Hey, i finally finished typing up the ENTIRE thing.
I went on the Backstage Magic tour, and I know some folks are interested in a recap and highlights.. so here we go
The night before (and I promise this is relevent and short - I loathe those "and we spent 5 hours at the airport at gate 26..." type trip reports) we plotted our route to Epcot at 8:45am. Priceline had landed us at the Radisson Worldgate. Where's that? That was my reaction too. It's actually on a road called "Maingate Lane" just off of I-4 and 192. Why's it called Maingate? I think it's because WDW's Entertainment and Theme Park Merchandise have their offices right there in bright purple buildings. If you cut through their parking lots, you pop out on a road that goes right to AK and the AKL. Nifty.
Thus we drove that route to check out how long it would take us to get to Epcot so we wouldn't be late at 8:45am the next morning. Took like 10mins to get to Epcot. Thus, doing the math conservatively, I decided we needed to be leaving for Epcot by 7:45am. Pit stop at Mickey D's later, we're in Epcot's parking lot bright and early.
We wander over to Guest Relations and learn a simple fact that no one bothers to tell you - they don't care if you check in, just go sit near the sign. This is different then most tours I've been on at MK and DL where you had to either get a ticket or sign in at Guest Relations. For Backstage Magic, the most expensive and top end tour? Nope, sit your tush in the general vicinity of the sign, someone will come find you.
By 8:30 a small crowd had gathered in the general vinicty of the sign... far more people then would make for an intimate tour. Foo. Some of the folks were umm.. not my type. I know it's not just me - everyone has some other type of park guest that you pray you don't get stuck in a vehicle with or grouped with in some manner. By the grace of the heavens, a CM came out and asked us to divide up by which tour we were taking. It turns out the people I -did not- want to spend the next 7 hours with were going on the Epcot Garden tour, not my tour.
I did a little happy dance. I wonder if anyone noticed.
Everyone got signed in and we got a personal listening device with a little over-the-ear piece. The tours can have up to 20 people. We also got name tags with Mickey Mouse pushing his way into a mirror - through the looking glass. Neato.
Our tour guide was cool and quickly got us started.
We headed off into Epcot bypassing admission media and simply walking through a wheelchair/stroller gate. Did I mention this tour doesn't require admission?
Anywho, we paused for a moment to "discuss" the Epcot Garden tour: "Look, they made it 10 feet into the park and stopped at the first planter. That's going to be an 'exciting' tour, I can tell."
I like my tour guide.
Then we moved on past SSE and off to the right to the backstage gate near the potties. Last potty break for hours. We were thoroughly warned about using cameras backstage, the signifigance of our name tags was discussed, and we pushed through the looking glass and popped out backstage at Epcot.
Oo.. aah... ok this isn't terribly exciting. If you haven't seen the butt-side of the Living Seas i'll clue you in. It's big, it's brown, it's a warehouse building. We did note how close things were backstage despite the 10min walk it would of been onstage. Thankfully our bright yellow Mears Motor Coach awaited and we climbed in. We headed around the back of the Seas, Land, Imagination, and Soarin. Big ugly building.
Highlight: Scale Nautilus up on saw horses near the Land.
We went under the water bridge at the International Gateway. We saw the backside of Japan with the adjacent land all torn up. We saw inside Japan and it was clearly still used as a warehouse (bummer). We stopped at the American Adventure.
We went into the park, saw some trucks working on the park, and discussed 3rd shift work and how World Showcase can still be worked on while Future World was already open. We compared the height of ourselves to the doors over the American Adventure. We're short. Its tall. We noted the sloped walkways leading up the entrance to disguise the true height of the building.
We went around back. We talked about painted on and barely detailed adornment at the rear just above the tree line for the benefit of the resorts that can see it.
