Magic Kingdom Blog
Magic Kingdom is one of my favorite parks, tied with Animal Kingdom. I have to say it’s a tie because I will probably say Animal Kingdom is my favorite when I start that blog post too. Our morning started early in hopes to catch the first bus to the Ticket and Transportation Center. The line of guests with the same idea seemed to tell me we needed to get up earlier for the rest of the trip. The 7:30 bus arrived at the TTC at 7:45, and we made our way right up to the monorail platform. Just to be turned away because the monorail was down this morning. Thankfully we were among the first groups of people to notice and made our way quickly over to the ferry. By the time the ferry docked and began loading passengers the crowd was enormous. If we had been caught even a few minutes behind that would have delayed our entry to Magic Kingdom by at least half an hour.
Getting into the park was a breeze, and we made it in with enough time to get in for early access. Following the crowd through Tomorrowland we jumped right in line for the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train. I am an admitted travel weirdo and had the entire day planned out in advance. Waste not, want not…right? Believe it or not this was my first time on the Mine Train and I loved it. Second up on the roster is the Haunted Mansion which is a small hike from the Mine Train. Regular park hours had just begun as we got in line for Haunted Mansion. The line was basically non-existent but you could see the masses making their way through the park.
Ben and I operate on completely different eating schedules. Ben has to eat breakfast shortly after waking up and I was certainly pushing his limits. This called for Starbucks coffee and a breakfast sandwich. We had every intention of taking a little break and were just walking around with our coffee when we saw how short the line for Thunder Mountain was. What do you do with an iced coffee when you want to go on a ride? Well, you dump out your water bottle and put it in that. I’m not dumping my $6 ice coffee for anyone.
The day is absolutely cruising by. Every time I look at my watch I’m equally shocked with how much we’ve managed to do already and by how fast time is moving. Our next stop is Pirates of the Caribbean. The wait was slightly longer than average but not by a ton. We hit the point in the day where we want to start slowing down to prevent burn out, but manage to still operate full speed. We traversed the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse outside of Adventureland in record time. I have always been drawn to treehouses and forts so this attraction holds a piece of my heart, even though some think it’s a waste of time.
The line for the Jungle Cruise was a bit of a trap. The estimate was about 25 minutes when we got in line but it must have been right before they changed it. It was about a 45 minute wait and the heat was really beginning to kick up. With all of our major rides that we wanted to do out of the way we adventured through Tom Sawyer’s Island. This was another one of my favorite spots as a kid, also relating to the love of forts, tree houses and secret tunnels.
Our legs and stomachs were calling for us to take an afternoon siesta. We left the park and headed back to Shades of Green for some quality time at the pool and the sports bar. My original plan was to be back in the Magic Kingdom before Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween party started. Things never go to plan on vacation and we lazed around a bit too much. The bus leaving the resort was also quite late, which put us back at the Magic Kingdom only a few minutes before the party started. The line for guests to get into the party was wrapped around the entrance by guest services. On a whim I went for the regular park entrance since we had day tickets too, and counted my lucky stars that it worked.
Starting out a special event at Disney already tired is not really ideal but there we were. Starbucks round 2 helped lessen the internal battery drain slightly. We fit It’s a Small World and The Little Mermaid in before heading back to Main Street to find the event wristbands. Corn Dog bites from Casey’s Corner was dinner tonight, but after a late lunch ended up being perfect. We didn’t have much of a plan for the party other than to enjoy the event itself. Walking around until we found something that piqued our interest was the plan, and that happened to be Thunder Mountain with a 15 minute wait. I was set on getting a good spot to watch the Boo to You parade and we were closest to Frontierland at the time. The timing was great because the Dapper Dans were performing right across from where we chose to sit. The crowds filled in really quickly for the parade. The parade was fun to watch but getting up after sitting for a while was hard.
The hunt for the trick or treating stations began right after the parade. The stations were giving out fistfuls of candy and we filled our bags so fast. We eventually had to choose to stop because we couldn’t fit another piece of candy, anywhere. This would be what a kid’s trick or treating dreams are made of. We watched the fireworks from the Tomorrowland bridge and the view was slightly obstructed. Thinking back I wish we had toughed it out on Main Street to get to see the whole show.
If you’ve made it this far in the blog, that is my advice. Don’t try to save time. Watch the fireworks from a prime spot. Our reasoning was so we could scoot over to Iron for our 11:00 Tron reservation. The logic was slightly flawed. We ended up circling the line a couple times because no-you cannot get on even one minute early. I was not expecting Tron to be over so quickly. Sure it’s a super fast thrill ride but the amount of time you spend in line to the amount of time spent on the ride is a bit skewed. (Still worth it).
We were wringing the last drops of energy we had to catch the last Boo to You parade on Main Street, and got a front row spot to watch the Villain Spooktacular. It was a fantastic performance but by the end of it my back and feet were screaming to be done for the day. The post park day exhausted walk to the monorail is one I think everyone can relate to.