Day 10: Hollywood Studios Day 2 & Best Meal #5!
Second and final day at Hollywood Studios today! Yes, of course we ate breakfast before driving over there, but it was a repeat at Kona Island, so nothing exciting and new to report on there, so let’s get to the good stuff, shall we?!
First off, we decided to purchase
Genie+ for Hollywood Studios today, but not the Lightning Lane access for Rise of the Resistance nor Mickey & Minnie’s Runaway Railway. The process through the app on my phone was easy enough, but two things to be aware of…there was sales tax on the purchase (which I just saw on an online article is not the case for Disneyland; a Florida thing?) and the transaction was done using the credit card linked to the app (similar to a mobile order payment), not directly onto our room account (which was my actual preference as I like to have a fully itemized log of all Disney transactions…we had been burned before).
As recommended by the CM at the Poly front desk the night before, as soon as we entered Hollywood Studios, I immediately popped over and into the short queue for their Guest Relations. “Short” as compared to the Guest Relations line just outside of the main entrance, where that queue was a good dozen or so people long. Where we were, there was a number of CMs, all dressed in the “plaids”, holding tablets, greeting those of us in the queue and asking how they could help. As each interaction commenced, the CM would politely ask the person or group to walk with them to a separated location nearby to converse.
The CM who assisted us was very nice, but very puzzled by what we claimed to have experienced at Epcot with Remy. Scanning my Magic Band, she retrieved our account and reviewed our history. Now displaying an even more puzzled look, she asked us to hold tight while she went inside the Guest Relations building for a good 10 minutes or so. When she returned, she flat out told me that there was no evidence in their side of the system that we ever had the virtual boarding group for Remy last night. Ah, I said, retrieving my phone from my pocket and bringing up my Gallery folder, I then called up the screen shot image that I smartly took of the display in My Disney Experience, showing our boarding group. I had done this during our dinner at Tutto Italia Ristorante on a hunch…looks like it was a good idea!
Still baffled, but now persuaded by the evidence, the CM simply asked, “What would you like?” My wife and I looked at one another and I responded, “What are our options?” She said, “I can give you Rise of the Resistance or…” We politely stopped her there. “If we can get Rise, then that would be awesome!” And so, we did! She tapped on her tablet a few times and said that we were all set for Rise via the Lightning Lane, with no restriction on the return time today! I’d say that was an acceptable resolution, huh?!
Before letting us go, she asked me for some more information for their internal documentation. Basically, what type of phone did I have, what operating system, and what version. She admitted that the record of our Remy boarding group, even though we missed it, shouldn’t have simply disappeared from our account and she couldn’t explain why it did. Hopefully, whatever information they can glean from our experience can help them troubleshoot their system and ensure that nothing similar impacts others in the future.
Knowing that we could hop over to Rise whenever we wished, we chose to jump in the line for Runaway Railway first. It was still morning, not terribly busy just yet, so the queue wasn’t horrible; not great, but about 45 minutes or so. And, yes, we checked our watches, it proved to be a true 45 minutes in the Stand By line, as those who paid for the second tier Lightning Lane access legitimately used their privilege, entering the attraction through the shorter line, and logically impacting the general wait. Not a huge deal by any means, but a real, observed impact of the new service now being online.
While in the Railway queue, we checked out our Genie+ Lightning Lane reservation options and were not immediately impressed with what was available. The attractions with more immediate return times were not really ones that we were excited about, nor we felt necessitated Lightning Lane access. The really “good” ones already displayed return times into the afternoon. Being veterans of app-based FastPass in WDW and MaxPass at Disneyland, we were not novices on how this tool worked, but boy was this frustrating.
Next, seeing as we hadn’t ridden it yet, with only late-ish Genie+ access available, and fearful that the Stand By line, currently at about 30 minutes, would only get worse as the day progressed, we decided to return to Galaxy’s Edge for Millennium Falcon: Smuggler’s Run, where my daughter and I got to pilot the beloved piece of junk! It was a blast, but proved to be a forecast of my day, the ride made my motion sickness kick in a bit (and yes, I was wearing a motion sickness patch which usually helps a lot). Not too bad though.
Knowing that Rise of the Resistance can be glitchy and go down every now and then, we decided to take advantage of where we were and our bonus Lightning Lane pass to experience this amazing attraction one more time. Again, it was spectacular, but…it didn’t go off as perfectly as our first time the other day. On the First Order Star Destroyer, we were escorted into the detention chamber and watched the projections of Kylo Ren and General Hux, but then nothing happened. At this point in the adventure, you are supposed to be rescued by members of the Resistance via a hole that is cut into one of the side walls. Well, that simply didn’t happen. Those of us in the group who knew what to expect, immediately realized that something wasn’t quite right and after a few minutes, the front door to the chamber opened and a First Order officer ordered us out and back into line in the hallway. Eventually, we were ordered into a different cell, where we watched Hux and Kylo again, but this time the escape worked!
