Laura's Disney Lines

Captain EO, the 3D film starring Michael Jackson which ran at Disneyland from 1986-1997, re-opened at Disneyland on Tuesday, February 23 as Captain EO Tribute.

In addition to Michael Jackson starring as the title character, the cast features Anjelica Huston as the Supreme Leader. It was produced by George Lucas and directed by Francis Ford Coppola. The 17-minute film features original songs and new Disney-created space characters with magical transformation powers, such as Hooter, Fuzzball, and Major and Minor Domo.

Captain EO is playing multiple times a day in Tomorrowland in the theater formerly occupied by Honey I Shrunk the Audience. Disney is saying it will be showing for a limited time, though there is no word on just how long that might be. According to Imagineer Tony Baxter, at this point there are no plans to bring it to Walt Disney World.

Jeanine Yamanaka attended the media event on Opening Day and shares some of her thoughts, photos, and interviews.

Guests began lining up outside the park the night before - there was a separate line for the EO crowd:

Once inside, there were signs directing guests back to Tomorrowland:

New signs on the entrance - those in the queue attended a showing for the Early Magic Morning crowd before the "official" first showing at 1000.

Captain EO cast members set up the queue for a busy day:

More new signs:

Disneyland president George Kalogridis was in attendance.

Two of the original performers from EO were there. Debbie Lee Carrington (middle) played Idy, half of the two-headed "Geex". Renee Colette (right) was a dancer in the film.

Some thoughts:

-- No photos or video were allowed during the movie.
-- The film uses a new 70mm print and the audio is great.
-- Some effects were new, like seat motion, but quite a few were missing, like the smoke, lasers, and starfield.
-- It will apparently be open until they notice a crowd drop-off, at which time they'll close it.
-- They have no plans for a replacement, since they don't know how long they'll have it open.

After the first show Jeanine had the opportunity for several interviews.

Imagineer Tony Baxter talks about bringing the movie back as well as its future:

Debbie Lee Carrington shares some of her experiences in making the movie:

Rick Rothschild, In-Theater Effects Director, on bringing Captain EO back:

New merchandise is available both with the classic Captain EO logo, and with the new Captain EO Tribute logo. In this clip, Merchandise Manager Cheryl Stockwell talks about some of the new merchandise:

An embroidered Captain EO nylon jacket will be available in mid-March.

Note: Captain EO merchandise is available only at Disneyland park, and is not available for purchase via Disneyland Merchandise Guest Services.

The 5th annual Disney's California Food and Wine Festival returns from April 16 through May 31 this year. It's a day longer than last year's Festival, taking advantage of the Memorial Day holiday on May 31. There will be daily events and some new venues this year, though there have been a few changes and even cutbacks in the Signature events. We have more information on the Festival on our web page HERE, which we will be updating as additional information becomes available, and I plan to blog live from the Festival's opening weekend. You can also visit the official site: http://www.disneyland.com/FoodandWine.

This year's theme is The Art of Flavor, and one of the new venues is the Festival Artisans area in the Pacific Wharf. There's not a lot of information on this yet, but the Food and Wine web site describes it as: "local artisans...an array of culinary and wine-inspired crafts, original art, and gourmet home and food products."

One of the biggest changes will be the addition of the Festival Showplace, which sounds like it will be the new location for just about everything that was at the Golden Vine Winery during previous Festivals. The Showplace is located in Stage 12 of the Hollywood Backlot area, the building that was originally the Hollywood and Dine food court, and has more recently been the Annual Pass Processing Center. Sweet Sundays and culinary demonstrations will be held there, and the Festival Gift Shop and "Wine Sellers" shop will also be located there. The thing I'm most excited about coming to the Festival Showplace, though, is the return of the Taste of California Marketplace, with its menu of tapas-sized Festival food items. There was no Marketplace last year because the restaurant location they had been using for it was in the process of becoming Cocina Cucamonga, so it's very nice to see that they found a new location for it this year.

There are a lot fewer Signature Events this year, some, like the World Celebration dinners, "Behind the Scenes With", and Festival Wine Receptions are not returning at all, while others have fewer dates available. The Winemaker Dinners are back at Steakhouse 55 on Friday nights, though there are only four and not six. On one of the off Fridays Steakhouse 55 will be hosting a new offering, the Brewmaster Dinner, featuring a multi-course meal paired with Karl Strauss beers. Napa Rose Cooking School also returns on five different Saturdays, as do the Taste Wine Like an Expert classes (4 classes) and the very popular Sweet Sundays (every Sunday). As of this date, the guest pastry chefs have not yet been announced for Sweet Sundays. Taste Food-Wine-Life also returns, but for only one evening (May 29) instead of two, and surprisingly it also returns with a lower price - $135 instead of $150. Winemaker dinners have held steady at $135 while tickets are up $5 each for the Wine class and Sweet Sundays, at $55 and $70, respectively, and up $25, to $475, for the Napa Rose Cooking School. The Brewmaster dinner is $110. All of these prices include gratuity but not tax.

