Upon arriving to MCO, we checked in with the Magical Express. This is the first time staying at a resort and also the first time taking the Magical Express. At first the long line seem a bit overwhelming but it actually moved pretty fast. It took less than 10 minutes from what looked like a 30 minute wait. Cool! So onto the "red carpet" to hop onto our bus. Wait time? 2 minutes.
A short trip...well, I dozed off a bit since I was already at the airport from NYC at 6 AM in the morning and was a bit tired. I think total trip from airport to Polynesian was 30 minutes. We were the first stop.
Checking in was quick. We got our lei's. Our plans were explained to us more in detail since this was the first time at a Disney resort plus we had the Magic Your Way Tickets and the Disney Dining Plan. Plus it was also my girlfriend's first time at WDW. (Hun, if you're reading this...I'm gonna brag that it's my 17th visit to WDW :wave
The resort was NICE! The CMs were extremely friendly and helpful.
We loved the themed rooms. We stayed at the Tokelau longhouse. I have read reviews about rooms being too dirty and too dark. My girlfriend is a clean freak (sorry babe for calling you out) but she found it was clean to her liking.
The bathrooms have all those H20 shower gels and shampoos. We like!
Since we checked in early 12 PM and our luggage hasn't arrived yet, we decided to visit the Magic Kingdom. I also heard of people saying they need their luggage ASAP and that it took too long for the luggage to arrive. I did not find that of an inconvenience. We didn't need anything that was in the luggage. I placed my faith in Disney for my bags to arrive safely so we can go out to have fun. (P.S. Our luggage were in our rooms when we went back to take a break)
Magic Kingdom was a bit quiet around 12:30 PM. I was surprised that I could take a picture of the castle without too many crowds getting in the way!
(Look Ma, no crowds getting in front of my camera!)
Now I know why it was pretty quiet. Everyone was at the Haunted Mansion! But the line went by pretty quick. The wait to the ride was about 15 minutes. no biggie. I liked the new ball of Madame Leota. My girlfriend was amazed of the effects.
My girlfriend saw something interesting and wanted to go check it out. She said "Oooh, let's go to that ride. It looks interesting!" That ride was Splash Mountain but unfortunately it was closed until late February.
We took a dinner break and headed back to the Polynesian. Dinner was at Kona Cafe. From the name of it, I thought the food would be mediocre but I thought wrong! Our food was DELICIOUS! I had the pork chops. I forgot the name of it. I think it was pomegranite glazed pork chops or something. (Wished I had taken a photo of the menu). Dessert was great too. The caramel banana creme brulee was worth licking! We also had the mahi mahi. It was okay. It was fresh but I think it needed more flavors.
(Also eaten was the vanilla cheesecake)
I chose to go to the Magic Kingdom on this day because of the Extra Magic Hours for the evening. it was weird to wander the park with almost no one around. It felt kinda of "special"
Great TR so far! I'll be staying at the Polynesian for the first time soon (that I can remember), so I was glad to hear you liked the rooms and Kona Cafe! Thanks for sharing, and can't wait for Day 2!
1/7/08 - Day Two, Animal Kingdom...Lions, Tiggers and Ducks Oh My!:
This is my second trip to Disney's Animal Kingdom. The first time was back in May 2002 and it was extremely crowded! We didn't get to see much then so this warranted another trip back there (I use the same excuse for all my WDW trips! :ROFLOL
The only 2 rides I wanted to go on was the Expedition EVEREST and Dinosaur! Did we get enough of these 2 rides? Heck no! We rode both of these at least twice. Crowd levels were average. Not too crowded and not too empty. It was just right.
These 2 ducks were funny. I was wondering if they really understood me at all. I said "Don't bother me. I'm eating. Go bother the people over there." and off they went to bother the other guests!
The thing about going on the rides multiple times is knowing when they'll snap your picture...
The Safari was relaxing. It was a nice break off from the warm weather and sun. But I guess our wish was taken too seriously as a rhino blocked our path and didn't want to move!
Also we finally got to watch the 'It's Tough To Be a Bug' show at the Tree of Life! Yes, I haven't watched it yet :hammer:
I always wondered if Donald Duck is actually a female underneath that costume. He does seem a bit on the short side...*pondering minds*
I planned the trip accordingly so we can hit the parks with the Extra Magic Hours and Disney's Hollywood Studios falls on this day. But I had a feeling everyone did the same. :brick: Not a big deal. The crowd levels are still within my tolerable limits. The only annoyance were some of the guest's behaviors. (Which I won't get into right now. :zipit
I'm having a bit of the writer's block so let me bust out some visuals...
I like the new signage. It has that nostalgic "Hollywood" feel to it.
