Day 12 - Disney's Hollywood Studios

Today was going to be a great day, even though I was still under the weather, there was no way I was going to miss some of the best attractions on the property - located at the fantastic Disney's Hollywood Studios.

We arrived early, got a fast pass for the Rockin Roller Coaster, the Aerosmith rollercoaster, and made our way to the Tower of Terror.

The Tower of Terror is a ride that would make Anthony Glynn literally shit himself if he ever were to ride it. You get sat in an elevator, transported through the Twighlight Zone, and then shoot up and forced down then up then do...well you get the picture. This was an AMAZING ride,  no gravity force in this thing, you literally get shoved up, then swiftly shot down. The camera bag was between my legs and it was at eye level on the first downward pass, I quickly pushed it to the floor hoping that I hadn't smashed this new superdooper camera in the process, but really to overwhelmed with the ride to care.

Tanya said that it was way better than the sister ride in California, high praise indeed.

The spookiest photo taken on this trip...Ooooohhh

 We then took our turn on the Rockin Rollercoaster. I was looking forward to this one because neither of us new what to expect, flying coaster? Stand up coaster? Who knew? Not we, not we.

We moved into the recording studio and was given the rundown, we had to get to the gig quick!

Upon entering the ride chamber we saw the coaster in it's first position, awaiting the go at the entrance to a long dark tunnel. Stevie Tyler counts down and ZOOM, the coaster was gone! I don't know how fast, but it was bloody quick. This was going to be an incredible ride.

We were moved to the frontiest front there is... the front, something that Tanya was a bit nervous about, but something I new would be AWESOME! And it was. WHEEEEEEEE away we went into a hairpin and corkscrew IN THE DARK! WHOOOOOOO. Although I new that Tanya would get off the ride and give me the old "Veruca Salt" - "Matty I do not want a boat like this!", I thought it was terrific and wanted to go again.

We moved through the rest of the park, taking in the sights and sounds, me feeling slightly sicker at each turn, but pushing through. The Star Tours ride was great, getting caught in Darth Vaders force grip was a terrific feeling in the motion simulator - Tanya rode with her eyes closed.

Unfortunately this was the best photo I could get of both C3P0 and R2D2

Matt in front of the New York backdrop - pretty cool right?

 Then we did the studio backlot tour - and that was fantastic too!

NO NUKES NO NUKES

Herbie is just sitting out the back catching some rays.

I lifted this out a swamp with the power of my mind.

The moment before matt was tackled by the army men for calling them losers.

Day 11 - The second day of Magic Kingdom.

Today we went back to the Magic Kingdom to see the three other lands that we had not gotten to yesterday. Unfortunately it was also the first day that I really was starting to feel out of it, some kid must have sneezed on me somewhere, and combined with the humidity, my penchant for fabulous nosebleeds, and the fact that we were exhausted, I knew that I would need to take today a bit calmer than most. 

We started in Tomorrowland and the mighty ride, "Space Mountain". Tanya informed me that I would love this ride, and she was right! It was a terrific dark ride (inside rollercoaster). It was fast and had some mighty strong G-force turns, everything that a good rollercoaster needs - except an upside down bit - but I could make do without.

We had a multimedia adventure with Stitch, but the highlight of Tomorrowland was "Astroblasters", a laser shooting adventure against Zurg - Sworn enemy of the Galactic alliance - it was terrific, an amazing "interesting thing", to coin a phrase from my youth. Tanya was unable to figure out which laser was hers so she didn't manage to shoot much, but we had a great time nonetheless. 

Across the park to Frontier Land and a ride on Splash Mountain, which we had fast passed so it was only a 10 minute wait in line.

Frontier Land was great too - the Hall of Presidents was cool too, some very robotic/lifelike robots of each and every president on the USA. Kennedy looked a little sour for some reason, not the happy-go-lucky president I always pictured, but I guess that being made of wax and being forced to perform the same "nod" every 30 minutes and nothing else would put a dour expression on anyone.

