Originally Posted By goodgirl FRIDAY – March 4 In the morning, Sue announced that she wanted to buy everyone breakfast. We exited the hotel to the Boardwalk and went into Kouzzina by Cat Cora. We were seated immediately and enjoyed a delicious meal. Side notes: I had gone online and made some lunch and dinner reservations. However, because we were last minute travelers it was slim pickings. As it turned out we never used any of the five reservations because we weren’t in the area, weren’t hungry or had other plans. We had no problems eating though! There’s lots of options. Another note: www.allears.net has a pretty good compilation of menus and pricing for all the restaurants at Walt Disney World. I printed out those that were on the Boardwalk and some other recommendations from friends. The girls enjoyed reviewing these in the room. After breakfast, Pat still wasn’t feeling well so decided to stay in the room for awhile. So Sue, Kathy and I caught the Disney Bus to The Magic Kingdom. This park was furthest from our hotel and took about 20 minutes or so to get to. I was excited to see how similar and how different this park was from Disneyland. After visiting Disneyland so many times, the Magic Kingdom was a bit surreal at times. I would look for common landmarks (the Matterhorn, for example) and not find them there. Upon entering the park I realized we didn’t have a map! At DL they hand them out at the turnstiles. At the Magic Kingdom you pick one up within the tunnels. A Disney guy was going by with a cart full of maps so I grabbed a couple. Interestingly we saw that while the names of the attractions were in English, the descriptions were in Spanish. “Wow, “ I thought, “they are really integrating both languages into everything here.” Then later we had a good laugh when I realized I had pick up the Spanish version of the map. Cinderella’s Castle! OMG! It was gorgeous! I wanted a photo in front of the castle. I was even willing to have the professional photographer take it so the three of us could be in the photo. However, I guess they don’t do that there because we couldn’t find any photographers. In fact there was a huge crowd of people in front of the castle sitting and watching a show that was going on with the Disney characters. We went left into Adventureland. First stop was Jungle Cruise. Not on my list but it was there with a short wait time. I thought the queue was interesting. We had a female skipper who did a great job; it was fun to see the similarities and differences between MK and DL. Next was Pirates of the Caribbean. I had been told this wasn’t worth it but Kathy was excited to go on it; it had been under refurbishment when she went to DL 10 years ago. She loved it! I told her that she needed to go to Disneyland. The WDW Pirates is only half of Disneyland’s. I missed the Blue Bayou, Miss Candice’s grandfather, the talking pirate skull, and so many of the other scenes. It was about 10:30 and we decided we wanted ice cream. Kathy and Sue fell in love with the chocolate covered Mickey bars. My favorite is the Mickey ice cream sandwich. We made our morning ice cream a daily habit. Next it was Splash Mountain. This is one of my favorite attractions at Disneyland. It was very much the same but with some minor differences in the scenes. I might be wrong but MK’s Splash scenes seemed very much more vibrant and colorful than Disneyland’s. Everything seemed to just pop out. The ride was fun and we didn’t get wet. Then it was on to the Country Bear Jamboree. Many of my friends say how much they miss this at Disneyland. Since I had never seen it at DL we had to go. It was also one of Pat’s favorites and I’m sorry she missed it. It was a cute little show and a good opportunity to rest our feet. Boy, the time sure does fly. I was disappointed we didn’t get to do that much here but hopefully we could find some time on Sunday to come back. We hopped on our bus back to the Boardwalk. Our hotel was the first stop and we made the mistake of forgetting to get off. We got off at the next resort—the Swan—and just walked around the lake back to the Boardwalk. Very quick, very easy. Pat was feeling better so we went to the Disney shop on the Boardwalk and she bought a bright red sweatshirt to wear. It was late afternoon (about 3:30) and we hadn’t eaten lunch so we went into Big River on the Boardwalk. The food was…ordinary. Then off to Epcot World Showcase. The International Flower show was occurring that week and there were character topiaries everywhere. These were a delight to look at. We went to the French Pavilion and watched their gorgeous movie. By then it was dark and a little harder to figure out what was what. However, the architecture of the different lands was incredible. Pat decided she wasn’t feeling well and headed back to the room. The American Pavilion was beautiful. A CM stood in the center of the rotunda area and gave us an engaging history lesson on the building. The American production was interesting too. We found an area along the wall around the lake and watched Illuminations, an incredible fireworks and pyrotechnic show on the lake. Then back to the hotel to bed.
Originally Posted By davewasbaloo Sounds like a great 1st day, I am so sorry Pat was not feeling well.
Originally Posted By A Happy Haunt The Photopass CM's hang out around The Plaza restaurant to take Castle backdrop photos.
Originally Posted By Disneymom443 Sorry Pat was not feeling good. You must have just missed the photographer for the castle. They are all up and down Main Street. And one normally near the hub.
Originally Posted By disney pete Great first day apart from Pat feeling unwell,can't believe you never saw a photopass photographer normally theyre up n down main st hounding you for a photo,we met a nice female photopass CM last year who took lots of pics of me proposing to Kristine,time sure did fly for yall,must have been having fun.
Originally Posted By Autopia Deb LOL you must be the first person in the history of PhotoPass to NOT see a photographer in front of Cindy's castle. I love the Mickey ice cream sandwich too.
Originally Posted By WDWdreamin So funny about the Spanish map! I wish everyone was feeling well, esp if she wanted to see those country bears. Yeah, POTC at MK is just so lame in comparison, but Splash is impressive. I kept looking for the Matterhorn and trying to figure out where I was on DL terms, but it was good I had done so much planning and looking at the maps online and in the Unofficial Guide so we didn't get lost. We LOVE world showcase. Didn't really get Illuminations myself. Thanks for sharing. I enjoy living vicariously.
Originally Posted By davewasbaloo Really Dreamin? I love Illuminations, again one of the stand out reasons to go to WDW (though I cannot decide my fav between Remember or IROE).
Originally Posted By WDWdreamin It may have been that it was our first night and we were tired, or that we weren't in a good location (right at the entrance to World Showcase on the right (towards Canada)). But we didn't understand what was going on, although I had read before about the plot. It just seemed strange.
Originally Posted By Autopia Deb The current version of Illuminations gets a mixed reaction. Many absolutely love it, others find it somewhat boring. I'm in the ADD crowd who have a hard time sitting through the long "ball" section in the middle.