First place to hit of course was the Tower of Terror! I just LOVE the feeling of random weightlessness! My girlfriend on the other hand was terrified. She didn't go limp as I suggested so the feeling of the drop was intensified. I think maybe I jumped out too many airplanes while in the Army so I gotten used to it? :shrug:
Didn't really take a lot of pictures at this park. I was too busy having fun!
We had a dinner reserved for Hollywood and Vine. Just to let you know, this place is a buffet style dinner. And if you have the Dining Plan, it's 1 Table Service per person. Dinner was average. It wasn't bad either. I stuffed myself on the carved meats.
After dinner, it's the bus ride back to the Polynesian. Gotta love that Disney transportation! :sohappy:
Extra Magic Hours in the morning for Epcot! So arrived at Epcot around 8:15 AM and it seem pretty empty. First thing we headed to was Mission: SPACE! Much to my girlfriend's resistance, we opt for the Orange team. Bad mistake. She couldn't take the spinning and got a bit nauseous. It wasn't that bad for me though. I barely felt a thing. :shrug:
Next stop was Test Track! The line went by pretty quick. I would say 10-15 minutes of waiting before we got on the ride. I also took a video of the entire ride....which will be uploaded to my album once I get to it
This is definitely our "go at your own pace" park for us. We didn't have to rush to a ride in order to grab a Fast Pass, etc. We strolled around the World Showcase and took a few photos along the way.
Starting with Mexico
China was also a nice spot to go to
Had lunch at La Cantina de San Angel. We used one CS credit from our Dining Plan since we saw the lunches were a pretty decent size. So, we decided to say it for a later afternoon lunch for another day.
Dinner was at Restaurant Marrakesh. We had reservations at 8 PM so we got there 30 minutes prior. We got our seats 10 minutes later. Yay! We felt bad for the couple who got in 5 minutes after us with the same reservation time but had to wait another 30 minutes.
Rest of the night was catching the Illuminations and walking around. Definitely needed this slower-paced day.
It's Day Four and I can't believe it's almost over! We got up and decided maybe we'll give Breakfast at Ohana a try. We found out it was a character breakfast and boy was it fun! We were served with juices and coffee. Then came the eggs, bacon, sausages, potatoes and Mickey waffles! Yes, the first to go were Mickey's ears *muahahaha* :fork:
The highlight was when Pluto came out followed by Stitch. I think the two have a problem with getting attention so they were competing against one another with the guests. After a few tackling moves, Stitch wins!
Stitch picked my nose and wiped it on my shirt
And Stitch was speaking. Do they allow the characters to speak? He did sound like Stitch though. Well, here's Stitch taking some grapes so he can toss them at Pluto and other guests
Poor Pluto got knocked down for the count
Wonderful view from Ohana
Overall we enjoyed the Character breakfast at Ohana. *2 thumbs up!*
Day Four To be Continued at Disney's Hollywood Studios...
After being attacked by Stitch, we have Disney's Hollywood Studios planned for the day. So we hopped onto the bus and away we go. (P.S. Gotta love the Disney transportation. They have been pretty reliable for us.)
We had to check out some of the shows that we had missed on the first visit. I think it was better to divide one day for the rides and another day to follow up on the shows and shopping.
So, we decided to catch the Indiana Jones Stunt Show. There seems to be some changes made since the last time I had watched the show. The little jeep no longer flips over. The show seemed a lot shorter than I had remembered.
They were all jumping for joy...
First time to catch Lights, Motors, ACTION! Extreme Stunt Show for us. I have seen this on the History Channel but never saw it in person. The music and the cars seem to make you want to sit at the edge of your seat (benches in actuality).
The set's pretty big.
There was an accident in which we thought it was planned but according to other guests, it wasn't. In the first scene, the hero car and the bad guy car collided with each other so both cars had to be called back into the backstage for check-ups.
I even caught it on video. Sorry for the short video as my memory card was full.
Afterwards, guess where we went back to? A picture's worth a thousand words...
Yeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaaah!
My girlfriend still freaked out on this ride. She said this time the ride seem longer than the first and there were too many drops. Yay for the random drops!
We finished Hollywood Studios pretty early like around 5 PM so off to Animal Kingdom. Bus time!
Didn't take much pics since we're just walking around and everything was starting to look the same to me. Too much Disney? Naaaah!
Okay, I was giving too much faith with the Disney buses and it's finally caught up with us.
We wanted to head to Downtown Disney for dinner but there was no direct bus routed there. We chose to hop onto the bus to Saratoga Springs since the bus person said it was closest to DTD. Bad mistake. The bus was extremely packed. I think almost everyone had a baby stroller. It was standing room only for us. I was so exhausted that I took a nap while standing up! (It's an Army trick)
There were 4 stops for Saratoga Springs and DTD was at the 4th and last stop! Ah the agony! Next time we'll rethink our route plan and probably should've headed back to the Polynesian to take the bus to DTD. Next time. (Another excuse for us to go back)
Well, to end the night we had dinner at Bongo's. Food was GREAT! It wasn't expensive. A dinner for 2 came out to $43 and I gave an 18% tip. It was well worth the trip.
