March 6 – 13, 2021 – Kathy birthday trip – day 5

Wednesday 3/10/21

This was the first morning of true alarm waking me up, and out of a dead sleep too! I was out so hard! Showered and spun 5 from the room. We headed down to the bus stop for MK, got there about third party in line. We mobile ordered breakfast sandwiches and I got some more Disney hot chocolate! We made some new friends from Texas before ordering breakfast, a family of four, mom, dad, and two teenage boys. It was great talking to them and they were super appreciative of our tips since they hadn’t been to WDW for a few years. How is it we keep making friends in line? Are we those kind of people that others just like to talk to? Do we give off a vibe or signal…. hey, talk to us? We were really glad to have chatted with them too, because the cast member working the line was being a stickler about not eating in line, our first experience with someone like that. So they told us to go enjoy our sandwiches together and they would hold our spot. That was so nice of them! The sandwiches are so good and really filling, a great value for the dollar! After just a little bit more time the first buses pulled in and we were loaded and pulling out at 7:45 for an official 9:00 MK opening. We got to MK and enjoyed a nice pretty leisurely entrance. We planned to go left for a little easier start today. BTMRR was down so we rode Pirates twice as a complete walk on. We were almost on the Jungle Cruise before official park open! The only thing that stopped that was a broken mike on one of the boats so there was a small delay while they switched that out. Oh my gosh, we had a great skipper, Skipper David! He was so funny and quick witted! The passengers participated well too! Splash was starting to back up but it was our chance so we jumped in line. It was already posted at 40 minutes not too much after open and it wound up being about 35, so pretty close to spot on. BTMRR was up and running after we got off, but there were masses of people everywhere in the area and we could see they were queuing through the Frontierland train station and back down. No way we were waiting for that knowing we had more time. So we headed for Haunted Mansion instead. 10 minutes was the posted wait, and it was even less than that, even though it started past the Liberty Belle! It’s amazing how social distancing makes the lines look huge but they move quickly. We decided we wanted to grab Mickey waffles from Sleepy Hollow since we were planning a little later lunch. Kathy found a picnic table behind Ye Olde Christmas Shoppe and I heard the Dapper Dan’s and saw the Mickey cavalcade go by while in line. After our snack we rode the Liberty Belle. Kathy decided she wanted to get the Pluto plush where he’s holding the keys in his mouth like the dog in Pirates so we made our way over to that shop. We saw Captain Jack doing a distanced meet on the way, in Pirate plaza of Adventureland and got some pretty good pics. Making our way to Main Street we got some nice pictures of the Pooh and friends cavalcade at the benches at Liberty Square. We also got some great pictures of the princess cavalcade from the Castle hub. Kathy stood behind me waving so we really got some awesome shots, including some of my Ariel! We definitely wanted to check out the Firehouse and the fire engine and displays. I really like what they did with it since Sorcerer’s of the Magic Kingdom ended. We headed out to the boat to Wilderness Lodge for lunch and a break. We had great pulled pork sandwiches, just nicely sweet barbeque not too spicy, and house made chips still warm from the fryer. Oh I have missed those! The cast member giving out drinks talked to us about how happy they were to be back, WL itself was still closed but DVC was open. She said some people were taking pictures of their mugs on their phone and then they didn’t have to drag them into the parks! She made sure we were well supplied with a couple extra Cokes before we left Roaring Fork. We took a nice couple hour break in the lobby, checking out the gift shop and Kathy got a nap on one of the couches while I rocked in one of the chairs by the fireplace. I do love WL, would love to stay there some day if I were ever rich!

We made it back to MK just after 5:00 and got to see Gaston on his horse leading a float with Pooh, Peter Pan, and Mary Poppins with Tigger dancing along behind in the Town Square hub. Rabbit was dancing along on the train platform! Kathy had seen a lady with a neat backpack in line for Splash earlier in the day and asked where she got it. She said at DTD but that she had seen them around property so we decided to see if they had any in the Emporium in hopes of not having to go back Downtown later. They were queuing outside the Emporium almost to Casey’s but in reality it probably wasn’t two minutes before we were inside. It didn’t take too long to find the backpack for Kathy to purchase. We decided to check out some lower waits this evening and rode the Teacups with just one cycle wait, Dumbo with absolutely no wait just as the lights were coming on and evening was coming on. From there we enjoyed Under the Sea with absolutely no wait and over to HM again with no wait. Possibly the best part about this one was the graveyard was open! Well, maybe not “technically” open, but the chain blocking it off was down. So we walked in! We were literally the only people going through it and got some awesome shots with no one else around! The gate to “rejoin” the queue wasn’t technically “open” but it wasn’t locked either. So we really didn’t break any rules! Since there was no wait, I made the possible mistake of telling my Haunted Mansion jacket wearing wife that “I could ride that again”. Zoom! That was the only permission she needed! I’ve been trying to catch the years that Constance the bride has been married in the attic scene, so far and especially on this trip I found 1860, 1871, and 1878. I can’t find the other two marriage years though. It was after 7:00 now with MK closing at 8:00 so we video called Lauren for some Castle hub views at night and a walk down Main Street with the lights on. A bus was waiting for us and we were home shortly where we threw some laundry in so we wouldn’t be taking so many dirty clothes home. It was such a great day!

Steps: 23,535
Miles: 10.6
Calories burned: 3679
Spin: 5