Hitchin' our way all the way to our final day at Disney. We may be grinning in this photo, but inside we were a bit sad. We started our morning by exiting our resort room, and checking in our baggage at the airline check in near the lobby. We woke up and left bright and early, since we knew this would be our last opportunity to catch the morning opening show.
My outfit for our last day at Disney was themed to my favorite ride, The Haunted Mansion. A HM wallpaper print dress from Amazon with lace shoulders and bottom border added...HM theme ears from Etsy, and "Foolish Mortal" necklace I made for our last trip and never got to wear.
We stood in front of the train station, eager to have a good view for the show.
It started to drizzle a little bit, but we weren't going to let a little rain impede our last day at Disney World. The show started, and a cast member gestured for everyone to move forward.
Once inside the parks, we decided the time was right for us to go on It's a Small World. This ride means a lot to us, even more after we went on a behind-the-scenes tour in May (Marceline to Magic Kingdom) where our guide went on the ride with us and gave us little bits of info. I always thought these clowns were a bit odd and bizarre, and my opinion was justified when she pointed them out and said that they were an addition by one of the imagineers who made the Haunted Mansion. They originally had a sign they were holding up that said "help me."
We had written up a list of things we hadn't gotten to yet and wanted to do on our last day. Riding Small World was one, meeting Gaston was another. So we meandered over to the Beauty and the Beast area of New Fantasyland, but were a bit early for everyone's favorite beefcake.
We took some photos by his fountain. Because of the wet day, it was pretty quiet.
And I got a photo in his chair again.
The inside of Gaston's Tavern wasn't decorated, but there were wreaths and garland outside, adorned with...sure enough...antlers. He uses antlers in all of his decorating.
Bonjour Village Gifts also had a Beauty and the Beast theme tree.
Bonjour also had a print I was quite tempted by, but ultimately didn't buy.
Gaston looked quite a bit like he did the last time we met him on our last trip.
Next we had a fast pass for my favorite ride in the universe. Since I was wearing HM finery, I had Tom take a bunch of photos of me with signature HM items. Starting with Master Gracey's tombstone. This trip there was no rose on it.
Pretty pretty tombstone.
When we were waiting in line, the ride went down momentarily, and the steadily moving line stopped. I knew the photo would be awful, but I got a photo with my beloved bat stanchions...my favorite signature item from the Haunted Mansion.
As we left, I got more photos outside....
And we went on again.
This time as we left, a photopass photographer was there and took our photos. I wish he'd have told us which way Gus was going to be hitching.
Phineas too!
One more fast pass ride on the Minetrain! Such a fun ride.
Cloudy skies might bring rain, but they're also good for castle photos!
All day was a dance between rain showers. I'd say the pace was 40 minutes of dry weather, 10 minutes of torrential rain. Wash, rinse, repeat.
We wandered over to Adventureland for the first time on our trip. Pretty much the only thing we do in Adventureland is go to the Tiki Room, and we still had to do it for this trip.
First, I shot a fly by photo of Jasmine's new outfit. Which really is quite lovely in person.
A rain shower selfie in our ponchos!
We ate lunch again at Cosmic Ray's. So good! And we got a table again with a castle view.
After lunch, it was time to cross off something else on our list: our trip-tradition eating of the Kitchen Sink / Mickey Pants sundae! We had the sweetest custodial worker take our photo here. He was out there wiping down tables and chairs, a fruitless gesture since just a few minutes after we sat, the rain came down in droves again. It was long enough for us to devour our sundae though, and then take cover to wait out the rain.
A rainy day in Disney can really be amazing. You gotta just....well, in the words of Crush, "Go with the Flow." Just resolve to have a great day, and appreciate the fact that crowds lessen, and the magic is still around.
Another thing on our list was riding the carousel. I took a carousel selfie with my horse...
And then noticed the scared look in his eye when I checked my photo. So I took this one, for better accuracy of his mood:
This was our last ride at Disney. We walked through the castle...the first time it was open to do so on our trip...walked through the Emporium one last time. I found this hoodie I loved, but the size medium was oddly quite small. And the entire display was nothing but mediums. The hoodie wasn't on the parks buying app, and they had no other sizes. So it will exist only in my memory and admiration.
Our tradition is to end our trips to Disney World by visiting the big cheese and thanking him for the wonderful time we've had in his theme park. This trip, we had an extra bit of Disney magic. Normally, Mickey is very talkative when you meet him in the theater. Which is quite fun and entertaining, but can make it difficult to get a word of your own in. But we were surprised to see that when we entered the room, Mickey was quite mute.
Normally people would complain about this, just like they might complain about the rain we'd had all day. But this afforded us a magical ending to our trip. For the first time, we were able to fully say goodbye to Mickey, to thank him thoroughly for his parks, for the magic...for the wonderful time we had. Everyone there seemed quite pleased and touched that we came to say goodbye.
This was me explaining how we felt to Mickey.
And in response I got what was seriously the biggest Mickey hug I've ever gotten. It was comparable to the Chewbacca hug we got last trip when we gave him his Yavin medal.
What a magical trip. One we will never forget. Why do we keep returning to Disney World trip after trip, year after year, vacation after vacation? Moments like this. Magical moments. A place that creates joy even on a rainy day. Memories we hold dear in our hearts after we return home.
Thanks for going with us on this trip to Disney! When will we be back? We aren't sure...but we are sure we can't stay away for very long from this, our home filled with magic, joy, and memories.
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