Trip Report The We Need to Use Our Rollover Days Trip Report!

Hello! It's been a long time since I have done a trip report, figured I'd give it a shot with the trip we just returned from today!

Background
We actually had a much longer trip in September of 2021 and it is abnormal for us to go this close to a recent trip. There were several factors at play that made us decide to go to Disney again, first off we had to use our rollover days from 2021 by the end of January (not the best policy but it is what it is), Typhoon Lagoon had reopened and we absolutely love Typhoon Lagoon, my daughter had Tuesday the 1st of February off from school for Lunar New Year so we were really targeting that last weekend of January for some long weekend trip somewhere, and finally we saw some fairly friendly room rates.

Where
We went back and forth about where to stay for so long I thought we would never agree and not make the trip. In September we stayed at Pop Century for the first time, and both of us were surprised by how much we enjoyed it so that was option one, we have a very strong desire to stay at either the Beach or Yacht Club, but have never pulled the trigger on that one, and finally Port Orleans French Quarter which is a resort that always looked nice that we had never done previously having stayed at Riverside. We ultimately decided on French Quarter, staying 4 nights Friday the 28th of January -Tuesday, February 1st.

Who

Me

My Wife Cara

Our Daughter Siobhan
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Our original plan included 2 full days at Typhoon Lagoon, 1 day at Epcot, and our arrival day we would spend at Disney Springs. Typhoon Lagoon may be Cara's favorite place in all of WDW and she was incredibly excited to find out it had reopened. We also wanted to check out the Festival of the Arts which we had never experienced before. Well as time went by we changed things up and decided a second park day was the way to go, after a brief debate on whether this should be Hollywood Studios, Magic Kingdom, or a second day at Epcot (my personal favorite) we decided on Magic Kingdom, knowing that Siobhan would like that best.

Day 1 - Sorry Blizzard We are Going to Disney World
We had a nice and early flight from LaGuardia to MCO at 7:30am, I scheduled a Lyft to pick us up at our apartment at 5:35am, but told my family it would be there a little earlier, if I gave them the exact time we wouldn't be ready and the Lyft would have left. At that time there is very little traffic, and we can get to LaGuardia in about 20 minutes. It appeared like we would get into MCO early as boarding went very smooth, but there was a slight delay getting our plane to takeoff, and we still managed to land at MCO early! but there was a delay getting the plane and jetway connected, so by the time we got all that straightened out we were a few minutes late. Oh well, we didn't have any real plans for the day until dinner. Before we departed I did a little investigating on what was going to be the best way for us to get from MCO to French Quarter, RIP Magical Express, the Mears shuttle was only about $8 dollars less than a Lyft so it was an easy decision to take a Lyft. It was about $35 dollars and saved A LOT of time compared to Magical Express, in all honesty if Magical express was miraculously back on our next trip we may opt for the Lyft still.

We got to Port Orleans French Quarter real quick, our room was not ready so we dropped our stuff with a super amazing Cast Member at bell services and decided to take the boat over to Disney Springs.

Boat travel at Disney is underrated, there is something peaceful about it. We got to Disney Springs and out first stop was Gideon's to get our name on the virtual queue. It was about a 2.5 hour wait on the virtual line, I figured we'd be in Disney Springs that long anyway so no big deal. I do really wish Gideon's had a window for people who just wanted cold brew though! we hadn't had our coffee yet that day and some peanut butter cold brew would have hit the spot. We had agreed that we would try to have lunch at the Polite Pig, we had been there only once before back in 2017 when Cara was pregnant with Siobhan!

Cheddar Sausage and Brussel Sprouts

Ribs and Cauliflower
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Cara had the ribs, I had the cheddar sausage, Siobhan got a share plate and a bunch from both our plates but she mostly only ate the cauliflower. Cara also had a Grapefruit Margarita while I had an Old Fashioned and Siobhan had some Apple Juice. Everything was rather tasty, I enjoy this place, I am sure people from Texas or the Carolinas would disagree... It was quite busy but we were still able to get a table. Around this time we learned my Mom had just landed in Ocala, FL to judge a dog show, and she was going to make the drive out to join us at dinner! We decided to keep this a secret from Siobhan to see how she would react to Grandma being there. Sadly we don't have much family in NYC so Siobhan doesn't get to see her grandparents that often. With lunch done we decided we would head over to Jock Lindsey's Hangar Bar to kill the rest of our Gideon's wait...

