A bus came along fairly quickly. There were only a few of us on the bus, and it didn’t seem like a terribly long ride back to Music. From Music, it was a short walk to my room, which...shocker! hadn’t seen housekeeping yet. It wasn’t even noon yet.
I found the ice machine, and did a couple rounds of icing of the ankle before I fell asleep. As we know from the earlier ride pictures, the nap was much needed.
When I woke up, I iced the anke once more, and then headed over to the food court at Music for a late lunch. As I was leaving, housekeeping was arriving at my room. The housekeeper looked downright worried when I told her that no, I did not need any more towels (there were like 7 in my room). But then I remembered that some more ice bags would be good, and she was delighted to find some for me. I told her she could put those in my room, but not to worry about making the room up. That seemed to make her happy, so I continued on to the food court. Phew, I didn’t tick off housekeeping! That puts me ahead of April’s trip!
At the food court at Music, I got a “southwest bowl”. I’m pretty sure the CM making mine was new, because she was offering me every option, and that didn’t really go along with the “pick one from category a, one from category b…” thing the menu had going, but I wasn’t complaining. My southwest bowl consisted of rice, black beans, chicken, queso (essentially melted cheddar), and shredded cheese. I got a go cover on it, filled my mug (thank goodness these are no longer resort specific) and headed back to my room to eat.
Upon my return to my room, I found a fresh stack of ice bags, right next to the ice bucket that I had parked on the nightstand. Perfect! I enjoyed my late lunch, and after some more icing, was pretty sure I could conquer the world. I chilled for a couple more hours though to play it safe. It probably also rained in that time period. It is Florida in the summer after all.
Sometime after 5, I got my stuff together and headed for the bus stop. It was time for an evening in the Kingdom of Animals! And I JUST missed the bus…
I killed time texting, and eventually another bus came along. The bus ride to Animal Kingdom was relatively short, which was a very good thing, since that was, by far, the coldest bus ride ever. I was really wishing for the long sleeve shirt that was in my suitcase!
Once at the Animal Kingdom, I only needed to kill a little time before my fastpass for Flight of Passage, so I browsed some stores. Ended up buying a couple of items and having them sent back to the hotel which (spoiler alert!), I ended up forgetting about until the day before check out!
Shopping done, it was time to head toward Pandora. Since I still had a couple of minutes before my fastpass, I stopped for a photo op, realizing after the fact that that was not the outfit to be photographed in…
Finally, it was time for a banshee flight. I walked as quickly as my (rapidly swelling) ankle would allow through the nearly empty fastpass line, and was directed into the row they pull singles from to finish off rooms, just in time to be directed into the last spot in a loading pre-show room. WOOHOO. BTW, the wait time posted outside was nearly 2 hours, at about 7 PM.
Once again, I thoroughly enjoyed Flight of Passage. Actually, I think I enjoyed it more this flight than in April, because I only looked straight ahead. At one point in April, I looked down. Don’t do that.
After flying on the banshee, I browsed the exit store for a couple of minutes, and then decided it was time for dinner. Tonight’s dinner? Pulled pork french fries and mandarin orange lemonade at Flame Tree. Although there was not nearly as much pulled pork on the fries tonight as there was in April, they were still delicious. And I could drink that lemonade by the gallon.
After dinner, I realized I’d made a critical error. I should have ridden Everest and then eaten heavy food. Now, Everest was not really an option. A look at the wait times, and the only attractions with low-ish wait times in the park were Dinosaur and Bugs Life. I dealt with Bugs Life in April, so Dinosaur it is!
Dinosaur actually ended up being pretty close to its posted 25 minute wait. I’m sure it’ll come as no surprise that they were only running one load zone side. Despite my best efforts coming out of the pre-show to ditch them, I spent most of my time in line behind a group that was pure white trash. Truly obnoxious. They were a group of 5. Close to the load zone, I was able to get some space between myself and them. However, then a CM went looking for single riders. Low and behold, they wanted to fill that one spot in the group of 5. The CM looked apologetic when she placed me with them, so clearly, it wasn’t just me thinking not the best of them.
I’d forgotten, from the one time I rode this one 10 years ago, just how bumpy this ride is. Thanks to the combination of short legs with feet that just barely touched the floor, and an ankle that was pretty useless for balance, I had to hang on to the grab bar. That, combined with the antics of the others in my ride vehicle made for a charming ride photo.
After Dinosaur, I headed back to Asia. It was time to enter the fastpass area for Rivers of Light. There was still well over half an hour to kill before showtime, so I passed the time texting, and taking in the changing sky, and also the changing light colors on the Tree of Life and surrounding trees. Unfortunately, because of lights in the stadium, these things couldn’t really be captured by my phone camera.
The show started at 9:15. I had heard REALLY mixed reviews, so I wanted to see for myself. And, honestly, I liked it. Does it have the storyline of Illuminations? No. But visually, it’s spectacular, especially for a show that can’t use any fireworks, the music is great, and, there is some purpose behind the show. Is it something I need to see every trip? Probably not. Would I be willing to see it again? Yes.
When Rivers of Light ended about 9:30, I joined the masses exiting the park. By now the ankle was easily the most swollen it had been, so I was moving pretty slowly. But honestly, most people were. So I wasn’t holding up traffic!
When I got to the bus stops, the line for Music was WAY shorter, and I knew it’d be a much shorter walk to my room, so I hopped in that line, instead of the line for Movies. As luck would have it, buses for both hotels showed up about the same time. Even luckier for those close to the front of the line, about the same time it became apparent that loading an ECV was going to be more difficult than usual, thanks to the weird positioning of the bus and a gutter, another bus pulled up alongside to double load. I’m pretty sure we were back at Music before they ever got that ECV loaded. That outside bus driver was a task master. It was fantastic.
I limped back to my room, got fresh ice, iced my ankle for a bit, and then got ready for bed, mentally mapping out a slower day for Saturday.
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