Another price increase...the wine, beer, and spirits seminars are no longer complimentary, though the price for a wristband is a nominal $1.00, cash only. Wristbands must be purchased in the queue line. It appears that the cooking and culinary demos are still free.

Other returning Festival offerings are the Festival Wine and Beer Walks, where guests can sample different wines and beers. The Jr. Chef program for younger guests will also return. In addition to the Taste of California Marketplace, special Festival food items will be available at many restaurants at Disney's California Adventure, and selected Disneyland Resort restaurants will be offering a special prix-fixe menu.

Tickets for the Signature events go on sale on February 16, but, as reported on the Disney Parks Blog, tickets for some events went on sale to Annual Passholders on February 4. Through February 15, AP holders may purchase these tickets at discounted prices. Visit http://www.disneyland.com/ap for details.

Hope to see you at the Festival!

RIDEMAKERZ---FINALLY A SHOP FOR MEN AND BOYS
by Guest Blogger Alpha Gollihugh

As we were visiting in Downtown Disney, California last week, we discovered something new, a shop for men and boys. How many times have you dragged your boys and men through the "cutsie" shops in DTD, and they are just waiting to get to dinner or wanting to visit the next park? Here is a shop that they may actually LIKE to visit while you are shopping.

This is the shop that used to have all the villages and cute figurines and decorative items. Well, they are gone and "souped up cars" are now the line of merchandise.

The doors are wide open, and a cute salesman is there to help you fulfill your dreams of miniature hot rods. Step in and choose a car body, and then go wild choosing all the different chassis parts, wheels, decorations and decals. When you have chosen your main parts, you come to the assembly line to power screw them into place. Some pieces are quite tiny and smaller children may require an older helper to attach them.

More body parts, finishes, models, and posters.

Buckets of tires of varying sizes and prices.

Here is one of the finished cars with spoiler, special engine, top rack and the special adaption to make it a remote controlled car. For the younger ones, this last step can be left off and it will be a push, or display car. They have cars that you can try, and the boys we saw were having a great time.

So here you go guys, something to do while the women discover all the other joys in Downtown Disney.

In December we stayed at the new Animal Kingdom Lodge Kidani Village for the first time, and I've been meaning to post a follow-up of what I thought about it. There were a lot of things that I liked, but also several things that I didn't.

Since I have lots of photos of the room, I'm going to start with some of the things that aren't so photo-intensive - and also start with the "negatives".

Pembe Savanna - this was the savanna view we had, which is on the "back side" of the resort. It's a lot narrower (especially where our room was) and doesn't have as many animals as the Sunset Savanna - I was very disappointed in how few animals we saw from our room. Next time I will request an even-numbered room - those look out onto the Sunset Savanna.

Internet access - though it was free for us as DVC members, the network connection was in the Master Bedroom and NOT out in the living area as it is at most of the other resorts. That was very inconvenient for us since there were nights when I was up late blogging and Lee wanted to go to bed. I wish they would go wireless like they do at the Disneyland resorts. Next time we'll have to bring our own (much longer) network cable, I guess.

Air Conditioning - This was really annoying. There is a vent on the ceiling right inside the doorway to the room, and it was CONSTANTLY blowing cold air - it's on a building-wide system and you can't turn it off. So it always seemed cold in our room - we actually had to turn the heat on! The maintenance people came to our room one morning because they were changing A/C filters and we asked about it - they seemed pretty frustrated about it, too. All they could do for us was close off the vent a little bit, which helped, but did not get rid of the problem.

Motion-activated fans - these were in the bathrooms and the toilet room and were also annoying since they made a fair bit of noise. You sure couldn't sneak to the bathroom in the middle of the night!

Parking - Since Kidani is so large and spread out it was nice to be able to park under the building and relatively close to our room. But there's only one entrance/exit to the parking, and if your room was on the far end of the building like ours was, it was quite a long and circuitous road to get there. There did seem to be another exit about halfway, but it was blocked off for some reason. The garage is divided into sections named after Lion King characters (Timon, Pumbaa, Simba, etc.). The cast members at check-in really need to tell you what section you should park in, otherwise you can end up a LONG way away from your room. There's a place on the room key envelope where that info is supposed to be provided but the CM who checked us in didn't fill it in.

