5-week Split Stay in Florida, Feb/March 2020 - Day 29: Animal Kingdom & Checking into Old Key West

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Day 29: Animal Kingdom & Checking into Old Key West
March 9, 2020
[-- Trip Index --]

Today's quick movie:


Today was the start of the very last week of our holiday! In exactly 7 days we'd be leaving Orlando and heading home, so I woke up feeling all determined to definitely make the most of this last week, and not let little annoyances or tiredness get me down like it had a few days over the past week. We were also checking out of the Polynesian today and heading to Old Key West, and I was hoping that would improve Michael's mood too. Not that it had been very bad - it's just that his daily gym trip is important to him, he really recharges and energizes and it's his 'me' time, so the Poly/GF gym being so crappy and crowded just wasn't making him happy, especially considering the premium we paid to be at the Poly over the other 3 DVC resorts we stayed at!

He did go to the gym this morning, and Myla woke me at 6AM out of a very deep sleep. She was wide awake and needed to pee, but she hasn't yet gotten into the habit of peeing by herself. She generally can't reach any light switches, and wouldn't go into a dark bathroom by herself. So I had to get up and help her, and then settled her beside me in the big bed with the iPad and her headphones. You know how when you're in a super deep sleep and you get woken quickly, you feel like you have a hangover? Yeah, that was me that morning! I instantly had a headache, I felt nauseous and just really really groggy. I tried to doze a bit more while Myla was being such a good girl and quietly watched Disney+ on the iPad.

Michael returned just after 7AM with the coffees, and they helped to wake me up a little. I had most of the packing done, but still needed to do some last bits and pieces, but we also wanted to be on our way early - today we were going to Animal Kingdom for our very last day there, as I had managed to get more Flight of Passage FPs for 9:30am. Not an ideal time considering we had to check out, but we were both eager to be there for the opening of the FP window - to try and squeeze in 3 rides within that hour with our 3 FPs. I had decided I was definitely riding it today, after chickening out last week.

So in order to let me finish packing and getting ready as quickly as possible, I got Myla dressed and Michael took her to Captain Cook's for her beloved Mickey waffles kids meal. He had the oatmeal, and the total was $10.95 for breakfast. I didn't buy anything, and just snacked on some of the stuff left in our room - I had a peanut butter sandwich, and some cornflakes in between showering, getting ready, and finishing packing. I took one last photo from the balcony while gathering up the now-dry swim wear - they were repainting the building across from us, and the vibrant colors looked so much better than the older faded ones!


I ended up totally rushing and forgot to take any last photos of our lovely room. I did really enjoy our time at the Poly, but Michael and I agree it's one and done for us. The premium price just isn't worth it for us - we'd rather be at the Contemporary for far less per night, or stay at Wilderness Lodge for awesome theming. The monorail was convenient, but it was always busy and not always reliable!

Michael was back at our room for around 8:45, and I rang bell services to collect our luggage just as I was finishing up packing. They came about 10 minutes later, and we headed to the bus stop. We waited around 10 minutes for an AK bus, and were on our way just after 9AM.

We decided I'd go on FoP first while Michael waited with Myla, and then he'd go on, and I could decide if I wanted to take the 3rd FP, or let Michael do it again. We knew we had to be quick once we got off the bus, as it really is a bit tight scanning in for the FPs 3 times within the 1 hour! So I explained to Myla that I had to be fast for the ride, gave her and Michael a kiss, and basically left them at the AK entrance as soon as we were through the bag check. I could walk faster on my own to FoP than we would altogether with the stroller! I even cut through some of the shops on Discovery Island, and eventually reached Flight of Passage at 9:35 AM - not bad!



