When You Wish Upon A Star...POOF your teens vanish!

joanna71985 · Feb 1, 2013

sweetpee_1993 said:
"Twice Charmed" is good! Have you seen "Dreams" yet??? That one was a first for us on this cruise and it blew us away! But I'll get to that! LOL!

Nooo, but I want to!! They both sound really good

Disneyfalcon · Feb 1, 2013

My word, I hit the toe jackpot! You rock, Kelly!!

Your underwater pictures are awesome. What camera are you using again?

sweetpee_1993 · Feb 1, 2013

Disneyfalcon said:
My word, I hit the toe jackpot! You rock, Kelly!!

Your underwater pictures are awesome. What camera are you using again?

Thanks, Tammy! I was thinkin' of you at Castaway so you definitely were there in spirit! We've got a Pentax Optio WG-1 like this:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B004MKNJEI/ref=mp_s_a_1?qid=1359766080&sr=8-2&pi=SL75

It doesn't take very good "land" shots but it's pretty bang-up underwater. Very simple to operate. Does high def video, too. And, it's shock-proof and cold-proof to like 10F or something like that. Pretty rugged little thing. I got it on clearance at Target. I also got a Pentax floating wrist strap for it that's bright yellow like this one:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B001Q5Q62Y/ref=redir_mdp_mobile

Yep, it floats the camera beautifully! I love the Pentax! Of course I also edit the colors when I get home to kill the shades of blue and give the pics underwater more dimension. That always helps! LOL!

5thGenTexan · Feb 1, 2013

Awesome report, I can't wait till April 26th.

Disneyfalcon · Feb 1, 2013

sweetpee_1993 said:
Thanks, Tammy! I was thinkin' of you at Castaway so you definitely were there in spirit! We've got a Pentax Optio WG-1 like this:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B004MKNJEI/ref=mp_s_a_1?qid=1359766080&sr=8-2&pi=SL75

It doesn't take very good "land" shots but it's pretty bang-up underwater. Very simple to operate. Does high def video, too. And, it's shock-proof and cold-proof to like 10F or something like that. Pretty rugged little thing. I got it on clearance at Target. I also got a Pentax floating wrist strap for it that's bright yellow like this one:

http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/B001Q5Q62Y/ref=redir_mdp_mobile

Yep, it floats the camera beautifully! I love the Pentax! Of course I also edit the colors when I get home to kill the shades of blue and give the pics underwater more dimension. That always helps! LOL!

It's really good! Even with processing mine aren't that crisp when underwater!

Disney_Belle · Feb 1, 2013

This report is killing me! What I wouldn't give to be spending some time at CC with some sunshine right now!

Uncle Lupe · Feb 2, 2013

They should rename that place Margaritaville. So much paradise and liquor but so little time. How cold was the water??

Billy6 · Feb 2, 2013

sweetpee_1993 said:
Sunday, January 20 - At-Sea Day Love All Around!

Classic sweetpee TR! Love it! Next time around to CC, Cabanas are on the radar for us... Our cruise we had activities planned so the extra money went there. But relaxing and enjoying more of the island is the plan.

This guy in the pic above, Kevin Johnson, was on our cruise. We saw him that last night at sea...

Keep it rolling, Kellz!

sweetpee_1993 · Feb 2, 2013

5thGenTexan said:
Awesome report, I can't wait till April 26th.

I know a few people who are gonna be on your cruise! Not US, but the girl who does my hair is taking her little boy (he's 3) and her hubby (who's a total skeptic on the idea of cruising with Mickey). I was telling her about our cruise before we left and she said her hubby wasn't so sure he'd be okay with "Mickey tucking him in at night". LOL! That was freakin' hilarious! Y'all are gonna have oh-so much fun!

Disneyfalcon said:
It's really good! Even with processing mine aren't that crisp when underwater!

