WDW Trip: Left Bookend

Let me begin by explaining the name of this post.

A few months ago, I found out that I would be doing a presentation with two professors at a national math conference in Orlando.  I think we all know that I could not go all the way to Orlando without getting over to WDW somehow.  Not long after the news about the conference, we were scheduling our photo session at MK and learned that Tuesday, February 10 was available.  We immediately jumped on that date and knew we could combine a trip to WDW for the photos with being in Orlando for the conference.  We were trying to decide whether it would be better to drive or fly, and we decided that we would drive down and spend a few days at WDW.  C would fly home mid-week to work while I was at the conference, and then fly back to Orlando.  We'd then spend for two additional days at WDW before we drove home together.  I know that may seem like a crazy plan to some of you, but it seemed perfectly reasonable to us!

So I am referring to the pre-conference visit to WDW as the "left bookend" and the post-conference visit to WDW as the "right bookend" for what is hopefully an obvious reason.

Here's a photo of our Magic Bands for the "left bookend" trip – characters from The Rescuers:

Bianca and Bernard

Saturday, February 7

We left our house at 12:30 am, drove through the night, arrived at 2:00 pm, and checked in to our hotel.  On our drive, we came across an amazing bridge, which I loved (please excuse the filthy windshield)!

We stayed at Art of Animation, which is such a fun and colorful resort!  In my opinion, it is the best choice in the "value" category, but since three-fourths of the resorts are family suites, the regular rooms are sometimes hard to come by because it is a popular resort.  We lucked out and got a regular room, whose theme is The Little Mermaid.  We stayed here about two years ago and loved it then, too!

After a quick nap, we headed over to Animal Kingdom for our dinner reservation.  As I've previously written, we are trying to go to restaurants we haven't been to, so we had dinner at Yak and Yeti.  We weren't sure what to expect, and to be honest, we are always a little leery of new restaurants because we are both vegetarians.  But we were SO impressed!  The food was delicious!  If I were to assign Yak and Yeti a grade, it would be an A+.  It was undoubtedly one of the best meals we have had at WDW!  What a completely unexpected surprise!  We had wok-fired green beans (I am not convinced this isn't a typo...seems like it should be wok-fried), vegetable lo mein, and sautéed bok choy, all of which were amazing.  To drink, we each had their signature drink, the Yak Attack, which was not only beautiful, but so yum; for dessert, we had fried wontons and grilled pineapple skewers, and they were incredible.  I'm not sure if our expectations going in were so low that we were overly impressed, but we really loved this this restaurant!

After dinner, we wandered around Animal Kingdom and there were very few other people around.  In all of our trips to WDW, this was our first time being at AK at night.  It is definitely the park we visit least, and when we do go, we tend to be there for only a few hours at a time.  It was so beautiful at night!  We will surely be spending more time there in the future!

Sunday, February 8

We were up early because we had a breakfast reservation at Crystal Palace at MK, so we drove over to TTC and took the monorail to MK.  I was able to snap a few photos from the monorail, including three of the Wedding Pavilion.  So beautiful!

The last time we ate at Crystal Palace was in 1996, so we were excited to go back.  Our reservation time was prior to park opening, so we were able to walk down Main Street and to Cinderella Castle while the park was almost empty.  This alone was worth the cost of breakfast!  The meal was a character buffet with Winnie the Pooh, Tigger, Eeyore, and Piglet.  For fun character interactions, I think a dining experience is definitely the way to go because they come to your table for photos and are generally very entertaining.  Obviously the delicious food is also a great reason to dine here!

castle maintenance

After breakfast, we wandered around MK and did a few attractions – Splash Mountain, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, and Tom Sawyer Island – before stopping for a snack at Sunshine Tree Terrace.  How excited was I to find this plastic cup?!?  Little things make me so happy!  You know I love Orange Bird!

After that, we just meandered around the park and did some shopping on Main Street, before going back to our hotel to relax for a while, which also allowed some time for me do get some homework done.  While I don't love doing homework when we are away, the food court at Art of Animation is spacious and we can always find a quiet corner in which to work.

At about 5:00, we hopped on the bus to MK because we had a dinner reservation.  Those of you who have chatted with me about WDW are well aware that I am not a fan of the buses, but we take advantage of them every once in a while.

Dinner was at The Plaza, another restaurant we'd never been to before.  It was so quaint inside, with a very old-timey feel, and the food was very good.  When we finished dinner, the Main Street Pianist was performing, so we listened to and chatted with him before grabbing dessert at Cheshire Café.  We went to TTA and Monsters, Inc. Laugh Floor in Tomorrowland, and Enchanted Tales with Belle in Fantasyland, all of which had minimal wait times, which was great.  We ended the night over in the Storybook Circus area to ride Dumbo and meet Minnie, Daisy, Donald, and Goofy.

A classic Disney Cartoon is entitled "Lambert the Sheepish Lion" and it was one of my very favorite cartoons when I was young.  I absolutely loved it!  I sang the song all the time.  It happened to be released 63 years ago to the day – February 8, 1952 – and there is a Lambert poster in Storybook Circus that I took a picture of to mark the occasion!  I also took a picture of another poster:  Humphrey.  You may have noticed him earlier in the post as well; he is in another classic cartoom that I adored as a child that also had a song I sang all the time.  Humphrey, Orange Bird, Lambert...I love unique, interesting, somewhat obscure characters and these are three of my absolute faves.

