We’re Officially Dopey

What sane person signs up to run 4 races in 4 days totalling 48.6 miles (78.3km)? Apparently several thousand insane fellow participants in Disney World’s Dopey Challenge in Florida. What were we thinking has been running through my head since about the beginning of December and even more so now that we’ve been down here for the last week to some pretty frigid weather conditions. We decided to come down a week early so we could get some time in at the parks before the craziness begins. The weather forecast looked great the days leading up to and including our departure date. Unfortunately while we were in transit, something changed and a cold front moved in and settled over the Eastern Seaboard reaching down to Florida. At some point the snow line was sitting at Tampa; not too far from Orlando. 

Having never been to Disney World, we spent our first week exploring the four parks; Animal Kingdom, Magic Kingdom, Hollywood Studios, and Epcot Centre. Each had its own unique characteristics making it somewhat difficult to decide which I liked the best. Magic Kingdom and Hollywood Studios were most similar to Disneyland whereas Animal Kingdom and Epcot Centre brought so much new to explore. DW has a great fast-pass system linked to their online app. It allowed us to pre-plan rides well in advance of our arrival and made planning out our days easier. With quite a bit of research, Z determined which park we'd visit on which day and was able to pre-book the most popular rides with a fast pass. Each of the parks were also still decked out for Christmas. At night the Tower of Terror in Hollywood Studios had a Christmas themed light show illuminating on the building, there were beautifully lit Christmas trees and wreaths all around as well as Christmas music playing over the speakers.

  

DW is all about the experience and they put all their focus on ensuring guests have the best experience possible. With us being there over the Christmas/New Year's break the parks were quite busy but line ups for what we had planned to do were rather manageable. Again the fast pass system really made a big difference because without that we would have spent most of our time waiting in line for the most popular rides. The one that never seemed to have a wait less than over 2 hours, was Avatar's Flight of Passage. This was an amazing flying simulator ride where you ride a Banshee. It's still a fairly new ride in the Land of Pandora at Animal Kingdom. The detail that DW has put in at Pandora is incredible. It's a good thing too that I finally watched the movie Avatar before this trip or much  of what I saw would have been lost on me. The other really cool attraction at AK is Kilimanjaro Safaris. Situated over 110 acres, this attraction takes you in an open-sided jeep through an African forest filled with exotic African wildlife. It provides an up close and personal experience with some of the animals. Some of the animals within the attraction included: hippopotamus; crocodiles; zebras; giraffes; elephants; lions; and cheetah. There were many others including many exotic birds as well. It gave a good taste of what an African Safari could be like without travelling all the way to Africa (still remains on the bucket list though). 

In Epcot Centre, the World Showcase of 11 different countries was my favourite part. In each of the country pavilions you got to experience the local culture and food. The attractions with the pavilions were staffed by locals from each country making the experience authentic. We ended up trying the crepes in France; having dinner in Morocco and Germany; having lunch in England.

One of our other favourite things to do was to watch the different shows DW puts on throughout the parks. We enjoyed Jingle Bell, Jingle BAM - a spectacular light and fireworks show at Hollywood Studios; they project different light imagines to music on the main stage building. In Hollywood Studios they also put on a very impressive Star Wars themed show on the main stage. The Fantasia show is a must see as is Rivers of Light in AK. Rivers of Light is a spectator show that uses water screens combined with lights and lasers to create hologram effects over the water that leave you awestruck. A very moving show is the Candlelight Processional at Epcot Centre. We were fortunate to see actressChandra Wilson from Grey's Anatomy as the narrator for our performance. Mickey's Once Upon a Christmas Parade was a 20-minute parade with so many of the Disney characters singing and dancing along the route, topped off with good 'ol Saint Nick in his sleigh. We were there for New Year's Eve and in true Disney fashion, no experience expense is spared. Z found out that Magic Kingdom would celebrate New Year's both on the 30th and on the 31st. We had determined we wanted to spend New Year's Eve at Epcot so on the 30th we spend the evening at MK and stayed until the fireworks show. The atmosphere was electric; the cast were extra enthusiastic and the crowds were pumped full of excitement. Leading up to one of the most amazing fireworks shows I've ever seen, a DJ on stage at the castle was spinning tunes. The fireworks show lasted about 20 minutes and was a 360 degree experience with the main fireworks show taking place over the castle, but also had fireworks going off all around. The entire experience can be summed up as "magical".

New Year's Eve at Epcot was pretty cool. The excitement and energy of all the guests was contagious. The cast members handed out New Year's Eve hats and noise makers. A couple of the cast photographers had special New Year's signs we could use. We started our day here just before our lunch reservation at Rose & Crown pub in the United Kingdom pavilion. We enjoyed a tasty lunch of chicken masala curry and shepherd's pie with a Guinness for me (yes, it's Irish) and a single malt whiskey flight for Z. We had our last meal of 2017 at the German Biergarten restaurant; a Bavarian style buffet. The restaurant has communal seating so unless you have a big group, you end up sitting at a table with complete strangers; exactly as you would find in a biergarten. The authentic atmosphere also included an oompah band and the beer was served in beer steins. You can dine on a wide selection of authentic German salads, entrees and desserts. It was a vibrant atmosphere leading up to ringing in the new year. The night was capped off with a fantastic fireworks display over the world showcase lagoon which featured the nightly illuminations light show right before the fireworks. It was a great way to bring in 2018!!

A couple of the other places we ate at are worth mentioning. At Disney's Animal Kingdom Lodge we dined at Boma - Flavours of Africa buffet restaurant. One of the really cool things about this restaurant is the lodge backs onto AK's safari property and so you can see the animals rooming around the grounds. The restaurant features traditional African foods including Nigerian peanut soup; Durban-style roasted chicken; coconut rice; Kenyan coffee tarts and Zebra domes for dessert.

Spice Road Table at the Moroccan pavilion was a favourite and we ended up eating here twice; once for dinner and once for lunch. We had reserved dinner here as part of the Candlelight Processional performance and were in no way disappointed by either. We each had a three-course meal; mine was hummus fries followed by the mixed grill skewers with rosemary potatoes and french green beens topped off with the pistachio and saffron custard (really a creme brûlée) and Z started with spicy garlic shrimp followed by the coriander-crust lamb topped off with a chocolate pyramid for dessert. Truly flavourful food and the wine flight  with wines from Lebanon, Morocco, and Spain just added to the meal.

In Disney Springs we had dinner our first night at Homecoming a restaurant owned by Art Smith, Oprah's former personal chef. This restaurant can be summed up by saying home-cooked southern comfort food. Very tasty!

The final restaurant worth mentioning was the Garden Grove located in our hotel at the Swan. We had breakfast here for four days and enjoyed a great selection of fresh fruits, fresh baked items and a selection of warm breakfast items including an omelette station and extra crispy bacon. The best part of this restaurant is on the weekends you can dine with Disney characters and so when we showed one day, Goofey was just arriving to great the guests. Needless to say we didn't go hungry on this trip because it wasn't difficult finding great places to eat!

We also decided to take some time and visit the manatee refuge at Blue Spring State Park. This park is home to more than 200 manatees over the winter. The manatees migrate here due to the warm water temperatures of 23C on average. It's a great park for nature watching and besides seeing the manatees, you can catch a glimpse of a variety of other fish, turtles, birds and even alligators (we didn't get to see any). The park has a lot to offer guests besides a great boardwalk along the river, you can also camp here, scuba dive and swim in the summer months. It's a pretty neat park to check out when in the area.