Ian
10-17-2007, 01:20 PM
Day Two
Saturday morning came quickly for those of us who needed some extra sleep, but we got up bright and early anyway, met John, and headed to the counter service place at SSR for some breakfast. The service was devastatingly slow and the coffee was near undrinkable, but they made up for it by serving bad food, too. ;)
After our delicious meal ( :ack: ), we packed into John's car (his very, very SMALL car that was loaded up with very, very BIG boxes!) and drove to Epcot for our Soarin' meet. Epcot was pretty busy and the stampede to Soarin' was near legendary. We survived, though, and grabbed some Fastpasses. After much milling around, waiting, and moderate grumbling, a small group of us decided to head over and ride The Land while we were waiting. While we were on the ride, I got a call from Christine (who was the meet organizer) wondering why we weren't all outside waiting where we were supposed to be. Whoops! :blush: That's what we get for letting John be the only one with a copy of the itinerary.
When we got off and went back to the Soarin' queue area it was just loaded with INTERCOTees waiting to ride. We organized ourselves into a group and got in the standby line. The wait was pretty brief and I was fortunate enough to find myself among a group in row 1B in the dead center. Best seat in the house, baby! I love this ride ... love it, love it, LOVE IT! On behalf of our entire flight crew ... thanks, for Soarin' with us!
Most of us still held Fastpasses for Soarin', so we all decided to pay a little visit to The Seas with Nemo and Friends. We had fun visiting with Nemo, Dory, Mr. Ray, and all the others in "The Big Blue World." We stopped on the way out to take in a showing of Turtle Talk. Most of us are still wondering if that little boy ever got his rocket back. ;)
We all regrouped back at Soarin' again to use our Fastpasses, did that, and then headed off for Mexico for our Gran Fiesta Tour meet. On the way, our very own Carol won herself a set of YoaMD Mickey ears! I'm pretty sure that Beth and Donna won them too, but I'm not sure?
Anyway, we had ourselves a good old time cruising the rivers of Mexico with Donald, Jose, and Joey Carioca and then our groups split up to head off in search of food. Our next meet wasn't until 7PM for the Norway Mickey-fest, so we had some time to ourselves to just kick back and enjoy each other's company.
Gary, John, Frankie, Tracy, and I opted to go to Nine Dragons. They didn't open until noon, though, so they told us that we'd have to wait 20 minutes for a table. About 10 minutes into our wait, Frankie decided to his legendary powers of negotiation to get us a table more quickly. He went inside and was quickly able to shorten our wait time to only ten minutes. Way to go Frankie!!
Gary and I were on the dining plan, so we both got appetizers of the Drunken Chicken. John and Frankie split an order of the Pot Stickers. In an odd twist, for entrees, one side of the table (John and I) ordered the Kung Bao chicken (also known as "Kung BAAAAAAAAAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!"). The other side all ordered the Honey Sesame chicken. Weird ... must be some kind of left brain/right brain kinda thing.
When John's Kung Bao arrived, it was strange. Mine had both red and green peppers, but for some reason John's only had green. He commented on it to the waiter and asked if maybe they could just bring him some red peppers. The waiter apologized all over himself and went John one better ... he brought him a whole new plate of chicken with red and green peppers! Nice job on that one, Disney!
Since Norway was close by, we headed over there after lunch to do a quick Maelstrom ride. Ve vere not de first to pass dat way ... nor vill ve be de last!
After Maelstrom, John decided that he wanted to head back to SSR for some rest. We needed to be back in time to grab some dinner and meet Samaya (our Disney VIP guide) at 6:15 to head over to Epcot. John had a lot of merchandise that needed to make its way over to the Illuminations meet area in France and they were allowing him to take it in backstage to avoid having to drag the boxes through Epcot. In order to do this, we had to follow Samaya in John's car just so we could make it through security. Disney runs a tight ship when it comes to backstage access!
We stopped at Mouse Gears on the way out to do a little shopping, but nothing really caught my eye. John and Frankie took off, but Emily joined us in the interim, so she, Gary, Tracy, and I wandered up to America to see if we could take in a showing of the American Adventure. Unfortunately, the timing didn't work out so we just sort of wandered around a bit, browsed in the countries, did a little more shopping, and then went out to Em's car to go back to SSR.
She dropped Gary and I off and headed back to her resort to clean up before meeting Samaya, and Gary and I did the same. We met up with John around 5:30 and headed down to Artist's Palette for some quick dinner. Service? Again ... painfully slow ... John almost blew his stack waiting for a simple sandwich to arrive. The good news this time was my roast beef and bleu sandwich was pretty darn good. But because of how slow the service was, we BARELY made our meeting with Samaya, even though she was a little late.