 

[macefamily]

Here, here !!! You're my first, first !

 

[cgersic]

Me too!!!

 

[KellBelle]

Following along! I 1000% agree with you that Gideon's should have a coffee window. I can give or take the cookies, but that peanut butter cold brew is amazing!

 

[MickeyCB]

Following along!

 

[Bullseye1967]

 

[amjt660]

Great start to the report

Following along

(that's me at the back - the guy with no rhythm - that should dance like everyone IS watching)


Max

 

[PMC0849]

Day 1 Continued -

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We strolled over to Jock Lindsey's which had a little bit of a wait, agreeing to take first available, which I do regret as I do enjoy the loose Indiana Jones theming inside. It was Happy Hour so we wanted to take advantage. We ordered a Queso Dip, a strawberry lemonade for Siobhan, Cara had a glass of wine, and I had a Reggie's Revenge as it was the only cocktail on the happy hour menu.

Mmmm day drinking...

Doing a Billy Corgan at DL impression

It was a cool but nice day, probably in the mid 60s, which was very nice compared to the mid teens we left. There was also a Blizzard hitting NYC that night so we were pretty happy with our decision to get the heck out of dodge. The little deck at Jock Lindsey's was nice but there were a lot of these brown birds hanging about waiting for people to drop food. The staff kept shooing them away but they just came back, a table next to us was having issues with them congregating above their table and requested to move indoors, while they weren't too bad where we were sitting it was clear they were having a negative impact on a few people's experience. I was already to get another drink when we got the text that it was time for Gideon's! Overall I do enjoy the Hangar Bar, I much prefer Trader Sam's but the stress of getting to Sam's at the right time vs having to wait two hours or just being told they don't have tables for the night isn't always worth it, Jock Lindsey's Hangar Bar is always a fine plan B for me.

According to Siobhan this was me.

And this was her Uncle Trevor, I really see the resemblance here.
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At some point before Gideon's we did go to Uniqlo which I forgot about until uploading pictures. Anyway we checked in for Gideon's, if you don't know you have to sign up for the Gideon's virtual line which both times I have done it have been a little over 2 hours, you will then get a text when it is your time to get in the physical line which was about 20 minutes this time, good thing it wasn't too hot this day because there was absolutely no shade! If it's hot you might need a lot of water. This is where I have to apologize, I somehow stopped taking pictures the rest of this day and didn't get any of our cookies or dinner later, D'oh!! Anyway we got into Gideon's and I had a pretty good idea what we were going to get, Cara wanted to get cake, but after seeing how big the slices were agreed we should just get some cookies. We ended up getting one of the seasonal cookies which was a banana bread cookie, a peanut butter cookie, and 2 chocolate chip cookies, one of which we were giving to grandma when she arrived, we also both got a peanut butter cold brew. Again, Gideon's please open just a cold brew walk up window! it would be my first stop every time we went to Disney Springs. We did a little more shopping, mostly of the window variety, while we waited for my mom to meet us. Around this time we also got the notification that our room was ready! We met up with my mom which was a pleasant surprise for Siobhan, and decided to stroll back to the boats to head back to our room, stopping in a couple shops on the way.

I want to go on record, the wood laminate floors that are going into the rooms these days, I think they are a lot better than the carpet. So count me as a fan Disney. Room was nice, felt substantially bigger than what we had at Pop! when we pulled the second bed down at Pop there was no room left! we had more than enough space in this room. I do prefer that Pop! had a sliding door separating the bathroom from the bedroom and the shower at Pop! had a sliding glass door instead of a shower curtain. Overall I was very happy with our room at FQ. We had to wait a bit for our bags, but once they got there we wanted to head out to Riverside for a drink before dinner at Boatwright's. We decided to walk instead of waiting for the boat and it was a really lovely walk, highly recommend! We sat down for and ordered drinks at River Roost and ordered some drinks, Cara and my mom had wine, I had a Jai Alai IPA, and Siobhan had one of those 50th anniversary lemonades where you drop a little character thing in it and it changes colors. We went ahead and checked in for our reservation at Boatwright's and finished our drinks. We didn't have to wait long for our table, which was good because I think all of us were feeling the effects of early morning travel.