Dining - There is NO quick-service option (especially for breakfast) at Kidani, and the "store" is woefully small with a very poor selection. Yes, you can take the bus over to Jambo House and go to Mara, but that's quite a ways to go (and could be quite a wait for the bus). Lee walked it one morning, and even at his pace it took 13 minutes to go one way (of course from our room it took five minutes just to get to the lobby!). Sanaa is really good, though, and we really enjoyed our meal there - we will definitely eat there again, and we hope the menu stays as varied and interesting as it is and doesn't get "dumbed down" as we've seen at other WDW restaurants.

The Lobby - I really loved the lobby at Kidani. It feels like a scaled-down version of the one at the main Animal Kingdom Lodge, but it also seems more inviting and cozy. I really liked the glass torch lights. And the Library room was a nice place to hang out, too.

The rooms are beautiful and large - we stayed in a one bedroom villa, and it was very comfortable - I could easily stay there for several weeks or months and feel quite at home! I did find them to be a little bit dark, though - which fits in with the theme, but I prefer something brighter. And it took us a long time to figure out the light switches! Many of the lamps had their own switch, and in some cases the switch was on the *cord* and not on the lamp itself. In the dark the night we arrived those were very hard to find.

I LOVED the master bathroom - it was HUGE!!! I would especially love to have the big walk-in shower at home...

On very cool thing about the one bedroom villas is that they have two full bathrooms, and the second bathroom was very nice, also.

All of the detail in the decor was really amazing - the designers out-did themselves this time.

There were Lion King characters carved into the furniture:

And also painted on the murals in the master bathroom:

And even woven into the curtains!

Lee noticed that the legs on the dining room table had hooves like a giraffe.

And here's the back of one of the chairs out on the balcony:

There were lots of other interesting decor details, too - I liked the ostrich egg in the lamp.

One interesting thing at Kidani: there were quotations painted on walls all over the building - one cast member told us that there were 40. I think we saw 10 or 12 of them - given the size of the building it would take a long time to roam the hallways and viewing areas and track them all down. Might be a good rainy day activity, though!

Jambo House vs. Kidani

Hmm...I've stayed at both now...and they both have their stronger/weaker points. The rooms are a lot nicer at Kidani, since they were built as DVC Villas to begin with, and are not converted hotel rooms like Jambo House. But there's a lot more dining options at Jambo House, and it doesn't seem to be spread out quite as much. I also think that any of the savanna views at Jambo House are better than the Pembe Savanna (but Arusha or Sunset savannas at Jambo are equivalent to Sunset Savanna at Kidani). Parking is more convenient at Kidani - once you get there. :-) I think the lack of dining at Kidani is a big problem - I don't think most DVC members cook while on vacation, but still, it's nice to have ready access to some grab-and-go type items for breakfast or a quick snack, and that's just not available at Kidani.

Part 2 of my photos and observations from my trip to Disneyland on Friday.

I'll start with the resorts, since that's actually where I began my day - walked there from the Pinocchio Parking Lot (I arrived early enough that I was parked outside in the Pinocchio lot rather than inside the garage, which suited me since the walk from there is a little shorter to/from the hotels).

The remodeling of the Dreams Tower at the Disneyland Hotel still continues - it looks to be about halfway done. If anyone has the opportunity to stay in the new rooms please send us some photos!

At the Paradise Pier, the new Surf's Up Breakfast with Mickey has replaced the Lilo and Stitch character breakfast. It's a breakfast buffet - there is no longer an a la carte menu. Stitch is still at the breakfast, along with Mickey, of course, but no Lilo. The buffet includes: an omelet station, breakfast flatbreads, Mickey waffles, chocolate peanut butter banana French toast, smoothies, parfait station, chilaquiles and smoked salmon. $25.99 for adults and $13.99 for kids, tax and 15% gratuity will be added.

For those who would like a hot breakfast but not the buffet, the Surfside Lounge is offering breakfast now in addition to the usual coffee and pastries. The menu is HERE.

A number of things going on at DCA. The construction walls are still up around Paradise Bay, but they have finished the structure they were building at the end of the bridges between Paradise Pier and Pacific Wharf so those walls are down, and that makes it not quite so claustrophobic. This looks like a big light and speaker tower to me.

