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.
Wednesday 28th July (Free drinks in Epcot!!)
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)
Wednesday is EE day at Epcot for Disney residents, so Epcot was scheduled for today. Despite this, we had problems getting out of the room and to Epcot until around 9.30am. My main priority today was to do Test Track and then just do whatever rides and shows we could. So, we headed straight for TT and the waiting time was already 180 minutes for the stand-by line so I queued up with our Disney passes at the Fast Pass ticket machines. The return time showing above the machines was 1.30pm to 2.30pm and the current time was 9.45am, shows how popular the attraction is! It took me eight minutes to get to the front of the queue to get our Fast Pass tickets. During this time, the return time changed twice by five minutes, our return time was 1.40pm to 2.40pm.
We then did Ellens Energy Adventure which the boys and I enjoyed but DH complained it wasnt very educational and what did dinosaurs have to do with the plot! It was still fun and amusing. What initially looked like an ordinary seating set up for a theatre or cinema turned out to be several vehicles which moved into different rooms of the building and we watched large video screens and displays of dinosaurs with Disneys animatronics of Ellen and the scientist Bill Nye who was
showing Ellen the importance of the forces of energy.
We then went into the nearby Innovations building which had a load of fairly pointless things to press and pull. All good fun and the kids enjoyed this bit (and we were in another air-conditioned building great!). Further round inside the building was the Internet Zone. Great I thought, maybe I could access the DIBB? No, not exactly, but we did spend a while in this area because there was a game the boys wanted to have a go at and there was a queue for it. The game was called Toon Tag and is played by four players, you could choose between Goofy, Mickey, Minnie or Donald. All the time they were queuing, I was hoping they would get into the same game otherwise we could have been waiting there another twenty minutes! Also, I knew we would have trouble if one of them ended up with Minnie! Luckily, neither of these happened and they each got to play the characters which are on their WDW passes Donald for Piers and Goofy for Michael.
Time for lunch and we headed towards the Mexico end of World Showcase as we needed to be at that side of Future World to get back to Test Track for our timeslot. Trevor and I had some nice Mexican food, but there wasnt much on the menu which looked appealing for the kids. We thought they might like the dough cinnamon sticks, so we got one for each of them. No, they didnt like them! Trevor and I happily ate them for our dessert, but they did (for some reason) make me think of cinnamon flavoured corrugated cardboard! We decided we had enough time to go to the McDonalds stand (nearer to Canada) to get nuggets and fries for their lunch. As Trevor was waiting for the food, a wire frame with holders for salt & ketchup etc fell to the ground! It was definitely nothing to do with Trevor, honest! We left it as a lovely clear up job for a C.M. sorry!
Time for Test Tract
Unfortunately, Michael kept muttering that he really didnt want to do it but as the rest of us did, we managed to persuade him (well sort of, he was still being reluctant as we got into our car!). Anyway, the verdict? I loved it and got the t-shirt! Theres room in the cars for six people, Trevor and Piers sat in the front with a single rider and I sat in the back with Michael. The other guy in the car with us enjoyed it too, he had never done it before.
Wandered outside and saw some performers in blue leotards doing some strange acrobatics near the large fountain. We then entered Ice Station Cool where we could sample all sorts of strange fizzy drinks for nothing!
This picture was actually taken on a different day when we visited again ......
Ice Station Cool is operated by Coca Cola and along with their free drinks, you can buy all sorts of Coca Cola merchandise. We avoid spending any money in there! Its just as well its not a long walk to the nearest restrooms, as with all that free sampling we need to be relieved!
As we headed out, it started raining, luckily not heavily (didnt get the heavy stuff til a while later). Got back to the Caribbean Beach Resort and decided on a swim at the main themed pool, hadnt tried it yet and it looked fun. Stayed in for about half an hour then headed into Old Port Royale (main building containing shop, restaurant, food court etc) to collect yesterdays shopping from the Animal Kingdom and also to fill our resort mugs. We stayed in this building for a little while as it was now raining heavily.
Back to the room and headed off to Wal-mart. But, if only it were that simple, it took us an hour to get out of the room and onto the road! We had to get dry and dressed; I spent ages trying to find my map of Orlando (not that I needed it that desperately) and I had to rebandage my blistered toes! I had one on the second toe of my right foot, one on the big toe of my left foot and another one on the little toe of my left foot. Enough of the gory details, got to Wal-mart at 8.30pm and it seemed we only had half an hour to get all we wanted. (We later discovered there was a Wal-mart open 24 hours slightly nearer.) We took the boys into McDonalds (inside Walmart) and discussed what our shopping priorities were. We only ended up buying a bit of food and using their restrooms. Buying waterproof shoes for Trevor, more clothes for all of us and developing pictures would have to wait until tomorrow.
On our way back to CBR, we went wrong again! GGRRRRRR!! We knew where we went wrong last time and were determined not to do the same again. This time we went too far and missed our turning fo the I-4 westbound! As I write up these notes in our room, it has come to me in a flash where my Orlando map was in a pocket of a bag I didnt check earlier! (Oh well, too late now), never mind.
Another late night staying up to finish my trip report notes, the things I do for you lot! Nighty night.
