I am always super excited to go to Magic Kingdom...and that is what we did on Day #2! It will always be a very special place to me. For one, I LOVE seeing Cinderella's Castle. Each time that I walk onto Main Street and look up at the structure I get the chills. Combine the Castle with the Wishes fireworks show and I am really smiling ear-to-ear. It makes me feel like a child again, and I love that feeling. The second reason is because I worked there! It brings back memories of the Disney College Program that I completed during my undergraduate career. Oh, memories.
Kenny and I woke up fairly early feeling excited for our first day at the parks. We both got dressed for the day and packed up our bags to check out of the Animal Kingdom Lodge. We just stayed there for one night to experience it, and were moving to Coronado Springs for the remainder of our trip. Still feeling a little tired from the previous day, we rolled our suitcase down the hall to the front desk. We checked out and handed our bags to Bell Services so they could transfer them to Coronado Springs and head out to the parks. When we arrived at Magic Kingdom, we quickly realized that we needed to get back onto the bus and head to Coronado because we did not have our park tickets that we would receive at Coronado Springs Resort during check-in. We felt a bit frustrated that we did not think of that before, but we were excited to see Coronado since we had not stayed there before.
We stepped off of the Magic Kingdom bus and onto the Coronado grounds searching for the front desk. The property is very large, and features the most beautiful lake. I snapped some photos of the lake and then we entered the lobby of the resort. Kenny and I were glad when they informed us that we could check into our room so early. We filled our resort mugs that are included in our package and headed to our room. I cannot get over how nice this resort is for a moderate resort, and it has the most beautiful pool too.
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| Coronado Springs |
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| Coronado Springs |
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| Coronado Springs |
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| Coronado Springs |
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| Our Room at Coronado Springs |
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| Coronado Springs |
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| The Pool at Coronado Springs |
We got comfortable in our resort and then hopped onto a bus back to Magic Kingdom. After drooling over the Castle for a couple of minutes and taking photos of it as if it was going to disappear, we headed to one of Kenny's favorite attractions: Pirates of the Caribbean. I am happy to report that we walked right on. The weather is in the mid to high 70’s during this time of year, and crowds are nice and light. You can practically walk onto most all of the attractions...with the exception of the most popular ones. This is one of my favorite times of year to come. So many people make the mistake of coming in high season when crowds are ridiculous, prices are higher and the weather is unbearably hot. It is not enjoyable. If you can make it work to come during low season it is definitely worth it.
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| My beautiful Castle :) |
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| Too bad they had the crane out... |
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| Pirates! |
It should be no
surprise that we decided to have dinner at Cosmic Ray’s Starlight Café. I worked at Cosmic’s while completing the
College Program. It is the second
busiest quick service restaurant in the world, and features three different
bays of food options. Since the
portions are large there, we decided to share a meal and add on some chilli
cheese fries. When you do this and you
are on the Dining Plan, you can save your Quick Service meals to add together
to create a Table Service meal option. Let me know if you would like clarification on this,
because it is a great way to save money and get more bang for your buck. At Cosmic’s we share the half chicken; which
comes with green beans, mashed potatoes and chocolate or carrot cake. It always tastes good and goes a long way. With the addition of the chili cheese fries it was almost too
much food. After riding more rides
for a couple of hours we stopped to use a Snack credit on ice cream. Mmmm. Kenny loves the Mickey Bars and I like the Frozen Chocolate Covered Banana.
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| Half Chicken, Green Beans, Mashed Potatoes, Chili Cheese Fries and Chocolate Cake from Cosmic Ray's |
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| Mickey Ice Cream Bar as a Snack Credit |
We rode all of our favorites, except for Splash Mountain because we did not want to walk around the parks wet as the weather cooled off. Also, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad is closed for refurbishment, unfortunately. That is one negative to coming during low season; they often choose to close a popular attraction to refurbish it. It has never bothered us that much. One year Splash Mountain was closed and that sucked, but we got over it. Dinner took place at one of our favorites at Disney World: Tony's Town Square inside of Magic Kingdom. This is a Lady and the Tramp themed restaurant that features Italian food. I ordered the Chicken Parmigiana, and Kenny had the New York Strip steak. Every filling bite was delicious, even the tiramisu!
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| Chicken Parmigiana at Tony's Town Square |
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| New York Strip at Tony's Town Square |
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| Tiramisu and Cappucino at Tony's Town Square |
With Extra Magic Hours going until 11pm, we stayed a bit later to continue enjoying the attractions. And since we are going back to Magic Kingdom later in our trip we did not do everything that we like. Today we did: Pirates of the Caribbean, Space Mountain, The Haunted Mansion, Mickey's Philharmagic, Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger, the Carousel of Progress and It's a Small World. Kenny would not go on The Hall of Presidents because of Obama being in it now, haha. It's okay... there are plenty more things to do.
Oh, oh...if you have not heard...they are replacing many of the Fantasyland attractions with a Beauty and the Beast restaurant called Be Our Guest, as well as some new attractions. This also includes the Beasts Castle...which we could see part of as we looked past the construction. I actually stood on top of a park bench to try to get a closer look at what they are building beyond the temporary wall. It looks really cool! I am already excited for our next trip so we can see the finished product! Check out the story on the Disney blog. We felt exhausted at the end of the day. There is a lot of walking going on in Disney. But at least the weather is nice, and the crowds are low. Stay tuned for more.
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