Thursday, March 5, 2009

Day 7 -WDW Vacation

Our next day saw us reach the one week mark of our trip. It is so amazing to see how fast time goes when you're in the midst of a wonderful vacation; things happen so fast that it generally takes some time after the fact to take inventory of the amazing things that we did. This little recap has been great for me to do just this. Going through the photos and relating what happened makes me realize how much we got to do!

If you will recall, our last day was quite trying, and we were pretty much worn out, but we were looking forward to our first fun day in EPCOT, starting with a breakfast with the princesses in the Norway pavilion restaurant Akershus. We set the alarm to give us enough time to make our 9:00 a.m. reservation, but in the midst of a late night of laundry, a VERY early morning feeding for Jaden, and hitting the snooze once, we woke up just after 8:00 a.m. OH, CRAP! We started throwing clothes on, waking up Lexie and dressing her, everything that we had planned to do (with the exception of a shower) in ten minutes instead of ninety, and hoped that we could make it in time. Just as we were about to leave, I couldn't find the camera anywhere. I had it in my hand that morning, but now it was MIA. Our video camera was toast (see Day 6), and we were going to a special breakfast with a gaggle of princesses, so we really had to find the camera. We looked for 20 solid minutes...under the beds, in the closets, over and over. As stressed as we were, I couldn't believe that the camera had disappeared in the twenty feet of hotel room that I traveled while I got ready to go. Finally, I found it at the bottom of our computer bag (that Stacie had checked twice before). We were off!

We raced to the monorail station, which was not close, got to EPCOT, and I ran with Jaden to the Norway pavilion, which was conveniently located at the opposite side of the park. Stacie and Lexie made good time as well, and once they got to the restaurant we were being seated. Sure, we were 45 minutes late, but they were nice enough to honor our reservation. Upon entering the restaurant, Lexie had her picture taken with Belle, and then we were seated. We helped ourselves to a great fruit and pastry bar, and they brought us eggs, potatoes, bacon and sausage on a family style platter. Then, in succession, Aurora, Snow White, Jasmine, and Mulan visited us. Lexie was completely awestruck. She looked into their eyes, and wouldn't look away, regardless of what was said. She was pretty cute to watch, and made sure that they all signed her autograph book as well as posing for a picture.

After breakfast, we jumped into line for the Maelstrom ride in Norway, which was just about to open for the day. We then went next door to Mexico, and got to ride the Gran Fiesta tour with the new Three Caballeros overlay. It was so nice to not have a long wait, so we went several times. After, we walked over to Future World to see Figment (Lexie loved the part where he was taking a bath on the ceiling), and we also found Nemo several times. Our last order of business that morning was going on Spaceship Earth (the big golf ball). Lexie and I took one seat, while Stacie and Jaden rode behind us. It is a very interactive ride with a touch screen right in front of you. Lexie started pushing buttons while I sat down, and we came within a couple of seconds of listening to the entire ride narration in German. I'm sure that my two years of junior high school German classes would have come in handy, but we enjoyed it in our native tongue just fine.

We went back to the room for a nap (learning from the day before's mistakes), and went back to EPCOT for the afternoon and evening. We had a sit-down chat with Crush the turtle, found Nemo a couple more times, and finally cashed in our FastPass for Soarin'. Lexie was a little apprehensive about it, and I managed to film her with our still camera during the ride. At first, she is nervous as the room goes dark and we go up in the air, then her eyes get really big, and then she starts going "YAYYYYY!!". I've watched it over and over because it really captures her and her fearless attitude. Those times certainly trump the more difficult times. Lexie took her mom on the ride next, and Jaden and I waited in the foyer.

Once again, we closed the park, leaving with the last of the crowd. Jaden decided that it was time to eat RIGHT THEN, so I knocked on the door of an ice cream shop that was closed and begged for some hot water. We mixed the hot with some water from a drinking fountain so that it was the right temperature, and we were in business (it was kind of amazing to see how quickly and efficiently we were able to perform this task after a week in WDW). Our trip back to the resort was very nice, and we geared up for another fun day.

1 comment:

Amy said...

Sorry to hear about your hectic morning, but I'm SO glad you found your camera! Those are some really cute pictures. I would have loved to go on the Nemo ride more than once while we were there, but time just didn't allow it. It's one of my favorites at Epcot. The clam-mobiles are so much better than those crowded submarines. I'm also glad Lexie liked Soarin' so much. Thanks for another entertaining post. I know you guys are super busy, so I just waited patiently and was delighted to see the recap of Day 7. Makes me wish we were back there!