Split Stay Get Away - Day 7: “Today we went to IHOP and I ate food!”

[Stewboy]

The Index

Thursday 31st May 2018

We woke up at about 8:45am, refreshed after a good night’s sleep in nice and comfy beds. Only having to walk a few feet to get coffee was a bonus; not opening the bedroom door to a cloud of smoke was also a big plus!

I made coffee and heard Isabella calling from her bedroom. She wanted to drink her milk in the living room because she wanted to try out the comfy sofas. She was really impressed with the condo, commenting: “It’s better than I expected, I expected it to be a piece of dirt!” She’s usually such a genial, positive child - it was a very odd thing for her to say! Still, at least she liked it I suppose.

Breakfast this morning was at IHOP at Berry Town Centre, only a five minute drive away. After years of not eating at IHOP due to a bad experience at a location on International Drive, it’s now replaced Denny’s as our favourite offsite breakfast destination.

By 9:50am we were ready and on our way, five minutes later we were checked in and being shown to our table - we were hungry so were that we didn’t have to wait.

For my breakfast, I was going to use the voucher that we had that entitled us to a free stack of Rooty Tooty Fresh 'N Fruity Pancakes. Jo got the voucher by signing up to their mailing list online, and printing the voucher out before we came. (She did this with all the restaurants we were planning to visit - it was a good way to save money.) I got my pancakes with peach fruit topping and two fried eggs, cooked over easy, on the side.

Jo went for the same thing she had on both visits last summer - the Create Your Best Combo (Two eggs, two bacon strips, and hash browns with Harvest Grain ‘N Nut pancakes); and Isabella went for the Silver 5 (five silver dollar-sized buttermilk pancakes with scrambled egg and crispy hickory-smoked bacon).

I sat on a chair on one of the table, and Jo and Isabella sat together on the banquette. This turned out to a mistake - Isabella may be little but she has big elbows, as Jo found out when the food arrived and they started eating!


Can you spot Oswald?


Isabella Elbows

Despite the elbows, we enjoyed our breakfast. Sufficiently full, we moved on to the next item on today’s agenda: mini-golf at Winter Summerland.

Last time we played mini-golf a couple of years ago, Winter Summerland had been closed for refurbishment so we’d played Fantasia Gardens instead.

The drive took about 20 minutes. We checked in at about 11:30am and although we wanted to play the Winter Course, the Summer Course had a shorter wait so we chose that one instead.








Welcome to Winter Summerland

We took a few photos around the entrance while we waited to be called. Five minutes later we were heading over to the Summer Course, hole one - aka ‘Gnome Away from Gnome’ - to begin our round.

The next 50 minutes were a lot of fun. We enjoyed playing all the holes, much more than Fantasia Gardens. Everyone managed a hole in one at some point, and now that Isabella is 6 she can last all 18 holes.


Summer Course


Hole 1


Hole 2


Hole 3


Hole 4


Hole 5


Hole in one!




Hole 6




Hole 7


Hole 8


Hole 9


Hole 10


Hole 11


Hole 12




Hole 13


Hole 14


The South Hole


Hole 15




Hole 16




Hole 17






Hole 18

[Stewboy]

Jo ended up being the winner, and Isabella got a really good score; we all managed to get below par for the course, which was 56.

The final scores were:

• Jo - 43
• Me - 50
• Isabella - 54

The scores

We’ll definitely be heading back to Winter Summerland at some point to play the Winter course. Once we tallied up our scores we handed back our clubs and balls, Isabella added to her pressed penny collection, and then we headed back to the car.

The time was now about 12:45pm, and our destination was Premium Outlets Vineland Avenue - we were going shopping.

It took about 20 minutes to drive there. Finding a parking space at any Premium Outlets is a challenge - even on a Thursday afternoon. We were lucky and found a good space not far from one of the entrances, and as it turned out, close to the new outdoor Starbucks kiosk.

Jo and I got ourselves a venti decaf iced caramel macchiato to share, Isabella had an iced water, and then we walked round to the Disney Character Warehouse Store - the only reason we were here!


