Daddy/Daughter & Mommy/Daughter Days!
Hey There Everyone! As you may remember from the last installment, Roxy and I sat down with the girls and let them decide where to go on our “extra” Disney World day.
The envelope please!
Bean wanted to go back to MGM and Pumpkin Girl wanted to go back to EPCOT and hit the World Showcase (which we completely missed the first day due to bad planning and sickies). Bean wanted me to go with her …she’s like that if we’re doing something different or daunting. Makes my dad mojo shoot up a notch when she says only daddy will do …Hehehe. Kyra preferred going with Roxy, so it was settled.
We all piled in the van and I offered to Roxy that she keep the rig in case they finished their day first. So I drove us all to MGM and Bean and I gathered our stuff and gave big hugs n kisses to Roxy and sis and waved goodbye to them as they went off in search of EPCOT and their adventure.
I’m going to start off with Kyra and Roxy’s day at EPCOT because it is always “ladies first”
…one learns this lesson pretty quickly when surrounded by them – lol
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Roxy and Kyra finished dropping me and Bean off and made tracks to EPCOT, found good parking, and hit the turnstiles just as the park opened. They got inside and Kyra already had a list of things to hit/places to go. Their first stop was “Honey I Shrunk the Audience”, which they enjoyed.
Somewhere around that time Kyra realized that she had left her camera on the table back at the resort 🙁 It was the only day that I wasn’t there to take pictures and she was really looking forward to being “in charge” of getting pics as they walked around. Needless to say she was pretty bummed about it. Roxy bought a couple of disposable cameras from one of the shops and they started snapping pics here and there. Unfortunately most of them did not turn out but a couple are scattered here and there amongst the PhotoPass pics :-]
Somewhere in the early hours they hit the character stop and Kyra met up with some familiar friends
Their next stop was Journey into Imagination with Figment. Kyra really liked Figment and ended up with a Figment snow globe by the end of the trip 😀 From there it was off to ImageWorks where they did some really fun interactive stuff in there.
Then they hit Soarin’ and took the extra time to do the trivia test and got cool certificates from it. Roxy was nice enough to say Bean’s name when they asked so she got one too 😉
Innoventions East was their next destination for more interactive fun.
By the time they finished with that they were pretty hungry and stopped off at the Electric Umbrella for lunch. Standard counter service fare, but it did a good job to give their legs a rest and refuel them for their next stop which was Spaceship Earth. They thought it was pretty cool …I forgot to ask Roxy if she noticed any of the changes from when she was there in the 80s.
Innoventions West was next and I believe that is where Kyra made me a cool little gray/green robot that has a proud place amongst my toys in my office at work.
Note that I just took this picture on 2/23/2022 – so that little robot and a friend are still sitting in my office 14 years later!
Back to our story. Now it was time to make the big transition and hit World Showcase! Kyra had a grand plan for catching as many characters as she could that afternoon. They started in Canada and buzzed through it pretty quickly. Next stop was UK where they caught up with the White
Rabbit
And the Queen of Hearts
And Snow White
Rolling on into France they ran into Princess Aurora
Followed by Belle and the Beast
No rest for the character-seeking the zoomed into Morocco and found the Genie (just missed Princess Jasmine)
After some more walking the encountered the whole Aladdin crowd (I’m assuming still in Morocco)
They looked around a bit and then moved on to Japan. Here’s where they hit a bit of a cultural oops and started looking for Mulan there. No Mulan to be found of course so they left Japan and skipped the American Adventure (since they were character hunting and already had the “classics”). They glanced at Italy and made it to Germany, where
they stopped to shop.
