Don & Laurie's Grandchild Trip

Day 6 - Sun. 4/27 - MK & Blizzard Beach

Our original plan for today was to go to Blizzard Beach this morning and Magic Kingdom afterward, but when we realized MK is only open until 7 and we'll only spend a couple hours at the Beach, we decided to switch it up. (That makes little sense to me now, but it made perfect sense to us at the time.)

When I get out of the shower, Serina is on the cell phone with her sisters. Buying minutes by the hundred sure has changed life, hasn't it. The downside is that she's become a teenager at 5, laying on the bed with her feet up on the headboard while she talks. On our 6th day here, she "owns" Disney World now, knows where everything is, every bus stop. You can see that she feels at home now, pigtails bobbing, giggling, and leading us to the Magic Kingdom bus stop.

Our first stop is the Indy Speedway, since Grandma hasn't had a ride with Serina yet. If you're a smoker waiting for someone to get off the Speedway, you're bound to hear the traffic report, several times. Several times. Several times. "Hi there, Tomorrowland travelers, this is Mr. Johnson in SkyView Hovercraft 1, bringing you the latest Tomorrowland traffic report. As usual, everything is perfect on Tomorrowland's superhighways. Back to you at TTA Central." Sort of like weather on the 8's, only this is traffic on the 30 seconds.

Serina isn't sure she wants to ride the Teacups today, but she does spot Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum there for autographs. Laurie asks them (as usual) to sign the same page, so we can put their picture on the opposite page. TDum says he needs some money for that, we always knew he was the smart one.

We go up to see how long the line is for Pooh and it's got a wall around it, closed for refurbishment. Bummer. Serina didn't want to ride Dumbo on Day 2, but Laurie thinks that since she rode the Triceratops Spin the other day she might like it. She says she isn't sure at all, but when we get close she announces she wants a blue elephant. And the ride is fun.

While the girls were in line for Dumbo, and I was walking past the queue on a search for a spot that offered both shade and photographic access, a 4-year-old girl with her older sister and mom and grandma looked up at me and said "I rode on two scary rides!" Snow White and the Haunted Mansion must have been substantial victories to warrant sharing with a complete stranger ;-) Overheard another mom saying "Well, Early Entry did us a lot of good, we got stuck with the characters out front and here we are again, stuck in line for Dumbo." As my dad used to say, can't win for losing. (I never knew what that meant, but I know this is just the situation where you use it.)

On our way to Toon Town we see some very short lines for the Queen of Hearts, Prince John, and Cruella. Serina's not sure at all, because they look very mean, but she knows she wants to get more autographs than her sister and cousin. That Queen IS really mean too, she snaps the book shut after signing it, and Serina makes sure she's on the far side of Grandma for the picture. She skips Prince John (Day 1, Epcot;-), but forces herself through a session with Cruella. We think she's even scarier than the Queen, mostly because the "face" characters are so much more real.

After deciding that she does want to ride the Teacups today, we make our way down to the Barnstormer. She wants me to ride with her this time, explaining that it goes up the hill very slow but then goes down very fast. I say "You mean we're going to go through that barn?!?" She shrugs her shoulders and says, "Hey, you get on the ride, you go through the barn." (Note to self -- talk to the imagineers about those hard plastic, 6-inch deep corduroy seats. They're probably designed to keep little butts from sliding sideways, but holy cow!) After the ride I tell Serina that it wasn't too fast, and she says "It's pretty fast if you're a little kid!" True enough, everything's relative.

We finally get a chance to check out Minnie and Mickey's houses. As if we needed proof that she's a tomboy (dirt bikes and all), she isn't terribly impressed with Minnie's place but spends quite a bit of time in Mickey's.

On the way to the train, she's talking about going on Splash again, wondering how many times the other girls rode. She decides she's going to ride it again. On our way out of the Main St. station, Laurie sees someone that reminds her of LauraB, so she gets on the cell phone and calls her up and lets her listen to the train sounds all the way around to Frontierland, describing all the sights as we go by. Must have come as quite a surprise to Laura, and made her day.

