Epcot Thursday

  Another beautiful day at Disney.  The weather was chilly again this morning, but warmed up around lunchtime. It is sunny and warm, so unlike home right now.

Waiting for everyone...

Our morning walk...

Getting ready for the Flower Show...

   Russ and I went to Epcot while the others went to Hollywood Studios. It was a lovely morning walk.  As you can see from the picture, there weren't many people around. It did get busier, however.
   Soar'in is our second favorite ride at Disney. We got a Fast Pass and then went right on. Love that ride. We went to the Living with the Land ride. It is so interesting to see all the things that Disney is experimenting with in agriculture. 

Growing in sand???

  We went on Soar'in again and loved it again. That's it for this trip.

Getting ready for the Flower Show

 

So  pretty...

   The walk back to The World Showcase is beautiful.. I love the walk. My feet don't love it, but I didn't listen to them.  
   We met up with everyone and had lunch at The Chinese Pavillion. No pictures 'cause I was hungry. We had white rice and orange chicken. Yum..
   We went on two more rides.. Mexico and Norway's water rides. When you are our age if you don't go on these rides every time you forget them.. Wicked fun.

Noah and Ezra outside Norway...

   The World Showcase was a busy place today. People were everywhere, but that's part of the fun and excitement.

The boatride at Norway

 

Mexico has a ride with Donald Duck.

   Russ and I walked to the American Pavillion and saw the movie called An American Adventure. It always makes me cry because it is so moving...

Eyore up close and personal

He kissed my hand.

  As we were walking Eyore came walking up to us for a photo op. I thought he was cute.  He kissed my hand as he started to walk away. How gallant!

Fun with family

  We got back to the room and rested for a short while 'til everyone came back. We then went to Smokey Bones to meet up with my sister, Phillis and her husband, Cary. We had a great meal and lots of fun with family. We miss seeing Phillis and Cary, but they may come up this spring or summer.

Phillis hates having her picture taken... I surprised her..

  Our time at Disney is almost over. We leave tomorrow around three for home. It's been a great vacation here. I won't be able to blog 'til tomorrow, so I will let you know what we did on the last morning . I think we are going to Magic Kingdom to check out some new rides we missed.

Mimi and Ezra

  Here are a few more pics from today..

Dinner tonight

The cornbread is delicious.

Hubby and a friend

So romantic

Hollywood Studios and Downtown Disney

   Russ, Connie, Chris, and Tom took the boat over to Hollywood Studios yesterday morning. It was a lovely day;sunny but a little cool. A perfect day for us. Well, it was perfect until Chris "took a header" on the walkway. There was a depression in the wooden walkway as it joined the cement. She stubbed her toe and fell hard. It knocked the air out of her and she had trouble breathing. It scared us to death. The Disney staff were great. We showed them the unsafe area of the walkway. They took notes and gave Chris a band aide for her scrapes. By the time we came back from the park it was fixed. They do want safety first.

Her elbows and one hand got scraped, too.

I ate this for breakfast 'cause Mom's loves oreos.

  I love taking the boat over. It's such a lovely slow going trip and you get to sit down. The captain was a hoot. He told jokes like.." I always thought I would be an astronaut, but my teachers knew I would be a sea captain because my rank card was in the High C's"... We liked him.
  Once we got to Hollywood Studios where did we direct our path.. right to Toy Story Mania. There was  a forty minute wait so we got Fast passes that were good at 12:40. But as we started to walk by we noticed that there wasn't really a line outside. We took a chance and decided we would wait. It was only a twenty minute wait. Not bad. I lost to Russ, of course. I wanted a rematch at 12:40.
  Chris and Tom had to head back to Beach Club to play miniature golf with the kids. Russ and I wanted to explore Hollywood Studios more.
  We went on the Star Wars ride which I had

Star Wars ride

forgotten how much I liked it.

Our favorite ride

   













 

Meatball subs

   We decided to eat a little early at Pizza Planet. This was a new place for us. The food was pizza; imagine that. They also had meatball subs. We chose that to be different. It was pretty good. Russ loved it.

I am not singing....

   We walked around a bit and took in the sights. There was an umbrella attached to a post with rain coming down over it like the Gene Kelly scene in :Singing in the Rain". Russ wanted a picture of me under it.

   We went on the Great Movie ride which is a great ride for people who love old movies. We didn't wait too long.

Once around again...

  Then we used our Fast Passes to go on Toy Story Mania again. I improved my score, but didn't beat Russ: "Drats"
   We had extra Fast Passes from Chris and Tom. Once we were outside we looked for someone to give the passes out to use. We found an older couple who had NEVER been on Toy Story. We explained the ride to them and they seemed pleased to get on.. Hope they liked it.

A great show

Car chase scene

  We decided to go check out another show called "Lights, Motors, Action".  It was a really good show. It shows how stunts are done in the movies using cars and motorcycles. One scene had a man on fire and a man falling off the side of a high building. Way cool.
    


  It was time to head back and go to the pool. It turned out to be a pretty wonderful day weather wise, too. We had a great time at the pool.

The candy store

   Everyone wanted to go to Downtown Disney. What fun. We took the bus. It was busy but not to busy. I love going there with all the excitement in the air. I got a new Mickey for my collection, plus some souvenirs. 
  It was a great day but my feet were killing me. The bus ride home was relaxing. What will today bring for excitement. I think we are heading to Epcot. I will eat my way through the countries.

