Here We Go Again! 2 Weeks in the Most Magical Place on Earth..and the Dark Side

[SnapesGirl]

Day 11 – Happy Mother’s Day!

Saturday was another rough night for me so I felt a bit out of it for the first part of the day. We got up slowly and made our way to Universal (for the last time!) by 9am.

We met Marilyn on our way to Diagon Alley. I love how the meet and greets at Universal are a lot more casual than those at Disney. And you have to love her security guard on the side. He looks like he needs a hug.

Gringrotts was down when we arrived, so we walked around a bit and went to Knockturn Alley again. I have to say again I love how they did this! I was trying to take pictures and there was a really creepy wizard standing around me. Just love the whole atmosphere there!

We figured we would do the rest of the park first, so we walked back out to London. For once there was no one in line to see the Knight Bus conductor, so we went to get a picture. There’s the shrunken head (from the 3rd movie) in the bus and he interacts with you. I actually hated the talking head in the movie, but it was a fun interaction.

I tried seeing if anyone was at home at Grimmauld Place, but no one answered.

I did catch Kreacher peeking out of the window, though!

Our first stop was Men in Black. We put our stuff in the locker and I believe it said we had 20 minutes free (since it was a 5 minute wait). Well, once we got inside, for some reason they were only loading the vehicles on one side of the track, so it turned out to be about 30 minutes. When we got to the locker, it said we had to pay as we went over the time limit, but we spoke to a Team Member and he opened it for us (and a couple of other people who had the same problem).

Next stop was the Simpsons ride and area.

Mom picked up the famous pink donut, but the regular size one, not the huge one!

We did Transformers and the Mummy in the single rider lines. Both rides took maybe 5 minutes to get on.

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We then made our way back to Diagon Alley to see if Gringrotts was working. It was, so we used the single rider line, which took about 10 minutes. We weren’t terribly hungry, so we grabbed 2 butterbeers and 2 bags of chips (I know, I know, very healthy) and sat on the steps a bit. Somehow we never managed to catch the show with the Tale of the Three Brothers. I’ll save it until next time

It was time to say goodbye to Diagon Alley and take the train to Hogwarts.

Forbidden Jourey had about a 35 minute wait, so we just used the single rider line. I wanted to do it one more time and Mom said she would sit it out. I knew she was up to something. Once I came off, I found her in the gift shop and sure enough, she wanted to buy me the blanket I said I wanted, but she didn’t know which one it was! She thinks she’s so sneaky lol

I picked up my Hogwarts throw.

We also made a stop at Honeydukes to pick up a few containers of sherbert lemons. Word of warning – the lemon candies in the glass containers are NOT the same as those you can fill up the bags with. The ones in the glass containers are much better!

I took one last look at Hogwarts and reluctantly left the area. I’m serious – if I could live in this park and Diagon Alley, I would!

On practically every trip, Mom talked about getting a henna tattoo, so I told her to finally get one! There is a henna stand in the area between Hogsmeade and Mythos.

We did Spiderman once more and I did the Hulk again. The single rider line was closed, but even though the sign said a 15 minute wait, I walked right on.

By 2pm, were officially done, so we headed back to the resort. I immediately jumped into the pool and didn’t move for about an hour, while Mom did laundry. I know, not a cool thing to let Mom do on Mother’s Day, but she wanted to!

While we were getting ready to go out for dinner, I took a couple more pics of the room:

While I was in the shower, I noticed something on the wall that I never saw before. It’s a hidden Mickey inside Ariel’s locket!

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[SnapesGirl]

Day 11 continued...

Once we were freshened up, we drove over to the Animal Kingdom Lodge for our 6:30pm ADR at Boma. We had Mother’s Day dinner here last year and both loved it, so I thought I would continue the tradition ​

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Mac & cheese – very exotic:​

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It was another great meal and we left stuffed. Last year Cast Members were handing out bags of chocolates to the women on the way out. This year there weren’t any bags, but still a nice meal!