Emily rode over to Epcot with Samaya and John, Gary, and I followed along in John's car. Going backstage is always neat, even though I've done it before as part of the Backstage Magic Tour. I was furiously snapping pictures as we drove along ... although backstage sort of looks a lot like some old factory somewhere, so it's really not all that scenic.
We stopped backstage in the UK and wheeled our boxes up to our viewing spot on the bridge in France. We left them there and then hightailed it over to Norway to start checking people in for the Mickey meet. Gary and I were assigned the task of taking down names and handing out wristbands. With over 125 people to take care of, you can imagine we were busier than one armed paperhangers! Eventually, though, we got everyone checked in successfully and were able to head up to the VIP area to spend some time with everyone ... and with the Big Cheese, of course!
I wandered around trying to get pictures of everyone and do a little socializing, but then John pulled me in to get a staff photo taken with Mickey. After a bit more socializing, it was time to walk over to France to start getting things ready there. I walked over from Norway to France with Karen and her daughter, Jen. I think I inadvertantly offended Jen, because when she told me she was 16 I was flabbergasted. I told her I thought she was about 12 or 13. BOY was she crushed! Her Mom helped soften the blow, though, when she explained to her how important that would be in about 20 years. ;)
So we got to France for the Illuminations VIP party and helped John set up his merchandise tables for a bit. People were slowly filtering in and pretty soon the landing was PACKED. John gave every attendee one of the blue, light-up lanyards (courtesy of INTERCOT's sponsor Offical Ticket Center ... thanks, guys!!) and we made quite a sight, all 125 of us down there on the landing, blinking away.
There's not much to really say about the experience ... it was as awesome as it was last time. Maybe moreso for there being so many more people there. The view of the show is incredible, the snacks were great, the company was great ... everything was great. To say that John and the sponsors outdid themselves on this one would be an understatement of epic proportions. It was, quite honestly, one of the best non-family related nights of my life. We just had a wonderful time. Thanks, John and all the sponsors who made it possible!!
So this is the part I'm sure a lot of people are waiting for ... the report about the Jellyrolls meet. So here it is ...
We got to Jellyrolls around 10PM or so. A good time was had by all. The End.
Oh yeah ... and we found out that the guys at Jellyrolls don't know Mr. Roboto. Ask John to show you his $20 bill.
Night, night everyone! Stay tuned for Day Three!!
Saturday morning came quickly for those of us who needed some extra sleep, but we got up bright and early anyway, met John, and headed to the counter service place at SSR for some breakfast. The service was devastatingly slow and the coffee was near undrinkable, but they made up for it by serving bad food, too. ;)
After our delicious meal ( :ack: ), we packed into John's car (his very, very SMALL car that was loaded up with very, very BIG boxes!) and drove to Epcot for our Soarin' meet. Epcot was pretty busy and the stampede to Soarin' was near legendary. We survived, though, and grabbed some Fastpasses. After much milling around, waiting, and moderate grumbling, a small group of us decided to head over and ride The Land while we were waiting. While we were on the ride, I got a call from Christine (who was the meet organizer) wondering why we weren't all outside waiting where we were supposed to be. Whoops! :blush: That's what we get for letting John be the only one with a copy of the itinerary.
When we got off and went back to the Soarin' queue area it was just loaded with INTERCOTees waiting to ride. We organized ourselves into a group and got in the standby line. The wait was pretty brief and I was fortunate enough to find myself among a group in row 1B in the dead center. Best seat in the house, baby! I love this ride ... love it, love it, LOVE IT! On behalf of our entire flight crew ... thanks, for Soarin' with us!
Most of us still held Fastpasses for Soarin', so we all decided to pay a little visit to The Seas with Nemo and Friends. We had fun visiting with Nemo, Dory, Mr. Ray, and all the others in "The Big Blue World." We stopped on the way out to take in a showing of Turtle Talk. Most of us are still wondering if that little boy ever got his rocket back. ;)
We all regrouped back at Soarin' again to use our Fastpasses, did that, and then headed off for Mexico for our Gran Fiesta Tour meet. On the way, our very own Carol won herself a set of YoaMD Mickey ears! I'm pretty sure that Beth and Donna won them too, but I'm not sure?
Anyway, we had ourselves a good old time cruising the rivers of Mexico with Donald, Jose, and Joey Carioca and then our groups split up to head off in search of food. Our next meet wasn't until 7PM for the Norway Mickey-fest, so we had some time to ourselves to just kick back and enjoy each other's company.
