The Saga of the Dole Whip

[ericadawn16]

For my 30th birthday, I bought a Park Vinylmation. It ended up being a Dole Whip which I was disappointed with so I traded and ended up with a robot.

I'd never had a Dole Whip before. I soon learned that this was tantamount to blasphemy on Disney property.

Earlier this year, I figured out how to get a Dole Whip without going to Hawaii or buying an admission ticket. It's available at the Polynesian Resort for anyone who walks in and pays the price...which was like $4.50 when we went.

The trick was getting there and back again. Naturally, we don't want to pay parking so we parked at Downtown Disney and planned to take Disney's many forms of public transportation.

We ended up on a bus to the Grand Floridian which I promised my mom was extremely close to the Polynesian. I love the Grand Floridian. It's about as close to a working Victorian hotel as Florida can get nowadays. Since we walked to the Polynesian, I got to see parts of that resort that I'd never seen before.

Isn't this children's water park adorable?



If you can tell me what trees these are, I'd love it. It's almost like cotton but much softer and wispier than my brother's cotton tree was. Just a slight breeze would set off hundreds of these fluffy white wisps. They were everywhere. We tried to take some home but they either disintegrated or flew away at some point.



The cafe serving the Dole Whips was extremely easy to find and the Dole Whips are self-serve! I tried to get as much of the ice cream as I could without having it all fall over and my mom went for classical elegance.



Dole Whips completely live up to the hype! It's high quality ice cream...my mom compared the taste to home made when she was growing up...with a pineapple flavor. This isn't artificial pineapple flavor, it's the real stuff. It's a like a wizard turned a pineapple into ice cream. However, it was so good, so delicious, so rich...that we couldn't imagine having it all the time at every visit like some people do. Once a year or so seemed good enough.

No, you can't have any.



I tried to find Tahiti but it appeared to just contain hotel rooms. Like all Disney resorts, the Polynesian is an awesome place though.



Now, the internet said if we could just make it to the Transportation Center, we could take the bus back. Thus, we get to take a monorail ride and get a prompt bus.

This is a lie. I later had a customer tell me that this hasn't been in the case in about ten years. We took the bus back to the Polynesian and just made the departing bus for Downtown Disney.

I love having adventures at Disney.

Comments

[thespian15.livejournal.com]

Dare I admit I have never had the Dole Whip either. :o

That is quite the adventure you had. :)
I have done the bus from Polynesian to Downtown before. I was at Epcot one time when it started to pour so I hoped the monorail thinking I would ride to Magic Kingdom and then hope a bus to either Downtown or back to Pop Century and then to Downtown. I ended up at Polynesian and hoped the bus to Downtown, and it took forever. Ugh...

So now I have to have some Dole Whip next time I go to WDW, huh? lol...
I don't know if it's the same thing, but Minnesota's State Fair has a Dole Whip. I haven't had it there either. lol........
Hugs, Jon

[ericadawn16.livejournal.com]

Hmm, strange...

The internet says the castmembers are incorrect and it is available elsewhere...also, it tasted just like ice cream but it's actually vegan which I forgot about.

First, I found this page about the fair version and thought the color looked too pale.

http://www.hardlyhousewives.com/2014/09/minnesota-state-fair.html

However, this has the Disney version also looking that pale so maybe both cameras and/or operators suck.

http://www.disneyfoodblog.com/2010/05/05/disney-dole-whip/

Still, you should definitely try it next time.

[thespian15.livejournal.com]

It does seem odd that Dole would limit it to just one place to be sold. :o
The pictures look so yummy..... :)

[cp.livejournal.com]

Mmm, Dole Whip is pretty awesome. The floats (pineapple Dole Whip in pineapple juice) are even better! :) But I agree, once in a while is enough for me. Usually when we go to the Dole Whip place in the Magic Kingdom I go for a Coke float with vanilla Dole Whip instead.

Since we're between annual passes, this is the sort of thing I think we'll do once the weather gets a bit more pleasant. The walk between EPCOT and Hollywood Studios (which runs past the Swan & Dolphin and the Boardwalk and Yacht and Beach Club) is very nice too. I just wish the parking at Downtown Disney wasn't so abysmal right now! The sooner they get the garages open, the better!

[ericadawn16.livejournal.com]

We used to LOVE doing that walk! Anytime, we got tired of one park, we could just walk to the other. I figured out we did at least ten miles one day of walking.

I wish the Boardwalk had more unique stuff like Downtown Disney because we haven't actually been there in a year or two...we like to look at stuff but we don't do restaurants. However, I did love the entertainment after dark.

Also, my mom is curious whether they got the food trucks up and running at Downtown Disney.

[cp.livejournal.com]

The Boardwalk is awesome for photos--I've done a number of visiting families there, and it always makes for nice results. But apart from the scenery, there's not much. I do need to take the girls to Beaches & Cream sometime, though, that's good stuff.

Hmm, I think I did see the food truck spot on my last visit, but I didn't pay close attention. It was too hot!

[surreal-44.livejournal.com]

The tree is hard to decipher. It might be some sort of hybrid or specialty silk cotton tree. It seems way too small to be an actual cotton tree, although the little puffs look like it. :) It's pretty!

And I love your photo of the duck. How cute is she? :D :D

[ericadawn16.livejournal.com]

Okay, I tried harder to investigate online and it appears to be a Cottonwood.

We just don't have these in Florida, lol. I'd only seen the actual cotton bushes/trees before and real cotton is not soft and fluffy especially with the seeds in the middle. This stuff was so fluffy.

The animals on Disney property are so used to people that they are incredibly photogenic and quite a few will pose for you. This is both awesome and sad.

[surreal-44.livejournal.com]

There's nothing sad about animals growing accustomed to humans. Even if we never built cities, it would happen naturally. Many animals grow so accustomed to each other, they create symbiotic relationships that are beneficial to both species. :-)

[ragnarok-08.livejournal.com]

Dole Whip sounds really good :)