We walked around the gift shop a bit and I snapped this cool pic from behind the counter:

We drove back to the resort and decided to walk around to a bit to burn off the meal!

Another thing I didn’t get a chance to do this year was the movie by the pool at night. I wanted to, but on the nights we got back around 8pm, I was just too tired to walk to the room, then back to the pool, then back to the room again!

By 9:30pm we were back in the room and in bed for the night!
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[SnapesGirl]

Day 12 – We Found Nemo!

Today was our second day at Animal Kingdom. We made our way to the park for 9:30am.

Our first stop was the Safari, which only had a 20 minute wait.

It had already gotten hot enough that I was ready to jump into this water!

We got to see the baby elephant this time!

And we finally got to see a lion that was awake! I wonder what they think when a bunch of humans roll by?

After the Safari, we walked through Pagani Trail again to see if we could get a picture of a hippo and the baby gorilla.

And we did!

We also caught a pretty entertaining show in Harambe Village:

By 11am, we were already hungry so we figured we might as well just have lunch. We went to Restaurantasaurus. I got the chicken nuggets and Mom got the kids corn dogs. I didn’t take pictures since they pretty must standard across property, but the kids corn dogs come in a pail with a shovel. As we didn’t need the pail and shovel, we left it on the table for another kid.

Next we went to see one of our favourite shows – Flights of Wonder. I’m not a bird person (Mom is), but I really enjoy this show! Very cool to see some of these massive birds flying and the show is pretty funny, no matter how many times we see it.

Apparently owls are not smart enough to deliver our mail… or at least that’s what they want the Muggles to think.

We then walked over to Dinosaur to use our FP, although it wasn’t really needed as I believe there was only a 10 minute wait. I just love how terrified that kid in front of us looks.

We then walked around the Maharaja Jungle Trek and sat down in some shade a bit. It was incredibly hot and muggy this day, so we made sure to get some cups of ice water and sip on those during the trail.

By 1:20 it was time to use our FP for Expedition Everest. Perfect timing as we needed to cool off a bit and it was nice to have some sort of a breeze!

We had some time before our final FP, so we went back to Restaurantasaurus and got 2 Wildberry Lemonades. Once we finished those, we went over to the theatre for our 2:30 FP for Nemo. A couple of years ago, Mom fell asleep somehow and missed the show, so this was kind of like the first time for her!

It’s a very good show and the actor who played Marlin sounded just like the one in the movie!

We were done with the park, so we took the bus back to the resort around 3:40pm. We went to the pool a bit and discussed where to go for dinner. Before the trip, I printed a bunch of menus from restaurants in the surrounding area. Of course, we hadn’t gone to any of them lol. So tonight we decided to venture out a bit and go to Carabbas on Vineland Ave.

We both got a salad to start (as it came with our meals). I had the house salad and Mom got a Cesar salad:

Mom got the Tag Pic Pac, which is Tagliarini pasta with crushed tomatoes, garlic, olive oil and basil:

She said it was very good except for the chunks of raw garlic.

I got the Mezzaluna – half moon ravioli with chicken, ricotta, romano and spinach in a tomato cream sauce. These were great. Couldn’t taste any chicken though, so don’t let that turn you off if you don’t like chicken!

We decided to skip dessert as we were going to Epcot since I wanted to see Illuminations. So we drove back to the resort and hopped onto a bus to go to Epcot.

We went to L’Artisan des Glaces for some ice cream. Mom got the strawberry macaroon ice cream sandwich and I got a cup of the mint chocolate. I thought I took a picture, but it seems to have disappeared!

Mom liked her dessert, but I thought mine was just ok. To be honest, I think the one at Baskin Robins is much better, but that’s just me!

We weren’t sure where would be best to watch Illuminations, so we sat right outside the pagoda in Japan. There were some nasty looking clouds rolling in which gave us a nice lightning show, but thankfully no rain and the fireworks went off without any problems!

We wanted to let the crowds clear out a bit, so we slowly made our way around the World Showcase and back to the bus area.

