A Visit to "Mickey's Tower" (and the Wilderness Lodge)

We took a "last-hurrah" (before surgery) Disney vacation last weekend, and this will be the post of a million pictures--it could have been 10 times that if I hadn't accidentally left the camera in the car for about 48 hours of the trip (including the one day we had really beautiful weather).  We waited to tell Will until the day before we left, and I think next time we'll wait until 30 minutes before we get into the car, because he gets sooooo excited he drives us nuts.  He loves a visit to "Mickey's Tower" (Cinderella's Castle and its environs) more than just about anything (except dinosaurs).

We booked a room at Disney's Wilderness Lodge.  The Lodge and grounds were beautiful:

It's supposed to be reminiscent of the National Park lodges of the Northwest--it did remind me a little of the lodge at Glacier National Park.

Will loved the spring that bubbled up into the lobby, then flowed outside to form a waterfall.

There were lots of rocks to climb on.  And guess who decided she needed to keep up with Big Brother?

That's as far as she got before we pulled her off the rock and set off a little tantrum.

While the main areas were beautiful, our room was nothing too fancy--although Will gave it 2 thumbs up because it came furnished with a bunk bed.

On Day 1 (Thursday), we checked in and then took the boat over to the Magic Kingdom.

I'll post the pics from that day in Shutterfly along with the others (email me if you need the password!).  We ate dinner at the Fort Wilderness campground, and had planned to go to the campfire sing-a-long with Chip and Dale, but once the sun went down we were freezing!  Will and Anna didn't seem to mind, but John and I were shivering, so we made an executive parental decision to go back to our hotel and thaw out by the fireplace in the lobby.

The next 48 hours of the trip are undocumented by photo (except for a few I took with my phone).  Friday morning I enjoyed a spa day (part of my V-day present--did I mention I had a fabulous Valentine's Day this year?) while Grandma took care of Anna, and John and Will went to Disney Quest.  On Saturday, John headed back home to work (he forgot he was working the day when we scheduled the trip, sadly).  I had planned to stick close to the hotel with the kids because I'm too much of a ninny to venture into the theme parks with both of them.  However, I realized about 30 minutes after we woke up in the morning that we'd go stir-crazy in the room all day.  So we set off to explore the rest of the hotel.  We hiked the nature trail, and watched the Disney version of Old Faithful erupt on the hour:

While we were walking outside the hotel, Will spotted one of the Disney buses and asked if we could get on it.  I asked him if he could be good and help me with Anna if we rode it and he said yes.  I didn't have much time to think about it (which was probably a good thing), so we hopped on the bus going to Downtown Disney.  We had a wonderful time and Will behaved (almost) perfectly!  We visited the T-Rex restaurant gift shop (where Will picked up a "beprise"--more on that later), and then went to the Lego store where Will made some Lego dinosaurs:

We had lunch at Wolfgang Puck Express, then took the bus to the Contemporary Resort and rode the monorail around a few times.  We finally made it back to our hotel for some of the scheduled children's activities.  All the Disney hotels have them, but we usually never participate because we're in the parks instead.  We had a great time, though.  Will made a little airplane during craft time, and also decorated a cookie (all by himself):

We headed back to the room in time for a nap that mercifully lasted until John got back.  Then John and I dropped the kids off with Grandma, Uncle Shawn, and Aunt Cindy (yay for babysitters!) and went out for a quiet and delicious dinner.

On Sunday morning, we spent a little more time playing around the hotel:

And Will had a chance to try out his "beprise" (surpise/souvenir) from the day before.  Can you guess what he picked out as a souvenir?

Here's a hint:

Yep, some dino flip-flops!

The boy is just a little crazy about dinosaurs.

After all the dinosaur tracking, we went to Hollywood Studios for the day.  The highlight this time was the "Honey I Shrunk the Kids" playground.

John and I took turns going through the giant spider web with Will. I have to say that was probably my favorite part of the day--sooooo much fun, even for a big person!

We had lunch at the 50's Prime Time Cafe--my first time eating there.  The decor and the menu were so much fun, and the wait staff was definitely interesting (especially when they reprimanded us for elbows on the table and not saying "please"!).  After a quick spin on the Rockin' Rollercoaster for John and me, and a tantrum from Will (because he couldn't ride the roller coaster!!!), we headed back home.

Some final photos from the day (and if you're game to see even more, check out the Shutterfly site!):