Kyra’s favorite thing to collect is bells and they had a wonderful crystal bell in one of the shops. Unfortunately the one she picked out was cracked. They told her they could find another one and that they did engraving, so she asked for her name and the year (2008) to be engraved on one. It turned out that one of the CMs had to leave the store to go to some other store room to find one and then get it engraved. It was going to take about 30 minutes for the whole thing so they decided to…
…you guessed it, go back to Japan to look for Mulan again. It is a sad truth that I’m the geography person in the family and wasn’t there to save them the extra legwork. At least this time they were told that she was in China. On their way they stopped for a quick rest and refuel, getting Funnel Cakes at the American Adventure – yum yum!
They stopped back into the shop in Germany and the bell was ready – yay! From there it was of course on to China …only to find out they had just missed Mulan 🙁 So they headed over to Mexico and rode the 3 Caballeros and got a sig and Pics with Donald.
On to Norway and Maelstrom. They were going to see the show but missed it due to a bathroom break.
With that they decided they had gotten their fill of world travel and returned to Future World. The line was short for Test Track, so zoom zoom!
From there they did some shopping, largely in Art of Mickey and picked up a framed Mickey & Minnie for Roxy’s best friend and a couple of posters (which we now have proudly framed at home). They had a very full day and decided to call it a day. They strolled out the gates and Roxy gave me a call to tell me they were on their way to pick us up.
Next up my Bean AKA “the whipmaster” tests my endurance for thrill rides and my ability to criss-cross the park as we have our MGM Day!
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So rewinding to the beginning of the day again, we waved good-bye to Roxy and Kyra and headed for the turnstiles. It was a pretty nice day with a decent amount of sunshine and a high expected to be in the low 70s. We had a great spot in line …maybe 5 people back in our queue. The CMs were milling around and talking to each other as they got ready to open. Right before they were going to start letting people in Bean had to have a potty break. Good old bladderus interruptus.
So we went off to the left of the entrance to the bathrooms just past customer relations. While she was in there I finally remembered to pick up “1st Timer” buttons. Yeah, 9 days into the trip and I remember the buttons 😛 I was able to get one for me and Bean, plus and extra for Kyra. They were the last 3 the CM working the window had – Whoohoo!
She came out and I gave her the button and we were on our way in. We made a quick stop at the stroller rental and picked up her “ride”. By this time the good people at “InTheCan” Pictures were
doing their thing
I asked Bean if she wanted to watch the show and she answered quick as a shot that she wanted to get down to Rock “N” Roller Coaster (RnRC) and Tower of Terror (ToT) while everyone else was watching this. Oh yes, she was coming to the ways of working the Disney system just fine – Hehehe.
We ran into another lively character at the end of the road
She was quite talkative but we had other things in mind:
We had gotten to ride RnRC once on our first MGM day and ToT 3 times. Bean wanted to at least match her 5 times of riding ToT in Disneyland when she was five. So I snapped a quick pic of her in front of the guitar
Then we grabbed FPs and headed down the standby lane, which had a 10 minute wait posted. Before we went in the door I grabbed a shot of ToT
And on we went inside. The line actually didn’t form until right about here
So we were quickly in to see the guys
We get the invite and head “around back” to wait for our limo. The club across the way was rockin’
We rode the in the second car that time and it was fun, but a bit crowded with my long legs and camera backpack. Soooo away we went back around – FIVE MORE TIMES before getting to a point where the line was getting longer …meaning it was just starting to go out the door – lol.
We waited through that last line for our 5th line and low and behold it was FP time! Yup, you got it – SIX times in a row!!!
After the first time we decided we would wait to ride in the first car – more leg room for me and a much better view for Bean 😀 The CM running the ‘first car’ queue got to know us very well. He was very fun and talked to us while we waited. After the first couple of times we wouldn’t even have to ask, he’d just immediately wave us into the waiting area when we came up.
We were actually kind of bummed that he wasn’t there for ride number six. It was fun talking to the other people – especially since we were next to first time riders almost every time and Bean got to boast about her riding prowess. Anyways, here’s a shot of us “flooring it” down the entrance tunnel. I was driving of course ;-]
With all that under our belts do you think she would give ole dad a break? No way Jose! We were off to ride ToT!
