I really wish I had written summaries! Usually I can remember pretty easily. But this was a stressful trip with the luggage issue and I think I didn’t have enough space left in my brain!
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Thank you Clare for all the great pics and for doing 1 day at a time so I can keep up. Don’t get me wrong, I also love live TRs, but I feel like I can keep up here
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This is much more my speed 
I’m not even getting a full day done every day.
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LOL. He doesn’t know what he’s talking about.
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Well the important part was the great day, not the sleepless night!
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OMG. That poor baby should have booties on to protect their paws!!
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The ones I saw in the parks all did but I still can’t believe it was pleasant for them.
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Hopefully the humans they were serving were giving them adequate water. I feel like that’s really where you can tell the people who have legitimate service dogs vs. the “bought their stuff off the internet” - both in making sure that their paws are protected, they’re getting adequate water, etc. and also because if a dog is truly a trained service dog, it will be used to being out and about with their human in all kinds of weather. The “internet service dogs” are most likely not used to being out in the elements as much and yeah, they will suffer more.
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All? 
Oh the poor kid 
I don’t understand how they can lose your bags and tell you there’s no compensation for that! I don’t blame you for crying.
What is it, exactly?
How kind of them, to step up where the airline responsible for your predicament did not!
POFQ is so dang pretty. I really need to stay there.
Oh no
CLASSIC! Love it 
This is totally not public 
It really is something else, isn’t it??
LOL nice pun!
Wow you’re still at morning time? It started off questionably but you’ve done a lot to this point! Bravo!
Well earned!
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I (sort of) recently discovered Oofos and can DEFINITELY see myself touring in those, despite never being comfortable in flip flops for touring before. When I was on Nassau last weekend some colleagues and I were on a walking tour for about 4 hours and they were so comfortable. Expensive but worth it. They’re all I’ll buy going forward, honestly!
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Did I say all? I meant all the ones they could be arsed with 
Vimto is basically a mixed fruit drink. Originally it was just a cordial that you mixed with water but at some point they started producing it as a fizzy drink.
You should definitely stay at POFQ! We love it.
It was a fantastic morning, mainly because of our golden ticket!
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Home of Harry Styles???
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No because he’s not from Manchester. He’s from Holmes Chapel, it’s about 30 miles away. Much closer to where @sanstitre_has_left_the_building lives than Manchester.
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Day 4 - Animal Kingdom morning
I am so unimpressed by AK being open at 7.30 which is ridiculously early and shutting at 8 which is also ridiculously early. We left our room at 6am and the bus came at 6.07. Look how happy I am! We stopped at all the Riverside stops on the way, nobody got on.
There weren’t many people ahead of us but there were quite a few buses just arriving so we hustled to the security line. I think we had about 20 people in line before us, not bad at all. And it was a beautiful morning for it.
We were first at the furthest left taps and they opened at 7.14 but we were held on the bridge to Pandora till 7.23.
They walked us back then but only to the queue entrance. It wasn’t running early today! In fact they held us there until 7.32. I was still glad we’d been there so early when I saw the hordes of people behind us.
So at 7.32 we were walked through the outdoor queue but not allowed inside for a few more minutes! I was quietly furious. I wanted to get on the ride! They walked us through the lab which I’d never seen before, so I finally got a proper - though very quick - look at the floating Na’vi, that was nice. We’d done it at RD on a previous trip but skipped the lab, and hadn’t done it standby any other time. We were 7th and 8th on the first ride of the day. But then we had the extended preshow again!! There must have been something wrong, they stopped us at every opportunity. We weren’t off the ride till 8.02 after the park had opened at 7.30 and it’s a 4.5 minute ride! It was a joke. Still it’s a great ride.
We grabbed some photopass pics while we were there.
From here we went back across in front of the tree to Dinosaur. We’d booked a slightly later safari LL, I didn’t want the first of the day as last time we did that we barely saw any animals.
Dinosaur was fine as always. We enjoy it.
Then I persuaded Joe on to Triceratops Spin - I will never know how! It was the first time for all of us. We had to replace Primeval Whirl with something I guess. I quite enjoy all these spinning rides that we’ve always skipped.
We went back to Pandora again to ride FOP with our ILL, and stopped for some more photopass pics.
Now it was time to head to Africa! I think we were actually a little early for our safari LL so we did the Gorilla Falls trail. I always enjoy this! There weren’t many gorillas to be seen today though.
Now it was time for our safari! It was pretty good. The ostriches kept walking around the trucks holding us up. Not quite a giraffic jam but close!
It was about 10.30 when we got off the truck and we had an early lunch mobile ordered at Harambe Market at 10.45, so we went for a look round. I really wanted to find the ‘most beautiful’ wall which I couldn’t find the last time we were there. I did find it this time!
Harambe Market was very quiet at that time and felt so laidback! It’s a nice setting. The squirrels are super bold though! The food was great - except the Simba cupcake. I bought it because it was cute but I didn’t eat much, it was vile!!
From here we went to Asia for our Everest LL. I spotted another photographer along the way though and made poor Joe stop again. He hates having his picture taken. He couldn’t even raise a smile.
We did enjoy the parrots (?) from Winged Encounters flying overhead. It took us by surprise!
Everest was great though! It was more or less a walk on with LL.