In my heart I thought we would go back to River Roost for Yeehaw Bob after dinner, but the rest of my body was telling me you're going to sleep friend. We skipped appetizers at Boatwright's and just got entrees, again I am sorry I didn't take pictures, I think I was just too tired to focus on picture taking. I had the prime rib, Cara and my mom both got the jambalaya, and Siobhan had the kids Mac and Cheese. Everything was good, I have seen a lot of hate for Boatwright's but the meals I have had there have always been fine, I generally am not going out of my way to eat there, but anytime we are at the PO resorts we might go one night. We skipped desert and sadly did not have the energy for Bob. A Boat was coming in as we got to the dock and we climbed aboard. We said bye to my mom as she needed to head back to DS to get her car.

We got into the room and watched a little TV, and checked out the weather. Typhoon Lagoon was looking less and less likely, we were going to go on Sunday, but they had already closed it for Sunday, so we made a quick change of our Monday plans, swapping Monday at Magic Kingdom to Sunday. There wasn't much hope for Typhoon Lagoon on Monday either but we weren't giving up! We went to bed with a day at Epcot, my absolutely favorite park by a mile, to look forward to!

 

[Duckberg]

Really NICE HD pics

 

[Darstarr]

I was in NY for the blizzard.
Your plan sounds much better….

Following along!

 

[PMC0849]

I was in NY for the blizzard.
Your plan sounds much better….

Following along!

Yeah it looked like a rough one! We were content with it decision to be in Florida.

 

[cgersic]

Enjoying so far!! I sure miss French Quarter so I'm happily enjoying being "back" with you and your family!

 

[ShookieJones]

View attachment 618090

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Nice pics!! For some reason I just LOVE these gators. Probably all the good memories of staying at this resort over the years, but they just do it for me!

Following along!
PS - My stomach growled at the BBQ pics and my mouth watered at thought of a Peanut Butter Cold Brew..YUM!

 

[erstwo]

Loving this TR! Siobhan is precious - love her pink flower ears - brings back memories of when my daughter was little! Cracking up that so far there has been a Weezer tshirt and a Billy Corgan reference - and you and your wife look FAR too young for all that 90's nostalgia. Love it though!

 

[PMC0849]

Loving this TR! Siobhan is precious - love her pink flower ears - brings back memories of when my daughter was little! Cracking up that so far there has been a Weezer tshirt and a Billy Corgan reference - and you and your wife look FAR too young for all that 90's nostalgia. Love it though!

Lol! Thank you, we were both born in 1983 so we had a good amount of 90s exposure!

 

[PMC0849]

Day 2 - Epcot is the Best Park, Change My Mind
First off, remember to make sure to turn your room climate control to heat if it's ever cold when you visit, our room got down to about 62 degrees overnight because I didn't double check, oh well, much rather sleep in a too cold room than a too hot room.

I think we were all hoping to sleep in a little bit, but for us sleeping in is 7:30am and that's about when we all woke up. We did take our sweet time getting ready, we shared a Gideon's cookie for breakfast and hopped on the bus to Epcot! We actually got to Epcot early enough for the early access, something we never are able to achieve! It was quite cold and we hadn't had coffee yet so our first stop for the day was to head to the Joffery's over by Test Track. I should mention while in bed before leaving I did succumb to the Genie and bought a spot in line for Ratatouille, I figured this was the only way we would get to ride it as I know we are bad at waiting in lines over an hour (45 minutes sometimes) Disney 1 Patrick 0.

This ride shouldn't be in Epcot, that being said I cannot wait to ride it!

It was a cold but beautiful day!
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Siobhan was adamant that our first stop of the day was Frozen ever after so we made our way to the Norway pavilion, (RIP Maelstrom, you were to beautiful for this world).