We grabbed FastPasses and strolled up the standby line, which was at 15 minutes. I was interested in seeing what I could capture this time around so I went into geeky camera guy mode. The first time in I didn’t take any shots of the gardens or lobby, instead tweaking settings for low light inside the ride. I caught these on the first go of it:
Poor lost souls
“Time” to go for a ride
The funky bands of light opening up
Swirly weirdness
And yes, you got it – Bean going full tilt and me on another thrill ride playing with my camera
The next time around I get some obligatory lobby shots
I even ran over and got a quick pic of the directory
And then it was back into the ride!
And then I test my manual dexterity to switch to auto/high-speed settings and catch a beauty shot out the open doors at the top!
I snapped a pic of the screen on the way through and this time I’m not fiddling …I’m POISED FOR ACTION! to catch that view out the window – hehe. Also notice the dad on the far left giving the camera a “hey, do I know you”? 😀
I then put the camera away and we went through on standby one more time. When we came off it was still short of our FP time. I looked at my watch and saw it was getting close to time for the Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular and convinced Bean that it was time to move on from the thrill rides.
We knew we wouldn’t make it back in time, but honestly couldn’t find anyone to take our FastPass tickets because standby was still only 10-15 minutes! I ended up just putting them on the ToT FastPass machines so the next lucky couple could find a happy discovery. So now, off to Indiana Jones!!!
I had given us a good buffer of time to get there and get seated so we ended up front row towards the left in the theater. They did the pre-show stuff and Bean was bummed that the volunteers had to be grown-ups :-[ I took a couple of shots while we waited
After some pre-show skits were done the show began and in came our valiant hero!
Much jumping and dodging ensued
He made it off the floor but his perilous journey was not over!
Hey, who opened up the Pit of Despair???
The treasure is in his grasp…
…Huzzah!
The rock says “Look, I’m squishing your head” 😀
Farewell steadfast hero
Hey! Wait a minute! What kind of show are we runnin’ here?
Bye bye temple…
During this interlude it was my pleasure to teach my young one about all that was Indiana Jones. Up to now she had been very apathetic about watching the movies. I had tried to get her to do so at home before our trip but after the bad experience on the Indian Jones ride at Disneyland she wanted nothing to do with it. But now she suddenly had a keen interest for it – lol
As an aside, she has now watched all three movies and is waiting for number four to come out!
…hello marketplace
When we left off a truck was getting in the way but it moved on 😀
I AM the Lord of the Dance!
…oh yeah, we’re supposed to be chasing the good guy
Is it just me or it there something just plain wrong with what the bad guys have going on here?
Hot potato!
Fear the whip
He can fly, he can fly, he can fly!
Exit Stage Right!
Tarzan and Jane eat your heart out 😀
No really, I just want to talk to you about your long distance service!
Time to take the plunge!
Bring on the extras!
Hey, where’s Marian?
…ohhh, here she comes 😀
Oops!
DHS’s Fire Dept.
Now those extras get to take part in the show in a stunt fighting demonstration. Bring on the rube!
Hey, did he steal that off the Backlot Tour???
Here it comes….
The Grand Finale…
Can you feel the buildup???
Ye ole calm before the storm?
More milling about
Oh yeah, we have to leave if the good guys are going to come out and try to escape 😀
…here they come!!!
…
…
…ANNNDDDD CUT!
That was it. End of show. They apparently had some technical difficulties that did not allow them to do the finale safely :-[
We shuffled out with the disheartened masses and I stopped to get a pic of a rusting truck
…and another one with Bean in front of the tank.
Tune in next page to see Bean go To Infinity and Beyond!
By then time we finished with Indiana Jones we were getting pretty hungry so I asked Bean what she wanted to eat. She said pizza so off we went to Toy Story Pizza Planet. We got a couple of slices and salads and headed upstairs away from most of the noise. It was actually a very nice meal by a window where we ate and talked about all of the adventures we had already had and what we wanted to do next.