Another Day at Disney....

   We had a great time yesterday at Animal Kingdom. We headed straight for the Safari Ride. If you get there first thing you see more animals. And did we see more animals. We could have touched an ostrich that was right by the truck. Ezra was amazed at all that he could see.





An upside down tree

                                                                    The weather was a little over cast but we were hopeful that it wouldn't rain while we were exploring Animal Kingdom. The safari truck had a canopy roof, too.                                        

Another safari group

    














A water buffalo, I think....



   This Safari ride was really one of the best ones we have been on. We saw the lions moving around and pretty clearly enjoying their morning. It's usually just the male sleeping.  



The lion and his mate

                                                             




Modeling for us

    We saw quite a few giraffes. They are so graceful when they walk. I have never gotten three giraffes together in one picture. It was almost like they were posing for us.
   We really love the Safari Ride. Everyone thought it was worth getting up early.


Thank goodness for strollers.

   





















This little guys was behind glass.

   We got off the ride and headed to the Walking Animal Forest. Ezra was being such a trooper. He thought the animals were awesome.


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  We saw a baby gorilla acting out for the crowd. He seemed to love the attention. He had a bottle he was playing with almost as if it were a doll. The crowd really loved it when he feel off the wheelbarrel. What a hoot!

We decided after all that walking and the skies were looking a little ominous, that we would walk towards The Festival of the Lion King. We have seen if before and really enjoyed it. We thought Ezra would like it. The kids wanted to shop and look around, so we left them behind. The show was fantastic.  

A great beginning to the show...

  The music and singing was awesome.  The costumes and the animaltronics took your breath away. Ezra loved it.

Very focued on the show



The animals move during the show.

 After the show we met up with the kids and decided to eat lunch at The Rainforest Cafe. The skies continued to look threatening so we thought it might rain while we were eating. Good thought..


Russ and I shared this yummy dish.

   













The food was great. We were hungry-a great combination.
   We wanted to go see It's a Bug's life, but it was not to be.. The rains came and we got wet. We hid out in a gift shop until it let up enough for us to make a run for the buses. We rested up in our rooms until the sun came out again.
   Half of our group went to the Premium Outlets in Orlando to do some shopping and the other half rested. Guess which half that was..ummmm.

A great spot for viewing

   We then caught a bus to Magic Kingdom to see the parade and fireworks. We found a great place right outside Pecos Bill's restaurant to watch the Electrical Parade. We were so close you could almost touch the floats. It was great.







Pete's Dragon

 


 











   To end the day we watched the fireworks in front of the castle. It was the end of another great day at Disney. Our feet were killing us so we caught the bus and headed for the hottub. We sat on the edge and dunked our feet in front of the jets. You could hear a round of "Ahhhs" from the crowd. Time to head for bed and see what tomorrow brings.



A great ending...







A Magical Day

  We started our day at Magical Kingdom. We we got there as the Disney characters opened the park. It's really fun to hear the music and feel the excitement with the millions waiting with us. Well...not millions, but alot of people.


Russ loves roller coasters...



   We headed to FantasyLand 'cause we had not really explored this new section of Magic Kingdom. It's wicked cute. Barnstormer is a new roller coaster for those who are faint of heart-namely me. I went on and had my eyes opened the whole time. That's bravery....

  The weather was a little overcast but very warm. I think it was in the 80's.  It was lovely compared to 12 inches of snow that I heard Portland, Maine got yesterday.


The Big Top

 We went into what I call the Big Top. It was really a sourvenir place , but it looked cool. I love the lights and colors that are there. 

Yummies under The Big Top












Not to mention the yummies that are in the glass case above. I used my Magical willpower to not buy anything to eat here. Call me proud....
  


Winnie the Pooh ride



  We continued to walk through FantasyLand to see what we haven't experienced. We came upon a Winnie the Pooh ride. Who doesn't like Winnie the Pooh? So we went in. It was cute. We sat in the honey jar to ride through. It went pretty fast so many of my pics were blurry. Here are some good ones.



So cute...

                                                                        

Another scene in Winnie the Pooh ride

  We finally met up with the kids after eating a Dole Whip. I don't have a picture of these yummy treats cause we ate them so fast. I'll get a pic tomorrow.. if I can contain my excitement of having one of these luscious concoctions.


Love you Johhny Depp...

   We all then headed to Pirates of the Carribean ride. We had been on it just before the Dole Whips, but we went on again in the spirit of family solidarity and it's a fun ride, too.


A lurking elephant



   Next we all went on the Jungle ride. It is a nice ride on a boat through the jungle with animatronic animals. Again it was a somewhat fast ride so some pictures were blurry. Here are the good ones.



An animal meeting of the minds

   

What a great name for our boat...

                                                       One great ride for families is the Tomorrow Land Speedway. The kids( That's including Tom.) got to drive a race car. Kids can go by themselves if the parents let them.  



Driving home










We ate lunch and then Russ and I went to The Hall of Presidents and Monsters Inc. We were quite pooped by then. We all met up and headed towards the buses. The pool and hot tub was calling our names. What a nice end to a great day.


The Lobby



Here are some pics around Beach Club.

A picture in the lobby.