Vacation Day 19: Laura and Jake's Last Hurrah

Since we were up so late the night before, we slept in today to recuperate. Thank goodness for Vavo and Vavu getting up with the kids when they awoke. I don’t think we could’ve functioned if we woke up early!

We spent a lot of time in the morning debating about what the schedule would be for the day. We took so long, that it was almost time for the boys’ naps by the time everyone was about ready to leave. Since there wouldn’t be time to go to the parks and come back for naps, Maria volunteered to stay at the house with the boys until after naps, then rejoin the group later. She was still tired and really sore anyway, so she preferred to rest some more.

Everyone else headed over to Epcot, to finish up the last few things the Mason’s didn’t get to do yesterday. It was their last day in the parks, so they revisited some favorite attractions, and tried some new ones.

When they got into the park, Andrew went and got Fastpasses for Test Track. Laura kept calling it “Fast Track” by accident, and that became the big joke of the day, calling the ride “Fast track”.

While waiting for the Fastpasses to become valid for use, the group went over to the Land Pavilion, and saw the Circle of Life show (based on the Lion King), and went on “Living with the Land”. The ride “Soarin” was too crowded, so they decided to skip it.

The next ride was the infamous “Journey into the Imagination with Figment”. This is one of our family favorites! Jake really liked Journey – he said it was really neat and he’d ride it again. After the ride, everyone was ready for a snack. Drew and Vavu got turkey legs, Vavo got some ice cream, and Jake and Laura got some hot cocoa and coffee.

The next stop was Ellen’s Universe of Energy before the group headed back to Test Track to use the Fastpasses. That seemed to be one of Jake and Laura’s favorite rides in Epcot.

Next, everyone got on the ferry to Disney/MGM Studios, where they would meet up with Maria and the kids. Back home, the kids were just waking up from naps, and Maria was bribing them with cookies to get into the van. :-)

Once we got back together as a group, we were ready to eat dinner, and go over to the Streets of America to view the Christmas Light display. We wanted to eat dinner at Mama Melrose’s Ristorante Italiano, but it was totally overbooked (boo boo). So we opted for eating at Pizza Planet, cuz we were hungry! Pizza Planet is themed after the movie Toy Story, because that is the name of the pizza place in the movie. It has an arcade inside, and tons of Toy Story characters everywhere.

After some pizza, we wanted to go see the Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights. These Christmas lights dance in time to Christmas Carols. It was an awesome display! We were completely surrounded by flashing, blinking, changing, rotating, sparkling lights!

We stayed until after the park closed, watching the lights dance at least 3 if not 4 times. It was so late that the ferry was packed, and we weren’t even sure if it was running anymore. So we all rode together in the van back to the Epcot parking lot where Jake and Laura’s car was. There wasn’t room for everyone in the van, so Jake volunteered to ride in the TRUNK! It was a hilarious sight.

Once we got back to the car, Vavo and Vavu took the van with the kids back to the house to go to sleep, and Maria, Andrew, Jake and Laura took the car to Pleasure Island to finish up the Mason’s visit to Disney.

Our first stop was the Comedy Warehouse, where we had front row seats! The comedians used a number of our suggestions for their improv. It was really funny and we had a good time.

After the show, we went to the Adventurers Club, where we ended up spending the rest of the evening. The actors were really funny, and we got into the spirit of the club. We saw a cabaret show, were initiated into the club as members, listened to a lecture (not really) on archeology (not really), and finished up the evening with the big Hoopla! (repeat, Hoopla!) We were there until the last show. It was such a good time. We laughed a lot.

After we were done at Pleasure Island, we decided to make a quick stop at WalMart to get some necessities. Since it’s 24 hour, we just went to the one by our house and picked up some essentials, like bread and snacks and shorts for Maria!

It was a really late night. We didn’t get home and go to sleep until 4am. Thank goodness again for Vavo and Vavu being willing to wake up in the morning!
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The best part of day 19 was Pleasure Island... both the comedy show and the adventurer’s club were so entertaining! We had such a blast!
The worst part of day 19 was Walmart. Their service was just as bad as any other Walmart we have been in and reminded us why we don’t shop there.
What we learned on day 19 was that when you plan to meet someone in the parks in a separate car, think carefully about parking arrangements lest you have to stash someone in the trunk; the Adventurer’s club oath is still funny the second time around, and many things about the drunk people around us that we didn’t really care to know
The weather on day 19 was fog / drizzle of rain in the morning, leading to overcast at night. Still warm though, no need for a jacket even late at night :)
Our character sightings on day 19 included Minnie, Pluto, Goofy, Chip ‘n Dale
The crowd level on day 19 was moderate; Epcot was early entry today so the crowds were larger than normal.