The cast: Myself and my girlfriend, Beka.
Date taken: March 22nd – March 26th, 2007
Lodging: All Star Movies
Ticket type: 4-day Park hopper (Magic Your Way)
Day 1 (March 22nd) Arrival:
Flew into MCO around 10:00 am. This was the first time I was signed up for Disney’s Magical Express, and I have to say that it definitely beats renting a car. I usually rent since I go other non-Disney places, but this time, I planned to make the trip 100% Disney. We got to the airport and got to skip baggage claim which was great. We checked in at the Magical Express desk (next to the car rental desks). Showed them our passes and we were on the bus in a matter of minutes. We didn’t get the intro video because we rode in on a Disney Cruise Line bus, but I wasn’t too worried. This was my 5th visit to Disney, but Beka’s first visit. By the time we were on the trip, I had already given her most of the veteran tips and even got her a good starting set up for pin trading. She’s really into dogs and really wanted a room in the 101 Dalmations building. We put a comment about it on the initial booking form as well as when we called about the room/check in. Sure enough, when we got there to check in, the cast member said, “You’ve received an upgrade to a premium room.” I asked, “What building ?” He replied, “101 Dalmations.” Beka had a big grin on her face. We got there before normal check in time, but the CM said it was no problem and that our bags would be in the room once it was assigned. In the meantime, we could go enjoy the parks. We got our Keys to the Kingdom (room key/park ticket/catch all card) and checked in an additional bag to be taken to the room so we didn’t have to carry it around. We headed over to the Magic Kingdom first.
Day 1 – Magic Kingdom/Animal Kingdom/DisneyQuest:
Since I’m used to going in September in the off-season, it seemed crowded to me. Was still better than any summer crowd, but I really enjoy how you can pretty much walk straight up to the rides in September. We arrived at the park around noon. We decided to go by Pirates of the Caribbean first. The wait time displayed was about 40 mins. Time flew pretty quickly as the rehabbed queue setup was new to me. I’ve loved Pirates since I was about 7 years old so I was excited to see the new changes. Was weird having two pathways to the ride now. The right side seems to be the original path, the left side seemed new to me. The changes were not huge. The mist curtain with Davy Jones and the addition of Barbosa and Sparrow in various places was pretty much the extent of it. One huge difference is the air blown out of the cannons from the Wicked Wench. The second time we rode the ride we had an air blast nail us in the face. Almost hurt it hit so hard. Definitely felt like a cannon ball was wizzing by. The only thing I wasn’t too big on was how the end treasure room was completely taken out and the new more closed off “Sparrow” treasure room was put in. I wish the Aztec chest was placed in a more prominent position and I miss the whole drunken pirate pointing his gun at you and shooting right at the end. I remember as a kid having that part of the ride freak me out a bit. Haunted Mansion went much faster and had only a 10 min wait. I went fairly smooth, only one stop that was due to a family that couldn’t get organized and loaded in time. After that we hit Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain. We got a Fast Pass for Big Thunder and waited in the 40 min wait line for Splash. 40 mins in the Splash line goes much slower than it does in Pirates. They should work on a better pre-show or something for that. Splash Mountain had two stops during the ride. Not sure why – one took about 3-4 mins before it got restarted. I never had to use Fast Pass before, so this was my first time (never needed it in the off season). It was great. When we returned to Big Thunder, it took about 6-7 mins and we were on the ride (versus the 50 min standby wait time). We got the I.M Brave engine. BTM still rates high on my list of MK rides. After that we decided to try and hit Philharmagic. We managed to get in right at the show start, so there was no wait at all. Was great as usual. In between these rides, we were slowly upgrading our “trade” pins (we got a bulk pack from pinfinder.com so we had a few pins we didn’t want on our lanyards at all). Tons of those “cute” series characters on the lanyards right now. I’m a villain (mainly Maleficent)/pirate/haunted mansion collector, so the pickings were slim for me. Beka started to focus on Pluto and 101 Dalmations, and of course, Nightmare Before Christmas (she’s a huge collector of that in general). After that we attempted to go to Space Mountain. It had an 80 min wait and the FastPass time was really late, so we