honeyrabbitt
Earning My Ears
- Joined
- Jan 13, 2014
I want to share the results of our day at the MK! This was our first trip to Disney with our 5yr and 3.5yr olds - Tuesday Jan 21, 2014.
We stayed in a Fort Wilderness cabin with my inlaws (so 4 adults, 2 kids), and we found the accommodations very roomy, clean and convenient! A half-bathroom would be greatly appreciated, but the one bathroom was ok.
We were out the door at 8am, caught a shuttle bus quickly which took us to the ferry. We got to the park before rope drop and were thrilled to see the opening show (I didn't know they did that, it was very cool!)
I had the MyDisneyExperience app on my phone, and our first FP+ was 9:05-10:05 meeting with Cinderella. We made our way up to Fantasy Land, found a place to park the double stroller we brought*, and headed to the Fairy Tale Hall. The Standby line for Cinderella was so short we decided to save our FP and just wait - which worked slick since my daughter at the last minute decided she'd rather meet Rapunzel. It ended up being 10-15min wait, but both kids really enjoyed meeting the princesses.
While we were waiting I used the app to switch our FP+ to...I forget what (I ended up switching it again later to a 7pm Belle's Enchanted Tales. Switching FP were kind of tricky because (unless I wasn't using the app correctly) you could only change the time of the event or the experience. So, if I had Cinderella at 9am, I would have to pick another event at 9am, then go back in and change the time of that new event, or first change the time to meet cinderella for a later time in the day, then go in and change that to a different event at the same time...does that make sense?
Moving on! After Princesses we went to the teacup ride and were able to walk right on, no line! Next, Winnie the Pooh, which was maybe a 5-10min wait. I was underwhelmed with the ride but my daughter said "let's do it again!" as soon as we got off, so I guess it's a hit with the under 5 crowd. Next was Dumbo and again, walked right on! Scooted over to Ariel's Grotto for a 10:05 FP with Ariel. Got right in and out, then walked right onto the Under the Sea ride- no line! Then over to Small World and had to wait maybe 5-10min, not bad at all.
After satisfying the princess requests of my daughter we headed to Adventure Land to satisfy my pirate loving 3yr old son. We had a 12:00 FP for Pirates of the Caribbean but, again, decided to bank it since the line was so short. We basically walked right on that ride too (which was a huge hit!). I changed that FP for a 2pm Thunder Mountain. After Pirates, we grabbed a table at the currently-closed restaurant right across the way and ate our pre-packed ham sandwiches. We finished in plenty of time to get front row seats for the Jack Sparrow Pirate Tutorial, which was really fun. My 3yr old desperately wanted to be chosen to participate in the show, and was heartbroken that he was passed over. Luckily at the end of the show they called both children up (along with pretty much any other kid that wanted to!) up on stage to join the pirate brigade.
With that over we headed to Thunder Mt. My 3yr old wasn't tall enough and I'm pregnant, so we handed our Magic Bands over to my dad and his wife who had met us at the park, but since they weren't staying on-site were unable to get FP ahead of time and had a heck of a time figuring out that whole system. The rest of our group had to wait in line for 10-15 even with a FP, but they enjoyed the ride.
Kids were starting to burn out at this point (2ish), so we did the carousel and headed back to the cabin. Both kids napped and we all had dinner that we had brought with us.
We got back to the MK at 6:30 and headed to Fantasy Land for our 7pm FP with Belle. Once we got all the way up there, the princess-loving 5yr old decided she didn't want to see Belle, so I changed the FP for a meeting with Mickey later, and we rushed down to Adventure land again since my phone app was showing 5min wait times on all the rides. We walked on to Aladdin's carpet, Jungle Cruise and one more time on Pirates! Next we fought the crowds on Main St (parade just ended) to get the kids cotton candy. Headed over to meet Mickey and found out our FP were for 8:05 and it was only 7:40. The fellow said we could come back, but we noticed the stand by lane was very short. We asked how long the wait was and the CM says, "oh, just 5min." Duh...so we did that instead of coming back for the FP. Mickey was very cool
Next, we went up on the balcony and watched the fire works. The grown ups decided they wanted some sweets too, so after the show we fought the crowds again to get to the ice cream store. We came out and found a place to sit and eat on a brick wall and were surprised to have great seats for the Celebrate the Magic show (that we hadn't known was about to take place). The show was great and ended with the song from Frozen - which is my kids absolute favorite right now so the whole lot of us were singing at the top of our lungs! What a fabulous end to the day!
My 3yr old came down with a bad fever in the middle of the night, little guy left it all out on the field! We were very glad that we weren't planning to go to the park for a second day, everyone was pretty beat.
It really couldn't have been a better day! We saw 90% of what we wanted to see, without much hassle. We would have liked to do Peter Pan but the line was never shorter than 60min, except in the middle of fireworks when it was still 30min - ***?? I would have liked to see Belle, but kids are finicky! We didn't set foot in tomorrow land, but with our aged kids we didn't think there were any must-do's in there.
Anyway, that's our story - I hope you all have as good of an experience as we did!
