Day 3 – Magic Kingdom and EPCOT
We woke up bright and early so we could get to the Magic Kingdom in
time for the rope drop show. We had 9:45
am reservation at Crystal Palace for the Pooh and Friends breakfast buffet and daughter wanted to meet Tinkerbell and one of her fairy friends before we ate.
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| Our Birthday Girl! |
Daughter got dressed in her blue sequined party dress, tiara and “Sweet
16 Birthday Princess” sash and her black knee high tennis shoes. She was adorable! I’m not just saying that because I’m her
mom. She got many compliments from cast
members and guests alike. So it’s not
just me being a biased mom. Seriously.
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| Hubby and daughter listening to the Magic Kingdom rope drop show |
We took the Disney bus to Magic Kingdom but chose to get in a line to
enter the park rather than in front of the train station to watch the rope drop
show. Even though the platform is
raised, since Hubby was sitting and everyone else is standing, he couldn’t
really see the show. However he did
bebop along to the music. This was a
choice on our part. I imagine that if we
had gone in front of the train station instead he would have been able to see
the show just fine. When the show was over they started letting guests through
the gates and we were already in line and ready to go see Tink!
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| Rope drop show from the line to enter the park |
We had some concern because the Tinkerbell meet and greet was taken off
the Disney website the week before. We
knew that they were getting ready to move her to a new location and her fairy
friends would not be moving with her. We
were hoping we got into the Fairy nook before that change happened. We did check the Disney app that morning and
she was listed as meeting in her nook so that is where we headed as soon as we
entered the park. Sure enough, Tink was
there along with her friend Silvermist!
We had so much fun visiting with those fairies! They told daughter that she looked like she had
been in a blueberry fight and they love blueberry fights. Silvermist felt that daughter had been
sprinkled in two scoops of fairy dust and there is a one scoop limit per
person. We convinced her that no rules
were broken. They were wonderfully
engaging. The Memory Maker photographers
were awesome too. I was pleasantly
surprised with the candid shots the photographers took. It really makes the photos extra wonderful.
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| Daughter and Tink |
Next we were off to Crystal Palace for our breakfast ADR (Advance dinning reservation). We were seated to the left of the entrance at
one of the tables by the windows. We had
a wonderful waiter who was friendly and made sure we always had a fresh juice
or coffee on the table. The buffet is
pretty typical breakfast fare such as eggs, bacon and sausage, potatoes,
cereals, pastries and fruit. They also
served a yummy concoction called “
breakfast lasagna”. It is full of pancakes, custard, bananas,
berries and more. It was decadent and full of sugar and oh so yummy!
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| Celebrating our 20th Anniversary at Disney! |
After eating all of these decadent sugar covered carbs, our waiter
surprised us with cupcakes! He brought a
cupcake for each of us and a card signed by the characters for daughter and a
postcard for hubby and myself. It was a
really sweet gesture that kicked of our day with a special start.
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| Anniversary cupcakes! |
We met Pooh, Tigger, Piglet and Eeyore! They were all so fun and lovable! Daughter was so cute; it was like she was a
little girl again.
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| So much cute! |
We were done with our day at the Magic Kingdom so we started to head
out of the park but stopped first to get photos with the memory maker
photographer. I recommend getting photos
taken at off hours, not just as the park opens or as the park closes. There is rarely a line and the photographers
have more time to personalize your photo poses.
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| A princess and a castle! |
We were park hoping to EPCOT so we took the express monorail from
Magic Kingdom to the TTC and then over to EPCOT. Let me tell you about that express monorail
ramp and a wheel chair. It was a
challenge. It is a fairly steep ramp but
there are flat areas just large enough for a wheel chair or ECV every so many
feet. However stopping at those
platforms caused me to lose momentum and make the next section that much
slower. My daughter took to waiting
until it was clear and running the wheelchair from the bottom to the top. That was more than I could do so more power
to her.
Transferring a wheel chair onto the monorail was a breeze! There is a specific gate that wheel chairs go
to and there is a cast member who stays in that area. When the monorail comes into the platform the
cast member lays a metal ramp over the gap between the platform and monorail. Our only job was to center the chair on the
ramp. Super easy!
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| EPCOT - Canopies in Future World |
We had FP at 12:05 at Test Track, 1:35 at Spaceship Earth and 2:45 at
Mission Space. Test track and Mission space with a wheel
chair are straight forward. You just go
through the line until near the landing area where a cast member took the wheel
chair and we loaded the ride car. Part
of test track is a ramp but hubby would just put the brake on the chair and I
always stood behind the chair as some added support. We all enjoyed Test Track, especially seeing how well "our" car did in all of the tests, Our daughter enjoyed looking at the cars in
Test Track. She found a green (her favorite color) one that she spent time
with. I think they exchanged Skype
names.
I’m glad I had the chance to
ride Mission Space. I enjoyed the
story. My husband and daughter loved the
ride. I never feel the need to ride it
again. Ever.
We really enjoy Spaceship Earth and it is always a part of our EPCOT
visit. Spaceship earth cannot accommodate
wheel chairs or ECV’s in the regular line so we have to enter at the exit. As a matter of fact, on any ride with a
moving sidewalk or platform we were directed to the exit for boarding. This gives folks with mobility issues a
little more time to board the ride car.