I scanned in and headed up the slope, feeling my nerves build. I love roller coasters and anything that goes fast or has big drops, but I have a bit of a thing about being sick (vomiting). I have pretty bad motion sickness, and although I'm perfectly fine on most rollercoasters, I can't cope with simulator rides or anything that spins AT ALL. So my nerves were less about the ride being scary, and more about my fear of being sick. I know - ironic, right? I've vomited from motion sickness hundreds, if not thousands, of times in my life so you'd think I'd be used to it, but the older I get, the more of an opposite effect it has on me and the more scared/anxious I get from it. Usually if I have a bad episode of motion sickness, that's the whole rest of my day wiped out too, as I tend to panic and then need to lie down for hours afterwards to feel remotely okay again. So I really didn't want that to happen right now, and I was trying to be brave and fight my fears to go and experience this ride anyway - Michael had assured me the motion bit is fairly smooth (the bumpier/rougher, the worse for me), and that he thought I would LOVE it and end up kicking myself if I didn't try it. So with all these thoughts/fears, I was walking through the empty FP queue, taking photos of the pretty scenery around me to distract myself.


You get to see even more of Pandora in the queue, it's all so pretty and impressive - worth it for that alone, nearly! I entered the inside queue area, and again the FP queue was empty so I didn't really have a chance to stand still and take photos - I was just snapping as I walked, I just wanted to get on the ride so I could stop being nervous!


As I was standing in my correct lane in the above photo, I was focussing on taking deep breaths and giving myself courage - it would have REALLY helped me to not be on my own at this point! I know my nerves would not have been this bad at all if I'd had Michael and Myla with me to talk to/distract me. In fact, I was so busy taking deep breaths, that I didn't actually hear the CM at the top of the queue asking for single riders, and it took the people behind me to prod me and say, hey, aren't you a single rider? Which, yes, I was, and I was very eager to get on the ride NOW and not wait any more! I thanked the people behind me for giving me a heads up, and walked past everyone else waiting straight into the room with the numbers.



We all stood on our designated numbers, got assigned our avatars, and went into the next room where we stood on our numbers again. I was the very last one in the room each time, and the CMs were starting to freak me out - I felt like they warned us like 20 times about how intense the ride is and how you shouldn't ride it if you're motion sick! Though that said, Michael, who ended up riding it 5 times in these few weeks, told me it's not that bad at all, they only warn you once, so maybe I'm misremembering it!

Finally we were let into the proper ride room and got on our banshees. I immediately liked the ride vehicle, it felt comfortable and more like I could 'go' with the motion on it to reduce my chance of getting sick. I had a banshee on the far end, which I also liked, rather than being in the middle. Another big breath, and we were off! I closed my eyes during the bit when we were being linked, but opened them when I heard the oohs and aahs around me from the other riders.

Just, wow. I LOVED IT. The screen is SO big and immersive it doesn't feel like a screen at all! The way the banshee moved under me, made me feel like I really was flying myself and controlling some of the movements - this felt so awesome and I just forgot all about my fear. My eyes were just feasting on the landscape and everything around me - the sights, the sounds, the spray of the water when we skimmed the waves. I closed my eyes briefly a few times when I felt the movements may get a bit too much, and I made sure to look up and to my right - I could see rows and rows of 'bikes' just like ours all above and to the right, and it was actually a really good momentary distraction from any motion sickness to see the other people.

I loved the bit where you're paused in the cave for a few seconds, with all the bio luminescence. It was absolutely breathtaking, I now totally get the hype, and I LOVED it. I must admit I teared up at the beauty of it all - probably a release of my stress from earlier too!

When it finished, I found Michael waiting for me near the exit, and took over sitting with Myla so he could go ride it. He was so happy to hear I'd loved it, but I felt like my legs were shaking and I just wanted to sit down for a minute. Maybe it sounds weird, but to me that ride really was an emotional experience too!


When Michael had his ride, it was 10:25AM so we had 5 minutes left to scan in a 3rd time. However, at that point Myla decided she needed to pee. He asked me if I wanted to experience it a second time - I kind of did, but I decided to let him ride it for the last time. Myla doesn't like peeing with him and prefers to go with me, and I didn't want to push myself too much on the motion sickness front - I was fine now, but a second time may be too much. So I decided to quit while I was ahead, and sent him on with Myla's MagicBand, and told him to meet us back by Creature Comforts, the Starbucks. I took Myla for her pee, and we walked around to Starbucks.