We all could have used that sauna this day!
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The wait was not long, about 20 minutes, Siobhan really likes this ride, but she was afraid of the Snow monster at the end and kept hiding or covering her eyes in anticipation of this scene. I just can't stress enough that I miss Maelstrom. Immediately as we exited the ride into the gift shop Siobhan saw some baby Anna and Elsa dolls that she wanted, we managed to avoid a tantrum over us not buying the first thing she saw that day, Disney 1 Patrick 1. The wait time had jumped to 50 minutes as we left and I got worried we might not get on too many rides that day, no big deal we were really there to check out festival of the arts and eat food. We didn't really have a game plan and just started wandering towards Mexico, there was still some time before the food booths opened, and we didn't feel like doing Grand Fiesta Tour, but we did run into someone...

We decided to make the next stop was to check out the Pop Eats booth, just in case they had figment popcorn buckets, spoiler alert they did not. We still wanted to go to this booth first as we wanted the grilled cheese and tomato soup, and let me tell you it was a good day for grilled cheese and tomato soup. Along the way Siobhan noticed Minnie Mouse, Siobhan is obsessed with Minnie Mouse, she jumped out of her moving stroller, grabbed me by the finger and dragged me over to where Minnie was, I overheard at least a few people comment on how cute it was.

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It was funny watching Siobhan get really shy whenever we met a character, she would whisper what she wanted to say to the character to me or her mom. It was very cute seeing her be super excited then retreat into her shell. We made it to Pop! Eats about 10 minutes before they opened, there was a big sign saying they did not have the popcorn buckets, a cast member came through the line and informed everyone they didn't have them, yet when they opened the first group in line was only looking for Figment Popcorn buckets. I'm not sure if they weren't paying attention, thought the CM and sign were lying, or what. We got the Grilled Cheese and Tomato soup, we should have gotten the brie one, but I wanted the classic, we got the almond frangipane cake, Cara got the Bloody Mary and I had the Brooklyn Pulp IPA, I know I came all the way to Florida for a beer I can get everywhere back home, it was still good.

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The grilled cheese and tomato soup really hit the spot, the sandwich was very buttery which I loved, just a classic can't go wrong pairing! Cara and Siobhan liked the cake more than I did, I thought it was a tad dry, it was pretty but I would skip that one next time. Moving along to the next booth we came to Deconstructed Dish, we got the BLT and the French Onion Soup, I also got the Short's Brown Ale. I was very surprised to see Short's outside of Michigan, I thought they were pretty much a Michigan exclusive. I grew up in Michigan and lover Short's and apparently I resemble the owner because on more than one occasion when visiting family back in MI people have asked if I was Joe Short.

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The winner here was the BLT! That was super tasty the egg was cooked perfectly too! The Soup was mostly just awkward to eat, it was fine, but we both agreed the BLT was the way to go!

 

[Sbk1234]

Nice trip report. I agree, Epcot is the best!

 

[PMC0849]

Day 2 Continued
We continued our journey around the world showcase after our deconstructed dishes, stopping at Gourmet Landscapes. We ordered the bone marrow and the risotto, Cara also got a glass of the Austrian wine.

I love bone marrow, and you just don't see it on enough menus. I know the Yachtsman Steakhouse used to have it on their menu a few years ago, I hope they still do. The risotto Siobhan ate all of so I didn't even get a taste, it must have been good because she doesn't usually devour things like that, unless they are cake or cookies. We continued on through the United Kingdom, there wasn't much happening there so we proceeded to France. I don't know what it is about the festivals booths in France but they are always the busiest and least staffed. We opted not to wait but wanted to take a quick peak at the Ratatouille expansion to the pavilion.

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It wasn't our time yet, the stand by line was a steady 80-90 minutes all day. It was a cute area and I was looking forward to coming back that evening. Has anyone tried out the Crepes here? How are they? We walked around the France pavilion and went and did the Beauty and the Beast sing-along. Now, I want to have an in-depth conversation about all the plot holes this created, number 1... just kidding. This was silly, and I think Cara and I were the only ones singing along. I think impressions of France was a better fit, I hope maybe they update and bring back something like that, and the sing-along is just a place holder. We continued on making our next stop at the Encanto Cocina!

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We ordered the Chorizo and Potato Empanada, and I have to say with no hyperbole this was the best thing we ate all weekend, and may very well be the best festival food I have ever had at Epcot! If you are there for festival of the arts prioritize getting this!!! We kept talking about it all day.