saved it for another day. We headed over to the Tea Party ride. We managed to spin ourselves silly and were a bit dizzy after that. We headed over to Stitch’s Great Escape and got right in. Beka was feeling a bit sick so I don’t think she got the full experience of that ride. I still like it, despite the fact a lot of people don’t. I do think it has more potential. It needs to be “plussed” a bit more. Beka went to trade for a mystery pin and ended up with a nice surprise. The cast member gave her a “dream” prize and she got two exclusive Tinkerbell pins for free. We got done there and headed over to Cosmic Ray’s for a bite to eat. I tried the Corned Beef – not bad. The Sonny Eclipse show was cheesy and funny as usual. It’s better than just sitting there listening to crowd noise. After that, it was off to Animal Kingdom for a bit. We took the bus ride there and got there in about 20 mins. We hit Dinosaur first. Was only a 20 min wait. After that, we went on the Primeval Whirl (10 min standby), then hit the Kali River Rapids. I managed to get the back of my shirt fairly wet, but was dry past that. Was a nice refresher (while I was outside). We grabbed some popcorn and hung out with some birds on a stone bench behind one of the food stands (near the White Stork pen). It’s a great place to hang out if you want some of the local wildlife to hit you up for food. Some more people showed up with some turkey legs and a large bird came down for some. He started getting pretty bold after awhile and was a few steps short of taking the turkey leg right out of their hands. It was pretty funny. After that, we headed over to “It’s Tough to be a Bug.” The last part always cracks me up – mainly from the crowd reaction (I won’t spoil it for anyone who has never done it). We decided to head back to the resort, check our room and change into dry clothes. We got back and all the bags were there and the cast members left a Mickey head made of towels on one of our beds. We changed and headed over to Downtown Disney. It was almost 10 by the time we got to DisneyQuest. We were told they were going to close at midnight, but the sign said 11pm. We decided to go in anyway. We got the late night rate (half price) and hit a couple of rounds of the Buzz Lightyear bumper cars and the Pirates game. We started messing with the recording studio stuff, but they turned it all off shortly after 11. We headed back to the room and got some much needed rest.
Day 2 Epcot/Magic Kingdom/MGM Studios
A little fuzzy on what all we did on this day, but here’s what I can remember. We started the day at Epcot. We didn’t get there at opening, we were a bit tired, but got there shortly thereafter. We went over to Test Track and it was already a 40 min wait. We grabbed a Fast Pass and went over to Mission Space. We went to the Orange line (same as the original setup – with the spinning and all) and only waited about 5 mins. Got in there and it was just as much fun as always. Got out and headed over to Test Track. The Fast Pass line got us into the preshow within 3 mins or so. We rode that and then decided to go make our reservations for the Biergarten (my fav place in WDW to eat). We got our reservations and decided to relax on Spaceship Earth for awhile. The ride got stopped once right under the Michaelangelo part. After that, we killed some time in the World Showcase. Here’s a little tip for you pin traders: in the Outpost shop (the sorta generic Africa section in World Showcase), when we talked to someone about pin trading, they pulled out a board. Basically, we had to give them a pin to trade without seeing the board. We then had 30 seconds to pick something off the board or he was going to pick something for us. Was a neat little game. I then proceeded in playing on the bongo drums that were there. I did ok I guess since a few people actually thought I was a cast member doing a performance. We headed over to eat at Biergarten which is ALWAYS nice. Yummy. The show was great as well and we had a short conversation with the other guests at the table about pin trading. For those that have it in their budget, I highly suggest getting into pin trading. It offers a completely different Disney experience for guests. You get to socialize more and feel like part of a more exclusive “club” of guests and cast members. It’s a lot of fun – it’s not just about the pins, but the experience in general. We were going to Soarin, but the wait time was around 80 mins, so we skipped that and headed back to MK. On the way out of Epcot, we stopped at the pin stand out there. We ended up getting a “Magical Moment,” from the cast member there. He had a game called the Mystical Pin Quandry. He had a covered board and we traded a pin and then had a few seconds to pick a