Babieemelly's travel blogs:
- Orlando, Florida: Three Weeks of a Million... 2007
- New York City: "There's no need to... 2007
- Rocky Point, New York: Beaches, Ports and... 2006
- Orlando, Florida: The Three-Week Disney Resort Report 2006
- Rocky Point, New York: A Weekend Threatened... 2006
- New York, New York: Life in the... 2005
- Orlando, Florida: A Month-Long Dream Come True 2005
- Rocky Point, New York: A Snowy Weekend... 2005
- Lancaster, Pennsylvania: A Return to a Childhood... 2004
- Rocky Point, New York: Midnight Beach Parties... 2004
- Long Beach Island, New Jersey: A Weekend... 2002
- Rocky Point, New York: Restoring My Love... 2001
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Day 13: At the KONA... KONA Cabana
Entry 17 of 29 | show all | print this entry |
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Today I woke up at 9:00. Mom and dad were sitting out by the pool so I had some cereal for breakfast and then went online to check my mail before I took a shower and get dressed. As I was doing my makeup at 11:00 I watched another "America's Next Top Model" marathon on VH1. I was finished getting ready by 12:00 and I hung out in my room watching TV. We had a 2:45 reservation for lunch at the Kona Café at the Polynesian Resort so we left at 2:00. We were driving through the Disney welcome gates by 2:30 and were at the Polynesian by 2:40. We pulled through the parking gates and got our three-hour parking pass. Today was going to be another brutally hot day. At 2:40 in the afternoon it was already a hundred and five degrees. It was miserable!
Mom and dad were taking a while putting the window covers in the car to block out the sun so Mike and I made our way to the entrance to the Polynesian Resort. Mom and dad knew where to meet us. Mike and I walked to the lobby and the pathway leading to the front of the resort is great! I'm in love with anything tropical so I loved all the plants, waterfalls and little Tiki figures. I felt like I was genuinely in Hawaii... except for the huge Mickey-covered buses pulling in and out of the parking lot. Close enough. I took some pictures in the area, and then Mike took a picture of me with a Tiki figure. A random guy walked by and asked us if he wanted him to take a picture of both of us together. It was nice to offer but we didn't need a picture together; if we wanted one mom and dad could just take it. But by now Mike was getting sick of all of my plans, and I was getting sick of his complaining, so we hardly wanted to look at each other let alone take a picture together, haha!
Mom and dad met us a few minutes later and we all went inside. I love the lobby of the Polynesian; it's so... Polynesian. It's like a huge tropical rainforest right in the middle of a Disney resort. What more could you want?! We took a few pictures in the lobby before heading to the back of the resort to the stairs that would lead us up to the second floor of the lobby which houses the restaurants. Before going upstairs we stopped in a big art store. There were lots of moonlit beach scenes and paintings of palm trees swaying in the breeze. Some of the paintings were really, really gorgeous... and really, really expensive. The most interesting piece of art I saw was a $4000 painting of Ariel from "The Little Mermaid" sitting on a rock on a deserted beach. Now, paying $4000 for a painting is a bit extreme but it's understandable when it comes to amazing works of art. However, $4000 for a painting of Ariel? I'm the biggest Little Mermaid fan out there but come on. I'd really love to meet the person who would spend all that money on a painting of a cartoon mermaid. Then again, there are people who pay hundreds and thousands of dollars to buy old Disney ride vehicles so crazier things have happened.
When we were done looking around we headed upstairs to the restaurant. When we got up there we stopped at the bathroom across from OHana, another great Polynesian restaurant, where we had first used the Disney coconut soap last year. I was so sad to see that they no longer had coconut soap! Haha! I hadn't seen it anywhere on Disney property yet, but I was sure that they would have it at the Polynesian Resort. I guess we would just have to stick with plain old soap, the kind that smells like... soap. We headed over to the Kona Café and made it right in time for our priority seating but we didn't even need one because the restaurant was completely empty. There were a few other groups in there but most of the restaurant was just deserted which is why I thought it was interesting when the woman seating us sat us right on top of another table full of people. There were tons of empty tables. Tons. But we had to get comfy and cozy huddled up next to a bunch of strangers who felt it was fine to eat at a nice restaurant still in their dripping wet bathing suits. Nice.
