Day Four
Firstly I feel I should apologise for my temporary absence…as you may have read I had work at the weekend and then I planned to update on Monday by writing a little after work on Sunday then posting the day after. However, my sister and I were picked up from work by our grandparents who said that they would drop us off at home before heading off to a friend's birthday party near our house after a cup of tea and a cake with us. Well! We opened our front door to find our entire family (about 25 people!) and close friends (another four!) in our living as a surprise "good luck for Uni and goodbye" party. Needless to say we were very shocked and I didn't really have the time to continue my TR! Haha! Then on Monday it was declared that we were going shopping for last minute things before we move in at the weekend. So that's that and here it is.
There was a bit of a queue for breakfast this morning, but nothing horrendous! We actually think that the Parks got busier as the week went on, perhaps because the prices drop so much after the 6 week holidays! Anyway we were soon seated as the system is so orderly.
Today was also the first day that there was a menu for the hot options on our table. It's not very expensive (when compared to prices in the Parks). I did take pictures of it but they aren't very clear. I suppose I could post them if anybody wants to know what's on offer!
I had cereal too today because I clearly know how to live life on the edge.
Then, of course, it was time to go back to our favourite place and go on Peter Pan as per the new tradition. Again it was a walk on. Yay extra magic hours! Then we did Dumbo where there was a bit of a queue but where else can you view Fantasyland from the sky whilst sitting in a flying elephant?
Then we did the teacups for the first time on this trip. At first we weren't sure that they were even open but a family were allowed through so we followed!
Afterwards, we decided that it would be a wonderful idea to go over to Discoverland to do Orbitron because we had wanted to all week but put it off because there always seemed to be a queue of half an hour plus.
We were still in EMH so we waited for about 15-20 minutes which was okay because we had a lovely view of the moon and snacks to eat!
However when we got on the ride we soon discovered that it was perhaps not the best idea to have me and Beth in one "capsule" and Charlotte alone in another since Beth is the tallest of all of us! We were a bit…uncomfortable but it did, at the very least, make the duration of the ride very funny! We didn't even think to give Charlotte our bags. Definitely not a ride made for two adults!
Charl was fine!
The Orbitron Experience must have made us slightly delirious because we then thought that it would be an excellent idea to go over to the Studios to queue for crush! I think it was about 9:40 at this point so we were expecting to queue to get in but the gates we already open and the Crush queue was already at over an hour long! We decided that we might as well queue for it because otherwise we never would.
Thankfully Charlotte had bought her iPod to the Parks with her so we could watch Tangled on it whilst we waited. There was no sound because obviously it was reasonably noisy but we have watched it so many times that we could probably quote it word for word anyway…
I think we only saw one episode of queue jumping so it wasn't too bad on that front. There was a little girl in front of us who soon discovered that she was too small to ride and was devastated and had to bribed to move out of the queue! I think that the cute little sign is a bit deceiving before you read the warnings.
Eventually (and after about 50 minutes) we reached the final stretch of the queue and loved the theming (by this I mean the "mine" seagulls!) However, we weren't too happy when we discovered that it is a continually moving ride given my experience on the boats yesterday! Anyway we got on and it was my turn to ride alone.
I wouldn't say that I enjoyed the ride (especially near the end when Charl shouted to me "are you okay?!" and all I could do was say no!) but I would probably do it again if only to watch the nice bits at the start. Beth on the other hand loved it! Even if it was my favourite ride in the whole of
Disneyland I don't think I would want to queue so long for it.
Despite feeling a little nauseous we decided then to do Tower of Terror.
The wait was only fifteen minutes so we couldn't use the long queue as an excuse! I did want to do it though because there is obviously no other way for me to find out whether I would like it or not. Again the theming was quite good but not really my thing which you probably could have worked out from the amount of time that we spent in Fantasyland compared to everywhere else! We had a fantastic Cast Member experience when we were being loaded in to the lifts; he was so in character and it was hilarious. He was just about to close the doors when he said "au revoir" in a creepy voice and did a weird little thing with his eyebrows. Nothing big but it was great nonetheless. I ended up enjoying this ride but it did make me feel really sick!
I think I would be okay if I did this alone but straight after crush was a bit too much. I really liked the part when you are at the top and the doors open so you can see outside. It was a lovely view because it was so sunny. We went in to the TOT shop afterwards and I bought pin badges for TOT, Crush and Parachute drop. I may have wanted to ride the first two a bit more so that I had justification to buy the badges…Beth bought the photo from this ride because a) our faces were hilarious and b) she wanted to prove to her Auntie that she actually went on it! I liked that they zoom in on just the people in your 'party' because I wouldn't like knowing the I was on someone's sideboard somewhere in their photo.
We needed a sit down then to recover from our experiences! Clearly we are not thrill ride people. Well, Charlotte and I aren't…Beth loved them both despite thinking that she wouldn't! Again we timed it right here because we ended up seeing some characters walking by which was nice.
After a little while and the application of some sun cream (I am very pale and the sun was warming up quickly!) we headed back over to Main Street to get a hot dog from Casey's.
We just got one to share and ate it whilst watching the celebration train again. To be honest I didn't enjoy it that much and don't really see why people seem to love them so much, sorry! Maybe it's just me.
Look at that castle!