number. I managed to get one of the Haunted Mansion cast lanyard pins I was trying to find for awhile now. He also gave us certificates to commemorate the moment. We hopped on Pirates again (wait time was only about 10 mins) and Haunted Mansion again as well. We got stuck in a lot of crowds, mainly due to parades and marching bands. Had another great pin trading experience. There was a cast member that had some decent pins and I told him how I was trying to complete the pirate cast lanyard series pins (the 3 pin set with the flag, chest and wheel). I needed the chest. He said, give me one min, just wait here. I waited and he came back with the chest pin I needed. Was nice of him to go get his “pirate stash” as he called it, for me. We then headed over to MGM to hit Villains in Vogue and Tower of Terror. Villains is by far my favorite shop at MK. Grabbed some stuff from there and took a quick ride on ToT before getting some seats for Fantasmic. Fantasmic was great, but they seemed to have some issues with the torches on the canoes during the Pocahontas section. I was just happy that the dragon was working ok. After that it was back to the room to crash out. When we got back, I went to close the window and noticed the cast members had left a little more towel art for us. There was an Easter basket with 2 chicks (or maybe one chick and one baby duck) and a rabbit all made from towels (with some pipe cleaners for ribbon and some stickers for eyes). It was sitting in the window. I put it on top of our TV. I also turned the Mickey towel art into a smiley face for the cast members.
Day 3 MGM Studios/Magic Kingdom/Downtown Disney
There was a morning Extra Magic Hour at MGM this day, so we started the day there. We hit the Aerosmith Rockin Roller Coaster first. It was a 30 min wait as soon as we got there, but it was more like 20. It was great and we immediately went to Tower of Terror after that. We had fast passed the ToT so we got right in. It was fun (one of my favorite rides at WDW) as always. After that we headed over to the Sounds Dangerous with Drew Carey thing. It was ok, but I think the could’ve done more with it. We avoided the High School Musical Pep Rally (sorry, not my thing) and ducked into the Great Movie Ride. Was good, but the gangster actor seemed a bit bored. The driver was great, though. Headed over to Star Tours and saw the wait was awhile, so we grabbed a Fast Pass and went over to Muppet Vision 3D. I’m a huge Muppet fan, so I loved it. It wasn’t crowded at all, which was weird for once. Especially since I’ve seen another report from the same time period saying it was packed. Everything seemed to work fine. Beka was crushed when she stepped out and realized she had lost one of her Stitch pins along the way. We tried to look but couldn’t find it. We headed over to Star Tours and rode it. Afterwards, we grabbed a bite to eat at the Sci-Fi. We headed over to the Backlot tour after that. Once we got off, we went to trade with a cast member by the exit. During the conversation we had mentioned Beka losing her pin. He said, “That’s really sad especially when you are a pin trader.” He then pulled out a book and wrote her a certificate for a free pin. He said we could take it to any store and get any one pin she wanted. She grabbed a Nightmare Before Christmas pin that she had her eye on. Needless to say that made up for the missing Stitch pin, which, coincidentally, I managed to get another one of by trading with a CM as we were leaving MGM. After all was said and done, it worked out great. Tired, we decided to take a break at our room. We grabbed a few hours of rest. We then returned to MK. We tried to hit Space Mountain again and it was down for technical difficulties. We rode Pirates one more time and went back and the wait time was 80 mins. We decided to head over to Downtown Disney to hit the pin store there and maybe catch some traders. We found that you can’t hit Downtown Disney with the buses from any of the theme parks. Since we were at MK we decided we could take the Monorail to the Contemporary and wait for a bus there. BIG mistake. Here’s some advice. If you want to get there within a reasonable amount of time, hit one of the value resorts (All stars or Pop Century). It took about 30 mins before a bus showed up and it had to hit the Polynesian on the way as well. We talked to a CM about it later and he said that the value resorts have the best bus system. We got there pretty late and there were only a couple of pin traders there and most of them were packing up so they were not that interested in trading. We did manage to trade with a few CM for some good pins. We ate at Earl of Sandwich which was quite tasty. We headed back to the room and thought about our last full day at Disney.
