Disney Day 8: Epcot Day 2
Epcot Day 2 had a lot of character 😉
That is to say, we planned two character meals for today: the Princess Breakfast at Akershus in Norway, and the character meal at Garden Grill in The Land pavillion.
We planned the Princess Breakfast because the younger two of our kids still love the princesses (even though they’re boys) and Cinderella’s Table was full when I tried to book it. So this is the next best thing.
Getting there was confusing (my fault – I didn’t plan our route in advance) but once we got there, we were let it pretty quickly even though we were a few minutes late for our Priority Seating time.
I must say of all the character meals, the characters in this venue really sort of rushed through. We didn’t get much time at all with them, they just dropped by to sign autographs and snap a few pictures, no real bonding with the kids. That bonding experience is what makes character meals special, and without it, you might as well set up cardboard cutouts.
The food was actually better than a lot of breakfast venues, featuring both a buffet of authentic Norweigan breakfast foods, and a "family style" serving of standard American fare.
At this point I’m going to stop and direct you to the pictures HERE, because the Breakfast pics were on a memory card that crashed and are thus in a different album in the gallery. It’s pictures of the kids with all the princesses at breakfast.
Moving on, we toured (again) the world showcase and got very tired (it is so huge). Maybe next time, we’ll allow for one day for each country – that would be fun, eat meals in one country and just hang out in that country all day. Yeah, when we’ve got all the time in the world. But not soon. 🙂 So the kids got their faces painted in Africa (it’s a country now, according to Disney!) and then we made our way back to the front of the park where all the rides are to take ride inside the geo-dome (Mission:SPace?) I remember this being a more fun ride, but this time it seems like it was just a documentary. I guess my memory isn’t what it used to be. Next, Aaron and I finally used our Test Track fastpasses from the last time we came to Epcot, and I finally got to ride. That was a really fun ride, and I hope it’s there next time we come to Disney.
Finally we made our way to lunch at the Garden Grill. We had been waiting our entire trip for this character lunch; last time we came to Disney, we were exhausted at lunch time and had no reservations. We had just toured "the land" and were ready to sit down and eat. We walked up, unknowing, to the desk at Garden Grill, and asked if there were any stand-by seats available. We were seated immediately, and only after we sat down did we realize that it was a character meal. This was one of our most memorable experiences, both because we "lucked" into a stand-by seat at a character meal, but also because this is where Ethan got chocolate all over his face, and the characters made a big deal about him and sort of danced around him, making fun of his face.
This time, again our great memories failed us. I’m not saying it was a bad experience, by any means, but it didn’t live up to our memories. The characters were so-so and came by infrequently for quick snapshots, and the food was not-so-special. But hey, we lived. It’s Disney, you can’t really have a bad time at Disney, can you? 🙂
Here’s pictures of the kid’s facepaintings, plus the char meal at Garden Grill.
This wraps up my Disney trip narrative. We certainly had a wonderful time, and it was well worth it. We’re going to go again, in about 3-1/2 to 4 years, so I can start my planning as early as 2010!