8.16.13---We got up early and moved over to the Yacht Club Resort in the Epcot area. It took me forever to get us checked in because the Magic Bands still had us registered over at Coronado Springs. Once we finally got the go-ahead, our things got taken up to our room. I quickly checked the place out but then we ran out the door to Hollywood Studios. HS is a 10-15 minute walk so we chose that option over taking the ferry. I will not lie when I say that I began to get nervous about the lack of people. It was crazy! There was no one out in the Boardwalk area. I started to wonder if we were going to end up like the Griswolds in Vacation and the park was going to be closed. Once we started to get close to the bus drop-off area, we finally saw some people but there weren't very many. After we got in, we headed left as everyone else headed right of the park. Star Tours was empty so we jumped right on it and it was our first official ride of the vacation. After that, we ran over to Rock 'n' Roller Coaster and Tower of Terror to use our fastpass + reservations. We met up with some friends from Asheville for both of those rides. It's crazy but my good friend Tracy had set up her husband and son's fastpass plus reservations and they just happened to be at the same times as ours. We had a blast but Emerson was a bit timid after riding such big rides. He had never ridden a big coaster before. I bet he will ride them again in the future. He just didn't want to on this trip, lol. I ended up giving away a paper set of fastpasses to TOT to another family.
BTW, Yacht Club was one of 4 resorts using the new Magic Band system and it worked amazingly well. We set up 3 fastpass + reservations daily and got right onto the rides without waits. On top of that, we were able to pull regular paper fastpasses too. Talk about double dipping! We didn't have to wait for hardly anything during our vacation. Oh, and the bands worked well for opening our rooms, charging merchandise/food to the room, and getting into the parks. I love this new system!!
Sweating it out in Hollywood Studios
My dear friend, Tracy (And no, we didn't plan our vacations together. It just happened that way!)
Sci-Fi Dine-In for lunch
We rode The Great Movie Ride and then used our fastpass + for Toy Story Mania before heading to lunch. It was so quiet and enjoyable in there. We go to this place every time that we are at Disney World. It is a family favorite. The car at the top left is outside the restaurant. The car at the bottom right is our actual table inside. Throughout the meal, they play old clips of movies and cartoons. They are silly but fun to watch. The food isn't fabulous but that isn't what keeps us going back. The experience is why we love it so much. It is relaxing and a nice reprieve from the crazy hot parks.
After lunch, we headed back to the hotel for a break. Everyone went swimming while I unpacked our stuff. That is when I realized that our view was terrible. I didn't pay for a good view, but still, it was really bad. It was the top of a rock-covered roof that had trash mixed in it. I was very disappointed. At the Polynesian, a bad view would be the parking lot and it would still look a lot better than this did. Ugh. This was just the beginning of my disappointment at the Yacht Club. The trek to our room was ridiculous and there didn't seem to be any shortcuts. There was only 4 small elevators in the bottom lobby and it got annoying being crowded amongst a bunch of other guests to get onto them. I have a lot of other complaints but I will post them later. On a Sidenote-We did end up transferring over to the Polynesian after the 2nd night and everyone was super happy about that decision. All was right with the World after we moved. :)
That night was our first night in the Magic Kingdom. I had planned for us see Wishes but that didn't happen. We got caught up in a thunderstorm as we were exiting Pirates of the Caribbean. Naturally, that was the only time that we didn't bring the ponchos with us. Wishes went on as scheduled but we couldn't see much of it from under the eaves of POTC. At that point, we were just trying to wait out the lightning and rain so that we could get the heck out of the Magic Kingdom. On the way out, I stopped at Aloha Isle for a yummy pineapple Dole Whip. Love those! I must have one every time we are there. It's nostalgic for me because I remember getting one with my Aunt Judy when I was 6.
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