneventful. I have to give Delta credit here for their pretzel/cracker/peanut (!) mix, it was really tasty. We land and get off the plane pretty easily and we are on our way to the Dollar Rent-a-car counter (since we were only here for 2 days we didn’t check any luggage—very nice).

We normally have problems finding the rental counters for some reason but this time it was pretty easy (finally getting the hang of it after all the trips, I guess). The airport is pretty much deserted at this point since it is now around 10:00 p.m.. We get to the level where the rental counters are and the ONLY one that has a line is Dollar [img]images/icons/rolleyes.gif[/img] . We stand in line for about 20 minutes because some women is apparently having problems since she was there when we got there and was still talking to someone when we walked away and there are only 2 people working. We get a very unfriendly woman who asks if we want to pay to fill the tank. We are going to be here for 2 days, driving on Disney property in a Neon, No we do not want to fill the tank. [img]images/icons/rolleyes.gif[/img] She then informs us that we will have to provide a receipt showing that we filled up w/in 10 miles of the airport (this will come into play at the end of our trip). Okay, whatever, just give me the car I want to get to Disney already! After signatures, etc. we head out to the garage to pick up the car.

More to come . . . I have to go do some work [img]graemlins/blush.gif[/img] !

[ 05-17-2002, 04:46 PM: Message edited by: TiggerAlli ]

[PS - I LUV WDW]

Great report so far, Allison! You had me LOL many times but here are two of my favorites:

If we need to be across the street at 3:00 DH wants to leave by 2:45 at the latest, on the other hand, I find anywhere from 2:45 to 3:05 to be acceptable

<font size="2" face="Comic Sans MS, Arial">I would get along really well with your DH - that is me all the way (luckily my DH is also this way)

so DH goes to get us a Personal Pan pizza from the Hut and a large diet. We eat this not so tasty meal (coldish & Pizza Hut do not go together IMHO) while ...

<font size="2" face="Comic Sans MS, Arial">I have to agree 100% with this observation!

Can't wait to hear more!

Pam

[TiggerAlli]

Who: TiggerAlli (Me, Allison), 34, 11th visit
TooGoofy4U (DH, Kevin), 33, 10th visit
Why : Because we could!!
When: May 10th-12th

Day 1 “What’s going on” Or “How Flexible can you be?”

We get a white neon that looks like it has been used very badly or is old. Okay, fine, 2 days we can handle this. Then we get in the car and yep, it reeks of smoke. Great, I know I asked for a non-smoking vehicle but I also know that it is after 10 and we want to get going, again, it’s 2 days we can handle it (see the flexible quotient coming into play?). Okay, we’re on the road to Disney!!! [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

We’re a little worried that B&C might be closed when we get there so DH pulls out the trusty Passporter to look up the phone number. Looks like they should still be open, YAY! We see the familiar purple signs and follow the ones that lead to the Epcot resorts. We re-live the time I insisted that I KNEW where I was going and passed up CBR [img]graemlins/blush.gif[/img] (a requirement at least once a trip) causing us to turn around and get a glimpse of the 2000 over Spaceship Earth. I, of course, say that that is why we got lost—so we could see that [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img] ! We head in the ‘back way’ (past Boardwalk) to get to BC. We walk through the doors of the BC and breathe in that Disney air-conditioning smell that is particular to the BC and know that we are home! We get sat at the counter and Brian comes up to take our order. This will be one of the few times that we see him since soon after this a large group of people that he met at a party come in (overheard him telling a fellow CM) and he spends most of his time with this table, that’s okay though. Now for our first “disappointment” [img]graemlins/pout.gif[/img] of the trip. I head to the bathroom to wash my hands and find that the BC bathrooms by the pool no longer have the rolled up washcloths that they used to have for drying your hands. Not a big deal I know, but we both just loved that little touch of luxury at this resort and were really sad to see it missing. We order the usual, cheeseburgers, onion rings, and a black and white shake! This is an enormous amount of food and something that we would never eat at home but it’s vacation so it’s okay, right? This is without doubt one of our favorite meals at Disney and for our longer trips we always come back to repeat it once more at some point. Unfortunately the buns were kind of stale and seemed a bit too big for the burger. Still yummy but not quite what it was before. Probably just an off day, we’ll be sure to test it out in Nov.!