Well thank you! I'm not skilled with the sophisticated DSLRs so a decent P&S is a necessity. The Pentax was a total fluke of a find. I was shopping Super Target (again) and happened upon it. I totally recommend it, tho. I'd say easily half or more of my "land" pics are iPhone 5 shots. Simplicity is best for me.

Disney_Belle said:
This report is killing me! What I wouldn't give to be spending some time at CC with some sunshine right now!

Our weather has been somewhat similar to CC's since we've been home. Maybe not quite as warm. Sunny sunny with highs around 70 everyday. It's been nice after the weeks of rain before the cruise. I'd love to be back on those gorgeous beaches, tho. The Galveston beaches are NOT that pristine or beautiful. Definitely another excuse to head east and visit the family in Pensacola!

Uncle Lupe said:
They should rename that place Margaritaville. So much paradise and liquor but so little time. How cold was the water??

I think they should rename the place "Kelly & Tracey's"! Has a nice ring to it! Bwaaaahahahahaaaa!!!!

Tracey watched the water temps in different locations around Castaway prior to our trip. He says the water temp when we were there was about 72F. I was anticipating as low as 70F or as high as 75F. People describe the water there in January as uncomfortably cold at first but "you get used to it". Like I said, we're thin-skinned Southerners. We don't do cold. The springsuit wetsuits weren't overly expensive (roughly $85 each) and are resellable. They're rated for comfort to as low as 68F. I can honestly say, the only OMG-that's-COLD moment I had was when I first walked into the water. The water was COLD on my feet for a moment or two. I've made the mistake of diving off into super-cold water before (small creek in Alabama in early March). It was such a shock it took my breath away and I froze. Like I wasn't swimming. My friends screaming at me to swim so I wouldn't be taken down-creek snapped me out of it. The CC water was nothing like that. Not even close. With the springsuit I was very comfortable and could've easily stayed in the water all day long. It was heavenly.

Billy6 said:
Classic sweetpee TR! Love it! Next time around to CC, Cabanas are on the radar for us... Our cruise we had activities planned so the extra money went there. But relaxing and enjoying more of the island is the plan.

This guy in the pic above, Kevin Johnson, was on our cruise. We saw him that last night at sea...

Keep it rolling, Kellz!

Billy, those cabanas can turn the most anti-Disney cruise hearts in a snap. They are amazing.

Sadly, we didn't see Kevin! We were old farts and snuggled up with a movie when he was onboard. Halfway thru the cruise Kevin swapped out for another act which we did end up seeing.

Tracey's working 6 days a week indefinitely. I'll be burnin' thru this TR pretty quick so I can get back to all the stuff I'm totally neglecting. That's my secret to posting reports so fast: I tune-out from normal life completely and immerse in the report. When I told Tracey I started my report this is what he said:

"Great! Send me the link. See ya in a week or so when it's done."

WishIWasAtWDW · Feb 2, 2013

Yay a Kelly cruise trip report!

This is getting me so excited for my cruise on the Fantasy. Only 98 days! Woo hoo! I love reading your cruise trip reports because you all do so many of the activities on the ships and its given me an idea of what we want to try on our cruise! Wes is excited to try the mixology class that you all did last time and that animation class looks so much fun! You did a really good job on your drawings. And I love your chubby Goofy! He's got even more character.

I love how you all got dressed up for formal night and then decided to bail. Hahaha Wearing uncomfortable shoes is the WORST! I can't believe you hung in there as long as you did. You got some cute pictures though! The boys look so handsome. I love their serious tux faces and poses.

That cabana view...WOW! I keep telling Wes that if we ever go on a cruise with more people, we have to get a cabana! I can't wait to read more!!

sweetpee_1993 · Feb 2, 2013

Tuesday, January 22 - We went to WDW and found the MAGIC!

I woke up at 3:30 a.m. afraid I'd oversleep. I was able to get back to sleep for a short time but Tracey was already up and outside on the verandah watching us pull into port at Port Canaveral. So surreal considering this is where our 3 previous cruises have left from & returned to. This is normally our beginning & end spot, not our halfway through the cruise spot!