Premium Outlets Vineland Avenue


Isabella and Oswald having a drink

We spent about 45 minutes in the Character Warehouse, and got some real (random) bargains including a teapot(!), some tsum tsums, a trading pin, a Animal Kingdom Lodge hoodie, a Luke Skywalker/Last Jedi MagicBand (for me), a Vera Bradley Alice in Wonderland bag, and much more.

As well as finding some bargains we also found Jo’s step-brother and his family browsing the shop! We spent a few minutes catching up - we’d be seeing them again at Epcot in a couple of days.

When we finally left the Character Warehouse, with lighter wallets but heavier bags, the only shop we wanted to have a look in was the Vera Bradley outlet. Although Jo had just bought a Vera Bradley bag she was still looking, but the only thing she could find in there that she liked was a hanging travel toiletries organiser - we used this on a recent stay in London and it was a really good purchase.


Character Warehouse


Old school Disney-MGM Studios sticker

The drive home took about 30 minutes, and as soon as we got in we had ourselves a snack (those Harvest Snaps we had last night) and I took some photos of our purchases, for the trip report. I also went onto the MyDisneyExperience app in order to register my new MagicBand so that I could wear in Magic Kingdom this evening. It seemed to work, but I took the ‘old’ MagicBand with me just in case!










The stuff we bought


Ready to go in her new dress


The car

Less than two hours after getting home, we were off again, this time to the Polynesian Village Resort for our 5pm Kona Cafe reservation. We checked in at 4:55pm but as it didn’t actually open till 5pm we had to wait a few minutes before we could be seated.

Despite arriving first, we noticed that other people were being called before us. I mentioned to Jo that last time we’d eaten here, they’d ‘forgotten’ about us - it turned out that it had happened again! Apparently it’s the fault of the pagers that they give you - they are very temperamental.






The Poly


Kona Cafe

Once that was resolved, we were immediately shown to our table, and put in our drinks order. Jo went for the Lapu-Lapu, and opted for my usual - SweetWater 420 Extra Pale Ale.

Last time we’d eaten here, I’d had the Island-style beef burger (with Char Siu Pork Belly, Soft-poached Egg, Havarti Cheese, Mustard Greens, spicy Mayonnaise, and Pickled Onions on a Pineapple Brioche Bun) and proclaimed it the best burger I’d ever had - on property, or anywhere else for that matter. Jo had decided she wanted to try it too so we both ordered it.

Isabella went for the hot dog, which also came with a dessert - she chose the ice cream sundae.


Lapu-Lapu


Island-style beef burger


Hot dog


Ice cream sundae

About 10 minutes after ordering the food arrived, and it was delicious. The burger was as good as I remembered and Jo agreed that it was a great tasting burger. Isabella enjoyed her hot dog and her ice cream. Despite how delicious it all was, when we compared the cost of that meal (we’d paid on credit card as we were no longer on the dining plan) with the offsite meals we had that week, it brought home just how expensive it was, and for what we had, it probably wasn’t worth it - one for the dining plan only in future I think.

Dinner was finished by 5:45pm and so we headed over to Magic Kingdom for some evening fun - we were planning on staying to watch the Happily Ever After Fireworks.

Our first stop was the Emporium on Main Street. Isabella really wanted to get herself a new MagicBand now that I’d got one. After some deliberation she got herself a really nice white Minnie Mouse one. We registered it straightaway on the app as I’d done with mine earlier. It was a little bit more difficult doing hers though, as she obviously doesn’t have her own account. Fortunately a couple of helpful CMs in the shop assisted us, and her MagicBand was all sorted.


Isabella and her new MagicBand

Fantasyland was next. On the way, we made a brief stop Rapunzel’s restrooms, and then continued on over to meet Ariel in her grotto. Just then the rain returned with a vengeance. We rushed round to Ariel’s grotto pretty quick, but as we tried to enter and get out the rain we were held up by some CMs. For some reason they weren’t letting us into the grotto, despite the rain. After a minute we managed to make them understand that we were getting soaked, and they let us in!

