This weekend has been incredible!
And I have this lovely couple to thank for it.
Ashley and Bo randomly called Derek and I on Wednesday asking if we had any plans for the upcoming weekend. They were coming to Disney and they were taking us with them – no questions asked. Of course we dropped every plan we had, so we could spend every minute with them, and didn’t regretted it for a second.
Ashely and Bo are an amazing couple and so much fun to hang out with. We’re honored to call them close friends and can’t wait until we have the chance to hang out with them again. 
We wore ourselves out yesterday visiting Magic Kingdom, Hollywood Studios, and Epcot. Today we made plans to fit everything in we had missed out on yesterday; including Animal Kingdom and a few other choice rides.
First things first – a good breakfast was in order.
A bowl of cereal was the perfect light morning meal before a full day at the parks.
- 2/3 cup Jumbo Rice Krispies
- 2/3 cup Kashi Go Lean Crunch
- 1 Orange
- Vanilla Yogurt
- Chia Seeds
Confession: Animal Kingdom is my least favorite Disney World park. It only has one really good ride and is missing that Disney Magic the other parks possess.
The one good ride? Expedition Everest.
Hands down this ride is worth the trip to the park alone. If you’ve never rode it I suggest you brave the wait for at least one ride. It’s probably the best roller coaster Disney offers.
We spent the morning in Animal Kingdom, then headed to Hollywood Studios right around lunch time.
Hollywood Studios has my least favorite food choices among any of the Disney Parks, but I made do with a big salad and apple on the side.
Contrary to what you may have heard, Disney actually has some pretty good food choices. You just have to hunt for the what you want. Most service windows and sit down restaurants offer vegetarian and vegan options and if they don’t it’s pretty easy to re-work a dish to accommodate.
The fiesta salad I had for lunch could have easily been vegetarian if I asked for it minus the chili and vegan without the cheese.
The Fresh fruit around the parks also make for a great refreshing treat on the side.
We were walking past the Toy Story ride when Ashley grabbed my arm and went “Oh my gosh – that was Whoopi Goldberg”
She pulled me backwards and sure enough – it was her! We both tried to play cool and took our cameras out to take a photo. However, just as I was pulling mine out, Whoopi being escorted to a secret entrance to the Toy Story ride.
Lucky her! That was was set at 120+ minutes! 
I think that’s the first time I’ve seen anyone famous in Disney, though, I’ve had friends who worked at Universal have a few famous people walk through their lines before. There’s nothing like checking he safety harness to someone you’ve seen on tv too many times to count.
After our brush with fame we decided an early dinner was in order. A new pizza place had recently opened in the Italy portion of the World Showcase that I had been meaning to test it out for a while now.
Via Napoli is a well-lit Italian style pizzeria that serves big, beautiful pizzas from a wood burning pizza stove.
Our table started with a trio of appetizers
Eggplant Caponata
Salami e Provolone
Mozzarella Caprese
I had a taste of each and all of the appetizers were fresh and delicious. I particularly enjoyed the slightly sweet caponata.
It was extremely hard to choose a pizza – each one sounded better than the last!
We ended up choosing the Quattro Stagioni (eggplant, artichokes onions, prosciutto, mushrooms) and were pleasantly surprised when each topping has it’s own section of the pizza. We were expecting all the piles piled on top of each other, but it was nice to have it seperated and allow each topping really stand out on it’s own.
The pizza’s crust was thin, but still doughy. The sauce was light, but still evident and the cheese was beautiful clumps of fresh mozzarella instead of the shredded fake stuff. In short the pizza was amazing and something I would 100% recommend to any visiting DIsney park lover.
We hit the parks for a little bit longer and wrapped up the weekend with my favorite Disney sweet treat.
Ice Cream Cookie Sandwich. Oh yes – this is for real.
Shared with Derek of course.
Delicious.
Even though I’ve been Orlando this whole time – I feel like this weekend has been some sort of a vacation. For the past 48 hours I’ve basically walked away from my e-mail, my phone, and various responsibilities. Tomorrow I return to the real world and promise to get right to work figuring out this whole self-employment thing.
I have some fun adventures in store – I can’t wait to start sharing them!
Good Night!!!
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