And of course work on the World of Color show is continuing in the bay itself.

The bay has been refilled and so the nice reflections are back again.

There's still plenty of construction walls up all around Paradise Pier, but the ones between the bay and the former Golden Dreams attraction have been moved closer to the bay so that there is a little more room to walk now. A wall completely blocks the walkway in front of Jumping Jellyfish so you have to go around the S.S. Rustworthy past Pizza Oom Mow Mow for the moment.

The Wine Country Trattoria and the Wine Terrace are both closed while the restaurant is being remodeled - it is scheduled to open again in April. And while we're talking about food and restaurants, here's a reminder that Disney's Calfornia Food and Wine Festival returns from April 16-May 31. No information on the schedule or events is available yet, though.

Big changes back in the Hollywood Backlot area - the center of the street is blocked by construction walls, and you have to go up one side or the other depending on whether you want to go to Playhouse Disney and the Animation Building or the rest of the backlot area.

The reason? The tracks for the Red Trolley are going in, and the trolley itself is supposed to open later this year.

The walkway is so narrow that they have had to close Award Weiners - there's no room for the line for this popular counter-service restaurant.

On the construction walls are vintage Disney movie posters.

There's a new Annual Passport Processing Center in the far corner of the backlot, which was a food court restaurant called Hollywood & Dine when the park first opened, but has been closed for years. I was told this location is "temporary", but not just how "temporary" it is.

I tried something I'd never had before - I was in DCA early enough that the Pacific Wharf Cafe was still serving breakfast AND I was actually hungry. I really like their soups and salads in bread bowls, but for breakfast they serve scrambled eggs in a bread bowl. It also came with two slices of nice crisp bacon and some fruit - a bunch of grapes and some sliced oranges. The eggs were a little dry but everything else was excellent. The eggs need a little oomph, so I got a couple of packets of salsa from Cocina Cucamonga. No way I could eat all that bread, and I ended up taking most of it home where it made for a fine soup bowl for some homemade split pea soup that night. For $5.99 it was good and very reasonably priced. The breakfast menu is HERE. I don't think the breakfast menu has changed at all in the five years I've been collecting menus for AllEars - I keep expecting the prices to go up.

There's a couple new stores that have opened in Downtown Disney recently. D Street is Vinylmation central, but they also carry "cutting edge apparel" for men and women as well as other collectibles and artwork.

But my favorite new store is The Cupcake Store, which is located at the end of Downtown Disney near the ESPN Club. It's a little shop right in the center, which sells gourmet cupcakes. They are nicely decorated with flowers, chocolate, candy sprinkles, etc. There's vanilla, yellow cake, chocolate, red velvet, and vanilla coconut and they are $4.95 each. I'm not sure why I took a photo of the shop and didn't take any pictures of the cupcakes!

Something that is not new, but I'd never noticed before, is this remote-control boat area on the side of the Rainforest Cafe. There was no one playing with it when I was there, so I don't know how popular it really is.

And that brings us to the end of my ravings - for now, at least.

I went to Disneyland on Friday - the first time I'd been there in six weeks. When you don't visit Disneyland for six weeks, things change!!! There's too much for me to put in one blog so I'll split it into two. With lots of photos, since it's easier to show it to you than describe it!

The updated Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln has re-opened in the Opera House on Main Street. Jeanine Yamanaka took a lot of great photos of the pre-show area which you can see HERE. No photos or video or any kind are permitted inside the theater once the presentation starts, though.

This version is actually very close to the original from the 1964 New York World’s Fair. Much of it is narrated in Lincoln's own words by actor Royal Dano, including a portion of a letter where Lincoln provided a short autobiography, describing himself as follows: "I am, in height, six feet, four inches, nearly; lean in flesh, weighing, on an average, one hundred and eighty pounds; dark complexion, with coarse black hair, and grey eyes, no other marks or brands recollected." (From a letter to Jesse Fell, dated December 20, 1859.) The "Two Brothers" Civil War story returns in this new version - I've always found that very moving and sad.

The body movements of the new animatronic still look robotic to me, but I thought the face was very lifelike, especially the eyes. Pretty amazing, really. The audio *sounded* recorded, though, and not at all like a real person speaking - I was disappointed in that.

Disneyland's 55th birthday is on July 17 this year, and new merchandise, with The Happiest Memories on Earth theme, is already on the shelves in the Disney Showcase shop on Main Street. My favorite is the retro ticket book memo pad though I have a feeling that next week they'll be selling a lot of the mini umbrellas! (Major rain coming to California next week.)