*re: the stroller. While it was nice for holding our "stuff" we found it a huge hassle to find a parking lot every time we went in for a ride, and when we came back in the evening we skipped the stroller and were much happier.
We stayed in a Fort Wilderness cabin with my inlaws (so 4 adults, 2 kids), and we found the accommodations very roomy, clean and convenient! A half-bathroom would be greatly appreciated, but the one bathroom was ok.
We were out the door at 8am, caught a shuttle bus quickly which took us to the ferry. We got to the park before rope drop and were thrilled to see the opening show (I didn't know they did that, it was very cool!)
I had the MyDisneyExperience app on my phone, and our first FP+ was 9:05-10:05 meeting with Cinderella. We made our way up to Fantasy Land, found a place to park the double stroller we brought*, and headed to the Fairy Tale Hall. The Standby line for Cinderella was so short we decided to save our FP and just wait - which worked slick since my daughter at the last minute decided she'd rather meet Rapunzel. It ended up being 10-15min wait, but both kids really enjoyed meeting the princesses.
While we were waiting I used the app to switch our FP+ to...I forget what (I ended up switching it again later to a 7pm Belle's Enchanted Tales. Switching FP were kind of tricky because (unless I wasn't using the app correctly) you could only change the time of the event or the experience. So, if I had Cinderella at 9am, I would have to pick another event at 9am, then go back in and change the time of that new event, or first change the time to meet cinderella for a later time in the day, then go in and change that to a different event at the same time...does that make sense?
Moving on! After Princesses we went to the teacup ride and were able to walk right on, no line! Next, Winnie the Pooh, which was maybe a 5-10min wait. I was underwhelmed with the ride but my daughter said "let's do it again!" as soon as we got off, so I guess it's a hit with the under 5 crowd. Next was Dumbo and again, walked right on! Scooted over to Ariel's Grotto for a 10:05 FP with Ariel. Got right in and out, then walked right onto the Under the Sea ride- no line! Then over to Small World and had to wait maybe 5-10min, not bad at all.
After satisfying the princess requests of my daughter we headed to Adventure Land to satisfy my pirate loving 3yr old son. We had a 12:00 FP for Pirates of the Caribbean but, again, decided to bank it since the line was so short. We basically walked right on that ride too (which was a huge hit!). I changed that FP for a 2pm Thunder Mountain. After Pirates, we grabbed a table at the currently-closed restaurant right across the way and ate our pre-packed ham sandwiches. We finished in plenty of time to get front row seats for the Jack Sparrow Pirate Tutorial, which was really fun. My 3yr old desperately wanted to be chosen to participate in the show, and was heartbroken that he was passed over. Luckily at the end of the show they called both children up (along with pretty much any other kid that wanted to!) up on stage to join the pirate brigade.
With that over we headed to Thunder Mt. My 3yr old wasn't tall enough and I'm pregnant, so we handed our Magic Bands over to my dad and his wife who had met us at the park, but since they weren't staying on-site were unable to get FP ahead of time and had a heck of a time figuring out that whole system. The rest of our group had to wait in line for 10-15 even with a FP, but they enjoyed the ride.
Kids were starting to burn out at this point (2ish), so we did the carousel and headed back to the cabin. Both kids napped and we all had dinner that we had brought with us.
We got back to the MK at 6:30 and headed to Fantasy Land for our 7pm FP with Belle. Once we got all the way up there, the princess-loving 5yr old decided she didn't want to see Belle, so I changed the FP for a meeting with Mickey later, and we rushed down to Adventure land again since my phone app was showing 5min wait times on all the rides. We walked on to Aladdin's carpet, Jungle Cruise and one more time on Pirates! Next we fought the crowds on Main St (parade just ended) to get the kids cotton candy. Headed over to meet Mickey and found out our FP were for 8:05 and it was only 7:40. The fellow said we could come back, but we noticed the stand by lane was very short. We asked how long the wait was and the CM says, "oh, just 5min." Duh...so we did that instead of coming back for the FP. Mickey was very cool
Next, we went up on the balcony and watched the fire works. The grown ups decided they wanted some sweets too, so after the show we fought the crowds again to get to the ice cream store. We came out and found a place to sit and eat on a brick wall and were surprised to have great seats for the Celebrate the Magic show (that we hadn't known was about to take place). The show was great and ended with the song from Frozen - which is my kids absolute favorite right now so the whole lot of us were singing at the top of our lungs! What a fabulous end to the day!
My 3yr old came down with a bad fever in the middle of the night, little guy left it all out on the field! We were very glad that we weren't planning to go to the park for a second day, everyone was pretty beat.
It really couldn't have been a better day! We saw 90% of what we wanted to see, without much hassle. We would have liked to do Peter Pan but the line was never shorter than 60min, except in the middle of fireworks when it was still 30min - ***?? I would have liked to see Belle, but kids are finicky! We didn't set foot in tomorrow land, but with our aged kids we didn't think there were any must-do's in there.
Anyway, that's our story - I hope you all have as good of an experience as we did!
*re: the stroller. While it was nice for holding our "stuff" we found it a huge hassle to find a parking lot every time we went in for a ride, and when we came back in the evening we skipped the stroller and were much happier.
