2BoysMum&Dad
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Feb 5, 2004
In my hand-written notes I made at the end of Friday 23rd July, I spookily gave the days report the heading The Calm Before The Storm, only because it was the day before we flew out to Florida and didnt think at the time it was really a very good or apt title. I have decided to name all the parts of my trip report The Calm Before The Storm Tour, in honour of the climax of our trip - Hurricane Charley which gave us an extra day in Florida.
Saturday 7th August
THE CAST
Sergeant Major Zoe You WILL enjoy yourselves
DH Trevor I am NOT going to like this
Birthday Boy Michael (aged 10 to 11)
Why to everything Piers (aged 8 and a bit)
We spent some time debating how to organise our last two days left on our WDW ten-day passes. I rather fancied the idea of doing half a day at each of the four major parks, but we also wanted to visit Typhoon Lagoon again. We then decided we could survive without visiting the Animal Kingdom again and I desperately wanted to spend some of our last full day in Florida at the same place we visited on our first full day the one and only truely magical place, the Magic Kingdom. Finally, we decided today would be Disney MGM in the morning and Typhoon Lagoon in the afternoon followed by a visit to Disneys Boardwalk for a wander and a meal in the evening.
This morning we had problems getting Piers out of bed again and he then complained he was hungry when we needed to get out of the room. We promised Piers wed head straight for a cafe or restaurant as soon as we arrived at the park. We headed straight for the Starring Rolls Cafe which was very nice, good selection of food, but very cramped inside for the number of people jostling for different items. It was evident they need to re-think the way the interior of this place is organised as it cannot really cope with a large number of people. Loved the food selection in here though. We sat outside at a table down the far end, next to the entrance of The Hollywood Brown Derby.
We packed in a reasonable number of rides today including (in no particular order) Indiana Jones (videoing most of it), Honey, I Shrunk The Kids Movie Set Adventure (videoing some of it) and Jim Hensons Muppet Video 3D. For the Muppet show, we sat in the middle of the front row this time (Pierss idea), it was not at all crowded and half the auditorium must have been empty. Decided that, actually, a few rows back would have been better for the 3D effects. But this was a brilliant position for a good view of the penguin orchestra (real Muppets in an orchestra pit), the two old men in the balcony and Sweetums who was a real life-sized Muppet wandering about the auditorium.
Did I mention that we did Sounds Dangerous last time we visited Disney MGM Studios? I would say its not worth the wait if the queue is long but worth a try if you are passing and dont have to wait long. Mostly done in pitch darkness and a bit of fun.
We did the Backlot Tour today, very good. Its done in three stages and supposed to demonstrate how various special effects are produced at the movies. The first stage has the audience standing in tiered rows by a water area with ships being shot at and a volunteer in a shed having a massive wave thrown at her (someone has a picture of this on the DIBB). Then were off through a props storage area and finally queue up for the next available tram which takes you around scenery. While on the tram, we are led to believe an advertising company are filming at MGM today and she is waiting to hear via her walkie talkie if it is safe to enter the film set and surprise surprise we are given the go ahead just before entering the area. We stop in a film set called Catstrophoe Canyon which has a large oil tanker lorry sitting in it. The woman does a bit of waffling and next thing we see is a load of water gushing down from the top of the canyon and heading straight for us, looks like were in for a soaking ......... Very effective! Off the ride and we walk through a display area like a museum full of the real costumes worn in some famous films followed by the obligatory attached gift shop.
I kept on about wanting to do the Great Movie Ride again but Trevor wasnt keen as he has done it once (and Piers) and Michael and I had done it twice. Better use of our time to do something else
.
Time to eat and there was a huge crowd and queue outside the Sci-Fi Diner. We queued up to find out how long wed have to wait for a car table. Turns out it would be an hours wait which was too long and Piers was distraught! We ate here on an ordinary table last time we were in this park and Piers had his heart set on eating in a car. We ate in a place around the corner which was adequate and spacious (the ABC Commissary). We said Piers could have a little present as compensation for not being able to eat in the Sci-Fi restaurant (you may remember we did something similar for Michael when we got him the wrong flavour ice cream the other day), and Piers was a little happier now. There wasnt anything he wanted in the main MGM gift shop so we said wed get him something from Wal-mart when we visit there later.
