Park Day Six: Magic Kingdom (TP Crowd Level Predicted 6 and Actual 7)
After their late night at Fantasmic, and their second late night overall, the kids managed to sleep closer to their normal morning wake up. I was up before everyone else, again, so I sat on the balcony and looked at my third version of our third day at MK. This was our final full day in the park, so I wanted to go back and work in the things we missed from the first two days that were must-dos for us. Our travel day would also be an MK day, but my goal was for that to be primarily re-riding favorites, rather than trying to fit in new experiences. From day 1, I was pulling over Move It! Shake It! and Happily Ever After. From day 2, we had missed Under the Sea and Peoplemover. The biggest change here was that we had not intended to have a third late night at the parks. Our next night would be Illuminations, so putting HEA here meant four late nights in a row. Much to my chagrin, I don’t control the weather, so that was just the way it would have to be. The good news was that my day 3 plan had included Festival of Fantasy, which we had already seen, and had been comparatively sparse to leave room for filling in, so it was relatively simple to rearrange.
C woke up first at 6:45am, which was unsurprising given that she had crashed in the stroller a good thirty minutes before her sisters were in bed. After bringing her down to get our morning coffee, I brought her onto the balcony along with the leftover ice cream from the night before. Wouldn’t you know, even when faced with the prospect of ice cream for breakfast, she was mad at me for not waking her up the night before to have her own. Who gets mad that they weren’t previously offered ice cream while being offered ice cream?!? Overly tired preschoolers, that’s who. She got over it quickly, as her sisters had in fact saved quite a bit for her. She had a few minutes indulgence to herself before the rest of the crew was up and chowing down on the remains. We got them dressed, gave them some yogurt sticks for good measure, and headed down to the bus stop.
We were waiting for a bus at 7:55am and, once again, the sign wasn’t showing an upcoming time for MK. Luckily, the bus arrived just a few minutes later and we were on the road at 8:03am. We were in a pretty deep line for security at 8:24 when we realized that our bag checker was being extremely thorough. I took all of the bags, gave Hubby my Starbucks order, and sent him ahead with the strollers and the girls while I waited it out with our stuff. I was finally through security at 8:38am and grabbed the kids and strollers while leaving him in line for drinks. The girls and I got a good spot to enjoy the welcome show for the third time this trip (when did they forget how to sleep???) and Hubby caught up with drinks in hand just as the show was starting.
Our original plan didn’t have us getting to the park for RD, so we opted to go hit up Under the Sea and then try to meet Anastasia and Drizella at their first set by the castle. Rather than trudging with everyone heading toward 7DMT, we opted to wait for the path through the castle to open up and head that way. It was a couple minutes wait but, once we were through, we were the only family walking through the castle wall to the back of the park. I know it means missing a first ride on a top priority attraction, but walking through an area of the park with no one else around was a breath of fresh air after so many days of Disney crowds. We were around to the ride and boarding our clamshell at 9:09am.
As mentioned earlier, The Little Mermaid is a personal favorite, so perhaps I’m biased. I just don’t understand why a ride like this always sports low waits and easy extra FP availability, but Peter Pan is consistently a top ride in the park, along with the mountains. Is it just that Peter Pan has a nostalgia factor that this newer ride doesn’t? Are the scenes that much better? I thought this was a perfectly lovely ride, especially the Under the Sea scene, and I’m not sure why it gets such a bad rap.
Regardless, after our ride we headed right back to the castle to meet Anastasia and Drizella. There were a lot of people just kind of milling around and I saw all of the servers from CRT walking down a back stairwell, so I thought it was some sort of ceremony. Turns out there was a fire alarm in the castle, so BBB, CRT and Castle Couture all had to be evacuated. In the midst of that confusion, none of the CMs were sure if and when the meet and greet was going to happen. One of the CMs thought that the ladies would still be able to make it out, as their dressing area wouldn’t have been impacted by the alarm. Someone else suggested that they might move their greet out to their secondary location on the castle wall, but didn’t have any way of verifying it for me. We weren’t in a rush to be elsewhere any time soon, and I had already seen how long the character lines got later in the day, so we opted to stay put. Although they were about ten minutes late, everyone’s least favorite stepsisters did end up meeting in their original location by the castle.