Once we get over there and make a bathroom stop, Serina doesn't much like the idea of another Splash trip. Too bad, it's only a 15-minute line, while Big Thunder is 45. We walk around back of Big Thunder so she can check it out, and after a few minutes she declares that it's not much faster than the Barnstormer. Ultimately though, it's a no go.

We ask her if she wants to go on the Pirates ride, being careful to be sure that she's aware that there's one very short, very dark place and one very small drop. Probably due to her increasing confidence and what must seem to her to be a shortage of real rides, she'll try it. We all have to hold hands throughout the queue because it's quite dark in there. She survives the drop nicely, but is quite tense throughout the ride. When we get outside she informs us "that's the very, very, very, very, very, very last time I'm EVER riding on that ride." She's bubbly and bouncing now, so she's certainly able to put anything behind her, but this puppy's definitely behind her. It's added a new term to our Disney vocabulary too, we now have a list of "E-ticket" rides and a separate (overlapping) list of "6-very-last" rides.

It's Laurie's turn to get her biggest laugh of the trip in the queue for Alladin. Laurie and Serina were going to sit in the front so she could control the elevation, with me in the back. Serina suddenly looks up at me and sternly demands "and you don't TOUCH that button back there." I assure her that I won't touch anything for the entire ride. About 30 seconds later, she looks up at me again and says "You better sit up front with me and Grandma can sit in the back, because she KNOWS about it." (In other words, it's not that I don't trust you Papa, but get your butt up here where you can't do any damage.) Now THAT makes Laurie's day ;-)

She's a little upset with us for taking her to see the Tiki Room, "You mean we have to stand up??!!" No princess, this is the pre-show, we'll find you a seat in a minute. She doesn't really like the show that much either, because "Iago's too mean." It doesn't make the 6-very-last list though, so we're thinking it wasn't too bad.

At 12:20 there's a 40-minute wait for the Jungle Cruise, and the FastPass return time is only 45 minutes away, that's kind of a no-brainer so we grab a set and head to lunch. The FPs say we can get another one after 12:24, only 4 minutes away. If I had more energy, I'd run over to Splash and get some there ;-) During lunch at Pecos Bill's, Serina informs us that Day 6 has been a lot of fun. We think that's a pretty good way of not dwelling on the bad things but looking at the big picture.

She's been spoiled by the FP, there are about 20 people in the Jungle Cruise line ahead of us and she asks us, incredulously, "This is the FastPass line?" When you think about it though, when you're 5 years old, any crowd of adults is just a big collection of knees and butts, so a line of 20 and a line of 200 look just about the same. She gets a big kick out of the Jungle Cruise, we have a good skipper who's fairly entertaining even if you don't get the bad jokes.

Getting Jafar's autograph in Adventureland is quite an Adventure, she toughs it out but concludes afterwards "Man, is HE creepy!" As we walk by the Crystal Palace I ask her if she remembers that building, and she says "Yes, that's where we had lunch with Pooh and Piglet and Tigger and Eeyore on Day 2." We can't even keep track of time that well at DW ;-)

We take the nice cool walk down through the shops on Main Street, when suddenly she's drawn outside by the sound of the Main Street band. Very entertaining. We escape the dreaded half-day at Downtown Disney (don't tell Laurie I said that) by completing all our shopping in the Emporium. (Don't know if those shops have separate names, but I call everything from Casey's to City Hall the "Emporium", if they ain't got no doors, they ain't different stores).

Our bus pulls up just as we get to the bus stop and there are only a few other people there, so Laurie tells Serina to get on while we pack up the stroller and our packages. We find her in our traditional spot across from the back door, laying across the three seats to save them for us.

