A Glimpse of Spring

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

I know that there are a lot of Fiends in places where it's still very much winter.

 

But, hang in there.  Spring is on the way.  In fact, winter ends in exactly one week from today.

 

Spring has already sprung in Florida.

 

TCD twin #1 had her spring break last week.  She spent a chunk of it in NYC, and arrived back in Florida on Saturday night the 7th.

 

TCD twin #2's spring break began on Friday March 6th, so she was home.

 

I knew their breaks would overlap, and had planned a trip to the Fort before Twin #1 ditched us to go to NYC.

 

But, we still had time for a quick day trip.

 

So we headed over on Sunday the 8th.

 

The plan was to hit Epcot and see some of the Flower and Garden stuff.

 

Then hop to Hollywood Studios- mainly to see it hatless.

 

Then finish up at the MK.

 

Then home.

 

We didn't arrive at Epcot until the afternoon.

 

It didn't seem very crowded:

 

 

We had just been here the weekend before to scout out some of the topiaries.  There were none in the main entry area then, but they were here today.  Finally, they broke out some new ones instead of recycling the ones they've been using for years:

 

 

We loved the Chip and Dale and Donald topiaries:

 

 

Look at this yo-yo showing off his extra long selfie stick:

 

 

First stop for us was the Festival Center.  I hadn't seen any menus posted on-line, and I was interested in seeing what they had in there. Plus, it's only open on weekends this year.  And, the twins had a merchandise item they were interested in.

 

On the way there, we saw this real man of genius with his shoes kicked off enjoying a nap on the grass under the monorail beam:

 

 

The Festival Center is in the old Wonders of Life pavilion.  It's worth going in just to see the inside of the pavilion again- it's only open during these festivals, and for the Flower and Garden Festival, it's only open on weekends:

 

 

We took a look at the menu.  So, they are serving food in here.  But nothing interesting like beet lollipops or anything:

 

 

We checked out the merchandise.

 

They didn't have what the girls were looking for, but a CM told us we could find what we were interested in at Mouse Gears.

 

The CM was right.  We were looking for the new Frozen Fever MB's:

 

 

The twins wanted them.

 

So we bought two.

 

Yes, we're suckers.

 

But, Twin #2 enjoyed her interactive MVMCP MB, and they had seen a video showing what this MB did at the scanners, so they thought it would be a fun thing to use over the spring and summer.

 

Next on the agenda was to hit some of the food booths.

 

First stop was the Pineapple Promenade, where we found a longish line.  That's to be expected on the weekends.  Plus, they didn't have any outside registers open here, so guests had to order, pay and pickup their orders all at the same window.  Not very efficient:

 

 

Our view from the line made the wait worth it:

 

 

Like they've been doing for the past few years, they had planters set up at the food booths with plants growing in them which were associated with the food being served in the booth.  That meant there were pineapples in this planter:

 

 

 

This is the what they have for sale at the Pineapple Promenade:

 

 

While the rum on Dole Whip sounds good, it's too much of a rip-off for me to enjoy, so we just went with a hot dog and some violet lemonades.

 

The hot dog serving is small, but it's tasty:

 

 

Violet lemonade is the girls' favorite thing at the Flower and Garden festival, so they each got one:

 

 

Our next stop was the booth located where the Puerto Rico booth was for the Food and Wine Festival last year.  This booth highlights sustainable food, and they have displays out front to demonstrate sustainability ideas. This display includes fake chickens:

 

 

I like the tilapia dish they serve here. It's allegedly dusted with ghost pepper, but it's just a little spicy:

 

 

From here, we headed toward Canada.  It's strange this year that there are no food booths in Canada or the UK.  The next food booth isn't until France.

 

As we passed through Canada, the new lumberjack show was about to begin.  So far, we've been lucky enough to avoid this, but since it was about to start, we decided to stay and watch a couple of minutes of it.

 

One thing I learned is that one of the lumberjacks is a lumberjill:

 

 

The lumberjill participated in an axe throwing contest, but my hopes were dashed when we saw that she was as good as the guys with the axe:

 

 

In all, we may have watched 2 minutes of the show, which was about a minute and fifty seconds more than we should have watched.