Day 4 Animal Kingdom/Magic Kingdom/Epcot/MGM Studios/Downtown Disney
We started the day at Animal Kingdom so we could hit Expedition Everest early. By the time we got there it was already a 40 min wait. We grabbed a Fast Pass and headed back to Dinosaur. We rode that and hit Primeval Whirl again. After that we went to the Kali Rapids again – mainly because we forgot to get our VMK quest sheet stamped the last time we were there. I got majorly soaked this time. I was quite cold for a good portion of the day. We went over to ride Everest and had a blast. My only complaint is that once you are on the mountain, you seem to lose a sense of how high up you actually are. It seems they should’ve spent some time putting some of the track on the outer side of the mountain so you could really feel the height. That thing does look quite huge from the outside. We got off and decided we wanted one more time on it before leaving, so we hit the standby line. After riding again, we went over to Flame Tree BBQ. Once again, very yummy food. There were some ducks there that were not shy at all. They would eat from your hands and were going under everyone’s tables to get scraps. After that it was back to Epcot. We ran over to Mission Space for another ride on there. The standby time was nothing. We were going to hit Test Track again, but the wait time and Fast Pass time was too long. We did a bit more pin trading and were going to hit Club Cool (oh yeah, we did do that on day 2), but were a few minutes late and it closed. We decided there wasn’t much else to do (Soarin wait time was still insane), so headed over to Magic Kingdom. On the way out, we went to the stand again and got asked to play the game again. We did the game and got an entirely different “Magical Moment” certificate. We hit Pirates yet again (told you, I love that ride) and also hit Big Thunder one more time with a fast pass we got before hitting Pirates. Haunted Mansion’s wait time was too long so we decided to head over to Space Mountain. It said there was a 40 min wait time, but it only took about 20. After that, we were going to go on the Astro Orbiters but the wait time was 40 mins and that ride is not worth a 40 min wait to me. We got stuck waiting on the SpectroMagic parade and after that headed over to MGM Studios for a last shot at Tower of Terror. We got there and the wait time was maybe 10 mins (said 20 on the board). We rode it with some girls bragging that they were on their 49th time. We got on the ride right away and afterwards saw that hardly anyone was there since everyone was getting ready for Fantasmic. We decided not to catch the other fireworks shows since I’m a professional pyrotechnician so I already get to see plenty of fireworks shows first hand. We managed to get straight on the ride and the cast members were more casual this time. They were all joking around. On the pre-show the two girls were there again. They were putting on the bell hop hat from the cast member and the cast member was talking with the video towards the end. He talked over the video at the end changing the last line to this elevator goes “…directly to – the gift shop.” We all laughed and headed for the elevators. Two really annoying guys were in front of us and headed for one side, so we picked the other. Apparently, we were the only ones and the cast member let us have a car to ourselves. I talked to the CM about the Disney College Program (which I’ll be doing in about a year) and he said it was great and I should enjoy it a lot. My ultimate goal is to get on board the Imagineering team. Anyway, we rode it and then headed back to Downtown Disney for some last minute pin trading/shopping. We got there and I picked up the Imagineering book and did some last minute trades. We got back to the resort and sadly returned to our room for the last time. The Magical Express info was on our door waiting for us. We packed our bags and got everything ready for our flight back home.
Day 5 – the return home
We did the airline check-in at the resort so we got to check our bags there and didn’t have to carry them with us to the airport (and also got our boarding passes and all that there). We got on the bus and watched the departure video. The amount of time they brought us back in was perfect and gave us just enough time to get into the airport, grab a bite to eat and then get to the gate with little waiting time. The flight was rough, but uneventful and we got home sad to leave Disney behind us. Needless to say, now my focus is to hit the books and get everything geared up to start the Disney College Program soon. It was exhausting but a lot of fun and I can’t wait to actually work there.
