Day Two: Revenge of the Six-Thirty Arrival Time
Sorry this took so long; turns out it was one of the longest and most eventful days of my life! There's a bit about midway through
Tootsie where Dustin Hoffman has a full day of work, has a date, babysits a child, goes dancing, has dinner, all hell breaks loose at his apartment, and then I think he goes back out, all in one 24 hour period that took a minimum of about 38 hours. This was like that!
We woke up at 5:15am, or as I like to call it, The Dark Side.
BF and I showered and dressed in a crazed fugue state and met smashing good sports BFA and BFABF in the Pop Century lobby to take a Lyft to Hollywood Studios, and fulfill our destiny as riders of Rise of the Resistance. Our car arrived and all was going smoothly until I realized it was bumper-to-bumper traffic for about 100 yards before the Studios parking booths. I knew we wouldn't be the only people with this wise idea, but I didn't quite realize all of Orlando would be joining us.
After urging the ladies not to bring bags so we could get through security faster, BF decided to be the only person in our party to bring a bag. Cool! Weirdly enough, he got through security faster than we did and was waiting for us by the turnstiles. We scanned in and headed up toward the Chinese Theatre. My plan was to head to Toy Story Land and do Midway Mania first before the line got too long. I had heard that Smuggler's Run's standby line is its longest at rope-drop, so I was fine to do some counter-programming and do Smuggler's Run later when the line was shorter. I was
very clear about this strategy at last night's dinner, but sure enough, as I started to turn right to line up for Toy Story Land, BF was like, "Why aren't we going to Galaxy's Edge? Isn't that the whole reason we came here?!?"
Reader, perhaps you can empathize with me here. Is your partner only too happy to let you plan the entire trip and meticulously develop a touring plan months out, and then question your decision literally one second before we're about to do something? It's endlessly fun and infinitely cute. Highly recommended! Also, it isn't!
After probably-not-as-calmly-as-I'd-hoped explaining to him what the plan was, he relented and we lined up outside TSL. At this point, it was 6:47am and COLD. We had thirteen minutes to shiver and stare at our phones, waiting for 7am. I explained to everyone as best I could what their task would be: to assign us all to a boarding group. If all four of us tried it, the better chance we had of getting an early group. But let's face it: I knew in my heart I'd be the one to get us the group.
7am hit. I went to the Galaxy's Edge page. The "Join Boarding Group" link wasn't live yet. I exited and went back in. Still nothing. Repeat. Nothing. Needless to say, I was starting to straight-up panic. I had a vague sense BF, BFA, and BFABF were trying to ask me questions: "So where do you click?" "So we're supposed to be joining a boarding group?" "Is this Magic Kingdom?" But I was not paying attention. My eyes were on the prize. I heard a couple of cheers in the crowd around us, so I knew people were getting onto groups. I COMPLETELY CLOSED THE APP AND REOPENED IT, and finally the link was red. I clicked it, added the rest of my party, and prayed we'd be on an initial boarding group and not a backup group.
Sweet Jedi in the morning, we did it. Group 67. Some folks around us were in the 20's. One had group 7. Others were in the 80's. What a crap shoot! If only I'd known then what I know now: that you have to have the app completely closed when 7am hits, and then open it. Nightmare!
I picked up what remained of my hair and tried to jam it back onto my head as we entered the queue for Midway Mania. It was my first time since they changed the entrance and added a track and I loved it! I am normally a truly dreadful shot, but I think I did a personal best this time! That's not saying much, as BF handily mopped the floor with me. Crowd control was being a bit overzealous, as entering Galaxy's Edge from Toy Story Land was blocked. So we had to walk the long way around for our Star Tours FP. Magical!
I was a bit nervous about doing Star Tours with a couple of little old ladies who already warned me they didn't like spinning or darkness. But they ended up loving Star Tours! BF was the spy, which made us all scream. The Endorian moon and Exogol scenes were super-cool, and as I'd just seen the
Last Jedi scenes this past summer (and was the spy!), it's been a great past few rides on Star Tours. The old girl still has some fight in her!
We had waited long enough. We had another hour or so until our Slinky Dog FP, so I suggested we explore Galaxy's Edge. BF was champing at the bit, so it was a no-brainer. We made our approach through the front entrance and...trees. Like, a lot of them. Like, a big open space with trees? Was this the immersive theming we've been waiting our whole lives for? We then ventured into the land a little further, into Black Spire Outpost Marketplace, and obviously our faces melted off our skulls from all the amazingness, but I must say the approach out of the tunnel into the land is a bit...spare.
We ogled. We geeked out. We took every selfie. We drank blue AND green milk (verdict: nope!). Our boarding group couldn't possibly be called soon enough. I read about a cool gift card you can buy at Droid Depot that's made of a weighty metal and is emblazoned with Batuu iconography. Yes, you had to put a minimum of $100 on it. But it's not like we weren't gonna spend $100 anyway, and it would make a sweet l'il souvenir to give to BF, our household's true Star Wars geek.
