The Photographer's Wife Parenting, Disney, Travel, Reviews & Other Randomness
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Day 3 - Tuesday
When rearranging our plans, we did decide to keep our early lunch reservation at 50′s Prime Time Cafe in Hollywood Studios on Tuesday.
We arrived at Hollywood Studios around 10:15. Although we didn’t think we’d be staying that long at HS, we got Toy Story Fastpasses since they were still available, but the return time was for 3:55-4:55, so spoiler alert: we didn’t end up using them - usually we try to hand them to someone when we are leaving the park, but I forgot I even had them…mommy brain? We then went to Trent’s first ever character meet and greet…the big cheese himself…Mickey Mouse!
Trent just wanted to touch Mickey’s nose, but luckily he did good and wasn’t scared. High five for the no-crying-character-photo win!
We then went to the next showing of Disney Junior Live. Trent loves Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Jake and the Never Land Pirates (I think Brett secretly likes them too since he watches them with Trent every day :P)
Did you know you sit on the floor? Yeah, that was interesting, but the kids absolutely loved it. Trent liked how he could roam around a little while we were waiting for the show to start. There is one live girl in the show and the rest are puppets, but there are interactive elements, like bubbles and confetti falling from the sky. Trent is old enough to recognize the characters and seemed to enjoy the show, even though our legs were half asleep by the end of it.
It was about time for Trent to eat and hopefully take a little nap, so I headed to the Baby Care Center while Brett wandered around to take photos.
I liked this Baby Care Center much better than the one at Epcot. It is definitely much smaller, but there are 2 private nursing rooms. Did you catch that? PRIVATE! They close with a curtain, so I made sure to pull the stroller in and block the door, just in case. There is a rocking chair and a small bench in the room. The light is a dimmer so you can choose just how bright or dark you want the room. So while it would have sucked if both rooms were taken, I was lucky enough to be the only one in there the entire time.
Next, it was time for lunch! 50′s Prime Time Cafe gets mixed reviews. We love it because we know we can each find something we like, even though we both get the same thing every time. We both clean our plates each time…and not because we’ll get in trouble if we don’t. Unfortunately, our waitress didn’t really play the role very well (or at all) but it didn’t bother us too much. Of the three times we’ve been there, our best role-playing experience was with a male waiter, so we’ve come to not even expect it from the female waiters any more. If you’ve had a different experience, please share!
The entire restaurant has such a fun theme, with the waiting area being no exception.
I tried the Peanut Butter and Jelly shake for the first time. It was dee-LISH! I didn’t taste the jelly so much, but anything peanut butter is good in my book.
Brett got something new we hadn’t seen before, lemonade topped with passionfruit foam.
Fried chicken for Brett and meatloaf for me.
With full tummies, we left and walked around with no particular place to go - which pretty much was our theme for the trip at this point, now that everything was rearranged and we were afraid to plan anything.
We ran into Mulch, Sweat and Shears performing, so we hung out and enjoyed the music. We even danced a little. Trent is too young to tell me I’m embarrassing him, so I’m taking advantage of it while I can.
We walked into the Honey, I Shrunk the Kids play area, but it was extremely crowded and Trent was just a bit too young to do anything, so we quickly walked right back out. We decided it was about time to head out, but now before taking some must-have photos….
Mimicking Mickey Mouse in front of the Chinese Theater…
and the first of his ride height photos. We couldn’t decide, so we did both Tower of Terror and Rock n Rollercoaster. We plan on taking these every trip until he’s tall enough to ride!
We headed right over to Animal Kingdom, which closed at 7 that night. Our parking spot was the furthest back we’ve ever had, which was good because Trent had fallen asleep in the car, so we let him sleep for a little while longer while we took advantage of Disney wi-fi. Ah, the joys of having a kid with us now…no longer on our own schedule, but plenty of decision-making based on their needs instead of your wants. And we wouldn’t have it any other way.
Brett took some photos on the way in, but we were arriving just as the parade was about to start, so we headed in quickly. The front of the park was packed, so we ventured to the right towards Asia, hoping to just kinda find a spot to casually stand in. We ultimately stopped at a spot near a taped-path. We were standing behind a family, but they had young kids so we felt we would be able to see just fine. Trent was still sleeping in the stroller anyway, so we planned on just leaving him be. It turns out, we stopped right next to a margarita stand….ah torture! Why you ask, because there was a LONG line. All the adults waiting nearby for their kids to watch the parade needed a frosty alcoholic drink…Well played, Disney. Well played.
Just as the parade was about to start, the family in front us made room and asked us if we wanted to move up to be against the rope. I have expressed my peeves about parades before, so it is nice to see that there are still nice people out there. I took the opportunity to wake Trent up so he could see from our front row spot. Poor kid, he’s off in dreamland and gets woken up to a bear in his face.
