I can’t believe that we are already on the last day of our trip! This is so bittersweet because I have really enjoyed revisiting this vacation through these blog posts. On the other hand, I’m excited to continue to share other trips and posts again. I do have at least two more Disney themed blog posts coming after this one. One post will share all my outfits for the trip and one will share our favorite food and drinks.
This day was a hard day for us not only because I didn’t want to go back to reality, but also because I also felt terrible this day. Mary Ellen was still having a lot of eye issues this day too. She didn’t even try to put her contacts in this day and I didn’t even bother trying to do my hair and makeup at all. We were definitely on the struggle bus. For our last day, I dressed up in a Tangled inspired outfit. This is important to note for the pictures shown throughout this post and for a magical interaction we had later in the day.
We started our last day at Disney World at Magic Kingdom, and then planned to hop over to Epcot in the afternoon/evening. Mary Ellen also got up at 7AM to get us an Individual Lightning Lane for Guardians of the Galaxy: Cosmic Rewind so that we could ride before our Dinner & Desert party. We started the morning by filling up our reusable mugs with Diet Coke (Coke Zero had broken down halfway through our trip) and headed out for another day of early morning hours at Magic Kingdom. Our first goal for the morning was to get to Splash Mountain when the park was still only open to resort guests so that we could take advantage of a short wait time.
While passing through Fantasyland, we stopped at the famous Tangled restroom area for a quick photo opportunity for me and my Rapunzel outfit. Luckily, we got there before the crowds! After that, we high-tailed it over to Frontierland to ride Splash Mountain. We had a good idea that this would be our final time riding Splash Mountain before Disney closed the attraction to transform it into Tiana’s Bayou Adventure. As it turns out, we were right. Shortly after our trip, Disney announced that Splash Mountain at Walt Disney World would close in January 2023. We’re keeping our fingers crossed that we get the chance to ride it at Disneyland before that version closes as well. We’re planning to go in November 2023 and as of now they haven’t announced a closing date (update to add: Disney just announced a May 31 closing date for Disneyland’s Splash Mountain). We made sure to get an epic photo on Splash Mountain (even if it has the watermark on it) and filmed the “Zip-pee-dee-doo-dah” celebration at end of the ride to keep the memories close.
After saying our goodbyes to Splash Mountain, we made our way over to Haunted Mansion in Liberty Square. This is one of our favorite rides in the park, but we also wanted to redeem the first time we rode it and make it through without the ride stopping. Of course, we didn’t have an issue with having the rides stop to let a person with mobility difficulties on, but getting stuck on the ride in the ballroom scene is a small form of torture. Listening to that organ music repeating over and over again haunts you in your sleep. I can still hear it in my mind. We did get stopped on the ride again, but it was at the very end when the music was finishing up so we still called it a successful ride!
Through with rides for the moment, we made our way over to Adventureland to get another round of Dole Whips at Aloha Isle. This time we both go Pineapple Upside-Down Cakes topped with Pineapple Dole Whip. I have to say, the mix of the cake with the Dole Whip was so delicious. It also felt amazing on our sore throats. We highly recommend this tasty treat!
After checking the wait time for Jungle Cruise and deciding that it was longer than we were willing to wait, we chose to go to Casey’s Corner on Main Street to see if Grayson was performing again. Unfortunately, Grayson was not there but another Casey’s Corner pianist, Neal, was and he was super entertaining to listen to. He played beautiful renditions of “A Spoonful of Sugar,” “Go The Distance,” and “Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious.” If you want to see any of Neal’s performance, you can find it in my Instagram highlight here. After hanging around for a song or two, we walked to Tomorrowland to go to one of Mary Ellen’s favorite attractions: Walt Disney’s Carousel of Progress.