It’s so nice to walk around the parks at night. Epcot was practically empty shortly after the fireworks and it just gives the park a completely different vibe.

We said goodnight to Epcot for the last time and took the bus for what was supposed to be a 5 minute bus ride. Well, there was quite a bit of construction going on and some roads were down to 1 lane. So it took us 45 minutes to get back to the resort!



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[SnapesGirl]

Day 13 – Olaf’s Magically Loses Weight on New Diet

We decided to spend the morning at Hollywood Studios. We got up a bit earlier as we knew we wanted to meet Baymax and would have to get there early. We got to the park for 8:40am. Once the park opened, we headed right to the Animation Section. We were told Baymax would only be meeting at 10:30am and the line only opened at 10am. It would also be another 20 minutes before the art class began, so we quickly made our way to Starring Rolls and picked up a chocolate croissant for me and a regular croissant for Mom.

Mom wanted to get in line for Baymax (I told you she hates these drawing classes), but I convinced her to come in. This time everyone voted for Olaf. I told Mom that it would be a breeze since he’s essentially a couple of circles.

Well the result was Olaf before and after his diet. This is Mom’s Olaf before his diet:

And my Olaf after dieting:

I know she’s going to kill me for posting this, but it was too funny. I tease her, but again, for someone who cannot draw at all, she still did a good job!

We got out of the class around 10am so we rushed over for the Baymax line which already had about 15 families in front of us. But it was totally worth it in the end! Hiro was very chatty and was asking us if we heard about R2-D2 who was somewhere in the park and about all the cool things he can do. I asked if he had a program for Baymax yet to clean the house and cook. Not yet!

Baymax noticed Maleficient on my shirt and how she was stroking her raven and he did the similar motions. So cute! And getting a hug from Baymax was the best!

By the time we were done meeting Baymax and Hiro, the line was over an hour!

Next we headed to Tower of Terror to use our 11:40am FP.

We then went to see the Voyage of the Little Mermaid:

I have to say, I really don’t enjoy this show. It could be so much better, but they skip over 80% of the movie. It just needs to be updated or something.

Mom was feeling hungry and was looking for a hot dog. We stopped by Min & Bill’s Dockside Diner. As we were waiting in line, I was going through the MDE app and saw they had regular hot dogs in another area of the park, but Mom didn’t hear me and ordered the hot dog in a pretzel bun. I wasn’t hungry yet, so I opted to get something later on.

Next we decided to see Indiana Jones (I wanted to see the Lights, Motor, Action show, but we kept missing the time).

We then headed to Star Tours to use what I thought was our 1:30pm FP. Well, turns out our Star Tours was at 2:30pm and Toy Story was 1:30pm! So much for my nice little index cards I made with our FP times. Would be nice if I actually used them! We stopped into Tattooine Traders as I had been eyeing this little talking Yoda doll all trip. This thing had such life-like facial movements! They had 3 dolls on the shelf and I picked up 2 (one for me and one for my uncle). But then I didn’t want to carry it around for the next couple of hours and since we only had 1 day left, they weren’t sure if it would get delivered to the hotel by the next day. So I put them down and told Mom I would get them at DTD later that night. Or so I thought…

We walked all the way back to Pixar Place and used our FP. We then walked back to the other side of the park and I got a regular hot dog at Backlot Express. $8. For a hot dog. Only at Disney World!

After having safely delivered the Rebel Spy, we headed back to the resort around 3. We spent about an hour in the pool and then started packing up. This is one of the worst parts of a trip! One item I always travel with now is a luggage scale (one of the small hand held ones). We managed to be 3 pounds under for our big suitcase and about 2 pounds under the limit for our carry-ons.

Once we were packed, we went to DTD to grab our last sandwiches at the Earl. We then went to the World of Disney to pick up the Yodas. Well, they were nowhere to be found. We found 2 cast members and asked them for help. They remembered seeing the Yoda dolls the day before. They checked their system and apparently they had all been moved to HS for Star Wars weekends. It was too late to go back to HS, so we decided we would get up early and go to HS first thing in the morning.

