Day 3 - The Magic Kindom!

We woke Saturday morning to bright sunshine and warm breezes. My brother-in-law J and nephew J had arrived late the night before and it we greeted them with enthusiasm! We showered and dressed when my sister announced that she had no shoes for her son J! He had arrived in his baseball outfit and cleats and she had unfortunately not performed her motherly duties and packed any real shoes for him! (She also forgot to pack socks for her husband - for shame!). We decided a trip to the shoe store was in order and so L and I and the kids set out for Wal-Mart. L had asked about the location of a Wal-Mart and was told by a staff member there was one "just down the road". So we set off, leaving J and my mother to fend for themselves. It was about 9 AM or so at this point. L figured with traffic and whatnot, we should be back by 10 or so. (hahahahahaha). We left Disney grounds and headed towards Orlando seeking Wal-mart. However, it was certainly not in the location expected by my sister and we drove and drove and drove (for miles and miles and miles) and STILL did not find a Wal-Mart. I kept suggesting we pull over and ask but my sister apparently didn't hear me. We found a discount store and all piled out of the car and into the store where we assaulted the clerks with "where are the shoes?" questions. Alas, there were no shoes to be found there. They told us about a Nike shoe store up the road (my sister's eyes lit up at the word NIKE) and off we went. I thought we should try to find the Wal-Mart store still as I was hoping to buy a pair of shorts for myself to wear to the Magic Kindom. When I pointed this out to my sister, she told me "well, they HAVE shorts at the Nike store for God's sakes" in her most withering voice. I answered back smartly, "well, they don't have BIG GIRL SHORTS, do they?" and she conceded defeatedly that they most likely did not (HAH!). On our way to the Nike store, in answer to my prayers, we spotted a SUPER TARGET store and apparently these words also make my sister's eyes light up. We made an illegal U-turn and swept into the Target store parking lot. We flew threw the nearly empty store and found the shoes where my nephew immediately found a cool pair of skateboard shoes that he fell in love with, much to my sister's chagrin. I hightailed it over to the "big girl clothes section" and started searching for appropriate shorts, but could not find ONE SINGLE PAIR OF SHORTS! My God! Where are the shorts??? I grabbed a sales clerk and dragged her over to the big girl section and challenged her to find me a pair of shorts....she also could not locate any shorts. I was mystified and angry and my voice started to rise as I wondered aloud how a freaking SUPER TARGET store in FLORIDA for God's sakes, didn't have any shorts....??? The clerk slunk away and my sister came over and asked brightly if I had any luck???? One glare from me told her I hadn't and she turned around and INSTANTLY found a rack with perfectly nice shorts on it (how did she do that?). I grabbed a pair and we ran to the registers. We decided that we were now famished and needed to eat something before we returned to the park and stopped by McDonald's for takeout. We headed back to the park and when we returned it was nearly 10:45 - Mom and J had a lovely, leisurely breakfast at the hotel, although their 2 breakfasts cost more than our 6 breakfasts had cost at McDonalds! We gathered our belongings and headed to the buses to go to the Magic Kingdom. We didn't have long to wait and finally, we had ARRIVED! We headed straight to the scooter rentals and mom and I obtained our scooters in no time. I really felt glad that I made the decision to rent the scooter and my sister was glad because now we had double the space to pile our belongings on! The sunshine was warm and our spirits were high as we passed into the park and began our trek towards Cinderella's Castle, which loomed in front of us. Main street was packed as the parade had just ended and it was quite difficult to maneuver the scooters around people. I found it quite astonishing that people really didn't look out for scooters and would walk right in front of me without hesitation, necessitating some quick stopping and starting on my part. We headed to Monster's, Inc laugh factory first and afterwards we made a delightful discovery. My sister stopped to talk to a cast member at the entrance to Stitch's Great Escape and she told us, because of the "handicapped" members of our party, we could go to City Hall and get a special pass that would allow our entire party to have what amounted to a group fast pass to ALL the rides. Well, my sister hightailed it down to City Hall as we waited for the rest of the group to come out of one of the rides. When she returned, she showed the pass to my brother-in-law, whose eyes lit up like it was Christmas morning! He KNEW what this meant...that we could ride and ride and ride and never have to stand in line! WOOOHOOO! We decided to test it out on Space Mountain and boy, did it ever work - we got right on the ride - no waiting! Space Mountain is DEFINITELY my favorite ride at the Magic Kingdom. We also took a ride on the overhead tram which was nice and cool and had expensive wieners, chips and pop for lunch ($8.50 per person!). After lunch we hit Splash Mountain and Thunder Mountain and several