Trip Report This all seems very familiar. The loco spring 22’ TR! - COMPLETE

Well the laundry is done the yard tended to and my visit with my sweet mother is complete. Time to start our TR.

When.
May 1-7

Who.
The loco and the wife, A. A handful of other wonderful people will be making appearances also!

Where
OKW. Just look at those well-themed trash cans. So immersive, so magical.

I didn’t take very many notes, and I have a pretty horrible memory(must’ve bumped my head on too many things), but I will try to recall as much as I can!

 

[fractal]

Day four continued.

A night ride on big thunder sounded like fun. Fireworks were two minutes away and we decided to watch from the Frontierland bridge since there was nobody around.
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It was better from here because it was uncrwoded, but I’m still not a fan of Enchantment. It has some nice pyro in it, but it’s just sort of boring. There’s no real soul to it.
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We walked on Big Thunder as soon as boring enchantment ended. It was wildly entertaining.
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No wet clothes for me this night.
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The fireworks were at 9 that night, but park closing wasn’t until 11. The crowds had found us as we left BTMRR. It was time to try to zig when everyone was zagging. We made our way towards Tomorrowland via Adventureland.
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The PPP here was cracking us up. Every time he snapped a picture he would say “yesssss” like Napoleon Dynamite’s brother Kip!
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This may be the best magic shot of all time.
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The hub had emptied out a bit, but was still pretty crowded.
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Much better job by that PPP! I'm so bummed about Enchanted. Really wish they kept HEA. BTMRR is great at night.

 

[Loco_driver]

Day four continued.

Our trip across the park paid off. Tomorrowland was quiet.

A got payback for her earlier defeat.

Our last ride during regular operating hours.

It was now after 11. Those of us who had planned right and had the energy were about to be treated to two hours of pure Magic Kingdom bliss.

Sorry I didn’t take a ton of pictures. We were far too busy having fun. I did write down what we got done though. In two hours we did HM-BTMRR-pirates-Aladdin-Pan-Pooh-Teacups-buzz. Not bad at all. We had time to squeeze in space mountain as well, but neither one of us were feeling up to it.

 

[Loco_driver]

Day four(or is it day 5) continued.

We had a blast during the extended evening hours. It was the kind of evening that keeps us coming back to this place.

The castle looks great all lit up for the 50th.

We did it! The only time I can remember being in the park later was around 2006 when the park was open until midnight with EMH until 3 am one summer night.

The beacons went off at 1:01.

It was nice to see “old castle” as well!

This was our longest day of the trip by a long shot. Luckily there was a bus waiting on us at the bus stop. We made it to bed around 2:30 AM. Needless to say we had no plans on being at a park opening the next day!

 

[cgersic]

This is a crazy beautiful photo!!

I was just about to post the same thing!

 

[cgersic]

Nailed it!!!
And the Napoleon Dynamite reference made me laugh out loud. That was one of my mom's favorite movies!

 

[lindawdw]

Sounds like the perfect day to me!!! We were at MK for extended magic hours also and stayed until closing too! We were like kids in a candy shop!!!

 

[Loco_driver]

Much better job by that PPP! I'm so bummed about Enchanted. Really wish they kept HEA. BTMRR is great at night.

I honestly wouldn’t mind a new show if it was actually done right. It took them just as much effort to make a bad show as it would to make a good one. Thankfully it feels much less permanent than harmonious(and is a better show), so we’ll see if it sticks around very long.

 

[Loco_driver]

Day 5. Cinco de Mayo.

I woke up to the sound of a lawn mower. I checked my phone and it said 10:30 AM. I don’t know if I’ve ever slept this late on a Disney vacation. The long night had taken it out of me! A was also awakened by the mower. We got up and got moving.

We started the day where we finished the previous one. Technically our second time in the park that morning!

We really had no plans in the park, we just tapped in so we could chose our park after lunch.

We browsed the emporium to kill some time. Anyone remember last year when we searched every gift shop for @Darstarr looking for this flatware set? Yeah they were in nearly every shop we went in this trip!

If you haven’t figured out by now, I’m a huge peanut butter fan. After seeing this in the last @Tuvalu TR, I knew I would be getting one. I mobile ordered it and carried it with me to WL(our destination for lunch). It was every bit as soft and peanut buttery and delicious as I anticipated!

We had some time before lunch. We relaxed in the magnificent lobby. It was peaceful, at the moment anyways.

I used mobile check in and received our table ready text within seconds. Our server Hmoung came by and threw some napkins and straws at us before taking our order.

We were just here for nachos! These were exceptionally good and way more full than they usually are!

I asked Hmoung for a coke to go with my nachos. He told me he was too busy to give me any refills.

We always enjoy our meals at whispering canyon, and this one seemed even better than usual with both service and food.

After lunch I saw something I’d never seen before. See that group to the left in the photo? That’s a giant cheer group who took over the entire lobby to practice their cheer routine. At the Wilderness Lodge. Really?!

A decided she wanted to do another drawing class at AK after lunch, so that’s where we went. There was a PPP at the entrance who was earning his ears. We were his very first subjects! Better than Callan!

Oh my we are so shocked at that man pushing A stroller! Maybe new PPP needs a little more practice!

 

[Loco_driver]

Day five continued.

This was passing underneath as we entered the park. Nobody else seemed to notice.

Donald was uh…. Showing off his tail feathers.

