Disney World 2015 (Day 2)

Day 2 - Epcot

It's day 2 of our big Disney Adventure and today we headed over to Epcot.  We have three days in Epcot with fast passes for several of the bigger rides so today was an easy day for us as we mainly decided to explore the front portion of the park and will start exploring the World Showcase on our 2nd and 3rd Epcot days.

Ashleigh scanning her wrist for Soarin'

I forgot to mention yesterday how wonderful the Magic Band system is. It makes things so much easier having our photo pass account, dining plan, theme park tickets, dinner reservations, and our hotel room key all on our wrist.. The kids are loving scanning their wrists at our fast pass destinations as well as for our photo pass pictures.

We headed into the park at 11am and high tailed it over to Soarin' for our first fast pass.  When I road this ride the first time when just Charles and I went, I completely enjoyed this ride. However, when you have two small kids and you know one of them is scared of heights, you worry - A LOT!!!   The kids did great but Mom was so worried Garrett would freak out and try climbing out of the seat.. LOL   They both seemed to enjoy the ride and once our feet were back on the ground I could relax.

We made two separate trips to the Ice Cool Station - a place where you can try various sodas from different countries throughout the world.  I was glad to see they still had the Japan selection still available - this is my favorite although the Zimbabwe version is just as good.  Alyssa really liked the Inca Cola (it tastes like bubble gum) while both of the little ones seemed to like the Zimbabwe and South Africa selections.

However, with the exception of Dad, NOBODY liked Beverly from Italy.. It was really funny as we had someone from Italy sampling drinks beside us and she said she couldn't stand it either..  If you ever go to Epcot, be sure to sit inside the Cool Station and watch others as they sample Beverly, it's more entertaining then some of the rides.. LOL

Garrett and Ashleigh try Beverly

After Soarin' we enjoyed a really nice lunch from Sunshine Seasons.  This was one of Dad's favorite places for quick service last time we went and he was just as happy with it this time around.  Dad got the turkey and swiss sandwich with potato salad while mom and the kids each got the chicken with black beans and rice meal.  The chicken was large enough that I could get one serving to share between the two kids with each getting plenty to eat - I just asked for an extra plate.. (We did the same thing at Peco's Bills yesterday).  There was no room downstairs for us to sit so we were allowed to go upstairs to the Garden Grill area where they are currently down for renovations. We had the area all to ourselves and had a nice view of the "jungle" while we ate. 

After dinner it was time for our fast pass for Turtle Talk with Crush which is so cute..  Those with kids will recognize Crush as the sea turtle from Finding Nemo.  Crush comes out and and actually talks to the kids in the audience - it's a full interactive experience.  Ashleigh was a bit upset that Crush didn't call on her to ask a question but the presentation was very cute and even a few more "adult" jokes were included.. The funniest part was a boy asked how turtles were made.. LOL 

Crush the turtle learning about humans as he teaches us about turtles.

After crush, we headed over to ride Spaceship Earth.  Garrett was very scared about this ride as he had watch a YouTube video and saw something about lightning in it.. He was scared there was lightning inside so getting him onto the ride was a big of work.. He finally got on it, thankfully without too much problems. Spaceship Earth is a journey back into time into the history of communications, from the times of hieroglyphics, to the telegraph and on to today.  It also goes into possibly situations for the future to come.  The kids ended up loving it, especially the beautiful view of Earth from space.

Since we already have fast passes later in the week for Mission Space and Test track, we decided to skip those for now and head over to Canada. Ashleigh has really been looking forward to trying Maple Sugar candy since we read about it in Little House in the Big Woods so I promised her when we were at Epcot she could try it.. 6 dollars later I purchased a box that contained 5 pieces, once for each of us and we sat and enjoyed them.  Ashleigh declared they were extremely yummmy... lol   We walked around Canada for a bit and went to watch the 360 Vision movie about Canada which the kids really seemed to enjoy.. We also checked out all the wood carvings including the totem poles and the kids picked out which ones were "Disneyfied" and which one was the authentic one made by the Northwest Indian tribe.   Then we had fun taking pictures in the cut outs for our faces.  Many years ago I took a picture of Alyssa with her head in the cutout. She was about 3 at the time and it currently hangs on my livingroom wall as it is one of my favorite pictures of Alyssa.  So we recreated those same pictures and those will go on the wall as well. 

 For dinner we crossed the Friendship bridge and hopped on a boat to head to the Beach Club for our reservations at Cape May's for their Clam Bake.  This was a dinner specifically for Garrett as he absolutely LOVES clams.. And sure enough, he ate two large pails full of them.   Alyssa was thrilled to see Calamari on the buffet and while I was a bit hesitant about buffet calamari, it was actually really tasty. Ashleigh ate her weight in clam strips and dad and I tried just about everything offered..  Everything was super fresh and yummy and we all got our fill . 

We headed back to Epcot and Ash and Garrett got to meet up with Chip and Dale.

With full tummies and after a long day, we decided it was about time to head back to the hotel.. We took our time leaving Epcot, allowing us to take some great photographs of the Spaceship Earth. Also, since there was a conjunction of Venus and Jupiter,  we set up to take a photograph of the monorail passing under neath it..  

Once back at our hotel, we relaxed by swimming in the pool and then we hit the sack since we had an early wakeup call for the next day.

All in all, we had a wonderful first Epcot day.. Tomorrow is Hollywood Studios.