I was starting to feel a little under it by now, I also realised that I hadn't had anything "Decent" to eat since my Aussie steak on Monday night, so my guts were full of deep fried gunk - probably not helping my plight - so I purcahsed an orange and we took a casual cruise on the Riverboat around Tom Sawyers island

Matt eating his Orange on the Riverboat 

The Haunted Mansion - another attraction that was in recovery mode, closed for the time of our visit. Pooh.

 We then headed towards Pirates of the Caribbean, the ride that inspired a movie, which inspired three more, which in turn re-inspired the ride. A lazy river cruise was terrific, nice and cool and filled with Pirates! YAhhgrhhh. I purchased my share of merchandise and we made our way to the Tiki Room.

In the tiki tiki tiki tiki tiki Room. I was really feeling the effects of my illness and god bless her, Tanya allowed us to return home to the hotel for a night in. It was 4pm when we left.

Lining up for the Pirates ride

The Castle on the beautiful afternoon which Matt had to be sick during.... 

The happy lady and the sick bugger, note the merchandise bag in his hand, this bag was number 17 of 26 that would be collected during our time in Disney.

Day 10 - The beginning of our Magic Journey in the Magic Kingdom

Today - Wednesday - was the end of our stay at the Grand Floridian. Unfortunately this hotel was an extravagance that we could not afford to keep up, but we were glad to have had the experience.

We did not know how today would go, we knew we had to be out by 11, and could not check in at the Holiday Inn near downtown Disney until 3pm, but we checked out and moved to our new venue at about 11am anyway in the hope that we would figure it out when we got there.

The drive from the Floridian was quite a long one, a $25 cab ride, probably 15 miles, to the Holiday Inn. We were told our room was not ready yet but they could hold our baggage until the evening if we wanted to do some sight seeing. We checked out bags, grabbed our Laundry bags to do some laundry and made our way to the laundry room, we discovered that we needed a butt-load quarters, between the two of us we only had a fanny-load so we went to the front desk to ask for some change. The lady at the front desk had changed - well thats probably not true, it was probably just a different lady - and she noticed my Disney badge "Happily Ever After" which they give to Honeymooners, said she was a sucker for weddings, offered us an upgrade to a room with a view that was ready at that point in time - which I gladly accepted and away we went to our room, with our butt-load of quarters. We did our laundry and moved to the cafe to have some lunch - it was pretty average.

After the laundry was done we decided to head to the Magic Kingdom and do Main Street USA and some of our shopping, might even catch the fireworks too!

I'll let the pictures do the talking from here. These are out of order for some reason, my apologies.

Tanya was feeling silly in the line for "It's a small world"

Tanya will not be crowned King of England

Matt will be crowned "King of the Idiots"

We rode on Cindarella's Carousel

Tanya picked the Clydesdale and couldn't get down 

I thought this was funny - this is in Mickey's Philharmagic, a 3D journey through the music of Disney - a terrific attraction

Terrific topiary

Overcast day, doesn't dim our happiness. Tanya in front of the mighty Cinderella  Castle

Matt in front of the Castle

Mickey, in the Parade, passes in front of the Castle

Matt prepares to steel the baby in that pram.

The gorgeous girl in front of "Partners" and the Castle

Matt wanted to get this rice crispie, then decided against it - his stomach thanked him later

Following the parade down Main Street USA

Aren't we the Hoi Poloi? 

"Everybody do the Michigan Rag!"

The Happy Couples

The Mouse family in the Parade

All Aboard the Walt Disney Express

At the beginning of our day, in front of the Train Station

One of many photos of the castle. It is truly amazing, huge, but beautiful.

This was taken in the afternoon, Tanya teared up a little. The crane in the background is  building the new additions to Fantasy Land - Snow White's House, Beasts Castle... should be good - we'll never get to see it complete, but it was great to see things being built around Disney.

There were a lot of additions being built and changes being made and repairs going on. Disney World certainly is in a state of perpetual growth.

This was to be the only Jiminy that we would see at Disney. He does not do signings or photos - a fact that upset Tanya greatly.

This guy was ok, he couldn't do the voice as well as me though...

At dusk, looking from the Castle, down Main Street.

Captain Hook on his Electric Ship

Mickey leads the parade.

The Mighty Bald Eagle brings up the rear - how very American

As usual, the fireworks are spectacular.