I queued up for a coffee and choose a slice of banana bread , and Myla picked a plain banana. We sat outside to eat it, watching the little monkeys play around across the path. Michael soon joined us, and we headed to our next FP once my coffee was done: our last ride on the Kilimajaro Safaris!



This ride is such a firm favorite of us all - we can't get enough of it! We rode it 4 or 5 times on this trip, and on no occasion did we get the fake collapsing bridge though, have they stopped using that effect altogether now? I could have sworn we did get it once last year! Anyway, the safari is great as always and we saw the brand new baby zebra very close to our truck! So cute!


We had promised Myla she could pick a new toy from the little stand right at the Safari exit - she'd asked for one from there a few times. They have all the baby animals wrapped in the little blankets, and she LOVES those - she picked Figaro the cat from that range earlier on in the holiday, and we'd promised her she could pick another animal here today if she kept behaving so well - this 'dangling carrot' thing works really well with her. Any time she seemed like she was gonna play up or not listen, we reminded her of the baby teddies and it worked like a charm! So since she had truly been such a good girl, today she got to pick a new one, and we paid $38 for Baby Giraffe, who is still a firm favorite even today and sleeps in her arms every night. 🥰

Michael was getting hungry now, since he missed out on the Starbucks snacks, and he fancied another roasted vegetable bowl from Harambe Market. We joined the short queue, and by the time he got his food ($10.25 for the bowl and 3 cups of water), Myla had promptly fallen asleep, still cuddling Baby Giraffe!


She was still asleep when Michael was done eating, and we decided to let her sleep a while longer instead of waking her up. I'd originally hoped to take the little train to Rafiki's Planet Watch now, but we decided to walk the Gorilla Falls trail instead so we didn't have to wake her. I love these little trails, and we saw the animals in relative peace and quiet - it reminded us of being here on our honeymoon! 😍


When we wrapped up our leisurely walk, it was just past 1PM and our Lion King FP for 1:30 was coming up. We bought a popcorn refill, parked the stroller in the Lion King area, and slowly and gently woke Myla up. She'd been napping for over an hour by then, but the sight of fresh popcorn and promise of the Lion King show soon woke her up fully and we headed on in.


After being picked to participate in the show on BOTH our last two viewings, I was a little worried she'd expect it again now. But luckily, she told me as we were waiting to go in that she didn't want to get picked today, she was tired and just wanted to sit on my lap. Phew! I told her that was fine and assured her she wouldn't be forced to participate, haha!

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We very much enjoyed our last Lion King show of the holiday - just love this one, it never gets old!

That was our last FastPass of the day, so we had the whole afternoon to do whatever we fancied. It was around 2:30PM, and now it was my turn to be hungry. I decided I wanted one last meal at Satuli Canteen, and Michael is always up for more food (even though he'd just eaten 2 hours ago!). So we walked back to Pandora, and I ordered two Crispy Tofu bowls, both with sweet potato hash and green onion sauce - we both agreed this was the best combo! Total was $26.51 for this...late lunch, I guess it was?


We didn't order anything for Myla, as Michael had kept the waffle she couldn't finish from this morning as well as the bag of apple slices, so she happily tucked into that and washed it down with ice water - she loves chewing on the ice cubes!


We very much enjoyed our meal here - definitely one of our favorite spots in AK! We asked Myla if there was anything else she still wanted to go in Animal Kingdom. We had 2 more autographs to get for her book, but I'd already seen those 2 characters didn't come back out until 3:45PM so we had some time. I suggested to her the little train to Rafiki's Planet Watch, but she shook her head and insisted she wanted to go back to the Boneyard for another play. That was fine by us - this was right beside where the character meet would be anyway, and at this point we were still convinced we'd be back in 6 months for our big birthday/anniversary trip, so no biggie if we didn't do Planet Watch now.

