Thursday, November 30
Epcot!!! (My favorite park for years’n’years!!!)
Twenty years ago, we scheduled a trip for early November, 2003. We stayed at the Wilderness Lodge, and we scheduled some fun stuff. There was a fireworks cruise for the Magic Kingdom fireworks, and a meal at California Grill. I had saved up a lot of money for my every-other-year Tinker Bell watch purchase, and I was ready to shop, shop, shop!!!
What I didn’t count on, twenty years ago, was that I was going to arrive in WDW with a full-blown upper respiratory infection that was trending toward pneumonia as well as, well, you know, other problems. That whole trip is a very vague memory, except for three things:
- I couldn’t walk around the World Showcase because of the respiratory infection;
- The Tinker Bell watch I bought needed major readjustments by a jeweler; and
- There was a whole day where I stayed in the hotel room and cried while my husband did laundry, hung out in the hotel bar watching college football, and my kids spent the day playing in the Wilderness Lodge swimming pool. Without adult supervision.
On the positive side, that’s the trip when my younger son Woodrow started eating very adventurously after an early lifetime of subsisting on NutriGrain bars, Oreos, and chicken nuggets. Another Food & Wine Festival convert for the ages!
And here we are. 2003 to 2023. What a difference a couple of decades make!
Amy again decided to hang back, but Randy was, as usual, totally game for the game plan. WOO HOO!!!
So this Thursday was supposed to be my last day in the parks this year. I had a plan to order breakfast from the Boardwalk Deli so we could sneak into Epcot from the International Gateway. The five of us – Wesley, Randy, Tobin, Woodrow, and I – piled into our SUV and drove over to the Boardwalk! Smooth sailing! Wesley and Woodrow picked up our breakfasts from the Deli. I briefly fussed at Tobin over his handling of his breakfast sandwich, but Wesley made me chill out. Ugh. Old habits die hard!!! Anyway, we ate bagel sandwiches on the BoardWalk, drank our coffee, and enjoyed the clear, cool sky. Soon we made our way over to the International Gateway without incident. Of course we were all stopped before being allowed into France. While we were waiting, the family next to us asked me to take a picture of them. I happily obliged, and then they pixie dusted me with their very own laser-cut ornament!!! LOL!! Happy people!!!
When the rope dropped, this mass of humanity moved with alacrity and we were soon in the queue for Remy’s Ratatouille Adventure.
OH. There was this thing. Uch. I’m such an idiot. It’s France, right? And I took French in high school and college, never used it for anything – well, there’s a story from Cherokee, North Carolina, in 1985, when I was a counselor for a girls’ summer camp, and the campers all went into a museum and the counselors were setting up in a park for lunch, and these French tourists showed up, and one of them was gorgeous, and one of my fellow counselors struck up a conversation with him and all the other counselors gathered around me while I translated what the French people were saying…
Right, that’s my one “I used to speak French” story.
So here we are, in the France pavilion, and just like every ride in Disney World, the guy at the loading dock – who is French! – is asking everyone how many people are in their party. And me, thinking I’m all clever and stuff, when it was my turn, I triumphantly yelled, “CINQ!” and held up five fingers cuz we had FIVE people in our party, and CINQ is FRENCH for FIVE!!! HA HA!!! I AM SO CLEVER AND LOOK AT ME, I SPEAK FRENCH!!!
:::cringing so hard:::
And the guy immediately replied in French, and I caught the gist of it, which was, “Wait here and when it’s your turn, I will direct you to one of those numbered lines next to a car,” (like Every Disney Ride Ever) but I didn’t really understand every word and while I stood there, I started worrying, “This guy is going to tell you something in a minute, and you are really not going to understand him,” so I finally 'fessed up. “Hey, um, I’m not really French, I speak English, I’m so sorry,” and he was really nice and didn’t roll his eyes at me for being a doofus.
But here’s the really cool part. When it was my turn to be directed to a car, he looked right at me and enunciated clearly, “Un … et … deux,” and I yelled, “ONE!!! AND TWO!!!” and pointed enthusiastically at the rows he had assigned me. Such a nice guy. He helped me feel like it was NOT stupid of me to try out my rusty old French numbers in the line for Remy’s.