 

So, you know how they're opening up Starbucks locations in all the parks?  I thought that meant that the Joffrey's stands would go.  But the one by the old Millennium Village entrance is still there, and not only that, they're selling special Disney branded coffee by the bag now:

 

 

I guess Starbucks couldn't afford to pay Disney for exclusive coffee rights in the parks.

 

When we were here the weekend before, we hunted around the UK for the new Shakespeare garden.

 

It turns out it hadn't been set up yet.

 

But, it was here today:

 

 

The gimmick here is that they have signs quoting some of Bill's writing, and I guess the flowers in the garden correspond with the quotes.  For example:

 

 

I reckon there's violets and thyme plants in this area of the garden:

 

 

Another sign from something called Hamlet:

 

 

This bust here is supposed to be good old Bill. You can't be sure, though, as no one knows what Bill actually looked like, or even if he was a real person (did you know that?) :

 

 

Here's a sign quoting a familiar line from that nice and happy Romeo and Juliet play:

 

 

I guess Hamlet is a big deal because it had two signs:

 

 

Next up, we hiked around the world showcase, clear to America.

 

We planned to leave via the International Gateway, and we all wanted something in America, so we started there and worked our way back.

 

We got two of the burnt ends hash dishes and a pork slider.  Everything we got here was very good.  This is a photo of the hash:

 

 

As we headed out of America, people were just taking their seats for the Gin Blossoms concert.  Luckily, we got out of earshot before that started:

 

 

There had been some talk about stopping in Japan and/or Morocco for additional food items on the way back, but we bypassed those and stopped in France.  I got a booze lollipop there:

 

 

The girls split a macaron, and I have a photo of that to show you, but that will have to come in the next update- as we are at the photo limit for this one.

 

TCD

[Memphis 105]

I'm in. and FIRST TOO.   :banana:  :banana:  :banana:  :banana:  :thewave1:  :yaysmilesa-smiley:

 

Okay just a little too happy about this. I blame it on Friday the 13th

[mouseketab.....Carol 1,261]

We weren't as focused as you when we visited some of the Food Booths earlier in the week, and not a single picture, but some of the stuff was yummy!

[twiceblessed....nacole 433]

Oh... love the pics.  Excited to read all about it :)

[Katman1356...Jason 1,140]

Count me in. I could really use some spring.

[parrothead7368 aka Norm 101]

Fifth!!!! I'm in............

 

Best Regards,

Norm

[Beckers 1,136]

Oh spring! I'm in!

[DaveInTN 3,247]

Wow, flowers AND Shakespeare?  I'm so sad to be missing that.  

[CCIntrigue...aka Gwen 547]

I'm in.  First page?

[Duane 150]

Hey, hold on, wait for me!

[GaDawgFan.....Kelly 799]

IN!

 

Are selfie sticks becoming more of a thing? I like making fun of them, but didn't know they were big time. 

[Seals 111]

 

The twins wanted them.

 

So we bought two.

 

Yes, we're suckers.

 

 

"We" ? (who paid?)

 

 

Our view from the line made the wait worth it:

 

 

 

 

This is just gorgeous. Just what I need to stare at on this rainy day too far from WDW.

[twiceblessed....nacole 433]

 

 

 

 

 

 

Forgot to mention... I want one of these for Bailey; she would LOVE it :)

[twiceblessed....nacole 433]

 

 

 

 

 

 

Forgot to mention... I want one of these for Bailey; she would LOVE it :)

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

I'm in. and FIRST TOO.   :banana:  :banana:  :banana:  :banana:  :thewave1:  :yaysmilesa-smiley:

 

Okay just a little too happy about this. I blame it on Friday the 13th

 

Way to go, Harold.

 

I think that is a bit of an overreaction.

 

We weren't as focused as you when we visited some of the Food Booths earlier in the week, and not a single picture, but some of the stuff was yummy!

 

Yes, there's some good stuff there.  By the way, it was good to see you and Rick on Sunday!

 

Oh... love the pics.  Excited to read all about it :)

 

Glad you like it.  Sorry to say it's just going to be two posts' worth of photos.  It was a quick trip.

 

Count me in. I could really use some spring.

 

I'm sure you could use some spring.  Twin #1 was only in NYC for four nights, and she was ready for some warm air and sunshine.

