WDW Dec. 2008 Trip Report - Day 6

Day 6 began with an pretty early breakfast at Chef Mickey's. This is a great place for breakfast. The buffet offers a fairly wide variety of options, and having fun with the characters always is a treat. Afterward, we took a moment to admire the Pinnochio gingerbread sculpture near the escalators. Take a close look and you might see several hidden mickeys. For a closer look (with some help) see this larger view.

The weather was looking terrible, but we decided to give the Magic Kingdom a try. This would be a real adventure. About half way down Main Street, the skies opened up - big time! It started to absolutely POUR! We made our way through the Emporium and other stores all the way to Casey's until we were out of cover. We looked at each other. My wife said she wanted to shop a bit more (what a perfect time to get Christmas presents), so the kids and I made a mad dash to Cinderella Castle. As luck would have it, the castle tunnel was open, so we were able to find a brief bit of shelter before sprinting again to Cinderella's Golden Carousel. Even with the rain, we were laughing our heads off. It was funny. We were soaked, but we had a great time. Even my daughter, who hates getting wet in the rain, was laughing in the end.

My wife caught up with us outside Philharmagic and we made a second dash to the Haunted Mansion. I happened to have a chance to get a very good look at Madam Leota's tombstone. It's pretty cool the way it subtly moves.

As always, the Haunted Mansion is a great attraction. The new staircase scene is great and the new floating Leota ball is just awesome.

After the Haunted Mansion, the rain started to let up a bit and it was time for me to head over to Mousefest opening event. This was the first day of Mousefest, so I wanted to catch at least part of the opening events. My wife and the kids went back to the Grand Floridian, while I went over to the Contemporary. Even monorails have problems sometimes, so I got there late. I did manage to meet a few folks, including Lou Mongello of the WDW Radio Show. It was really great to finally meet in person someone I'd been listening to for more than a year.

After the meet, I met up with the family back at the Grand Floridian. By this time the rain had blown over, so we decided to head to Epcot. We managed to snag a couple of late day Fastpasses for Soarin'. In the meantime, we rode Spaceship Earth, enjoyed a bit of Innoventions and did a little Living withe Land. I don't know what it is about Living with the Land, but I find this attraction very relaxing. I also love the intro music.

As we were waiting for our Soarin' Fastpass window to open up, I struck up a conversation with a cast member who I think was a Dream Squad member. While I didn't win anything, he did give me an awesome tip for riding Soarin' with kids. As always, Soarin' is incredible, though I did notice that the projector was getting a bit dirty, like the film had a LOT of dust on it.

After Soarin, we again split up (boys and girls). I took their boys on their first ever trip on Mission: Space. My oldest was very apprehensive about this. We went on the green team and afterward my oldest absolutely loved it!! He really got into the attraction abot half way through.

We met up with the girls in the United Kingdom pavilion and together we waited for Father Christmas to arrive. He began his presentation talking about how the English ring a bell for every year since Christ's birth. He then selected my younger son to help ring the bells. My son was beside himself, he was so excited. Afterward, Father Christmas gave my son a small bell for him to keep as a momento.

There was a beautiful full moon out as we walked back toward the Epcot Christmas tree to enjoy the lighting ceremony once again. With a full moon just in the right place, I just had to stop and take a few million pictures of the tree with the moon in the background. We then strolled to the front of the park, enjoying the lights and the holiday music. What a way to end the evening.

Coming up - day 7 - our last full day in the park.