Day 13: Hong Kong Disneyland

In the morning we got up early and found a quick breakfast with Winnie the Pooh banana breads (a Bailor favorite) and Mickey waffles and some really good porridge. I’m missing these things as I write this. It was quite rainy that morning which we had somewhat expected from the reports. It was on the sea and in the mountains so it pretty much rained every day at some point. We decided to go ahead and brave things and catch the bus. Bailor was already content in the stroller and we had to take him out, which I probably got a little over concerned about, but I apologized to the driver :-) . Bailor wasn’t having the stroller when we got there though. I tried to cover Bailor with my jacket, but he was not happy about it at all.  It was a long wet walk to the park entrance from where the buses picked up even with bribes of candy.  We finally made it through the gate and the rain started to let up and sunshine and peace was restored as we were looking at one of the most beatiful sites of the castle lined by main street and backed by beautiful mountains. We got our first visit buttons from guest relations and we were ready to go from there. We got some food and coffee to try and avoid further meltdowns. We got our fast passes for Hyperspace mountain (Space Mountain with a StarWars galactic battle theme) and then went and rode the other fast pass ride before the park got busy, Winnie the Pooh. It was neat and was a trackless ride system. Bailor loved it and was waving at all the characters in the different scenes so that gave us quite a bit of hope for the other rides. We traded off riding Hyperspace mountain. I took Bailor to see R2D2 and Chewbacca. R2D2 he tolerated, Chewbacca we have a video to remember for sure. I learned some tricks for getting Bailor to interact with the characters including having him give them high fives, fist bumps and stickers. Stickers were also my way to entertain him in the line by putting them on his face or mine. After Chewbacca we met Mackenzie and I went to Hyperspace mountain. Mackenzie and Bailor got to go on Buzz Lightyear which they greatly enjoyed. After that we headed over to the Toy Story land and Mystic Manor section of the park. Toy Story land gave us a sneak peek to what we could expect in Hollywood Studios in Florida and Mystic Manor was an area completely unique. Some call this the Haunted Mansion of Hong Kong Disneyland, but it was completely unique using trackless ride vehicles, all sorts of technologies that created atmospheres for the senses and a very unique story of a monkey of a professor that lets all this craziness out of a magical music box. Again, Bailor loved this one so we were on a role.

We checked out the Toy Story land where we rode the slinky dog attraction. From there we headed back to thee front of the park where we changed some money to Hong Kong dollars since some places only took cash. We also checked the stroller so we wouldn’t have to carry it any further as Bailor was done riding.

We rode the train back to Fantasy Land. Mackenzie headed to get our snacks while I waited with Bailor in the Dumbo line. What parent doesn’t want a picture of his kid riding Dumbo for the first time. You all just may not get to see the pictures as Bailor was much more interested in the phone I was using to take the video and pictures than the ride, but once we put that away he enjoyed it. Mackenzie had brought us some delicious snacks including an awesome drink with weird, but tasty lime Jelloish add-ins with soft serve ice cream.

This was also where we discovered Bailor’s love of shows. We did the Mickey’s Philharmagic 3D show as partially a way to get into the AC for a little bit. He didn’t want to wear the glasses and we almost lost his confidence as the seat folded on him since he wasn’t big enough to hold it down, but he loved it!

We wanted to go back and ride Mystic Manor again as it was such a favorite of Bailor's so we headed back through toy story land and an area called Grizzly Gultch where mainly there were lots of themed geysers and a mine train ride. We found that these areas closed early to prep for the fireworks show so we headed back and Mackenzie managed to jump on the last mine train ride, while Bailor and I shared some fries and shrimp skewers. We were pretty hungry so it was pretty delicious.

At that point it was about time for the park to close so we headed back to the front of the park to find a good spot for the fireworks. We weren’t sure how Bailor would react, but he was in awe for the majority of the show and not sacred of them at all. That was good, because we like our fireworks. :-) After the fireworks the park shops remained open. We had planned to shop during this time so we could see all the souvenirs around the park before deciding on anything. Apparently that was everyone else's plan too. We’re used to seeing that in Florida, but this was a whole other level of shopping. Guests weren’t there to pick out a souvenir here and there. They were there to SHOP.  We should have been clued into this when we received a discount coupon for merchandise if we shopped in the morning. :-) We found a couple things, but resolved to check out the gift shops in our hotel and the Disneyland hotel down the road. We picked up the stroller at the front of the park and walked a very tired Bailor back to the awaiting buses. When we got back to the room Bailor was so tired that once we laid him on the bed he was out. Mackenzie went back out to check out the shops. We got our stuff together for departure the next day.