We headed back from Pandora to Discovery Island to get to Dinoland. Myla was full of energy now that she had another meal in her, and was happily walking instead of sitting in the stroller. We really encourage that, and I do hope we can be stroller-free on our next trip!


We ran into Kevin again - hi Kevin!


And we stopped for a Photopass picture in front of the Tree of Life!


I decided I wanted a nice photo of the two of them in front of the nice Discovery Island sign - Myla wasn't playing ball, until Michael tickled her and I got some lovely genuine photos of them mucking about.


Once we got to the Boneyard, she headed straight for the slides, and had a whale of a time there again. She was very careful taking Baby Giraffe down the slide, making sure he sat properly on her legs and telling him off if he wasn't sitting up right! 😂


She played for around 20 minutes until she tripped and fell up some stone steps and hurt herself. She had scraped both her shins and was crying quite a bit. That seemed a good point to leave, as the meet n greet was starting soon anyway. We joined the little queue and consoled her with kisses and cuddles, and her sore shins were soon forgotten.

Here we were taking a picture to send to grandma, as Myla wanted to show her Baby Giraffe.


We messed about a bit in the queue, and then finally Scrooge McDuck and Launchpad McQuack came out about 5 minutes late. While we were waiting, I got a text to say our room at Old Key West was ready, so that was perfect timing!


There was only 1 family in front of us, so we didn't wait long at all. The CMs were very impressed to see our autograph book, and even moreso when we told them these were the last 2 autographs to collect in this park, and they'd now officially be completing our collection of all meetable characters in AK! 🥳


Woohoo - one park finished with autographs, 3 to go!

We headed to the bus around 16:10, saying bye and see you soon to the park as we left. We had spent a total of 5 whole days in AK this time around (also due to cancelled Blizzard Beach days when it was too cold), and we STILL hadn't seen or done everything! We just love this park, and I know we easily could have spent a 6th day here without being bored. We all love the theming of the park, how green and lush it is, and it just fits so well with Myla's likes and interests right now, as well as with our own. We were feeling very happy and grateful to have had such a good time here!


We were at the bus stop 10 minutes later, and got all excited again as we now had to look for the bus to Old Key West! We all seem to love switching hotels, and Myla absolutely loved the thrill of getting on a bus and going to a NEW BIG HOTEL (as she calls them) - it's a total surprise for her every time what the new hotel will look like, and she loved this element of it. The bus pulled up in no time, and we then sat on the bus for another 10 minutes before it drove away.


There was a bit of a discussion as to which bus stop we should get off at. Our assigned room was in the Hospitality House section (and seemed to be very close to what I requested again, yay! ), but I knew we could get off at the first stop and just walk back over the bridge. Michael doubted me a few times, but eventually went along with it. We visited Old Key West briefly on our honeymoon 5 years ago, just to get some food, enjoy the surroundings, and take the boat to Disney Springs, but we hadn't stayed here before. I had made sure to request a ground floor room as close to the main pool, gym, and lobby as possible (preferred rooms were already sold out by the time we booked), and luckily we had been granted just that. Getting off the bus, we were both hit by how much we liked the look of this place. It looked so peaceful and relaxing, with all the space, beautiful grounds, and pastel colored buildings!

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It was a 2 minute walk from the bus stop to our room, which we found no problem. This turned out to be SO handy - both the Penninsular Road as well as the Hospitality House bus stops were within minutes of our room, so we could get on at the last stop (thus missing the long loop) and get off at the first one (also missing the loop). This meant our travel times to the parks were actually much better than from Saratoga Springs, where we had to sit through the loop every time. This easily added 10-15 minutes to the bus journey, depending on how many ECVs had to be loaded on at the additional stops! So it was definitely a big bonus of OKW and our room location in block 62!

