Trip Report Shortest Retirement in History?

Justin Bieber lasted 2 weeks.

Tom Brady lasted 40 days.

I, Tuvalu, outlasted them both. Not by much, mind you. Yet if not for the encouragement of some forum friends - along with some unusual circumstances - you wouldn’t be reading this.

Unusual circumstances, you say?

Around Thanksgiving my beloved Woody learned his presence was required at a work conference. In Orlando. At Universal.
Just down the road from Walt Disney World.

Woody said I could accompany him if he drove (rather than flew) to Florida. And that we could leave a couple days early and have some Disney time together.

Well you don’t have to ask me twice!

I’d be on my own during the conference. Since the majority of Universal’s attractions don’t appeal to me, it didn’t make sense for me to buy Uni tickets when I could visit WDW for free with my AP. Being solo, I thought it might be fun to do a live trip report so y’all could be my virtual companions!

Turns out I won’t be alone while Woody is occupied after all. Some friends that you have seen in my previous TRs (and one you haven’t) have offered to play with me. I can’t wait!

 

[Tuvalu]

Wednesday, August 21

It was lightly raining when I went out to sit on the balcony a little past 6 am.

As I waited for dawn my eyes were drawn skyward to some birds flying about. But when I fully focused on the flying objects, I realized something….those weren’t birds.

It was a colony of BATS, quickly darting to and fro, dangerously close to where I was sitting. In dozens of stays over the last 20 years, I have NEVER seen a single bat. Not one. Bats creep me out. I always avoid the bat enclosure at AK. And now here they were only a few feet away.

I was paralyzed. Woody was in bed and the heavy drapes behind me were closed. I decided to distract myself by taking a quick video. Looking at a screen was preferable to reality in that moment.




Their activity lasted about 20 minutes and then they were gone. I wondered if there are bat houses on the roof. Bats are good for pest control - especially mosquitos, and I’d read central Florida was having a prolific season.

I was glad to see the sun breaking through.

 

[RememberWhen]

So cool! I would have been delighted to see a colony of bats! But I understand that people find them creepy. A colony of cockroaches or ::shudder:: spiders… would have me shrieking!

 

[riverside]

Bats...ugh!! The bridge between Riverside & FQ has tons of them flying around there early in the morning!!

 

[93boomer]

Wednesday, August 21

It was lightly raining when I went out to sit on the balcony a little past 6 am.

View attachment 816323

As I waited for dawn my eyes were drawn skyward to some birds flying about. But when I fully focused on the flying objects, I realized something….those weren’t birds.

It was a colony of BATS, quickly darting to and fro, dangerously close to where I was sitting. In dozens of stays over the last 20 years, I have NEVER seen a single bat. Not one. Bats creep me out. I always avoid the bat enclosure at AK. And now here they were only a few feet away.

I was paralyzed. Woody was in bed and the heavy drapes behind me were closed. I decided to distract myself by taking a quick video. Looking at a screen was preferable to reality in that moment.




Their activity lasted about 20 minutes and then they were gone. I wondered if there are bat houses on the roof. Bats are good for pest control - especially mosquitos, and I’d read central Florida was having a prolific season.

I was glad to see the sun breaking through.

View attachment 816324

Wow that was a lot of bats!! We used to have one that stayed under our top deck. It was a little one so it didn’t freak me out.

 

[Tuvalu]

Bats...ugh!! The bridge between Riverside & FQ has tons of them flying around there early in the morning!!

Memo to self - avoid walking between PO resorts in the morning!

 

[Loco_driver]

Do you know what the pirate says after "here kitty kitty"? It sounds like "have a little old time rum", which I'm sure is not accurate.

have a nice little tot of rum with Old Bill. Apparently his name is bill.

 

[Tuvalu]

have a nice little tot of rum

Google edit: A tot of rum was the rum ration given to sailors in the British Royal Navy from 1866-1970. It is equivalent to 70 ml or 2.5 oz.

 

[wdisney9000]

have a nice little tot of rum with Old Bill. Apparently his name is bill.

Interesting. Thanks!

I've already said "have a little old time rum" to my cats a bazillion times so I'll keep saying my basterdized version lol

 

[wdisney9000]

Google edit: A tot of rum was the rum ration given to sailors in the British Royal Navy from 1866-1970. It is equivalent to 70 ml or 2.5 oz.

Dang, the British Royal Navy was stingy with the rum. I dont blame the Pirates for ransacking whatever they could from those parsimonious a-holes!

 

[93boomer]

Memo to self - avoid walking between PO resorts in the morning!