We went inside! Yay! Who knew all the scenes would be parked in neat little rows? I knew they went up and down, I just never figured they fit in neat little rows. Costuming and makeup/hair folks were attending to the animatronics. We learned how costumes were sewn to come off the AA's regardless of their welded postion. We learned about the real human hair used and the inventory of wigs - like 2 off stage for 1 onstage or something like that.
We saw little glow in the dark footprints on the ground to make sure maitenance folks don't walk in and kill themselves.
Back on the bus and over to Epcot Cast Services. We went through the heritage hallway with all the areas represented on panels painted by their own people. The maitenance one had Figment, fiber optic lights, and a motion tirgger for a speaker overhead that played the original attraction theme song. Cute.
We stood in the main hall and tried not to get run over. YOMD's lives here and none of the CMs seemed to care either. A nearby TV played clips of them giving out cheesy prizes and rewards for CMs as they went down the hall toward work. Sort of saying "Hey, look at this cool thing we did for you! All part of the YOMD's!" We're talking handing them roses and handfuls of candy. Yeah, i'm sure that's appreciated 5mins before you have to be onstage. The CM's recieving the prizes in the video looked less then thrilled. Noteably, none of the incoming CM's stopped to watch it. We were on a potty break so I watched it.
One wall was all about the history of Epcot, though decked out for YOMD's. It left me optimistic that something could occur for the 25th.
Off to Epcot costuming and an explination of the check-out process. Fun with barcodes. We toured through the racks breifly then went to see a small area where they worked on repairs and even checked out the inventory of buttons. We swung by wig sotrage and care and waved to the pretty princesses in their bloomers putting on their makeup in a special room.
On the bus again, underneath Test Track, and out of Epcot. A few mins later we were heading into MGM via the butt-side of Tower of Terror. We got our bags checked by a security CM, and we drove through the backside of MGM. We roamed past the rear of Toy Story Mania. It's big, it's hollow, it's an empty warehouse which is almost finished.
Off the bus and into the costume production facility. We learned how they create and design all the costumes for WDW, Cruiseline, and other areas. We saw the giant pattern-peice cutting machine and met the perfect stripe matching fabric folding woman. We saw all the seamstresses and waved to the Backlot Tour vehicle going through as we were on the other side of the glass. We pretty much learned the whole process of costume making. We even saw some meetings taking place and boardrooms with designs pinned up on the walls. Heck, we even saw a girl getting fitted.
I don't recall exactly how we got there, but we ended up inside MGM sort of near the entrance for the Backlot Tour. We trekked through the park and over to Mama Melrose - lunch time!
We were seated at 2 tables for 10 sort of in the back corner. We got salad and appetizer pizzas. Yummy. Then we got the main courses. Some chicken thing and a white sauce noodle thing with peas and a red sauce with mussles (in the shell, eww) and shrimp (double eww) that was shared around the table. Plentiful portions though. Then desert came and each end of the table got a plate with like 5 full desserts on it. We could of just each taken one, but instead we split things up. Very yummy.
I usually hate being forced into anything "family" style with people who are not my family, but the people I was with were enjoyable so it went well. I was most grateful those other people were on the Garden Tour.
Lunch over, out the backside of the restaurant, and onto the bus. Next stop WDW Florist. We walked through and saw magic in the making. Beautiful arrangements were being made and we went into flower storage and learned that roses give off a gas that browns other flowers. They hang things of anti-rose to suck it up. I'm allergic to everything but the place smelled wonderful. We saw the productiona area for events and such. They were making baskets with a Star Tours theme that had little Star Tour vehicles in them. We then went to the area where they make giftbaskets. Saw the inventory, saw storage.
Onto the big Holiday Services building. We tromped around the warehouse full of christmas stuff. We learned how they glue the tops on bulbs so they don't come undone. We saw the massive storage of various colored glass bulbs. We saw every type of fake tree known to man. We got to see them assembling some trees and making a giant garland. We got to see all the ornaments en masse and learned about the whole 5-year-theme policy and how they buy 5 years worth of replacements for everything. Also saw the giant icon trees in various pieces. Learned about their program to switch over to LED lighting and saw the millions of sparkles of glitter on the floor.
