My Rosetta was all ready and we were good to go
We arrived at MK just after 5.30 pm. There was already a party atmosphere and even the security staff were in the spirit of things.
Having collected our Trick or Treat bags and had our wrist bands attached to our arms we took a seat outside The Chapeau to have a look at the MNSSHP map. While going over where to find everything two ladies started chatting to us. They were beautifully dressed as villains and while we talked my eyes moved down to the one lady’s feet and what looked like 6 inch stiletto heels .....
I am a very tactful and discreet person at times and immediately blurted out, “Oh my but you are brave! Those shoes are going to kill you before the night is out! Did you bring anything else to put on your feet later?” DD, still engrossed in the map, muttered “Oh MUM!” The lady laughed about it and then announced they were on their way to Tony’s for dinner first. We said goodbye and she stepped off the pavement ... and fell face first onto the tar.
Was it something I said?
We strolled around to Main Street, just in time to be ushered onto the sidewalk as the Celebrate Parade was about to come around. I was quite pleased as we hadn’t made the time to stop and see it this trip yet. I then did a very professional job of taking photos with a DSLR in one hand and a lightweight camcorder in the other, whilst trying to avoid the lady standing to my right who kept getting her elbow in my frame whilst flicking her hair every 5 seconds! Needless to say, this attempt at multi tasking left me with a sub par video and a bunch useless photos! Now I know for next time: one thing at a time.
We took a leisurely stroll across to Fantasyland, stopping for a couple of photos on the way.
I don’t know if it was our anticipation or just the general atmosphere, but there was an underlying buzz beneath a feeling of calm as we entered a nearly deserted Fantasyland. We rode the Carrousel a few times and then enjoyed a quick spin on Winnie the Pooh before working our way towards Toontown
As DD was dressed as a fairy she wanted to be at Pixie Hollow as soon as possible. We passed the line for the Dwarfs, which was already very long and I paused and tried to reason with her that this line wasn’t going to let up at all during the evening and it would be better to stop for our photos now, but she was having none of it. I knew as I reluctantly followed her that we weren’t going to be back. My mind was swinging between thoughts like: This is her trip. This is my trip too. We can compromise and make sure we come back and each do what we really want to .... which ended in me deciding ‘Oh for goodness sake; just let it go and enjoy the night!’
I have to first give a brief bit of background here. I had my own ideas of what we would be doing this evening and had ensured plenty of autograph pages, lots of photopass and character pictures, some rides and trick or treating along the way. My planning for the party night had entailed spending hours working on autograph pages, researching where all the party characters were and what times they were available, best places to stand for the parades ...... you get the picture... You will see as the events of the evening unfold how it is important not to get ideas on how things will turn out if you haven’t had the benefit of firsthand experience before. Unless of course you want a set plan to stick to, but in this case, that would have just spoilt the carefree fun of the evening so I wasn’t even going to consider it.
We arrived at Toontown and rode the Barnstormer a few times and at about 6.46 pm went to take up our positions in what is always a notoriously long line to meet the fairies. What a pleasant change to find ourselves behind no more than four families. At exactly 7 pm the CM’s moved the rope and we followed the other guests in front of us up the ramp to wait to meet the characters. As always, this is where the fun begins. They were letting one family through at a time and we sat and waited, and waited for what felt like an eternity until the next group was led through. When our turn finally came it was quite apparent why it was taking so long. Two words: utter chaos! Iridessa, Tink and Terrence were there, together with a CM and three Photopass photographers. They were very excited and cheerful when we entered and we were given a warm welcome, but everyone was talking at once and flitting about from one place to the next while I was grappling with two autograph books trying to find the right pages (they wouldn’t tell us before we went in who was going to be there). I managed to get a few photos, but everyone seemed to be all over the place and I honestly found it to be quite stressful just being in that environment. In the midst of all this, a few of them were quite taken by the autograph books so these were being passed around from one to the next, while I stood by helplessly and watched, with no idea where my Photopass card was, who had which book and spotted the post-it notes lying on the ground which had moments earlier been marking where the characters were to sign, all the while trying to keep track of where DD was.