In the Emporium I was surprised to see Disney-themed college t-shirts for sale - Alabama and Texas I understand since they were in the Rose Bowl, but, not being a college football fan, I didn't get the significance of Ohio and UNC.

The new popcorn buckets and travel mugs feature The Muppets, with the Celebrate Volunteering theme. I love seeing the Muppets in the parks!

There's a new Disney's Honorary Volunteers Cavalcade which also features the Muppets, but Alpha will have more on that in an upcoming blog.

I guess I'll go around the park counter-clockwise...In Tomorrowland, Honey I Shrunk the Audience is shut down to make way for the return of Captain Eo in February.

Over in Fantasyland, holiday "it's a small world" is still running - that surprised me, though it shouldn't have, because it usually is up through the end of Martin Luther King weekend.

The new Troubadour Tavern has opened at Princess Fantasy Faire, replacing the former Enchanted Cottage Sweets and Treats. The new menu (HERE) still features bratwurst but also offers baked potatoes and corn on the cob.

The Celebration Roundup and BBQ has a seasonal theme: Big Thunder Winter Roundup.

Even the tablecloths have a wintry design.

I liked this colorful winter vegetable garden that was planted outside of Big Thunder Ranch.

There's walls all around the Rivers of America while it is being refurbished, though I got a pretty good view of it from the bridge next to Pirates of the Caribbean, and from the stairs near the Hungry Bear restaurant.

Back in Critter Country they are doing some work on Pooh's Corner, though the shop is still open.

I went in there to see what kind of seasonal treats they might have - there were some chocolate-covered marshmallows on a stick with candy hearts on them and some heart-shaped cookies and crispie treats.

I'm not skipping Adventureland or Toontown - it's just that nothing there seemed changed to me.

I was able to see parts of two of the Disneyland Band's shows - when they performed just inside the turnstiles, and then again when they performed in Town Square.

The park really wasn't crowded, especially first thing in the morning. For the first hour and a half just about everything was a walk-on. By 1:00 the longest posted wait was 35 minutes for Space Mountain. It was a great day to be in the park.

Part 2 will cover DCA, Downtown Disney, and the hotels.

Alpha Gollihugh brings us this breaking story from Disney's California Adventure!

A new show on the roll at Disney's California Adventure features the Green Army Men from Toy Story. From under the bed in the upstairs bedroom of the Toy Story Midway Mania ride, come Andy's army men, full-sized and looking for recruits. They march, they drum, and they teach any volunteers to be "real toy soldiers". Even the important fact, "that toy army men have to hold perfectly still if any humans come into the room".

"Hup 2-3-4, hup 2-3-4, army men set up!"

The army runs on beat......set up the drums.

"I see some out there that would make fine soldiers for Andy's army!"

"I can't hear you.......come forward and line up here!"

"Calling Andy, I mean 'commander'.......shall we train the new recruits?"

"Come on recruits, quickly now, in line....."

"Now we need to train you................follow me...March!"

Weapons training: "Ready...fire! Ready...fire!.........This will really 'bug' them!"
(They are throwing lady bugs)

"An army marches to its drummers..................ok recruits......listen and come in on command!"

"Toy soldiers must know that when people enter the room you must hold absolutely still...............like this."

"Time to move on. Remember army men, Base is the big green box under Andy's bed."

This fun little show is performed several times a day. The Green Army Men come out from backstage near the Maliboomer, and recruit likely candidates as they travel along the boardwalk to Ariel's Grotto. Training sessions take place on the boardwalk in front of Ariel's Grotto.

(A big thank you to Alpha for putting this blog together!)

Alpha Gollihugh attended Disneyland's Candlelight Processional on December 4 and brings us this guest blog.

"Beautiful, Outstanding, and just plain Awesome!"

These are some of the words we heard after the first performance of the 2009 Candlelight Processional at Disneyland, last night. The first weekend in December each year, the train station steps at Disneyland are transformed into a stage for a huge choir, orchestra, trumpeters, and a select few soloists and speakers. Choir members are drawn from local high schools, colleges and Disney cast members. At 5:30 and 8:00 each evening the lights are dimmed and the choir comes down Main Street in only candlelight, and files onto the huge structure fixed for them each year by Disney magicians. Those with dinner packages and other groups like D23 are given seats in the area from the base of the stage and extending into the central park. The rest of us are left to stand in all the rest of the park area,side walks and extending down Main Street. Some wait as long as 3 hours before the performance, standing, so they can be the first behind the seating area. But it IS worth it !!!!

