Beryl, Breakdowns, Beauty and the Bates family - Day 6

[Nimbus]

Previously...
Pre-Trip
Day One - The Journey There
Day Two - Around the World at Epcot
Day Three - Swimming and Shopping
Day Four - Soggy at Seaworld
Day Five - Hollywood Studios

Day Six - Wednesday 30th May 2012 - Manic Magic Kingdom

We'd been in Florida for over 4 days now so it was about bloomin' time we headed to Magic Kingdom, which was sort of a recommended park for this particular Wednesday. That recommendation was a teensy bit wrong because it turned out to be busy (or maybe MK is busy every day at this time or year?). But we didn't know that as we got up early-ish, gobbled up some breakfast at the hotel, and set off on the early shuttle bus to Disney.

Here we were getting on-board:



We were dropped off at Epcot as usual and from here we took the monorail from Epcot to the Transport and Ticket Center and from there to the entrance of Magic Kingdom. Doing that meant we had to go through the bag check bit twice - once at Epcot and once at MK. What do they look for at bag check using those giant chopsticks? They don't pat you down or check your pockets so they mustn't be looking for knives, guns or bombs. They're probably just making sure you're not carrying any Marvel merchandise from the Universal parks.

"Sorry sir, but Disney can't advertise Marvel products or movies within the parks as per the 'East of the Mississippi' agreement. You'll have to leave that Hulk key-ring behind".

Talking of Marvel, I saw the Avengers monorail as we headed towards MK but wasn't quick enough to take a picture. Instead, here's a photo of our monorail train:



We were a little too late to catch the opening ceremony but we've seen it before and it was nothing special then. So we joined the crowds trying to get and eventually made our way onto Main Street. Last time we got here for rope drop in October 2010 the park was quite empty for the first hour or two but that wasn't the case today.

Our first aim was to go and ride, or get fastpasses for (or both), Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. This had recently been refurbished and had only re-opened a few days before. So off we fast-walked.

On the way we had to have a restroom stop (sigh) so I took this obligatory picture of the castle whilst waiting:



Then, just into Frontierland, Hannah saw Princess Tiana from the Princess and the Frog and wanted to get her autograph. We stopped and queued to see her:



She was actually quite amusing (but also a bit cheeky), commenting on my frog-like legs and asking Hannah whether I was a frog before Michelle met me. Saying goodbye to her, I saw a booth that was doing the Sorcerers of Magic Kingdom treasure hunt. There was no-one waiting so I thought I'd go up and ask about this. We were each given a pack of 5 cards plus a key card and then received a brief demonstration of what you had to do. Our first 'mission' was to find the Mystic Portal in Fantasyland, however we wanted to go on Big Thunder Mountain first so we decided to go there afterwards.

Eventually, we got to BTMR but, eeek, it had gone technical and wasn't running. The CM at the entrance couldn't say when it would be back up. We decided to get a fastpass for this anyway and wandered off disgruntled.

Splash Mountain also didn't look like it was working yet so we gave that one a miss too. Instead, we carried onwards into Adventureland and entered the gloomy Pirates of the Caribbean. There was a little bit of a queue for this but nothing too bad. However, the ride was slightly spoiled by a guy in front us taking hundreds of photos with his flash on, even after being told that flash photography was not allowed.

From this, we then dashed in front of the castle and towards Tomorrowland, probably my favourite “land” in MK. Even though it was still early, the crowds were building:



We popped into the Monster Inc Laugh Floor, which was busy but we managed to squeeze in. This was as hilarious as always. It's similar, and just as good, as Turtle Talk with Crush over in Epcot. Hello Humans! Aaaargh!

Just a few steps away from this was Stitches Great Escape, which was just letting people in. This attraction sometimes seems to get a bit of bad press on the DIBB but we think it's quite good - not brilliant but worth seeing if you can. The effects where you think Stitch is on your shoulders and jumping around the room are just as good as the old ExtraTERRORestrial Alien Encounter attraction - but not as pant-wettingly scary, thank goodness.

By this time the queue for Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin was out of the building and too long for us. It was time to get a fastpass then. At this point we decided not to rush back to Frontierland to use our BTMR fastpasses - it would probably still be broken down anyway!

Whilst we waited for our Buzz Lightyear fastpass time to come round, we went on the PeopleMover. There was actually a queue for this! A queue for the PeopleMover!?! I've never known this to have a queue before. Anyhow, once onboard I took this pic from this great excuse for a nice sit down:



Then we hustled into the Carousel of Progress (unsurprisingly, this wasn’t busy) and as we were stepping inside we felt a few drops of rain. This 'ride' is pretty much missable, although the song is catchy. Join in if you know the tune…

"There's a great big beautiful tomorrow, shining at the end of every day..."

