See here for Day 4 part 1 describing the actual Disney World Marathon portion of the day.
After making it back to the hotel room and having a much needed warm shower, I sorted out a bunch of my gear and ate a sandwich that I had waiting ready in the room’s fridge. I also made my way through the rest of the runDisney snack box.
At this point the early mornings caught up with me and I decided to lay down and have a nap so I could do my planned late night in Epcot that night.
I set my alarm to wake me up at 3pm and I woke up feeling pretty good. Then I blinked and lost a half hour…ok, so up at 3:30 then.
I got dressed up nice and warm and headed to Epcot wearing my Goofy Challenge medal.
Interesting observation though – I saw very few other Goofy Challenge medals but several Dopey Challenge and stand alone Walt Disney World Marathon medals around the park. Why so few Goofy Challenge medals? Were there actually that few Goofy Challenge runners by percentage or did many of the Goofy Challenge runners decide they hadn’t earned that medal since the half marathon was cancelled and decided to wear the full marathon medal instead? I’m not sure frankly. Either way I felt I had earned the Goofy Challenge medal and displayed it proudly.
I did a bunch of wandering around Epcot through the late afternoon and evening as the temperature got steadily cooler. At one point I hopped into the France pavilion to watch “Impressions of France” to get a half hour out of the cold.
The cold didn’t stop me from wandering around with a cold beer in my hand though…
I had a light supper in there at some point – most years I end up getting a reservation for one of the table service restaurants to celebrate but since I was on my own this year I hadn’t bothered. So instead I hit Electric Umbrella quick service instead and sat where I had a view of Fountain of Nations – not the fanciest of places but it holds good memories of eating here with my family on previous trips that makes it kind of special.
I then hit a few rides – Frozen Ever After and Little Nemo – before wandering over to watch Illuminations – I picked up a hot coffee and a pastry to enjoy the show as well. It has become tradition for me to catch Illuminations on the last night of the Disney World Marathon weekend trips, it always feels like a great end to an epic weekend.
It wasn’t exactly the end though. The park closed to standard guests after Illuminations but resort guests enjoyed a couple extra “Magic Hours” and I took advantage of that to get on Soarin’ and Spaceship Earth with very little to no wait.
I then had to head into the Mouse Gears shop to pick up another piece of luggage – I had been given a shopping list of stuff to get by my wife and between that and my Goofy Challenge swag, I needed more carrying capacity.
I found something at Mouse Gears that was big enough to carry what I needed while still counting as a carry on bag so I wouldn’t need to check another piece of luggage. It was not a cheap solution but it was well built and I will be able to take advantage of it on future trips with the family for sure which lessens the per use cost.
At this point there was still a half hour until the Magic Hours were over but I was burnt out and still needed to get back to the room to pack!
A relatively short bus ride later I was back at the hotel packing and luckily the new bag was a great size for what I needed. Yay!
And shortly after midnight I was able to crash out and get some sleep!
Next up Day 5 – hotel checkout, 2 parks and catching a plane home.
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