 

Fifth!!!! I'm in............

 

Best Regards,

Norm

 

Good job, Norm.

 

Oh spring! I'm in!

 

I see that this thread is attracting all the NJ Fiends.

 

Wow, flowers AND Shakespeare?  I'm so sad to be missing that.  

 

Yeah, I know flowers and poets are some of your favorite things.  Throw in some hummus and rabbit food, and you'd be in heaven.

 

I'm in.  First page?

 

First page by a mile.

 

Which isn't going to be that great of an accomplishment, as this report will barely make it to a second page.

 

Hey, hold on, wait for me!

 

OK, are you on board Duane?

 

Sit down and buckle up, 'cause we're moving on.

 

IN!

 

Are selfie sticks becoming more of a thing? I like making fun of them, but didn't know they were big time. 

 

Selfie sticks are a huge thing.

 

The twins are thinking about making a social media page where everyone can post photos of all the goobers with selfie sticks in WDW.

 

TCD

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

"We" ? (who paid?)

 

 Don't you have teenagers?  They paid with "their own money."  Which they got from mom and dad.  So we all paid.

 

This is just gorgeous. Just what I need to stare at on this rainy day too far from WDW.

 

Glad you liked it.

 

The Flower and Garden Festival is beautiful, and a great way to kick off spring.

 

Forgot to mention... I want one of these for Bailey; she would LOVE it :)

Stay tuned to hear the rest of the story about those MB's.

TCD

[Beckers 1,136]

IN!

Are selfie sticks becoming more of a thing? I like making fun of them, but didn't know they were big time.

Popular enought places are banning them!

"On average, more than one million selfies are taken everyday, the research claimed, while 10,700 selfies were found to have been taken against the backdrop of the French landmark.

Others in the top five included Disney World in Florida, the Burj Khalifa in Dubai, London’s Big Ben, and the Empire State Building in New York."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/travel/travelnews/11402619/Selfie-sticks-banned-in-US-attractions.html

[GaDawgFan.....Kelly 799]

Yes! I hope the twins follow through with the website!

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

Popular enought places are banning them!

 

Yup.  I heard that.  And Disney ought to ban them too.  They are annoying and can be a safety hazard.  Imagine one flying out of some genius' hand on a ride and smacking a guest in the face.

 

Yes! I hope the twins follow through with the website!

 

There probably already is one.  But I haven't found it yet.

 

TCD

[momof3kids-Yvonne 594]

I'm in!

I was a fan of the Gin Blossoms back at the end of my high school and beginning of college life. I probably would have stopped for a bit to listen to the concert.

[Helmsey......Todd 134]

Yay spring!

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

I'm in!

I was a fan of the Gin Blossoms back at the end of my high school and beginning of college life. I probably would have stopped for a bit to listen to the concert.

 

I can't name a Gin Blossoms song.

 

Most of these bands have had at least one hit.  What was the Gin Blossoms'?

 

Yay spring!

 

Agreed!

 

I like spring.  The problem is that we don't get much of one in Florida.

 

TCD

[Tri-Circle-D 2,059]

This is going to be a short and sweet trip report.

 

It's going to end right here on page 2.

 

This is the last batch of photos I have from the day trip on March 8.

 

We left off at the France booth.

 

Here's that macaron I was talking about.  I don't generally go for this type of thing, but I tried a bite, and I have to say it was really good:

 

 

Time was getting away from us, and we still needed to see DHS and get to the MK.  So, we headed out of the International Gateway.  As you probably guessed, the famous TCD transportation luck held, and a boat was pulling up as we arrived. I've done this before recently to confirm how long the boat ride takes.  The boat pulled away from the dock at 5:44 pm:

 

 

We arrived at the DHS dock at 6:08 pm.  I believe that means our trip took us 24 minutes total:

 

 

These guest waiting to get on the boat to go back to Epcot would not be as lucky:

 

 

So, we get to the DHS scanners, and the twins are excited to scan their new Frozen MB's.

 

Guess what?

 

They didn't work.

 

Of course, they had the MB's they wore to get into Epcot with them, so it wasn't a problem.

 

But still.

 

Those stupid MB's are supposed to be interactive, and they wanted them to interact.  Or at least to work.