Did you know they hand make each and every bow?
Like a home depot of holiday stuff, bundles of decor for various resorts and locations are stacked on shelves - shrink wrapped of course. The names of the locations are scribbled with a sharpie on a little label that just stuck onto the industrial shelving.
After that, we drove off to the entertainment services thingy. Another big warehouse. It holds all of the setups for events and such. Did you know they have a giant elephant graveyard setup - incase you want that for your fairytale wedding. Saw all the various podiums, giant statues of characters, the collection of desks for talk shows... all that fun stuff. Big backdrops too and some flats. Made me feel good about my career in theater since I can do scenic painting as good as those flats.
Though it was interesting, the entertainment building was really just like a giant storage shop for any theater of film company - it just happened to hold stuff for Disney. To me it wasn't really new, but i can see how other people would find it neat.
We donned safety goggles and we headed across the way to the promised land - Central Shops. We got to go into fabrication and all those fun areas.
We started with an ascent of some stairs to an overlook thingy. We could see the machines all laid out, someone welding in the distance, and really we just took in the size of the place. Got told the story of how a newbie would be handed a fork then asked to reproduce it 6-8ft tall. The fabrication area is really giant industrial looking thing of machines and tools. Not exactly awe inspiring, but lots of metal.
Then we went downstairs and checked out the sort assembly area and animatronic/high pressure stuff area. We pushed some button on an animatronic, learned the difference between air and hydrolics, and saw some ride vehicles in various pieces and stages as they were being worked on.
Next was I would call shell-central. Essentially it's where they carve and forms and mold and cast and that fun stuff. Got to see some more vehicles in pieces, of particular interest a Spaceship Earth vehicle which had be hacked in some places to allow new vaccum formed pieces to be inserted for the refurbishment. Nifty. Also got to see the molds for elephant skin, and giant blocks of foam that they carve.
Around the corner and into the paint shop. Got to see some workbenches with various graphics ready to be done and learn about some of their paint processes. There were future DVC vans being painted in a multistep process. Essentially they buy regular vans, in white, and then paint them with multiple coats to get the unique look.
Ride vehicles spotted which were getting some sort of work somewhere in the shop include: spalsh mountain logs, snow white carriages (in the paint shop, getting the faux wood treatment), tea cup and sauver, primevil whirl vehicles, Spaceship Earth vehicle and audio/data box, HM buggies, DVC vans, and some Astro Orbitor rockets.
Saw some sort of kiosk thingy that had yet to be installed wherever it was going. A whole bunch of white boxes with screens on top, sorta like podium tables. Can't figure out what they were.
We also learned that the shop is responsible for all the parking trams, even the ones in Anaheim.
Eventually we headed outside and drove around the building to scope it out. Got to see the old Splashtacular t-rex from Epcot chilling outside the building. Off to Mk.
We parked backstage at MK behind the Bakery/Candy Shop area. We hopped out of the bus and headed into the park for a potty break on the walkway past Plaza Inn to Tomorrowland. Back to backstage, we then went down into the Utilidors. Down there we made a nice loop and got to trek around the whole mainstreet USA area. Nothing amazing really happened. We got to see the maps and also got to go past some areas of itnerest like the maitenance office thing and others.
Back upstairs we watch the parade. We had learned about the parade system while down in the utilidors. We got to see the magnets in the track that the vehicles register and then report back to the central PC. That was neat. Got to watch the whole cleanup after the parade and learn about the process.
Back to backstage and onto the bus. We did some Q/A and drove back to Epcot's bus drop off. Got our Mickey Through the Looking Glass pin.
All in all, a wonderful experience. I really recommend it. I really didn't realize the tim was flying - though 7 hours long it seemed short. Hope you liked this review and glimpse o the tour.
