I wanted to take the chance to review our night-time side trip on Day 2 of our vacation. We had spent the day checking out every corner of Epcot, and with our stomachs crying out for some food we had reservations at one of our favorite places.  We had to take the monorail from Epcot over to the Ticketing and Transportation Center, then transfer to the resort line for one quick stop.  The Polynesian Village Resort is where my sister and her family were staying.  This is a resort I have always wanted to stay at but haven’t not yet had the chance.

I can’t remember a visit to WDW without us going over to ‘Ohana for dinner.  In years past we were even able to just walk up without a reservation, but those days are long gone.  The foods it always really filling, and the Lapu Lapu drinks always reminds me that we are on vacation.

This tropical drink is made up of Myer’s original dark rum, Bacardi 151 Rum, and tropical fruit juices all served up in a hollowed out Pineapple.  While I enjoyed 2 or 5 of theses we always enjoy the endless skillet of Pork stickers, and awesome sticky chicken wings with mounds of Polynesian noodles.  Then to top it off there are skewers of beef, chicken and shrimp constantly being dropped off on our plate.  Every so often the entire restaurant prepares for the young guests to partake in the famous coconut races.

I needed to try to work off some of my dinner so I jumped at the chance to try to keep Hanna and her two cousins from knocking someone out with their coconuts.  Music is played while the kids try to use the broom to push the coconuts around the restaurant.  It’s not really a race just a fun way for the kids to entertain the crowd of onlookers.  After another few rounds of food we finally had to wave the white flags.  This was another great experience for us but it was time to let the next group of gluttons in to enjoy their dinner.  We headed back out to the main lobby area of the resort.  My wife, youngest daughter melody and my parents all decided they were ready to head back to our resort.  Hanna and I had other ideas and decided to hop on the Monorail and visit a few resorts.

For those of you that are familiar with the Monorail loop you can visit the Contemporary Resort, Polynesian Village Resort and the Grand Floridian Resort with the TTC (Ticketing and Transportation Center) and Magic Kingdom squeezed in among the resorts.  This is actually a fun free attraction to do when visiting, and if you haven’t ever taken time to just wander around some of the resorts you are definitely missing out.  We started at the Poly so our first stop would be the Grand Floridian Resort.

Once you step off the Monorail you enter the Grand Floridian on the second floor.  Just inside the sliding doors of the resort is the first of the penny machines located here.  This machine is home to the 2016 Goofy penny, Classic Mickey’s Face and Pearl from Finding Nemo.  This resort is really gorgeous and I would spend hours just looking at all the details of this place.  We were headed down to the first flood but instead of just taking the boring old elevator we take the grand staircase.  At certain times they actually have Cinderella make a grand entrance down these stairs with an entourage of young guests with her.

   

Across the lobby over towards the exit area of 1900 Park Fare restaurant is where we were headed.  We ate here later in our trip and I’ll go over it in more detail than.  On this stop we were just here for the two machines.  The one on the left used quarters and had designs of Mickey Donald & Goofy, Mulan & Mushu, and Timon & Pumbaa.  The second machine pressed pennies with Cinderella’s Mice friends Jac & Gus, Alice, and Cinderella’s Prince Charming.  The last machine is in kind of a strange spot, you actually have to go outside, and down a pathway to the resorts Bus Stop.

It’s located right near where guests get on and off the buses for the different parks.  If you end up trying to use it while a bus is emptying out you may get run over as this is right in the middle of the exit area.  The pennies here are of Mickey in a Tuxedo, Winnie the Pooh & Tigger, and the Siamese Cats from Lady & and the Tramp.  After visiting all he machines here at the Grand Floridian it was time to head back up to the Monorail.  We jumped on the next one that arrived and just a couple stops away we got off at the Contemporary Resort.  This in my option is one of the coolest resorts, not necessarily the most up to date or fanciest, but where else do you have a Monorail driving straight through the middle of your resort.  We got off the Monorail and headed down the escalator one floor to the main 4th Floor concourse.  If you are a pressed coin collector this is one of the must do stops to make.

Look at this wall of awesomeness.  There is even a change machine nearby which is great because otherwise your shorts would probably be falling down with all the quarters and pennies it would take to press all of these in one trip.  As you can see from the picture there are six machines in total, three penny and three quarter machines each with three designs.  That’s 18 designs in total at all one place and you don’t have to wonder around the entire resort.  Let me take you on a tour of these machines.

   

Starting from the far left side of this wall there are the first two quarter machines.  The first machine has designs of Ariel, Sebastian, and Flounder from The Little Mermaid and all have the Contemporary Resort Logo.  The second machine has designs of Aladdin & Jasmin, Peter Pan, and Tinker Bell also with the Contemporary Resort Logo.

   

The third quarter machine has images of Walt Disney World 2016 Where Magic Lives, Snow White, and Dumbo.  The fourth machine changes to pennies and has designs of Winnie the Pooh & Eeyore, Buzz Lightyear, and the Contemporary Resort.

Almost there.  The fifth machine has designs of Chef Mickey’s at the Contemporary Resort, Mickey in a Tux, and Marlin & Dory from Finding Nemo.  The last machine had another 2016 Music Magic Memories design, Mickey Minnie Donald Goofy & Pluto all one penny, and Stitch from Lilo & Stitch.  Phew!

By this time it was getting late and we still had a way to go to get back to Epcot and then over to our resort.  This was definitely a fun little side trip to take and Hanna always looks forward to riding the Monorail whenever possible.  This is a quick way to acquire a lot of pressed coins in a relatively short period of time.  It probably took us about an hour or so to do these resorts but that also included a little wandering around and souvenir shopping.  By the time we got back to Epcot things were getting ready for Illuminations and the crowds were getting a little heavy around.  We made a quick stop back over at the France Pavilion for some snacks and decided on the Macaroons and Chocolate Croissants.

   

I could barely wait to dig into these, but forced myself to wait unit we got back to our room.  Once there my family tore into these pretty quickly.  The macaroons were good, but the chocolate croissants were fantastic.  My wife took advantage of our close proximity to Epcot and had me go over to France a couple more times during our trip for more croissants.  I was always more than happy to oblige.