Back to CBR for a rest and then off to Typhoon Lagoon. We drove along with a huge amount of doubt as to whether they would be letting anybody in as there was a huge storm going on. Low and behold, when we arrive there are a load of cars exiting the park. We drive in anyway thinking maybe people were just leaving by their own choice rather than the park were chucking people out. Unfortunately not, they were admitting people as long as they didnt want to swim
We have to give up on this (obviously) and we headed back to CBR to get our proper clothes back on (we had our swimming costumes on under our outer clothes) and then drove off again towards Wal-mart. I took my disposable camera to be developed into prints and put on a CD. We bought some more food supplies, cheap swimming goggles (less than a $1 a pair!) and bought some Yu-Gi-Oh cards for the boys ($8 per pack) which they paid for with their pocket money. We gave Piers $4 towards his cards as his consolation present from us.
The traffic on the way to Wal-mart and on the way back was absolutely awful. This writing of weather and traffic problems during my evening note taking made me think of an incident yesterday on the way to Universal Studios in the evening. There was a couple on a motorbike which made me rather shocked! The first thing I noticed about them was the fact that they had bare arms and I was worried what would happen if they fell off. Next thing I noticed was the fact that they had no helmets either and they must have been travelling well over the speed limit.
After finishing at Wal-mart, we headed back to CBR via a rather longer than necessary route! Why is it we can normally get to where we are going (except yesterday!) but can never return the same way! As it was rather late when we arrived back at CBR, we just ate in the room and decided to do Disneys Boardwalk properly another night.
Since arriving in Florida, I have been cursing myself for forgetting to bring the phone number of an English friend who moved out to Naples (west coast of Florida) a few years ago with his family. I got a couple of phone numbers from directory enquiries and tried phoning them on a few occasions without success. Tried again this evening with no luck. Even tried texting a friend using my mobile phone to ask her to investigate and text me back. She had no luck either. Oh well, maybe just as well gives us another good excuse to visit Florida again another time!
Join us for our wedding anniversary tomorrow. Time for bed ZzZzZzZzZzZzZzZzZzZz
Saturday 7th August
THE CAST
Sergeant Major Zoe You WILL enjoy yourselves
DH Trevor I am NOT going to like this
Birthday Boy Michael (aged 10 to 11)
Why to everything Piers (aged 8 and a bit)
We spent some time debating how to organise our last two days left on our WDW ten-day passes. I rather fancied the idea of doing half a day at each of the four major parks, but we also wanted to visit Typhoon Lagoon again. We then decided we could survive without visiting the Animal Kingdom again and I desperately wanted to spend some of our last full day in Florida at the same place we visited on our first full day the one and only truely magical place, the Magic Kingdom. Finally, we decided today would be Disney MGM in the morning and Typhoon Lagoon in the afternoon followed by a visit to Disneys Boardwalk for a wander and a meal in the evening.
This morning we had problems getting Piers out of bed again and he then complained he was hungry when we needed to get out of the room. We promised Piers wed head straight for a cafe or restaurant as soon as we arrived at the park. We headed straight for the Starring Rolls Cafe which was very nice, good selection of food, but very cramped inside for the number of people jostling for different items. It was evident they need to re-think the way the interior of this place is organised as it cannot really cope with a large number of people. Loved the food selection in here though. We sat outside at a table down the far end, next to the entrance of The Hollywood Brown Derby.
We packed in a reasonable number of rides today including (in no particular order) Indiana Jones (videoing most of it), Honey, I Shrunk The Kids Movie Set Adventure (videoing some of it) and Jim Hensons Muppet Video 3D. For the Muppet show, we sat in the middle of the front row this time (Pierss idea), it was not at all crowded and half the auditorium must have been empty. Decided that, actually, a few rows back would have been better for the 3D effects. But this was a brilliant position for a good view of the penguin orchestra (real Muppets in an orchestra pit), the two old men in the balcony and Sweetums who was a real life-sized Muppet wandering about the auditorium.