Here is some of the crowd waiting and the empty stage 1 hour prior to performance. Then the orchestra begins to play and from the far end of Main Street you begin to hear voices singing:

It takes a while, for there are probably 1000 voices. At least it looked that way to me. When everyone is finally in, the Disneyland Herald Trumpets hails the beginning of the music. The special speaker this year was Jon Voight. He was wonderful and added much to the evening.

In the center of the stage is the Living Christmas tree, formed by Disney Cast Members, willing to give many extra hours to present this wonderful gift.

The speaker reads the Christmas story from the Bible and each section is interspersed with Christmas songs, in wonderful harmony and power.

The performance is a bit over an hour, but the time flies! A few well chosen soloists add to the show as do 2 wonderful bell choirs.

When the story is complete, and most of the music, the speaker reads "One Solitary Life" which tells more about the life of the Christmas babe. Finally the Choir, orchestra and other specialists perform the Hallelujah Chorus. The last song is all the voices, and those watching, joining in singing,"Silent Night". You are just lifted to heaven! I have seen and enjoyed this performance at WDW too, but there is nothing like seeing it where it has been done for 54 years, Disneyland.

Our last day - I can hardly believe it! As usual, it's gone way too fast, and we're left with a list of things that we *didn't* have time to do.

But we got most of a full day today - instead of having a flight in the very early afternoon it wasn't until 6:00, so we had time to go to two theme parks before leaving for the airport.

We actually got up EARLY (for us, at least) - it wasn't even 8:00 yet! We enjoyed the pastries that we got at Kouzzina yesterday morning - the coffeecake was especially good, and there were actually two pieces of that! We also had a "sweet bread" cupcake, a mini-croissant, a small blueberry muffin and some dried fruit.

And what a difference a few hours makes - by 8:00 it was already about 10 degrees warmer than it got all day yesterday!!! There was rain in the forecast for the afternoon, but we had blue sky and sunshine for most of the morning - it was a lovely, comfortable, beautiful day!

We got our bags packed and were out of the room by about 9:00 for the drive to Animal Kingdom. After we parked and were walking up the aisle we saw Chad, Kerry, and Kevin ahead of us, so we walked in with them. Unfortunately that meant that we were both distracted and neither of us noticed which row we were parked in! Oops. (But when we came back later we did actually go down the correct row.)

Back at Harambe Fort the AllEars meet was already in full force - there was a Hidden Mickey seminar, conducted by Steve Barrett, going on, and a lot of other people were standing around chatting. I had the chance to chat for a while with Kitty (who writes about vegan and vegetarian dining for AllEars) and Rocky and I really enjoyed that - I had been hoping that I would get to see them. We all love cats and Disney, and we're also Crescent Lake Snobs - we just needed Steve Russo there for a "Crescent Lake Snob" photo. (That's kind of an inside RADP joke.)

Somehow Rocky got designated to take a photo of those of us who were still around at the time we decided to take a group photo - and then people kept handing him cameras. :-) He must have taken 7-8 at least!

And we posed for an AllEars team photo as well - I think there were almost more people taking pictures of us than there were people in the photo, LOL!

After that it was time to do the videoing for the AllEars Holiday video that Lee will be putting together - Coming Soon to a Youtube Channel near you. :-) Some of us did it in one take, some weren't happy with the first and wanted to do it again...and of course those of us watching weren't helping matters. It was really a lot of fun.

We had a Team lunch at Tusker House, where 13(gasp!) of us descended upon the place. Fortunately that was not an unlucky number and we had an excellent meal with a great server. I think I like Tusker House even more than Boma, though I think Boma has better desserts.

We laughed and shared stories - most of us live quite far apart from each other so the chances we have to get together and socialize as a group are rare. And we missed all of you who weren't there with us!!!

Lee and I had to say our goodbyes to everyone after that since we were starting to head home. :-(

But we still had a couple hours, so we went back to Epcot to do a few things that we had missed, with a stop in the lobby of the Boardwalk to get our boarding passes printed - something we hadn't had time for in the morning.

All week we'd been planning to see Joyful, the gospel singing group that is performing at the stage behind the Epcot fountain, but the timing had never worked out. We missed the first 10 minutes of their 2:15 show but were able to hear them perform several songs - they were pretty good, and brought a nice energy to the stage.

We had time to catch one more set of the Voices of Liberty - this time they performed two songs we hadn't heard - Angels We Have Heard on High and Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

While we were there we went into the Liberty Inn to see the life-size gingerbread house they have in there. I like the "glass" on this one.

