Test Track, Big Thunder, and Everest, Oh My! A First Time Trip with Lots of Thrills!

[karebear23]

Animal Kingdom is great! Give Mater & McQueen a HIGH FIVE for riding EE!
Love the Safari & Lion King Pics!
Too bad it was raining off and on...did it make the heat worse??? It was probably super humid!! Next trip you all will have to plan more time at AK to see everything you missed !

What an awesome picture of Mickey in the parade. Every time I take parade pics they always turn around . We still haven't seen that parade...
Hopefully we will see it in 23 more days

 

[MommyMcQueen]

Great updates!!

Aww...I felt the same way about Space Mountain when we rode for the first time in April. It made me nervous that the boys were sitting behind me instead of beside me. Apparently, all my worries were for nothing because they both loved it!! Yay for McQueen being so brave and Mater loving it!! Love the Mickey ice cream bar pictures!! So cute!!

We love the opening show at MK!! I tear up every time I see it!! How cool that Aladdin rode with you!! So glad your boys loved BTMRR! It's a favorite of my boys as well! They could ride it over and over again!

Your Chef Mickey's pictures turned out great! It's always so much fun there...sorry you felt rushed though. We love Goofy's in DTD! Those treats are so yummy!

Sounds like a fun day in AK! You got some really great pictures! for both boys riding EE!!

Hi Angie! Glad your boys loved Space Mountain!! It was a fun ride and I'm glad we tried it. I think that *next time* when they're older I'll be a lot less worried - Mater just made the height requirement by like barely a half inch!

Seems like all little boys just LOVE BTMRR!!! It's funny becuase even here at home now, they still talk about "Big Thunder" and play trains when they never really played trains that much before! I guess it's still fresh in their minds. Last week Mater was making a card for Dan's birthday and he was drawing a picture of them riding Big Thunder together - it was so cute - he drew these little square train cars and little stick figures inside them with these long flowing arms doing their "hands up high" on the ride!

EE was a blast and I'm so glad we did it! They were so brave!

I noticed your serious camera in one of your photos. What kind do you use? Whatever it is you have some awesome photos!!

We had heavy rains off an on on our AK day as well.

The boy's excitement over EE is so cute! We also rode it 3x in a row since the wait time was only 10 minutes the first time and we also had fast passes.

What a grat day!

If you check out Post 73 I give some detail on my cameras and stuff. I use a digital Canon Rebel SLR - it's an older model camera. I also use a Sony Cybershot point & shoot. All the park pix are the Canon, the travel pix and the DTD pix were done on the Sony.

Thanks for the compliments on the photos! I keep telling people that I use Photoshop A LOT! And I really do, I manually go and edit every picture and it makes a big difference. Not every picture I take is wonderful, but you can make them much better with a little cropping, rotating things that are crooked, and playing with the color balance. I had a lot of dark photos due to the cloudiness on this day and was able to lighten them up a lot and salvage them. I'll try to post an example later of a before and after PhotoShop - it can make a big difference!

Sorry to hear you ahd a rainy AK day too - what can you do but make the best of it! I would have liked to ridden EE again, but Dan and McQueen didn't really want to and we needed to go get a spot for the parade.

I did love AK, it was a fun day, there is lots to do and explore in that park!

Animal Kingdom is great! Give Mater & McQueen a HIGH FIVE for riding EE!
Love the Safari & Lion King Pics!
Too bad it was raining off and on...did it make the heat worse??? It was probably super humid!! Next trip you all will have to plan more time at AK to see everything you missed !

What an awesome picture of Mickey in the parade. Every time I take parade pics they always turn around . We still haven't seen that parade...
Hopefully we will see it in 23 more days

I love that Mickey picture too - one of my favorites! It took a while to finally get a character to look our way - I kept telling the boys to wave really big so the characters would see them and wave back - usually we didn't get noticed - but this time we did!

The humidity this day was intense - it was just a drippy, thick, stagnant kind of day. We were all always just wet from sweat, the sprinkling, and the humidity. Its always a bad day when I come out from inside and my glasses fog right up! The camera lens too, I was constantly wiping fog off the camera lens when we'd go from indoor to outdoor.

YEAH for 23 Days!!! How long are you going for? Where are you staying?

 

[karebear23]

The humidity this day was intense - it was just a drippy, thick, stagnant kind of day. We were all always just wet from sweat, the sprinkling, and the humidity. Its always a bad day when I come out from inside and my glasses fog right up! The camera lens too, I was constantly wiping fog off the camera lens when we'd go from indoor to outdoor.