I ended up dragging myself from bed around 4:30. We had ordered breakfast delivery in-room for 5:30. That worked out well. We were all dressed, fed, and walking out the door at 6:10. Our bus reservation time was set for 6:30 going to Epcot. We got down to deck 1, aft before 6:15 then stood in a very crowded small area waiting for the gangway to open along with every other person on the ship who had the 6:30 bus reserved. What's the hold-up?! Gah! People nearby were joking that this was a sign of things to come for the rest of the day.

Little did we know how right they would be.

The hold-up was a delay in the ship being cleared by customs. Several times an officer of some sort stepped thru the door into this tiny area and updated us. It was just after 6:30 when the gangways finally opened. It was sooooo odd to walk off the ship in Port Canaveral from a lower deck gangway out onto the pier. Usually we walk off of the pretty glass walkway from the deck 3 lobby/atrium. They had a ton of CMs and port authority folks on the pier guiding us into the terminal building. Where we walked into is the area where you normally have to come find your checked luggage post cruise. The warehouse-type place looked very different when it's completely empty. No luggage. No crazy hoards of people. Empty. Empty tables. And I'm looking around at the gorgeous artwork that's on so many of the walls and still wondering why they put this awesome stuff in a place where you can't take any pics of it. **sigh** Someday I'll figure out how to get me some pics of these pieces. They're giant painting-type renderings, like 1940s travel posters of scenes from Castaway Cay with the characters. They're amazing!

Wait a minute! Did I say we were going on a bus to Epcot?! Yep! Sure did! The 8-night Bahamian cruises out of Galveston include a port call at Port Canaveral. This includes bus transport to/from the WDW parks along with a 1-day parkhopper ticket. Although we've felt we were done with the 4 parks at WDW since our last trip in September 2011, we saw this as an opportunity to see the stuff that would be new to us since then. It's a way to see it without spending the time or money on a dedicated trip to WDW. One-n-done. Win/win. It was perfect! Just in case you're curious about the logistics, here's the info sheet that was given to everyone onboard the ship about our WDW day:

As soon as I got on the bus I shot an email to Tammy (Disneyfalcon) inquiring about booking a room at Pop for today so we would have somewhere to catch a nap. I knew with us getting up so early and wanting to stay for fireworks and park closing tonight we would absolutely need a solid nap.

We drove past "the arch" onto Disney property around 7:45. We were off the buses headed towards the gates of Epcot right at 8:00 just in time for early Extra Magic Hours! Yep, we got to partake of those, too! We ARE technically Disney guests, right?! I thought this was a cool shot to get:

Wanted to note that the lines at the turnstiles and RFID posts were kinda long-ish. We lined up at an RFID post and watched other people we knew were from the ship who were further ahead of us in the lines. We were trying to see if their room key ticket media was going to work. No, our room key tickets didn't work on the RFID readers but they were somewhat prepared for us. There were 2 or 3 CMs standing near those entry points with what appeared to be iPhones that had scanners. When a DCL ticket was presented those guests were directed to step over to the iPhone-toting CM for scanning in. Interesting. And for whatever reason, the RFID thing wasn't speeding up the entry process with other guests anymore than the old turnstiles. I found that interesting.

I also want to mention at this point Tracey was like, "What the hell is that?!" at the RFID entry posts. All the months I'd been telling him about NextGen and all the things that were coming and he was asking me now. Does this man listen to me at all?! As slow as the RFID lines were moving, it wasn't a good peek at things to come. **sigh**

I had informed the boys before we arrived on the bus that as soon as we walked in the gates we had to pause for a pic with their Leave-a-Legacy tile before we dashed off to any attractions. They both groaned and fussed only briefly. They know this is a battle they can't win. LOL! Don't they look thrilled?! Especially Brian with the red around his eyes from the sun yesterday:

Instagram'd pic:

And we were off! Thinking of @plaz10, I snapped a few pics of SSE:

sweetpee_1993 · Feb 2, 2013

Since today is a day for things that would be new to us, the only thing on our agenda for Epcot this morning was Test Track 2.0. We had watched YouTube videos of it when it was in soft opening but still tried to reserve judgement for when we could see it in person. Well, today is the day.