I looked at the schedule and saw that Buzz and Woody were at Al’s Toy Barn, so we finished up and headed that way.
Here is bean getting ready with her autograph book
Buzz said “Hi Space Ranger!”
Hello to both of them
BIG HUGS!!!!
AND KISSES!!!
More Hugs!
And Strike a Pose 😀
We moved on with the Backlot Tour as our destination. We stopped at the umbrella and waited and waited and waited and finally gave up waiting for the “rain” and snapped a shot.
Of course as soon as we started walking off the rain started up 😛 Oh well – on to the Backlot Tour!
Some movie props and models in the entrance area – first some stuff from the Pirates of the Caribbean movies
Then a model of the Arizona from Pearl Harbor
On to the special effects show. It was too cold to have the audience member go get drenched in the “room” (made up like the inside of a ship’s bridge), so they just did some bullets and pyro stuff.
Into the prop warehouse. We were a smaller group so there wasn’t much time to stop and really look at the stuff they had in there.
A bit of Narnia
I think this is stuff from the Flintstones movie
Ye ole shrink ray
And before you knew it we were on the tour vehicle. As we were pulling out I could see that we were in for a special treat! The Lights Motor Action Stunt Show was going on – Whoohoo!
Here is the “good guy” car next to one of the “bad guy” cars just as they are speeding back into the stunt arena.
The bone cages from Pirates II
The LMA practice track
And a couple of shots of the prop P-47 from Pearl Harbor
The day had been warmer earlier, but had turned cloudy and a bit cooler by this point, as attested by the gloomy horizon behind the water tower
We rolled inside and I managed to catch a couple of decent shots of the costume area
Graphic arts
And set design
We came out of the warehouse area and I caught a quick shot of the two “water towers”. Funny thing is that the topiary water tower actually has more water in it since the big one is just a prop – lol
And then it was on to the models. These things are very cool and I would have loved to have been able to jump out and walk around these things. The first one was from the Jodie Foster movie “Flightplan.”
From Flightplan to Con Air
Cycle from Indiana Jones III
Walt’s ride
And on into the canyon
All seems quiet
Uh oh…
BIG Uh Oh!!!
That’s a LOT of water!
Well Okay, THAT’S A LOT OF WATER!!!
The water started to pool on our seat and I after brushing it back with my hand a few times I managed to get away with only minor soakage of my pants – lol. But I protected Bean from it and my camera stayed dry so all was well ;-]
As we came out we saw the Herbie halves sitting behind the stands – so cool to get a literal “behind the scenes” look at the insides that made that stunt work!
And saw the cars racing out from one of their scenes.
The good guy exited – stage left, but the bad guy is heading right for us 😀
He zooms by, but just as he goes behind us one of his partners in crime comes screeching to a halt right in front of us
As we go by he gives us a wave :-]
Don’t know what pod things are but the crypt is from the Haunted Mansion movie.
Stuff from “Mighty Joe Young”
Flight of the Navigator
Star Wars stuff
A couple of cool props from “The Life Aquatic” – great movie 😀
A beat up Herbie
Hotblack Desiato’s shop from “The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy” movie
A couple more crypts – also from Haunted Mansion
And a quick shot of the City Skyline as we pull back in to the station.
When you come inside you walk through a display of famous villains so I took a couple of shots.
Captain Barbosa
Ye ole Storm Trooper
And a villain that needs no introduction
Tune in next time for a trip on The Great Movie Ride ……and there was much rejoicing!
*the peanut gallery goes “yaaaayyyy” with lackluster enthusiasm*
We did a little more looking around in the Villain display and then strolled out to see that the Cars were out saying hello. Bean isn’t as much into characters and wasn’t interested in waiting in line to get a pic with them so I just waited for a moment in between parents bringing up scared/enthusiastic little ones to get a shot of them by themselves.