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We ran into Belle after enjoying our empanada and Siobhan wanted to say hello. Again she got very shy and we had to do most of the talking. We did speak to her a little about what she was currently reading before we moved along. We ran into Jasmine shortly after this but I failed to get any pictures. Siobhan doesn't really like Aladdin so isn't as familiar with Jasmine, she doesn't like any of the movies with a male lead. We headed over to the Japan pavilion for our obligatory stroll through the most fun gift shop in Disney, still no pearl hunting, hope this returns soon, it always adds a but of life and fun to this pavilion. We purchased a blanket from here as we were worried Siobhan was getting cold. A quick look at some Japanese snacks and we were on our way.

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We stopped next at The Artist's Table in the American pavilion. We ordered the beef wellington, the pistachio cake, and I had the beer flight. Again I thought the cake was a little dry, the flavors were fine but I am not clamoring to go get it again. The beef wellington suffered the most from looking worse than the pictures Disney provided but it tasted really good. I can also appreciate beef wellington is a complicated dish to make and puff pastry likes to break when you are cutting into it. I made beef wellington for Christmas dinner this year and was curious who did a better job. I think Disney did, Cara disagreed.

Behind the scenes of the first picture.
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Our next stop was Pastoral Palate where we got the wild boar cassoulet, I also had rose blonde ale, and Cara had the rose cider. I didn't care for the wild boar sausage on top of the cassoulet, it was just mediocre. The rest of the dish was tasty though. I apologize for the next chunk we seemed to stop taking pictures, I think all the eating and stuff caught up with us and we got a little tired. We stopped by the donut box and had the vanilla donut with all the strawberries, my immediate response was "this is rather pedestrian" I hope the other options were better, Siobhan liked it though. We walked through the recently remodeled Epcot gift shop, the name escapes me, we didn't find anything we truly loved so we moved across to the Lands Pavilion and took a ride on Living with the Land. Always a great ride, I love seeing the greenhouse, I also have some very early memories of eating at the Garden Grill and seeing some of the ride below. Soarin had a rather short line, only 30 minutes, we went to check if Siobhan was tall enough, sadly she was about a 1/4" too short. Oh well next time. At this point Siobhan requested we go on the Nemo ride, so we headed over to the Sea's with Nemo and Friends. While she was really excited again she was scared of the ride, and wanted to close her eyes until after the shark scene, once that was over she opened her eyes and had a lot of fun. I can't say I blame her, I was afraid of the sharks on 20,000 leagues under the sea when I was around her age. We explored the aquarium for a bit, taking in the manatees, dolphins and more!

​

 

[PMC0849]

Day 2 Continued
Okay, let's wrap up day 2! We left the aquarium area and went back to the Deconstructed Dish. We were the only people in line last time not getting the key lime pie so we decided we wanted to be just like everyone else!

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The key lime pie was my favorite desert dish we had all day, so if you are trying to limit the sweets skip the others and get this one! We had a couple more things we had bookmarked to go back to so we made our way around the World Showcase again, trying to kill time before our Ratatouille reservation. First up a stop at Craftman Courtyard.

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We got ourselves the Pate de Campagne: Country Pork Pate with Pistachios, Truffles, Toasted Ciabatta, Red Onion Marmalade, Pickled Mustard Seed, and Caperberries. I will say I didn't have high hopes for this, Disney tends to steer clear of offal (bring back the authentic haggis for Food and Wine please!), but I was pleasantly surprised, this was a very tasty pate. Following the pate we made our way over to the China pavilion and The Painted Panda.

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We had a small disagreement on what to get, I wanted the Shumai and Cara wanted the Pork Bun, had it been earlier in the day we would have certainly gotten both, but we went with the bun. It was fine, nothing too special.

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On our way around we came across Snow White, who really really tried to get Siobhan to open up but she was still too shy to talk with him. One day we'll get her talking with these characters, and hopefully next time we'll be able to get closer. It was getting close to the time for one of the Disney Broadway shows, we have been wondering if Siobhan was old enough to sit through a show since we live in New York and would love to take her to the Lion King or Aladdin, but we just don't know if she would sit through it, so we had a little test run. Today's performance was largely from Newsie's a show Cara and I saw on Broadway several years ago and really enjoyed. I somehow had not seen the movie... still, for Cara and several of my friends it was a cult classic from our youth. I was more of an "Iron Will" kid for my live action Disney fix.