We entered the room at exactly 5PM, and were pretty happy. The room was big - yet it didn't feel any bigger than our Poly room. Probably because this had a second bed taking up a lot of space, where in the Poly we'd left the sofa as a sofa and therefore had more floor space. The room also felt strangely sparsely decorated. There was so much room yet hardly any furniture. There was only 1 bedside table, in between the two beds, when there was more than enough space for a bedside table on the far ends of both beds as well. Aside from the beds and the 1 bedside table, there was 1 chest of drawers with a small TV on top (well, it wasn't too small, but it definitely was tiny compared to the HUGE TVs we'd had in the other rooms), and one table with 2 wooden chairs. Our Poly room had really nice and comfy upholstered chairs, so these were definitely a step down. I only notice this stuff because the chairs is where I sit to do my work - normal people probably wouldn't notice that though! Aside from these small niggly things, we were very happy with the room. The bathroom actually looked newly renovated - the counter top looked brand new, the toilet seat seemed brand new, the shower curtain had never been used, and both the toaster and coffee maker in the kitchinette were brand new never used before either!


It was all very nice and I especially loved the bathroom - I'd love to do my bathroom at home in these colors! I was just a bit perplexed by the lack of furniture in this big room - I kind of feel it would have seemed bigger if there wasn't so much empty space? If that makes sense? Anyway - these were only very minor complaints, we were super happy with our room and loved our stay here. I think overall, taking in every single aspect of each of the DVC hotels we stayed in, Old Key West was the surprise winner for us. We'd return to all of them (well, Poly only if we had tons of extra cash to burn), but OKW was the one we all loved best for various reasons, and I honestly hadn't expected that!

I rang bell services for our luggage, and they said it'd be around 30 minutes before they could send it over. That was fine, we weren't in a hurry, and decided to pop over to the lobby in the mean time to pick up our magic bands and get some more bread, peanut butter, and soy milk from the shop for tomorrow morning.


We were back at the room in time to accept the luggage and tip the bell boy, and I did my work for the day over the next 40 minutes while Myla and Michael chilled. None of us were overly hungry for dinner, but we weren't quite ready for bed yet either, so we decided to take the boat to Disney Springs, to Myla's absolute delight, to treat ourselves to some snacks instead of a proper dinner. So we got changed (the temperature had dropped a bit again after being lovely all day), and headed back to the boat dock. This is out the back of the lobby, so again only a minute from our room.


Myla loved riding in the boat again, like we had done from Saratoga Springs. It was a lovely evening with a nice sunset, and Old Key West just looked SOOO pretty. I think we were all falling in love!


I decided I wanted to get an order of fries from DLuxe Burger - I love a good portion of fries and those had been sooo tasty especially with the different sauces! Michael wanted foccaccia bread from Erin McKenna's Bakery, and Myla wanted chocolate icecream from the same place, so that was handy enough. We went to get my fries first. I did a mobile order for them from the boat, and we basically just walked right in, collected them, and sat down, even though it was quite busy with a long queue inside!


They were absolutely delicious again, and just what I wanted. I'd definitely come back here for the fries alone - the burger was yummy too, but I knew I couldn't have managed that after our Satuli Canteen meal only a few hours ago!

Our next stop was Erin McKenna, where Michael got his bread but they'd run out of the little tubs of chocolate icecream. The girl suggested we get an icecream sandwich, which is the chocolate icecream between 2 cookies. I agreed, but was a bit miffed - the icecream sandwich costs $10, and has about half the amount of icecream of the tub at $6! Plus, wouldn't you know, Myla took one bite of the cookie and decided she didn't like it, so we then spent the next 20 minutes painstakingly removing ALL traces of the cookies from the icecream while it melted. I was too full for the cookies and Michael didn't like them either, so they sadly ended up in the bin. Oh well - at least Myla was happy.

On the way back to the boat, we stopped to listen to the live music for a bit. Myla loves a nice band and was happily dancing along.


The atmosphere was great and we loved hanging around a bit, but it was coming up to 8PM now, so we decided to call it a day and get the boat back - Myla was starting to flag, and since we didn't bring the stroller, neither one of us fancied having to carry her home if she decided she had enough of walking!