Gary, John, Frankie, Tracy, and I opted to go to Nine Dragons. They didn't open until noon, though, so they told us that we'd have to wait 20 minutes for a table. About 10 minutes into our wait, Frankie decided to his legendary powers of negotiation to get us a table more quickly. He went inside and was quickly able to shorten our wait time to only ten minutes. Way to go Frankie!!
Gary and I were on the dining plan, so we both got appetizers of the Drunken Chicken. John and Frankie split an order of the Pot Stickers. In an odd twist, for entrees, one side of the table (John and I) ordered the Kung Bao chicken (also known as "Kung BAAAAAAAAAOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!"). The other side all ordered the Honey Sesame chicken. Weird ... must be some kind of left brain/right brain kinda thing.
When John's Kung Bao arrived, it was strange. Mine had both red and green peppers, but for some reason John's only had green. He commented on it to the waiter and asked if maybe they could just bring him some red peppers. The waiter apologized all over himself and went John one better ... he brought him a whole new plate of chicken with red and green peppers! Nice job on that one, Disney!
Since Norway was close by, we headed over there after lunch to do a quick Maelstrom ride. Ve vere not de first to pass dat way ... nor vill ve be de last!
After Maelstrom, John decided that he wanted to head back to SSR for some rest. We needed to be back in time to grab some dinner and meet Samaya (our Disney VIP guide) at 6:15 to head over to Epcot. John had a lot of merchandise that needed to make its way over to the Illuminations meet area in France and they were allowing him to take it in backstage to avoid having to drag the boxes through Epcot. In order to do this, we had to follow Samaya in John's car just so we could make it through security. Disney runs a tight ship when it comes to backstage access!
We stopped at Mouse Gears on the way out to do a little shopping, but nothing really caught my eye. John and Frankie took off, but Emily joined us in the interim, so she, Gary, Tracy, and I wandered up to America to see if we could take in a showing of the American Adventure. Unfortunately, the timing didn't work out so we just sort of wandered around a bit, browsed in the countries, did a little more shopping, and then went out to Em's car to go back to SSR.
She dropped Gary and I off and headed back to her resort to clean up before meeting Samaya, and Gary and I did the same. We met up with John around 5:30 and headed down to Artist's Palette for some quick dinner. Service? Again ... painfully slow ... John almost blew his stack waiting for a simple sandwich to arrive. The good news this time was my roast beef and bleu sandwich was pretty darn good. But because of how slow the service was, we BARELY made our meeting with Samaya, even though she was a little late.
Emily rode over to Epcot with Samaya and John, Gary, and I followed along in John's car. Going backstage is always neat, even though I've done it before as part of the Backstage Magic Tour. I was furiously snapping pictures as we drove along ... although backstage sort of looks a lot like some old factory somewhere, so it's really not all that scenic.
We stopped backstage in the UK and wheeled our boxes up to our viewing spot on the bridge in France. We left them there and then hightailed it over to Norway to start checking people in for the Mickey meet. Gary and I were assigned the task of taking down names and handing out wristbands. With over 125 people to take care of, you can imagine we were busier than one armed paperhangers! Eventually, though, we got everyone checked in successfully and were able to head up to the VIP area to spend some time with everyone ... and with the Big Cheese, of course!
I wandered around trying to get pictures of everyone and do a little socializing, but then John pulled me in to get a staff photo taken with Mickey. After a bit more socializing, it was time to walk over to France to start getting things ready there. I walked over from Norway to France with Karen and her daughter, Jen. I think I inadvertantly offended Jen, because when she told me she was 16 I was flabbergasted. I told her I thought she was about 12 or 13. BOY was she crushed! Her Mom helped soften the blow, though, when she explained to her how important that would be in about 20 years. ;)
So we got to France for the Illuminations VIP party and helped John set up his merchandise tables for a bit. People were slowly filtering in and pretty soon the landing was PACKED. John gave every attendee one of the blue, light-up lanyards (courtesy of INTERCOT's sponsor Offical Ticket Center ... thanks, guys!!) and we made quite a sight, all 125 of us down there on the landing, blinking away.
There's not much to really say about the experience ... it was as awesome as it was last time. Maybe moreso for there being so many more people there. The view of the show is incredible, the snacks were great, the company was great ... everything was great. To say that John and the sponsors outdid themselves on this one would be an understatement of epic proportions. It was, quite honestly, one of the best non-family related nights of my life. We just had a wonderful time. Thanks, John and all the sponsors who made it possible!!
So this is the part I'm sure a lot of people are waiting for ... the report about the Jellyrolls meet. So here it is ...
We got to Jellyrolls around 10PM or so. A good time was had by all. The End.
Oh yeah ... and we found out that the guys at Jellyrolls don't know Mr. Roboto. Ask John to show you his $20 bill.
Night, night everyone! Stay tuned for Day Three!!