And!!! We totally enjoyed the ride!!!
Well, how could we not? It’s completely adorable.
(I had no tags to give that lovely CM, but I did do a Cast Compliment on the MyDisneyExperience app. He was really – I mean – that’s the kind of CM magic that really makes me love Disney.)
After Remy’s, we headed out. I wanted to find a restroom. Wesley wanted to go back to the International Gateway and rent a locker. (It was already too warm for our jackets!) I had read that the restrooms at the UK pavilion were out of order. (AUCK!) So I went all the way to the restrooms at the thing in the place behind the hedges. ROFL!!! What is the name of that place? Millennium Village? Well, that’s what it was 20-odd years ago. I had never been back there, so I had never experienced those massive, massive restrooms. Wow!!! But I also ran into a few more people who were like, “Are there really any restrooms back here?!” The joint was kind of a maze.
When my group re-formed, we headed straight to The Land pavilion for Soarin’ Over California. So happy!!! OMG, OMG, OMG!!! I loved, loved that attraction in 2006. It’s amazing to me that I only rode Soarin’ Over California maybe 4 or 5 times, and then went 14 years before riding the computer-generated Soarin’ Over the World. I mean, it’s OK, but like the Avatar ride, it’s just fake. Reality on film is so much better.
We asked to be seated in the middle. I waited next to a lovely older lady who had mobility issues. She apologized a lot for how “slow” she was; as far as I was concerned, this just gives one more time to appreciate every detail and experience. She was so nice. I hope she had a great trip. We sat together in the middle and I cried. Sniffle!! Then she reminded me to look for the Mickey on the golf ball. ROFL!!! I had totally forgotten about it!
We were going to do Living with the Land next, but the queue was, like, 20 minutes and filling up fast. Woodrow and Tobin were working Tobin’s DAS pass and had a thing – a LL? – for Mission: Space in a little bit. In the meantime, they all wanted to tour The Seas. (So hard not to call it The Living Seas!!!) I was not interested at all, so I sat outside in the nearly empty stroller parking lot. Well, I was looking for shade.
I read the news on my phone and watched a family eat a very early lunch. They parked next to wall and pulled out sandwiches and baggies of blueberries and grapes, and they ate what looked like lunch. Seemed perfectly happy to be doing it, too! I am a spoiled American brat; I have known since 1996 that it is possible to be frugal in Disney World and carry your own lunch into the parks, but I have never done it, and I am pretty sure I would be a whiny snotwad if I had to eat a bologna sandwich while sitting outside a pavilion with a ton of awesome food offerings. (Hello, Sunshine Seasons is right over there in the Land Pavilion!) But that family was happy. It was a big family. Two sets of parents (I think the dads were brothers, but they didn’t speak English or French, so I’m not really sure), 5 kids, some of whom were still in strollers, and all of them happily monching away on sammitches and booberries. It was awesome!!! Kudos to them! I was whining to myself every time the sun moved so that I was out of the shade and into the sun, so I kept scooching down the wall to stay in the shade. Ugh! How long can 4 people stare at aquariums?!? This was taking forever!!!
Finally, my people came out and found me, and we crossed over to the other side to ride Mission: Space.
I love that ride!!! I’m always a little nervous – well, I’m nervous since our return trip in 2021. I am a lot heavier … and older … than I was when Mission: Space was new. But it’s always so good!!! The weightlessness is just so cool. Highly recommend this attraction!
At this point, we had done everything in Future World that we wanted to do (except Living with the Land, but that was still an hour wait), so we headed to the World Showcase where we turned left and started walking around the lagoon slowly, shopping and watching mariachi bands and whatnot. It was sunny and too hot within about 15 minutes, so I stopped at a stand outside China and bought a little bamboo umbrella. It was cute but impractical and I really just wanted the shade it provided.
By the time we made it to Germany, it was time for the men’s lunch reservation at Biergarten. I don’t actually like the Biergarten. I haven’t been there since 2006, so I should probably acquire an open mind and try it again, but ugh, I look at that price for an adult meal – SIXTY!!! DOLLARS!!! – and I just cannot bring myself to pay that much for a massive meat buffet. Meat, y’all. It’s meat with meat side dishes and a sausage array to defeat any vegetable which might threaten to accost some unsuspecting meat-eating man.