YEAH for 23 Days!!! How long are you going for? Where are you staying?

Ugh! Animal Kingdom is the worst for begin hot and humid!!

We go for a week every year. My parents have a timeshare with Marriott...so we stay off property. I can't complain since it's free!
But sometimes I wish we were on Disney property.

I can't wait. I'm half tempted to just drive over to WDW and visit. But I hate to take DD out of preschool! My parents just went to Epcot yesterday and they said it was pretty empty! Lucky them!

Well I can't wait to see whats up next in your TR !

 

[portobello_rd]

your from my neck of the woods! im in Appleton, WI. love all the pictures!

 

[natebenma]

I was behind several updates but all caught up now!

What awesome seats the boys had for the opening show at MK. And great pixie dust for the ride and photos with Aladdin and Jasmine! I like the one where Al is sharing a secret! Maybe where the cave of wonders is. Oh yeah, you haven't seen the movie...

Your boys are so photogenic! You have been sharing some really, really super family pictures!

Good for the boys on Everest! My 9 year old would not ride last year or this year

Chip and Dale are our favorite characters. They play around and are so fun. Chip has the brown nose (like a chocolate chip). Dale is the other one!

 

[MommyMcQueen]

your from my neck of the woods! im in Appleton, WI. love all the pictures!

Hello Neighbor!! Thanks for joining in!

I was behind several updates but all caught up now!

What awesome seats the boys had for the opening show at MK. And great pixie dust for the ride and photos with Aladdin and Jasmine! I like the one where Al is sharing a secret! Maybe where the cave of wonders is. Oh yeah, you haven't seen the movie...

Your boys are so photogenic! You have been sharing some really, really super family pictures!

Good for the boys on Everest! My 9 year old would not ride last year or this year

Chip and Dale are our favorite characters. They play around and are so fun. Chip has the brown nose (like a chocolate chip). Dale is the other one!

Thank you for the info on Chip & Dale!!! Good to know!

Mater is still talking about Everest! We were showing some pictures the other night and he kept going on and on about Everest and the Yeti - it was so cute!

Thanks also for the compliments on the photos - photography has been a hobby of mine for about the last 7 years, after McQueen was born I got into photography quite a bit. Don't do as much now and don't have as much time to work on it or be creative but it's still fun!

 

[MommyMcQueen]

Hi all!

Sorry for the deal in posts and updates over the weekend - it was McQueen's 7th birthday on Saturday! So we spent Saturday doing birthday stuff with him, then Sunday he had a few friends over for a party in the afternoon - it was insane! The kids had fun though and I was glad he got to have some friends over.

So today I'm just trying to catch up on stuff and I have not edited my Hollywood Studios pictures yet, so no update yet. Hope to have it soon though!

Karen

 

[HamburgerHelper]

looks like a sweet trip

 

[wdwgirl03]

Ahh, don't know how I missed your update Karen. I LOVE the Animal Kingdom and am so glad you guys enjoyed it.

Yay for the boys riding EE! My sisters and I always joke about how kids these days are so much braver than us. We never would've done the thrill rides when we were little (well, my youngest sister would've...she was five when she first rode BTMRR and is pretty much the reason why we've done all the other big rides because she wants to try them!).

GREAT picture of Mickey in the parade!

 

[martinolichfamily]

to McQueen! ​

 

[MommyMcQueen]

looks like a sweet trip

Thanks! It was pretty sweet....or as Crush taught us to say "Totalllly Sweeeet!

Ahh, don't know how I missed your update Karen. I LOVE the Animal Kingdom and am so glad you guys enjoyed it.

Yay for the boys riding EE! My sisters and I always joke about how kids these days are so much braver than us. We never would've done the thrill rides when we were little (well, my youngest sister would've...she was five when she first rode BTMRR and is pretty much the reason why we've done all the other big rides because she wants to try them!).

GREAT picture of Mickey in the parade!

Hi Sarah! We did love AK, despite the rain that day.

The kids are pretty brave! I was really suprised they wanted to ride some of the stuff they did, but it sure was fun to taken them on and ride with them! I think I was like 15 before I rode my first coaster!

to McQueen! ​

Thanks Heather! He had a great birthday! I can't believe my little baby is already 7!! The time just goes so incredibly fast....

 

[MommyMcQueen]

Hi All! Well I (again) have no update ready! I'm falling so behind on my pictures and have not gone through the Hollywood Studios pix yet. Honestly I'm losing a little bit of my steam on it - WHY did I take so many pictures?????