As we strolled out I had Bean stop real quick to get a shot under the ton of bricks 😀
We walked through the Streets of America just taking it all in but didn’t stop for any pictures. After that we curved our way around onto Commissary Lane and around to The Great Movie Ride.
I had been hesitant to ride this one because of bad reviews on the DISboards website, but Bean really wanted to and there was hardly any line. We went in so fast I only got a shot of the carousel horse in the lobby.
before we were on our “boat”. In hindsight I should have held off and got us a front row as we were second to last and it was hard for Bean to see everything.
Anyways – on with the show!
This was a tough one to catch because of the weird lighting and screen over the whole thing
The Duke
He’s still singin’
Bad guys waiting in the wings
Uh Oh – it’s a stick-up!!!
Bank job gone bad
The cowboy jumps on board and hijacks our trip
Get ‘em Sherriff!
I don’t know about you guys, but this replica of Ripley is scarier than the Alien itself ;-]
More Raiders to keep Bean’s interest in the series up
The greedy cowboy goes bye-bye and our tour guide retuns
Faces only a cryptkeeper could love
Now how did the monkey get named Cheetah?
Couldn’t catch Tarzan, but howdy Jane!
Here’s lookin’ at you kid
Mickey making magic
Ooops, did I do that?
We represent …The Lollypop Guild
Hello my pretty
Follow, follow, follow, follow…..Everybody sing it!
The “oldies”
…and the “goodies”
There ended our float along the GMR river. Bean actually liked it and was up for going again (she had said this about backlot too) and I enjoyed it myself. Great movie nostalgia throughout.
I looked at our list of things to do and said what I had last time – “once we’ve finished doing the other stuff you wanted to do, we’ll see” 😀
We moved along and found that The Little Mermaid was about to start. With this show we learned a very important lesson in where NOT to line up. We ended up sitting in the front row on the very end. It was a horrible, horrible view, especially for Bean – even with her in my lap.
I took a few pics in there, but with no flash it was a real dice roll. It should be noted that the next pic puts me at picture number 1,300 on our little photographic journey …and I still have over 2 days to go – lololol
Fishies
Cue Ariel
And ye ole evil sorceress Ursula!
Quite the stage presence!
And there goes her voice
Hey, when did I end up at a Pink Floyd concert???
The battle ensues
Cue Ariel again
Transformation time!
Some day my prince will come! Oh yeah, wrong film
I looked back at the schedule and it said that the Incredibles were down in or around “Walt Disney: One Man’s Dream”, which is something that I wanted to check out anyways so we headed in. It was cool to see the history of Walt and all of the memorabilia they had in there and Bean really liked looking at the models of the different castles. The movie was cool too ….I think there were maybe a dozen of us on the whole place so we sat front row center.
Never did see the Incredibles anywhere inside or out. Must have misread that one.
We left there and walked back down to the thrill rides – Bean was itchin’ to do one more trip on each. I had kept track of the schedule for Beauty and the Beast and it was showing and had the crowds distracted 😀 We hit Rock n Roller Coaster first, which only had a 20 minute stand-by –
look, recording equipment ooohhh-ahhhhh!
It was fun and we of course sat in the front car.
Now it was on to Tower of Terror! We were walking up to the entrance and Bean told me she wanted to ask the Bellman a question. I said sure and she walked up to him and said “how come you guys never smile?” He looked at her and said that they do smile but they don’t get many so
they have to save them up! He then got down on one knee and posed for a picture with her 😀 😀
It was a very cute moment.
I figured I had taken enough ToT pics earlier so I kept the camera in its bag and just enjoyed the ride with my wonderful daughter. This brought her ride total up to EIGHT TIMES on BOTH ToT and RnRC!!!!
We were hungry again by then so stopped at the Sunset Ranch Market for dinner. I can’t even remember what we ate – lol.