I went on the Backstage Magic tour, and I know some folks are interested in a recap and highlights.. so here we go
The night before (and I promise this is relevent and short - I loathe those "and we spent 5 hours at the airport at gate 26..." type trip reports) we plotted our route to Epcot at 8:45am. Priceline had landed us at the Radisson Worldgate. Where's that? That was my reaction too. It's actually on a road called "Maingate Lane" just off of I-4 and 192. Why's it called Maingate? I think it's because WDW's Entertainment and Theme Park Merchandise have their offices right there in bright purple buildings. If you cut through their parking lots, you pop out on a road that goes right to AK and the AKL. Nifty.
Thus we drove that route to check out how long it would take us to get to Epcot so we wouldn't be late at 8:45am the next morning. Took like 10mins to get to Epcot. Thus, doing the math conservatively, I decided we needed to be leaving for Epcot by 7:45am. Pit stop at Mickey D's later, we're in Epcot's parking lot bright and early.
We wander over to Guest Relations and learn a simple fact that no one bothers to tell you - they don't care if you check in, just go sit near the sign. This is different then most tours I've been on at MK and DL where you had to either get a ticket or sign in at Guest Relations. For Backstage Magic, the most expensive and top end tour? Nope, sit your tush in the general vicinity of the sign, someone will come find you.
By 8:30 a small crowd had gathered in the general vinicty of the sign... far more people then would make for an intimate tour. Foo. Some of the folks were umm.. not my type. I know it's not just me - everyone has some other type of park guest that you pray you don't get stuck in a vehicle with or grouped with in some manner. By the grace of the heavens, a CM came out and asked us to divide up by which tour we were taking. It turns out the people I -did not- want to spend the next 7 hours with were going on the Epcot Garden tour, not my tour.
I did a little happy dance. I wonder if anyone noticed.
Everyone got signed in and we got a personal listening device with a little over-the-ear piece. The tours can have up to 20 people. We also got name tags with Mickey Mouse pushing his way into a mirror - through the looking glass. Neato.
Our tour guide was cool and quickly got us started.
We headed off into Epcot bypassing admission media and simply walking through a wheelchair/stroller gate. Did I mention this tour doesn't require admission?
Anywho, we paused for a moment to "discuss" the Epcot Garden tour: "Look, they made it 10 feet into the park and stopped at the first planter. That's going to be an 'exciting' tour, I can tell."
I like my tour guide.
Then we moved on past SSE and off to the right to the backstage gate near the potties. Last potty break for hours. We were thoroughly warned about using cameras backstage, the signifigance of our name tags was discussed, and we pushed through the looking glass and popped out backstage at Epcot.
Oo.. aah... ok this isn't terribly exciting. If you haven't seen the butt-side of the Living Seas i'll clue you in. It's big, it's brown, it's a warehouse building. We did note how close things were backstage despite the 10min walk it would of been onstage. Thankfully our bright yellow Mears Motor Coach awaited and we climbed in. We headed around the back of the Seas, Land, Imagination, and Soarin. Big ugly building.
Highlight: Scale Nautilus up on saw horses near the Land.
We went under the water bridge at the International Gateway. We saw the backside of Japan with the adjacent land all torn up. We saw inside Japan and it was clearly still used as a warehouse (bummer). We stopped at the American Adventure.
We went into the park, saw some trucks working on the park, and discussed 3rd shift work and how World Showcase can still be worked on while Future World was already open. We compared the height of ourselves to the doors over the American Adventure. We're short. Its tall. We noted the sloped walkways leading up the entrance to disguise the true height of the building.
We went around back. We talked about painted on and barely detailed adornment at the rear just above the tree line for the benefit of the resorts that can see it.