Moving inside the new queue area:

Does anyone else look at this thing and think "Death Trap"?

So right about now Tracey turns to me and says, "I thought the videos we watched really stunk but this makes what we saw of the ride make more sense. I think I'm feeling good about this." Design time!

Chandler, who's 2nd favorite game genre to dedicate his time to aside from Call of Duty is things like Need For Speed and Grand Tourismo, was destined to be the design master of mega-performance super-cars:

sweetpee_1993 · Feb 2, 2013

Letting the artist do his thing:

Tracey & Brian worked together on their design:

Chandler is such a motor-head. He loooves cars. He knows a ton about cars. He frightens me sometimes in his knowledge about cars. These engine displays? He loved these. Geeked-out. Critiqued. It was kinda cool to watch him!

Ready to ride???

Let's go!

I put the iPhone down and paid attention to the ride.

sweetpee_1993 · Feb 2, 2013

Aaaaand we're back.

So during the ride we never saw our car designs on the little performance report screens. That was a definite disconnect from the pre-show activities. We were like, "Um, why did we just design a car???" The ride itself felt very Tron-ish which is cool. Nice lighting effects. Definitely carries the glowing blue theme all the way thru from the queue...well, except for the outside area. From the former environmental testing chambers on we all felt the sets were lacking at best. Hollow is a good word. It's like they put up walls in front of the old sets, added some lighting effects, and called it done. Where's the cool stuff to look at? Where's the "Dang! I gotta ride again so I can see more!" None of us felt that. And the ride itself didn't feel connected with the pre-show. The outside high-speed loop felt like an afterthought. The extent of retheme to this was some purple arrows painted on the track. Really? That's IT?! Weird. I did have a little geek moment when doing the roundabout where the new GM cars used to be displayed outside. I spotted one of the Test Track vehicles off to the side. When we stepped out of the car Tracey was the first to put it to words. This is what he had to say:

"That sucked. There's 10 minutes of my life I won't get back. That's crap. I'm done."

Well, alrighty. So we walked through the post-show area past all the interactive displays. I can see where the focus was placed on this entire overlay and I get what the concept was shooting for. However, I think the new version with the whole "design your own car" depends way too heavy on these post-show interactive kiosk offerings. We never saw our designs while on the ride. The design aspect for us relied on these post-show activities. The only problem is we don't usually take the time to do these things. The activities that are post-show for SSE we've done only 1 or 2 over the course of maaaaany years because when we passed by there was a kiosk open. My boys are pretty serious gamers in their day-to-day lives. These little post-show activities are like kiddy toys to them. They aren't interested. I'm not interested. Tracey's usually ready to get to whatever we're doing next. So unless you are the type that takes the time to stop, wait for an open kiosk, figure out how to do what you're supposed to be doing, then play along the entire experience of Test Track is now pretty much lost on you. Disney, not everyone wants to stop and play games. We do that at home. I'm on vacation to NOT have my kids sucked into game consoles. Give us a cohesive, detailed RIDE experience to share together. In summation (is that a word?), Test Track 2.0 gets a solid THUMBS DOWN from my family. We felt it took away from what the ride previously was vs. improving it.

We did meander over to the Corvette display before leaving. Chandler loooooves Corvettes. In fact, his dream is to someday have one of his own. Well, okay, not the new 2014 Corvette Stingray. He's not down with the Corvette / Camaro hybrid design but whatever. This car in blue is Chandler's dream:

This car in any color, according to Chandler, is design garbage:

It was funny because the Chevy rep that was standing there got a nice little soapbox spiel from my son over the travesty of the failure of the new Corvette design. After a few moments I pulled my kid away making my apologies to the poor Chevy fella. LOL!