other rides. They were awesome as well. The crowds were huge but again, no waiting in line for us! We then went to the Haunted mansion and although we did have to go through the main line, it moved fast and we could remain on our scooters. We then were diverted to the handicapped line at the entrance, where we left the scooters and walked a short distance into the mansion to wait for our escort. We made it in and I really enjoyed this ride as I remembered it from my trip here in 1972 when I was 7. It had really made a big impression on me at that time. It was about 4 PM by this time and our thoughts had turned to dinner - my brother-in-law J decided he wanted a big, fancy, sit down dinner in the park and we decided to make reservations at a nice place. Unfortunately, our reservations weren't until 8:20 or so! We thought this would be fine as we could get a snack or something to tide us over and continue to enjoy the park. The only bad thing, according to my sister, was we would miss the fireworks show....damn. So, we headed out into the park and re-rode some of our favorite rides. By 6:00 we had wandered back to the restaurant and were trying to decide what snack we could have that would get us through until dinner TWO HOURS later! Nothing seemed good to us and finally, my mother told my sister just to go into the restaurant to see if perhaps they could seat us earlier than our reservation. Miraculously, the next thing we know, L is waving us over....it worked! We could eat NOW!!!! We hurriedly parked the scooters and made our way inside where we were seated at a lovely table overlooking the street out front. We ordered our drinks and then our server brought us rolls and salad, which we devoured instantly - mmmmmm, so good! Our dinner was family style, meaning, they would bring us platters of food and it was all you could eat, so if we ran out, they would bring us more! The first dish he brought was all meat, roast beef, turkey and ham and it was delightful, with homemade mashed potatoes, gravy, green beans, mac and cheese. We fell on the food like ravenous lions, grunting with pleasure at every bite. We ate till we could eat no more (at least until dessert was served), which was a delightful apple cobbler and ice cream. Finally sated, we sat there congratulating ourselves on the way we handled things. My sister decided she needed to get my mom to the prime viewing spot for the fireworks, right in front of the castle, so they took the scooters to mark our territory, while my brother-in-law and I sat with the kids. We were going to meet my sister at Pirates of the Caribbean in about 30 minutes. My brother-in-law decided he needed to find a bathroom RIGHT NOW (dinner had kicked in I guess) and took off, leaving me with the kids and the check (actually, my wonderful brother-in-law had treated us all to that lovely dinner - thanks J!) Unfortunately, the bathroom at the restaurant was inadequate for J's needs (only one stall) and he hightailed it out of there in search of a more appropriate one. The kids and I sat outside watching the crowds and waiting for him to return. We finally met up down the street and headed over to the Pirates ride. There was absolutely no line as the crowd was already queuing up on the street for the fireworks and we got right on. It was quite entertaining and I managed to snag a 30% off sweatshirt for my son when we finished the ride. We scooted over to our fireworks-watching site and waited for it to get dark. Finally, Tinkerbell flew out of the castle and down into the crowd (this was actually a real live person!) and the fireworks started in all their glory. Very, very nice and lots of oohs and aahs from the crowd. We had decided (learning from our experience the night before) that instead of rushing off to the buses after the fireworks were over, that we would linger in the park and ride some more rides to avoid the crowds. We decided we HAD to ride the race cars, another ride I remembered from my youth. Mom didn't want to ride this one so we waited in line with the rest of the crowds and after about 15 minutes, finally made it to the cars. I insisted Lulabell ride in her own car and this kind of freaked her out a little bit, but she did and off we went. These cars were MUCH harder to control than I had remembered and I had a devil of a time pressing the gas pedal - it was very hard to push! In fact, I got a horrible foot cramp and kept having to switch feet to power the car - not enjoyable! Finally, the dumb ride was over and I looked back at my sister in her car and mouthed "I GOT A CRAMP!" she smiled and nodded and waved at me. We got out of the cars and I limped to the walkway. My sister asked me what was wrong with me and I said, "i told you, I got a cramp!" My sister said, "Ohhhh, I thought you said you had to CRAP!" and we doubled over in laughter at that. So, our wonderful time in Disney World was coming to a close and really, we had the best time ever. My mother told us many times that it was her best birthday ever and she would never forget it. I would just like to say thank you to my family because without them, the trip could not have happened and without them, it would never have been as much fun....thank you to my mom, J and L for everything - you guys rock! Tomorrow - our fourth day as we leave Disney World and head back to the real world.