We stopped at Goofy’s some for snacks and at that point, we saw the very first rain drops of the trip! We saw the lightning rolling in, so we went back to the bus and back to the resort. By the time we got back to AoA, it had stopped raining. We asked a Cast Member at the front desk if they could help us out with Yoda and have one sent over, but they said it wasn’t possible unless we bought it in the park first. Oh well!

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[SnapesGirl]

Day 14 – We Go Out with a Bang!
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We got up extra early as there was EMH at HS in the morning. We made it in the park for 8:20am and went straight to Tattooine Traders.

Well, all the Yodas were pulled from the store too and would be on sale at Darth Mall on Friday. And I learned a very important lesson – if you see something you like, don’t wait to buy it! It was a bit disappointing, but I’m MUCH happier I got my Death Eater mask!

I figured since we were in the park, we might as well do a couple of rides before leaving! So we did Star Tours and Tower of Terror!

Both rides were walk-ons so we were out of the park before 9am and took the bus to Magic Kingdom.

The first thing I wanted to do was meet Merida. We had such a great meet & greet with her last year and she loved my drawing, so this time I brought one for her to keep.

We had a great chat with her. She noticed the Mickey ears Mom was wearing and she asked her if I was turning her into a bear too! hehe

Our next ride was Haunted Mansion. No matter how many times we do this ride, it’s still one of my favourite attractions:

I had one more drawing with me and it was Abu. We went over to see if Aladdin and Jasmine were there and they were AND they were different than the ones we had met a few days prior. And this is where I love Disney magic. It was our turn to meet them and I gave them my drawing. Aladdin then asks if I was in the marketplace a few days before giving drawings too. I said yes. He then said that he remembered I did the drawing of him and Jasmine! Ok, I know they may talk behind the scenes and share dressing rooms and stuff, but it’s still so cool, even for me as an adult, when the characters remember things and they weren’t even the same ones you met before. This happened to me last year with Ariel too. Disney Magic to me

Aladdin was imitating Abu when he gets mad:

It was getting really hot, so we took some time to cool off in the Hall of Presidents. I love how they do these animatronics!

Once we got out of there, Mom grabbed a corn on the cob right outside the Hall of Presidents. She said it was very good.

Next up, we went to see one of our favourite characters to meet – Gaston! We had to wait about 20 minutes since he was just taking a break, but it’s always worth it. He wasn’t as arrogant as the Gaston we met last year, but he had just enough to make you cringe lol

When he noticed my crown, he proclaimed that even royalty comes and waits in line to meet him. *rolls eyes*
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[SnapesGirl]

Day 14 continued...

Since we were in the area we went to the Little Mermaid ride, which was also a walk-on, even though it said 20 minute wait outside.

Next up was Small World. I think we waited 10-15 minutes for this one. I have to say, I was a bit stressed with this one. There was a dad behind us with two kids and he was more preoccupied with taking pictures than watching his kids. They were standing up, leaning over, and one kid (who must have been about 4 or 5) kept sticking his hand in the water. All I kept thinking about was the story of the guy who lost the tip of his finger at Pirates. *shudder*

We still had about 20 minutes before our lunch ADR, so we did something we have never done before – Prince Charming’s Carrousel!

It was almost 2:30pm, so we walked over for our lunch with royalty:

We entered fairly quickly, but then had to wait about 10-15 minutes in line to get our picture with Cinderella. The meal no longer includes the printed photo, but since we had Memory Maker, it wasn’t a big deal . Would be nice if they lowered the price though!

Cindy (and all the other princesses) loved my crown

After getting our photo, we were called in to eat about 10 minutes later.

I didn’t find the meal as rushed as the last time we ate here. Maybe because it was the last seating before dinner, things were a bit more relaxed.

First we were brought the chef’s sampling plate which had salad with pear, cheese with honey, crackers and hummus. Very good.