Charlotte wanted to get a little gold-effect castle statue that she had seen in the shop under the castle (coincidentally) so we walked through and she got that. The shop was very busy so we got out as fast as we could! The service was a little slow but there were only two cast members for the entire shop which isn't a lot when you can't just get what you want and pay because everything is in cabinets. It didn't matter to us though and we were soon on our way in to Fantasyland. There we collected some fast passes for Peter Pan which we ended up not using but it means that we can use them in our scrapbook. Instead of staying in the Parks we decided to go back to our hotel to go swimming. Yay!
Not a very flattering photo of me!
Of course this time it was easier to find because we had been before and there were only two other people in the pool when we arrived. In fact two of the life guards were outside when we arrived and we wondered it was even open. We had put our swimming things on before we left our room so we just took off our shorts and tops, put our things in a locker and went in. By this time the other people had left so we had the entire pool to ourselves.
I think it was about 1 o'clock ish so from our experiences it is good to go early afternoon if you want it to be quiet. The only downside to this was the the lifeguards were messing around a bit playing catch with a ball that kept going in the pool and we felt rude if we didn't give it back to them. That and that the slide wasn't working, which obviously isn't a big deal but perhaps would be disappointing if you have children…or like the slide (not me, of course…) again we made the mistake of going from the jacuzzi back in to the pool! No one's fault but our own. Charlotte got out first because she was cold so went to sit in the sauna! We joined her soon after which was a bit silly because we were almost dry and then just had to have a shower.
The three open showers were freezing cold so we used the single one with the curtain over but obviously kept our swimming costumes on! There is body wash/shampoo on the wall in case you forget your own which is nice.
Then we went back to our room, dried our hair and got ready to go back to the Park for the parade at 5 o'clock. I think we left at about 4:00 and this proved an okay time to arrive and get front-row seats. Charlotte sat down and Beth and I went to get BTM fast passes. We must have been gone for a little while because Charlotte, bless her, was very bored when we arrived back! I then went to fetch a drink from Casey's using the voucher that we got with our hotdog but the queue was massive and by the time I was heading back it was definitely difficult to weave through all the people. Of course by this time we were expecting the parade to start soon but announcements kept coming on to tell us that there was an unscheduled delay. By this it meant that we would be waiting for another half an hour! It was a bit annoying but what can you do? A family were behind us and their girls were tiny so they went in front of us and their parents were very grateful. We would have to be really mean to not let two little girls who weren't even half the size of us see properly!
Having a rest whilst the music stopped!
Of course it was now 6 o'clock instead of 5:30 so we had to head to Rainforest cafe quickly in order to get back in time for Dreams. This of course meant that there was no time to redeem our fast pass before we went.
We made our way through the shop and under the fish (I love the fish!) and were seated straight away to a table opposite the elephant. We ordered our drinks and after a while our starter and mains too. For the life of me I can't remember what they were called, sorry! They were, however, delicious. Especially the starter which we could have quite happily eaten four of. Our mains were good too and we didn't have to wait very long at all. Our waiter was very nice even if he did ask if we were enjoying our meal at least five times! Better than not asking us at all though.
Even though we were full we still braved the volcano for pudding! Beth was determined to finish it all and did just that. The only thing that we were a little disappointed at was the lack of thunderstorms. I seem to remember them being very frequent, atmospheric and exciting but they seemed a bit half-hearted this time. Maybe because I am older now!
After we had paid we browsed through the shop for a few minutes (the talking tree is very creepy) but nothing took our fancy so we headed out of the rainforest and back over to Disney! It must have been near enough 8 o'clock because we sat in our Dreams spot straight away. I had remembered my Vinylmation that I wanted to swap so I headed over to the shop in Discoveryland whilst Charl & Beth waited. The cast member didn't speak great English but we managed just fine. I always feel so rude not being able to speak a second language when the vast majority of CMs at Disney and people from some other countries in general know two languages if not more!
I had an Indiana Jones Vinylmation that I swapped with a Robinson's Treehouse that was in the clear acrylic box. Then I swapped the weird thing with a top hat (!) for number 13 which was Small Worldd (yay!) and got Dopey who was in number 24 for my animal-with-a-beak that I don't know the name of! It's safe to say that I was very happy with that! However I have since read that only two swaps per day are supposed to be done with Vinylmation, perhaps the CM didn't know the rules or the language barrier proved difficult. I also bought some mickey shaped lollies as per Charlotte's instruction. I had to go and pay outside because they must have been near to closing. The two CMs there were very friendly and laughing with one another.
So I walked back over to our Dreams spot, Charlotte and Beth could see me right from the Discoverland entrance
(I don't know how!) so they stood up and waved which I was very grateful for because like earlier with the parade it had filled up substantially.
Dreams came on but we were disappointed because it didn't work properly! On about 3 occasions the projections stopped so it just wasn't as good, unfortunately.
Afterwards we headed out and went down Main Street instead of through the Arcade for once so that we could look at everything all lit up. Then in to the Village and World of Disney! We realised that just before the steps there are huge grates that have the railway underneath which was a bit weird. Beth was looking for presents for her sisters which proved difficult because they aren't that bothered about Disney (we're not quite sure what is wrong with them!) but after a little while she decided what to get. I think we resolved that we would go back in the morning because of course it was very busy.
Back at the hotel we were queuing for the lifts again but it didn't matter. The longer we could stay out of our room the more time until we had to start packing which of course meant going home! Obviously though we were soon there and managed to pack our clothes and tidy up a bit before going to bed for the last time!