Date taken: March 22nd – March 26th, 2007
Lodging: All Star Movies
Ticket type: 4-day Park hopper (Magic Your Way)
Day 1 (March 22nd) Arrival:
Flew into MCO around 10:00 am. This was the first time I was signed up for Disney’s Magical Express, and I have to say that it definitely beats renting a car. I usually rent since I go other non-Disney places, but this time, I planned to make the trip 100% Disney. We got to the airport and got to skip baggage claim which was great. We checked in at the Magical Express desk (next to the car rental desks). Showed them our passes and we were on the bus in a matter of minutes. We didn’t get the intro video because we rode in on a Disney Cruise Line bus, but I wasn’t too worried. This was my 5th visit to Disney, but Beka’s first visit. By the time we were on the trip, I had already given her most of the veteran tips and even got her a good starting set up for pin trading. She’s really into dogs and really wanted a room in the 101 Dalmations building. We put a comment about it on the initial booking form as well as when we called about the room/check in. Sure enough, when we got there to check in, the cast member said, “You’ve received an upgrade to a premium room.” I asked, “What building ?” He replied, “101 Dalmations.” Beka had a big grin on her face. We got there before normal check in time, but the CM said it was no problem and that our bags would be in the room once it was assigned. In the meantime, we could go enjoy the parks. We got our Keys to the Kingdom (room key/park ticket/catch all card) and checked in an additional bag to be taken to the room so we didn’t have to carry it around. We headed over to the Magic Kingdom first.
Day 1 – Magic Kingdom/Animal Kingdom/DisneyQuest:
Since I’m used to going in September in the off-season, it seemed crowded to me. Was still better than any summer crowd, but I really enjoy how you can pretty much walk straight up to the rides in September. We arrived at the park around noon. We decided to go by Pirates of the Caribbean first. The wait time displayed was about 40 mins. Time flew pretty quickly as the rehabbed queue setup was new to me. I’ve loved Pirates since I was about 7 years old so I was excited to see the new changes. Was weird having two pathways to the ride now. The right side seems to be the original path, the left side seemed new to me. The changes were not huge. The mist curtain with Davy Jones and the addition of Barbosa and Sparrow in various places was pretty much the extent of it. One huge difference is the air blown out of the cannons from the Wicked Wench. The second time we rode the ride we had an air blast nail us in the face. Almost hurt it hit so hard. Definitely felt like a cannon ball was wizzing by. The only thing I wasn’t too big on was how the end treasure room was completely taken out and the new more closed off “Sparrow” treasure room was put in. I wish the Aztec chest was placed in a more prominent position and I miss the whole drunken pirate pointing his gun at you and shooting right at the end. I remember as a kid having that part of the ride freak me out a bit. Haunted Mansion went much faster and had only a 10 min wait. I went fairly smooth, only one stop that was due to a family that couldn’t get organized and loaded in time. After that we hit Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Mountain. We got a Fast Pass for Big Thunder and waited in the 40 min wait line for Splash. 40 mins in the Splash line goes much slower than it does in Pirates. They should work on a better pre-show or something for that. Splash Mountain had two stops during the ride. Not sure why – one took about 3-4 mins before it got restarted. I never had to use Fast Pass before, so this was my first time (never needed it in the off season). It was great. When we returned to Big Thunder, it took about 6-7 mins and we were on the ride (versus the 50 min standby wait time). We got the I.M Brave engine. BTM still rates high on my list of MK rides. After that we decided to try and hit Philharmagic. We managed to get in right at the show start, so there was no wait at all. Was great as usual. In between these rides, we were slowly upgrading our “trade” pins (we got a bulk pack from pinfinder.com so we had a few pins we didn’t want on our lanyards at all). Tons of those “cute” series characters on the lanyards right now. I’m a villain (mainly Maleficent)/pirate/haunted mansion collector, so the pickings were slim for me. Beka started to focus on Pluto and 101 Dalmations, and of course, Nightmare Before Christmas (she’s a huge collector of that in general). After that we attempted to go to Space Mountain. It had an 80 min wait and the FastPass time was really late, so we saved it for another day. We