Disney Day 5

Hmm....we seem to be falling behind a bit in our updates. Stop slacking handler's and get blogging!!!

Okay, where were we? Day five was going to be interesting because we were scheduled to perform a rare Disney trifecta (visiting 3 parks in one day). This was not our original plan, but our earlier disappointments at DHS lead to this necessity. Our main goal of the day was to ride Toy Story Mania. Even though we got to the park shortly after opening, the fast passes were already for late in the afternoon. Knowing we wouldn't be staying that long, we decided to just get in line. A short 45 minutes later, we finally got to ride, and we thought it was well worth it.

We rode some other rides at Hollywood Studios, to justify our time there.

Then it was on to theme park #2 - Epcot.

See how happy the handlers are to finally really be experiencing the Food and Wine Festival!

Here is Handler 2 stymied by the choice between 15 beers from around the world. We finally decided on a flight of 3 beers, one of which was the 'Purple Haze'. That, my friends, is an excellent beer.

Okay, I have to introduce this little guy. He's a Vinylmation. What's that? It's the latest and greatest trading fad at Disney. The handlers couldn't care less about them and Handler 2 kept insisting they were stupid and he couldn't understand how they had become so popular so rapidly. However, after his beer flight, Handler 2 started thinking that maybe it might be funny to buy just one and trade it wherever he could and take pictures of each new one as we got it. So, here's our first (and only) vinylmation purchase. We'll post all of the ones we got in a future update.

And in a totally random occurence, the lady working the Chile booth turned out to be a snowbird based in Handler 1's hometown of Grosse Ile!

We sampled the offerings of New Zealand, Chile, Brazil and the Dessert and Champange booths, before ending up in Mexico.

While there, the handlers insisted we ride El Rio de Tiempo, which is basically the Mexican It's a Small World.

After that, we needed a stiff drink. Luckily, we had signed up for another seminar. This one was all about tequila tasting. Handler 1 thought it was very informative and actually gained a small appreciation for the drink.

After we were thoroughly watered (well Handler 1 anyways, as Handler 2 took one sip of each offering and made an 'icky' face before declining anymore) it was time to head back to the room and prepare for the evening's festivities.

A Halloween party requires a costume, so I decided to dress up as the scariest thing I could think of.

The handlers got into the fun as well. (If you don't get it, then you're not a J.J. Abrams fan).

The costumes ranged from the scary...

To the downright horrifying.

There's much to do at the Halloween party, not just going on rides in costumes and trick-or-treating. For instance, there's a special parade.

It's focused mainly on villans (or pseudo-villans) and the less desireable Disney folks.

The cool thing about this parade is that you get to see Disney characters that are never out at any other time. For instance, here's the hitchiking ghosts.

And fireworks, of course.

So, after one last ride on the Haunted Mansion, we headed off for bed.

Disney Day 4

Today we started out early so as to make our reservations at the handler's favorite breakfast spot! First stop was the Wilderness Lodge.

There we had an excellent and filling breakfast at the Whispering Canyon Cafe, and our friendly waitress Debbie was nice enough to take our photos.

After we stuffed ourselves, we made our way over to the Fort Wilderness Campground. Why? Well, something I've been leaving out of this tale thus far is Handler 2's new hobby. See, he recently got into geocaching, and although there are no real caches allowed on Disney property, there are a number of "virtual" caches. Handler 2 needed to get his picture here for one of them. But, since we were already at the campgrounds, we decided to look around.

We saw a bunch of the Disney working horses. Handler 1 was trying to figure out why all the ponies were cremellos (which means white coloration with blue eyes, a very rare horse coloration), then realized that, of course, these must be the ponies that pull Cinderella's royal coach for weddings and the like. Neat huh?!

Handler 2 thought it was hilarious that even the horses have Disney cast member name tags.

They really get into the spirit of things at the camprounds. These folks have completely decked their golf carts out in Disney Halloween theming.

These folks spruced up their campground (yes, that is a tent in the back...they have 20 inflatable decorations, but sleep in a tent).

I also attended an important summit for Gnomedom.

Such a nice fellow that Mickey the Gnome.

Then, it was off to the Magic Kingdom. Here it is in daylight (with bubbles).

