soneevda: DISNEY: Billy Park

Billy and I went to the parks today because it's been a while since we've spent the day together. For me, it was nice to have the company and someone to drive me around to get some errands done (tee hee). On the list were: exchange watches at the Emporium, ride Space Mountain & the TTC before they go down for refurb, check out the Characters In Flight at DTD, and to see what's up at the Outlets.

And we got them all done.

Both of us had a long week and were each reeling from a lack of sleep (Billy quality, me quantity) so we had no aspirations of hitting rope drop. We did make it over to MK around 9:30am and first thing got the watch exchanged -- it really is a simple beautiful watch.

Next we headed to Tomorrowland and secured some Space Mountain FPs. We had an hour wait, so we headed CCW to ride Winnie The Pooh. The timing was just right, and Billy happened to see a friend he worked with his very first day with Disney many years ago. It was very cool to see the strong bonds CMs have.

Anyways, after TMAoWTP, we still had 45 mins. So we continued CCW and made a trip to Tom Sawyer's Island to check out the fort and to walk on the barrel bridge -- SO much fun. By then, it was near time for our FPs, so we rode the WDW railroad to Mickey's Toon Town Fair.

We were hungry, and knowing that there really was no rush, we grabbed a pretzel and a corndog and sat beside the Stitch's Supersonic Dance Party construction area. It was a nice pause before we headed in.

Space Mountain Standby was at 60 mins as we went in FP. We rode the alpha track, which was a bit shaky at first but smoothed out. I really felt each long drop, which was fantastic. And that was probably my last ride before the refurb. It was good.

Billy chided me about Carousel of Progress -- I keep saying that no one wants to go to CoP with me (because no one wants to go to CoP with me). Well, today he said that he would go with me, but I passed because there was actually a crowd of people to get in, which I was happy about, and I just wanted that to be the happy thought I took away from it today.

Anyways, we took a turn on the TTC, which I will miss since it's the one ride at the Magic Kingdom that never has a wait (Stitch's Great Escape had a long line, and its FP kiosks were actually in operation). And from there, we made our way out of the park and back to the car.

Our next stop was Downtown Disney where I wanted to check out the soon-to-be-opened Characters In Flight attraction. We parked in the far West Side lot, which was pretty cool. It was quiet and was more the backside-ish area of DTD. We walked by the water taxi port (which I'm totally going to try out on my next visit) and followed the waterfront to the large yellow balloon.

I for one think that CiF is a fantastic addition. It's an experience I've read about on a blog about Disneyland Paris -- there's an identical attraction at their DTD equivalent. The concept is simple, and I'm always looking for new perspectives. Anyways, the weather was beautiful, the area was calm, and it was a nice walk.

Next, we drove to Qdoba for lunch (I wanted points for my card, plus the food's really good), then afterwards we headed into the chaos: Prime Outlets.

Okay, so the Prime Outlets wasn't total chaos (that's the Premium Outlets). There were just a lot of shoppers looking for deals. If you thought you heard that Magic Kingdom's attendance was high, I'd like to extend that thought to all of Orlando. Thankfully, Billy was there. He's a really calming traveling companion. The visit to the outlets was quite easy-going.

We stopped by Banana Republic to use up a gift card but ended up having to save it because of other discounts. There was a 3-day special where if you bought any 3 items, you got 50% off everything. Seriously. I even asked one of the associates. Also, it was the last day for a BR cardholder appreciation special where I'd save an extra 25% off by using my BR credit card. Holy Crap So I ended up buying four new new shirts and four new pants for just over $100. WOO!

Anyways, we continued to some other stores: Aeropostale, Nike, Adidas. Then we hit the only other "must" store, Disney! But there wasn't so much anything to buy except for some picture frames that a friend wanted as gifts. After that, we grabbed a quick bite of chicken fingers and then headed back to the car and back into town.

We were back by 5pm, missions accomplished. It was a successful trip, and I couldn't imagine staying out any longer. We were both so tired. I wanted to say bye to the pugs one more time, but Pom had worked the night-shift and I didn't want to disturb her in case she was still sleeping, so I headed home right them. I made it back to Melbourne in daylight (6:30pm), and within an hour, I've showered, uploaded the pictures, and nearly finished this blog -- I'm heading to bed soonhereafterwards I hope.

Anyways, pictures from today can be found after the itinerary...
-----
Here's what we did this visit:

GRAND FLORIDIAN

Monorail (light blue) to MAGIC KINGDOM
[- Space Mountain (->FP)]
- The Many Adventures of Winnie The Pooh
- Tom Sawyer's Island
- Disney World Railroad (from Frontierland to Mickey's Toon Town Fair)
- snack (pretzel & diet coke, corn dog & water)
- Space Mountain (<-FP)
- Tomorrowland Transit Authority

Monorail (purple) to GRAND FLORIDIAN

Car to DOWNTOWN DISNEY
- Characters In Flight

Car to QDOBA

Car to PRIME OUTLETS

-----