How Many Days In A Row Will We Wear Tie Dye (or Disney 2009 review): Part 7.3featured

You know the drill- if you didn’t snap ’em, don’t grab ’em.

After a quick tour around France, we hopped on a ferry back to Future World. Since grandma was resting back at the hotel, we had the opportunity to ride all of our favorites together. Usually, if it’s a ride she can’t go on, Stephanie and I will ride, or one of us will ride with Mom and then we’ll switch (this is where we really utilize the Fast Pass system: four of us equals four FP’s…which means Stephanie and I can either ride twice or we can do the switch with Mom while one of us walks around with grandma or goes on one of her rides). We had a few hours before our dinner reservation at Rose and Crown in the UK pavilion, and because we didn’t have to go back and get grandma (she didn’t like the menu that much and decided she would rather eat at the Contempo Cafe) and we had FP’s for Soarin’ and Test Track, we could get all of the major rides in Future World done before dinner.

We started at Spaceship Earth, and I decided to ride alone so Stephanie and Mom could ride together. The crowds were thinning out (likely due to the early afternoon time and the intense heat). Stephanie thought it would be funny to press a random language on the touch screen and they went through the entire ride (including the track) in Portuguese.

After a nice, relaxing go-round on Spaceship Earth, we headed towards Soarin’ and decided to hit the Seas with Nemo on the way since the ride was basically walk-on. I really like the queue area for the Nemo ride because it’s cool and dark and it’s a nice area to go through when you need a break from heavy sun. And it reminds me of some of the buildings at Lincoln Park Zoo back at home for some reason. The ride, itself, is nothing to write home about. It’s a nice ride, but it lacks a sense of realism that is found on other rides. Nothing really makes you go “wow” or captivates you. It’s just…nice.

We went over to the Land pavilion after the Nemo ride to use our Soarin’ FP’s. There was a family blocking the entrance because their little girl wasn’t allowed on the ride because she was too short and they were raising hell. We kindly excused ourselves around them and flashed our passes at the attendant. The standby wait was over an hour and a half. Yikes! The FP line was pretty long, too, but I think we only waited a half-hour or so from the time we entered the line until the time we were on the actual ride. And, once again, we were in the middle row! I can’t remember the last time I got to the highest row.

After an enchanting flight over the California landscape, we headed over to the Sunshine Seasons area so I could take two Motrin and stretch out a little. I was really puzzled by the leg pain I was experiencing and I really think it was a combination of dehydration (I wasn’t drinking nearly as much as I should have), wearing bad shoes our first few days in the parks and the amount of walking and standing in line we were doing.

We sat and contemplated whether or not we had time for Test Track when we had just over an hour until dinner in World Showcase, but I thought that since Rose and Crown isn’t the busiest restaurant, as long as we weren’t more than 10 minutes late, we’d be okay and we headed over towards Test Track.

The standby and single rider lines were INSANE and were nearly as long as the Soarin’ line (which has to consistently be one of the longest waits in all of Disney). It’s almost worse when the lines are long for Test Track because unlike Soarin’, Test Track is basically constantly loading. We approached the FP line and it said it was 20 minutes, which would give us plenty of time to ride and get over to England. The same family that was fighting with the cast member at Soarin’ was now fighting with the cast member at Test Track. Their little girl was maybe a half-inch or less too short to ride. They put her ponytail as high on her head as they could and the cast member wasn’t having it. They had her standing under the height measurer thing and telling her to stand up straight (which she was). She kept tipping her chin up and standing on her tip toes and clearly didn’t understand her family was trying to encourage her to fib her height as best she could. We passed them and got into line, but we saw the father and older sister in line later so I guess they lost the battle.

But back to the “20 minute” line. It didn’t look like a 20 minute wait. Once we got into the building, we didn’t get much further than the entrance because ALL of the lines were crammed to the gills. I began to doubt that we’d make it to dinner on time, but we were already in line so we stayed.

