Day 16: Epcot & Animal Kingdom

Summary: A day of two parks. Epcot first, Soarin then Guardians for the last time (except it wasn’t), and Remy’s. Had some snacks courtesy of the French then headed off to Animal Kingdom. Queued for The Lion King, great show and that was the last on our to do list ticked off but squeezed in Flight of the Passage and Navi River too. Dinner at Perkins, turned out great and managed dessert tonight too. Pool again. Last minute trip to Barnes & Noble for Patrick to pick up some more Blu rays. Done.

Virtual queue for Guardians between me and Ann and I am definitely winning the fastest finger game ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) Early group number so it’s time to wake up the sleepy teenagers and head off to the park for it opening.

So up to the full song selection of the Guardians ride, really hoping for Tears for Fears - Everybody Wants To Rule The World today but all of them sound great. We’re splitting today between Epcot (to get in Guardians for the last time) and Animal Kingdom (for The Lion King show we missed) and we’ll fill in the day with some of the best rides from each.

Park #1

So arrived at Epcot and we have less the hour for Guardians so head to Soarin’ to start. They used to rotate the scenes and one of them was flying over the orange groves but they don’t seem to have it now. Front row again so best seats in the house (or handglider or whatever contraption you’re flying in). And the time was ticking as Guardians had been called earlier why we were waiting in line so we didn’t have long to get across to the other side of the park. Except after we exit, Patrick turns around and tell us he’s left his sunglasses at Soarin’! You really pick your moments PG! So we said to the girl at soarin we’d left glasses behind and we’ll be back for them while we hurriedly walked over to the Guardians entrance.

Made it with 5 mins to spare, phew! Probably forgot to mention that the intro to the ride is Glenn Close and also Terry Crews are Xandarians who introduce you to the ride before the big bad celestial guy shows up. It’s really funny and Drax’s one liners just deck me - no Mantis though as it’s pre Guardians I :( And we all get Sykes up for the last time on Guardians and wonder what the song will be. It’s Disco inferno, not what we wanted but this song works really well with the ride, it’s my second favourite. We’re also treated to Labamba as the exit tune (which was on the short list for the ride itself) and even the Guardians theme tune outside. Everyone comes off the ride buzzing and that’s when the cogs start turning, although it wasn’t in the plan, could we manage to fit this ride in AGAIN, before we leave? Worked out if we park hop to Hollywood on Friday we can do it again, I offer up the plan and everyone agrees! I really like the Virtual Queue system for fairness but only being able to ride a ride one per day is so limiting especially when we have a ride like Guardians.

So with that decision made we make our way to Remy’s adventure in France (not sure where we are with France at present, it’s been such a rollercoaster of emotions, let’s say we’re in agreement right now). Oh we got Maple Popcorn from Canada on our way, decent, ranked third in the popcorn list behind banana and Galaxy’s Edge.

There was still not shoulder Remy for Patrick :( FU France! Anyway the ride. We were in the back row and actually for this one it’s possibly the better option, it’s a 3D ride and the screens just seem more in focus from the back row.

Rock Lobsta!

Now one of the snacks that Grace wanted to try Lobster Bisque or as the French say Bisque de Homard (it’s crazy the amount of actual French people in the France pavilion). It was on our shortlist of snacks to try out because it comes in a bowl made of bread! However we’re talking about a hot soup in 95 degrees heat but it was one Grace really wanted to try so we did. And France I take it back, we can be friends again. It was lovely though Ann didn’t really enjoy it because it was just too fishy. Reminds me of the time you used to get salads in bread bowls for every meal over here. In reality probably wasn’t like that at all but that’s what I remember and they were amazing! We also got a Croissant Jambon Fromage (Ham & Cheese Croissant) for Robert as he doesnt like fishy things at all! That was also very good. They also did things like Croque Monsieur & Macarons and I would have been happy if we’d scheduled dinner or lunch here, but alas it wasnt to be.

Now on our way back the kids were arguing a little so I threatened them with a one way ticket to the Figment ride as a punishment. They quickly shut up after that, its amazing what a little creepy purple dragon will do 😛

Look at the fear in their eyes!

