The day before 8/25/2012

This morning, we opted to visit the hotel restaurant for breakfast, and took part in a lovely buffet. This was the first restaurant we had ever visited where juice was served in a 16 oz. tumbler, and refills were offered. As usual, the waitstaff was over-the-top, Disney-helpful and the service was Disney superb. At Disney, no matter the type of restaurant, it seems that the servers had been told to give service before patrons ever ask for it. I could get hooked on that...

After breakfast, we set out for Epcot again. This time, we stopped at Mission for Mars, Captain EO (a 3D movie), and something called "Soaring". This was a neat bit of entertainment that has you sitting in a simulated airline seat. You are then presented with a full vision screen that shows a movie of what the pilot sees when flying--swooping down over a river, buzzing through canyons, soaring over NYC. It was really exhilarating. We stopped for a light lunch, then headed back after we received a call from Alex telling us that we needed to be at the rehearsal in 45 minutes. Uh-oh. That was news to us...We booked it back to the room, changed clothes, and boarded the monorail headed for the rehearsal. Only 20 minutes late. We did great!

Then we traveled over to the Polynesian Hotel, and the restaurant, Ohana, where we would host the rehearsal dinner. At this restaurant, courses arrive family style, with the ability to order more of any dish that is served. We started with a caesar salad, then, chicken wings and dumplings, then grilled chicken, steak, pork, grilled shrimp, and broccoli with noodles. We topped all this off with apple crisp and ice cream. Alex and Jenna presented us and Jenna's parents with some thoughtful gifts. It really was a wonderful dinner.

Our last stop for the day was the Magic Kingdom (again) to get a replay of the fireworks show. Since we did not really see the "Magic, Memories and You" precursor to the fireworks, we got to see that as well. It was fabulous. The castle was transformed into a giant canvas of special effects. This was a completely awesome display that left us convinced of the genius that is Disney today. The ensuing fireworks were splendidly choreographed, and a delight.

Tomorrow: the big day!

Animals, China, and Dessert! 8/25/2012

Woke up early today, and we decided to take a jaunt over to Animal Kingdom, Disney's animal park. It was promising, as usual, to be a hot and humid day. We set off on the bus to get there, probably a 25-30 minute ride. On arrival, we went directly to the more popular rides in the park, the Safari, and the Kali Rapid ride. The first is a truck ride through a Disney built African landscape. There were some pretty cool animals along the way, most notably, white rhinos, giraffes, and hippos.  The Rapids is a water ride where you sit in a round tube type boat that bounces off walls, and rushes down a stream. Of course, everyone gets wet. The waits for both rides were short, a nice surprise.  Then we opted for a bird show that featured some beautiful African birds. The trainer had the birds fly over the audience in many cases, quite low over the audience. The best was a crowned crane. It's feet nearly brushed Ray's head...

Since we had to get back to Alex's hotel for Ray to try on his tux, we headed out at about 12:30. we met Steve there. It turns out that Alex and Jenna had to vacate their room (along with everyone else in their hotel block), because some visiting bigwig needed to have the security of  no one else in the building.

We and Steve headed back to our hotel, where we grabbed some lunch, and set out for Epcot. There, we met up with Alex and Jenna, and some of Jenna's family. Together we visited a few of the Epcot "countries of the world"--especially the ones that had air conditioned attractions. By the time we reached the China exhibit, the skies were darkening, and suddenly, the skies opened up, and there was lots of thunder and lightning. Surprisingly, the downpour lasted for at least a couple of hours. Since we had reservations for the Chinese restaurant, we arrived for dinner right on time, only having to run through the rain for a short distance.

By the time we were done our dinner, the rain had stopped and the sun came out. Such is Florida in the summer.  Ray, Steve, and I met Alex again at the American pavilion, the site of Alex and Jenna's "Welcome Dessert Party". There, we mingled with Alex and Jennas friends, and Jenna and Ray's family. There was everything from fresh fruit to cake, to cookies, to ice cream bars, to apple crisp and LOTS more. The party was a huge success. At about 9:00, we moved to a privately reserved, front-row-seat viewing stage for the Epcot fireworks and lighting spectacular. In the beginning of the show, one of the effects was a raging fire. We must have been more than 100 yards away, but we could feel the blast of heat where we sat.Very, very cool.

By the time we left Epcot, the park was closing, and Steve, Ray and I took the Monorail back to our hotel. Steve continued on back to his digs. But the day was not done for Ray and me. We decided there was still time to take a dip in the pool, so we did just that in the warm evening. Disney Day 2 came to a close.

When you wish upon a star 8/24/2012

Outside the hotel

Our digs for this weekend

After a relatively short and pleasant flight, we arrived in Orlando right on time at about 10:30 a.m. We had marked our luggage so that Disney would pick up our bags at the airport and deliver them to our room. That way, we could skip baggage claim and go directly to Disney transportation to our hotel, the Contemporary. Directly after stepping off the bus at the hotel entrance, a young lady approached us, and asked if we were Mr. & Mrs. Blank. Upon confirmation, we were greeted warmly and given our checkin documents, and then led to our room--no standing in line to check in for us! We found our room after a bit of a trek, and upon opening the door, figured we had come to the wrong place. What we had confirmed for was a standard room. What we got was a suite with king bed, 2 sleep sofas, 2 baths, 2 refrigerators, and a water view from 2 sides, windows on 3 sides (it was an end unit. In addition, we have a spacious living area, 2 tvs, 4 clothes closets. Very nice. Once we settled in, we checked out the hotel's workout area (we'll visit there tomorrow), pool, and restaurants, and had lunch. We figured we'd kick back for a bit, then go into the park for dinner and the light show and fireworks.

Dinner was great at an Italian restaurant in the Magic Kingdom, and the light show was sweet. But I must say that the music that accompanied the light parade was like the "It's a Small World After All" sing-song variety that makes your ears bleed after listening to it over and over for 20 minutes. The floats in the parade were festooned with LEDs, as were the characters that rode the floats and walked and danced the route.

But the highlight was the fireworks that followed the parade. The theme was "Wishes". Set to music from various Disney movies, the fireworks and lighting effects on the Cinderella castle synced well. It was a fantastic show. You can see the finale here.

Rather than take the monorail with the thousands of other people herding out of the park after the fireworks, we decided to take the pleasant 10 minute walk back to our hotel.