And the very last thing we did was to see the World Showcase Players perform their version of A Christmas Carol. We thought Lee was going to get selected to play Bob Scratchit, but at the last second they selected the guy standing next to Lee instead. Both of the audience "volunteers" were pretty good, though, and we enjoyed the show.

Now it was time to say goodbye...we had an uneventful trip to the airport, and I think we encountered the shortest lines at security that I've ever seen there.

We're cruising at 36,000 feet as I write this - should be an on-time arrival in San Diego.

It was a good trip, but looking back on it I think we did the fewest attractions that we have ever done - just two! Kilimanjaro Safari on Tuesday and Hall of Presidents on Friday. LOL! Some people would probably interpret that to mean we had a really bad trip, but it's not at all about the attractions for us. We actually spent a lot of time in the parks but we were wandering around doing things other than riding rides. And we spent a lot of time hanging out with friends both in and out of the parks - and that was really the best part.

Thanks to everyone for reading - I'll have some final thoughts about things I didn't have a chance to write about coming soon.

Got up (at about 8:45 again) to a cloudy and chilly day - no sun expected, and high was only supposed to be about 67 - and I'm not sure it ever got even that warm.

We decided to have breakfast at Kouzzina - we'd had dinner there back in October with the Koma family and really enjoyed it. There were a surprising number of people having breakfast at 10:00, but we waited less than 10 minutes for a table.

There were a number of items on the breakfast menu that looked good - we could definitely eat here again, and I'm sure we will in the future. Lee really wanted waffles, so he had the Classic Golden Waffle which came with a large spoonful of whipped mascarpone cheese, honey, and chopped pecans. He also got a side of the sweet potato hash.

I was torn between the Spinach, Tomato, and Feta Scrambled Eggs and the Create Your Own Yogurt and Granola, but I finally chose the latter. It came with Greek yogurt (which I really like) and granola, and then with some fruit and sugared nuts and honey. I was disappointed in how little fruit there was...for $10.49 I expected a little more, but it was good.

Just about the time our food arrived Linda and Deb came by our table - they had just finished their breakfast. But they joined us while we ate and we had a great time talking to them and catching up a little bit. They are a couple of special ladies, that's for sure!

We'd gotten some Kouzzina pastries to have for breakfast tomorrow, when we know we'll be rather rushed in getting out of here, so we dropped those back in our room and then headed out to do a little more Christmas decoration resort hopping. First stop was the Yacht Club. They have the usual tree decorated with nautically-themed ornaments (like ships!) in the lobby as well as the alpine village train set, which has all kinds of things going on around it.

Over at the Beach Club it is the 10th anniversary of the gingerbread carousel.

They had a rotating gingerbread castle on one corner, with Snow White on one side and Belle on the other:

And an the opposite corner was a rotating version of Chip and Dale's treehouse - they seem to be the "mascot" of the carousel, though I don't really understand why. There's also a special carousel 10th anniversary pin that has Chip and Dale on it.

This is the first time I remember them selling gingerbread in a shop in the lobby. One of the pastry chefs was hard at work decorating Mickey-faced gingerbread cookies.

Then we were off to Epcot for Mike and Masayo's Kaki-Gori meet. The temperature really wasn't very conducive to ordering a kaki-gori, but I saw a number of people who are apparently far more hardy than I am, and ordered them anyways.

Masayo brought bags of origami cranes and swans that she had made - I think she said there were about 200! Wow...I can't even imagine how much time that took to do...they were both pretty intricate.

Here are all of the AllEars team members who attended (except Mike, who had to leave early for his podcast, and Barrie, who arrived after we took the picture) - Linda, Jack, me, Erin, Deb, Michelle, and Fred.

And here's Jack, Lori, Kevin and John - they were trying to keep Lori warm, I think!

After people had mostly dispersed several of us who were more the RADP folks hung around visiting, and eventually decided to go have lunch at Yakitori House. One of the things I enjoy most about RADP meets is the small groups that break off after a larger meet, and go off and do something like eat, or get our picture taken with Mickey, or some other activity where we get the chance to just visit for a while. We were with Jack, Julie, and Kevin, and we had a really good time just being together. Luckily we were able to sit inside and eat, since it was still quite chilly outside, and the wind had come up a little bit.

Kevin, Julie and I all had the Shrimp Tempura Udon, which I enjoyed very much. Kevin and Julie ate it with chopsticks - I'm afraid I am not that accomplished. :-)

Jack had the teriyaki chicken, I think, and Lee had the b>Japanese Curry - it doesn't look very appealing in the photo, but fortunately it tastes a LOT better than it looks!

