Wayfaring Day 17

July 17, 2025 Thursday

Amy is spending the remainder of the week with our grandson and will go back to home base Friday to take care of cats and parents and other errands.

Japan

David and our younger son are doing EPCOT today. First thing was rope drop to Guardians which is David´s favorite ride of all time. We rode Guardians and then paid to ride later so we would at least get to ride twice. We made it to Soaring while the line was still short and spent some time in The Land and The Seas before moving on to World Showcase. We were hoping they might open Test Track today since opening day is the day after we leave for Tampa. We made our way to France and got in the single rider line for Remy´s Ratatouille Adventure to forego the wait of 45 minutes in the standby line. We actually ended up in the same vehicle together but as soon as we moved away from the platform the entire ride shut down. As we exited the cast members were loading a free lightning lane onto devices so we had a lightning lane for Ratatouille anytime for the remainder of the day. By this time we were ready to head to our lunch location. We decided to have lunch at the quick service restaurant at the new Riviera Resort. We had not visited this resort so we decided after France we would ride the Skyliner to the Riviera. We explored this nice DVC style resort and then had lunch at the small but nice little quick service place. David had the French Sub meal while our son had the Hearth Baked Pizza. The food here is good and the service is somewhat above average with smartly dressed cast members who deliver your entree to the table with a bit of flair. We walked through the Caribbean Beach Resort and its lobby and then across the island to the Caribbean Beach Resort Skyliner station. Once back to the World Showcase we cashed in our Ratatouille Lightning Lane and then did some looking through the pavilions before heading to Canada for their video show and then to watch the live band perform in some mighty intense heat.

We had a 4:20 pm reservation for Spice Road Table so we had to time our meandering so as to be in the vicinity around that time. At Spice Road Table in Morocco we ordered three small plates which is how they have organized their menu. We had the House-made Hummus Fries, The Spicy Shrimp and the Chicken Bastilla. Afterwards we strolled through the Mexico side of the World Showcase and eventually back to Guardians for our LL time slot. After that we found a place to watch the fireworks show but from a distance just inside the EPCOT area. Once the fireworks ended we headed to the monorail for a ride to The Ticket and Transportation Center. From there we walked over to the Polynesian and watched the Magic Kingdom fireworks. Then we walked to the monorail and rode to the Magic Kingdom station where we caught a bus back to the All Star Sports Resort. Wow, what a day.