The strangeness continued, as the Handlers insisted that I meet these giant chipmunks. They look as though someone has been experiementing on their brains. The one with the black nose noticed my old war injury from South Dakota and nonverbally chastized Handler 2 for dropping me. Well said giant black nosed chipmunk guy!

The chipmunks in the Magic Kingdom don't talk, but this trashcan does. Notice the guy with the bag in the foreground. I'm told that he is the trashcan's handler.

We decided to ride the Tomorrowland Transit Authority (recently, and amusingly, renamed as the Peoplemover) to take in some of the sites of Tomorrowland in comfort and relxation.

Handler 2 is on a horse.

This is the handlers' favorite ride, the Haunted Mansion. Eh, I didn't think it was that scary.

Handler 1 is unendingly amused by these birds and how they just roam everywhere around the parks.

We rode most of the rides in the park, and all of those the handlers actually cared to get on. After the day was done, Handler 1 found us a spot near the rose garden to take photos of the fireworks display.

Then we headed home to the hotel, in the hope that on the morrow, we might be able to score fastpasses for Toy Story Mania before sampling at the Food and Wine Festival.

Quote of the Day: "The answer to the question 'Do you want to go on the Haunted Mansion again?' is always 'Yes'."

Day 3 of the Disney Adventure

Today started off better than Saturday right from the beginning. First, we managed to avoid the smoke alarm wake up call. Second, after about 30 minutes on hold being forced to listen to cheery Disney music, Handler 2 managed to get ahold of the people at Lost and Found. Turns out, his glasses had been picked up! So, actually, nothing was lost (for very long, anyway). Handler 2 headed out to pick up his glasses from Lost and Found and Handler 1 stayed back at the room to help me with my blogging.

Eventually, we all met up at Disney's Hollywood Studios. As it was already about noon the chances for us to get fast passes for the (relatively) new ride Toy Story Mania were pretty much nil, however, we were hopeful that since the park was open until midnight that night we might be able to get on the ride much later.


One of the main attractions at Hollywood Studios is the Tower of Terror. Forget the Demon Drop and it's ilk, this thing drops you several time from a not inconsiderable height, after already creeping you out with Twilight Zone references. Handler 2 loves it, so the handlers always have to go on it.

This is how Handler 1 feels about Handler 2 after she's been on it.

We wandered about the park and went on a number of other rides.

Here's for all my geek peeps...

We also managed to catch a moment of the Jedi training academy and watched little kids make fools of themselves fighting Darth Vader with a plastic stick and attack moves it took all of 6 minutes to teach them. Still, it was kinda of cool.

For all my fencing peeps...

And this one's just for Carolyn.

Okay, guys, I get it. I'm short. But can we stop with the munchkin jokes for just a second?!

We could have stayed longer at DHS, but the handlers had reservations for a sit down dinner at the France pavilion in EPCOT. First, however, they stopped off to see the movie Impressions de France. They were hoping to get some ideas for our upcoming Europe trip. However, the film seemed a bit (a lot) outdated, and thus was unhelpful. According to the film, there is only one major city in France (Paris) and the only part of it you get to see is the Champs Elysees. Otherwise, everyone lives in quaint little villages, where they move their goods via wagons pulled by horses and split logs in front of stunning chateau visages.

Dinner was equally underwhelming (and definitely not worth what was paid). So, France was something of a disappointment, but no matter. It was off to Disney Hollywood Studios again to finish up our tour. It was dark by that point, and a lot of the guests had cleared out because it was closing time for the regular park (although resort guests got to stay late). Despite the fact that it was now about 10pm, and all non-Disney resort guests had left, the park was still crowded.

The handlers tried again to get into Toy Story Mania (also known as The Ride Which Shall Not Have Fast Passes), and failed. The wait was 80 minutes and the handlers weren't about to bother. So, we just wandered around the remainder of the park going on some of the smaller rides and just looking around.

This is Joe.

He was working the later shift at the Muppet 3D show and was willing to humor us in our boredom with the pre show. We got to go "behind the scenes" as it were.

Everything in Disney gets scarier at night.

But everything is prettier too. Handler 1 indulged her non-tripod, night-photo habit again.

After that, we braved the very full bus lines back to the resort and prepared for our early day the next morning.