The line moved quicker than I thought it would and we were in the briefing room within maybe a half-hour. There was a family of an older mother and father and a young son that kept trying to push their way to the door though the crowd in the room. When the doors opened, they tried to physically push us aside to get out. Why? I don’t know. Everyone has to wait in line. Everyone will get into a car. Why push? Anyways, Mom and I are more aggressive and blocked them but they managed to push their way in front of Stephanie and then wouldn’t let her come to us. I loudly told Mom what I thought of them (and refrained from cursing…snaps for me) and pulled Stephanie to us. Since they pushed themselves to behind us, I just hoped that they wouldn’t be in our car and if they were, part of me wanted to pull my best impersonation of the woman who rode with us on our second ride on Test Track ever (the reason why I won’t ever sit in the middle anymore if it’s just me and Stephanie and often have to barter with Stephanie to get my way out of the middle seat: she was a much older woman riding with her best friend for the first time. They were in the single-rider line and made it into the same car with her in back with me and Stephanie. She asked me about the ride and I told her it was pretty mild because it is. She then spent the entire ride going “I’m going to throw up. I’m going to throw up.” I’m a total vomitaphobic and the thought or sight of someone throwing up is enough to get me to throw up and give me visions and nightmares for weeks), but Mom told me that I better not because that would be tasteless and we were better than that and them.

There seemed to be a problem with the ride as we were approaching the loading area and the ride shut down for a few minutes. They decided it was fine and we were assigned a car. The trash behind us were assigned the same car- and then told the cast member they refused to ride with us! I guess they didn’t like being called out on their lack of manners, but no one is going to pull that crap around me and not hear it. So they were assigned to a separate car and we made our way into our queue.

The ride broke down again and we were waiting in our little queue for five or six minutes before being loaded into the car and being stalled in the car for another ten. It was becoming very doubtful we’d make dinner without running at this point. Something was wrong with one of the cars and they decided to evacuate the line and shut the ride down behind us. Mom was freaked out, but I told her they wouldn’t let us ride if it weren’t going to be safe.

I should have known better.

The ride had a lot of starting and stopping…much more than usual. Maybe half-way through the ride, they decided they had to shut it down totally and evacuate everyone off the ride. You can guess where we were stuck with our luck. I’ll give you three guesses and the first two don’t count.

Yep.

We got stuck in the heat room. Why couldn’t we have gotten stuck in the cold room? They did turn the heat lamps off after two minutes or so, and then a cast member came to get us out of the cars and lead us safely away from the ride. A big group of us were all stopped in the corrosives room (which STINKS…literally) and they gave us non-expiring FP’s to do Test Track at a later time and then led us down a secret emergency staircase and through the cast areas. Stephanie and I were having fun with it. Mom…not so much.

The entire evacuation process took another 10-15 minutes and at this point, we definitely missed dinner. Stephanie and I really wanted to try Rose and Crown, but at this point we decided it was best to head back to the Contemporary and see if the Concierge desk could find us some last-minute dinner reservations.

When we got back to the hotel, Mom went to see if grandma wanted to go out and Stephanie and I went to the Contemporary Concierge desk to see what they had available. I love the staff at the Contemporary. They were personable, helpful and we loved chatting with them. The gentleman who assisted us found us an 8:35 reservation at the Wave, and even though Mom and Stephanie didn’t care for it when we dined there for lunch last year, we grabbed it since it wouldn’t require any transportation. I kind of wanted to see if Flying Fish or Citricos had any availability since we seemed to have a surplus of credits from the meals grandma was eating in the room and I wasn’t sure how Mom would feel about going back to the Wave, but she was up to giving it another shot.

We had an hour and a half until dinner and we contemplated going over to Magic Kingdom for a little while, but we decided to rest. Stephanie went to take a shower, Mom and grandma went on a walk since it was starting to cool off a little and then went to grab grandma’s dinner at the Contempo Cafe and I crashed in bed and watched some TV. The Disney resorts seem to have almost every channel, but I always settle on the Stacey program (even though it runs on a loop and by this time, I’d seen it a million times).

We left our room at 8:30 and it was so nice to take a short walk and be at our meal. We tried the Wave not long after it first opened last year and I was the only one who had anything pleasant to say about it. The food was either too spiced or too bland. Mom hated her salad. Stephanie didn’t like her sandwich. My soup was too spiced, but my veggie sandwich had been great and the desserts were nice. They had recently changed the menus and I thought the dinner menu was better looking than the lunch menu had been, so I had hope for a nice meal.