It just takes HOURS to go through each day and I haven't had time the last few days, I'll get to them soon though. I keep telling myself I'm half way done, only 5 more days pictures to do!

My sister got a code for free prints from Shutterfly (where I order all of my pictures from) that she won't use so I've now been scrambling to upload a bunch so she can order them for me! It's like 150 free prints so its a good deal but expires tomorrow! So today I have to do that today and then I can get back to editing and getting through the last 5 days of pictures.

Hopefully I can start on them today and have an update soon! Thanks for sticking around!

Karen

 

[MommyMcQueen]

Day 6: Hollywood Studios Morning:

We had another really busy but fun day– it was Hollywood Studios day! We were up pretty early and got everybody ready by about 8am. Dan and McQueen ran over to the food court, grabbed some drinks and some muffins, and brought breakfast back to our room – it was just easier than heading over to the food court this morning.

We headed over to the bus stop at about 8:30am and were really surprised to see a REALLY long line!! At least it was long compared to what we have usually seen, it was the longest line we’ve been in. We ended up getting on the first bus that came – but just barely, we had to stand and were one of the last ones on, but that was okay, it was a short ride and it wasn’t bad having to stand, and we were the first ones off the bus!

Once at HS, there were lots of vehicles parked around the entrance, and the boys wanted to go see them, so we spent a few minutes looking at them and taking a few pictures.

We walked down “Hollywood Boulevard” and did a picture with the Photopass person, and took a few other photos.

Then headed over to the Great Movie Ride for our first ride that day. We were able to walk right on, and got seated in the last row of the tram that was just leaving– perfect timing. We went through the ride, the kids were a little bored since they didn’t know many of the movies, but McQueen liked the Indiana Jones scene and we all really like the Wizard of Oz scene – it was very cute.

After that was done, we walked over to Star Tours – it only had a 10 minute wait so we went into that, I was going to get FPs but we didn’t need them. McQueen kept asking if we were really going to blast off and he seemed quite concerned about it! He even asked the gate attendant, who played along and said yes! We only waited a few minutes then we loaded into our simulator. It was a pretty fun ride, the kids both liked it, and Mater asked to do it again, but we didn’t.

From there we headed over toward the Muppet Vision show, but decided to go look for Lightning McQueen and Tow Mater first – and we found them just down the road! The boys were so excited to see them! It had a short line so we got right in and got pictures with the 2 Cars. It was cute – they were revving their engines and Mater kept covering his ears! It wasn’t that loud but I guess for him it was! They loved seeing the Cars and Dan and I even hopped in for a picture since Cars has been such a huge theme around our house and we all love that movie.

After the pictures we walked the Streets of America, which were really cool and we took some fun pictures on some of the building facades. Here is where we noticed that there was no one else around!! I’m sure everyone was at the big attractions early in the morning, and we had the streets to ourselves. It was kind of fun, the kids ran around and ran up and down the stairs, and we did a few photos. Eventually a few other people trickled around, but for a while we had the place all to ourselves!

From there we found the Honey I shrunk the Kids playground and headed in there. The boys LOVED it and probably could have stayed there all day! Mom and dad could only tolerate about 20 minutes due to the heat & humidity in there! It was so humid, we were all just dripping wet! They had fans on but we were all just roasting in there! But the boys ran around, climbed and played and had a ton of fun. It was a bit hard to keep track of them, but we did okay (only lost track of them 2 or 3 times), and they had a lot of fun, we had to drag them out of there, they wanted to stay longer.

Next up was the Studios Backlot tour. We walked over to that and the sign said a 15 minute wait, so we got in line and waited about 10 minutes in the queue, then were let in and the tour began. McQueen really liked it and was interested in a lot of the special effects, Mater was a little bored and causing a bit of trouble. We loaded the trams and they took us through the backlot, and it was really cool back there – got to see the working costume maker’s area (that was huge), set creation, and a bunch of old vehicles. Then they took us to a section where they did special effects – a rainstorm, a tanker explosion, and then a flooding rapids. We got just a tiny bit wet but it was pretty fun. We saw some other props and things and then the tour was over. The kids liked the explosion and special effects a lot. They also loved seeing the old Herbie and the cut in half Herbie – that was a highlight for them!

We had wanted to try to make it to the next Indiana Jones show, so we booked it back over to that, but we didn’t make it in time, it was already full, so we decided to break for lunch instead since it was about 11:20am. We ate at Pizza Planet and it was decent – kids really liked the arcade and they ate all of their pizza, so that was nice that they ate an entire meal again – pizza down there became their favorite.

