Food Spotlight: Walt Disney World 2018 Edition

Hope you are all having a very Happy Thanksgiving!

In the midst of celebrating our gratitude for all we have and for the people in our lives that we love, a big component of our annual celebration is FOOD! So this week, I’m taking a look at everything edible that I indulged in on my recent trip to the Walt Disney World Resort. And most of it I was thankful for… but not all!

Note: I was there just as the Halloween Time season was coming in, so most of what I ate were regular offerings rather than seasonal.

I’m going to just go chronologically through my trip, where I had a mix of table service, quick service and LOTS of snacks! Tuck in, folks, ‘cause this is going to be a super-sized feature!

I started out my first morning at my favorite character buffet at 1900 Park Fare in the Grand Floridian Resort & Spa! Not only was it delightful to meet with Alice, the Mad Hatter, Mary Poppins, Tigger & Pooh, but the food was good, too (for a buffet breakfast)!

Some of my multiple plates of food (yes, you need to pace yourself at this buffet, but there was so much good stuff to try!):

Mickey waffle, bacon, French Toast, cheesy potatoes, scrambled eggs, and Alice’s Red Velvet Pancakes.

Croissant, Eggs Benedict, scrambled eggs, cottage cheese, and lox.

Croissants, donut holes and a very dry stale bagel.

Here is a tip: never be shy about asking for food recommendations! My terrific waitress (who is there to bring you drinks at the otherwise self-service buffet), recommended Alice’s Red Velvet Pancakes, which were delicious! And she also gave me the suggestion to start from the end where the hot food was, which was opposite to where most people began their meal selections. She pointed out that hot food is the unique factor at the buffet, because you can find pastries anywhere and carry those anywhere, but you can’t carry hot food with you!

As always at this location, I stuffed myself and still wished I’d had room for more. The cheesy potatoes and donut holes, along with the Alice pancakes were my favorites and I had seconds of each. That said, it seemed like the choice of offerings were less than my previous trips and the quality of food not quite as high as it used to be. The bread products in particularly were quite dry and hard for so early in the morning and items tasted more simply served and mass-produced than individually prepared. However, it’s still one of my favorite meals in all of the Walt Disney World Resort and I still fully recommend it.

Resort Hotels Spotlight: Disney’s Art of Animation at Walt Disney World Resort

Multi-story Ariel figure outside of one of the buildings in The Little Mermaid section of Disney’s Art of Animation Resort. Each building has a huge beautiful figure like this next to it.

While I had previously loved my stays at both moderate Port Orleans Resorts – Riverside and French Quarter, the budget for my recent trip dictated a stay at a value resort this time around. And my number one choice of where I wanted to stay was at Disney’s Art of Animation!

I cannot imagine going to the Walt Disney World Resort and not wanting to be immersed in Disney 24/7, so it was important to me that the room I stayed in “felt like Disney”. And oh boy, did this room deliver! But before I get to the room reveal, I’d like to talk a little bit about the resort itself…

Note: I apologize for the fuzziness of the pictures in this feature – I was working with an older camera, my late flight had delayed my arrival by several hours until after 10pm and I was just super-excited to finally be there so I was rushing to get photos taken and blur happened, sorry!

Entrance to the Ink & Paint gift shop in the main entrance building at the Art of Animation Resort.

Art of Animation is a value resort, meaning the rooms are a bit smaller and not as ‘upscale’ as a moderate or deluxe. There is no table service restaurant at the resort, just a quick service dining court, which I walked through to look at some of the animation theming but did not choose to eat there.

Landscape of Flavors food court – Cars section. Each part of the food court is themed to one of the resort areas.

There is a ‘Big Blue Pool’ right outside the main building making it easily accessible for everyone staying there. And the bus stops are right outside the lobby and clearly marked for each destination – parks or Disney Springs. Signs listed the next arrival times for each bus – although the My Disney Experience app now offers this function during the length of your stay, too! I found the buses from the resort ran in good intervals and I reached each destination timely in the mornings. The location for a value resort (which tend to be further out from the parks than moderates or deluxe resorts) seemed reasonable for the travel distance and I actually got to the parks faster from here than from the Port Orleans resorts since those are closer to Disney Springs.

Show Spotlight: Walt Disney World 2018 Edition – Fireworks and Projection Light Shows

To end with a bang (literally!) my show coverage of my recent trip to the Walt Disney World Resort, today I’m featuring the non-Star Wars fireworks and projection light shows that I experienced at the Magic Kingdom, EPCOT and Disney’s Hollywood Studios. I covered Star Wars-related spectaculars in a separate feature already.

For a few of these, I only had the opportunity to see the show once, so I had to choose between video or photography. In the cases where I only shot video, I’ll embed them for you to watch, or you can go to my YouTube playlist for my trip, where you can see all the shows I filmed there.

Let’s start off in the Magic Kingdom!

For non-holiday nights, the Magic Kingdom has (unless canceled for weather issues) both a fireworks show and a projection light show on Cinderella Castle. Check the My Disney Experience app for specific showtimes.

As someone who really appreciates the lights and music more than the loud bang of fireworks, I have really enjoyed the continuing evolution of the nighttime shows to include more projections. I suspect ultimately the Disney Parks will continue to move towards this and away from pyrotechnics, but time will tell.

That said, I actually found the fireworks show to be the more emotionally moving one (and a worthy successor to the impressive Wishes), whereas the fast twirling style of this projection light show actually triggered my motion sickness a few times.  So I didn’t enjoy it as much as I would have if it had been a bit slower and there were less flips and quick motion in it. I would absolutely go see the fireworks show again any chance I could catch it, but would probably skip staying for the lights show afterward although it’s certainly worth watching once.

Here are videos of the fireworks show, Happily Ever After:

And the projection lights show, Once Upon a Time:

But please don’t ask me why ‘Happily Ever After’ comes BEFORE ‘Once Upon a Time’!

Moving over to EPCOT, I was fortunate enough to watch IllumiNations: Reflections of Earth at the World Showcase lagoon on two different nights (one drizzling rain down on me, one not).

Show Spotlight: Walt Disney World 2018 Edition – Magic Kingdom’s Festival of Fantasy Parade and Main Street Trolley Show

Two daytime productions you may see moving through Walt Disney World Resort’s Magic Kingdom are the Disney Festival of Fantasy Parade and the Main Street Trolley Show.

I was able to catch both on my recent visit!

Disney Festival of Fantasy Parade

I’ve mentioned before that I’m not really a big parade fan. But I had waited years to finally see this one in person for one big reason: a fire-breathing dragon!

Unfortunately, a mishap caused the Maleficent dragon float to be damaged earlier in the year, and it had not returned by the time the parade passed by. So it all felt rather anti-climactic to me – like watching the majority of a movie and five minutes before the ending, it just stopped. I was very disappointed that I did not get to see this beautiful technological marvel in action, but there were still things about the parade that I did enjoy. (Standing in the sun was not one of them. Mousertainment Tip: stand on the shady side of the street if you can!)

The sections of the parade run as follows:

Disney Princesses

Belle & Beast

Cinderella & Prince Charming

Anna & Elsa

Tiana & Naveen

Tangled