We were actually running out of attractions to go to at this point. I looked and saw that the Monster’s Inc. characters were going to appear soon and she was up for that. Here’s a pic while we waited
Just before they opened the door Bean said she had to go to the bathroom. I asked the couple behind us if she could hold our place, partly in words and partly in hand signals because they didn’t speak English – lol. We got her to the bathroom and back just in time and I thanked the couple for saving our place.
Here she is with Mike and Sully
We strolled around and walked by Star Tours but decided not to ride it
I did have Bean get on the speeder thing and did one of her just sitting
and another that I did some photoshop tweaking on that has her really riding on it with no supports 😀
We walked around the corner and did Drew Carey’s Sounds Dangerous. Both Bean and I were pretty unimpressed by that one. I would only go back in there if I went to DHS on a REALLY hot day and wanted to go somewhere to cool off.
We strolled around a bit and I took a few shots as darkness descended on the park
There was this stupid cart in front of that hat…
…so I ended up angling my shots to try and keep it out of the frame
It was starting to get close to Fantasmic! time so we started heading that direction. I snapped a pic of the water tower and of one of the store fronts.
The “In The Can” cast was at it again
We left them behind and took the walk up to the arena for Fantasmic! We eventually worked our way to the front row, just right of center. People started really squeezing in, but we held our own and kept our seats. The crowd wasn’t as lively as the last time we were here, but we still did a few
decent human waves. I took a shot of the set before the show started
We had the “luck” of sitting almost right in front of one of the toy vendors and I ended up buying her one spinny-lighty thing and Bean used some of her own money to buy another. After a while we
heard the now familiar “monologue ending with “We now invite you to join Mickey and experience Fantasmic!, a journey beyond your wildest imagination.” 😀 😀 😀
Cue the lights!
Here’s Mickey!
Bring on the human flower :-]
On came the black light animals
And those funky monkey things
I only took a pic of Jiminy during the bubble sequence
I claim this land!
…no you don’t
No really, I claim this land
Okay, maybe I don’t :O
Go John Smith!
Sing it Pocahontas!
And in an odd theatrical transition, cue the floating Princes and Princesses!
Playtime is over!
Bubble, bubble, toil and trouble
Give us a hug!
No hug!?! Fine – then bring on the snake!
Watch out Mickey!!!!
Peek-a-boo!
A close call for Mickey
Rubbing the lamp brings unexpected results
Big, fiery unexpected results
Mickey tames the beast!
…and brings on the magic
Gathering power…
Liftoff!
Mikey’s sword dies out with the lights. The mountain goes dark and then shines like a blanket of stars
Then a special surprise comes around the river bend
Hi everybody!
The character Steamboat continues its journey – I took LOTS of pics of the boat trying to catch a shot of all of them.
I hope that’s a new dance move Goofy ;-]
Off they sailed
Bring on the FIREWORKS!!!
Here comes Wizard Mickey to conduct the show!
The show ends and we wander out with the shuffling masses …or at least I wander and Bean rides in an abandoned double stroller that we traded up for at a CM’s suggestion (apparently lots of parents ditch them there at the theater rather than taking them back to the front).
We strolled up towards the hat and I had Bean get out for a quick pic
One more shot of the hat
…and then around to the boat
Past that Hollywood and Vine all buttoned up for the night.
Bean wanted to pull the rope one more time outside of the Indiana Jones Stunt Spectacular so we rolled around up there. Interestingly enough they were doing a show – it was after hours so it must have been a special presentation or something. I tried to get a CM’s attention, but they were way up top just behind the seats and it was too loud for them to hear me.
Since we had missed the finale I was sorely tempted to “jump the ropes” and see if we could get in just to see the end, but I didn’t want to risk ending our special day with security escorting us out of the park ;-]
We got a call from Roxy and Kyra saying they were wrapping it up at EPCOT, so we walked back towards the front and did a little shopping until they called to say they were there. We all went back to the resort with another special day of memories under our belts. And tomorrow
we had our big day at Discovery Cove to look forward to!!!