 

We asked the CM at the scanners where we could go to get the MB's fixed.

 

He said to go into the big gift shop where they sell MB's, and a merchandise CM would be able to help us.

 

So we had to make an unscheduled stop.

 

Not a huge deal, as all we planned to do here was look at the theater with no hat.

 

Which we could do from this end of the street:

 

 

Look-no hat!

 

So we go in the gift shop and wait our turn for a cashier.

 

We explain to problem.

 

She says we need to see a manager.

 

Who was at another register.

 

We waited in another line.

 

The manager seemed to know what she was doing, but she couldn't fix the problem.  We think the cashier at Epcot screwed something up.

 

The manager says we need to go to guest relations, and she leads us there.

 

This sure was taking a long time.

 

Ordinarily, at this point, I would start to loudly complain.

 

And maybe yell at someone.

 

Perhaps bang on a counter with my fist.

 

But that was the old me.

 

I've learned that gets you nowhere with the CM's.

 

In fact, I told the girls that I would let them show their receipts to the Guest Relations CM and explain the problem, and I would stay out of it.

 

The manager CM didn't take us to guest relations.  She took us into the space where they used to sell all that weird memorabilia.  Now, the whole thing apparently is a FP+ troubleshooting station.  They spent a billion dollars on this mess, and it can't fail.

 

This is what the room of crappy memorabilia looks like now:

 

 

They have these tablets all over the place, where you can log on to your My Disney Experience account and access all of your reservations, and presumably, make new ones:

 

 

While the girls were talking to the guy in the plaid vest, I checked out one of the tablets.  It let me log in to my account- and everything seemed to work.  And it was much, much faster than the stupid phone app.  I haven't seen any mention of these tablets being available to the public anywhere, yet they're here.  Maybe that could be of some use to you on a future trip.

 

The girls were taking a long time.  But, I could see that everyone was smiling and being pleasant, so I left them alone.  At this point, there were two plaid vest CM's helping them, and I could see a lot of MB scanning and tablet tapping was going on.

 

Eventually, the girls called me over.  The head plaid vest guy was stumped as to why their MB's wouldn't work, and he needed to call in someone else.  Before we even asked, he offered us two FP's to use in the park while we waited.  That was a huge deal, as we had no hope of riding any rides in DHS today.  So we got a little pixie dust for our minor inconvenience.

 

Here's one last photo from inside the old memorabilia store.  It's a sign with Cinderella trivia.  Sorry, but I didn't see the answers posted anywhere:

 

 

Hey here's a photo of the inside of the DHS Starbucks.  I wonder what I was doing in there?:

 

 

Here's a closer look at the space formerly occupied by the BAH:

 

 

I love the view, but I wish they'd take that construction wall down:

 

 

The wall was too tall for me to reach my camera over (if only I had a selfie stick), but I could peek through the cracks, and see that there's still a huge mess back there with dirt and mud and construction equipment.

 

We hadn't planned on riding Toy Story, but we now had FP's for it, so we headed that way.  These sycamore trees don't know it's spring yet:

 

 

On the way to Toy Story, I suggested to the girls that we stop in One Man's Dream and look at some of the old Disneyland stuff on display.  We have a new appreciation for Disneyland now that we've finally visited there.  Plus, they're going to be living and working there later this year.  There is a lot of cool stuff in there, and we had a good time looking at it and discussing it.

 

By the way, this is what the plaid vest guy had given to us:

 

 

Those are called No Strings Attached passes, and they work like FP's.  There's nothing on there that says they have to be redeemed that day.   I suggested to the girls that we save them and use them another time, and instead head back to pick up their MB's and be on our way.  We had some good FP+'s reserved at the MK, and it was soon going to be time to use those.  The girls agreed.

 

So, we saved those No Strings Attached passes, and headed back to the FP+ triage room.

 

A funny thing happened on the way.

 

A Fiend encounter.

 

Carol and Rick were heading in to the park as we were heading out.

 

We exchanged pleasantries, but not for long.  We needed to get going and so did they. But, it's always fun to run into a Fiend.

 

The plaid vest guy who was working with us earlier was now gone, but he had left a note and the MB's with another plaid vest.  The note said the MB's were fixed, and that for our trouble, he had loaded three more FP+s for any MK attraction on to all of our MB's.