We had a really nice lunch there and spent a few minutes planning out what we had left to see and what we wanted to get done that afternoon. There was still alot to see and do and we spent the whole morning on one side of the park! We had a really great morning though and were able to see a lot, so I was really happy with how much we had gotten done.

Up Next: Hollywood Studios Afternoon: Heat, Heat, and More Heat. Oh...and rain.

 

[natebenma]

Sounds like a fun day so far. Great pictures of the family and Mater and McQueen with Mater and McQueen. Nice to tour the streets with so few people!

We spent about 5 minutes at the HISTK playground last year- you are so correct! Hot, humid and miserable!

Doesn't sound like conditions improved as the day goes on...

 

[martinolichfamily]

Yay for updates!!

Your AK day looked great!! The Lion King Show was great! We saw it for the first time this year.

Sounds like ya'll had a good morning at HS!! I hope ya'll got to ride Toy Story Mania!! Cant wait to read more!


I totally know what you mean about growing up too fast...my DS just turned 9 yesterday!!!

 

[MommyMcQueen]

Sounds like a fun day so far. Great pictures of the family and Mater and McQueen with Mater and McQueen. Nice to tour the streets with so few people!

We spent about 5 minutes at the HISTK playground last year- you are so correct! Hot, humid and miserable!

Doesn't sound like conditions improved as the day goes on...

Hi Dee! It was a fun day - HS was a bit of an odd park for us - we didn't go in with any big "must-see's" but we did enjoy everything we saw and did. The cars were so great, I wish they would have had some more Cars themed attractions, considering how big that movie is with boys....maybe we;ll have to visit DL in a few years!!!

Yay for updates!!

Your AK day looked great!! The Lion King Show was great! We saw it for the first time this year.

Sounds like ya'll had a good morning at HS!! I hope ya'll got to ride Toy Story Mania!! Cant wait to read more!


I totally know what you mean about growing up too fast...my DS just turned 9 yesterday!!!

Thanks Heather! TSM was DOWN for that week!!! I'm still disappointed over it!!! So no TSM for us this trip...we'll have to settle for our Wii game but it's just not the same I'm sure.

Glad you saw the Lion King show - it was definitely one of my favorite things we saw all week - so good. Glad you liked it too!

 

[karebear23]

belated to McQueen!

HS is kind of a strange park for us too. The only must do's for the kids are TSM & Playhouse Disney Live.

I love RnR coaster & TOT...but I haven't rode those in ages.

I used to love the backlot tour...but I don't think it's the same. I remember how cool it was when the water & all the fire!

The HISTK playgroud is super sweltering isn't it!

Love the Pictures of you all w/Mater & McQueen. We have yet to see them...so it's necessary this trip!!!

hope the weather doesn't get too crazy for you..but it sounds like it's not going to be pretty!

 

[MommyMcQueen]

belated to McQueen!

HS is kind of a strange park for us too. The only must do's for the kids are TSM & Playhouse Disney Live.

I love RnR coaster & TOT...but I haven't rode those in ages.

I used to love the backlot tour...but I don't think it's the same. I remember how cool it was when the water & all the fire!

The HISTK playgroud is super sweltering isn't it!

Love the Pictures of you all w/Mater & McQueen. We have yet to see them...so it's necessary this trip!!!

hope the weather doesn't get too crazy for you..but it sounds like it's not going to be pretty!

Hi Karen-

we didn't do either RnR or ToT. Mater was too short for RnR - although he REALLY wanted to ride it and was upset when we told him that he couldn't. I didn't want to take them on TOT and have them be terrified and not want to ride anything after that, so we skipped them both.

Yes, the playground was so hot. I really wanted to spend some time there so the kids could play, and we knew that they would love it, so we tolerated it as long as we could - about 20 minutes. Between the heat and it getting busier, it was time to go after those 20 minutes. I'm glad we did it though.

Hope you get to see the Cars on your trip! They are so cute. I didn't notice at the time but they move their eyes! I have a bunch of pix of McQueen with his eyes one direction, then 1 picture with them another direction! It suprised me when I saw that!

 

[mickeystoontown]

Sorry I haven't posted in a while. I've been reading just not posting. It's just now lunch time and you've done a lot of stuff. That's great! There have been several times that we've had the Street of America to ourselves too. For some reason, it makes us feel special.

 

[Angies1274]

Great update!!!It sounds like you have had a fun morning at DHS! My boys love Pizza Planet and it's usually a must-do for us! Glad your boys enjoyed it too!! Can't wait to see how the rest of your day goes.