Park #2

So on to our 2nd park of the day, Animal Kingdom now that we done what we wanted to at Epcot. We really only wanted to do The Lion King here but probably cant not do Flight of Passage at the very least too.

It was hot today and we’re really feeling it as we get to the park entrance. However we dont need to feel the hot sun beating down on us to know that it’s hot, we have something better, we have a Grace. Yes Grace lets you know about that big burning ball of gas in the sky about every five minutes or so, so you always know that its hot out. With your own Grace you’ll get all the classics: “It’s a million degrees”, “Why is it so hot?”, “It’s mediocrely(?) boiling”, “It really is too warm” and “Why can’t it be raining?”, and she will make you wonder how on earth you would know that it’s a sunny day without her.

Anyway, right to The Lion King for the 2pm show and it is busy, again! It’s the 30th anniversary of The Lion King so maybe that’s why but from what I remember we really didnt have a problem with getting in to the show until now. We did get in the queue early enough to just get in to the showing which was good, although we were away at the back of the theatre.

Great show and Im glad we went back for it. Seemed a little bit shorter that the previous shows we attended, but still very enjoyable.

So I’m taking a few photos in the Lion King show because it’s a great show (took about 450 in the end) and Ann said I fancied the bird (a girl dressed as an actual bird) because I took a lot of photos of her. In my defence, she was dancing and twirling about and doing some high wire acrobatics so I had to take a lot of photos of her. I mean, was she unattractive? No. Would I have taken the same amount of photos if it was a dude? No, probably not. But thats not the point. And I dont know what the point is now, but anyway look at the lovely colourful photos…

So we agreed that we also had to do Flight of Passage after that. It’s amazing, like a more intimate and intense Soarin’ and definitely one of my top 5. And since we were in Pandora we went back on Navi River Journey to grab some photos I missed last time.

Dining decisions

Having done a few of the best rides here, we decided to head home for the day as Robert and Grace were feeling a little under the weather. We decided to go to Friendlys for some dinner on the way. One from my younger years. I used to remember they had wooden puzzles on the tables like Solitaire and The Tower of Hanoi that you could play with while at waiting for your food.

Except when we got there, we were told we had to wait 30 mins for a table - the place was dead which was weird so with plenty of other places on our shortlist we left (after crossing out Friendlys with a huge red marker on the Excel spreadsheet). We picked the next one on our list, Perkins - another one we’ve been to before. We actually came here for one of Patrick’s birthdays one year and the one thing I remember they do well, is dessert! Or more specifically pies!

Sat down and looked at the menu. They do all day breakfast food - good sign! I opted for a turkey club sandwich, instead of the Double Bacon Avocado Burger (which was about the size of my head), so that maybe I could have enough room for dessert. Patrick asked if they served coffee because he wanted to get coffee and cherry pie - a nod to his favourite tv show Twin Peaks… that he doesn’t shut up about!!! Actually great food and most of us did bottomless coffee and pie after our food (Grace stuck with cookies because theyre her favourite). Great food and very reasonable too - probably would have come back here if we had enough time.

So back to the hotel room early which meant spending some time relaxing at the pool. Well it would have been relaxing, if Patrick didnt stop going on about going back to Barnes & Noble again (even though we were going back on Thursday). We finally caved and headed off to Barnes and Noble before it closed so he could get some more Criterion. That should be our last visit to B&N, but well see.

Oh for the short time we were at the pool I managed to take a photo of Sammy our resident squirrel. He was off in a flash, hence the quirky angle, but Im sure we haven’t seen the last of him!

So tomorrow, Magic Kindom for the practice run on the 4th July Fireworks - hopefully Virtual Queue Tianas for the morning, take a break at Disney Springs and then back to MK for some evening entertainment - its gonna be a long one!

Todays Stats

- Step Count: 18.3k
- Starred Rides: Guardians, The Lion King, Flight of Passage
- Total steps: 286.2k
- Total miles: 122.2 miles