The Magic Kingdom, Part 2

On the fourth day of our Disney vacation, we revisited the Magic Kingdom. We got an early start and were there a few minutes before the park opened to see the characters arriving on the Walt Disney World Railroad. Once the park opened we headed straight for Tomorrowland and drove cars on the Tomorrowland Indy Speedway. Next we rode the Astro Orbiter:

Robert, Kenna and I then went to see Stitch's Great Escape (another show full of special effects that the boys wouldn't like), while Nana, Papa, Cullen and Camden revisted a favorite from Sunday - Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin.

From there we went to visit the only "lands" that we missed on Sunday - Frontierland and Liberty Square. On the way we met Goofy:

In Liberty Square we all rode the Haunted Mansion ride:

And watched the Country Bear Jamboree. The show is pretty hokey, but Nana and I remembered it fondly from seeing it 30 years ago. We don't think it's changed any, but it still entertained us all:

Next, Robert took the boys to explore Tom Sawyer's Island, while Kenna, Nana, Papa and I rode the Big Thunder Mountain rollercoaster. We enjoyed it so much that Nana and Papa traded places with Robert and Kenna and I took him on Big Thunder. From there we rode the Walt Disney World Railroad around to the front of the park, and had a nice picnic lunch at some tables overlooking Main Street:

We spent the afternoon souvenir shopping. We started our shopping on Main Street in the Magic Kingdom and then took a bus to Downtown Disney. There we visited The World of Disney (the largest Disney store in the world) and the Lego Store, along with a few other shops. The Lego store had several huge sculptures made from tiny little Legos, like this one:

The kids had worked hard in the weeks leading up to the trip, earning spending money for souvenirs. They enjoyed shopping and all spent within 50 cents of all the money they had!

After the money was all spent, we rode the bus back to the Magic Kingdom to watch the evening parade, which was beautiful.

We watched the evening fireworks show from in front of the castle; we had been behind the castle for the fireworks on Sunday, which was neat, but the view was better from the front:

It was a great ending to another "magical" day!