When we came out, the sun was shining but there were big puddles everywhere. It looked like there had been one of those 20 minute downpours Florida is famous for. Thankfully we'd missed it and now it was our time use our Buzz Lightyear FPs.

This is still one of my favourites - because I won (again). Mwahaha!

Of course, the other big ride in Tomorrowland is Space Mountain, however when we approached this, the sign outside indicated that the standby queue of something like a 60 minute wait. So we got some fastpasses for this.

In general, the park seemed to be very busy – even busier than Epcot and Seaworld had been during Memorial Weekend. I don’t know whether people had been put off going to Magic Kingdom earlier in the week because of the weather or something? There were also a lot of groups of schoolchildren and people in matching coloured t-shirts in the park so I’m guessing this was the time for end-of-year school trips.

I think at this point we decided to have lunch. We'd brought some bagels and fruit from the hotel's buffet breakfast with us but, because the sun was now shining and it was hot, we wanted to sit down in somewhere air-conditioned. Sadly, the Starlight Cafe was very busy. So instead we got some drinks and sat on a wall outside to eat our food and fry in the sun. We did have a good view of the Merida meet'n'greet area though. This area was quite large and Merida looked very close to her animated counterpart.

As we finished our lunch, we started to hear music coming from near the Castle. Heading over there we saw a small parade - surely not the 3pm parade starting 2 hours early? Actually, it was the “Move It, Shake It, Celebrate It” mini parade where they get you to join in the fun and dance along with the characters.



It was quite hot and I didn't fancy sweating like a pig, but Hannah and Michelle joined in.



Not that they sweated, of course. Anyway, this parade was actually better than the main one if you ask me.

After this we wandered into Fantasyland through the crowds and towards the new expansion. Well, to the small bit that is currently open anyway. Along the way, I snapped a picture or two of Beast's castle beyond the rather bland red wooden partitions.



Skipping past the not-yet-double Dumbo ride, we joined the longish queue for the Great Goofini Barnstormer mini-coaster. It was still hot and the queue was neither covered nor air-conditioned, which meant the wait wasn't very pleasant. To pass the time, I took a pictures of the train waiting at the new Fantasyland station:



...and of the Great Goofini ride itself:



It's a pity that after all that queuing the ride was only about 30 seconds long!

My notes and memory are a bit vague but I think around now we got fastpasses for the Winnie-the-Pooh ride and then went back into Tomorrowland to ride on Space Mountain. This is one of best rides at Magic Kingdom and one of the few that is actually suited to three people. It’s great for us even if it does throw you around a lot!

We then hiked back into Fantasyland and considered trying out the Sorcerers of Magic Kingdom game. After spending ages trying to figure out where the mystic portal was from the uninformative map, we finally found it near the PhilharMagic show. There were about 3 or 4 people waiting in line so we joined that for a few minutes.

However, we felt a little impatient waiting in the sun so gave up and instead went on Cinderella's Carousel...



...and then waltzed straight into Philharmagic. This is still an excellent show with some good 3D effects. At least Hannah was now old enough so that she did not freak out at the darkness and loud soundtrack (which is what happened when she was 3).

It was now approaching 3pm, so we hurried over to locate a spot to view the main “Celebrate a Dream Come True” parade. We bought some ice creams whilst we sat on a back wall near to the Liberty Belle riverboat dock waiting for the parade. Here's a photo of the riverboat itself:



Just like the rest of the park, it was busy here with people coming and going but seemed like a nice spot. Except, when the parade started, people climbed up on another wall in front of us blocking our view. So when Michelle and Hannah also decided to stand up on the wall behind them, we were a bit shocked when a CM came along to tell us to get down but not the others. When we pointed out the other people, the CM did nothing. Michelle and Hannah stood up again a bit later but were again told to sit down without the CM doing anything about the people in front of us (who were just at risk from falling as we were). Eventually, Hannah went and stood on the wall where the other people were stood and watched the parade from there.

Meanwhile, I could see through a gap in the crowd and took these piccies (and a few more that I'll not bore you with):





From what I remember, the parade was the same one as the one we saw in 2010.

After the parade had gone by we pushed our way through the hustling masses and back to Fantasyland. It was time for our go on the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh ride. Actually, we still had a few minutes to go until the start of the time window on our fastpasses, so we sat outside the ride and waited for a while:



We had great fun bouncing around like Tigger. On the ride, not whilst we sat outside!

