Seeing the parks through Walt’s eyes and another late night at the Magic Kingdom

Today was one of the days we had really looked forward to. We had to get up early as we had signed up for the “Through Walt’s Eyes” tour. While I was in the shower Tom prepared some breakfast and we had sandwiches, tea and some sweets out of the fridge. By 8am we were out of the villa and on our way over to Epcot.

We got a parking spot really close to the park entrance, went through bag check and over to the Tour Garden. We were the first people to sign in for the tour, got nametags and listening devices and talked to the guides for a while until the rest of the group showed up and signed in. Once everyone was there we walked over to the bus parking lot and got on a bus that was taking us to Disney’s Hollywood Studios.

There we walked to the area where Fairfax Fair is and even though we had been there lots of times before, the guide pointed out a lot of war related items that had influenced Walt Disney. The guide was really knowledgeable about anything Walt and was able to tell lots of interesting stories. We than walked towards the hat and there he spoke about Hidden Mickeys and had anyone heard about Hidden Mortimers.

He then proceeded to show us one! Back we went on the bus to drive to an area where the warehouses are and we looked into a workshop where they keep and repair props. It was quite a walk through it all and not all that interesting, since we had been taken there before on other tours. Our next and last stop was the Magic Kingdom, where we used the entrance behind Main Street and our guide took us into the Utilidors. Another visit we had already made on other tours. We then walked along Main Street and our guide pointed out a lot of the windows on Main Street and who the people were and how they had worked and influenced Walt. Even though our guide was very knowledgeable there was not really much new information on Walt we could gather, but then we have taken a lot of tours and have already seen a lot. In the end we went back to our bus, which took us back to Epcot, where we were given a commemorative pin and a rain poncho as it looked a lot like rain.

We were even asked to pick another bottle of water out of the cooler they had. Tom and I were hungry by then, having had breakfast very early in the day. So we got into our car and drove over to the Polynesian resort to have some lunch. We walked up to the kiosks and placed our order. We ordered the Pulled pork Flatbread, which was  the Flatbread of the Day and an Aloha Pork Sandwich, that came with Polynesian Chips.

While our order was prepared, we got two Diet Cokes and our desserts. Tom got a Fruit cup and I had a Pineapple cup. We walked over to the seating area and who should walk up than two of the people who were on the tour with us. They pretended not to know us, so we pretended not to know them either. We sat there for a while eating our lunch and having a laugh because one of the chips really looked like a crown.

After we had finished our lunch we decided to hop over to the Magic Kingdom, but when we were out at the Monorail Station we could see that it was going to rain soon, so we just walked down to the car and drove back to Old Key West. We barely made it in the door before a storm broke. It was raining cats and dogs and we were happy we had made the right decision in going back to Old Key West.

I did a load of laundry while Tom was working on the internet and then we just spent some time in front of the TV.We snacked a little on the Muffin Sandwich and the Bread Pudding we still had from Earl of Sandwich. After a few hours the rain stopped and by early evening we left our villa again to drive over to the Polynesian Resort again for some dinner. We checked in at the Kona Café, were given a buzzer and told that it would be a 15 minute wait.

There were lots of walk ups and the people signing in ahead of us were walk-ups too. We expected to be seated next, but no, Kona Café obviously doesn’t honour ADRs, so we had to wait our time, which didn’t sit well with me. Finally we were led to our table, a tiny two top next to a column and our server introduced himself, then leaving us to check the menu. While we were still studying the menu our server brought out the Soft Bread and Macadamia Nut Butter. We then ordered our main courses.

Tom had the Teriyaki-style New York Strip, a sirloin strip grilled with pineapple teriyaki glaze served with mashed Yukon gold potatoes and stir-fried broccolini and I ordered the Coconut Almond Chicken - sauteed chicken breast served with Asian greens tossed with honey-lime dressing, golden pineapple, strawberries, and toasted almonds. We munched on the bread until our main courses were served. After we had finished our entrees we were quite full, but ordered a dessert, since we were on the Disney Dining Plan. Tom got the No Sugar Added Apple Stacker - with cinnamon, sour cream and crisp won tons served with sugar free vanilla ice cream and I thought I might give the Banana-Chocolate Creme Brulee - with a chocolate spiral another try. It took ages for our server to bring the bill, but then we finally made our way over to the Magic Kingdom. There were still a lot of people at the bag check and the turnstiles, but we finally made it inside the park.

We were right on time for the Main Street Electrical Parade, which we both love, so we stopped and watched it. After the Parade we walked towards the Haunted Mansion, but the line was still too long, so we walked through Fantasyland and saw that they were still distributing Fast Passes for Peter Pan’s Flight, so we got one.

We then walked back towards the Christmas store and over to Adventureland and when we saw that there was literally no line for the Jungle Cruise we jumped on board. We just love to ride the Jungle Cruise at night as the skippers tend to be more relaxed and crack a lot more jokes than during the day. So we had a fun cruise and a lot of laughter. Next we hopped on another cruise, the one of the Pirates of the Caribbean. Again the line was pretty short, so we were off and on the ride in no time.

 When we got off we realized that the park had gotten far less crowded, so we walked over to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad to have a look at how long the line was there. It was only a 5 minute wait, so we got in line and literally walked on the line, even though we asked to sit in the back of the train. Fun ride was over far too soon, so when we got back we just walked around one more time and rode again.

By then it was nearly time to go and ride Peter Pan and on the way there we just had a look at the line for the Haunted Mansion and since there was none, we visited the 999 Happy Haunts residing there, too. By then our Fast Pass was valid and we hopped in line and were on the ride in no time. We watched out for the Hidden Mickey in the ride and were off just in time to catch the next performance of Mickey’s Philharmagic.

We only waited for about 5 minutes before we were led into the theatre. The show was fun as always and we still had about 20 minutes of Extra Magic Hours left, so we headed over to Space Mountain and since they let us, we got in line. It said 20 minutes and it WAS a 20 minute wait. Since we were in the Stand by line we had lots of time to enjoy the ride area and found Disney's "newest" and "furthest" off resort, The Hyperion Resort! There were still lots of people with Fastpasses walking on, but around the time the park officially closed we had finally gotten close to boarding our ride vehicle. Once we made it to the boarding area we were filling in the last two seats of a ride car. We had a lot of fun sitting there, screaming through space. It was time to leave the park, so we strolled towards the exit, got in line for the Monorail and picked up our car. It was way past our bedtime when we finally made it back to our villa, where we fell into bed.