Now on the “dark ride” portion of Rise, our droid driven vehicle yet again got us through. One cool thing was that in the AT-AT walkers’ room, our ride vehicle went into a different direction versus our first ride, giving us a slightly different perspective on this part of the fun! Also, something a bit different and not planned I suspect (maybe?)…when we arrived in the room with the single Kylo Ren animatronic, there was a huge thing blocking our view of him completely and I don’t recall there being any audible soundtrack of him speaking. Instead, the right-side video screens, showing the space battle going on “outside” drew our attention, where Kylo could be seen in a Tie-Fighter. Unlike our previous ride, no threatening Kylo figure getting blasted as the back wall was blown out. I think I heard of this being something called “B Mode” and I am not certain if it is an expected optional experience or one that is done when there is an issue with the animatronic figure. It certainly didn’t spoil the overall experience.
Nearing 11am and having already ridden Railway, Falcon, and Rise, and our first general Genie+ Lightning Lane return time still an hour or so away, we decided to grab some lunch at the ABC Commissary. Mobile order submitted, we once again had to wait outside and show the CM at the door our pickup push notification before being allowed entrance to the building. Claiming our food and then a table along the far end window, we enjoyed a tasty meal.
My wife ordered the Mediterranean Salad with mixed greens, tomatoes, cucumber, pepperoncini, Kalamata olives, and feta tossed in a Mediterranean vinaigrette, served with hummus and grilled flatbread. She enjoyed it very much. Our daughter adores Club sandwiches and had to order their Chicken Club Sandwich; and so did I. We too were quite happy with our selection, but if I am honest, they were not the most photogenic meals. However, the two treats that we purchased along with them were…the Frozen Apple Cider and the Caramel Apple Tart…
These were as yummy as they were picturesque!
Content with our lunch and shared treats, we headed back out into the park to hit some more attractions. We enjoyed Muppet Vision 3D, not requiring use of Genie+ because we were able to walk right in, and then made our way over to Toy Story Land. Our Genie+ reservation was for Toy Story Mania, but we were still a tad early, so we enjoyed a fun little ride on Alien Swirling Saucers (again, not needing to use Genie+). Not long after getting off of the Saucers, our time arrived for Mania, which we always love, and upon exiting the attraction I was amazingly able to nab a time for Slinky Dog Dash in about an hour (my guess is that someone canceled theirs)! This allowed us to jump into the Stand By line for Mania one more time!
This would be our first time riding Slinky Dog and we were all very excited. Observing it, the ride seems rather tame; a coaster fit for the younger crowd. Quick, with some rises, mild drops, and a few decent banks, but nothing compared to Space Mountain or Everest. Not very different from Barnstormer in the Magic Kingdom in our opinion. Boy, was I in for a surprise!
I mean, the ride was everything that I described above, but I could not imagine how much it was going to mess with me. Since each row of the ride vehicles are two-seaters, my wife and daughter shared one row and I was seated next to another single person. The ride began and all seemed perfectly fine. It was fun; but as it progressed, my head just started feeling a little woozy. Honestly, I didn’t get it. It was an outdoor coaster, the wind was blowing in my face; it wasn’t extremely hot at that particular moment in the afternoon, but I came off of it feeling really off. I don’t get sick or anything like that, rather I just get a headache and feel strange. Perhaps it was having to wear the facemask; I simply don’t know. In any event, I needed to sit and chill for a bit to recover.
While relaxing, I checked Genie+ again and was able to grab a time for Tower of Terror. Since we had time before that window opened, we saw that a performance of Beauty and the Beast – Live on Stage was starting soon, so we headed up there to enjoy the show in a nice, seated, and shaded area; and again, we didn’t need Genie+ for this either. Are you seeing a pattern?
The Beauty and the Beast show was as pleasant as we remembered, still leaving us with some time to kill before our Tower arrival time. We decided that some cold drinks were in order and grabbed a table at a nearby quick service location. It was at this point that we really hit a wall. I was still feeling a little off and our daughter suddenly really didn’t want to go on Tower any longer. Disappointed, yet thankfully understanding, my wife said that she didn’t want to ride Tower by herself. So, we talked about it and eventually decided that we simply had enough that day. I then went into the app and canceled our Tower reservation so that someone else could enjoy them. In the end, we never rode Tower of Terror or Rock’n’Roller Coaster this trip, which was a bummer.