Brian wanted to go hit Mission:Space. Nobody else felt like it. I needed to call Tammy back and verify my Discover card with her to get that room at Pop finalized. We let the kiddo go solo while we mosied over to Mouse Gear. I blabbed poor Tammy's head of at the speed of sound for a few minutes on our way into the store. I spent some time browsing while Tracey ran for a potty break. Chandler spotted the Disney Dooney bags and made me go look at them. I think he was secretly waiting to have a good laugh at Mom going nuts spending the big bucks while Dad wasn't looking. Nope. None of the designs appeal to me. Sorry. I have other plans for Daddy-O's big bucks, son.

sweetpee_1993 · Feb 2, 2013

Tracey saw several tshirts he liked in Mouse Gear but wouldn't buy any. He's had a really bad run with excessive shrinkage in the length of Disney tees. He doesn't like to feel like when he sits or bends down his hiney is hanging out. I don't mind his hiney hanging out but he's got a problem with it. Whatever! LOL!

Brian rejoined us and we made our way towards the International Gateway.

I love how when we get home from vacation Tracey can look at all the pics and say things like, "When did you take that?!" First of all, DUH! It was when we were in Epcot. Second, it was probably when you were walking off without me fussing that I must be Japanese with my incessant picture-taking.

See? He fusses in the moment but then is glad I captured those moments later. Men. They make ZERO sense sometimes.

We had to stop at the shop right there at the gateway so I could buy a memory card for the camera. I messed up and put the goofy card that the lock engages every time I slide it into the Pentax camera. Thus far, all pics have been via iPhone. Ugh. At least I didn't feel totally ripped on the card purchase. I didn't think $30 was too much for a 16g SD card.

We were out of Epcot at 9:15 and caught the next Friendship boat to DHS.

Sleepy, Brian?

Reflections of sweet little moments:

Favorite deluxe resort:

The lines at the DHS turnstiles were insanely long. Crazy. Every availabile turnstile was open and we were lined up back to the ticket booths. WTH?! Tracey looked over at the RFID entry, the gate area behind construction walls, and asked how much Disney had into this NextGen garbage. My understanding is $1.5 billion dollars and counting. This is WDW's next big offering. Isn't it wonderful?! He mumbled a line of words I can't repeat. I questioned him again as to whether or not he ever listens to me when I tell him about all this stuff. LOL! Standing in the midst of the chaos of the DHS turnstile lines we acknowledged remembering the things that we really disliked about parks vacations and why we don't want to do them anymore. Moving on...

I bet you think we're in DHS to hit up TSMM! Maybe RnRC! ToT?! Nope. It's all about the Star Tours, baby! On our way Brian had to stop to pull the rope:

When we got over to Star Tours there was a Jedi Training Academy going on. Does this show usually increase the Star Tours line? I ask because there was an actual LINE with an actual WAIT. I don't think I've ever seen that before! When we used to go the Star Tours wait was as long as it took us to walk thru the queu up to the load area. We even had to do a switchback outside in the Ewok village! For the first time ever we actually saw the BACK of the AT-AT and noticed the exposed structure. Cool!

So, 10 minutes of waiting in an actual line (LOL!) and we had my favoritest journey on ST2.0 that I've been on yet: Tattoine for a pod race and Naboo with a dive underwater. Very very fun!!!

fractal · Feb 2, 2013

Castaway Cay looks awesome! Love the cabana and all the underwater pics.

Sorry you didn't like Test Track. I've read reports that it's the greatest thing this side of CarsLand and reports like yours.

that's funny about Chandler giving the Chevy guy "the business".

sweetpee_1993 · Feb 2, 2013

WishIWasAtWDW said:
Yay a Kelly cruise trip report! This is getting me so excited for my cruise on the Fantasy. Only 98 days! Woo hoo! I love reading your cruise trip reports because you all do so many of the activities on the ships and its given me an idea of what we want to try on our cruise! Wes is excited to try the mixology class that you all did last time and that animation class looks so much fun! You did a really good job on your drawings. And I love your chubby Goofy! He's got even more character.

