Fort Wilderness is a magical place, as those who have visited before can attest.
Sometimes, the most simple and routine things turn out to be special and memorable.
And so it was with our plain old take out chicken dinner from Trail's End on Friday night.
As I already mentioned, the weather on Friday was perfect. It got a little hot in the afternoon, but as evening approached, a nice breeze picked up, and it was just warm and pleasant.
The take out menu at Trail's End is pretty simple. For those of you who haven't seen it, this is it:
The Giddyap and Go is the best deal on WDW property. We enjoy one of those on almost every camping trip. I strongly recommend that you spring for the extra few bucks it costs for the all white meat option. The all white meat version gives you a lot more chicken. We always pick it up and bring it back to the site.
But, I have always wanted to pick up the chicken dinner, and then picnic around the corner on the porch. There are two picnic tables there. They overlook the playground and Bay Lake. But, when we arrived, a large group had commandeered the picnic tables, and had just begun to eat. Here they are:
These folks look like they have done this before. Also, note that they have the old school brown Trail's End refillable mugs. These are not rookies.
So, we ordered our food, and found some open rockers, and watched the world go by.
This is a great spot to people watch. We were there at just before 7. So, there was a crowd just entering the Hoop Dee Do, and a crowd leaving. Do you know that it is all you can eat and drink in the Hoop Dee Do? And the drink includes beer and wine? Invariably, there is someone heading out of the show a little wobbly on his feet. Fun stuff. For example, check out the gentleman in the coon skin hat in this photo being observed by the Disney po po. He was feeling no pain:
All kinds of things will come by if you sit on the porch. Folks on golf carts, folks on bikes, and folks in horse-drawn carriages:
Well, before we knew it, our food was ready. It was all packed up nice, including plates, utensils, napkins and ketchup. Everything we needed.
But, the tables were still occupied.
And, these folks were not going anywhere soon.
One of my DD's mentioned that she had seen a couple of picnic tables down on the beach. We wandered down there, and found two empty tables. We took the one that was right on the wood line. Here it is:
And here is the view we had from there:
Now, imagine that you are sitting there, watching the sun set, with a nice breeze blowing off the lake. Imagine further that there is soft music playing in the background. The nice, soothing music, like you hear sitting on the porch outside of Crockett's. Wait, did I say music?
Yes, it was coming right out of this speaker next to the trash can:
This was a magical place to enjoy our meal. We were surrounded by the non-stop activity of the Fort, yet we had a quiet, private, spot to enjoy our meal. Truly magical!
Despite our big appetites, we have never completely finished the Giddyap and Go meal. There is so much food! So, in addition to a few pieces of chicken, we had a bunch of biscuits left over.
DD decided to share the food with the ducks that had been politely eyeballing us throughout our meal:
You might notice that there are a couple of young boys who joined DD in feeding the ducks. They were visiting the beach with their mom. I think they were from the Boston area. They had the greatest time running up and down the beach and having the ducks chase them. Good fun!
As the sun continued to sink in the sky, we packed up, and decided to head out to Epcot.
We headed up to the Settlement bus stop to catch a bus to the Outpost.
I snapped these photos on the way, as there occasionally are folks on the boards who ask about the horse drawn excursions:
I also snapped a few photos of the area where there used to be a trailer on display. If you didn't know it was there ,you might walk right by it. There used to be a trailer that sat here. As you can see, there was a platform built that allowed folks to walk up and look in the windows. I believe the last one there was a Coachman Futura. It always seemed a little strange to me to have one trailer sitting here. The platform and electric connections are still here (sorry for the blurry photos-it was really starting to get dark at this point):
We headed to the bus stop, where we found a yellow and orange bus waiting.
We took the yellow bus, and headed out.
We got to the Outpost, hopped in the car, and took off for Epcot. We got to Epcot at around 8:30, hit Soarin', and then visited a few of the countries. It was EMH at Epcot, and since they don't use the wristbands anymore, we could stay as long as we wanted, even though we were not resort guests on this visit. We could not ride any of the rides, but there was no problem just visiting the countries and their shops.
We finally called it a night at a little after 10, and headed for home.
It was a great day.
And, that's all I have.
Until next time.
TCD
