Hoping we had digested our food well enough, we redeemed our FP’s for ToT. Here’s the only clone from WDW so far that was different. So different, in fact, that it threw me off. The queue is the same, the video is the same, but the room right after that was different and I liked it better actually. It was massive and was two stories whereas the one in WDW is much smaller with only one floor of loading elevators. Once on the ride, there were many differences. In WDW, the order is: 1) Doors open and you see the ghosts of the 5 (or 6? can’t remember) people who died 2) Doors close and the elevator goes somewhere else 3) Doors open and the elevator travels down a tunnel and then eventually drops. At DCA the order is: 1) Doors open and you see your own silhouette in the mirror 2) Doors close and the elevator goes somewhere else 3) Doors open and you see the ghosts of the people who died and then it drops. I hope that all makes sense, I didn’t know how else to describe that. So when the elevator dropped at DCA, I was not expecting that at all. I was expecting another room. I can’t say which one I like better since they are similar but they are both great.
After a debate about not wanting to get wet, we finally were all convinced to ride Grizzly River Rapids. Glad we did, it was a fun ride. My favorite part was this guy
Since we were nearby, we picked up FP’s for Soarin’. Now that we’ve done pretty much every ride already and it was only like 3 PM, we went over to the Blue Sky Cellar and the Bakery Tour. Blue Sky Cellar was nice but since it was only focused on the Fantasyland Faire, we didn’t spend much time there because I couldn’t care less about that project. The only thing interesting to me was the planning part of a project because a lot of it was very similar to Marketing (my major). The aspects of finding what the park needed and what people would want this in the park is all part of Marketing Research, and I find that to be so interesting. In fact, I hope to be conducting that market research for Disney in the future as a career!
Although the Bakery Tour itself isn’t wildly entertaining, I’m a huge fan of Colin Mochrie and he was amusing as one of the two tour guides. Also, watching the bread made me want to eat bread so we bought two loaves of sourdough and enjoyed it thoroughly. In my opinion, there is no better food than a great piece of bread.
Went back to ride Soarin’. It’s the same attraction as at EPCOT except with a much better queue. The queue at EPCOT is awful, but I’ll get back on topic. Soarin’ is always a great ride, especially with Patrick Warburton as the narrator of the video. I felt like there were more scents at DCA than at EPCOT but maybe not, who knows.
After Soarin’, we went and did Goofy’s Sky School which is the average “Wild Mouse” ride you can find at any amusement park. Next, I found Woody tucked away in the corner of the park and there was no one else around so I got a picture with him.
He made us reach for the sky
Mickey’s Fun Wheel, or as I like to call it, Mickey’s Wheel O’ Death was our next stop. Obviously we had to ride on the swinging carts and it was terrifyingly fun. It added a little more fun to an otherwise terribly boring Ferris wheel ride.
Unfortunately, Aladdin was not showing that day or else we would have gone to see it since we had now done all the rides that we wanted to do. With time to kill, we headed over to the Animation Courtyard and did everything there was to do there. Turtle Talk with Crush is always funny, although now that I’m older, it bothers me how the actor did not sound like Crush at all but who am I to judge?
The Toy Story Zeotrope blew us all away. I think we stayed watching that thing for 20 minutes. So amazing! Whoever made that is a genius. We had some fun in the Sorcerer’s Workshop (apparently I’m most like Peter Pan, I don’t hate that comparison) and made some Disney characters say some un-Disney-like words in Ursula’s Lair. If you don’t know what I’m referring to, it’s an area where you can voice-over a multitude of Disney scenes and/or songs. It’s really fun, especially when you have an immature sense of humor and when you’re the only people in the area!
Animation Academy kept us waiting and we were about to leave when finally the next show started. We drew the main guy from Frankenweenie, which is a movie I never got a chance to see. Mine turned out alright though
One other thing to note about this area was that I was happy to see they still had some references to Hercules in the Sorcerer’s Workshop. Hercules is and most likely always will be my favorite Disney animated movie.
With time to kill before World of Color (which we had gotten Blue FP’s for), we went exploring in Cars Land and waited an hour to ride RSR in the dark. Although the wait was long, it was well-worth it to see Ornament Valley lit up like it is. It’s breathtaking, really.
It was about 7:45 PM when we got off of RSR and so we walked to Paradise Bay to get decent spots for the 8:15 show. We maneuvered our way up to the front boardwalk area where it’s the “you will get wet” area. We didn’t care; we now were front row for this awesome show. And when I use the word awesome, I literally mean “full of awe”. Everything about the show was just jaw-droppingly amazing and I got the chills multiple times, which may or not have been from the cold water splashing up on me but I hope it was from the quality of the show.
After WoC, we ordered a pizza to go at Napolini in DTD and brought it back to our hotel room. The pepperoni pizza was absolutely delicious. A great way to end the day. After watching some TV, we were out cold by 11 PM, resting up for a long and chaotic day at Disneyland the next day.
Overall, I absolutely loved DCA. We could have finished all of the major attractions with ease by 3 PM but we took our time and enjoyed almost everything the park had to offer. I have to say, I think it’s probably my second favorite Disney park, behind the Magic Kingdom at WDW. I know, it’s probably so weird for you locals to hear that, but I honestly had a fantastic time at the park. The theme and the environment were just so great and the rides were incredibly enjoyable. It probably helped that the parks were relatively empty, because we didn’t wait more than a half-hour for anything at all.
Besides the rides, I loved the shows that spontaneously occurred at many different places. In the main circle of the park, they had the Newsboys and the Five and a Dime. I didn’t care for Five and a Dime but I loved, loved, loved the Newsboys for many different reasons. I am in love with the Broadway show and movie Newsies and have been in love with the movie for about 8 years now. The Newsboys were obviously based off of Newsies and they sang the song “Seize the Day” form the musical, which put the widest smile on my face. Also, they sang “Make ‘Em Laugh” which holds so many great memories for me since I played Cosmo Brown for my high school’s production of Singin’ in the Rain my senior year of high school. In addition to these shows, I noticed Minnie’s Fly Girls and some Green Army Men show over by Goofy’s Sky School. Team Disney Anaheim has really made this park great and has made it a place I will go out of my way to make a return trip back to.
Coming up later this week will be my report on Disneyland. I don’t have the best writing skills and I know I ramble on a lot so thanks for reading and stay tuned for more!
P.S. If you're interested, here's me performing Make 'Em Laugh. My high school's theater was kind of a big deal, our theater held about 1200 people every night!
. Soundsational is an amazing parade if you like parades even a little you might want to check it out. DL parades blow WDW parades out of the water for the most part. Also DL has AMAZING fireworks! Better then Wishes by a mile IMO.