I love how you all got dressed up for formal night and then decided to bail. Hahaha Wearing uncomfortable shoes is the WORST! I can't believe you hung in there as long as you did. You got some cute pictures though! The boys look so handsome. I love their serious tux faces and poses.

That cabana view...WOW! I keep telling Wes that if we ever go on a cruise with more people, we have to get a cabana! I can't wait to read more!!

98 days! That's like NO time! Woot!

Oh, I feel like we never do enough. We actually sleep until we wake up, stop for naps, and hit the bed somewhat early at night. Mixology, it was a very differnt experience on this cruise. I'll get to that.

Even if you aren't the artsy-type, go to the animation class! They do the characters step-by-step and make it really simple. You can do it!

Thanks for the compliments (and sympathy!) on our formal night adventures! I know we have to seem completely out of our minds for being so weird about it all. Who goes thru all that fuss then bails??? We do! LOL!

Aaaah, the cabana. Well, I know they all sold out within minutes of the 120 day booking window opening on our next cruise (Fantasy, May 25th). I just talked to my brother and he was like, "I wonder if we could find a way to offer some of the people with cabanas cash for their reservation?" We also discussed how much we'd go (split 50/50). We're willing to go $1k + the cost of the cabana. Crazy? Nah. It. Is. Worth. It.

fractal said:
Castaway Cay looks awesome! Love the cabana and all the underwater pics.

Sorry you didn't like Test Track. I've read reports that it's the greatest thing this side of CarsLand and reports like yours.

that's funny about Chandler giving the Chevy guy "the business".

Castaway Cay is incredible. The cabana is like icing on the cake.

Test Track, yeah, not Disney's most glorious moment for us to say the least. Carsland??? I've not seen it in person but I wouldn't even think the two were even close to the same neighborhood much less ballpark. No way. I realize I prob'ly come of jaded because I've made no bones about my distaste and dissatisfaction with the overall state of things at WDW. I didn't really delve too far into the emotional build-up I had and shared with my family about going to WDW even for this one day. I really, really worked to get my brain into an open space and set aside the previous emotions. I wanted to like TT2.0. I wanted to be happily taught that YouTube videos are too one-dimensional to represent an attraction experience. Even after the initial let-down after the ride Tracey & I wanted to fully understand why we felt the way we did. We spent a lot of time the next day discussing in great detail TT2.0 along with the rest of the details from our "Disney World Day". The things I detailed as our perceptions and disappointments in the experience are what we identified as the problems we had. Keep reading. We still have the rest of the day at WDW. Or not. I know you might not like what I have to say. I'm sorry.

Chandler is very passionate when it comes to cars. Worries me sometimes because he gets going about stats & performance then I remember this is a human being I'm handing the key to my car over to on a regular basis.

sweetpee_1993 · Feb 2, 2013

When we finished up Star Tours we were getting a bit hungry. I checked at Sci-Fi Dine-In and they would have a table for us at 11:00. Then I started thinking about those menu prices and the absurdity of spending $100 for us to have basically burgers and shakes. I know that's what we'd all order. So we cancelled that and decided Pizza Planet would be less of a financial commitment and faster anyway. It wasn't yet 11:00 though. What to do to kill 15 minutes? Pictures!

I soooo love the Muppets!

In the Muppets corner of the shop:

The signs crack me up. Like the one behind the counter in this shot:

"Check-out time is whenever you like. Patrons wishing to pay will find their money gladly accepted. Patrons wishing to sneak out without paying will find it easier than they think." LOLOLOL!!!!

Then it was time for lunch:

Pizza, salad, and bottled water hit the spot.