Meeting Ariel in her grotto is always a great character interaction, and this time was no different. Noticing that Isabella’s hair was wet from the rain Ariel got out a dinglehopper and sorted it out for her!

We got a few photos, Isabella got her autograph and the now obligatory selfie, and then we were done.
















Meeting Ariel

Outside in Fantasyland the rain was still coming down hard. We got out the ponchos and headed out into the wet. The rain was coming down so hard that there were huge lake-like puddles all through Fantasyland. Some people obviously didn’t mind the puddles as they were walking right through the middle of them and letting their kids splash about in them - some people had even removed their shoes!






Rain, lots of rain


No shoes

[Stewboy]

We made our way through the hub and into Adventureland to the Enchanted Tiki Room. There was a 15 minute wait - we were just glad to be out of the rain again.

During the pre-show outside the attraction there was a duck with a front row seat, he must be a regular as he wasn’t fazed by it in the slightest - despite all the noise, the water, and the flames!




Duck enjoying the pre-show


"Pierre, you rascal you"


"It's time to wake up the glee club"

After the Tiki Room we had a FastPass for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. The rain continued to fall as we headed into Frontierland, and when it was time to ride we even kept our ponchos on!

Outside the ride a group of guests was having a great time in the rain - a mummy duck with her ducklings. Is there anything cuter than a baby duck?!


Baby duck!

Our final FastPass of the day was Pirates of the Caribbean, so back to Adventureland we went. This was the first time on the ride that we saw the new redhead female pirate - but we missed her dialogue as we were at the back of the boat.


The redhead

By the time we’d done the ride the rain had finally stopped, which we were pleased about as we didn’t want them to cancel the Happily Ever After fireworks.

The time was now 8pm which meant we still had an hour and a quarter until the fireworks. Isabella decided she wanted to do Carousel of Progress so wandered over to Tomorrowland - it’s her favourite attraction apparently.

Once we’d rotated through the 20th century, it was about 8:40pm. Jo and Isabella wanted to share an ice cream and made the mistake of getting a sundae from Auntie Gravity's Galactic Goodies; Jo was not impressed and will not be visiting that quick service location again!


Auntie Gravity's - not so goodie!



It was now time to head over to Main Street to find ourselves a decent place to watch the fireworks. We’d sacrificed the better views near the castle to be closer to the exit but managed to find a decent spot at the top of Main Street, not far from the Town Square and the exit.

While we waited, Isabella kept herself amused playing with her Ariel bubble wand (with the music turned off, as it’s loud and annoying). Shortly before the show began, Jen and her family (Dibb name: The A team) came and said hello. They’d recognised Isabella, who was difficult to miss as she was twirling around with a light up wand making bubbles! We chatted for a couple of minutes - they seemed like a lovely family - but unfortunately neglected to get a photo. I think it was their last day and they were heading out of the park to avoid the crowds so we didn’t want to hold them up too long!










Fun on Main Street

The show started soon after they’d gone, and although we had a decent view, I picked Isabella up so that she could see more of the castle - she’s a lot heavier than she used to be.

I probably don’t need to tell you how amazing the Happily Ever After is, so I won’t. Jo was on photo duty to me having my arms full; it stopped her from crying at least!

As soon as the show finished at 9:30pm, we turned and headed straight for the exit. We’d managed a quick getaway and by 10:30pm were home.
















Happily Ever After fireworks



Isabella had a quick bath and went to bed, while Jo and I chilled out on the comfy sofas until about midnight.

So that’s day 7 done, tomorrow we spend the morning at Animal Kingdom, and visit Longhorns for some delicious steak.

Thanks for reading, and for all your lovely comments. I read them all, and will get around to replying eventually.

[mick]

Another great day

Joan

[Palm trees]

Sounds like a great day, we've never been to the golf, I think I'll add it onto the list for next time.

[Cinderella]

Brilliant day!

[i love jack]

Love Ariel doing Isabella’s hair!

[eleele]

A very busy day - looks like you had an amazing time!

[EJSakaAnna]

Yummmm IHOP! Love Isabella's new dress x

[disneypars]

Busy day managed to get plenty done though. Great photos.