This morning began our second day at Disney! We headed over to lunch at Ohana (at our hotel, the Polynesian) and had a delicious breakfast. I mean, it was amazing! They brought this delicious orange/mango/passion fruit juice that tasted like it was freshly squeezed. The coffee was yummy. They seated us with 2 kinds of Hawaiian "welcome bread"- one with pineapple and coconut and one was like a cinnamon bun. YUM! Then a bit later our other food came (one thing to know about Ohana- the meals are served Family Style-- it's not a buffet or a menu restaurant- you eat what they have prepared and they bring a large platter to the table to feed everyone). The main course at breakfast was a huge amount of bacon, eggs, pork sausage, hash browns, and fresh fruit. It was incredible! We ate like kings, for sure! Midway through the breakfast meal the characters arrived and began signing the books and posing for pictures. There was even a parade, which Emily ended up leading through the restaurant! It was super fun. :)
After breakfast we walked over to the monorail pick up area. (A quick aside here-- I think I will make it my mission to ensure that we never stay at a property where there is no monorail access [for now, there are monorail stops at Polynesian, Grand Floridian, and Contemporary resorts]. It was SO convenient to be able to hop on a monorail- they come by about every 3-5 minutes- and head where we needed to go. I imagine Disney's bus transportation is probably equally as good but the few times we had to wait for a bus the wait was much longer...and that's tough to deal with when you have little kiddos involved!)
Anyway....back to our day!
We headed over to the Magic Kingdom, had our bags checked/searched, and then put our tickets in the machine. Something that I didn't expect was that the first time you use your Parks admission ticket (looks like a credit card or hotel room card-- you use it for everything on the trip), you put it in the machine, then place your finger on a scanner and it takes a digital image of your fingerprint. From that moment, ONLY you/ your finger can operate that card for admission into the park. Pretty neat!
We were inside Magic Kingdom in just a few minutes and it was amazing. Everything is larger than life, perfectly themed, and it was all decorated for Christmas, which I pretty much so loved! It was all so, so beautiful, especially Cinderella's castle. We took some pictures, of course. :)
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| Do you see Paul and Emily? I love this shot. |
The sea of strollers. At the last minute, we decided to leave ours at home- and I am so glad we did! It was definitely not necessary (Emily has plenty of energy for walking around!) and she never once said her feet were tired.
We rode a bunch of rides in the morning- Peter Pan's Flight, Snow White's Scary Adventures, The Adventures of Winnie the Pooh, Disney's Philharmagic (love love love loved this!), the carousel, and probably more than I am forgetting. It was great and the lines were not long- the longest we ever waited was about 15 minutes! Emily was even super brave and went in the Haunted Mansion (she called it, the Spooky House, lol).
Then we met our second princess- Tiana!
We headed over to Adventureland to visit Pixie Hollow/ Fairies Nook. Emily was so excited to see which fairies would be there!
Rosetta!!!
Tinkerbell's Fall Scepter!
Tinkerbell!!!
We headed over to Aladdin's area next.
The Magic Carpets ride.
Daddy and Emily zooming us up and down!
Meeting Aladdin and Jasmine!
After that, we decided to head back to the hotel again. (Another plus for staying on the monorail line- this was possible because it only took 10 minutes to get back to the hotel!) Emily was getting a little tired and wanted to swim in the Polynesian's pool! We spent an hour or so in the pool and then got ready for dinner.
Dinner that night was in the Crystal Palace- home of the Friendship Celebrashun featuring Winnie the Pooh, Tigger, Eeyore, and Piglet! The food here was buffet style and very tasty!
Leaving Magic Kingdom- such a pretty castle!
After dinner, Emily was in for a REAL treat! We headed across the park to Cinderella's Castle and Bibbidy Bobbity Boutique! Emily was treated to a new dress and shoes, hair, nails, and makeup. She LOVED it!
We came out of the castle with JUST enough time to go out where the Electric Parade was taking place. After the parade, we sat down directly in front of the castle for the Wishes fireworks show. (Hint- if you're in the park, the BEST view of the fireworks show is at the END of Main Street- if you're in the very front of the castle, like we were, you'll be too close to see the fireworks [they are set off behind the castle] PLUS, you'll have to fight a MASSIVE number of people getting out of the park after the show. We didn't really have much of a choice but leaving the park after the show was STRESSFUL- loads and loads of people trying to leave all at once and we didn't want to lose each other in the crowd.)
Our own princess on the castle steps:
Electric Parade:
Wishes:
That's it for Day 2!! We are exhausted and have had an amazing day. Can't wait to see what tomorrow brings! :)
