Lessons Learned: Walt Disney World Christmas Trip Report Day 2

The Plan:

Epcot 9:00-12:30

Take a break at the hotel and have lunch

Animal Kingdom 3:30-7:00

Magic Kingdom 8:00-11:00

So we arrived at Epcot at 8:15, coffee in hand and got in line. We met a cast member from near my hometown and chatted for a minute. Then at 8:40, we were let into the park to go to one of the holding areas. At the Innoventions East and West walkways, they hold the groups going to Test Track or Soarin and at the head of the Fountain, they hold the people headed back to Frozen Ever After.

We were just about 4 people back from the rope when they opened at 9:00 and slithered our way over to the Joy and Sadness Meet and Greet and the Baymax Meet and Greet Entrance. We were first in line to meet Joy and Sadness!!!! Now, Inside Out is one of my top 5 of all time movies, so I was BEYOND excited to meet them. We got our pictures and then found NO LINE for Baymax, so we hopped in that line and met Baymax.

Then we headed across the walkway to meet Mickey, Minnie and Goofy. Did I mention it was Walt Disney’s birthday? I had made us Happy Birthday Walt Tshirts at www.vistaprint.com to celebrate!

When Mickey read our shirt, he got really excited! It was the reaction I was hoping for! I love Mickey and Minnie! Mickey kissed me. Minnie had a similar reaction and we were flying!!!

So at 9:25, we headed to our Soarin’ FP+ (9:15-10:15) and then rode Living with the Land. (On our first trip, we did the Behind the Seeds tour and if you have someone in your party who loves gardening, this is not to be missed)

Then we rode Journey into the Imagination, which I find greatly enjoyable.

We took a bunch of PhotoPass pictures and then headed across the park for our Mission Space FP+ (10:25-11:25).

My original plan was to hit our Spaceship Earth FP+ (11:25-12:25) and go back to Pop Century for lunch. I got booed on that. So, because I was able to push the Spaceship Earth FP+ back to 12:20-1:20, we went back to the Land Pavilion to eat at Sunshine Seasons for 90 minutes.

We all enjoyed Sunshine Seasons, if you aren’t going to be in the World Showcase for lunch, go to Sunshine Seasons.

After Spaceship Earth, we headed back to rest at the resort.

Because the rumors that Rivers of Light would open hadn’t come true, we decided to forgo the Animal Kingdom stop…we still should have headed over there, but our next trip is Animal Kingdom centric, so I am trying to let it go ;)

On the way back to the resort, we were able to get a 4th FP+ for Space Mountain in Magic Kingdom…Score!!!! We crashed for a few hours, got up, unpacked, cleaned up and picked up dinner at Pop Century before heading to the Magic Kingdom.

We focused on Tomorrowland for the night and did Carousel of Progress (There’s a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow!!!!), PeopleMover, Monster’s Inc. and Space Mountain. We should have done Buzz Lightyear too…just wait.

So around 10:45, we exited the park. We had ridden the bus and felt pretty confident about the decision. Wrong.

On our previous trips, at Magic Kingdom, Celebrate the Magic took place just before Wishes and as soon as the fireworks were over, the park emptied. However, with the new projection show, Wishes was scheduled for 10:00 and Once Upon a Time was scheduled for 10:45…which drew out the crowd.

We should have done more in the parks. Because of the way Wishes and Once Upon a Time were scheduled and some bus confusion, we ended up spending almost 2 hours waiting to get back to Pop Century.

Lesson Learned: Drive to the Magic Kingdom at night. (Yes, it still took us an hour to get back to our car, but a good portion of that hour was sitting on a ferry and on a tram.)