Alright, we are beyond full, so let’s go check in to CS. We have never stayed here and only toured it briefly when it was first opened so we don’t really have any experience with the layout so this is some new territory for us, cool! I had called yesterday to make sure that they had our requests, non-smoking, 2nd floor, 8B building. I spoke w/Heidi and she said that we were in 7B (Ranchos) but that our other requests had been met. We check in and we are no longer in 7B now we are in the Casitas on the third floor (can’t remember the building) and we have a view of the courtyard. Cool [img]images/icons/cool.gif[/img] , an upgrade without even having to ask! We get to the building and walk past a pretty fountain and down our walkway, indeed we have a view of the Three Caballeros! This is neat, since this is kind of an icon of the resort. We are very happy and excited about all of this until we walk in the room. The room is a smoking room and from the smell of it the person/people who had it before us were chain smokers [img]images/icons/mad.gif[/img] . It was truly nasty and my DH’s allergies started kicking in immediately. This would mean no sleep for him and not much more for me, we cannot stay in this room. I call the front desk and explain the situation and ask for another room. The nice man on the phone puts me on hold for a bit and then comes back and pretty much says there’s nothing we can do but we can give you a non-smoking room tomorrow. Now, if this was the floor or the building or nearly anything else I wouldn’t have even called in the first place but this is a “no go” issue for us. I ask him to please find us a non-smoking room in any of the moderates, we will go wherever one is available. He puts me on hold and comes back and says that there are no non-smoking rooms in any of the moderates. I ask him to please look again as this is something that we cannot live with. He comes back a little while later and says that there are not any rooms anywhere but the All Stars. I am still completely baffled [img]images/icons/confused.gif[/img] by this as there are many many more non-smoking rooms than smoking rooms but this is what he tells me. We go back and forth about this a few times and then he says he will give me to a manager. Iris comes on and says that she will get us a room at the AS and calls over to verify that they do have a non-smoking room. She tells us we can move to the Sports for the night and then check back in at CS tomorrow morning. We are not happy with this but if it’s AS or breathing we will move. At this point it is past midnight and we are exhausted anyhow and just want to sleep somewhere. We leave the room and notice that after just 20 minutes our clothes are stinky and decide that we have made the right decision since DH would have been totally messed up for the rest of the trip if we had stayed there. We lug everything back to the car and head to AS, another resort that we have no experience with. I have to admit our first impressions of this resort were not terribly favorable. There were quite a few people in line (at 12:45 a.m.!?!) but the CM’s were moving through them pretty quickly. We walked up and explained everything and gave them Iris and Ramon’s name. The CM went in back, verified everything with Ramon, and came back out to explain everything to us. This was unnecessary since we would only be here for about 7 hours but she was nice and I didn’t want to be rude to her, none of this was her fault. We head over to Surf’s Up and find our room. The beds seem really small as does the tub and the towels are practically threadbare compared to most of the Disney towels but that is okay, we just want to sleep! We wash up and fall into bed only to find pancake thin pillows. Great, DH sleeps w/2 pillows all the time but no matter how thin I just cannot sleep that way. I try but eventually my second pillow ends up on the floor. The entire time all of this is happening I keep telling Kev that we should look at this as an adventure and see “how flexible we can be”. He keeps giving me a look that says “What is going on?”. Besides we would not have stayed at the AS without this happening (not likely anyhow) so we get to experience two new resorts in one short weekend! Not really my idea of a great start but things improve greatly over the next 2 days! Besides, we are here, in the Magic [img]graemlins/love.gif[/img] , it can’t be that bad!

Coming up Day 2!

[ 05-17-2002, 05:44 PM: Message edited by: TiggerAlli ]

[iloverags2]

Enjoying your report, especially the encounter with the couple headed to Paris.

Where in Chicago did you live? We grew up in the south suburbs, and my sister is now in the northwest suburbs.

