Another Magical Day in Magic Kingdom

Once again, we are completely exhausted.  There were some pitfalls today, but we still managed to get the most out of our time in Magic Kingdom.  Like I said yesterday, we divided the park in half, and today we focused on Liberty Square, Frontierland and Adventureland, although we did stray a little bit.

Even though we left the hotel at about the same time, there was practically no line at security, which was awesome.  We hoped this would continue throughout the day, but, alas, crowds did pick up over time.  Since there wasn't really a line at the entrance, we were able to get some nice photos of us in front of the train station before heading inside.  We were then able to see the rope drop ceremony, which was a wonderful surprise.  It was a cute little show where Mickey comes out, welcomes everyone and then all the other characters come out to say hello to everyone before scattering for the day.  Of course, the show ended with fireworks.

Once the rope drop was over, we rushed over to Adventureland to ride the Jungle Cruise, as lines are ridiculous, and we didn't have a FastPass for it.  We waited in line for about 20 minutes.  Bryan hadn't been on it before, so all the horrible dad jokes and puns were new to him.  I think that's what makes Jungle Cruise so endearing, it doesn't take itself seriously at all, especially now that Animal Kingdom is open, and people can see real animals.  Although, that was what Walt Disney originally wanted for the Jungle Cruise, real animals, but it just wasn't feasible at the time.

Done with Jungle Cruise, we headed to our first FastPass for the day, Haunted Mansion.  Even though we rode the ride last night before leaving, we still rode it again and enjoyed it just as much as the first time.  The ballroom scene is my absolute favorite.  There's so much to see and take in, I could spend ages in that scene and still not see everything.  I also love Haunted Mansion because it's the only haunted attraction I'll ever do; I hate jump scares.  One guy behind us in line was surprised, as he thought it was an actual haunted house you walk through, like the ones at the beach or at the fair.  Hopefully he wasn't looking to actually be scared.

After riding Haunted Mansion again, we went back to Adventureland to meet Aladdin and Jasmine.  They were so adorable.  The showed up talking about something (I couldn't hear what), and when they went to greet each guest, they always held hands.  It was so cute.  I was determined to stump Aladdin, so I asked him if he'd heard from his father lately.  Right away, his face lit up, and he said, "Kaseem!?  I actually brought him to the palace yesterday, he's around here with Iago, probably near the pirates because he knows they have lots of treasure.  The two of them are actually working at exploring ruins on the outskirts of Agrabah in search of treasure.  Apparently the jewels are bigger than the ones in the Cave of Wonders.  You'll be able to hear Iago, he won't stop talking about the time he got to hold the Hand of Midas."  I have to admit, I was incredibly impressed.  I also don't think Aladdin gets to talk about his dad a lot, so this was his chance to show off some seldom-used knowledge.  Don't worry, though, I have a plan to stump Belle tomorrow.

By the time we finished with Aladdin and Jasmine, it was about 10:45, so we did the logical thing and got ice cream from Aloha Isle.  Rather than get a dole whip, however, I got the Kakamora float, which had coconut dole whip, pineapple juice, blue caracao and a chocolate cake pop.  It was delicious, although it melted really quickly, so I had to rush to eat it.

Having some time to kill, I subjected Bryan to the Enchanted Tiki Room.  Just alking about it right now, I have the song stuck in my head.  I know it's a fairly low key show and is fairly dated, but I wanted to see it because I've heard rumors that Disney might replace it with something else at some point, so I wanted to see it one more time, just in case.  If Disney doesn't get rid of it, oh well, we got to sit in the air conditioning for ten minutes and relax.

With still a little bit of time to kill, we decided to check out the Swiss Family Treehouse.  I'd been to Disney three times before this, and I'd never done this attraction before.  It's pretty much a life size model of the treehouse from The Swiss Family Robinson, which I'd read a children's version of about twenty years ago, but never the real version.  It was pretty cool to walk through and see everything, although I feel like I would have appreciated it more had I brushed up on the book or even the movie.  This wasn't an attraction we planned on visiting, so we didn't watch the movie ahead of time.

After finishing up a the Enchanted Tiki Room and Swiss Family Treehouse, we headed over towards Pirates of the Caribbean to meet Captain Jack Sparrow.  We'd actually gone up there a little bit earlier and asked a cast member where Jack would be. She said, "Sometimes he's over by the stage, sometimes he's in front of the ride, sometimes he's in a little cave between Adventureland and Frontierland.  We can't really keep him in one place."  For some reason, I found this absolutely hilarious.  Now, however, they're trying hard to keep him contained to the stage across from Pirates of the Caribbean.