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We were back in our room just after 8PM, and got Myla all snuggled in her new bed after a quick sponge bath. She missed her Stitch bed from the Poly a little bit, but loved the novelty of sleeping in the big big bed, surrounded by pillows! We didn't really worry she'd fall out - she doesn't toss and turn a lot usually, and she sleeps in a proper single bed at home that she's never fallen out of it, so this was perfect.


We turned off the lights just before 9PM, and Myla was asleep in 5 minutes. Michael and I were catching up with the news from home on our phones - me reading up on the Netherlands (I'm Dutch and this is the country we currently live in) and him on the UK (he's British, all his family lives in the UK, and I spent 14 years living in the UK from ages 20-34 so we have strong ties to both countries), and ended up talking about this softly in the dark for another while. The coronavirus cases in Europe were rising swiftly so far, with several hundred cases in Holland, and the prime minister of the Netherlands, where we currently live, had held a press conference that evening (afternoon for us Florida time) to announce new policies on social distancing in the country, to go into effect immediately. This was all new to us at the time - no more shaking hands when you meet people, no more hugs or kisses when you meet up with family, try and keep 1.5 metres between you and other people at all times, try to work from home as much as possible, etc etc. Michael had been reading up on new UK news, there'd now been 3 deaths, the stock exchange was taking a hit and the UK Foreign Office had actually issued a negative travel advice for all of Italy! We were discussing the implications of all these changes and considering what 'new world' we'd be coming home to in a week. We also talked about the possibility of the US issuing a negative travel advice for all of Europe, like the UK had done for Italy, and joked about there being worse placed to be stuck in than Florida if there were no flights home. Neither one of us actually thought this was a realistic option - yeah maybe the US would issue a negative advice for Italy too, but since it wasn't Italy we were flying home to, we weren't too worried! (yet.)

We were just glad we were in Florida, so far away from any hotspots, and no noticeable effects of the pandemic here yet. It did seem weird to be rubbing elbows with thousands of strangers every day in the parks, swimming pools, and on transportation when at home, people were being advised to keep a big distance from others - everyone in WDW was basically doing the opposite of what was advised. It did make me a little uneasy, and Michael too, but we reasoned with each other that the virus must not be here in Orlando yet, otherwise we would have seen similar measures locally.

This all was definitely having an effect on us - we tried to hang on to our Disney bubble, but we just couldn't avoid being wary of all the news coming out of Europe. From this point on we became extra vigilant with wipes, hand gel, and washing hands, and were wiping down most surfaces Myla would touch, as well as making sure her hands were cleaned every time she touched any food. We generally do that anyway, just for hygiene, but we were super vigilant with it now, with our own hands as well. We just felt it better to be careful and not have regrets about this later on!

We eventually went to sleep closer to 10PM, resolved to enjoy the rest of our holiday to the max, but with an unease about the situation back home in the back of our minds.

[mick]

Another lovely day really glad you enjoyed the ride and had no ill effects

Joan

[JudeB]

Another great day - Animal Kingdom is my favourite park too. There is so much to see and do. As you say, the safari is different every time you go on it. Your new resort looks beautiful and definitely an added bonus that you can get about by boat - who wouldn't want that! It is interesting to read your reactions as they were happening about the onset of the virus. How a few weeks can change everything... Hope you were able to enjoy your last week. I've really enjoyed your trip report.

[mrsdjh]

I’m so pleased you went on FOP and loved it - your description of the ride sums up my own feelings of it.

Your new room sounds in an ideal location. I like the look of OKW.

[Florida1972]

Great report, I look forward to reading each day, it must be a mammoth effort to write up so many days so thank you!

[Rabel]

What a lovely day, thank you for posting. Love the outfits

[flo-tinka]

Great full day
FoP sounds amazing
Like others, interested to hear what it was like being in Florida as things progressed worldwide