We were tired so it was time to call it a night. Glad our bus went straight to the Polynesian.
As my girlfriend mentioned "Epcot again?" So I mentioned that we haven't checked out Soarin' yet and other attractions that we can go at our own pace. "Oh yeah" was the reply.
I was glad we checked out Epcot on this day because Space Ship Earth was opened! As we were walking towards the sphere, I noticed people walking to and lining up for Space Ship Earth. So I grabbed my girl and made a quick speed walk up up to it. Yes, it's a "soft" opening! The sign still said "Open in February". The line moved pretty quick. One thing noted by my girlfriend was how creaky the ride sounded. She was afraid something might break! I reassured her that nothing would happen as Disney is very careful about the safety of the guests.
Overall ride was the same as what it's been years ago. The new AAs are more fluid-like now. I guess other people weren't impressed as I have noted that some guests a few cars behind us were talking ON A CELL PHONE. All I can say it "Double You Tee Eff"??
Well anyways, here are some of the photos from the ride:
The Jetsons?
Took a relaxing ride on Soarin'. I expected more but it was still breathtaking regardless. Would I ride it again? Maybe not unless they included more breathtaking footages.
Also at the Land was the ride Living with the Land. After seeing the food, we were hungry so we ate at Sunshine Seasons. The food was pretty good!
I guess we'll finish off with visiting the World Showcase to see what we've missed.
At O Canada!
Alice
At China
We heard many fire trucks in the distance and saw a lot of smoke.
A CM mentioned that there was a brush fire at mile away at Polk County. It seemed awfully close though...
Well, we decided we've seen enough of Epcot. I think we've covered every square inch of this park so we'll head on over to the Magic Kingdom to finish off the day.
To Be Continued...Day Five, "There's a great big beautiful tomorrow..."
It seemed like we were park hopping twice a day and its true. I planned it that way because I had reserved dinners at those parks.
So, onto the Magic Kingdom since it's closer to our resort and we had dinner reservations for the Spirit of Aloha. (Photos below)
Is it me or did Orlando get warmer and warmer every day? It went up to 81 degrees on this day! I actually got myself a tan. So, we rode the Walt Disney World Railroad at least 3 times to get some shade before finally getting off at the main entrance.
First stop: Carousel of Progress! My girlfriend thinks I'm a geek for singing along to the song. Ah, what does she know?
Mickey's Toontown Fair
Minnie's Country house was not closed but WOW was it packed! I stood at the door for 10 minutes and gave up so we ended up going over to Mickey's.
We decided to head back to our room to get ready for dinner.
Florida has such beautiful sunsets. I surely do miss home (Ft. Lauderdale)
(I've maxed out my photo posting so check out the next reply below)
Next Stop, Dinner at Spirit of Aloha!
Not knowing were to walk (the trails and pathways at Polynesian are extremely dark), we got a bit lost and ended up at the front desk bypassing the photographer. So we checked in and got confirmation on our table. besides, we didn't want a photo anyways.
What I didn't like was that the dinner starts around 8 PM....which coincided with the fireworks at the Magic Kingdom. I wanted to catch some fireworks before dinner.
Food came out pretty quick. First was the salads, coconut pineapple bread and a pineapple. Yummmm!
Next was the main courses: 4 roasted chicken halves, about 10 ribs, huge heaping of rice and steamed veggies! And there were just the 2 of us. I felt bad since we didn't finish all that food. I wanted to ask the next table if they wanted some since they did get a second round of food! The chicken was extremely dry. It was tasty but too dry for us. The ribs were great though. Rice and veggies were so-so.
Dessert was some raspberry volcano thingie. I forgot the name. i think I was too stuffed to hear the name.
While all this eating was going on, there was also a show happening on stage. You have your dancers doing their thing. The show overall was okay. It wasn't all that. I would suggest people to watch it at least once if you've never watched it before. I don't think I'll do a return trip to this show.
A pitcher blocked my way
Desserts came out on this tray
The desserts. I only had 3 bites...
That's it for dinner. We finished the night by taking a stroll over to the Grand Floridian to scope it out as a prospective resort spot. They were doing construction in the lobby and was extremely noisy. I wonder how it looks by now? Anyone got pics?
It wasn't that bad for me though. I barely felt a thing. :shrug:
The chicken was extremely dry. It was tasty but too dry for us. The ribs were great though. Rice and veggies were so-so.