Wednesday 28th July (Free drinks in Epcot!!)
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)
Wednesday is EE day at Epcot for Disney residents, so Epcot was scheduled for today. Despite this, we had problems getting out of the room and to Epcot until around 9.30am. My main priority today was to do Test Track and then just do whatever rides and shows we could. So, we headed straight for TT and the waiting time was already 180 minutes for the stand-by line so I queued up with our Disney passes at the Fast Pass ticket machines. The return time showing above the machines was 1.30pm to 2.30pm and the current time was 9.45am, shows how popular the attraction is! It took me eight minutes to get to the front of the queue to get our Fast Pass tickets. During this time, the return time changed twice by five minutes, our return time was 1.40pm to 2.40pm.
We then did Ellens Energy Adventure which the boys and I enjoyed but DH complained it wasnt very educational and what did dinosaurs have to do with the plot! It was still fun and amusing. What initially looked like an ordinary seating set up for a theatre or cinema turned out to be several vehicles which moved into different rooms of the building and we watched large video screens and displays of dinosaurs with Disneys animatronics of Ellen and the scientist Bill Nye who was
showing Ellen the importance of the forces of energy.
We then went into the nearby Innovations building which had a load of fairly pointless things to press and pull. All good fun and the kids enjoyed this bit (and we were in another air-conditioned building great!). Further round inside the building was the Internet Zone. Great I thought, maybe I could access the DIBB? No, not exactly, but we did spend a while in this area because there was a game the boys wanted to have a go at and there was a queue for it. The game was called Toon Tag and is played by four players, you could choose between Goofy, Mickey, Minnie or Donald. All the time they were queuing, I was hoping they would get into the same game otherwise we could have been waiting there another twenty minutes! Also, I knew we would have trouble if one of them ended up with Minnie! Luckily, neither of these happened and they each got to play the characters which are on their WDW passes Donald for Piers and Goofy for Michael.
Time for lunch and we headed towards the Mexico end of World Showcase as we needed to be at that side of Future World to get back to Test Track for our timeslot. Trevor and I had some nice Mexican food, but there wasnt much on the menu which looked appealing for the kids. We thought they might like the dough cinnamon sticks, so we got one for each of them. No, they didnt like them! Trevor and I happily ate them for our dessert, but they did (for some reason) make me think of cinnamon flavoured corrugated cardboard! We decided we had enough time to go to the McDonalds stand (nearer to Canada) to get nuggets and fries for their lunch. As Trevor was waiting for the food, a wire frame with holders for salt & ketchup etc fell to the ground! It was definitely nothing to do with Trevor, honest! We left it as a lovely clear up job for a C.M. sorry!
Time for Test Tract
Unfortunately, Michael kept muttering that he really didnt want to do it but as the rest of us did, we managed to persuade him (well sort of, he was still being reluctant as we got into our car!). Anyway, the verdict? I loved it and got the t-shirt! Theres room in the cars for six people, Trevor and Piers sat in the front with a single rider and I sat in the back with Michael. The other guy in the car with us enjoyed it too, he had never done it before.Wandered outside and saw some performers in blue leotards doing some strange acrobatics near the large fountain. We then entered Ice Station Cool where we could sample all sorts of strange fizzy drinks for nothing!
This picture was actually taken on a different day when we visited again ......
Ice Station Cool is operated by Coca Cola and along with their free drinks, you can buy all sorts of Coca Cola merchandise. We avoid spending any money in there! Its just as well its not a long walk to the nearest restrooms, as with all that free sampling we need to be relieved!
As we headed out, it started raining, luckily not heavily (didnt get the heavy stuff til a while later). Got back to the Caribbean Beach Resort and decided on a swim at the main themed pool, hadnt tried it yet and it looked fun. Stayed in for about half an hour then headed into Old Port Royale (main building containing shop, restaurant, food court etc) to collect yesterdays shopping from the Animal Kingdom and also to fill our resort mugs. We stayed in this building for a little while as it was now raining heavily.
Back to the room and headed off to Wal-mart. But, if only it were that simple, it took us an hour to get out of the room and onto the road! We had to get dry and dressed; I spent ages trying to find my map of Orlando (not that I needed it that desperately) and I had to rebandage my blistered toes! I had one on the second toe of my right foot, one on the big toe of my left foot and another one on the little toe of my left foot. Enough of the gory details, got to Wal-mart at 8.30pm and it seemed we only had half an hour to get all we wanted. (We later discovered there was a Wal-mart open 24 hours slightly nearer.) We took the boys into McDonalds (inside Walmart) and discussed what our shopping priorities were. We only ended up buying a bit of food and using their restrooms. Buying waterproof shoes for Trevor, more clothes for all of us and developing pictures would have to wait until tomorrow.
On our way back to CBR, we went wrong again! GGRRRRRR!! We knew where we went wrong last time and were determined not to do the same again. This time we went too far and missed our turning fo the I-4 westbound! As I write up these notes in our room, it has come to me in a flash where my Orlando map was in a pocket of a bag I didnt check earlier! (Oh well, too late now), never mind.
Another late night staying up to finish my trip report notes, the things I do for you lot!
Nighty night.