We went inside! Yay! Who knew all the scenes would be parked in neat little rows? I knew they went up and down, I just never figured they fit in neat little rows. Costuming and makeup/hair folks were attending to the animatronics. We learned how costumes were sewn to come off the AA's regardless of their welded postion. We learned about the real human hair used and the inventory of wigs - like 2 off stage for 1 onstage or something like that.
We saw little glow in the dark footprints on the ground to make sure maitenance folks don't walk in and kill themselves.
Back on the bus and over to Epcot Cast Services. We went through the heritage hallway with all the areas represented on panels painted by their own people. The maitenance one had Figment, fiber optic lights, and a motion tirgger for a speaker overhead that played the original attraction theme song. Cute.
We stood in the main hall and tried not to get run over. YOMD's lives here and none of the CMs seemed to care either. A nearby TV played clips of them giving out cheesy prizes and rewards for CMs as they went down the hall toward work. Sort of saying "Hey, look at this cool thing we did for you! All part of the YOMD's!" We're talking handing them roses and handfuls of candy. Yeah, i'm sure that's appreciated 5mins before you have to be onstage. The CM's recieving the prizes in the video looked less then thrilled. Noteably, none of the incoming CM's stopped to watch it. We were on a potty break so I watched it.
One wall was all about the history of Epcot, though decked out for YOMD's. It left me optimistic that something could occur for the 25th.
Off to Epcot costuming and an explination of the check-out process. Fun with barcodes. We toured through the racks breifly then went to see a small area where they worked on repairs and even checked out the inventory of buttons. We swung by wig sotrage and care and waved to the pretty princesses in their bloomers putting on their makeup in a special room.
On the bus again, underneath Test Track, and out of Epcot. A few mins later we were heading into MGM via the butt-side of Tower of Terror. We got our bags checked by a security CM, and we drove through the backside of MGM. We roamed past the rear of Toy Story Mania. It's big, it's hollow, it's an empty warehouse which is almost finished.
Off the bus and into the costume production facility. We learned how they create and design all the costumes for WDW, Cruiseline, and other areas. We saw the giant pattern-peice cutting machine and met the perfect stripe matching fabric folding woman. We saw all the seamstresses and waved to the Backlot Tour vehicle going through as we were on the other side of the glass. We pretty much learned the whole process of costume making. We even saw some meetings taking place and boardrooms with designs pinned up on the walls. Heck, we even saw a girl getting fitted.
I don't recall exactly how we got there, but we ended up inside MGM sort of near the entrance for the Backlot Tour. We trekked through the park and over to Mama Melrose - lunch time!
We were seated at 2 tables for 10 sort of in the back corner. We got salad and appetizer pizzas. Yummy. Then we got the main courses. Some chicken thing and a white sauce noodle thing with peas and a red sauce with mussles (in the shell, eww) and shrimp (double eww) that was shared around the table. Plentiful portions though. Then desert came and each end of the table got a plate with like 5 full desserts on it. We could of just each taken one, but instead we split things up. Very yummy.
I usually hate being forced into anything "family" style with people who are not my family, but the people I was with were enjoyable so it went well. I was most grateful those other people were on the Garden Tour.
Lunch over, out the backside of the restaurant, and onto the bus. Next stop WDW Florist. We walked through and saw magic in the making. Beautiful arrangements were being made and we went into flower storage and learned that roses give off a gas that browns other flowers. They hang things of anti-rose to suck it up. I'm allergic to everything but the place smelled wonderful. We saw the productiona area for events and such. They were making baskets with a Star Tours theme that had little Star Tour vehicles in them. We then went to the area where they make giftbaskets. Saw the inventory, saw storage.
Onto the big Holiday Services building. We tromped around the warehouse full of christmas stuff. We learned how they glue the tops on bulbs so they don't come undone. We saw the massive storage of various colored glass bulbs. We saw every type of fake tree known to man. We got to see them assembling some trees and making a giant garland. We got to see all the ornaments en masse and learned about the whole 5-year-theme policy and how they buy 5 years worth of replacements for everything. Also saw the giant icon trees in various pieces. Learned about their program to switch over to LED lighting and saw the millions of sparkles of glitter on the floor.