We checked in and even though the restaurant wasn’t busy, we had to wait a few minutes for a table. We were led to a small annex of the main dining room that was a bit busier (and had a wailing toddler at a table that was thankfully finishing up) and brought ice water while we perused the menu.

I love the ambiance of the Wave. The recessed lighting and the mellow colors set the tone that almost seems to fit a signature dining venue more than a casual table service meal. Our server, Angelo, came over to introduce himself and give us some highlights of the menu. Angelo was really great with explaining the best dishes and what they were (and I found out that boniato was a kind of potato, not to be confused with bonito, which is a kind of fish flake they use on Iron Chef…I had always avoided boniato potatoes because I thought they had fish flakes in them). He took our drink orders and then set out to get our drinks and some bread.

Angelo returned with a basket of warm, whole grain bread and a small plate of butter with Hawaiian sea salt on top. Stephanie hates salted butter, Mom could take it or leave it, but I absolutely love it. It really enhances the creaminess of the fresh butter and the flavor of the bread (which was, in this case, a hearty sourdough with a heavy sprinkling of grains and seeds throughout the bread). I’m not a big fan of whole grain bread with such large grains in it, but Stephanie and Mom thought it was the best bread they had thus far. It really was very good, especially since it had been many hours since our early afternoon lunch and we were famished.

Our drinks were brought out with the bread. Stephanie had a diet Coke and Mom and I both had smoothies. Mom had the Mega Berry Smoothie (Raspberry purée and nonfat yogurt blended with Odwalla Berries GoMega) and since I had that one last year and wanted to try something new, I went with the Supercharged Tropical Smoothie (A blend of tropical fruit juices, nonfat yogurt, and Odwalla Super Protein Original) and it was exactly what I hoped it was. I usually stay away from smoothies at Disney because they’re heavy and I’d rather have something lighter, like an iced tea, on a hot afternoon, but this one while slightly heavy in texture (as any smoothie is) was very light and refreshing in flavor.

Mom started with the Lump Crab Cake (Pan-seared with Napa Cabbage Slaw and Ginger Tartar Sauce). I’d never known Mom to eat crab (or order crab cakes) so none of us really knew what to expect when she was served a large crab cake on a pile of thickly julienned cabbage and carrots and a shallow pool of sauce. I can’t comment much on it other than Mom really, really enjoyed it.

Lump Crab Cake

Stephanie wanted something light, so she started with the Avocado and Citrus Salad (with Local Greens and Orange Vinaigrette) despite the fact that Mom really disliked this salad when we dined here last year. Stephanie really enjoyed it and thought it was fresh and the creaminess of the avocado was perfect with the crunchy greens and the acidic citrus segments, but I tried some of the avocado and thought like last year, it tasted funny (probably because it was not quite ripe).

Avocado and Citrus Salad

I love lettuce wraps, so I was pleased when I saw that the original lamb and scallop lettuce wraps were taken off the menu in favor of the more “normal” Five Spice Chicken and Lettuce Wraps (Water Chestnuts, Shiitake Mushrooms, and Soy). I have a hierarchy of lettuce wraps and at the very top are the lettuce wraps from PF Changs. There really are no better. Below PF Changs is Big Bowl’s lettuce wraps, then Cheesecake Factory’s lettuce wraps and below that are the frozen ones from Trader Joes. These fell somewhere in between Big Bowl and Trader Joes. There was entirely too much five spice in the chicken and, as these were pre-assembled, too much sauce in the lettuce cups, making these messy to eat. The lettuce was soft and fresh and I loved the crunch that the water chestnuts added to the dish, but I was a little let down with these.

Five Spice Chicken Lettuce Wraps

Mom really couldn’t decide what she wanted and ultimately went with the Grilled Marinated Flank Steak (with seasonal vegetables, chimichurri and guacamole) and thought it was excellent. The steak was perfectly well-done for her and was served on top of some nicely julienned veggies and a crunchy vegetable relish. There was a dollop of guacamole on top and while it was good, it was unnecessary and almost distracting. I was surprised at how soft the steak was despite Mom’s insistence it be well-done, with no pink and no running juices.

