DAY 1 – Travel, Magic Kingdom – 13,932 steps
Third time apparently is a charm. In mid-December, after previously planning and canceling this vacation twice, we finally, finally made it to Walt Disney World with the kids. Our flight left at 6-something in the morning. Maya and Ian got a kick out of us leaving at “stupid o’clock.” They had been all a-fizz about the trip for the two days prior to leaving because, for a delightful change of pace, we packed early.
This trip was a long time coming
The airport was completely insane. We arrived about 90 minutes early, thinking we’d get to eat breakfast before our flight. Alas, after standing in line for a while to order breakfast and observing the complete lack of urgency from the worker bees at the restaurant, we bailed and bought snack food from a nearby shop. Ian’s breakfast that day was Doritos and Yoohoo. #parentinglikeaboss
Our flight to Orlando was uneventful. After landing, we quickly ducked into a restroom to change into shorts, because we left Austin’s 40s and arrived in Orlando’s 80s. Luggage was collected, and we got into the first of many, many Disney lines – this one to board the Walt Disney World Magical Express (a term here which means: the bus to our resort.) Disney is doing away with this service, so we’re fortunate to have been able to make use of it when we did.
Our room at Disney Pop Century
Our room at Disney’s Pop Century Resort was already available when we arrived, so we rolled our luggage over and checked it out. Since we’d be here for a full week, we decided to book what’s called a “split stay.” We’d stay the first three nights at Pop Century, a value resort, and we’d stay the last four nights at the Contemporary, which is a deluxe resort. This did several things for us. Of course, it let us save a bit of $$ while still getting a taste of the fancy life. It allowed us to compare the two kinds of accommodation for future reference. And, it enabled us to choose hotels that were convenient to different WDW parks. For example, Pop Century was relatively near the Animal Kingdom, and it was a Skyliner ride (or two) away from EPCOT and Hollywood Studios.
I use the word “we” a lot up there, but here’s the truth: Sean planned all of this. Three times. He made spreadsheets and phone calls and reservations galore. Three times. He watched his options for things shrink and morph as COVID changed the rules of the Disney game over and over again. And still, we are lucky. The kids were vaccinated just in time. Sean and I were able to get our vaccine boosters in as well. We sort of slid in before the omicron variant ramped up.
Anyhow, after settling into our hotel room for just a moment (the kids were particularly enamored with the Murphy bed), we boarded a bus to Magic Kingdom. After arrival, we all scanned in with our little magic bands and headed in toward Main Street. If Magic Kingdom is overwhelming in and of itself, it is doubly so at Christmas time. Everything was decorated and festive. The streets were full (thank goodness for those vaccines). Because Maya had been begging to do so, one of the first things we wound up doing was going into a shop so the kids could look for their Disney ears.
These ears have all the bling. And they light up!
Ian tried on several sets of ears and fairly quickly settled on some white ones with a golden bow and lots of sparkles that had a button that would light them up as needed. Maya was unsatisfied with the offerings at the shop. She apparently had seen someone earlier who had some that “looked like dragon ears,” and so she was very specifically looking for that kind. Once she explained all of this to Sean, he pointed out that the only dragon he could think of was Figment and that she would likely have to wait for two days till we were at EPCOT to be able to get these ears. To our astonishment, she chose to wait for the ones she wanted!
Walking out of the shop, we were immediately ushered off the street to make way for the oncoming cavalcade. There would be no parades, thanks to COVID protocols, but the various parks would have little cavalcades running throughout the day. We saw these periodically throughout our trip (we never planned for them, just happened upon them, which was fun). These sometimes featured different costumed characters (Donald, Daisy, Mickey, Minnie, Chip and Dale, etc), there was one that came through loaded to the gills with princesses, and more than once, we saw one that featured Santa himself. I wonder if Mickey felt intimidated with Santa Claus gallivanting around his park system.
In the tiki tiki tiki tiki tiki room
Since there was only a short wait and we had time to kill before our mobile order for lunch would be ready, we popped in and saw the Enchanted Tiki Room show. As with all Disney things, the theming was fun and immersive, and because Sean has been playing Disney music for the kids for months, they were well acquainted with the Tiki Room bird residents. They seemed enchanted themselves as the birds and flowers sang and the statues on the wall moved and danced. Maya confessed to me on the way out that it was a little scary, but she seemed to love it all the same.