Did you know they hand make each and every bow?
Like a home depot of holiday stuff, bundles of decor for various resorts and locations are stacked on shelves - shrink wrapped of course. The names of the locations are scribbled with a sharpie on a little label that just stuck onto the industrial shelving.
After that, we drove off to the entertainment services thingy. Another big warehouse. It holds all of the setups for events and such. Did you know they have a giant elephant graveyard setup - incase you want that for your fairytale wedding. Saw all the various podiums, giant statues of characters, the collection of desks for talk shows... all that fun stuff. Big backdrops too and some flats. Made me feel good about my career in theater since I can do scenic painting as good as those flats.
Though it was interesting, the entertainment building was really just like a giant storage shop for any theater of film company - it just happened to hold stuff for Disney. To me it wasn't really new, but i can see how other people would find it neat.
We donned safety goggles and we headed across the way to the promised land - Central Shops. We got to go into fabrication and all those fun areas.
We started with an ascent of some stairs to an overlook thingy. We could see the machines all laid out, someone welding in the distance, and really we just took in the size of the place. Got told the story of how a newbie would be handed a fork then asked to reproduce it 6-8ft tall. The fabrication area is really giant industrial looking thing of machines and tools. Not exactly awe inspiring, but lots of metal.
Then we went downstairs and checked out the sort assembly area and animatronic/high pressure stuff area. We pushed some button on an animatronic, learned the difference between air and hydrolics, and saw some ride vehicles in various pieces and stages as they were being worked on.
Next was I would call shell-central. Essentially it's where they carve and forms and mold and cast and that fun stuff. Got to see some more vehicles in pieces, of particular interest a Spaceship Earth vehicle which had be hacked in some places to allow new vaccum formed pieces to be inserted for the refurbishment. Nifty. Also got to see the molds for elephant skin, and giant blocks of foam that they carve.
Around the corner and into the paint shop. Got to see some workbenches with various graphics ready to be done and learn about some of their paint processes. There were future DVC vans being painted in a multistep process. Essentially they buy regular vans, in white, and then paint them with multiple coats to get the unique look.
Ride vehicles spotted which were getting some sort of work somewhere in the shop include: spalsh mountain logs, snow white carriages (in the paint shop, getting the faux wood treatment), tea cup and sauver, primevil whirl vehicles, Spaceship Earth vehicle and audio/data box, HM buggies, DVC vans, and some Astro Orbitor rockets.
Saw some sort of kiosk thingy that had yet to be installed wherever it was going. A whole bunch of white boxes with screens on top, sorta like podium tables. Can't figure out what they were.
We also learned that the shop is responsible for all the parking trams, even the ones in Anaheim.
Eventually we headed outside and drove around the building to scope it out. Got to see the old Splashtacular t-rex from Epcot chilling outside the building. Off to Mk.
We parked backstage at MK behind the Bakery/Candy Shop area. We hopped out of the bus and headed into the park for a potty break on the walkway past Plaza Inn to Tomorrowland. Back to backstage, we then went down into the Utilidors. Down there we made a nice loop and got to trek around the whole mainstreet USA area. Nothing amazing really happened. We got to see the maps and also got to go past some areas of itnerest like the maitenance office thing and others.
Back upstairs we watch the parade. We had learned about the parade system while down in the utilidors. We got to see the magnets in the track that the vehicles register and then report back to the central PC. That was neat. Got to watch the whole cleanup after the parade and learn about the process.
Back to backstage and onto the bus. We did some Q/A and drove back to Epcot's bus drop off. Got our Mickey Through the Looking Glass pin.
All in all, a wonderful experience. I really recommend it. I really didn't realize the tim was flying - though 7 hours long it seemed short. Hope you liked this review and glimpse o the tour.
