On Christmas Eve, we had another full day planned starting with breakfast at the Polynesian Resort. This was no normal breakfast; we had breakfast with Lilo and Stitch. Mickey and Pluto were there too, but the main reason for going was Stitch. I'm a big kid, what can I say. Breakfast was great and Stitch was as mischievous as ever. After eating breakfast and taking lots of pictures, we hopped on the monorail over to EPCOT.

Much like the other parks, EPCOT hasn't changed much over the past five years. There was a new attraction called Mission:Space which was a glorified motion simulator. Although there were two versions of the ride (one version more intense than the other), it didn't appear as if either were different. The biggest change at EPCOT was the redesign of The Living Seas attraction. What was just a huge aquarium has now been converted to allow for a Finding Nemo ride and an interactive show featuring Crush from Finding Nemo. I expected the interactive show to be cheesy, but it was worth standing in line. It was pretty funny having Crush actually talking to the kids and answering their questions.

EPCOT has never been my kind of park because there is little to do except walk around looking at stuff. We wandered for hours, stopping for lunch and then wandered more before standing in line for the Candlelight Processional. The Candlelight Processional is an annual show that features a huge choir and an orchestra. The choir sings Christmas hymns and in between songs, a guest narrator tells the Christmas story. Our guest narrator was Gary Sinese. About halfway through the program, it began to rain and as luck would have it, we were a few rows back from the covered seats. We sat it out, but it rained the rest of the evening. Eventually we gave up trying to look around and headed back to the hotel disappointed and wet. I think we may skip EPCOT next time or spend a half day as opposed to a whole day.

On Christmas Day, we had planned to visit Disney-MGM Studios, but the weather was supposed to be nasty. We decided to spend the day indoors at Disney Quest which is basically a five story arcade. Before going to Disney Quest, we enjoyed a Christmas breakfast at IHOP and wandered around Downtown Disney to window shop. There are a lot of virtual reality games there as well as new and classic arcade games.

One of the best things about Disney Quest is playing games based on Disney properties. One of my favorite games was Pirates of the Caribbean which allowed teams of people to shoot cannons trying to sink other ships and take their gold. There was also a Jungle Cruise game that takes riders on a virtual river rapids ride. It is probably the most tiring game I've ever played as you have to actually paddle your boat. Other Disney games included Buzz Lightyear's Astroblaster (bumper cars that shoot foam balls at the other cars), Mighty Ducks Pinball (where players control their ball on-screen by moving their body) and Virtual Space Mountain (make your own roller coaster).

I could have stayed there even longer than the 10 or 11 hours we were there, but since I wasn't alone I had to be considerate of others. Considering the price to get in though, we had to stay long enough to get our money's worth. Admission into Disney Quest was about 75% of the cost of a park ticket. I missed my family, but it was a fun and unique Christmas Day. It sure beat sitting in the hotel room all day or having strep throat like I did last year.