The positively stupid hours our bodies were keeping had started to catch up to us, and we headed towards The Trolley Car Cafe for some caffeine. Then we headed as far away from it as possible when we saw the line. Um...there's more than one place to get a cup of coffee, everyone! Trolley Car Cafe did not seem to be accepting boarding groups. So we doubled back to the coffee stand on Pixar Place, which also had a Flight of Passage-like queue. We pivoted to looking for food, and settled on Woody's Lunchbox. We headed back into TSL, doing our FP for Slinky Dog on the way to Woody's. Slinky Dog is...fun! Fine! A nice way to look at the park, at least!
Yes, I swore I wasn't gonna eat potatoes on this trip. But I hadn't eaten anything for hours and the "potato barrels" (tater tots) of the Breakfast Bowl began warbling their siren song. We grabbed a table and did mobile order and we had breakfast (with much-needed coffee!) in minutes. People rave about Flight of Passage and Rise of the Resistance as game-changers; I feel that way about the Skyliner and mobile ordering.
On our way back through our preposterous zig-zag of a touring plan, we stopped at One Man's Dream, as we had time to kill before our Muppet Vision 3D FP. I had looked through this museum (which I love), but had never watched the film before. I can't say I learned very much, but it was still a really well done film and, duh, made me a tad misty. Have I mentioned I'm a crier? The fact that it took two and-a-half whole hours for my first tears to come is a sign of my steely resolve.
We used our useless, purely ceremonial third FP of the day on Muppet Vision 3D (a perennial favorite; the fact that The Muppets Present...Great Moments in American History went away before BF could see it is one of the great injustices of the 21st century, right next to...y'know, everything else). We poked around in the shops behind the theatre for a while; I love that little tucked-away corner! Meanwhile, our boarding group crept closer and closer to being called.
Back to Galaxy's Edge we headed, to gently stalk Rise of the Resistance. We found the cart that sells those Coke grenades! They're refreshing, they're carbonated, they freak out the TSA, they're six bucks a pop...what's not to love? We took one sip, and then it happened. They called our boarding group. Game on.
What happened next was honestly a blur. Yes, there were things I was expecting, because despite my attempts at a spoiler embargo, I got bits and pieces of things from TV promos and
The Imagineering Story (ugh, SO GOOD; I could watch a hundred more seasons of that thing). But there were also HUGE SURPRISES, all amounting to, you guessed it: a pretty dang emotional experience. Is it the best attraction at Walt Disney World? Honestly, probably not. But I can safely say there is nothing like it.
If you're guessing that we followed up this one-of-a-kind immersive experience with Beauty & The Beast - Live on Stage, you'd be right! After all, we had a tradition of trudging all the way over to the other side of the park to uphold. This show is...a fine enough way to sit down for a few minutes, I guess? We caught a bit of Star Wars: A Galaxy Far, Far Away on our way to our lunch ADR at Sci-Fi Drive-In Theatre. I have to tell you: this was the toughest-to-get ADR of the whole trip. I sat at work reloading endlessly for both this and Slinky Dog FPs...and eventually got them both like the all-around baller that I am. For as much trouble as it was, I hoped it would be worth it.
Um...this restaurant rules. The theming is incredible, and the food and service were great too! BF and I split the Buffalo chicken salad and the barbecue platter and both were really tasty. The ambience can't be beat, and it was extra-awesome to see that some of Ward Kimball's space cartoons for the
Disneyland TV show were in the loop they were playing, as I had just read about these in Kimball's biography I was reading on the plane down to Orlando (did I mention I'm an insufferable dork?). I'm really glad I managed to snag this ADR.
At this point, BFA was ready to head back to Pop Century. She had injured her knee while painting her house a couple of weeks ago, and even though her knee was wrapped up, a few hours in a Disney park will grind even the strongest bones to dust. The rest of us thought an afternoon nap sounded like a pretty tasty idea as well, so we hopped on the Skyliner and were back at the hotel lickety-split. Team Skyliner 4 lyfe!!!!
We had reservations at Oga's for 5:55, so the plan was to nap for an hour or so and hop right back on the Skyliner. I also went ahead and made myself a 5:05pm FP for Tower of Terror, the greatest attraction on Earth that literally no one wanted to ride on with me. I figured I'd leave for Studios a little early and everyone could meet me, as I'm certainly the most commando of the bunch and don't expect anyone to keep up with my disturbing energy level. That's when the text came.
BFA couldn't even put weight on her leg. She was in for the night. And as BFABF is indeed a best friend, she was in for the night too. It was a bummer, but they really wanted to rope drop Animal Kingdom tomorrow and if this is what it took, then so be it. BF got up from his nap and decided to come with me to Studios and drink in some more Galaxy's Edge while I repeatedly rose and fell.