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This was a lot of fun! Probably because the songs from Newsies are great! They did do a song from Tarzan on Broadway, which was awful... sorry but maybe there was a good reason that show flopped. There was another song I didn't recognize that I didn't catch where it was from. Siobhan was very good during this sat and watched the entire thing! Maybe we can take to Lion King or Aladdin. On this note I want to express that I have often felt that Disney Springs should have a permanent theater (in addition to the Cirque De Solei one) where they can have Disney on Broadway shows rotate through. Perhaps the short lived NBA experience can be repurposed for this. Change out the show every year or something, seems like this is a no-brainer but maybe I'm missing something. There is a reason I am not a billionaire businessman.

After the show it was our time for Ratatouille!

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So Cara and I actually rode this ride, and in a way Siobhan did too. We went to Disneyland Paris in 2017 when Cara was a few weeks pregnant. One thing about DLP in March is it is very unpleasant weather wise, and no sane people go there so there were no lines. Had it just been Cara and myself we probably wouldn't have paid to ride and just skipped it, but I really wanted Siobhan to have a chance, plus I love Ratatouille. This is a cute fun ride, it fits having it in the France pavilion. Is it worth waiting 90+ minutes probably not, it is a lot more fun than Frozen Ever After, and since Epcot is kind of lite on rides I imagine it will be awhile before the wait times see any significant reduction. When we were here in September they were doing previews for AP holders, and there was a bunch of fun looking merch, I really wish we could have gotten some of that! Oh well, I am still working on convincing Cara we should do 1 year as AP holders and just go to WDW for all of our vacation time! I am also trying to convince her that we should do a full two week trip sometime. I think she was onboard with my idea of if we did go for two weeks spending Saturdays and Sunday at the resort pool instead of the parks. Are day at Epcot was winding down but we did still have dinner to enjoy, so we headed to our ADR at Biergarten. We had a little time to kill so wandered through the gift shops in the German pavilion. Thankfully there are not many toys here so not too much we have to keep Siobhan away from. I think she halfheartedly asked for a Christmas tree ornament.

Ignore the little hand!
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I always have fun at Biergarten, and I always have to get a liter of beer. I always fine the food can be inconsistent here, whether that's just buffet timing or kitchen inconsistencies I can't say. Today everything was good except one sausage I had that was really dry! Also the guy at the carving station must have been under orders to cut everyone the smallest piece of pork he could! Oh well I'll just go back for multiple tiny pieces. We had just finished eating and were finishing our beers when the band came on!

The best part of Biergarten!
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We stayed and watched the band give a great performance as always, finished our drinks and then headed out! As we were leaving the German pavilion the announcement for the fireworks came on. We had a brief conversation about whether we should stay for the fireworks or not. Siobhan wanted to stay, Cara wanted to head back to Port Orleans, and I was on the fence, normally I would always vote fireworks, but it was late, cold, and I did agree with Cara's point about beating the crowds. I thought maybe we could take a quick ride on Spaceship Earth on the way out but by the time we got there all the food was making me quite sleepy. So we just kept going to the bus. This is where the New Yorker in me came out a little bit, when the buses are filling up and are at standing room please please move all the way in to the back. We were the last 3 allowed on the bus but nobody would move all the way back even though there was plenty of room, and the bus driver was a little too timid to make the request, no problem I did. People got the point moved back which allowed us to get past the line, and allowed a few more people on. The moral of the story, please move all the way in when boarding any public transit! We made it back to French Quarter and all promptly passed out, ready for our upcoming day at Magic Kingdom!