But now that we've eaten the early morning is catching up with us. We're oh-so sleeeeeeeeepyyyyyy. Thankfully, we had a napping spot waiting for us at Pop Century. Buh-Bye DHS. It was fun in spite of being so brief. On the bus. I snapped this pic because it reminded me of many a day-gone-by:

sweetpee_1993 · Feb 2, 2013

When we got to Pop there was 4 families in front of us for check-in. We stood there waiting for half an hour to check-in. I don't recall ever waiting that long to check-in at a resort. Pop 5x's before now, Contemporary twice, POFQ twice, Animal Kingdom Lodge, Polynesian, Wilderness Lodge, Yacht Club...never. That was odd. I was so worried our room wouldn't be ready and our $80 gamble would be a bust. But, YAY, we had a room all set for napping in the '50s.

We all crashed for a 2 hour nap. SOLID. Went to sleep with Stacy softly playing in the background. Just like old times. Well, except for her being so grown-up and not as enthusiastic as she used to be. LOL! When we woke Tracey hopped in the shower to refresh. I did a quicky sponge-bath. I briefly worried we wouldn't be able to drag the boys from their bed. They were seriously in some deep states of slumber! On our way out the door I wanted a picture of our napping spot. Tracey obliged:

Hey! How 'bout those touch pads for the room keys (that the Disney Dream has had since day 1)! Then Tracey wanted to tell me how he really feels about the summation of $1.5 billion dollars that so generously included key touch pads:

LOL! We've got really twisted senses of humor! I know.

We've been to Epcot and DHS already. Where to go for the rest of our "Disney Day"?

Man, the MK was buuuusy! Remember, we normally didn't visit the parks unless it was during the ever-shrinking lowest attendance times. We used to work very hard to avoid the masses...which is a large part of why we don't want to go to WDW right now. We're tired of dodging the crowds. Very tired. But here we are just for the day. Surely we can muscle through.

Photopass pic for posterity. Just an FYI, the special photopass cards we received onboard the ship were important to use because all our photopass pics from the parks "magically" appeared in our Shutters photos onboard the ship for purchase (or inclusion in the photo CD onboard the ship).

We made it to Main Street and immediately stopped for my favoritest of all WDW treats, Mickey crispy treats on-a-stick! (I realize I look thoroughly perturbed in this pic. The boys take forever to snap a simple pic and I was dying to gobble it up!)

sweetpee_1993 · Feb 2, 2013

Again, this was our day to do things that were new to us. We headed straight back to the New Fantasyland towards the Under the Sea/Little Mermaid. Man, was it tight back here! The walkways were solid shoulder-to-shoulder, elbow-to-elbow people. Yikes! The standby line had a posted 60 minute wait. I checked the Lines app and it seemed everything of interest had a long-ish wait. So our choices were wait in line here or wait in line somewhere else. But this is what we wanted to do so we proceded into the standby line.

The landscape, rock work, and details outside the Little Mermaid are so gorgeous! Picturesque. Beautiful. Enchanting! Totally drew me in:

Even with a long wait it totally didn't feel like it. All the interesting things to look at, all the wonderfully rich theming really keeps the imagination moving. No dull, gosh-this-line-is-forever. The little crab scurrying about in the different displays was so not even needed. See Disney? Make things rich and interesting and you don't need to play techie-tricks. Do what you're famous for!

Having fun, Brian?

Chandler was into whatever driving game app he was playing. Geez, kid! You're missing all the cool stuff!

I was so lovin' all the details. Like the flatware half-buried in the sand:

The way all the little "artifacts" were sorted into groups of similar objects, it's like Ariel has been there collecting all these wonderful albeit ordinary things.

I love these chests. I want to peek inside so bad! I would love to have them to decorate at home with. But, alas, they were nailed down. Disney knew I was coming again! Dernit! Wouldn't I have been the vision of innocence strolling out the exit gates with a treasure chest tucked under each arm? LOLOLOL!!!

Eventually we made our way inside towards the load area...when Tracey & Brian felt the need to ask, "Clams??? Hasn't this already been done at Epcot??" Yes, guys. Now shut up and get in. LOL!

When You Wish Upon A Star...POOF your teens vanish!

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