This attraction was originally created by Walt Disney himself for the 1964-65 World’s Fair. After the fair was finished, it found its home at Disneyland before moving to its current and permanent home at Disney World in 1975. The “carousel” takes audiences on a journey of a family through four different time periods (the turn of the 20th century, the 1920s, the 1940s, and the 21st century) showing the progress of inventions all the way from the lightbulb to the washing machine and the future of voice activation appliances. As you’re going between each time period a fun song called “It’s a Great Big Beautiful Tomorrow” plays. It was written by the Sherman brothers, who also wrote the music for Mary Poppins as well the iconic “it’s a small world” attraction. In addition to this attraction having a historical storyline, there is also a fun bit of history associated with the attraction itself. This is one of the few remaining attractions that was worked on by the big cheese himself, Walt Disney. We also appreciated that the Carousel of Progress provided a solid 20 minutes of air conditioning on that hot Florida summer day.
Next, we headed over to Columbia Harbor House in Liberty Square for lunch. We had placed mobile orders before getting on the Carousel of Progress. We both wanted something healthy and refreshing after a week of eating whatever we could basically get our hands on. I ordered the Grilled Shrimp Skewer, which came with a side of green beans and rice. I really enjoyed this healthier option. Normally you wouldn’t expect to find something so healthy in a theme park! We didn’t have any problems finding a table in the restaurant, but many people who came in just 10-15 minutes later weren’t so lucky.
Feeling refreshed and energized after lunch, we walked back over to Tomorrowland to ride Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin. The line for this ride was pretty long, between 30 and 45 minutes, and a good portion of the wait was outside in direct sunlight. We were a little uncomfortable, and we were definitely more restless than we usually were in queue lines. It was somewhere between our experience in the queues at Slinky Dog and Big Thunder Mountain (still not as bad as Big Thunder Mountain, though!). Even still, we made it through no problem. We definitely breathed a sigh of relief when we got back into air conditioning.
Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin is similar to Toy Story Mania at Hollywood Studios. It’s a ride that’s also a game! You compete with the other person in your car to see who can score the most points and take down the Evil Emperor Zurg. The main two differences between this attraction and Toy Story Mania are that this ride doesn’t have any 3D effects that require 3D glasses and that this ride utilizes an omnimover ride system (like the Haunted Mansion). Mary Ellen won this round. My gaming skills were definitely off for the last two days and will definitely demand a rematch the next time we’re at Disney World.
After saving the galaxy with Buzz Lightyear, we decided to forgo any more attractions at Magic Kingdom. We had ridden everything we wanted to ride, and weren’t interesting in waiting a long time for any attractions that we might have wanted to repeat. Since our Individual Lightning Lane and dinner reservations in Epcot didn’t start until much later, we opted to hop on the monorail and visit the Grand Floridian Resort and Spa.
As we were leaving the park, we noticed that a parade was about to come through. We decided to stop and watch it. It wasn’t the big 3 PM parade that we had seen before, but the rarer Rainy Day Cavalcade. I thought this was a normal event that Magic Kingdom did regularly, but Mary Ellen got really excited to see this because she’s never seen it before. Apparently, if there’s any chance of rain or it is raining, they do a Rainy Day Cavalcade instead where the parade performers are in rain gear and the characters are in covered cars to protect them from the weather. We were a little surprised with the choice because it was very sunny. It had only rained for a few minutes about an hour earlier, but apparently that was enough to cancel the parade and send the cavalcade out instead. Even still, we really enjoyed waving to all of the characters!
The Dapper Dan’s were coming out to perform by the fire station while we were making our way out of the Magic Kingdom. We stopped to listen to them for a few minutes because it’s always worth it to stop and listen to the Dapper Dans! I felt like it was the perfect way to leave Magic Kingdom and continue our farewell to the Most Magical Place on Earth.