Good night Epcot, hope to see you soon.​

 

[PMC0849]

Day 3 - Pink Cup or Bust!
We always knew we were going to go to Epcot on this trip but we did have a bit of back and forth about the second park. We ultimately landed on Magic Kingdom because we thought Siobhan would enjoy it the most (though Animal Kingdom was a strong contender). We once again made it during the early entrance hours but just barely. That morning we made the call to try out Genie+ I know I know, I feel dirty about it. We also purchased spots for 7DMT as we really wanted to take Siobhan on it, she Loved Barnstormer and Slinky DogDash on our last trip and this was the only other rollercoaster she was tall enough for. I have thoughts on this system I will get to at the end of this chapter. We made out way into Adventure Land and went on one of the two things I prioritizing, The Enchanted Tiki Room!

I should have waited for the birds...
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This show has grown on me overtime, it's corny but I love it. Siobhan proudly let me know she did not like it so we moved along. We found ourselves walking up a little side path next to Cinderella's Castle when we heard a loud scream. We were worried someone was hurt or there was an altercation or something, nope, it was just Cinderella's step sisters interacting with guests!

More villain meet and greets please!
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They were having fun as some guest head a bunch of apparel with one of them on it. We kept going and knew we were heading for the carousel which Siobhan loves! She named her horse Jellybean! We also ordered some breakfast and coffee from Friar Tuck's from line.

Notice Siobhan had a Tiki room dress!
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We never used to ride the carousel but these last to trips we have ridden it a whole lot! After our horse ride we picked up our food from Friar Tuck's we got some tater tots with gravy, a breakfast sandwich, and of course coffee. It was another cold day but the forecast had it warming up into the mid-50's and it was sunny all day! But that morning was very chilly. Our food got cold real quick! The sandwich was just okay, I would it more of those tater-tots though! From here we started heading out of fantasyland but as soon as we walked past Small World Siobhan spoke up that she wanted to ride it. I was surprised she remembered what the exterior of the ride looked like but we hopped in line. This is one of the ones she really likes, along with Frozen Ever After, The Voyage of the Little Mermaid, and the rollercoasters she is tall enough for. She later would tell me she only liked the girl rides and not the boy rides. We eventually made it over to the second and final attraction I was determined to do this time.

The Country Bear Jamboree is such an underappreciated gem! I live in fear of this being replaced with some mediocre IP attraction but I really hope it perseveres. From our jamboree we made it over to Pirates, as we approached Siobhan exclaimed "I hate this ride" but she went with us with little protest. We also happened to see Captain Jack was out! I was surprised to see him out not during a special ticketed event! A pleasant surprise, others must have been excited to as he had drawn a very large crowd.

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It was time for us to head over to the one thing Cara was determined to do this trip, get cheeseburger eggrolls! We had these a few years ago and they were pretty good, but she has been obsessed with getting them again. When we were here in September the booth was closed every time we went by, and she is still bitter about that.

The lines were no joke!
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They had separated the line into two, cash only, and card only in an effort to speeding it along. We waited a good 10 minutes before a guy came down the line asking people if they were there for Pastrami or Cheeseburger, we were the only ones in line who wanted 1 of each and we got to skip to the front! Apparently they had only 1 cheeseburger roll left, and had to wait for more to be brought out. I want to say this, and it may be controversial, the pastrami spring roll was superior to the cheeseburger! Both good, but I would get the pastrami one again in an instant over the cheeseburger. As we were heading back to the action we got to see a High School Marching band come through! That must have been exciting for those kids.

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This is where I must have gotten distracted and stopped taking pictures for a bit. I know we wanted to get something to eat, and while we were deciding it hit me like a ton of bricks. Everytime we come to this place I always tell myself I want a corndog, one of the hand dipped ones from Sleepy Hollow, but I always forget, don't get my corn dog and have to put it off until next time. Now I am no consieur of corn dogs. I have probably had less than 5 in my entire life, but I will say that this was a damn tasty corn dog, well done Disney. Now I hear the ones in Disneyland are better so I am eager to get back there and try one in the future.

In this stretch where I failed to take pictures we managed to knock out several rides, Tea Cups, Little Mermaid, Mickey's Philharmagic, Haunted Mansion, and Monsters Inc Laugh Floor. I really liked the addition of "Coco" to Philharmagic. When we were in line for the tea cups I overheard a couple other kids who wanted pink cups, just like Siobhan, I had to make sure I knew where every pink cup stopped or it could have been a disaster. Did I succeed? Stay tuned for the continuation of Day 3.