Trent got so much attention during the parade…I’d say 70% of the characters interacted with him and I even heard the parade families saying “Look at the cute baby”. I swear it…totally not making it up.
After he had his fill of parade character interaction (i.e. the parade was over) we stopped for a delicious ice cream treat. Trent got to try his first Mickey ice cream sandwich…he was a fan!
We then walked through both animal paths. Unfortunately, not all of the path is stroller-friendly. I couldn’t even go up to see the tigers because of the stairs. And yes, I know I could have taken him out of the stroller, but let me tell you something about Trent. That boy does NOT like being in the stroller. He wants to be held…so during those few blissful moments where he is content and happy being in there, I do not mess with it because there would be no way he’d go back in without a fight.
A few highlights from the paths:
The hippo was full of action this evening.
Brett loves the meerkats.
In between paths, we took in the beautiful sights…
As we were walking through the one path, we noticed a magnificent sight…absolutely NO line for Kilimanjaro Safari. None. Zilch. A car was literally waiting there for people to even walk up and get on. We typically rush over to KS first thing in the morning in a mad dash with 100,000 other people, because that’s when they say the animals are usually most active. Then we don’t even give the ride another thought the rest of the day.
But let me tell you a little secret, later in the day is the bee’s knees. Not only did we literally walk right on…as in, right up to the first row without anyone in front of us the entire length of the queue, but the animals were so active and out in the open…even those damn lions that are always hiding. I’ll let Brett’s photos do the talking.
Trent, as usual so far, did amazing. Although some of the animals were too far for him to notice, the scenery and car ride itself was enough to keep him entertained.
Just as we were leaving KS, we realized the last showing of the Festival of the Lion King was about to start in just a few minutes, so we hauled booty over to it and there were plenty of seats open. I’m telling ya, Animal Kingdom is the place to be in the evening!
Trent kind of lost interest during several parts of the show, but still made it to the end without a meltdown. That’s a success in my book.
Animal Kingdom was closing up as we were leaving the show, but with our tummies grumbling, we started thinking about food. We decided to see if Ranforest Cafe had any openings. We only waited long enough for them to grab menus and print our ticket…there were so many seats available, it was almost a joke.
After we sat down and ordered, I realized I forgot Trent’s applesauce pouch in the car…ugh, what a bad mommy. So we asked if they had a fruit platter, because we didn’t see one on the menu, and in true Disney fashion, they accommodated us with a platter of strawberries, grapes and oranges. He gobbled up the grapes, but only after we peeled the skins off of them. This is when I realized Brett’s secret talent…he is a master grape peeler. Any openings in Cirque du Soleil for a master grape peeler?
I had been wanting to try the new Beergaritas I’ve been seeing in many restaurants and on Pinterest, so I got their Coronarita, which is a mini Corona bottle placed inside a frozen margarita.
Mind blown. It was delicious. I’m no lush, don’t really drink beer, and certainly do not like anything where the alcohol taste is overwhelming, but this was perfect. The beer taste mixed so well with the tart of the margarita. I definitely recommend trying it if you’ve been wanting to. Trent wanted to taste the frosty goodness, but he settled for just being in the photo with it.
Also, I was “adventurous” and ordered a chopped salad. I typically can’t justify spending $15 on a salad, but I just wasn’t in the mood for french fries or burgers, so I thought this would be a light alternative. It was so good and I ate the entire thing and felt full afterward. It was almost like you could eat it with a spoon, with all the itty-bits all mixed together, you got all the ingredients in every mouthful. I think I’m now a chopped salad convert.
Brett got chicken fried fried chicken and I think he ate the entire thing too. So either we were extremely hungry or this dinner outing was a success!
Towards the end of our meal, it dawned on us that the parking lot trams stopped operating an hour after the park closed, so we better hurry or else we’d have to make that very looong trek back to the car.
We got the tram to ourselves and pretty much closed up shop, having an empty parking lot all around us.
We headed back to the hotel and decided to fit in a short swim session for Trent. It was unusually chilly out, which didn’t affect us while we were in the pool, since the temperature is kept at 80 degrees, but we sure looked ridiculous while we were waiting outside of the food court for Brett to fill up our mugs and get snacks. Everyone walking by was in sweatshirts and we were sitting there in our bathing suits and I had Trent wrapped up in the towel.
We enjoyed our snacks back in the room before calling it a night!
Click here to continue reading to Day 4!
To see all the full-resolution photos from the trip so far – click here to view them in Brett’s gallery!
If you enjoyed this post and need to see more Disney stuff, check out our Disney page!
xoxo Lynn
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