Back at the hotel, Laurie and Serina do a little more bonding as we take the cool shortcut through the food court. Serina and I take a different path than Laurie through the tables because Serina wants to beat her to the door. Laurie walks just fast enough to let Serina almost catch up, then speeds up just a bit by the door. Serina declares it a tie, and I tell her she should know by now that Grandma doesn't like to lose. Laurie says, "No, I like to win. I think all middle children like to win." "You're a middle kid?!!?! I'm a middle kid too!!! So's my mommy!" Instant common ground.

After resting for a bit, we head over to Blizzard Beach at 3:00, with the bus driver asking to make sure that everyone knows it closes at 6. On the way in the park, Serina sees a poster for the toboggan rides and wants to do that first. We quickly find a nice spot with chairs over in Tike's Peak, and as we're parking our gear she sees the kids' water slides there and wants to check them out. I walk up to the top with her and she goes down one slide, then decides she wants to do something else.

Laurie and I are both feeling a little overheated already, so we talk her into taking the lazy river around to the toboggans. The Blizzard Beach river is just a hair shallower than the one at Typhoon Lagoon, and Serina can stand up all the way around. So she "runs" almost a complete lap. We make one and a half laps and walk over to the bottom of the toboggan ride so she can decide if it looks good when it isn't on a poster. Yes it does.

On the way up to the top though, we must have missed an exit, because soon we're in the line for the Family Raft Ride. She thinks that sounds like fun, and we're excited because we couldn't get the other two girls on it. I'm trying to keep an eye on Serina to make sure she gets in the boat okay, and I make a misstep and fall full on my side in the raft like a big goober. Everybody and his brother is all over me making sure I'm okay. Except Serina, who's busy trying to get a good grip on those handles, and doesn't have time to be bothered with some old relative lying in her boat. And we launch, and we go up and down and around, and it's a blast, and she wants to do it again. But on the way to the stairs she decides she really wants to try that toboggan. I'm not crazy about that one, so I head back to camp while the girls head up the hill. They have a ball. Serina knows from watching people up ahead that the CM would be giving her a little head start, but she tells Laurie "you're still going to beat me, because you're heavier and I'll slow down more at the bottom." I think she's done this before.

I had decided to take the lazy river around to camp and wait for them, but when I get back they're already through with their ride, back at the camp, and leaving me a note that they're heading to the wave pool. When they call that a lazy river, they mean it. (Well, okay, "they" don't actually call it that, but "we" do.) Serina likes the wave pool here too, unlike Typhoon Lagoon this one is just steady bobbing waves of up to two feet, depending where you are. And Laurie likes the fact that I'm there because she's finally getting in some alone time in the sun.

On our way back to the hotel after closing the Beach, Serina wants to know what park we're going to next. Laurie tells her we thought we'd just go back and stay at the hotel, and she says, in disbelief, "But it's still daytime!!" When we get back to the football field at the All Stars, there's a 7-year-old boy looking very lost and panicky. Laurie asks him if he's lost, and he sobs "no, but my 2-year-old brother is." His parents are down checking out the pools and the CM's are very quietly but actively involved in the process as well. Serina says "we have to help find him," so we take her out behind Building 10 and look along the edge of the bushes. At every sidewalk intersection, she'd say, "let's look down here." After about a half hour I start asking her if we should start to head back and she just keeps saying, "well he has to be SOMEWHERE."

She says something interesting as we walk past the baseball building, she's glad we aren't staying there because "all the doors are the same color." Must be something comforting about our color-coded sets of rooms. When we get back to the football field, the CM is casually talking to some guests, so the boy must have been found. Serina is quite relieved, and can finally get back to the less serious business of climbing on the X's and O's.

Since we're back in the room early after supper and tomorrow is our last full day, we decide to do most of our packing tonight. Serina has no problem with that; she's excited that she gets to pick our bus tomorrow. We ask her what park we'll be going to, and her immediate answer is "not Epcot". I think she can still "feel" Illuminations. One other bit of luck we have is that as we're packing and flipping channels, we run across the movie "A Painted House." We had both really wanted to see it, because it's the first book we had ever read together. There's just no end to the "magic" here ;-)

Day: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7