You learn something new every day!

 

[erstwo]

I love bats! They really do so many good things.
The only ones that scare me are the ones as tall as a 5 year old in Australia. Those are a big - you stay over there and I’ll stay over here - from me!

 

[ajrwdwgirl]

Wednesday, August 21

It was lightly raining when I went out to sit on the balcony a little past 6 am.

View attachment 816323

As I waited for dawn my eyes were drawn skyward to some birds flying about. But when I fully focused on the flying objects, I realized something….those weren’t birds.

It was a colony of BATS, quickly darting to and fro, dangerously close to where I was sitting. In dozens of stays over the last 20 years, I have NEVER seen a single bat. Not one. Bats creep me out. I always avoid the bat enclosure at AK. And now here they were only a few feet away.

I was paralyzed. Woody was in bed and the heavy drapes behind me were closed. I decided to distract myself by taking a quick video. Looking at a screen was preferable to reality in that moment.




Their activity lasted about 20 minutes and then they were gone. I wondered if there are bat houses on the roof. Bats are good for pest control - especially mosquitos, and I’d read central Florida was having a prolific season.

I was glad to see the sun breaking through.

View attachment 816324

OMG that bat experience would be a nightmare for me. I too have to avoid the bat enclosure that AK (I run through the walkway, and I never run). I can't even look at a picture of bats it freaks me out so much, you were very brave to be out with them. I do realize that bats are good for the environment and getting rid of icky mosquitoes but the bats can just do that far, far, far away from me.

Edit: just read @riverside 's post and I will not be walking near that FQ/POR bridge either.

 

[Tuvalu]

This has been a constant in my brain during our bat discussion.



(And I thought IASW can be an annoying ear worm. )

 

[Zipadeelady]

This is the one that keeps popping in my head.

 

[Tuvalu]

Wednesday, con’t

Woody and I grabbed a quick breakfast in the lounge and made it to Epcot in time for early entry.

As I attempted to take a pic of the sign, from out of the blue Woody ran to it and gave the two thumbs up. It was so unexpected and I couldn’t stop laughing!

One benefit of not being RAT or FEA people means we can stay in the front of the park and not rush to World Showcase during early entry. We chose to go to the Land. The standby time for Soarin’ was posted at 5 minutes as we headed into the queue.

And came to a halt right here where we didn’t move for 15 minutes.

Turns out Soarin’ wasn’t “officially” open until 8:45 am. Our total wait was 25 minutes - which was ridiculous considering there weren’t that many people ahead of us and LL entry didn’t begin until regular park open at 9.

 

[Tuvalu]

Thankfully we were able to walk right on Living with the Land. There was no animal or insect movement in the rainforest section which was disappointing.

As our boat approached the banana trees I told Woody that Em never sees bananas on them.

Woody pointed and said, “This plant has a bunch of them - no pun intended!”

“Look - there’s more on the back!” he proclaimed.

Today must have been cleaning day in the greenhouses.

Experience ruined. Disney owes us something!

 

[Tuvalu]

I’ve really got to use
My imagination
To think of good reasons
To keep on keepin’ on

(Who can Name That Tune for $100?)

The finale tries to capture the essence of the original attraction using cardboard cutouts. That’s why you gotta use your imagination!

 

[Tiggerish]

I’ve really got to use
My imagination
To think of good reasons
To keep on keepin’ on

(Who can Name That Tune for $100?)

Your local band, Gladys Knight and the Pips!

Title is the first two lines you quoted.

 

[Tuvalu]

Wednesday, con’t

After saying goodbye to Figment, I took Woody on a tour of the college campus/office park that was behind walls when he last visited Epcot.

He wasn’t up for dancing to Encanto, however.

And he agreed with vlogger Offhand Disney’s assessment of Communicore Hall.

 

[Tuvalu]

Spaceship Earth had been “temporarily closed” all morning. I kept checking its status via the app and when I saw it was open we quickly headed that way.

Apparently we weren’t the only ones.

However only ten minutes later we boarded.

And thus began our painfully slow travel through time. The omnimover advanced at a snail’s pace — when it wasn’t fully stopped. The stops began right away and there was only a few feet between them. I decided to take a picture each time we came to a complete halt.

This one was first. At the time I fully expected our faces would not appear in the “Welcome to Your Future” video near the end. The result will follow in the next post.

Stop #2

Stop #3 (told ya it was only a few feet!)

Stop #4 (I was able to thank the Phoenicians multiple times during this stop.)

Stop #5 (@amjt660 I had a math lesson. Too bad it was in Greek!)

Stop #6