Also the cast members can slow down the ride a little bit to help with the
boarding. It’s not a huge time delay but
just enough.
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| Happy Anniversary to us! |
We had some time in between fast pass times so we enjoyed a few of the
topiaries and garden. We spent a while in
the hummingbird garden near the Test Track area. I love the sound of the grown bamboo rattling
in the wind. It’s a very peaceful sound.
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| Entrance to Hummingbird Garden |
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| Bamboo in the hummingbird garden |
Next we headed to World Showcase.
There were specific countries that daughter really wanted to spend time in
that she felt we hadn’t given enough time to in the past. We walked through England (which we had spent
several hours visiting in October) and headed straight to Canada. We took time and enjoyed the gardens and
waterfall, shopped in the gift shop and even ventured to the top of the
pavilion and spent some time just sitting on a bench and listening to the water
fall below. The pavilion is wheel chair
and ECV accessible but some of those ramps are mighty narrow. Fortunately there are platforms here and
there so if there are to wheel chairs or ECV that need to pass one can stay on
the platform until the other passes.
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| Bambie Topiaries |
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| Canada Pavilion |
Next we traveled to France! Our
first stop was to the Memory Maker photographer at the fountain. He got some super cute photos of us. My favorite is the one of hubby and me giving
kisses to daughter. We explored the
gardens, stores and watched the movie. We had a nice time in France.
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| France Pavilion |
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| France Pavilion |
Our Next stop was in Morocco!
This is one of my favorite pavilions!
I love getting lost in the shops and talking to the cast members. We were there specifically to meet Aladdin
and Jasmine so we went straight back to their area. The cast member who directed the line was
really nice man who was full of great information and lots of jokes. He made the wait seem really quick. I really liked this meet and greet
location. There were drafting tables
with blue prints of various lamps and one dedicated to THAT lamp. The back ground for the photos is a scene of
Agrabah and really set the scene for meeting Aladdin and Jasmine. The characters were AMAZING! She had so much fun talking to them.
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| Aladdin and Jasmine Meet and Greet Area |
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| Aladdin and Jasmine Meet and Greet - This photo cracks me up |
We decided to spend more time exploring Morocco – we got lost in the
shops looking at all of the stuff and things, talking to cast members and we
spent some time in the Gallery and the current exhibit called Moroccan
Style: The Art of Personal
Adornment. We learned about Moroccan
dress, jewelry, henna and makeup. We
also enjoyed looking at the architecture throughout the pavilion.
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| Moroccan Shop |
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| Moroccan Pavilion |
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| Moroccan Style |
It was getting close to our ADR at Rose and Crown so we headed back to
the U.K Pavilion and checked in at the podium.
While we waited we enjoyed the fun topiaries in front of the Sportsman
Shoppe.
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| Peter Pan Topiary at U.K Pavilion |
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| Captain Hook Topiary in U.K. Pavilion |
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| Crocodile Topiary at U.K Pavilion |
We were soon called and seated in the dining room near the back door
to the patio. We love the atmosphere here
and it is the one restaurant we always eat at when we visit Walt Disney
World. Hubby ordered his usual, fish and
chips and a Guinness beer. I also got
the fish and chips and daughter ordered the Corned Beef and Cabbage, we both
drank the minute maid punch. We had a
lovely waitress, Igraine from Ireland. We
chatted with her about Ireland and how she liked Disney. While we were eating a nice guy was seated
next to us. He was sitting by his self
so we started a conversation. It turns
out he was on a business trip and had one day off so he decided to spend that
day at EPCOT. We chatted about Disney,
work, family, and life as homeschoolers.
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| Rose and Crown |
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| Daughter took a selfi with her dad in Rose and Crown |
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| Rose and Crown interior |
Before we left for our trip I ordered a special 20
th
anniversary cake from EPCOT Food and Beverage (407-560-6395) to be delivered for dessert. I was quoted $62 and I ordered an 8” vanilla
cake with white chocolate mousse, with a thin layer of white butter cream and
covered with white fondant. It was
topped with a white chocolate anniversary Mickey and Minnie and inscribed in milk
chocolate with “Celebrating 20 Magical Years”. I told them to just do the decoration in
white, whatever they thought looked good and they piped Mickey silhouettes
around the cake. It turned out really
cute and tasted amazing! I forgot to
take photos of the inside of the cake, but trust me, yum! Since we chose to not eat the dessert on the
meal plan they deducted $10 from our cake cost which was a nice surprise. We shared some of the cake but it was still a
lot of cake so we had to have it boxed to take back to our room.
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| Our Anniversary Cake |
When Igraine came back with the box she also
brought daughter a Rose and Crown U.K collectible beer mug, without beer. It was
a really nice surprise that daughter really appreciated. Igraine offered to let us go out on the patio
to watch Illumination but we decided to just sit at our seats since we could
see the globe from the window and we could hear the music. It was nice to just relax while and enjoy the
music. After the show we strolled our
way to the bus stops to head back to our resort. It was a
really good day!
You can view all of our
day 3 photos in our Flickr album here
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