Wednesday, October 28, 2015

Disney 2015: Day Two - Magic Kingdom

On our first day in the parks we got up and hit the ground running! We stayed at The Contemporary this trip which is just across the street from the Magic Kingdom so we loaded everyone in Merritt's stroller that we borrowed and set off. My plan was to get through the gates, meet Marie from the Aristocats, walk down Main Street and go directly to Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, and then go to our first fast pass - Enchanted Tales with Belle. Well, none of that happened. We were about five minutes late, Marie wasn't out yet, and the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train line was out the door and around the side. SO. We just went straight to Enchanted Tales with Belle. When we got there they told us there was no wait and to just reschedule my FastPass+ for something later in the day so I used it for Haunted Mansion after lunch.




Enchanted Tales with Belle was SO CUTE. The story is that we're at Maurice's house and we go through the mirror to the Beast's castle. We're all people from town and we're going to surprise Belle by reenacting the story of the night she and the Beast met. James got picked to be the Beast and Will got picked to be Chip. It. was. so. cute. I have a video of the whole thing that I'll upload later.
















After we finished at Enchanted Tales with Belle (it's about 20 minutes) we headed to The Little Mermaid ride. James haaaaated this one last time, despite having a huge crush on Ariel. This time, both boys enjoyed it!

We stopped by The Barnstormer next (James' favorite ride the first time) and rode it twice in a ROW. Will LOVED it. It wound up being his FAVORITE ride this time!




Since Dumbo is right next door we rode it next. We had to pull Will away from it when it was over because we had another FastPass+ to use and actually never made it back. It's just a classic, isn't it?





Our Peter Pan FastPass+ was next. I was thrilled that we had a FP+ for this because the wait is always ridiculous, but they have a new indoor queue for this ride and we didn't get to see it because the FP+ wait is the old outside line. Can't complain when you just walk right up, though, can you? I thought Will would love this, but the height scared him. And it's a little dark.

It's a Small World only had a 10 minute wait so we headed there next and Will ADORED this one. This is always the one I'm afraid of getting stuck on. Because, seriously. Thankfully, we did not.

James was scared during Mickey's Philharmagic last time but BEGGED to do it this time so we did. It's a 3D show where Donald gets himself in trouble. We wound up ALL the way at the end of a row, which I do not recommend. My eyes couldn't focus on the 3D and I felt like I needed to look at it cross-eyed the whole time. Both boys LOVED it, though. This must have been Will's first experience with 3D because he was hilarious to watch. He kept trying to grab the things in front of him.

Our last pre-lunch experience was to meet Peter Pan! We totally lucked up on this. I was looking at the map while we headed back to get the stroller and realized there was a character meet-and-greet nearby. I looked over and saw that a line had started to form. We hopped in with THREE families ahead of us and waited 15 minutes on Peter to arrive. He was awesome. BOY, do you need some energy to be Peter Pan! He asked James how old he was and talked to Will about how old he was, too. He talked about the boys "grown-ups" and as we were leaving he asked about my birthday and "growing up," too. He asked how old I was and if I needed to use his fingers, too. Fingers AND toes, Peter. 











Our first character dining experience was at Crystal Palace with Pooh and friends. This was a fun one. The boys were LOSING THEIR MINDS over all the characters wandering around. Throughout the course of the meal we saw Pooh, Piglet, Tigger, and Eeyore. I will say that character meals are a tiny bit stressful for me BECAUSE I want to snap pictures and have their autograph books signed and it all moves so quickly! The food here was good. It wasn't anything fabulous and I can't even remember what all was on the adult buffet, but the boys loved the penne pasta and the corn dog nuggets. We were happy and STUFFED by the time that we finished here!







{Bouncing with Tigger!}



As soon as we left lunch we headed over to the Haunted Mansion and hopped in a doom buggy. The boys were VERY apprehensive about this ride, but I MADE them ride it. THEY LOVED IT. I knew they would. And I was singing Grim Grinning Ghosts for the rest of the day. :) 

{Clearly, the sun was bright. And this photo pass guy was the only person I encountered who was just not friendly!}

After the Haunted Mansion we used our FastPass+ for SPLASH MOUNTAIN!!!! James had been waiting for this ride since the LAST time we went to Disney. People ask me all the time if Will is bigger than James was when he was three. Will just looks like a big kid. He's wearing 5T everything. Will is exactly one month OLDER than James was when we went to Disney in 2013. In 2013 James couldn't ride the 40-inch rides because he was 39.5 inches. Well. William is at least 40-inches because he was allowed to ride all of the 40-inch rides. They were PUMPED about Splash Mountain and it did NOT disappoint. I love the Brer Rabbit part of the ride and the boys loved all of the dips and slides. :) It's a good one!

{I cannot stop laughing at this picture. Look at our faces! Goodness. Will looks petrified, I CLEARLY look too excited, Mom smells something bad, Eddie is asleep, and James is just the right amount of excited.}

We stopped by the Country Bear Jamboree next. The boys thought it was funny - especially the animals on the walls and the bear that comes down from the ceiling. I think it's funny, too. It was a nice, air-conditioned break.





We headed back to our hotel room after Country Bear Jamboree in hopes that the boys would rest a little bit for a long night. No such luck. We DID rest our feet and watch a television show or two and we all had a good snack, but no napping occurred. After two hours of siesta time (from about 4-6pm) we headed BACK to Magic Kingdom dressed for Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party! Yippee!!! I'll share more about that in my next post.

2 comments:

Meggie said...

So fun!! I love the picture of y'all on Splash Mountain!! Priceless! =)

Leslie @ Lamberts Lately said...

I'm so glad you're posting about Disney...this gets me so excited for our trip in a few weeks!