headed over to the Tea Party ride. We managed to spin ourselves silly and were a bit dizzy after that. We headed over to Stitch’s Great Escape and got right in. Beka was feeling a bit sick so I don’t think she got the full experience of that ride. I still like it, despite the fact a lot of people don’t. I do think it has more potential. It needs to be “plussed” a bit more. Beka went to trade for a mystery pin and ended up with a nice surprise. The cast member gave her a “dream” prize and she got two exclusive Tinkerbell pins for free. We got done there and headed over to Cosmic Ray’s for a bite to eat. I tried the Corned Beef – not bad. The Sonny Eclipse show was cheesy and funny as usual. It’s better than just sitting there listening to crowd noise. After that, it was off to Animal Kingdom for a bit. We took the bus ride there and got there in about 20 mins. We hit Dinosaur first. Was only a 20 min wait. After that, we went on the Primeval Whirl (10 min standby), then hit the Kali River Rapids. I managed to get the back of my shirt fairly wet, but was dry past that. Was a nice refresher (while I was outside). We grabbed some popcorn and hung out with some birds on a stone bench behind one of the food stands (near the White Stork pen). It’s a great place to hang out if you want some of the local wildlife to hit you up for food. Some more people showed up with some turkey legs and a large bird came down for some. He started getting pretty bold after awhile and was a few steps short of taking the turkey leg right out of their hands. It was pretty funny. After that, we headed over to “It’s Tough to be a Bug.” The last part always cracks me up – mainly from the crowd reaction (I won’t spoil it for anyone who has never done it). We decided to head back to the resort, check our room and change into dry clothes. We got back and all the bags were there and the cast members left a Mickey head made of towels on one of our beds. We changed and headed over to Downtown Disney. It was almost 10 by the time we got to DisneyQuest. We were told they were going to close at midnight, but the sign said 11pm. We decided to go in anyway. We got the late night rate (half price) and hit a couple of rounds of the Buzz Lightyear bumper cars and the Pirates game. We started messing with the recording studio stuff, but they turned it all off shortly after 11. We headed back to the room and got some much needed rest.
Day 2 Epcot/Magic Kingdom/MGM Studios
A little fuzzy on what all we did on this day, but here’s what I can remember. We started the day at Epcot. We didn’t get there at opening, we were a bit tired, but got there shortly thereafter. We went over to Test Track and it was already a 40 min wait. We grabbed a Fast Pass and went over to Mission Space. We went to the Orange line (same as the original setup – with the spinning and all) and only waited about 5 mins. Got in there and it was just as much fun as always. Got out and headed over to Test Track. The Fast Pass line got us into the preshow within 3 mins or so. We rode that and then decided to go make our reservations for the Biergarten (my fav place in WDW to eat). We got our reservations and decided to relax on Spaceship Earth for awhile. The ride got stopped once right under the Michaelangelo part. After that, we killed some time in the World Showcase. Here’s a little tip for you pin traders: in the Outpost shop (the sorta generic Africa section in World Showcase), when we talked to someone about pin trading, they pulled out a board. Basically, we had to give them a pin to trade without seeing the board. We then had 30 seconds to pick something off the board or he was going to pick something for us. Was a neat little game. I then proceeded in playing on the bongo drums that were there. I did ok I guess since a few people actually thought I was a cast member doing a performance. We headed over to eat at Biergarten which is ALWAYS nice. Yummy. The show was great as well and we had a short conversation with the other guests at the table about pin trading. For those that have it in their budget, I highly suggest getting into pin trading. It offers a completely different Disney experience for guests. You get to socialize more and feel like part of a more exclusive “club” of guests and cast members. It’s a lot of fun – it’s not just about the pins, but the experience in general. We were going to Soarin, but the wait time was around 80 mins, so we skipped that and headed back to MK. On the way out of Epcot, we stopped at the pin stand out there. We ended up getting a “Magical Moment,” from the cast member there. He had a game called the Mystical Pin Quandry. He had a covered board and we traded a pin and then had a few seconds to pick a number. I managed