It was 7.40 pm by the time we made our way into what felt like a very calm park to catch our breath. DD wanted to go to Tomorrowland to see how long the Space Mountain line was and made sense to get there via the Candy Trail. There was plenty along the way and I smiled as DD skipped in front of me turning back to glance over her shoulder and flash a dazzling smile and tell me, “This is so much fun!” over and over again. When we arrived at the end of the Trail in Tomorrowland, she immediately announced that we needed to run back to Toontown and do it again. So we did. At the end of the second trip through the Trail she presented me with two bulging bags already nearly full. It turned out that she had collected an extra bag at one of the stations and was presenting both for top ups along the Trail. All this exercise had made us thirsty so we stopped at the Lunching Pad for a Solar Cherry Eclipse. It was absolutely delicious – so refreshing with a good cherry flavour and we took it with us and plonked ourselves down cross-legged on the ground near the Indy Speedway and as DD tipped out her loot for closer inspection (and just a little bit of gloating) we talked and laughed like little kids there. We must have looked quite an entertaining sight as plenty folk walked past and commented on us having such a good time and one lovely lady even asked if she could join us. Well of course! The more the merrier. So she sat down with us and together we compared the contents of our Trick or Treat bags. I love these unplanned magical moments and will never forget the expression on DD’s face as she sat there with the light shining on her eyes and face, all smiles. At that moment I realised that if we did nothing else all evening, it was worth the cost of the admission already, just for that experience, impossible to describe, but certainly one I will never forget. We said farewell to our newfound friend as we wiped tears of laughter from our faces. I have no idea what was so funny or why we were rolling around in fits of uncontrollable laughter
but this set the mood for the rest of the evening. DD wanted to hit the Candy Trail again, can you believe it and by now I was game for anything. I decided the best strategy for the evening was to think and behave like an 8 year old and just hope that nobody asked me for ID.
Once we reached Tomorrowland for the third time I pointed out that we probably had more candy than we needed. It was about 20 minutes until the first parade so we gave Space Mountain a miss for now and headed towards Main Street to see how busy it was and decide whether to wait for the next one. A lovely family saw us standing behind them, debating what to do and moved over, inviting DD to sit with their children on the curb. It was a very kind gesture and we accepted. The parade was every bit as good as promised. In fact, it was even better being there! I didn’t think anything could rival Spectromagic for me, but Boo to You won this contest hands down. I was urging DD to go and meet some characters, but she just wanted to be on the move and really didn’t want to stand in line for meet and greets.
We spent some more time on a few of the Fantasyland attractions and of course, collected some more candy before returning to Tomorrowland. Timing was excellent. The fireworks were about 20 minutes or so away and SM was walk on so there was nothing to lose by having a couple of rides on there before stopping for more candy. By this stage I was a little more serious when I told DD we really didn’t need any more and I already had 12 bags in my backpack which was starting to feel incredibly heavy. While we were having this discussion DD pointed out that we were standing next to the entrance to Astro Orbiter, something we had never done before and there was no wait time posted. A CM overheard us and invited us through, saying there was no wait at all. I am not big on things that turn me around in continuous circles, but I knew it was a short ride and since there was to be no wait I thought at least we could say we have done it. We collected our little cards and stood and waited for the elevator to arrive to take us up. The wait was pushing well over 5 minutes, followed by another slightly longer wait when we arrived at the top. Finally we walked to our little rocket to board. I was trying to see what the seatbelt situation was as there appeared to be one which was to go around both of us. DD climbed in at the front and I attempted to get in behind her – except I couldn’t fit. No matter what I did my legs were either too long or my rear end was sticking out too far, but we just could not get both of our butts into that little rocket. Eventually the CM there looked up and spotted me standing in the car behind DD and asked: “Is everything okay there?” Erm, clearly not. I wasn’t intending to stand for the spin! I told her that I couldn’t get in and she pointed out, sounding slightly annoyed, that plenty of the ride vehicles had two adults in them and it should not be a problem. It suddenly occurred to me that the 12 bags of candy in the backpack were doing nothing to assist matters
, but with a squeeze I eventually managed to get in as DD looked at me sternly and said: “You should be able to fit mum. That’s you told then!” as we erupted into another fit of uncontrollable giggles. Oh behave!!
