Walt Disney World - Day 4

 Despite severe lack of sleep, we surprisingly rallied and got up early enough this morning to make the tail end of the early entry window at Hollywood Studios... 

and took advantage of the lighter crowds by heading straight over the Sunset Boulevard area to ride both the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster...

and The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror...

multiple times...

FUN FACT: The last time we rode this ride was on our trip to DisneyLAND 8+ years ago, and M (well, really all of us) had really no idea what to expect, but put on a very brave face!

After several rides, we headed over to the Hollywood Boulevard area to ride Mickey & Minnie's Runaway Railway...

before meeting up with family to visit the Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge area...

where while the boys rode Millenium Falcon: Smugglers Run...

the girls met up with a few characters...

including Chewbacca...

before reuniting...

to ride Star Wars: Rise of the Resistance...

Afterwards, we headed over to the Grand Avenue area...

 

to attend the Muppet Vision 3D show...

before lunch at 50's Prime Time Café in the Echo Lake area...

After lunch, we met up with Max from A Goofy Movie...

before making our way over to Toy Story Land...

to ride Slinky Dog Dash...

with family...

Afterwards, the boys stayed put...

and the girls and I parkhopped via the Disney Skyliner...

back over...

to the Disney & Pixar Short Film Festival building in the World Celebration section of EPCOT...

to snag a photo with Mickey & Minnie all decked out in their Disney 100 costumes (we had just missed them yesterday)...

{with the famous mouse duo in their DisneyLAND 60th oufits back in 2015}

While there, we popped into the Journey Into Imagination With Figment building to meet up with Figment, too...

before skylining back over to Hollywood Studios...

where we found some fun on the way back in...

From there, we met back up with family to ride some thrill ride favorites with Aunt E in the Sunset Boulevard area...

The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror...

and the Rock 'n' Roller Coaster...

{the kids decided to be a band playing instruments this time through - Cousin B on trumpet, B on keyboards, M on the guitar, and L rocking out singing a song - they crack me up}

{the adults were just trying to avoid getting whiplash}

before heading back over to the Toy Story Land area...

to ride Slinky Dog Dash at night...

and Toy Story Mania!...

At this point, several members of our party retired for the night, but Hubby, B, L, Aunt E, and Cousin B headed back over to EPCOT for one last spin on Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind...

M and I skylined over to EPCOT with them, and then monorailed over to Magic Kingdom from there...

Aunt E had worked her magic in Fantasyland once more, and we were able to ride both Peter Pan's Flight...

and The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh via Lightning Lane...

before making our way over to the standby line for the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train just in time...

It moved much faster once the park closed and the Lightning Lane was roped off...

FUN FACT: At Walt Disney World, the published park closing time is the time the lines are cut off, but if you are in line when the park "closes", you get to ride, so if the park closes at 11:00pm, and you get in line at 10:57pm, you still get to ride the ride, even if the line is 45 minutes long, etc. This worked in our favor tonight!

After the ride was over, we quite literally helped shut the park down...

headed back to our room and crashed...

32,299 steps of fun...

One more park day tomorrow!

Walt Disney World - Day 3

Today was welcomed with a slower start as all 21 of us gathered for a delicious brunch at Boma - Flavors of Africa, a restaurant located on the grounds of our hotel...

After brunch, while M and I rested a bit in the hotel room, B went to the arcade with his cousin, B, and Hubby and L played ping pong, meeting up with a college student from Ontario who played a few rounds with them as well.

Early afternoon, we headed out to spend New Year's Eve back at EPCOT...

where we snagged a cool 360 degree cousins photo...

while waiting on the rest of our big party to assemble...

and where Aunt E was at it again, lining up Lightning Lanes and Virtual Queues, etc.

First, we headed over to Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind where we were in for a roller coaster like no other where the individual cars actually break apart from each other and cruise and spin singularly before returning together as a train...

{M's hair says it all}

All the spinning left me a little nauseous, but it was a winner with everyone else!

While already in the World Discovery section of the park, we rode Test Track again, as well...

before moving over to the World Celebration section of the park where we were able to ride Spaceship Earth again...

and meet Joy from Inside Out at ImageWorks...

From there, we moved on to the World Nature section of the park and walked through the new Journey of Water attraction...

before heading back over to World Discovery for our hard to snag dinner reservation at Space 220 Restaurant...

This restaurant features an attraction within itself where after your party checks in, you ride a "space elevator" up 220 miles above Earth...

Once you "arrive" at the restaurant, you are greeted with magnificent views of Earth down below...

The food was really, really good, too!

We took a few more photos...

before boarding our space elevator back down to Earth...

where we met up with Uncle B, Aunt E, A and E in the World Nature section of the park...

We then added cousins A and E to our crew so Uncle B and Aunt E could have a little bit of time to wander the park on their own.

With our newly expanded group of 7, we rode The Seas with Nemo & Friends...

and then explored a bit of the SeaBase aquarium before wandering over to the World Showcase area of the park to ride the Gran Fiesta Tour Starring The Three Caballeros, a boat ride located in the Mexico pavilion...

The World Showcase area seemed to be where the party goers were assembling, and therefore proved to be pretty crowded, so we made our way back over to the World Celebration area where we rode the adorable Journey Into Imagination with Figment ride...

before meeting back up with Uncle B and Aunt E + K and F, and attending the Disney & Pixar Short Film Festival...

Lastly, within the World Nature section of the park, we rode Soarin' Over California...

before getting ready...

to ring in 2024...

Happy New Year!

FUN FACT: Before this trip, we last visited EPCOT in 2011, just days before B started kindergarten, and tonight we rang in 2024, just months before he is set to graduate from high school...

Don't blink...

Headed to Hollywood Studios tomorrow (or rather, later on today)!