(I asked my people if my memory of the buffet remains accurate, and half of them said that there was salad, SO THERE, but ask them what kind of salad, and you don’t get good answers.)
Since Amy had not come with us, I had cancelled my reservation for Via Napoli much, much earlier. I just didn’t think it was worth it to eat there by myself. I planned to go to Les Halles, but I didn’t make it all the way to France before I got too tired of walking and too hungry to keep going. Instead, I stopped at Spice Road Table in Morocco and dined al fresco with a gorgeous view of the World Showcase Lagoon. I got the bread service (na’an with hummus and stuff) and the sampler, which came with kefta, spiced chicken, another thingy… Everything was fabulous except the lamb kefta. I’ve got to learn to stop ordering it. I just do not like it.
I kept in touch with my people who were stuffing themselves with enough meat and sausages to get the meat sweats, and I went back to Germany and got in line at Caramel Cootchie – er, I mean Karamell-Kuche – to get some by-gum caramel stuff. A woman in front of me was telling everyone around her what to order – she apparently goes there all the time, and everyone was just bowing to her greater knowledge. To be honest, I didn’t think you could really go wrong in there, but whatever. Everyone was having fun just standing in line and making up their minds. I got caramels and a ginger cookie sandwich that had both caramel and buttercream frosting in the middle. There were other things, but I no longer remember what all I got. I do know that when I paid and walked out, I thought, “Dammit, I should’ve gotten the caramel popcorn.” Kicking myself still!!! It smells divine in there!
(The cookie sandwich turned out to be Very! Sweet! I might not get that again the next time I’m there. It was good, of course, just really, really sweet.)
Tobin joined me in that shop (Caramel Cootchie) while I was in line. Wesley and Woodrow were shopping elsewhere. Randy had had enough of Epcot, and he headed back to the villa to hang out with Amy. (I think they were going to go somewhere outside the bubble.) Then it turned out Wesley was getting a shot glass in a German shop where they etch different things on the glassware, and he got a Dumbo shot glass. Cannot argue with that kind of taste!
Then we walked alllllll the way back to the Guardians pavilion and rode Guardians of the Galaxy, which was 6 kinds of awesome. We didn’t get the best song – we heard “Disco Inferno,” which is the second worst song you can get on that ride. (Wesley loathes “September,” but I can handle it more sanguinely than he.)
(The last time we rode, we got Blondie’s “One Way or Another,” which is perfect, but I just really want to hear “Everybody Wants to Rule the World.”)
There was some shopping, and Tobin decided to do more stuff in Epcot without the rest of us.
Annnnnnnnnnd… after that, it was time to go back to Saratoga Springs and get some major rest. We were planning to go back for Extra Evening time or whatever they call it now. I wanted to get a long nap and be ready for some late night shenanigans in my favorite park!!!
Before we left, though…
Of course, having parked at the Boardwalk, we had to go back through the World Showcase to the International Gateway. This is just one of the reasons that I walked 11 miles that last day in the parks. Parking at the Boardwalk… and it’s Epcot. Which I love, so I ain’t complainin’.
And, by the way, the walking didn’t kill me. My cardiologist loves my corgi puppy because she ensures that I walk at least – at least! – two miles per day (except on snow days when the snow is actually ice, ahem, January 15-22, 2024). Here’s a picture of Scupper, who keeps me in shape for WDW:
Yeah, she looks manageable like that, doesn’t she? HA.
By the way, I did not like the little umbrella I had bought at China. It was just super cute but not my cup of tea. (I prefer my lavender Totes umbrella. This was Lavender Umbrella’s third trip to Disney World, so it really knows how to shade me when I need it.) So when I got back to the resort, I made a tag that said, “You just found pixie-dusted shade!” and I left that cute bamboo umbrella at the bus stop. I really hope a child found it, but I’ll never know!