[tikibird]

Allison,

Enjoying your report so far! I agree about the cold + Pizza Hut = nasty!!! [img]images/icons/frown.gif[/img]

You also reminded me of one thing I didn't like at the All Stars - you are so right about the pillows! I was glad I had my airline pillow with me last trip, or I would have had a hard time sleeping.

I think you've also help me make up my mind about Dollar vs. National. That fill the car up 10 miles from the airport made me nuts, and they didn't check our receipt either! [img]images/icons/mad.gif[/img] I think I'll stick with National, even though the cost is higher.

Looking forward to your adventures in the parks, and hope you made it to CS!

[PS - I LUV WDW]

I have to agree with Tikibird - after reading about all the folks renting from Dollar and the receipt within 10 miles, I won't rent from them.

(Refering to Beaches and Cream)Still yummy but not quite what it was before. Probably just an off day, we’ll be sure to test it out in Nov.!

<font size="2" face="Comic Sans MS, Arial">Allison, I saw that your first week (how jealous am I that you are going for two weeks!) in November is the same as ours and we'll be at the YC... maybe there will be time for a Passporter lunch.

[disneyknut]

Allison,
Loving your trip report... I am especially impressed at how calm you seem to be during the 'flexible' times...
Me? I would have pitched a hissy fit but you seem to be 'going with the flow' Thumbs up to you!!
Looking forward to the rest of your report [img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[TiggerAlli]

Hi! Thank you all for the kind words, I'm glad that you got a laugh out of some of the experiences--we will soon, I'm sure [img]images/icons/rolleyes.gif[/img] !

P.S. I LUV WDW, actually DH has gotten me more in-line w/his way of thinking over the last 14 years but I Always underestimate the amt. of time something will take! It would be great if we could meet up, we will have to make some plans closer to the trip time. I'll have to write that down so I don't forget [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img] !

Hello [img]graemlins/wavin.gif[/img] Iloverags2! I grew up in Oak Lawn, DH grew up in Burbank, we had a house in Palos Hills for about 8 1/2 years before we moved down here. Where abouts in the south suburbs did you live? I know the whole southwest side pretty well. Small world, isn't it? What do you miss most about Chicago (other than fam/friends of course)?

tikibird, we did make it to CS and hopefully I will be able to post something about that today. Those pillows were crazy! Oh well, now I know. Actually I was thinking of you over the weekend, I work part-time at Kohls (kind of a Sears w/cheaper prices, if you don't have them in your area yet) to help pay for our obsession! Anyhow, they have a grouping of "outdoor" stuff and one of the groups has frozen mugs and a serving tray that says "Tiki Lounge" on them. They also have a Tiki mask on them. It made me think of you immediately. Kohls is also on-line if you want to see them, just an idea! As for Dollar vs. National, I will also go w/National or basically anyone else at this point. At least there are a pretty good list of other options.

Thanks, Disneyknut. Actually I am pretty proud [img]graemlins/blush.gif[/img] of myself for my attitude there. I too would normally have a fit when things start going that way but I knew we only had 2 days and I was determined that we would have a good time so I had to "modify" my response! [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

I hope to get some more posted today and with luck to finish by Thursday!

Thank you all again!

[Tara O'Hara]

Dear Allison,

I am really enjoying your trip report and can't wait to hear more! I like the way you write. You are a VERY flexible person! You sound like you have a great attitude about stuff that happens to you that you can't control. I hope you got to really enjoy the rest of your trip!

Tara
[img]graemlins/ears.gif[/img]

[toogoofy4u]

Ok, here is where I get to throw my "2 cents" in. [img]graemlins/puter.gif[/img] I have to laugh at everyone's response to how "calm and flexible" Allison was on that first night. If everyone knew Allison better you would have expected her to get angry [img]images/icons/mad.gif[/img] at all that was going wrong. I thought she handled everything very well. In fact I was the one that was getting mad. I guess we switch places this time. I think we both knew we were going to be there for a brief amount of time so we tried to make the best of it. Besides, how mad can you get at the happiest place on earth? [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img]

[TiggerAlli]

Who: TiggerAlli (Me, Allison), 34, 11th visit
TooGoofy4U (DH, Kevin), 33, 10th visit
Why : Because we could!!
When When: May 10th-12th

Day 2 "Excuse me could you move over an inch?"

