We stayed at Pop Century for just two nights until we moved into the Caribbean Beach resort. Pop Century was great. They gave us a preferred room (which meant close to the main area) and we all had fun running around the giant toys and things. Like Heidi sitting in the giant Big Wheel tire or the enormous Foosball field. The rooms were nicely remodeled and honestly, even though this is supposed to be a "value" resort. I really liked it. I would stay there again!
Thursday was our first day and we headed off to Magic Kingdom! Heidi tried to sneak into Lucy's stroller - ha! Sorry Heidi - you walk with the rest of us!
It was a beautiful day - hot but beautiful! We actually did rope drop (basically - get there earlier to when the park opens and be some of the first people in the park). Even though we had our Fastpasses and everything planned, we got in 4 or 5 rides even before 9:45 am! It was a great start.
This sums up Lucy. She just cracks me up at how comfortable she is at Disney. She owns it.
Disney recently launched some new ice cream cones. I think this one was the Rapunzel one and it was lemon with edible flowers. I'm not a huge fan of lemon but this was fantastic! It reminded me of the delicious iced lemonade we used to get at the Omaha zoo. It was so good, Lucy got one too!
Lucy didn't feel like getting wet, so Chris and Lucy went off to ride another ride together and Heidi and I got to ride Splash Mountain. Funny story - the ride broke down when we were about 5 boats from the unload point...for about 20 minutes...and we were in the zip-da-dee-doo-da singing - loud room... I'm like - wow - this is...a lot. We were kind of hoping for a in-show exit, but they got things fixed and we were on our way.
Another funny story - Chris wasn't sure where the cameras were on Seven Dwarfs mine train - so he basically made weird faces THE.ENTIRE.TIME riding it. He was laughing pretty hard and was happy when he say the pictures.
Now, different from other times that we go to Disney, this was Spring Break for a lot of people. In general Magic Kingdom was busier than we normally are used to. We planned ahead though. We rode about 5 rides before our 3 Fastpasses and then was even able to book a few more after that. We didn't wait in any lines. Also, luckily my family isn't all about rides. Heidi and Lucy were wanting to do something else by this time too. We also already had a plan to get out of the park right around lunch to not have to deal with the crowds during the heat of the day. We decided to head to one of the hotels on the monorail, the Contemporary. Very classic luxury Disney. We had a quick meal, shopped, pin traded and headed to another monorail resort, the Polynesian resort.
We were on a mission to experience Grotto Sam's lounge. This is a limited experience that opens at 3pm. Lucky, I managed to get our name in and we were the third group let in! Score! They have these specialty drinks and depending on what you order, different things occur. This is a tiki type bar and they have drinks related to like volcanoes, tiki gods, hippos etc. For example, we ordered a certain voo doo drink and the waiter was chanting and spraying everyone with water and then an animatronic lights up on the ceiling and does a whole show. If you order a volcano one, they have windows in there that rain and show a erupting volcano. The bartenders are hilarious and entertaining. They even have something if you order a plain ole beer. We didn't take really any pictures in there as we were just enjoying it!
Chris also was determined to get the giant pineapple drink. He treated it like his baby. Ha.
After our nice break with some hotel hopping. We just had to go to our favorite place...Epcot. Its just slower paced and we all love it. Plus, we had dinner there too!
We have a few traditions we always do, one being, you have to meet Mickey and friends on the first day.
Not that we are big on breaking or bending the rules, but we have noticed, typically at Epcot, the cast members allow Lucy and Heidi to ride together (you normally have to be 14 and 7). They always get so excited when they get to ride together! Figment is another, just silly Disney ride that we enjoy - one of those - it's so bad - it's good. Sometimes we are lucky to witness someone riding it for the first time and its the funniest thing ever. Like you can see them thinking what-in-the-heck is this ride.
It was a full first day at Disney, but we had a blast! I would do this plan again on our next trip for sure!