We hopped on the monorail and rode all the way around the Magic Kingdom monorail loop to the Grand Floridian Resort and Spa. The monorail station at the resort is on the second floor just outside of the main lobby. We took the first few minutes taking in the grandeur of the lobby from the second floor. The chandelier and is so impressive and it’s absolutely beautiful in there! We made our way downstairs and thought we would head over to Gasparilla Island Grill, the resort’s quick service restaurant, to grab a treat and use our refillable mugs to get Diet Cokes. We were a little lost trying to figure out the direction to get to the restaurant, but that’s when we ran into guest service extraordinaire, Randy. Randy left a lasting impression on us. He welcomed us to the Grand Floridian and, after noticing we were lost, asked if we needed help. He also asked if we were new College Program students because we didn’t have our Happy Birthday pins on either (not the first time we were mistaken for CPs!). After telling him that we were at the parks celebrating not only the 50th Anniversary but also our birthdays, he took us to the nearest gift shop and got us new birthday pins to be able to wear for the rest of the day.
We had an amazing conversation with Randy. He explained he believes that everyone has a Disney character inside of them, the same way that some might say they have a spirit animal. This has stuck with me to this day! He said mine was a little obvious since I was dressed in a Tangled inspired outfit, and after talking to Mary Ellen for a little bit and taking a second to look at her, he guessed that her Disney character was Belle. He also had us guess his, which we were able to deduct pretty quickly. I don’t want to reveal his Disney character so that if you ever get the opportunity to meet him you can decide for yourself. He told us that now that we learned that everyone emulates a Disney character, we would start to notice it in every person we met.
He then gave us the directions we needed to get over to the quick service location. As we said our goodbyes, we immediately got on the app to give him a huge cast member compliment, which is a feature of the Walt Disney World app that we used several times during our trip. At Gasparilla Island Grill, we grabbed a sweet treat and refilled our resort mugs. I ordered the Minnie Cupcake, which was delicious but very rich. Mary Ellen had a brownie that was shaped like Mickey Mouse. We obviously had a theme going with our snacks!
One last thing that we wanted to do at the Grand Floridian was visit the Enchanted Rose lounge. The lounge décor is inspired by Beauty & the Beast, which happens to be both of our favorite Disney movies. I had heard about the lounge on social media, and Mary Ellen had read about it on Disney Food Blog, so we definitely didn’t want to miss it! While retracing our steps back to the main lobby, we stopped to take a picture with the gorgeous scenery and Grand Floridian villas in the background. You can see how tired and probably sick I was (picture below), which my mom was quick to point out over text. Back in the lobby, we made the happy discovery a pianist had begun to play. If you caught on to the theme of this trip, you know that we stopped to listen to him perform. He caught our attention by playing “Santa Fe” from Newsies. We thought we were going crazy at first until we realized there was a live pianist in the lobby. He played a mix of Disney songs and music from Golden Age musicals.
Stepping foot into the Enchanted Rose Lounge, I was blown away by how gorgeous it was. There are four rooms in the lounge. The main bar area is inspired by Belle’s dress with a fabulous chandelier as the centerpiece. To the left of the main entrance is a room that is made to look like the iconic library from the film. Immediately off of the bar to the right when you enter is an area called the garden room which features gorgeous artwork of the enchanted forest from the film. There is also a nice outdoor patio for guests to enjoy the gorgeous view when weather permits. The entire lounge is airy and spacious with floor to ceiling windows. We picked a small table in the corner of the main room by the windows.
I ordered the Island Rose and Mary Ellen ordered an Aperol Spritz. We enjoyed both of our drinks and spent our time reminiscing about our trip as well as planning our big trip for 2023. Spoiler: we’re going on a cruise at the end of July! I promise to share blog posts from that trip a lot sooner than these! We were still able to listen to the pianist from our seats in the lounge and enjoyed playing our own little game of “name that tune.” After we finished at the Enchanted Rose, we collapsed onto the couches down in the lobby to listen to the pianist some more. We just weren’t ready to leave. He played “Wouldn’t It Be Loverly” from My Fair Lady, a song from Hello, Dolly!, “What I Did For Love” from A Chorus Line, and another rendition of “Go The Distance”. We also got another chance to talk to Randy before we left.