We took a seat and the woman who sat us put our priority seating information down in the center of the table. I looked at it and saw that it was noted that it was mom and dad's anniversary. Good, I had called ahead to make sure that it was noted and it was. Our waitress came by a few minutes later and took the paper but didn't look at it. That's alright, I thought, she'll look at it later. We gave her our drink orders, three diet Cokes and a Sprite, and then we looked over the menu. I had printed out the menu at home before we left so we all already knew what we wanted. We looked through the menu quickly, though, just to make sure that nothing had changed. It hadn't, and our waitress came by two minutes later to get our orders. After we had ordered I took a few pictures of the restaurant before mom told me to stop because the two grown men sitting behind us were getting annoyed. We're at Disney World; if you expect to go to a restaurant and not have people taking pictures and kids running around screaming, then you obviously don't know what Disney World is. Which is pretty impossible considering there are commercials and advertisements everywhere you look... and I mean, it's Disney World. There were people in the restaurant in their bathing suits! I was annoyed but I shut the flash off.
I then noticed that all of the restaurant's deserts were laid out in a small bakery area at the back of the restaurant, right near where we were sitting. I couldn't see what the deserts were but I saw a big Lilo and Stitch statue made of chocolate. Lilo and Stitch made of CHOCOLATE! It's a kid's dream come true, no wonder they love this place so much! Mom and dad got up to look at the deserts and took a picture of the Lilo and Stitch chocolate statue for me. I loved it.
Our food came a few minutes later and it was all absolutely delicious. I got the Island Chicken Sandwich which was a grilled chicken breast with apple smoked bacon, Swiss cheese, curry mango mayonnaise and fried onions on a Kaiser served with sweet potato chips. Mom got the Open-Faced Salmon BLT which consisted of grilled salmon on house-baked focaccia with Boursin cheese, tomatoes and frisee salad tossed with warm bacon vinaigrette dressing. We shared both entrees and they were delicious! I had been looking forward to trying the Island Chicken Sandwich ever since I printed out the menu but I wound up liking the salmon better. It was even better than the salmon at Mytho's which had been delicious, this was literally the best salmon EVER! The sweet potato fries were also delicious - they were fresh and crunchy, and only slightly spicy. The food was the best food we had eaten yet; mom and I both put it at the top of our lists. I can't even describe how good it was. Two thumbs WAY up for the Kona Café!
Dad and Michael also enjoyed their food. Mike got the Polynesian Plate lunch which came with a choice of options. He had the Chicken with Peanut Sauce, sticky rice and macaroni salad. He said it was good but the peanut sauce was a little too strong and slightly overwhelming. Dad got the Barbecued Pork Sandwich which consisted of pulled pork, sautéed onions and Asian barbecue sauce served on a Kaiser roll with creamy coleslaw. He really liked his.
When we were done eating we had to try the deserts. We were all full but the deserts looked really good. Plus, all of the Disney restaurants give you a free desert if you're celebrating a special occasion, and mom and dad were celebrating their twentieth anniversary. It was right there on the priority seating paper. Mom and I went back up to look at the deserts and we decided on a brownie with ice cream and an Apple Brown Betty. The Apple Brown Betty was good but the brownie was great. It was a lot better than a regular brownie, and it came with a little chocolate Mickey head. It was delicious!
We got the check ten minutes later and the meal had come to $60 including the deserts. Not bad, not bad. But where was our free desert for mom and dad's anniversary?! Our waitress wasn't a good one. Not only did she not acknowledge mom and dad's anniversary but she never got us refills even when we asked and she was just very cold and unfriendly. We saw her once throughout our whole meal; she didn't even bring out our food. What the hell? Oh well, I wasn't going to let the service get me down. The food had been incredibly good and we'd all go back to the Kona Café in a heartbeat!
When we were done eating we walked around the top floor of the Polynesian Resort lobby. We went into a few gift shops and looked at the big lounge located next to OHana before taking another quick bathroom break and then making our way over to the monorail. My plan was to take the Magic Kingdom resort monorail to the Ticket and Transportation Center and then transfer to an Epcot monorail. The Epcot monorail actually goes through Epcot and I wanted to get a good view of my favorite Disney park to take some pictures. There was a monorail waiting as we got out onto the platform and we ran onto a car towards the back. We were in a completely empty car which was great; we got to spread out and enjoy the ride. I took a few pictures and videos as we traveled around to the Grand Floridian Resort, the Magic Kingdom, the Contemporary Resort and finally the Ticket and Transportation Center. We got off there and made our way down the ramp and back up a ramp on the other side to get to the Epcot monorail.