For our entrees, I had the chicken with mac & cheese (second photo) and Mom had the fish of the day:

We both enjoyed our meals. During the meal, we got to take some pictures will all the princesses. I’m so sad Belle is no longer here!

Snow White said she had a pie in the oven for the dwarves. She said although she lives in the castle, she still goes to see them to cook and clean. I’m sorry, but if I lived in a castle, I would have servants who would go clean and cook for me lol

For dessert, I had the chocolate mousse (which I actually didn’t know it was all mousse or I would have skipped it) and Mom had the lemon sorbet.

I definitely think lunch was better than dinner. It’s a bit cheaper and we weren’t as rush as during the dinner time. It was fun and a was a nice meal to end our trip.​

 

[SnapesGirl]

Day 14 continued...

We decided to do Tomorrowland a bit so we walked over to do Buzz first.

The line was only about 5 minutes long, so not bad at all for mid-day!

Next we did Monster’s Laugh Floor. The funniest one (for us at least) was a few years ago when Mom got picked on. This time was probably the second funniest time! They picked on the adults in the audience quite a bit this time!

We were walking past the Mine Train and noticed a bunch of people watching – apparently the ride got stuck and they were trying to get people off:

We had a FP for Big Thunder Mountain so we started walking to Frontierland. I’m not a fan of this coaster – I find it way too bumpy, but Mom had never done it so I wanted to give her a chance to experience it.

We had a great time only because we were sliding everywhere and couldn’t stop laughing. It’s not something that we would experience again though.

We were really hot, so we decided to see how long Splash Mountain was. It was only posted as a 20 minute wait, so we got in line. In the end, we waited maybe 10 minutes, which was very entertaining as we had a couple in front of us who were high as kites. They found everything fascinating, especially the trees and leaves. It was pretty funny.

Now that we had cooled off a bit, we headed over to my favourite land in the Magic Kingdom – Adventureland. Pirates was only about a 10 minute wait.

I realized we hadn’t met Mickey this trip, so we walked to the front of the park to see the wait time.

On the way, we caught the end of the parade.

The song at the end of the parade – Vamos! – gets stuck in your head…forever.

We finally got to the front of the park, but the wait for Mickey was 40 minutes. We decided we would just skip it and go do some more rides instead. We had a FP for Jungle Cruise coming up, so we slowly made our way back to Adventureland and walked through some shops on the way there.

I was watching this guy for a bit, but there was way too much heat coming out of there!

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[SnapesGirl]

Day 14 continued...

We finally made it to the Jungle Cruise. Our skipper had some material we hadn’t heard before, and it was pretty funny. The only thing I forgot to ask a Cast Member is why the water was red? Does anyone know?

Since we were in Adventureland, we got in line to do Aladdin’s Magic Carpets. I keep hoping Aladdin will come ride them with me. One day!

We had a bit more time before our last FP, so we went to the Mad Tea Party first and then the Peoplemover.

Now it was a bit of a rush. Peoplemover stopped twice while we were on. We had a 8pm FP for Mine Train and an ADR at 9. So we speed walked to Mine Train and of course there was a line for FP as the ride had been down earlier.

Once we got off Mine Train, it was already 8:45pm, so we hauled it to the Tomorrowland area and got there at 9pm… right at the back of a long line for the Dessert Party. It seemed like the Cast Members were taking forever to check people in, but once they got a couple more people to help out, it went faster. The Dessert Party has become a tradition for us and a way to end our vacation. I don’t feel like we eat enough for the price, but just getting somewhere to sit and snack a bit without having to fight crowds is nice. Once they increase the price, I’m not sure that we will continue doing it.

We had a table right up front. People move to the railings once the fireworks begin, so you end up having to stand anyway, but it’s not a huge deal.

We were able to see a bit of the Electrical Parade, but it’s not a great view.

You do get a good view of the projection show. And a great view of Tinkerbell!