Feeling relaxed and reenergized, we dragged ourselves from the beautiful Grand Floridian lobby to the monorail station and over to Epcot. At this point it was almost 5 PM and we only had two hours to kill before our Individual Lightning Lane return time at Cosmic Rewind. We immediately walked over to the The Seas with Nemo & Friends area because I really wanted to do Turtle Talk with Crush after seeing all the hilarious videos of the attraction on TikTok. We rode the Finding Nemo ride to enter the pavilion, which was cute but similar to The Little Mermaid ride (the two attractions use the exact same ride vehicles and ride system). Turtle Talk with Crush was super fun! The cast member who does the voice acting for Crush did a great job and had us laughing so hard multiple times during the show. He made Crush’s answers to kid’s questions so funny and had the best reaction when learning about flying and airplanes.
After finishing our time with Crush, we had enough time to go to the Land pavilion to ride Soarin’ again. I really love this ride and can see why it’s a fan favorite. After Soarin’ we rode Living with the Land. This is a boat ride where you sail through the Epcot greenhouse to see the food and plants from around the world, as well as learn about innovations in farming. This ride was definitely educational and interesting, but a little too long for my attention span, especially considering my low energy level at the time.
Finally, it was time for Cosmic Rewind! It didn’t take us as long to get into the pre-show since we were in the Lightning Lane line this time. We ended up getting lucky and were sat in the same spot as the first time. I still think this is the best spot on the ride. Our song the second time around was “Everybody Wants to Rule the World” by Tears for Fears. While we weren’t as familiar with the song, we still had a blast. The second time on the ride confirmed that this was one of our favorites of the trip!
Next, it was time for our dining reservation at the Rose & Crown Pub in the United Kingdom pavilion. We did the Fireworks Dining Package which costs $89 per adult. With this package, you get a choice of one appetizer, one entrée, a dessert platter and unlimited beverages (including alcohol). For my selection, I went with their signature Sparkling Duchess cocktail (prosecco, elderflower liquor, ginger ale, and mint), the seasonal tomato bisque soup, and the fish & chips. Mary Ellen ordered a Sparkling Duchess, the cheese platter, and bangers & mash. For the Fireworks Dining Package, you don’t get to choose your dessert. Rather, they bring out a platter that has array of three miniature desserts for you to try. Those desserts were sticky toffee pudding, strawberry trifle, and malted milk chocolate mousse. All of the food was delicious!
Once the fireworks started, we were able to move down to the lower balcony level of the restaurant for an unobstructed view of the fireworks. We saw the Harmonious fireworks show, which was created especially for the 50th Anniversary. Harmonious is a celebration of music and culture that uses music from classic Disney movies both in English and in the languages of the countries in which the movies are set (i.e. parts of section focusing on The Hunchback of Notre Dame were in French). Unlike Enchantment in Magic Kingdom, Harmonious can be viewed from practically anywhere around the lagoon. This show used barges in the middle of the World Showcase lagoon that showed scenes from the movies being featured throughout the show. However, since the barges were permanent features in the lagoon, there have been a lot of complaints about how unappealing they looked during the day. Because Harmonious played its final show at the end of the 50th Anniversary Celebration, the barges are no longer an eyesore. If you missed the show during the celebration or want to see it again, you can watch the official recorded version on Disney+ or unofficial recordings on YouTube. One perk to the Disney+ version is that there are also behind the scenes tidbits thrown in. This was clearly the better fireworks show of the two we saw. We were blown away and definitely teared up at times throughout the show.
Sadly, our time at Disney had officially come to an end and we headed back to the bus stop for our final trip back to our resort. We packed up our suitcases and got ready for our early morning flight back home. We had an incredible trip and couldn’t wait to share with our friends and family. It was so nice to get away from work and life for nine days and I can’t wait for our return to the Most Magical Place on Earth! Also, if you haven’t figured it out yet, our final unexpected moment of the trip was meeting Randy and the conversations we had with him.
Our time at Disney World may be at a close here, but don’t worry: we’re planning a weekend trip to Disneyland in November 2023! We’re also going to be adding another friend to this trip. I hope you enjoyed following along on this journey and learning all the things one can do on an adults only trip to the Disney Parks.
Here are some more pictures of our day:
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