After this we had intended to do single rider a few times, but Joe took one look at the queue and said he was done. It was long! He went back to FQ while I got in line. I have never known it to go so slow! I was about 30 people back and it took forever. I was about 10 minutes just standing in direct sunlight and it was the hottest I had been the whole trip so far, I thought I was going to keel over. So once was enough for me! I’d been hoping that we would see either FotLK or Nemo on this day and save the other for the next week. But I really just couldn’t be bothered and set off to walk out.
On the way, I heard Kite Tails starting so I stopped to watch. It was Jungle Book. It left me speechless. I can’t even venture an opinion. Though I won’t stop to watch again.
As I got outside the park, there was another photographer so I thought why not! I wouldn’t have made Joe stop again, I swear 
It had been a fun morning but I was glad to get on that air conditioned bus!!
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Such great pics! AK is sooo hot, but I still love it.
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My family yotally agrees with you. Plus it makes me and DH slightly nauseous. So its one and done for us.
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Day 4 afternoon/evening - Disney Springs, Magic Kingdom and Tambu Lounge
Back at FQ I spent some time talking to my parents about the form they were completing for my missing luggage. Then not 5 minutes after we had it sorted, the phone rang and it was the front desk asking could they deliver the suitcase Aer Lingus had just dropped off! I can’t tell you how happy and excited I was, I asked them to bring it up straight away and gave them a huge tip!
It had in it most of the shirts I’d ordered from Etsy - not my 50th anniversary one though - my Ariel Loungefly and ears, and my Epcot ears from Etsy. There was other stuff as well, notably the top half of my Harry Potter pjs and the tops of 3 bikinis. My packing had been somewhat erratic 
It also had some Pooh flip flops my mum had bought me for the trip which I was thankful to see as my toes were all swollen and sore around the toe post of the Roxy ones I’d bought at DS our first night. Most of my Harry Potter shirts and my HP Loungefly were in the missing case though and we were going to Universal the next day. Still, I felt pretty confident now that it would probably turn up the next day or two.
We had a Homecomin’ reservation at 5 and I wanted to do some shopping beforehand, so we left about 3. It had just started raining quite heavily so we didn’t even go to see if the boat was running, we just got the bus. We had a wander around World of Disney but didn’t buy anything, then I went to the Christmas shop and got a new ornament.
We asked for inside seating at Homecomin’ - we had sat outside on our previous visit and it was nice but that was a bit later in the evening. They said they would text but when I said I had a UK number they seated us straightaway. That happened a lot. It was so good! Joe had the Art burger and I had Art’s Famous Fried Chicken and I think my cocktail was called the Local. It had coconut water rum and pineapple in it. I was determined to leave enough space to eat the chocolate pecan pie this time. But sadly I didn’t 
After Homecomin’ Joe went back to FQ and on to HS where he had a great night on his own. I went to the Alex and Ani shop and bought myself a new bracelet. I was meeting @AllmadhereUK at 8pm at the Poly. It was way too early but I thought I could go and look around. Then I had another idea - I could go to the Contemporary and walk to MK for a bit!
So that’s what I did. I waited quite a while for a bus but I wasn’t in a hurry. And when I got there, I had a quick look round.
Then I walked to MK. I can imagine that it’s great to get to rope drop and at the end of the night. But it seemed like a really long walk on a hot afternoon!
Once I got to MK though, I wasn’t sure what to do. There were quite a few rides I could get an immediate LL for and I considered Dumbo. But I didn’t feel like riding alone. So I went to take some golden statue and castle pics.
Then on my way out, I stopped for a few photopass pics.
I went to the boat dock and only waited about 10 minutes. There weren’t many people ahead of me but a lot joined the line after me. People were trying to squeeze on the boat. The last guy to get on had a huge folded up stroller. He tripped up coming down the step and dropped it. He had a carton of fresh strawberries balanced on top, and it went everywhere! It made a right mess. He got it cleaned up and we were finally on our way.
I’d never visited the Poly before and it made a good first impression coming in from the dock. But inside I found it quite chaotic. I don’t think I could stay there. It was so loud!
I made my way up to Tambu Lounge and met up with @AllmadhereUK. A UK liner meet over 4000 miles from home!! We got ourselves a table in a nice spot and had a good chinwag and a few cocktails for the next couple of hours. Since I was at the Poly I had to start with a Lapu Lapu - poor @AllmadhereUK has a pineapple phobia so I had to drink it extra fast to get it out of her sight 
Then I had a Pina Colava which was delicious!! @AllmadhereUK started with a Backscratcher, I can’t remember what she had next.
It was a really great evening with lots of laughs, but after my early morning and another to come the next day, I was longing for my bed. So we called it a night. I called a Lyft to get back to FQ.
I called at the front desk when I got back to let them know we were moving to Hard Rock Hotel for 2 nights the next day, and ask them to ring me when the other suitcase arrived. I was thinking I would come back for it since it had most of my Harry Potter stuff in it. They said they would not only ring but arrange for it to be delivered to me there! I was delighted!
Then I had to get to bed, we had a busy day ahead of us!
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Thanks!
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Neither of ever get any kind of motion sickness luckily. But it must be nicer not to be able to ride something rubbish than something great!
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It’s so cool you had a UK liner meet at Disney!!
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