A long nap was, indeed, taken that lovely afternoon, and I hung out at the tiny dining room table for a while with my people. I love my people. Amy is my best, best friend, and I dearly love being with her. She is fun and smart. Amy was on “Who Wants to Be A Millionaire” some years ago. She sang “Everything’s Coming Up Regis” (to the tune of “Everything’s Coming Up Roses”) to Regis Philbin. Amy is awesome. If y’all ever get a chance to hang out with her, I do recommend it.
Somewhere around 8:00, I started getting ready to go back to Epcot, and Wesley pulled me aside and confessed that he did not want to go. What?! Inconceivable!!! LOL Not really, I totally understood. We had been going like mad for days, and he just wanted to hang out with Amy and Randy. And after all the nice things I just said about my sister, I really couldn’t blame him!
So Tobin and Woodrow and I went to the bus stop and caught a bus back to beautiful Epcot. We had some PhotoPass pics taken in front of Spaceship Earth, but I prefer one that I took.
We walked through the Moana water thingie, and it was sooooo cute. I kind of wish I had spent more time there. I kinda thought I would walk through it again later in the night, but we did not make it back there again.
Then we headed over to Living with the Land to ride the Christmas overlay version. Lovely!!!
I do love that ride!!! I’m sorry Wesley missed it. It’s beautiful at night! And we missed the fireworks while we were in there. Whew!!! I am not a fan of the interim fireworks. I’m still pretty annoyed that Reflections of Earth has ended. I loved that show so much.
I was starving by this time, so we walked to Yorkshire County Fish Shop in the UK pavilion for a much-anticipated serving of fish and chips. I used to always get fish & chips whenever I went to WDW back in the day. (1996-2006, when I first became a Disney freak and memorized the Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World.) I had not found time to go here in any of my recent renaissance trips (Sept 2021, April 2022, Oct 2022). (I mean, seriously, y’all, all the food at Disney is so much better now than it was 20-25 years ago.) So I was really, really looking forward to this dinner.
There was hardly anyone else there! It was awesome!!! We found a table on the terrace there, but we hadn’t gotten enough napkins or malt vinegar. Woodrow went back to get them, but when he came back, he stopped at the first table with people and started putting down condiments and utensils, while talking, only to realize that he was talking to strangers. And they!!! Had misunderstood him!!! They thought that he was telling them to leave!!! ROFL!!! Tobin and I were calling, “Woodrow! Woodrow!!! We’re over here!!!” We all laughed, it was fun, and then we ate very delicious fried fish and french fries and, oh, I was so happy.
While seated there in the lovely, empty darkness, we discussed what to do next. We looked at the wait times for Ratatouille and Guardians, cleaned off our table, and started walking slowly back toward Future World. Slowly. We encountered a pair of custodians doing water art on the sidewalk, so we stopped and watched that for a while. They drew Donald! My favorite! It was really good, too. We chatted with those guys for a few minutes; Woodrow confessed that he only had one session of learning water art, and he never does it.
Boo!
Then we walked up the Mexico pavilion to ride the Gran Fiesta Tour, which I haven’t ridden in years and years and years. Seriously. I think it was 1998 or so. I mean, once you’ve ridden it… Y’know.
It was adorable! And there was absolutely no one there!!! We chatted with CM’s and shopped at a leisurely pace in the open shops and kiosks. It was such a pleasant way to pass the time! Highly recommended!
When we finally left the Mexico pavilion, we were – OK, wait, this is a shock, I know, but – we were actually tired. The park was still going to be open for a while, but we were just ready to hit the Creations shop on our way out. I bought the Three Caballeros mug, but there was only one Tinker Bell watch in the whole place. And I mean, we scoured that joint in search of nice watches. There was a big blue Donald watch, but I’d never had a Donald watch. It was always Tink… back in the day… when you could choose from dozens and dozens of watches at all kinds price points. Now you’re lucky to find a half dozen watches in only the biggest stores in the parks.
And the prices… well, that’s changed, too.
Back to the bus, back to the resort, where I crashed. No upper respiratory infections, no hormonal-imbalance-induced day-long crying jags, no Tinker Bell watches. But! Finally, a chance to sleep late!
Miles walked: 11.4!!!