*insert fanfare here*
After nearly a year, here is the finale of our trip to WDW! Whew!
DAY 4: Magic Kingdom and DHS…but mostly MK
Bright and early, Soarin08 picked us up at our resort and we were off for another magical day of mayhem! As we made our way to the TTC, we quickly realized that with so many folks around because of the marathon, the TTC area was absolutely insane! There were massive lines for every method to the MK…except for the resort monorail. Being the smart cookie she is, Soarin08 led us toward the entrance and we marched right on up to the platform and within a few minutes we were on the monorail and taking the scenic route to the MK. We made our way through security and the turnstiles and we were finally there!!!! After nine long years we were finally in the Magic Kingdom…let the 50 million pictures of the castle begin!
We headed over to visit the Haunted Mansion since the line was pretty much non-existent and it provided us plenty of time and space to take in the new queue area.
But first, Madame Leota had to make a stop at her mystical cart…

Interactive organ in the queue

Is this haunted room actually stretching? Or is it your imagination…hmmmm????

I honestly cannot remember every last detail of what we did (nor the exact order), but I do remember that we said “Hey Howdy Hey” to Woody, sang along with Country Bears, ran into the Mousecouple, marauded with some Pirates, whistled along with some Tiki Birds, witnessed Donald Duck’s antics during an orchestra concert and sailed around the world. We ate lunch in Yew Nork while being serenaded, were people that were moved, went on a journey through several decades, and laughed with some monsters.
Look! Here come the girls!!!
At It’s a Small World, I was given the red card for the first time ever! Yes, it’s kinda hard to see, but it’s there...
First time I ever saw Sonny Eclipse...
During this trip, we also discovered that we had a long lost daughter.

At some point during the day, we decided to have a picture taken by the castle from the Tomorrowland side. As we were assembling for the picture, the photopass lady told Soarin to “stand here by mom and dad”. Wait, what did she say???? Um, ok…so Soarin is apparently our daughter…she then had “mom & dad” take a picture alone, then had our “daughter” take a picture alone. It was too much to try and explain to the lady, but it made for an amusing memory.

Aren’t we a beautiful family?
Our “daughter”
On our way out of MK, we noticed Pooh and Tigger at the end of Main Street with hardly anyone around…we just had to stop for pictures…and we’re glad we did since it created a very memorable moment.

I don’t remember exactly how it happened, but somehow Cbog40 and I were told to smooch...I think it had to do with our Happy Anniversary buttons....but Pooh and Tigger covered their eyes. It was so cute and I am grateful to the Cast Members who kept on shooting pictures of the moment.
We also happened to snap a couple of artistic shots...
We decided to head over to DHS since the information we got was that it was the last night of the Osborne Lights. We got to meet up with the Mousecouple (again) and the Boilers briefly before they were off to their dinner ressies. As we wandered around, we saw that Phineas and Ferb were out so we decided to create some mayhem over there.
Ducky Momo is my friend!
We decided to forgo TSMM since the line was so long, no FPs available and it was a carbon copy of DCA…since we had limited time (like 3 hours) in the park, we wanted to spend it seeing things we couldn’t at DL (with 1 or 2 exceptions). But we did hop in the back of the line to at least see some of the queue since it’s totally different from DCA.
Buzz borrowed a kid’s hat for this pic...
As it became darker and darker, none of us saw the Osborne lights coming on and we found out that the night before was actually the final night.

Bummer!!!! Oh well…it’s another reason for us to come back! I remember that we went through One Man’s Dream, laughed with the Muppets (I couldn’t help myself), checked out the line for RnR (incredibly crowded…thanks, BTGs), just missed the last show of Lights, Motors, Action and saw the Jedi Training Academy (Cbog40 couldn’t help himself). We also grabbed a cherry coke from the little bar next to Prime Time Cafe, and went for a flight on Star Tours.
Anyone thirsty?
This really belongs back in California IMHO...
Remember these?
For the Star Wars fans...
Don’t know about anyone else, but I really miss this little guy...
For the Muppet fans...
Soarin found Perry!
Loved this sign over by the restrooms near the RnR queue
Yummy cherry cokes from here!!! Thanks for the tip Soarin!
It was about closing time and we headed back to MK for EMH and had to say goodbye to Soarin in the process.

Once we got into MK, we met up with the Mousecouple for a little while before they headed back for the night. I remember going for a nighttime cruise through the jungle (and yes, it was G rated), more marauding with Pirates (rather uncomfortably…the 4 of us in the front row…I think we took turns breathing

), and a ton of high-5s whilst zig-zagging through the never-ending queue that would take us on the “wildest ride in the wilderness”. Being the final night for BTMRR before its lengthy rehab, this was a must! We all walked toward Main Street, said our goodbyes and parted ways, but not before having our picture taken.
We still had a little time left so we decided to just take it all in since we didn’t know when we’d be back. For us, this means people watching, picture taking and walking around more so than riding rides. I don’t remember any other rides we went on other than the Peoplemover…it was our last ride of the night and kinda bittersweet. 1) Not knowing when we’d be back and 2) the grumpy older gentleman CM wouldn’t let us ride again because they were “closing”. Little did he know, the other CM was still letting some last minute folks ride. Oh well. We took our time leaving the park (and took an additional 50 million castle pics) and ended up being among the very last guests out that night. The park closed at midnight and when we left, it was going for 1am. It was cool seeing the night shift CMs coming in and even more fun was trying to guess their role.
If my memory serves me correctly (and usually it doesn’t), I believe it took at least half an hour for a bus to our resort to show up…we didn’t have much luck with buses and heading to the parks.
Except once, and I wish I could remember the specifics better. But I know we were waiting for a bus at our resort (late morning/early afternoon I think), and I don’t even remember where we were trying to go, but there were no buses going there. Finally a bus headed to AK stopped and the lady driver asked us where we were headed. We told her and she told us to hop on and she took us right over to our destination. Now, I don’t know how the bus system works…I don’t know if she had been circling the resort and saw us standing there (we were at CBR, and I don’t recall the bus “sharing” with another resort) and finally just stopped or what. I don’t know if it was something that she could have gotten in trouble for or not either…but we were very appreciative! That’s a magical CM!
Anyway, I believe it was almost 2am by the time we got back to the resort…and sadly, we went to bed (read: crashed) knowing the inevitable was just around the corner.
The next morning we got up, finished packing, ate whatever leftovers we had accumulated and went for one last walk around the resort…and drank the last of our mug refills. We checked out of the room, and waited for the Magical Express to whisk us back to the airport…to take us home to this…
Final mug refill totals: 29 (I think it was worth the $13…)