I hadn't ridden Tower of Terror since my November 2014 trip, so it was really nice to revisit. It's incredible how, no matter how many times I've done it, I always get nervous. Like this time will be somehow different and worse than the other times. A cast member called for single riders so I got to leave a bunch of chumps in my dust. The ride was exhilarating as always, but when I got to the photo displays, the lady who had sat next to me pointed at our photo and said "Look. My daughter's turning around to look at me and asking 'Why is he screaming like that?'" Oh, cool, lady. Like everybody wasn't screaming? It's the Tower of Freakin' Terror. Sorry I didn't demurely sip tea, lightly guffawing as I thumb through a
New Yorker! Jerk.
I met BF over in line for Oga's Cantina, where they seemed frankly relieved that our party had shrunk by two people. We were ushered in to a very small, very busy cantina, which honestly was super-awesome despite being ultimately treated like cattle. We were told multiple times we had a 45 minute limit at our table, which made me want to stay for 5. A glance at the menu revealed some very tasty-looking options. I went with the Jet Juice, as it was made with bourbon and I'm a bourbon boy. I looked around the bar and saw fizzy drinks and flaming drinks and colorful drinks garnished with entire cookies. Then my Jet Juice came, and, well, it was essentially a shot of red liquid in a miniature wine carafe. Don't get me wrong; it was delicious! But I was hoping it would be foamy or prismatic or say my name in 90 alien languages. We ordered Batuu Bits (trail mix just weird enough to seem not of this Earth), and BF ordered a wild, exotic cocktail called a....Diet Coke, if I'm remembering correctly. BF is diabetic and isn't drinking alcohol, which left his options limited, and he was still regretting the sugary sips of blue and green milk he had taken earlier that morning, or as my exhausted body considered it, many lifetimes ago.
We had a 7:25 appointment at Savi's Workshop, and as we had yet to ride Smuggler's Run, we began floating the idea of trying to squeeze it in between our homies Oga and Savi. We flagged down our waiter for the check, and when it come back he had charmingly combined our check with that of another party at our table (Oh, did I mention we were sat at a table with two other parties? It's much more charming at Biergarten, TBH), so as he fixed that, we did a little tour of the place and took eight bajillion pictures.
The single rider line was operating at Smuggler's Run, so it looked like we could do it and make it to our Savi's appointment with time to spare. I think we were in line for like seven minutes. It happened so fast! Suddenly we were thrust into the room with the chessboard on the Falcon. I didn't even have time to get a photo with BF; our color-coded groups were already being lined up. We knew we'd get assigned lame engineer jobs, but it was okay. We were riding Smuggler's Run! In less time than it took to get my thimble of Jet Juice!
So...fun! Yeah! Doing Rise of the Resistance first and then Millennium Falcon: Smuggler's Run is like going to the Eiffel Tower in Paris and then watching the Paris scene in Soarin' on the far left-hand side. But it was pretty cool in its own right. It was a bit hard to split focus between what was happening on the screen and the buttons on the side, probably due to me not being a particularly video game-savvy person. To be honest, I had much more fun just walking around the bridge of the Millennium Falcon than riding the actual ride.
That was the immersive part.
We had time to just hang out outside of the Millennium Falcon, take more pictures, and drink in the ambience before sauntering over to Savi's for our lightsaber ceremony. Okay, let's get this out of the way: this costs too much. I was happy to do it as a late Christmas present to BF, but it comes to like $215 with tax for a 20-ish minute experience, a cumbersome lightsaber, and a carrying case that (spoiler alert) already has a broken strap. Like, at least make the photos free with the purchase! Or throw in, like, a custom Star Wars Magic Band. Or $160.
All that said, I MEGA-CRIED throughout ENTIRELY TOO MUCH of this ceremony, especially considering that BF was making the lightsaber, not me. I loved that the whole ceremony was underscored by music. I loved the commitment of the head Gatherer. I loved when all of the builders (95% middle-aged man-children) triumphantly raised their rainbow of sabers into the air. I loved it all!
We got out of the workshop at 8:01pm, just in time for everything to be closed. Including Docking Bay 7, where we were hoping to grab a bite. Our choices were few: take the Skyliner back to the Pop food court? Take the Skyliner to Epcot and risk all the food there being closed? Or going to Disney Springs, where BF had never gone and I haven't been to since it was 1998 and it was called Pleasure Island, and everything was open until 11? The answer was clear. Somehow, we still had enough gas in the tank to hop on the bus to Disney Springs.
We grabbed a pretty tasty bite at Morimoto Street Food and wandered through the Lacoste, Uniqlo, and World of Disney stores before heading on back to Pop for some much needed shut-eye. Tomorrow we could sleep in two extra hours; that's right, 7am! Animal Kingdom was just around the corner.
Next: A Gnu Hope
This Starbucks, in a fun twist, was operated by remotely competent employees, so we got our joe in a flash and continued onto our bus. We were on the bus in about five minutes and then on the road about five minutes later. We were probably off airport property entirely before that poor man got his coffee cake.
This report! You have amazing writing skills!
Thank you.