While they were waiting, the girls had grand plans for this meet. They were going to tell the step sisters that they didn’t have to be jealous of Cinderella and that they definitely shouldn’t have ripped her dress and ruined her hard work. Instead, my little turncoats were completely charmed. It started with A saying that pink was her favorite color, and then the stepsisters starting fighting over whose dress was whose favorite color. Then, Drizella stopped for second, looked at the girls, and asked if they were triplets. When they said yes, she said, “Ick, so you have to share a birthday and presents and everything?” The girls were quick to tell her that they got still got a lot of presents, though, which made it better. She looked again and asked if they were identical and how could people tell them apart. That started my girls down the list (B has a bigger forehead, C is skinnier, etc) while the stepsisters were laughing back and forth at one another, “Did you hear that? She’s the skinny one!” After the posed photos, Drizella smiled and said, “I like you girls. You’re my favorites... now, go away!” Except, my kids immediately ran to me and said, “Mommy, we’re her favorite!” and they never heard the “Go away!” This meet ended up being another top story from the trip, since the girls are quite proud of being the favorites. Their signatures in our encyclopedia were a nice touch, too. What can I say? I'm a sucker for a skilled copy-edit.
We still had time before we needed to use our first FP, so we opted for a quick ride on Small World. We hopped in line at 9:37am to a 10 minute posted wait and were on our boat at 9:44am.
The girls were hyped to have the front row and once again loved pointing out all of the little details. Hubby and I were happy to see them so happy, which is really they whole point of bringing your kids to Disney, right? After the ride, our first FP was pushing towards the grace period, so we headed to the wildest ride in the wilderness. We tapped in at 10:07am and were on our train at 10:16am. Once again, A and C loved the coaster while it was a little much for B. She loves bats and Batman, though, so the bat shadows in the cave made her happy, even if she once again didn’t like that it made her belly feel weird.
Our next stop of the day was an ADR that I had been looking forward to for some time: Crystal Palace. As a lover of breakfast and all things sweet, the breakfast lasagna and puffed french toast had been calling out to me since early on in the trip planning. Hubby prefers lunch/dinner food to breakfast, though, (sacrilege, I know) so we booked a late breakfast ADR to satisfy everyone.
We checked in right at our 10:30am ADR time and, between the restaurant’s reputation and the number of families waiting, I thought we’d have quite a wait. We walked over to use the bathrooms between CP and Casey’s and got the table ready text just as we were washing up. We were seated, put in our drink orders, and told not to go to the buffet just yet as our first friend was right around the corner.
Our table was in a great location, as it was the 3rd table on the character location and you could easily see from the buffet when the next character was heading into the area. As always, we did the first buffet lap for the girls. They were super excited for this meal, as we had told them it would be their chance to have ice cream for breakfast. The soft serve machines weren’t open yet, so they picked some healthier options for their first round. Once the kids were situated, Hubby made a small plate to hold himself over until they switched over to lunch options. He came back just in time for our next visit.
After the girls bounced with Tigger, it was my turn to get food. I made most of my plate and hopped into the omelet line, but I had to hop out quickly because we were expecting another visitor.
A told Piglet that he’s her favorite, and he was appropriately touched. After the visit, I booked it back over to the omelet station because they were starting to switch the buffet over to lunch and I didn’t want to miss my chance. This time, I managed to put in my order before I had to rush back to the table.
The girls kept saying how soft Pooh was and heading in for extra hugs. It was 11:15am, or 45 minutes from our ADR time, and we had already seen all of the characters. I was thrilled to be making such good time, as I know CP has a reputation for dragging on. After the greet, I went back up and finally got my omelet. I apologized to the CM for my departure, but he was unphased. Temporarily abandoned eggs must be a frequent occurrence there. All of the food was worth the wait, though. The breakfast lasagna, puffed french toast, and cheesy hashbrowns all lived up to the hype!
While I ate, Hubby took the girls back up to get their soft serve. They were utterly thrilled, until they started to overdo it. Around the time that B started dipping her breakfast sausage into her ice cream, she started coughing and said she was going to be sick. Since I was mid-bite, Hubby rushed her to the bathroom, where she at least managed to toss in the toilet instead of on herself or the floor. By the time she got back to the table, she was saying she was hungry, so I knew this was another gag reflex issue and not an illness. I negotiated with B about what she could have to eat (kid would have gone right back to the ice cream) and Hubby made himself a lunch plate. We were ready to wrap things up just as the little parade around the restaurant was starting.
The girls marched along with Tigger at 11:40, after which we packed up, used the restrooms, and headed out. After reading a lot of less-than-thrilled reviews about Crystal Palace, I was happy with our experience. The food was delicious, the characters are fun and include two that don’t meet regularly, and we made great time. Even on a more budget conscious trip, I think the late breakfast ADR here is worth considering. On the
DDP, it’s a no-brainer. With out bellies full (except maybe B’s) we made our way toward our next FP of the day, Splash Mountain.
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