We woke up, not so refreshed, after about 6 or so hours because we wanted to get moving. Got cleaned up and set out. We decided to tour around AS to see what we hadn’t the night/morning before. While I was not too impressed with the Sports section we both thought the way they hid the stairwells was really cool! [img]images/icons/cool.gif[/img] We parked right across from the Music section and loved the huge speakers and the old-fashioned microphones on the roof (would that have been the rock-n-roll section?). We toured around slowly and took some pictures (even pulled over and parked to get one!). I would have liked to look around the Movies area more so maybe we will check it out a little next time. We saw the Love Bug area and commented on how our nephew would have adored the car theme (total little car nut even though he’s not even 4 yet!). Off to CS for check-in!

There wasn’t any line but the girl had too many problems. [img]images/icons/rolleyes.gif[/img] She couldn’t get our keys to print out and even she said she shouldn’t be working that day. No problem, that’s okay, everyone has an off day here and there. However, our room was available. Now, I am not complaining, it was great that our room was available but how, on earth, could the room be available at 8:00 a.m. when it wasn’t available at 12:30 a.m.?? Did they sneak some extra mousekeeping people in to clean it? We would have waited another half an hour or an hour for that matter last night to get this room instead of the whole thing we ended up going through. Whatever, we got the room, our stuff didn’t have to sit in the car for hours, we’re happy. [img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

We had decided to check out the Pepper Market for breakfast as we had never been there before. We walked down the hallway looking around and noticing all the neat details that are so a part of all the Disney resorts. There was somewhat of a line but it went by pretty quickly. We got sat and the person explained how it worked, i.e. bring your paper up to each place and they will stamp it for you based on what you ordered. Okay, we look over the menu and then decide that we want to look around, unfortunately we decided to leave the menu at the table, mistake! After wandering somewhat aimlessly I go back to the table and pick up the menu and find DH waiting for the Belgian Waffle w/banana pecan topping. I was going to get this too but decided that we should both get something different and switch halfway through (we ended up doing this for most of our meals and it worked out great). I see some yummy looking strawberries but I know that it will be too much food so I turn around and decide to get the breakfast pizza, something we have loved [img]graemlins/love.gif[/img] at PoR on previous visits. I order that and the not so friendly woman tells me to come back in 6 minutes. DH is back at the table so I head over there to sit w/him and see what his waffle is like. The only complaint about this is that we expected the banana mixture to be warm and it was cold, would have been better warm. I get my b-fast pizza and bring it back to the table, again it was okay but we preferred the ones at PoR. The server brings us our coffee (what is up w/the little cup of coffee and no refills?), we eat, and head out. All-in-all not a stellar experience but it is an eatery after all, how much should we expect? I would do it again but not go out of my way for it.
We decide to look around a little before we drop our stuff off at the room. We walk out the back doors and see this beautiful setting, gorgeous lake and these pretty buildings arrayed around it. I have to admit this was truly a pretty resort, something that I was not expecting to think, since I don’t particularly care for the “Southwestern” look. I also have to mention that I loved [img]graemlins/love.gif[/img] all the different lamps that had all over the resort. I know it's weird but I just love different lamps/lamposts, etc.. I take pictures of these everywhere we go (so much so that DH doesn't even make comments anymore [img]images/icons/tongue.gif[/img] ). Anyhow, this resort had a lot of great lamps to look at, I didn't even get pictures of all of them! We head over to the lakeside to take some pictures and notice we now have a duck following (as in many ducks). Since we were standing next to the pellet dispenser we had about 20 ducks sitting in the water waiting for us to feed them. I am not a bird person (tend to think they are dirty, sorry bird lovers) and I am not a “feed the animals because they are there” person but for some reason I am in the mood to do this. DH rolls his eyes and gives me a “are you kidding” look but it’s only a quarter so I buy some duck pellets. Geez, these things are trained, they all came swimming over at the noise! After I feed them a little DH decides that maybe this can be fun so he asks for some of my pellets that I gladly share and we spend about 10 minutes feeding the already overfed [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img] waterfowl. Time to check out the room! Of course we have to check out the gift shop first though. I see a Mickey t-shirt that I like and the pin of the CS that we will buy but we decide to wait until World of Disney store where we can get our discount. We wander around a bit but decide we are wasting too much of our precious time and head to the room.