By now, our breakfast snacks had long worn off, so we popped into Columbia Harbor House for lunch. Maya had fried shrimp, Ian had chicken fingers (the first of many), and Sean and I had lobster rolls. He and the kids also split a Happy Haunts Milkshake, a blueberry shake topped with a chocolate doughnut.
Happy Haunts Milkshake, garnished with a doughnut
Finally, FINALLY we were going to go on a “real” ride. This is the moment the kids had been waiting for. We had almost zero character interaction on this trip because the kids just couldn’t be bothered. They were there to ride rides. The first thing we lined up for was Big Thunder Mountain Railway. The kids got acquainted quickly with the notion that waiting in theme park lines is no fun at all. By Disney standards our first line was short – I remember it being maybe 30-45 minutes. The theming at Disney is pretty intense. During the line in this ride, a sort of smoky, railway smell was wafting about. Maya was not a fan.
This was also probably Ian’s first real roller coaster. Maya had ridden a few rougher ones at the Texas state fair (last attended in 2019), but Ian had been too little at the time, and had only experienced the kiddie coasters. My memory, admittedly a little hazy from the fully packed park days, is that both kids enjoyed it, though in a startled, overwhelmed, wow-what-was-that kind of way.
Regardless, they were both game to move on to Splash Mountain, one that I think Ian in particular had built up in his mind as the pinnacle of his Disney experience. After the standard long wait, we scored seats up front, which Ian wanted because he wanted to get wet. It would have made a great photo, except I was worried about losing my contacts, so I shut my eyes on the splashy part – whoops!
Bless Maya’s heart, she was uncompelled to pretend Ian was holding something on his hand.
Around 4:00 or so, the cracks in our plan started showing. The kids were clearly exhibiting signs of their truncated night’s sleep. Sean was coping with some frustration over the kids’ desire to go to shops, and eat snacks, and ride allllll the rides and how that ran counter to his desire to do things in an orderly fashion.
We managed to ride Pirates of the Caribbean (which sported some pretty fun animatronics and various aromas to accompany the action), and at the kids’ repeated request, we rode Magic Carpets of Aladdin, which let us control some of the ride action, something that Maya and Ian loved.
Tropical Serenade
Sean and the kids took a break and had a Tropical Serenade from Aloha Isle. This drink / dessert was made of POG (a juice of passion fruit, orange, and guava) and coconut ice cream and was garnished with a cake pop made from pineapple upside down cake. They LOVED it.
At Sean’s insistence and despite the kids’ grumbling, we watched the Country Bear Jamboree (turns out the kids liked it after all, by the way). [Sean: While this was a favorite from my childhood, and I still love the music, the show itself felt a little old and tired.] We took a quick climb through the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse while we waited for our dinner reservation time at Skipper Canteen. If we hadn’t all been so tired, that treehouse climb would have been fun. Even with the tired, it wasn’t too bad and the views were lovely.
In a tone of awe and wonder, “The back side of water”
Dinner was fun. The theming was cute and Jungle Cruise focused – complete with corny jokes. Our guide / server kept telling the kids their food was being prepared by monkeys, which they weren’t certain they were willing to believe. Maya and Ian each had a meal of chicken nuggets and fruit that included a special chocolate volcano dessert. The grownups started with a cachacas appetizer (which was delicious), and then Sean had char siu pork, and I had grilled steak. Everything was flavorful and beautifully presented. I was a little ambivalent about the quality of my steak and gave up about halfway through. The kids ate pretty well, but were particularly impressed with the desserts. They were little chocolate volcano cakes that were “molten” chocolate in the middle.They featured a swirl of red sugar “lava” perched at the cake’s caldera.
The much-lauded volcano dessert. You’d be upset too if they took your lava!
Maya was happily enjoying her cake, but while her head was turned talking to me, one of the servers coming through and whisked away her plate before she had eaten her lava. She was distraught. This was hugely disappointing to her since she had been specially saving the beautiful glass-like lava for the end. She explained what happened to our server, and lo and behold, the lady came back with some of the lava sugar decorations for Maya to have – she even shared them with her brother.
The tired Woodses elected not to stay for that evening’s fireworks. Instead, we took our bus back to the hotel and while the kids rapidly conked out, Sean and I worked to prep for the next day’s adventure.