As we weren't far from Mickey's PhilharMagic show, we decided to go and see this again before continuing onwards away from Fantasyland. We really wanted to go on Big Thunder Mountain but as we approached it in Frontierland we could see that CMs were turning lots of people away. Just like this morning, the ride was down and not working. And they couldn't tell us when it would be fixed.

Because BTMR was unavailable and it was hot, Splash Mountain next door was very busy. The standby queue was something like 90 minutes and the fastpass return time was late. Disgruntled, we decided to have a look around a nearby air-conditioned shop instead.

As we were coming out of the shop, I gazed forlornly at Big Thunder Mountain and noticed something that instantly cheered me up - they were now letting people onto the ride! Woohoo! So we rushed over and got into the queue that, contrary to the reports I'd read, wasn't air-conditioned. After about 15 or 20 minutes we boarded our train - right at the front:



Wait, where's the driver?!?

Actually, I think the ride is better at the back of the train. You have to wait until you're halfway down a drop before you're pushed forward with any speed when sitting at the front. Still, it’s a great little coaster. Big Thunder Mountain's refurb might have included a touch-up of the paintwork and some fixes of the water features but otherwise it seemed the same as before (other than the frequent closures).

By now, it was around tea time. The nearest place was Peco Bill's Tall Tale Inn & Café so we ducked into there. The restaurant seemed a little busy but we got a table without too much trouble. I think I had a cheeseburger and Michelle may have had a chicken wrap. Or something like that. I know I did help myself to lots of mushrooms and onions from the condiments bar.

After tea, we kind of wandered a bit. As we were going along we did Pirates of the Caribbean again, which was pretty much a walk on. No annoying guy taking pictures this time! We also walked past the Sorcerers of Magic Kingdom mystic portal in Adventureland and again there was a small queue of about 4 or 5 people. Instead, Hannah and I had a look at the Swiss Family Treehouse whilst Michelle sat down nearby. To be honest, the tree house is just like a themed queue; you walk along a path through the trees looking at the different rooms and then, oh, that's it, you've finished.

As we walked past the castle again, there was a show on with Mickey, Minnie and all the gang so we watched that:



Our day wasn’t quite over yet and so we ventured into Tomorrowland to have a good chuckle and guffaw in the Monster Inc Laugh Floor show again. Then we browsed through the shops on the way back to the entrance.

It was now getting late and time for us leave via the monorail back to the Transport and Ticket Centre. BTW, I watched the ferryboat leave the MK port and, within a minute or two, it took the same amount of time to get across the lake as the monorail took to go around it. Just so you know.

At the TTC, we swapped monorails and zipped back to Epcot to get our 8:30pm shuttle bus, which arrived at stop #42 on time. We’d had an early start so sadly had to miss the electrical parade and Wishes. Even if we had decided to get the later bus at 9:45pm we would still have missed them both because of the time it takes to get from MK back to Epcot.

After an uneventful shuttle bus ride, we were back at our hotel by nine. We had a quick drink and discussed what to do the next day, before turning in.

Today the weather had been better and sunny in the afternoon – although it had been hot and sticky at times. Due to the crowds of people in brightly coloured t-shirts, Magic Kingdom hadn’t been quite as magical as we’d hoped. Though, thankfully, we’d managed to get onto Big Thunder Mountain – one of Hannah’s favourite rides - after it had been broken down for much of the day.

Food Score: 6/10. The bagels at lunch were a welcome change from fried chicken strips and the burger for tea was nice.

Favourite Attraction: Let’s go for Big Thunder Mountain (when it was working) closely followed by either Monster Inc Laugh Floor or Mickey’s PhilharMagic.

Next…
Day Seven - Islands of Adventure

[anniebee65]

Great day! Interesting to read a full day at the parks, we have never accomplished this. Maybe next year we'll manage it

[Nimbus]

Originally Posted by anniebee65

Great day! Interesting to read a full day at the parks, we have never accomplished this. Maybe next year we'll manage it

See more...

It's pretty much all we've ever done. Probably because we've always stayed on Intl Drive and used hotel shuttle buses so it does tend to steer you towards full-ish days rather than coming and going when you please. The idea of leaving at midday to go back to your villa or onsite room for a rest and a swim and then returning later in the afternoon seems alien to us.

Oh and thanks for reading!

[RachelM]

What a good day at Magic Kingdom. Its a shame it was so busy though.

[Gill635]

Another fabulous day

x

[disney owl]

a busy MK day

[JoJo88]

What a busy day at MK! You seemed to get loads done despite the matching tshirt brigades

[Milner]

Great day at MK and great photos.

[amy1511]

great day look forward to reading more

[Iloveflorida]

Sounds like a great day, shame about BTM but at least you finally got to ride.