Trip Log:

 We left LAX a few minutes late so it was about quarter to 11pm on Monday night.  We landed at Orlando International just after 6am and headed for the Magical Express checkin.  Walked up to the counter, checked in and were off on a bus with two other people in less than 5 minutes.  We arrived at Pop Century by 7am and pre-checked in since the room was not ready yet.  We then thought it would be a good idea to grab some breakfast.  While we were decided what we wanted an EPCOT bus pulled up so we hopped on there and we were off.  We arrived at EPCOT around 7:30am and went to guest relations outside the park to pick up our temporary dining card, then hopped the monorail over to the Magic Kingdom and we took the Resort monorail around to the Contemporary where we finally go breakfast at the Concourse Steakhouse.  We were done with breakfast and walking toward the Magic Kingdom around its opening time of 9am.   We wandered up Main Street and to the Castle taking pictures of the Holiday decorations and headed into Tomorrowland where we road Buzz.  Then we circled around through Fantasyland and cut through the Castle and caught the first Castle show of the day then went into Liberty Square to see what was going on.  We ended up back in Fantasyland and road Peter Pan followed by Small World, both were walk ons.  We then doubled back through Liberty Square and cut over to Adventureland.  We road the Magic Carpets then Pirates.  We continued on to Big Thunder then jumped on the Steam train and road around to Main Street.  We called to see if the rooms were ready and 1 out of 2 was so we headed over to the Contemporary via the monorail then waited for a bus to Downtown Disney.  It showed up after 30 minutes…  we then walked over to CrossRoads and grabbed lunch and some groceries before walking back and taking the bus back to Pop Century to go see our room.  We were out in building seven about as far away as you could get.  We spoke with a manager and we were moved over to building one.  After unpacking we went for dinner at Everything Pop! Then waited about 20 minutes for a bus over to EPCOT.  We walked through the park taking some pictures on the way as we headed for the American Gardens stage to see the Candlelight.  We walked through Future World and then past Canada, the UK, France, Morocco, and Japan.  We found a good spot to stand with a fairly unobstructed view and watched the show then grabbed a funnel cake before heading back.  We continued on our counter clockwise loop of World Showcase and jumped on the last boat (7:45pm) of the evening back toward future world from near Italy.  We then headed for the front of the park and the bus back to Pop Century to call it an early night.

Thoughts & Observations:

• As I sat in Los Angeles waiting for our flight I was reminded again how horrible LAX is, especially the United Terminal. It was just a dump. Run down, dark, depressing.. maybe someday they will upgrade/fix the airport.
  
  
• We used Disney's Magical Express service again this trip and again were greeted with no lines, no waits and we were checked into the Pop Century Resort and on we were at EPCOT's front entrance within an hour of leaving the plane.
  
  
• We took the Resort Monorail over to the Contemporary from the TTC and the system seemed to be going slower than slower with long stops at each stop and confusion by the CMs.. not sure what was going on but it took us nearly half an hour from the TTC to Contemporary.
  
  
• The crowds at the Magic Kingdom were nonexistent and we could walk onto whatever we wanted to for the most part. It was great to see and we visited many more attractions than we had planned for the day.
  
  
• We road Peter Pan for the first time in forever at WDW. I forgot about the speed ramp at the load platform and how it does not stop like Disneyland. Also how there were almost no voices on the attraction at all, just background music.
  
  
• We walked across and road Small World too and even though its been cleaned up recently its still lacking something that Disneyland's has in my mind.
  
  
• The new additions to Pirates of the Caribbean were nice touches, but still does not help this abbreviated attraction in my book. I did enjoy the movie score playing in the queue. Also the Davy Jones effect seemed really rushed to me. The new Captain Jack Sparrow figures seemed identical to Disneyland's and the scenes and placement worked well. Actually the finale scene at WDW might be slightly better since they had more space, but I like being closer to the figures like Anaheim.
  
  
• Continuing a trend we noticed at Disneyland last trip, several groups of people found their way onto the railway station causing e-stops of the trains and the CMs to go running to get them off the platform.
  
  
  
• Since there is no direct bus service from the theme parks to Downtown Disney we went over to the Contemporary and caught the bus. It was nearly a 30 minute wait and then it had to go to the Polynesian Resort before heading to Downtown Disney.
  
  
• The Resort CMs at the Pop Century Check in desk were quite friendly and resourceful to help us out with our room situation. We were unable to get an early check in so had to wait until 3pm, which was not that much of a problem. But then we found out the location of our room which was in the furthest building facing away.. so it was quite a hike back to the main building and the bus stops. We talked to the front desk and they were able to move us to a closer building cutting the walk in half (wall maybe to 1/3 actually). It was great and very nice of them.
  
  
• Saw the Candlelight at EPCOT which is a great show, but in my mind Disneyland's still dwarfs it and seems more impressive and the musical arrangements I like better. The emphasis on the Voices of Liberty still hurts the EPCOT version in my mind.
  
  
• Speaking of the Candlelight.. I will complain more later but the combination of Candlelight dinner packages and the Disney Dining plan made getting dining reservations nearly impossible for dinner. Well it was impossible at many restaurants for our entire stay. I would have thought they would keep some slots open for full paying guests.
  

Pedometer Information for the day:

Enough with the text.. onto the pictures

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