We were off. Up and around, and around ..... and around .... and oh dear people, if you don’t stop this thing right now, this mamma here is about to share a little magic with all fellow riders - and I’m not talking pixie dust, people!
Meanwhile DD developed an instant fear of heights and was getting upset because I wasn’t vocally responding (I didn’t dare open my mouth). We came to a stop and now I was all shaky and feeling positively blech and couldn’t get out. As we finally made our way into the elevator for our escape we looked at each other and agreed: Never ever again! I overheard someone commenting on the wonderful view of MK at night from the vantage point and felt like responding that the only view I had was of the toe of my shoe, which was the only safe, stationary object I could find to focus on unless he wanted to sport a whole new look for the rest of the evening. That whole ‘walk on’ experience had eaten up about 30 minutes of our time. It makes you wonder when the usual wait times of 60 minutes are posted how much time people lose on the minute long ride. After a bottle of water and feeling positively more human, we stopped for a few rounds on Buzz, all of which were won by DD.
We went and watched Philharmagic again and enjoyed it just as much as if it were the first time we had seen it. DD now wanted to go back to Trick or Treating so we returned to the ones in Fantasyland, followed by Frontierland and then back to Fantasyland where we spent the last 20 minutes running through the same line over and over as DD charmed the CMs there, who eventually, after who knows how many rounds, presented her with two bags, completely filled with candy. Well, let’s say DD was running. I was so laden with sugar that standing by and watching was about as much as I could manage by this stage. It was pushing midnight now and I told DD that we now had a challenge getting all this candy back to the resort. We were also getting hungry and strangely, hadn’t really eaten any candy so we headed to MSB where we got a sandwich, a cute ghost cupcake, a cinnamon roll and a soda which we packed to take with us. I was buckling under the weight of who knows how many bags of candy on my arms as well as the now bursting backpack which contained little more than ..... more candy! Apologies for the lack of photos after the first part - my camera was buried under sugar and I was unable to reach it for fear that if I unpacked the bag, I wouldnt get everything back again.
We returned to POFQ tired, but happy and I watched DD empty out the contents of her Trick or Treat bags onto the bed. She wondered out loud how heavy it was (I had been pointing out that I had been carrying that around on my back for the evening) and we packed it all back into the bags, which we placed into a large (very large) carrier bag and hooked it onto the luggage scales. Wait for it: 13.8 kg!
In case anyone is wondering, we still have bags of the darn stuff in the cupboards, in spite of having given plenty away, sent bags to school and eaten from there over the months. Not at all what I had in mind for our first party night, but what an awesome evening it was. In fact, this year I am toying with the idea of doing two party nights so we can have one for rides and candy and another to focus on characters and photos. Absolutely awesome! There was plenty more to do there as well and we did see the fireworks but we watched them from where we happened to be in Tomorrowland so although we didn’t get the full effects of the display and narration, we had opted to ride SM at that time and it worked out just perfectly. We will definitely do it again!
- didn't even think of that. I was guessing when I was deleting. How am I to know what "IMG.2Tiggies.14267348403943789087890878329087908794087...." looks like in colour 
I must pull out some more of the character expressions with DD. They really sum up a special part of the experience.
I just had to be realistic and go by the advice I usually offer to people going to Disney for the first time: there is never enough time for everything you want so you need to just relax and enjoy everything that you do. The evening turned out brilliantly. 