to get one of the Haunted Mansion cast lanyard pins I was trying to find for awhile now. He also gave us certificates to commemorate the moment. We hopped on Pirates again (wait time was only about 10 mins) and Haunted Mansion again as well. We got stuck in a lot of crowds, mainly due to parades and marching bands. Had another great pin trading experience. There was a cast member that had some decent pins and I told him how I was trying to complete the pirate cast lanyard series pins (the 3 pin set with the flag, chest and wheel). I needed the chest. He said, give me one min, just wait here. I waited and he came back with the chest pin I needed. Was nice of him to go get his “pirate stash” as he called it, for me. We then headed over to MGM to hit Villains in Vogue and Tower of Terror. Villains is by far my favorite shop at MK. Grabbed some stuff from there and took a quick ride on ToT before getting some seats for Fantasmic. Fantasmic was great, but they seemed to have some issues with the torches on the canoes during the Pocahontas section. I was just happy that the dragon was working ok. After that it was back to the room to crash out. When we got back, I went to close the window and noticed the cast members had left a little more towel art for us. There was an Easter basket with 2 chicks (or maybe one chick and one baby duck) and a rabbit all made from towels (with some pipe cleaners for ribbon and some stickers for eyes). It was sitting in the window. I put it on top of our TV. I also turned the Mickey towel art into a smiley face for the cast members.
Day 3 MGM Studios/Magic Kingdom/Downtown Disney
There was a morning Extra Magic Hour at MGM this day, so we started the day there. We hit the Aerosmith Rockin Roller Coaster first. It was a 30 min wait as soon as we got there, but it was more like 20. It was great and we immediately went to Tower of Terror after that. We had fast passed the ToT so we got right in. It was fun (one of my favorite rides at WDW) as always. After that we headed over to the Sounds Dangerous with Drew Carey thing. It was ok, but I think the could’ve done more with it. We avoided the High School Musical Pep Rally (sorry, not my thing) and ducked into the Great Movie Ride. Was good, but the gangster actor seemed a bit bored. The driver was great, though. Headed over to Star Tours and saw the wait was awhile, so we grabbed a Fast Pass and went over to Muppet Vision 3D. I’m a huge Muppet fan, so I loved it. It wasn’t crowded at all, which was weird for once. Especially since I’ve seen another report from the same time period saying it was packed. Everything seemed to work fine. Beka was crushed when she stepped out and realized she had lost one of her Stitch pins along the way. We tried to look but couldn’t find it. We headed over to Star Tours and rode it. Afterwards, we grabbed a bite to eat at the Sci-Fi. We headed over to the Backlot tour after that. Once we got off, we went to trade with a cast member by the exit. During the conversation we had mentioned Beka losing her pin. He said, “That’s really sad especially when you are a pin trader.” He then pulled out a book and wrote her a certificate for a free pin. He said we could take it to any store and get any one pin she wanted. She grabbed a Nightmare Before Christmas pin that she had her eye on. Needless to say that made up for the missing Stitch pin, which, coincidentally, I managed to get another one of by trading with a CM as we were leaving MGM. After all was said and done, it worked out great. Tired, we decided to take a break at our room. We grabbed a few hours of rest. We then returned to MK. We tried to hit Space Mountain again and it was down for technical difficulties. We rode Pirates one more time and went back and the wait time was 80 mins. We decided to head over to Downtown Disney to hit the pin store there and maybe catch some traders. We found that you can’t hit Downtown Disney with the buses from any of the theme parks. Since we were at MK we decided we could take the Monorail to the Contemporary and wait for a bus there. BIG mistake. Here’s some advice. If you want to get there within a reasonable amount of time, hit one of the value resorts (All stars or Pop Century). It took about 30 mins before a bus showed up and it had to hit the Polynesian on the way as well. We talked to a CM about it later and he said that the value resorts have the best bus system. We got there pretty late and there were only a couple of pin traders there and most of them were packing up so they were not that interested in trading. We did manage to trade with a few CM for some good pins. We ate at Earl of Sandwich which was quite tasty. We headed back to the room and thought about our last full day at Disney.
