June 2007

A Launch to Lunch

Well I had already found the Davy Crockett Explorer Canoe at the Polynesian Village resort, so I had no reason to take a Motor Launch there again right? Well, actually I had really enjoyed the trip over the day before and at mid-day there was more or less no line for the motor launch, and besides that I thought of one other thing I wanted to do while I was over there. So I hopped on board, it seems to me that we got going a bit more quickly than the day before as a lot of my conversation with the skipper the previous day (Captain Geo, ohh that sounds like a pun with the Captain in there doesn't it?) Anyways... that conversation had taken place while loading, and waiting for more folks to load, as obviously you can't talk to these guys (or at least shouldn't) while they need to be focusing on preparing to cast off and actively piloting the ship. Anyhow today we had Richard as our Captain, he seemed to be another fairly long timer (I think he mentioned that he had worked at WDW when he was young and then returned again more recently).

It looks like I didn't take any pictures once we got to the Grand Floridian (which is the stop before the Polynesian). It was another beautiful day to be out once again a bit hot but not more than I would expect in Florida in June. Once we got to the Polynesian I started looking for Captain Cooks which is a self-service food location well not entirely self service they did have cashiers to check you out but there is a self-service Dole Whip machine, so I purchased one of these then took it with me to a seat out in the main atrium/lobby and took a seat by the waterfall/fountain, after eating I took a few moments to call up the voice mail lines of a couple of podcasts I listen too, yes I know that waterfalls sound a lot like static in audio, but it was a wonderful relaxing moment to try to share with others. Now I knew I wanted to go to Epcot next and had figured I'd pick up a fast pass for Soarin' once I got there, but I now decided, with a little food in my belly, that I was thirsty and would make Ice station cool my first stop. So I headed towards the monorail station, stopping to take this short video of the Tram making a u-turn.

Above: More Landscaping along with the US Flag, Florida flag and the Disney flag.
Below: photos of the landscaping terraces at the Monorail station.

Once on board the monorail I noted that the train I was on (I think it was Monorail Black) had the new floors, nice solid surface floors I think it looked like some form of plastic and there was some sort of stripe design inlaid into it, so not just the cheapest method possible, they are re-doing these floors in a way that improves the monorails, no more funky rain soaked carpet smell. I think that the monorail I was on may have just been recently renovated as in the night before, why do I think this, well I found a live entertainment schedule for the Magic Kingdom in my car...one from January...I'm thinking that perhaps it had been shoved into the crevices by the "jump seats" that were never used and removed during this project, and that with those seats removed it finally was able to work its way out, then again there could be another explanation, though with the floor changes going on right at the time it does make a kind of logical sense.

There were a couple of ladies with a little boy in the monorail compartment with me and we struck up a conversation and when they heard my plans for Epcot (Ice Station Cool, followed by fastpasses for Soarin') they seemed to think it was a good idea too, In fact we ended up going into the park together, though they reversed to order so as we got near Ice Station Cool they split off, after cooling off and enjoying some tasty beverages from around the world I ran into one of the ladies ass she came out of the Land pavilion (apparently she had went after the fastpasses for her group), and she mentioned that she had indeed been able to get a fastpass (as I had mentioned to them the possibility that they could be out of them, which may have been their reason for reversing the order I took), and a few minutes later I came out with my fastpass, which I ended up not using, in fact I have yet to experience Soarin' at Epcot, though I did ride the original attraction in my trip to the Disneyland Resort in 2005.

I went to the Friendship dock located between the transition to World Showcase and Canada pavilion to take a ride to the Morocco pavilion, while waiting I took a few photos of the Friendships that were out, Friendships IV and II.

As we neared to dock at Morocco a speedy boat crossed the World Showcase lagoon(from the dock nearer to Mexico), I found out that this boat is used to take crew members on the Friendships to and from their assignments (I.E. it comes and picks them up when their shift is over, or presumably at break time)

Above: Even in the large version of the image this CMs name is a bit hard to make out but it looks as if it might be John.