Grilled Marinated Flank Steak

Stephanie was stuck between the Cinnamon-Rubbed Grilled Pork Tenderloin and the Braised Chicken Pot Pie and while I thought she might like the pork better, she went with the chicken pot pie (with peas, mushrooms and carrots topped with thyme pastry). It was good, not great, as while the chunks of chicken were large, this was more like a stew with a puff pastry dipper than a pot pie.

Braised Chicken Pot Pie

On Angelo’s recommendation, I ordered the Grilled Beef Tenderloin (Cabernet Jus, Boniato Mash, and Locally Grown Tomatoes) because he said it was a nice filet mignon and was the specialty of the house. Let me tell you- it was the best filet I had all week (and I had filets at California Grill *and* Yachtsman Steakhouse). It was soft, tender and grilled to a perfect medium/medium-well. The cabernet sauce that was drizzled on the plate was, perhaps, the best sauce I’ve ever had with a steak and the bonito mash was only second to the wasabi mashed potatoes they serve at the supper clubs on the Carnival cruise ships. There was a small tomato and onion salad on the side and as I don’t like raw tomatoes or onions, Mom had that and said it was fantastic. Angelo’s recommendation was right on and I ate every single bite of this fantastic steak.

Grilled Beef Tenderloin

We were all stuffed from our dinners, but the desserts at the Wave are small one or two bite delicacies so we ordered dessert anyways. We’ve found that on the dining plans, even if you don’t have room for dessert, you don’t lose anything by ordering them and sampling a bite or two. And if you really don’t want dessert? You’re not losing anything, either. In our case, there’s always room for a bite of dessert.

The last time we were here, you could mix and match the desserts to create your own trio. This time, you could only order the trio as it was. Mom ordered the Freshly Crafted Sorbets (Lemon-Basil, Pineapple and Strawberry) and enjoyed the light, smooth textures of the flavorful sorbets, but didn’t know what to make of the lemon-basil one. It’s…a taste that none of us have yet acquired.

Freshly Crafted Sorbets

Stephanie ordered the trio of no sugar added desserts (Chocolate-Mint Mousse, Fresh Berries with Panna Cotta and Vanilla Bean Créme Brulée) and thought everything was very light and fresh and she couldn’t tell that they were no-sugar added.

No Sugar Added Desserts

I ordered the Creamy Indulgence trio (Cheesecake with Raspberry Coulis, Coconut Panna Cotta with Passion Fruit Drizzle and Chocolate-Passion Fruit Mousse with Pecan-Olive Brittle) and was pleasantly surprised at how good everything was. I’d had the cheesecake before and thought it was excellent, creamy and tasty, both times, and the chocolate mousse was rich and had a surprising combination of flavors that worked very well, but I was fully prepared to hate the panna cotta since I don’t like coconut and it ended up being my favorite part. The coconut taste was slight and mostly contained to the hard layer on top of the soft and sweet custard. Everything was surprisingly light and it was a great end to a fantastic meal.

Creamy Indulgence

The check came to $142.48, and we used three meal credits. For those looking for more bang for their buck on the dining plans, the Wave certainly provides that: we found the food was of great quality and freshness (well, except for the avocados, it seems). Angelo was attentive, helpful and very pleasant and the Wave is never really busy since it’s hidden on the first floor of the resort.

After dinner, we headed back to the room to see if grandma wanted to go over to the bridge to watch Wishes with us and we all headed back to the bridge. We had a great view for fireworks and it was surprisingly uncrowded (as it was all week during fireworks). I have to say, as magical as it is to see the fireworks up close in the parks, there’s a magic to be found when you watch magic from the privacy of your room or on an uncrowded bridge and not having to deal with the crowds and the pushing and the crazy people.

We contemplated going shopping at the stores in the Contemporary, but instead opted to just refill our mugs and head back to the room and try to get to bed early. I watched “Secret Life of the American Teenager” and then took a short shower and a long soak in the jacuzzi tub before settling in bed to watch a movie with Stephanie. We stayed up later than we wanted to, but it was all good since we had a later breakfast planned for tomorrow.