 

So, that supposedly meant that we now had six FP+'s each to use at the MK.  More pixie dust!

 

On the bus ride to the MK, we all tried to pull up the MDE app on our phones so we could see if those extra FP+'s were there.

 

Of course, the app wasn't working, so we couldn't check.

 

But, when we got to the MK, we stopped at a FP kiosk, and, sure enough, the bonus anything FP+'s were there:

 

 

As we passed through the hub, we were all happy to see that the partners statue is unboxed:

 

 

I don't like how small the enclosure is around it, or how guests can sit on the ledge.  Who wants a picture of that?:

 

 

We arrived in time to use our original Mine Train FP's, so we got to bypass the 90 minute stand-by line.

 

And then we hopped right back in the FP return line, and used one of our bonus FP's.

 

I wanted to go for a third time in a row, but the twins said we should do something else.

 

So, we hit up Peter Pan, which at the time had a 70 minute standby time posted.

 

I don't recall seeing this sign before, and we saw them really cramming people in to the flying boats.  This must be a new initiative to try to keep the lines moving faster:

 

 

After Peter Pan, it was time for us to report to the FP+ Wishes viewing area.  I had wasted one of our FP+ choices to try this again. We had just been here the weekend before, but it was raining, and the girls didn't get to sit on that beautiful fake grass.  Today there was no rain, and that fake grass was calling to us.

 

The girls went in to the viewing area, and I headed in to Casey's for some corn dog nuggets.  It was a zoo in there:

 

 

But, I got the corn dog nuggets, and joined the girls.  The CM's let you take food in there.  No problem.

 

We were some of the earliest guest to arrive, and got a nice spot in the center of the grass with a great view.

 

Life was good.

 

Then these two clueless people showed up, and stood in front of us and the other people who had claimed prime grass spots:

 

 

I thought that those folks would surely realize that they had just walked in front of a bunch of people who were there before them, and that there were places they could stand where they wouldn't be blocking other people's views.  But I was wrong.  they just stood there, oblivious to anyone else.

 

There have been a lot of comments on this board lately about how rude children are, and what a bad job young parents are doing these days. These were not kids or young parents. They were two clueless people who were in their late 50's or early 60's.  In my experience, rudeness is not a generational thing.  It's a societal thing.

 

I was going to say something to them, but the girls told me we should just move over a bit, so we did.  The view from here was fine:

 

 

By the time the fireworks were about to begin, the grass seating area was pretty much full:

 

 

While I still think that this is a waste of a FP+, the view from here is great (as long as inconsiderate people don't decide to stand in front of all the people sitting) :

 

 

 

The fireworks ended by about 10:20, and the park was open until 11.

 

We still had one more bonus FP+, so we headed back to Big Thunder.

 

The standby time was only 10 minutes, but we decided to make this our last ride and use the last bonus FP+ here.

 

We scanned our bands.

 

We all got blue.

 

The CM  there said we didn't have any FP+'s on our bands.

 

Good grief.

 

I showed her the photo I had taken of the screen showing all of our FP+s'

 

She said that was no good.

 

How did she know we hadn't used them all?

 

She said we had to show her on the app.

 

I told her that we had all spent a long time earlier trying to access the app, and that it was not working.

 

She said, yeah, it had been down a lot today.

 

I asked her if she could just let us ride and not make us waste our time trying to pull up the app.

 

She said no.

 

We all decided it wasn't worth it.

 

It would take us longer to pull up the app and prove that we had FP+'s then it would to go through the standby line.

 

Plus, I suspected that our FP+'s had somehow disappeared anyway.

 

So, we didn't get that last ride.

 

We left.

 

That's pretty much all I have to say about our glimpse of spring.

 

TCD

[parrothead7368 aka Norm 101]

They became big in 1992 with their album "New Miserbale Experience". Their biggest songs off that album were “Hey Jealousy,” “Allison Road,” “Until I Fall Away,” “Mrs Rita,” and “Found Out About You.”

I liked them and had the album.

 

Best Regards,

Norm

[dblr....Rennie 224]

I am in late but in, could this be the shortest TCD trip report ever?