The park was relatively uncrowded.

This person was performing on that one random stage that takes up the entire walkway in Harambe. We stopped and watched for a moment, but it was too hot for us to stay for long.

We boarded the train for our animation class. Todays drawing was Heimlich. It was a much more difficult subject than our past classes. A still did an admirable job.

I gave up half way through and just enjoyed the A/C.

They wouldn’t let me feed my drawing to the goats.

Tiana the llama is in the background “handling some business”.

 

[erstwo]

I only zoomed in on my phone - so I can’t tell if there were any adults there….
But as a cheer mom, I can tell you - those girls (and guys) think anyone and everyone might want to see their routine. . It’s a lot of youthful enthusiasm- so much that they kind of miss the social cues if there isn’t someone overseeing them (at all times)
Definitely not something the coaches encourage!
They’re usually just overly excited.

 

[Loco_driver]

I only zoomed in on my phone - so I can’t tell if there were any adults there….
But as a cheer mom, I can tell you - those girls (and guys) think anyone and everyone might want to see their routine. . It’s a lot of youthful enthusiasm- so much that they kind of miss the social cues if there isn’t someone overseeing them (at all times)
Definitely not something the coaches encourage!
They’re usually just overly excited.

They had adults with them. Not sure if they were encouraging them or not. It didn’t last long so maybe someone did figure out it was the wrong place for that.

 

[macefamily]

I'm surprised a CM didn't intervene from the front desk. There's not alot of open space there for the girls to 'do their thing.' BIG insurance liability for the Mouse if something bad happened.

 

[Loco_driver]

I'm surprised a CM didn't intervene from the front desk. There's not alot of open space there for the girls to 'do their thing.' BIG insurance liability for the Mouse if something bad happened.

That may be what happened I don’t know. They were cheering really loud for a few minutes then they stopped. Although once they split up there were plenty of TikTok videos being made. I had to ruin someone’s video just to get to the restroom! It all just seemed really out of place at WL.

 

[Darstarr]

Anyone remember last year when we searched every gift shop for @Darstarr looking for this flatware set? Yeah they were in nearly every shop we went in this trip!

And they still sit unopened in a closet. I thank you very much for thinking of me

 

[Swissmiss]

And they still sit unopened in a closet. I thank you very much for thinking of me

If I recall, this is because you want to wait until your boys have left so that they aren’t inadvertently thrown out, right?

 

[Darstarr]

If I recall, this is because you want to wait until your boys have left so that they aren’t inadvertently thrown out, right?

Great memory Swissmiss! Yep, they are for my retirement and the kids can use them on Mother’s day and Christmas when they come to visit

 

[lindawdw]

What fun dining experience at WCC and your nachos looked sooo good! That glass of coke is HUGE!!! The WL lobby is definitely not a place that the cheering squads should be practicing in for sure.

 

[Loco_driver]

Day five continued.

We boarded the train back to Harambe. Safaris had an accurate 5 minutes posted wait. We didn’t figure there’d be much to see, but why not?

It was a scorcher this day.

Most animals were laying in the shade.

One more thing at AK we had yet to do since it returned.

The modified show was very “meh”. I didn’t hate it, but it definitely needs the tumble monkeys and the bird dancers back. At least the fire twirler guy was still awesome. I’m glad the real show is returning soon.

We felt satisfied with our impromptu visit to DAK. We had dinner plans at Epcot. The bus stop for yacht/beach was full, so we grabbed a riviera bus instead. Shirley status on the charter bus! These were way more comfortable than the Disney buses!

Funny story time. We shared a skyliner cabin to epcot with a family with two young boys. The youngest was probably four or five. We were making a little small talk and asking the boys about their trip and what they enjoyed the most. The mom was telling us that this was their second trip, but the youngest was still a baby the first time they visited WDW. Then totally unprovoked the youngest boy blurts our “I rode the haunted while drinking my moms booobeeee milk!” We all couldn’t help but burst out laughing!

Anyways we bid our friends goodbye and headed for the Italy pavilion. I’m sure there’s a reason I took this picture.

Dinner was at Via Napoli. We had the quattro formaggi pizza. We have had this before and enjoyed it. This one was as good as expected. Our server, while not an Italian in any way, was still the best server we’ve probably ever had here.

We were seated in the main dining room, but had no issues with noise that others have had in the past.

Overall not a bad meal. We made our way to the front of the park so we could get home with our leftovers.

 

[Loco_driver]

Day five continued.

We stopped for a quick bathroom break in Germany.

Since we had leftover food with us we took turns so the food didn’t go in a gross bathroom. As I came out of the mens room A told me to keep an eye on the companion bathroom to see if anyone came out. Apparently a couple was acting quite frisky and went into the room together. They did not exit in the time that I pretended to take pictures of the miniature railroad. “Romantic road” indeed.

The cool kids were partying at Gaurdians. We would miss AP/DVC previews by one day.

Some fisheye pics on the way out.

I just can’t not stare at SSE in all her illuminated glory!

We enjoyed one of the “awakenings” before heading to the bus stop. It was a nice slow paced day, even if we did manage to make it to three different parks!

 

[lindawdw]

Another great day at AK and Epcot! We actually ate at Via Napoli this past trip for the first time in about 6 years and enjoyed the food but that main dining room was way too loud for us. Things go on in WDW that never would have happened some 20 years ago.