So, our Genie+ assessment…we felt, and admittedly some of this was on us and how we felt that day, that it simply wasn’t a value here. Given the decent crowd levels, the majority of the attractions that it granted Lightning Lane access to simply didn’t need it. When the Stand By wait time is 15 minutes or less, we didn’t really see much benefit. Granted, it was nice for Toy Story Mania and Slinky Dog Dash, where the posted wait times were longer, but in the grand scheme of things, we didn’t use it enough and this very much played into our decision not to purchase it for the Magic Kingdom on our final day in the parks.
Dinner tonight would return us to Disney Springs. Since we left Hollywood Studios early, we found ourselves taking our sweet time wandering through shops we had yet to visit along the West Side area. Our daughter particularly loved the M&M store. We also took a dramatic moment to stand in front of the former Disney Quest site and pay homage to one of our favorite places. Looking off to the immediate right, we looked fondly upon the Cirque du Soleil theater, reminiscing about the show we saw several years ago. Had it re-opened in time for this trip, I am sure that we would have made time to see the new Drawn to Life performance; next time perhaps!
Finally, it was dinner time! Tonight’s choice was Frontera Cocina! Now, having been born and raised in San Diego, I consider Mexican cuisine to be one of my absolute favorites. And I like to think that I know the difference between really good Mexican food, mediocre versions, and just plain blah. Generally, when we travel, we tend to avoid Mexican restaurants in most other cities because they simply cannot compare to what we can get (and regularly get) back home. That said, there are some exceptions…one primary exception are the restaurants in Rick Bayless’ Frontera group.
I was first introduced to Chef Bayless’ cuisine while visiting Chicago on a business trip many years ago and fell in love with it immediately. His food was perfection and every time I get the privilege to return to the Windy City, I make a point to visit that wonderful corner at Clark and Illinois streets, where I enjoy two of his three establishments there! And I say this with all honesty…his is the BEST guacamole that I have ever had and one of two that I only really like (the other being at a restaurant in San Diego of course). I cannot stand avocados and am not a fan of guacamole as a whole, but his guac is magical and I absolutely adore it!
Now, to our meal! We of course started with an order of the Guacamole & Chips with Bacon; paired with smoky chipotle and herby salsa. The guac is made with bacon, tomatillos, toasted pepitas, cilantro, and onion. Simply delectable stuff:
For our entrees, I ordered my usual, the Carne Asada; garlic and red-chile-marinated angus steak, served with black bean refritos with queso fresco, caramelized plantains with crema and Cotija cheese (some of the BEST things in the world!!!), tomatillo salsa, and warm tortillas:
Thinking back, and using our picture to help refresh her memory, we believe that my wife ordered the Carnitas Enchiladas; corn tortillas, slow-cooked pork carnitas, roasted butternut, cranberry-infused red mole, Chihuahua cheese, crema, black beans. They also threw a whole bunch of crispy onions on top (which she shared and were fabulous!):
Oh! I cannot forget to mention the amazing Avocado Margarita that my wife ordered and absolutely loved:
And our daughter decided upon the Carne Asada Tacos; grilled steak, poblano rajas, black bean refritos with queso fresco, salsa verde, and guacamole. She devoured them!
Needless to say, we were all very content after our appetizer and entrees! But wait! We were not done! Ladies and gentlemen, I give you the Pignata!!!
Listed on the menu as serving two people, it was absolutely perfect for the three of us! The Pignata was a chocolate shell filled with cajeta mousse, tender cake infused with Abasolo whiskey and vanilla (we confirmed with the server that the alcohol was cooked off), and crumble of chipotle bacon, candied orange and Maria cookies. It was delicious and a perfect way to end the meal! And our daughter had great fun using the provided mallet (which we got to keep) to break the little swine open!
All of it…the inside and the outside were delicious. I had read reports that this was underwhelming, but we didn’t think so in the least. We enjoyed it very much!
If you are keeping track of our meal rankings…this one was #5!
- #1 – It’s coming next! On the Day 11 report all will be revealed!
- #2 – Brunch at Homecomin’
- #3 – Dinner at Le Cellier Steakhouse
- #4 – Dinner at the Boathouse
- #5 – Dinner at Frontera Cocina
Up next…
Day 11: Our 20th Wedding Anniversary, a Little Golf, & Meal #1!
at the idea Disney has a broccoli farm somewhere. They just might! It is prominent on menus and (unfortunately for me) not something I care for. I haven't been to Homecomin' in a while but am going in a few weeks for brunch and you have me very excited about it. Everything looked delicious! If that was the #2 meal, I am eager to find out what earned the #1 spot! So happy you loved Rise of the Resistance and found it worth the wait. I saw the other day the stand-by wait (this is with Lightning Lanes available for purchase) was 4 hours 
... but I think the ride going down somewhat frequently compounded the issue.
