This morning we got up early and headed over to the Magic Kingdom for our 8:30am Keys to the Kingdom tour.
The KTTK tour is a walking tour through the Magic Kingdom that lasts about five hours and costs $60. It is only open to those over the age of 16, so we enjoyed a nice morning without kids hanging around.
Here's me in front of an empty Main Street USA with Roy Disney and Minnie:
And here is Carrie before the tour:
We met at City Hall 15 minutes before the tour to check in, get audio headsets, and place our lunch order.
Claire was our tour guide and she was fantastic! At first, I was somewhat disappointed when I found out that Matthew wouldn't be our guide, as I'd heard so many good things about him. But now I can't imagine the tour without Claire. It was great and we were both sad when the tour came to a close.
I won't spill any of the secrets, but we basically just walked down Main Street USA, headed over to Adventureland and rode on Pirates of the Caribbean, visited Frontierland and Liberty Square. We went backstage and saw the trash system and reservoir for Splash Mountain and also went down into the Utilidors under the park. For lunch we ate in a private dining room at the Columbia Harbour House. Our lunch was good and we were seated with the tour guide and another CM who was training for the tour. My favorite part was seeing a video clip about the laundry facilities for Walt Disney World. It's incredible. Also, when down in the utilidors I caught a glimpse of the Pin Replenishment counter. It was pretty neat.
We had taken our swimming suits with us to MK so that we could head to Typhoon Lagoon immediately after the tour. To catch the bus to Typhoon Lagoon, we walked to the Contemporary Hotel, then took a Downtown Disney bus. The bus took a while to come and it was around 3:00 before we finally arrived at TL and got our swimming gear on.
Our first stop was the Crush n' Gusher watercoaster ride and it was a great way to get soaked right off the bat! We also tried one of the body slides, the family raft ride, and another single rider tube slide. We got waffle cones and dried off a bit in the sun before going back to POP to get ready for dinner.
We got all prettied up and returned to the Magic Kingdom to catch a monorail to the Contemporary. I was going to make Carrie walk over there again until she revealed that she'd never been on the monorail before! For some reason I just assumed that she'd been on one before. The ride to the Contemporary from MK is short, but I'm glad Carrie got to experience the monorail. I guess when you're in your late twenties, it's not quite as exciting as when you're a little kid, but oh well.
We got to the Californa Grill early and were seated about 15 or 20 minutes after we arrived. I was hoping for a seat on the MK side of the restaurant so that we could see the fireworks better, but we were seated in the back with a obstructed view. We still opted to remain at our table during the fireworks while everyone else ran out onto the observation deck.
Our waiter's name was Walter and he was spectacular. Dinner was very good as well and one of my favorites of the trip. I enjoyed the Goat Cheese Ravioli, Pork Tenderloin, and Strawberries and Creme dessert. Or as Walter put it, "Signature dish on top of signature dish."
Getting back to the hotel after dinner proved to be a challenge. They wouldn't let us on the monorail to go to MK or Epcot because they said no more resort buses were running from the parks (around 10pm). So we had to wait for a bus to Downtown Disney and then transfer to a bus to POP. It took nearly two hours for us to get home after dinner. I was very frustrated but tried not to get too angry. Lots of other folks on the bus were really angry about the situation, especially after we had to stop and let two weelchairs on! The crowd grew more and more angry as we headed to Downtown Disney, and our bus driver, Maurice (who looked like Lando Calrissian), pacified the crowd with singing on the bus speaker. He was great and made everyone laugh and cheer up a little bit.
All in all, it was a great day. I loved the tour and I loved the waterpark and I loved my dinner and Lando's singing. We're not really sure what we're going to do tomorrow. The Magical Express bus is coming at 1:15pm, so that doesn't give us a lot of time to work with in the morning.