We had a wonderful time meeting Jack.  He was weary of me because I had on my Aztec gold necklace that I bought for Pirate Weekend at the Renn Faire.  He asked me if I had been in the moonlight yet, and when I said no, he said, "Then you're in for a real surprise later."  To be honest, Jack wasn't entirely thrilled with Bryan, as he didn't like his shirt.  He blamed him for his lack of rum and said, "If I had rum, do you think I'd be here right now?"  I then said, "Jack, what's the best advice for getting a crew in line?"  He said, "Well, I didn't do a very good job because there was a mutiny."  Then, he continued by saying, "There are two best places for a captain, at the top of the ship where you can see everything or the first one on the longboat."  It was great, and he definitely looked and acted the part.  I feel like Jack Sparrow is a difficult character to play, because there's way more when it comes to tiny little movements than you get with some of the other face characters.  I have to admit, however, I am a little disappointed, as I didn't refer to him as "Captain", and he didn't say anything.  Bryan said it's fine, but it bothered me because it's so important to him in the movie that that's what he's focusing on when he has a noose around his neck at the gallows.

At this point, we had a FastPass for Pirates of the Caribbean, but it was down, so Disney gave us a FastPass for pretty much any other ride with a FastPass other than Seven Dwarfs, meeting Mickey and Peter Pan's Flight.  Having had the same problem with Dinosaur and Toy Story Mania, we decided to just keep that FastPass in our back pocket until the ride got up and running again.  Unfortunately, this never happened, but more about that later.

Today there was a lot of down time for us.  Although we were in the park, we spent a lot of time sitting (and yet, we still got in 20,000 steps because we zig zagged across the park in the end).  I wanted to get spring rolls from the entrance to Adventureland.  According to Bryan, the guy in front of us in line asked the cast member how often Tim Tracker came around, and he said whenever there's a new spring roll, he normally shows up.  I got the pepperoni pizza spring roll, while Bryan got one pepperoni and one cheeseburger.  I thought they were delicious and surprisingly filling for something so small.  Bryan said he liked the cheeseburger one better.

With our food in hand, we headed over to Tortuga Tavern, hoping and praying Pirates of the Caribbean would open up again soon.  It was also significantly cooler in there, so we kept getting more food and just relaxing there until it was time to find a spot for the Festival of Fantasy parade.  We purposefully picked today to watch the parade since it starts in Frontierland.  We didn't care about seeing the parade on Main Street or with the castle in the background, we simply wanted a spot that wasn't very crowded and was in the shade.  If that's what you're looking for, outside the Christmas shop in Liberty Square is the perfect spot.  We hung out there for about an hour, eating and relaxing while waiting for the parade to start.

The parade was wonderful and so much fun.  A lot of the face characters in the parade were the same cast members we met yesterday, so that was pretty cool.  I think my favorite part was the Maleficent dragon.  That thing was absolutely huge!  I definitely wasn't expecting it to be a little smaller.  It had this cool steampunk look to it and breathed fire.  Added bonus: it didn't catch on fire (it had done so in the past).  The costumes and floats were absolutely stunning, and it was a lot of fun seeing some characters not available to meet go by (such as Captain Hook, Wendy, Flynn Rider and Prince Phillip).  Our spot was perfect for the parade, and I can't recommend it enough.  We simply sat on the wall right along where the handicap section was until it was time for the parade, and since we were right along the handicap section, there weren't any tall people standing in front of us.

Once the parade was done, we knew to avoid Main Street for a little while, as that was where the parade officially ended, and it was still going on for a while, so we wandered over into Fantasyland to see if the mice from Cinderella were out (as someone mentioned they saw them there on Tuesday).  When we asked a cast member, however, he said it was the Fairy Godmother, Anastasia and Drizella again, who we saw the day before.  Instead, we figured the parade was over (we'd spent a little time just wandering) and saw that Mickey only had a 15 minute wait down on Main Street, so that's where we went.

Of all the Mickeys we met (and we met Mickey in each park), this one was my favorite interaction; we had a lot of wonderful conversations.  It's important to note that this Mickey is dressed like a magician.  I noticed his sorcerer's hat up on a shelf and asked him if that's how he did his magic.  He said he used his magician's top hat, which was on another shelf.  I also asked him about the crystal ball, which said "Leotta Crystal" on the side.  Madam Leotta is the fortune teller in the crystal ball on Haunted Mansion.  I asked him if he got that up at Haunted Mansion.  He said it was scary and asked us if we went.  When we said yes, he asked if we'd picked up any hitchhiking ghosts.  I said yes, but we left them with Donald, which he thought was hilarious.  When we gave him the frame to sign, we were running out of room.  Mickey said he was up for the challenge of finding space and seemed relieved when he found a little bit of room to sing near the top.  This was supposed to be our last character encounter.  The key word there is "supposed".