It was a wonderful way to end the night and our trip. I really didn’t want to leave the park, but I guess eventually we would have been kicked out. So we followed the hoards out. The cast members opened a backstage area and let us walk though. We came out into Main Street.

We took one last look at the castle and reluctantly left the park.

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[SnapesGirl]

Day 15 – Back to Montreal and Final Thoughts

And so our trip was over. One year of planning and it was over in a flash. We were up and out around 9:30am and got to the airport at 10:30am. We grabbed a quick breakfast at McDonald’s and did the Disney store and Universal store one last time.

To say that we were sad to be leaving was an understatement!

Our flight was on time (darn it) and we got to Montreal around 3:30pm. We returned on a Thursday and since Monday was a holiday, I didn’t have to go to work until Tuesday. So I went downtown to the spa the next day for a much needed massage. And on the way home, I saw this at a bus stop!

It was nice to have a piece of Disney at home and made me smile!

So , here are our overall thoughts on the trip:

Timing

April 30th to May 14th was a perfect time to go. The crowds were low and the weather was gorgeous (only 10 minutes of rain during the 2 weeks!). It was pretty hot the second half of our trip, but at least the humidity wasn’t bad.

Resort

I love Art of Animation. We definitely could have had a cheaper trip if we stayed off property, but AoA has now become our second home. Mom loves the morning bustle of the Landscapes of Flavour and going to get our coffee every morning was an attraction in itself.

The room was perfect for 2 people and we didn’t find the walk to be far at all. I did hear more doors slamming at night than last year, but I think there were just more people at the resort this time. Our room was always kept clean and Mousekeeping did an awesome job this time and we loved the animal towels.

We didn’t go to the Nemo pool this time, but rather stayed at the Little Mermaid pool. It never felt crowded and apparently was much warmer than the Nemo pool. The lifeguards at this resort are wonderful.

All the Cast Members, from the lobby, the shop, the cafeteria – they were all friendly every day.

We relied a lot more on bus transportation this trip. I believe the most we waited for a bus this time was 15 minutes at Magic Kingdom. Other than that, we never had more than a 5 minute wait, whether it be at the resort or at the park.

It would definitely be hard to come back to Disney and not stay at AoA.

FP, Magic Bands and Parks

We might be in the minority, but we really like the new system with the Magic Bands and FP+. We didn’t use the bands to pay for anything, but we never had a problem with getting into the parks or using our FPs.

It was more convenient for us to have our FPs planned in advance, rather than the old way of getting the tickets at the park the same day. On the rare occasion I had to change a FP, I was easily able to do so through the app.

We didn’t use our Park Hoppers as much as I thought we would, but it was worth it for the few days we used. It was nice to have the option to go to another park for the fireworks or to grab something to eat.

Overall we found the parks to be clean (even the bathrooms) and the Cast Members were great throughout all the parks. We didn’t have or see any negative experiences.

We did notice that there were a lot more adults having meltdowns than last year, but I guess it happens.

We also enjoyed using Memory Maker. It’s worth the money as long as you stop at the photographers. We stopped at as many as we could and it was nice to get some pictures together.

Universal

If you go to Orlando, you have to check out Universal. They have done such an amazing jobs with the parks, especially with Harry Potter. You can’t just beat the rides there! I guarantee you won’t be disappointed!

Well, it was a great two weeks and we couldn’t have asked for better weather or a better time. Last year I knew we were going to come back to Orlando to see Diagon Alley, but for now, we don’t have another trip planned. We might need a couple of years to save up for the next trip. But who knows what can happen!

Thanks for reading and if you have any questions, ask away!
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[Saphire5742]

I was looking for posts about AoA since I'm planning to stay there during my May trip next year.
I enjoyed reading your report. Looks like you had a great time! And so many great pictures. I'm glad you found MM worth it as I also purchased it.
This trip is currently a solo trip but when I see how much fun you had going with your mom, I'm thinking maybe I can convince my mom to join me. Especially since I fly out on Mother's Day and my first dinner is at V&A's.