We are right off the parking lot this time, so much for our pretty courtyard, but it is definitely worth it to be able to breathe freely! [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img] We also have a corner room but since we are on the first floor (all my requests went out the window this time) and we face the parking lot and a wall there is no need to open the curtains. We aren’t really going to be here long enough for it to matter though. We pretty much dumped everything and ran out the door. First impressions, the room is okay but we really like the double sinks that the other moderates have. It didn’t matter this time since we were only there one night but if we had stayed for a week or so it would have been annoying to not have that extra space and the ability to use the sinks at the same time. The look of the room was very nice, right on target with what I would have expected.

Coming up, Day 2, part 2, MGM studios!

[Tara O'Hara]

Allison, it sounds like your trip is taking a turn for the better! I love your take on the ducks!

Tara
[img]images/icons/smile.gif[/img]

[TiggerAlli]

Who : TiggerAlli (Me, Allison), 34, 11th visit
TooGoofy4U (DH, Kevin), 33, 10th visit
Why : Because we could!!
When : May 10th-12th

Day 2 "Excuse me, could you move over an inch?"

We get to MGM and discover the “new” way to get in due to the new security measures. I, of course, pick the LONGEST line to get in (okay, it wasn’t actually the longest line but I seem to have a knack for picking the line where there is going to be an issue or something). The lady 2 people in front of us must have at least 6 bags that have to be gone through! We get in the park and one of the photographers quickly snaps our picture. We never buy the picture from MGM because they never seem to take the time to really pose us like they do at the other parks, this is always a disappointment [img]images/icons/frown.gif[/img] for us. We head over to ToT, my absolute, without a doubt, love it, FAVORITE [img]graemlins/love.gif[/img] ride in all the parks. There is about a 20 minute wait time listed so we grab FP’s and jump in the stand-by line. I can’t wait, what a way to start the parks, my favorite ride! WoooHooo! I can’t really explain my fascination with this ride but it makes me giggle uncontrollably, I am just a goofy mess when we are done and I can’t wait to jump back on! We get sat with a teenage girl who is by herself. I don’t know if she was scared or what but she kept bracing her leg against me when we would drop, kind of bugged me because I am not a real touchy feely kind of person and it took away from the enjoyment but I was still giggling [img]images/icons/grin.gif[/img] like a goofball at the end. We walk through the shop at the end and find the new shirt that DH MUST have (Goofy dropping the suitcases down the empty shaft) and decide that I will get the one w/Mickey on it (as DH has this and so do our best friends that sometimes go to DW w/us) but we will do this later. Time to get back on the ride w/the FP’s. We walk right on and get sat w/another couple. Apparently the man next to me must have been afraid because at the end of the ride (while I am still laughing) he turns to me and half yells, “Oh yeah, I can tell your were real afraid!”. This, of course, just makes me laugh all the more! I am up for going again but DH wants to check out RnR so off we go. There is a pretty significant wait here so we grab some FP’s and head off to see what is under the hat. DH is really not happy [img]images/icons/frown.gif[/img] with the hat being where it is, he thinks it ruins the look of the park. I am not as against it as he is but I have to agree that it really doesn’t look like it belongs there, especially after we find out that all that is really under here is the store that sells the 100 years pins. We do the trivia until we win and then look at the pins. We were going to buy these now (because it just feels like you gotta have them, even though we are not big pin people) but decided that we didn’t have the room to get them home and they can wait until Nov.. It still wasn’t time for our FP for RnR so we decided to get on GMR. Again we walked right on but here comes our first experience with “Could you please move over an inch?”