Done with Mickey, it was time to use our FastPass for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad.  You'll notice at this point we're just zig zagging across the park with no real plan.  Personally, I like Big Thunder Mountain Railroad more than Space Mountain, but that's just me.  I think the scenery is better (because it actually has some), and it's a much smoother ride.  We were worried because the FastPass line was incredibly long, but they got us on and off the ride in about 20 minutes, which was quite impressive.  I swore there was a ride photo for this, but the photo is off the ride in front of the mountain, not on the actual ride.  It was still a great photo if you ask me.

With Pirates still being down, we decided to head back down to Main Street to get something to eat.  I desperately wanted the mermaid cupcake at the Confectionary, but they don't make it anymore (they rotate through their cupcakes), so that was upsetting.  Instead, we headed up to  Casey's Corner for a bacon mac and cheese hot dog.  I don't know what Disney does to its mac and cheese, but it's absolutely amazing every time I eat it.  Bryan liked the bacon mac and cheese tots from Friar's Nook yesterday better, and I have to agree, but the hot dog was still delicious.  While we ate, the Move It! Shake It! MouseKe Dance It! Dance Party happened on the hub.  They do this twice a day where they bring out about half a dozen brightly colored floats with Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Daisy, etc. on them, and they play some songs with the words on a screen on the side of the floats.  They ride up Main Street then stop on the hub where kids can dance and sing along to the music.  It was a lot of fun to watch from a distance, and there were some characters, such as Goofy's son, Max, who we were surprised to see.  I didn't even know they had a costume for Max, but I guess they do.

We sat at Casey's Corner for at least half an hour, probably even longer, just eating and relaxing in the shade.  Our feet were killing us.  When I looked at the app, however, I noticed that meeting Daisy and Minnie up in Pete's Silly Sideshow was only half an hour, and they were the only two characters we were missing on our frame.  Since we didn't have anything else really going on (Pirates was still closed), we went up there. 

Now, we'd never met Daisy before, so this was a completely new character to us.  We asked her to tell us our future, and she said there were fireworks in our future, which was adorable until the cast member pointed out that the fireworks started shortly.  I also made the mistake of referring to Donald as Daisy's husband, and she got upset, pointing out that she didn't have a ring.  Oops.

Like Mickey, this was the fourth time we'd met Minnie.  She had a little dog show set up, and I complimented her on how well trained her dogs are.  She laughed when I told her that my dogs don't even sit on command.  When we handed her the frame, we told her that it was going to be a tight fit, but there was a little bit of space near Mickey.  She kissed Mickey's name and then managed to somehow fit her signature right next to him.

After meeting Minnie, we were done with characters.  In a whirlwind of two days, we managed to meet 25 characters and fit all of them on our frame.  I honestly don't know what's more impressive, the fact that we met 25 characters or the fact that all 25 of them fit their signatures on our frame mat.

With Pirates still down, we sat in Pete's Silly Sideshow for a while and watched the children play in the splash pad.  It was adorable to watch them play, and wonderful to just sit down for a little while.  People watching wasn't something we'd spent a lot of time doing in the parks, and Disney is honestly the perfect place to do that.  We were also in no rush to see the fireworks today, as we weren't watching them from Main Street.  I'd heard on Tim Tracker that one of the best places to watch the fireworks from is Fantasyland.  It's important to note you won't see the projections on the castle, but you're surrounded by fireworks.  In all honesty, I loved watching the fireworks from here was better than Main Street.  We watched from the bridge to Gaston's Tavern, looking between Be Our Guest and Gaston's.  It was perfect.  The fireworks were practically on top of us, and there was no one around.  I filmed the beginning and the end, but a lot of it, Bryan and I watched together, enjoying each other's company.  This may sound mushy, but it was so romantic and perfect.  It's probably one of my favorite moments from the entire trip.

Before going to the fireworks, Bryan and I had talked, and we figured even if Pirates of the Caribbean got up and running at this point, they probably wouldn't open it, as it would create a mad rush, and as long as you're in line for a ride by 9 PM, they have to let you ride it.  I'm not going to lie, I was super disappointed, but that's how life is.  We still had our FastPass to use, and we decided to use it on Space Mountain, which is Bryan's favorite ride at Magic Kingdom.  I honestly liked riding it the second time around, since I was prepared for all the jerkiness this time.  I really don't like where the camera is for Space Mountain, it's right after you go through the launch sequence.  I feel there are some much better place with sudden drops and turns that will get a better reaction out of riders, but that's just me.

By the time we finished Space Mountain, the park was closed. We stopped at the Emporium to buy a shirt I wanted, and then we headed back to the hotel for the night.  Overall, with the exception of Pirates of the Caribbean, I'd call Magic Kingdom a success, and we're now three quarters of the way through our trip.