Tuesday, February 15, 2011

Day Five at Disney - Epcot

When we got home from The Magic Kingdom the night before, I had a voice mail at the lodge that made me VERY happy. My dad got us reservations for the character dinner at Chef Mickey’s!!! I had tried before we left and while in WDW to no avail. It’s a very popular experience, evidently. But my dad got us 6:35pm dinner reservations on our 5th day in WDW.

I’m sad to say that Epcot did not get the attention it deserved. In my defense, I did not know it needed said attention until it was too late to do anything about it. From my perspective, Epcot did not offer too much to interest my 8 yr old, just a ton of walking and things for adults to look at.

After breakfast, I took our clothes to the laundromat in the lodge and washed some things we needed for our last 2 days (the things we’d been wearing everyday). Since World Showcase in Epcot did not open until 11am, I knew the front part of the park was going to be crowded in the morning, so I was in no rush to get to the park first thing.

The only 2 things the hubs wanted to do in WDW was to get on Test Track and Soarin’ in Epcot. We went straight to Soarin’ upon entering the park and got Fast Passes that were not good for another 2 ¼ hours. So we went and stood in line for Test Track for 45 minutes. That was a cool ride. We ate lunch afterwards, road through the Disney greenhouse and then went on Soarin’. That was a little too realistic for me and I was scared a couple of times but it is a fabulous ride (I tried not to say amazing again).

The only other thing we wanted to do in Epcot was for B to go on a Kim Possible Mission. The hubs’ knees were hurting from all the walking that week, so he decided to rest in the UK’s pub while B, my brother and I went in search of a Kim Possible station. We only had time for him to do 2 missions – one in the UK and the other in France – but they were so much fun! B got a cell phone from the KP station and that was his “communicator”. He received his missions via videos and text messages on that phone and went all over each “country” doing little missions and gathering clues to help Kim catch the bad guys.

For example, B went into a phone booth in the UK, entered a code and a golf ball came rolling out. He had to find the right store to take that golf ball to, find the ball washer and put it inside to be “analyzed”. Turns out the ball contained GPS info on the bad guy to help us track him to his lair. In France, B and I had to find and then position ourselves in front of a particular awning, look up at the Eiffel Tower and enter a code into the communicator. Evidently there was a camera on top of the tower that took our picture and sent it to the communicator for us to view. B was so funny as a spy, ducking here and there, hiding behind things, pressing himself up against walls and peeking around corners. At one point, we could not find a street we needed and he had to ask a cast member for directions. Oh, the story he made up for why he needed to find that street so they didn’t figure out that he was on a secret mission was hysterical! He took his missions VERY seriously. LOL! The hubs was very sorry he missed these missions after B described in painstaking detail everything he did.

That was all we got to do before it was time to leave Epcot and head to the Contemporary Resort for our Chef Mickey dinner. But we will definitely plan more time for Epcot if we get back. We took the famous WDW monorail to the Contemporary Resort! :o) We checked in and they called us back to the inner-waiting area where we got some family pictures taken with a Chef Mickey statue. Later we were taken to our table, our waiter took our drink order and we were free to help ourselves to the buffet. Preparing for this trip, I was looking forward to eating WDW’s world-renowned food. Then we got there and I found that everything is cooked with a soybean/olive oil combination and I am allergic to olive oil! :o( I had been eating plain meat without any fat or seasonings and plain, steamed veggies all week. The food at the Chef Mickey buffet looked so good and I’d had enough suffering. I decided I was going to eat everything I wanted to on that buffet just as it was. Oh, it was so good! When I went back up for my 2nd helping, I realized my face felt awfully hot. When I got back to the table I whispered to the hubs, “I think an allergic reaction had started to the food. Can you get me the allergy meds from our bag, please?” While he is digging, my mom looks over at me and yells, “Oh my God! Your face is COVERED in hives! What’s wrong with you?!” *sigh* Luckily it was pretty noisy in that place and I don’t think it drew too much attention. Plus, the allergy meds worked pretty fast. Don’t know why I did not think to take them on the monorail ride over…

Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Pluto and Goofy stop by every table while you are there and will sign autographs and pose for pictures with you. We had gotten signatures from all of them at parks earlier in the week, so we just concentrated on getting pictures. When my dad got his picture taken with Minnie, he was so excited! He even kissed her! The staff sung songs while we all waved our napkins in the air and lots of the guests knew the words. While we were eating, we noticed that a cast member went to the tables on either side of us to show them the pictures taken with the Mickey statue when they arrived and discussed the prices if they wanted to buy any. I thought the price for each picture was steep and was pretty sure we would not buy ours, but I did want to see them. By the time we were done the picture guy still had not visited us. The waiter went in search of our pix and came back empty-handed. It was almost 8:30pm by now. My brother, the hubs, B and I had planned to go back to Epcot to catch their night show, but the hubs changed his mind. He did not want to be out in the cold again, like the night before, and wanted to get B in bed. So my brother and I headed to Epcot and my parents decided to stay at Chef Mickey’s and find out what happened to our pix. They were finally found and my dad was given all of them for free b/c of the mix-up. World-class customer service in WDW, I tell ya!

My brother and I had our coats with us this night, b/c our parents had brought them to us at Chef Mickey’s. We were nice and warm with the coats but also since there was no wind on this night like there was at TMK. There is a lot more spread out space to watch the evening show in Epcot, so we got right up front. I liked the show. My favorite part was the projection of movies on the continents of the globe in the middle of the lake. But I liked TMK’s night show better.

On the way out, I stopped at a vendor cart full of all the light up things that kids want after dark. B had been eyeing a rainbow lightsaber with Mickey’s head on it and I wanted to see how much it cost. Things like this are always expensive at fairs and amusement parks. It was only $7!! That thing would have cost at least $15 in Kings Dominion. So I got it for my B. The hubs and I were pleasantly surprised at how reasonably priced most things were in WDW. Leaving Epcot was the 1st time we were not able to get on the 1st bus to our lodge. But that’s OK; people watching is fun, especially when you have such a variety of people from all over the world to observe.

Oh, I wanted to tell something I left out on my Day One post. I believe that the slight majority of people at the parks when we were there we from outside of the US. That is just another testament to how awesome WDW is! People from around the world spend their hard-earned money to come to the US and experience WDW. Anywho, as we were waiting for the Fantasmic! show at Hollywood Studios to begin, we the crowd entertained ourselves by doing the wave back and forth! Isn’t that awesome? No matter what country you were from, your race, religion or language, we all not only KNEW the wave, but did it. Together. And laughed. Together. That’s something. That’s hope.

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