Day 4 Animal Kingdom/Magic Kingdom/Epcot/MGM Studios/Downtown Disney
We started the day at Animal Kingdom so we could hit Expedition Everest early. By the time we got there it was already a 40 min wait. We grabbed a Fast Pass and headed back to Dinosaur. We rode that and hit Primeval Whirl again. After that we went to the Kali Rapids again – mainly because we forgot to get our VMK quest sheet stamped the last time we were there. I got majorly soaked this time. I was quite cold for a good portion of the day. We went over to ride Everest and had a blast. My only complaint is that once you are on the mountain, you seem to lose a sense of how high up you actually are. It seems they should’ve spent some time putting some of the track on the outer side of the mountain so you could really feel the height. That thing does look quite huge from the outside. We got off and decided we wanted one more time on it before leaving, so we hit the standby line. After riding again, we went over to Flame Tree BBQ. Once again, very yummy food. There were some ducks there that were not shy at all. They would eat from your hands and were going under everyone’s tables to get scraps. After that it was back to Epcot. We ran over to Mission Space for another ride on there. The standby time was nothing. We were going to hit Test Track again, but the wait time and Fast Pass time was too long. We did a bit more pin trading and were going to hit Club Cool (oh yeah, we did do that on day 2), but were a few minutes late and it closed. We decided there wasn’t much else to do (Soarin wait time was still insane), so headed over to Magic Kingdom. On the way out, we went to the stand again and got asked to play the game again. We did the game and got an entirely different “Magical Moment” certificate. We hit Pirates yet again (told you, I love that ride) and also hit Big Thunder one more time with a fast pass we got before hitting Pirates. Haunted Mansion’s wait time was too long so we decided to head over to Space Mountain. It said there was a 40 min wait time, but it only took about 20. After that, we were going to go on the Astro Orbiters but the wait time was 40 mins and that ride is not worth a 40 min wait to me. We got stuck waiting on the SpectroMagic parade and after that headed over to MGM Studios for a last shot at Tower of Terror. We got there and the wait time was maybe 10 mins (said 20 on the board). We rode it with some girls bragging that they were on their 49th time. We got on the ride right away and afterwards saw that hardly anyone was there since everyone was getting ready for Fantasmic. We decided not to catch the other fireworks shows since I’m a professional pyrotechnician so I already get to see plenty of fireworks shows first hand. We managed to get straight on the ride and the cast members were more casual this time. They were all joking around. On the pre-show the two girls were there again. They were putting on the bell hop hat from the cast member and the cast member was talking with the video towards the end. He talked over the video at the end changing the last line to this elevator goes “…directly to – the gift shop.” We all laughed and headed for the elevators. Two really annoying guys were in front of us and headed for one side, so we picked the other. Apparently, we were the only ones and the cast member let us have a car to ourselves. I talked to the CM about the Disney College Program (which I’ll be doing in about a year) and he said it was great and I should enjoy it a lot. My ultimate goal is to get on board the Imagineering team. Anyway, we rode it and then headed back to Downtown Disney for some last minute pin trading/shopping. We got there and I picked up the Imagineering book and did some last minute trades. We got back to the resort and sadly returned to our room for the last time. The Magical Express info was on our door waiting for us. We packed our bags and got everything ready for our flight back home.
Day 5 – the return home
We did the airline check-in at the resort so we got to check our bags there and didn’t have to carry them with us to the airport (and also got our boarding passes and all that there). We got on the bus and watched the departure video. The amount of time they brought us back in was perfect and gave us just enough time to get into the airport, grab a bite to eat and then get to the gate with little waiting time. The flight was rough, but uneventful and we got home sad to leave Disney behind us. Needless to say, now my focus is to hit the books and get everything geared up to start the Disney College Program soon. It was exhausting but a lot of fun and I can’t wait to actually work there.