. The CM tells us to get in a row with about 4 other people but these people will NOT move. We are standing there, the CM is repeating, “Could you please move down?” and they are looking at us like we are ruining their day. Now, I have to say, if it’s up to me, I prefer to be in a row w/just my group too but for crying out loud, if the CM puts someone in your row the least you can do is move over so they can sit there! [img]graemlins/pout.gif[/img] Anyhow the girl that was sitting next to me crossed her legs so that her foot was practically touching my leg (guess I have cooties, huh?) which was annoying me so I crossed my leg so that the bottom of my foot was pretty much touching the bottom of her foot. All right, enough of that! We have been on this so much (got the gangster, my personal favorite of the 2 storylines) that it is kind of a been there, done that thing but we still have to do it every trip! We are a little hungry when we get out of this but not enough for lunch so we decide to get some ice cream. DH gets a Mickey bar and I get a 100 years bar. Now, I have to say, (sorry Fortissimo, in particular) that I don’t really like the Mickey bars because I remember what they were like when I was in Jr. high and I loved them! Does anyone else remember when the ears were choco. ice cream w/choco. covering and then the face was vanilla but the eyes, nose, & mouth were choco.? I got those every day that we had ice cream (once a week) back then so the new ones just don’t do it for me. Sorry! The 100 years bar was okay, nothing special, IMHO. We also got 2 waters and pretty much sucked those down in about a minute! We walked back to RnR but it was broken down, so much for those FP’s! We wandered through some stores and then decided to have lunch after all. We went to the Commissary since a number of people here had suggested it. We both got large diet cokes, and I had the Feijoada, black beans w/rice, pork, and beef, YUM [img]graemlins/yuma.gif[/img] ! DH had the Tabbouleh wrap, which he thought was okay but not great. I actually liked it pretty well although I couldn’t taste the hummus (one of my faves) at all and I’ve only had Tabbouleh as a salad before, never as part of a wrap. We switched in the middle and were both satisfied and re-energized! From here we headed to Walt Disney, One Man’s Legacy. We both really liked this although we thought the layout could have been better. Why do they make you go back and forth across the path like that? It just seems awkward. We both really enjoyed seeing everything here and I have to admit I got choked up a couple of times. We weren’t finished looking around when the movie started so we asked if we could come back afterwards and they said that we could. We watched the movie and then popped back in to see the things we had missed. Then we headed towards WWTBAMPI. DH is determined to get me in the hot seat I am determined NOT to get in the hot seat. DH got in the hot seat last Sept. and made it to the 16,000 point question (I think, he got the hat and a bunch of pins) but blew it on Ralph Lauren’s real name (not a surprise!). I was so nervous for him that I am afraid that I will get up there and forget how to speak [img]graemlins/dizzy.gif[/img] or something so this is not real high on my priority list. We got FP’s for this and then headed over to Star Tours. We walked right on this ride and were seated in the back row. Again we have been on this ride a bunch of times but it is always fun. Unfortunately there was this woman 2 seats down from me that would NOT shut up! She talked to her friend the entire ride she was driving me nuts! Then she referred to GMR as a “wax museum”, that was it for me! Luckily the ride ended pretty soon after that or I may just have told her what I thought! [img]images/icons/wink.gif[/img] It was getting late at this point so we decided to forgo WWTBAMPI and head for the front of the park. We stopped briefly to watch the Streetmosphere performers and then headed down to RnR. There was almost no wait so we jumped in the stand by line and walked in pretty quickly. Fun ride, but nothing, IMHO compared to ToT. Of course, we had to ride ToT one more time! WOOHOO! We picked up our t-shirts and headed for the gates. Once again we were stopped by the Streetmosphere performers. This time they were doing a version of Blind Date or something like that. It was really cute and the guy they picked from the audience was getting into it with them so that made it all the better. DH filmed it and at one point one of the people looked/spoke directly into the camera! FUN! We looked at our picture but, once again, we couldn’t justify the expense for a not so good picture and we headed out the door. The tram guy was soo quiet you could barely hear what he was saying and it was clear that he wasn’t into his job this day. Oh well, onto Epcot (or as we now refer to it Ep COT, since that seems to be the way Walt was pronouncing it in the videos they were playing at OML).

[tikibird]

Allison

Glad to hear that your trip turned into being quite an enjoyable one!

I have to say I agree with your DH, though. Why did they have to put the HAT there? It has grown on me a bit, but still annoys me.

Looking forward to the next installment....