Monday, February 9

Another breakfast reservation meant another opportunity to get into a park before it officially opened for the day!  We drove over to Epcot at about 7:15 and were let into the park at 7:40.  The other families with breakfast reservations charged ahead toward World Showcase, but we took our time walking through the park at a very leisurely pace, which allowed us to get some great photos with no other guests around.  We loved that!  And again, the price of breakfast was worth having 40 minutes in Epcot with no one else around us!

Breakfast was at Akershus, which is in the Norway pavilion.  I'll say this.  I was not impressed.  The staff was less than stellar and the food was mediocre at best.  Several of the princesses made an appearance:  Snow White, Cinderella, Aurora, Ariel, and Belle.  I always find it awkward to interact with face characters because it's easier to be silly when someone is in a full costume, like Pluto or Stitch.  And frankly, some of the face characters are better than others – I've loved meeting Mary Poppins and Alice – so it really depends on who is portraying that character on any given day.  In this case, Belle, Aurora, and Snow White were fine, but Cinderella and Ariel were amazing. Very witty and clever!  I couldn't help but think about how quick they must be on their feet, how well they must know their character, and how they must be able to chat with both kids and adults, all the while smiling and posing for hundreds of photos.  Not easy!

After breakfast, World Showcase was still closed, so we headed toward Future World, and on our way, we saw a wedding was taking place at the Canada pavilion.  Cinderella's Coach was parked there, so we snuck over to take a photo.  Ah, memories!

We had a little bit of time to spare before our first fast pass, so we decided to go to Starbucks and grab a drink.  The thing about Starbucks is that there have only been a handful of times over the past many years when my name has been spelled correctly on my cup.  And that might not seem like a big deal to some people, but it drives me crazy anytime people misspell my name, even though I fully understand that it is not the typical spelling.  I know people have been giving fake names at Starbucks for a long time, so last week, I said my name was Ellie (from Up).  This time, when the girl at the counter asked for our names, I replied, "Rapunzel and Flynn," and she didn't even blink.  (Clearly I am not the first person to have done this.)  C got coffee, so she filled his cup and handed it to him, but I had to wait for my drink to be made and I am not going to lie…I was super thrilled when the guy called out, "I've got a caramel frappuccino for Rapunzel!"

We went over to The Seas to see Turtle Talk, which is always hilarious, and then spent some time admiring the manatees in the aquarium.  I love manatees so much!  We next headed over to The Land to go on Soarin' before heading out of the park, as the skies were about to open up.  We had a late lunch reservation at Beaches and Cream, and then we went back to our resort to relax for a while.  It rained all afternoon and into the evening, so it was a good time to get some homework done.  We had a quiet evening and went to bed well before the time any adult should go to bed because we had an extremely early start the next morning.

Tuesday, February 10

I am going to write about our morning in a separate post, but after our photos, we went to Port Orleans Riverside for breakfast, then did some shopping at Downtown Disney and DHS. 

 I was thoroughly disgusted to see this sight:

Given how early we'd gotten up that morning, we were due for a nap before driving over to Contemporary for dinner at California Grill.  This was yet another restaurant that we'd never been to – not because we hadn't been interested, but we could never get a reservation!  We knew the view would be incredible and figured the food would be good, but we were sure the restaurant wouldn't love up to the hype.  We were wrong.  What a fabulous experience!  The food was out of this world and the service was incredible.  Dessert was especially scrumdiddlyumptious!  (Side note:  thank you, Roald Dahl, for such a great word!)  C had the Chocolate Pudding Cake and I had the Sundae Sampler.  Both were simply amazing.  After dinner, we watched the MK "Wishes" fireworks show from the roof of Contemporary and it was completely magical.

We drove back to our resort to change and drop off our car before hopping in a taxi and going to Jellyrolls.  The show was so fantastic.  It always is, but every time we go, we are still in awe of the talent up on that stage.  Scotty played "Let It Go," which we hadn't heard at Jellyrolls before, and obviously I absolutely adored it, and he also did the theme from The Muppet Show, which C loved.  He played "Circle of Life" from The Lion King and then he and Ray did a very cool, jazzy version of "When You Wish Upon a Star."  This could easily have been my favorite song of the night, but then Scotty announced that the second-to-last song was for us and he played "Beauty and the Beast."  Happy sigh.

Seriously, I may be the most fortunate person on the face of the earth.

Wednesday, February 11

Unfortunately, we had to pack and check out because C was flying home for a few days while I went to a math conference.  We had a nice day and went over to explore the Swan and Dolphin resorts, which we have always admired from afar, but had never visited.  We had read somewhere that we could get a PB&J shake at a place at the Dolphin, so we were on a mission.  We found The Fountain and while I had the shake, C had the Caramel Apple Sundae.  We had no idea what we've been missing!  Oh, my word!  We will definitely be back to The Fountain!

Happy Tails to you!