Did I mention that we did Sounds Dangerous last time we visited Disney MGM Studios? I would say its not worth the wait if the queue is long but worth a try if you are passing and dont have to wait long. Mostly done in pitch darkness and a bit of fun.
We did the Backlot Tour today, very good. Its done in three stages and supposed to demonstrate how various special effects are produced at the movies. The first stage has the audience standing in tiered rows by a water area with ships being shot at and a volunteer in a shed having a massive wave thrown at her (someone has a picture of this on the DIBB). Then were off through a props storage area and finally queue up for the next available tram which takes you around scenery. While on the tram, we are led to believe an advertising company are filming at MGM today and she is waiting to hear via her walkie talkie if it is safe to enter the film set and surprise surprise we are given the go ahead just before entering the area. We stop in a film set called Catstrophoe Canyon which has a large oil tanker lorry sitting in it. The woman does a bit of waffling and next thing we see is a load of water gushing down from the top of the canyon and heading straight for us, looks like were in for a soaking ......... Very effective! Off the ride and we walk through a display area like a museum full of the real costumes worn in some famous films followed by the obligatory attached gift shop.
I kept on about wanting to do the Great Movie Ride again but Trevor wasnt keen as he has done it once (and Piers) and Michael and I had done it twice. Better use of our time to do something else
.Time to eat and there was a huge crowd and queue outside the Sci-Fi Diner. We queued up to find out how long wed have to wait for a car table. Turns out it would be an hours wait which was too long and Piers was distraught! We ate here on an ordinary table last time we were in this park and Piers had his heart set on eating in a car. We ate in a place around the corner which was adequate and spacious (the ABC Commissary). We said Piers could have a little present as compensation for not being able to eat in the Sci-Fi restaurant (you may remember we did something similar for Michael when we got him the wrong flavour ice cream the other day), and Piers was a little happier now. There wasnt anything he wanted in the main MGM gift shop so we said wed get him something from Wal-mart when we visit there later.
Back to CBR for a rest and then off to Typhoon Lagoon. We drove along with a huge amount of doubt as to whether they would be letting anybody in as there was a huge storm going on. Low and behold, when we arrive there are a load of cars exiting the park. We drive in anyway thinking maybe people were just leaving by their own choice rather than the park were chucking people out. Unfortunately not, they were admitting people as long as they didnt want to swim
We have to give up on this (obviously) and we headed back to CBR to get our proper clothes back on (we had our swimming costumes on under our outer clothes) and then drove off again towards Wal-mart. I took my disposable camera to be developed into prints and put on a CD. We bought some more food supplies, cheap swimming goggles (less than a $1 a pair!) and bought some Yu-Gi-Oh cards for the boys ($8 per pack) which they paid for with their pocket money. We gave Piers $4 towards his cards as his consolation present from us.
The traffic on the way to Wal-mart and on the way back was absolutely awful. This writing of weather and traffic problems during my evening note taking made me think of an incident yesterday on the way to Universal Studios in the evening. There was a couple on a motorbike which made me rather shocked! The first thing I noticed about them was the fact that they had bare arms and I was worried what would happen if they fell off. Next thing I noticed was the fact that they had no helmets either and they must have been travelling well over the speed limit.
After finishing at Wal-mart, we headed back to CBR via a rather longer than necessary route! Why is it we can normally get to where we are going (except yesterday!) but can never return the same way!
As it was rather late when we arrived back at CBR, we just ate in the room and decided to do Disneys Boardwalk properly another night.Since arriving in Florida, I have been cursing myself for forgetting to bring the phone number of an English friend who moved out to Naples (west coast of Florida) a few years ago with his family. I got a couple of phone numbers from directory enquiries and tried phoning them on a few occasions without success. Tried again this evening with no luck. Even tried texting a friend using my mobile phone to ask her to investigate and text me back. She had no luck either. Oh well, maybe just as well gives us another good excuse to visit Florida again another time!
Join us for our wedding anniversary tomorrow. Time for bed ZzZzZzZzZzZzZzZzZzZz