After lunch (it was after 3:00 by then) Lee and I headed over to Magic Kingdom via monorail, though we stopped at the entrance to Epcot to take a few pictures of the holiday topiaries.

At Magic Kingdom we went back to see the Hall of Presidents - our timing was great because a show was just a couple of minutes away. This is the first time we'd seen it since they changed it and added the new President Obama figure. It focuses much more on the presidents and how even someone from humble beginnings (like Abraham Lincoln, and Andrew Jackson, who was labeled a "barbarian") can become president. I enjoyed it, though I didn't think the Obama figure was that realistic. But I liked how he looked back at his "notes" (or maybe it was a teleprompter) before making his speech. I have to say that during his speech I thought back to the D23 presentation I saw on the making of the Hall of Presidents, and how the Imagineers who went to talk to Obama and record his speech sort of ran wild on their tour of the White House - sounded like they had a lot of fun! :-)

We got out just in time to make it to Erin's "Remembering Walt Disney" meet at 4:30 - we were meeting out by the floral Mickey.

Erin did a great job with this - she had lots of stories to tell us about Walt and Roy Disney and other things that went on as they tried to build the Disney Studios, and then of course Disneyland and Walt Disney World. I don't know how she remembered everything she did since I never caught her consulting any notes!

She'd originally planned for us to wander around the park as she spoke about various topics but because the weather was so chilly we went to Pinocchio's Village Haus and co-opted several table and she talked there. That was very considerate of her - a cup of hot chocolate tasted pretty good by then!

The meet ended just in time for us to get to the front of the castle for the Cinderella's Holiday Wish show (aka the castle lighting ceremony) at 6:15. It would be nice if they did this more than once each evening like they do at Disneyland...but at Disneyland there's no characters involved, just the soundtrack and the lighting effects. Still, it's awfully pretty as it lights up!

The park was getting ready to close since there was a Christmas party tonight, so we joined the hordes of people exiting the park. But instead of going back to the Epcot area we took the boat to Ft. Wilderness, because we wanted to see some of the Christmas displays over there that we had heard so much about. There are quite a few really large ones that are not too far from the Settlement House which is where the boat dropped us off. Some of these have lots and lots of different inflatable figures, as well as lights and other decorations.

I thought this one was nice - not as cluttered as some of them were:

And this one had both a monorail and a train set!

We managed to make our way out of Ft. Wilderness and our timing was great because when we got to the Outpost an Epcot bus was waiting - it ended up being pretty full, too - but I'm sure that's because it was Extra Magic Hours at Epcot that evening, and Magic Kingdom had closed early because of the party. It was a little after 8:00 when we arrived at Epcot, and our first order of business was FOOD!!! We went to Seasons in the Land mainly because it was indoors. Though we also enjoy the food there. It was still fairly busy, and that is never a quiet place to eat. I had a bowl of vegetable soup and a salad, and Lee had the cashew chicken and chow mein, which came with a big side of steamed broccoli - I helped him eat that. :-)

We'd originally planned to stay for Illuminations but that was still almost 45 minutes away, and we didn't feel like standing out in the cold for that long, so we decided to get some hot spiced wine and then head back to the Boardwalk and watch Illuminations from our balcony. That decision was reinforced when we walked out of the Land only to find that it was raining lightly. Hmm. So instead of getting glasses of wine we got a whole bottle - two glasses was $12, and an entire bottle was $13-something - and there's a lot more than two glasses in it - I wish we'd gotten one before this. Oh well, we'll remember for next year. (By the way - it warms up just fine in the microwave!!!)

It had mostly stopped raining by the time we had bought the wine, but we still were anxious to get "home". And as we had thought, we had a pretty good view of the fireworks from our balcony - they were going off right over the ESPN Club. It's still a terrific show, even from 1/2 mile away!

We fly home tomorrow evening, but we have a busy morning since we have to finish packing before we head off to Animal Kingdom for the AllEars meet that starts at 9:30. That means we have to get moving earlier than we have any other day this week...but hey, I'm done with this blog and it's not even midnight (but close!), so I'm ahead already. :-)

I probably will not have a blog on tomorrow's events ready to publish on Sunday morning since we don't get home until late Saturday night. But who knows, maybe I'll be able to take advantage of free internet access on our layover in Houston and get it done then...but probably not.

Thanks to all of you who have been reading and letting me know that you are enjoying the blogs!