There wasn't one in sight and there were only a few people waiting, so we got on line and waited... and waited... and waited. A good ten minutes later there was still no Epcot monorail in sight and it was unbelievably hot up on the platform. Finally a monorail came and we wanted to get a seat. There was no point in having to stand and squish into a car with lots of other people when the main reason for taking a ride was to take pictures and just relax. We were about to get into a car with an empty row when the people behind us pushed in front of us and sat down. Nice. I was so pissed off; I hate inconsiderate people. I turned around to them and said loudly, "What a waste of my time. I love how inconsiderate people are," and we walked through the monorail, getting out on the other side. We walked all the way back across the ramp and as the Epcot monorail pulled out we saw that all of the cars in the back of the monorail were closed and empty. If they saw that some people couldn't get seats why wouldn't they open up the entire monorail? Disney's a freaken muli-million dollar company; they can't open up a few more cars? It's not even like they would have to pay to open the cars, they're all on the same monorail!
We went back to the resort monorail and waited... and waited... and waited. I wasn't very happy with Disney. It was ridiculously hot out and the Polynesian was no more that a hundred yards away but there was no walking path. It took a good fifteen minutes for another monorail to show up and when we got on it we were able to get a seat. The Polynesian Resort was the first stop so it was a short two-minute ride until we were back at the resort. We wanted to stop in the bathroom one more time before we left so mom ran in and Mike went to run in, but the men's room was closed since it was being cleaned. The man cleaning the bathroom opened the one handicapped stall between the men and women's room and there was a little boy who went in first so we had to wait for him to get out. When he did Mike ran in and we were back at the car within twenty minutes, and back in our area of 192 by 5:00.
Mom and dad didn't want to go back to the house yet so we drove over to a big flea market with over 450 booths. Mom and dad had already been to the two flea markets that were closer to us, but this one was a few miles away after a good twenty-minute drive. When we got there we walked inside and saw that none of the buildings were air conditioned. It was now around a hundred and five degrees out and there was no way we were going to walk around in the heat just to look at more stuff in a flea market. We headed back to the house and were back by 5:30. I hung out in my room and watched "Rock Star" again on VH1. I loved that movie when I first saw it in 2002, and seeing it again reminded me of why I loved it so much. It's an awesome movie. Halfway through the movie mom and dad decided to go to Old Town. We had gone last year and the entire area was a dump and I had absolutely no urge to go back. I don't know why mom and dad did, but they left at 6:00.
Mike and I spent the time hanging out in the house. He watched TV in the living room with Oreo while I watched the end of "Rock Star" in my room and then watched the "20 Most Shocking Moments in Rock and Roll" also on VH1. It was a great countdown. I had seen it before a few years ago but I didn't remember much about it, so it was interesting. At 8:00 I watched the last hour of the countdown in the living room with Mike while I went online. Then Mike went to sit outside with Oreo and I took a few pictures. Mom and dad were back by 8:45 and had bought a few small things at Old Town. Mom said that it was a nice area with a lot of cute shops. It had been a run down dump with a bunch of crappy stores the year before so either they had greatly cleaned up the area within the year or mom just really loves to shop!
We wanted to watch "So You Think You Can Dance" so mom and dad quickly walked Oreo while Mike had a beer and I had a Parrot Bay Berry drink. It was really good but it tasted more like peach than berry. It was still good, though. At 9:00 we watched "So You Think You Can Dance" and loved watching the final six do their thing. Travis and Benji are so good! When the show was over at 10:00 dad and Mike went out in the backyard. Dad went in the hot tub while Michael went in the pool, and I got my MP3 player and listened to some music while I put my feet in the pool. Mike got out at 10:30 and he and mom decided to play cards, so I went back in to play with them while dad got out of the hot tub and went in the pool. We played cards until midnight, and Mike wound up winning the game. I then went in my room and read my psych book for a little while. I also watched the end of The Wedding Singer on VH1. I finally got exhausted at around 1:00 in the morning and quickly fell asleep.
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