Anyone here going to be at the MK on Saturday?

[mickeysaver]

We are! We can't miss the 40th Anniversary of WDW. I have heard a variety of info on the big day some definitely happening and some rumor. Personally, I can't wait to see the 60 characters marching up Main Street at 10 AM before Meg Crofton speaks on the Castle stage. I am also hopeful that the special Wishes ending is going to include perimeter fireworks. We are looking forward to a big day of pixie dust, character meets, and pin trading.

So, who else is going to be there to celebrate?

 

[JEANMR1]

We will be there briefly. We hope to step in at the end of the day for the fireworks. I'd love to be there in the morning for the speech but have plans elsewhere.
It will be me, my partner, our 4 year old, our 1 year old, my sister, and her husband.
The plane leaves tomorrow morning at 6:40! Wooo hooo!

 

[mickeysaver]

Cool! I just saw an article in the Orlando Sentinel that says that perimeter fireworks are a go! There will also be a one day only special t-shirt being sold. I think that I will skip the t-shirt, unless there is one that would be the right size for the baby. My partner and I will be there all day with our 20 month old little girl. I am really looking forward to this.

 

[Timrobb]

we will be there for the fireworks!

 

[mickeysaver]

So far, I have been able to piece the following together for what is going to happen at the MK on Saturday.

1.) There is supposed to be a special 40th Anniversary Cupcake at the Bakery, price undisclosed as of yet, so it could cost $0-$4 at best guestimate.
2.) There are rumored things to be happening to surprise guests at the Emporium on Main Street. No word officially on what or when or how, if anything, but multiple rumors from different folks that know different folks that work there that something is happening.
3.) There will be a special t-shirt for sale that will only be offered for sale on Saturday for the folks that are there in the MK.
4.) There will many special commemorative pins released for sale at the MK on Saturday. http://eventservices.disney.go.com/pintrading/event?id=59197
5.) There will be several Disney artists on hand for signings of their wares at various locations throughout the day. http://psc.disney.go.com/eventservices/artofdisneyparks//event/wdw_40thanniversarysignings.html
6.) At 9:45 AM there will be a character flood/parade up Main Street followed by a trolley. The parade will end at the castle stage where Meg Crofton is to speak and if I am interpreting the info correctly, the Dapper Dans will be leading the crowds in a Sing A Long. There will be a little daytime pyro thrown in for good measure.
7.) Wishes will be performed as usual, but there will be perimeter fireworks, which means that there should be a special finale added onto the end of the usual show.

 

[Tony-NJ]

I wish they were doing more for the 40th! We will be in the world 10/12-10/22. Enjoy to those who can be there on 10/1!

 

[mickeysaver]

I wish they were doing more too, but I am pretty darn excited about those perimeter fireworks, so I can't fuss too much. I started getting all of the goodies rounded up this evening for our day trip over on Saturday. I am very hopeful that there will be some surprises ahead, but I am not holding my breath.

All I can say is that when the 50th rolls around, they better have a massive blowout celebration that covers the entire WDW resort and makes the one for DL's 50th look pale in comparison.

 

[OrlandoMike]

If you see Orange Bird please get a pic for me!

He is kind of the unofficial mascott of the 40th! Glad to see him make a big comeback now that he dumped Miss Bryant!

 

[mikelan6]

I should be there at some point. I'm looking forward to the Olszewski event.

 

[mickeysaver]

If you see Orange Bird please get a pic for me!

He is kind of the unofficial mascott of the 40th! Glad to see him make a big comeback now that he dumped Miss Bryant!

But of course! I still remember having those little plastic orange shaped juice bottles when we went to WDW before the official opening. I always thought the Orange Bird was cute the fact that he finally threw the ***** to the curb only makes him cuter. I hope to have lots of great photos at the end of the day tomorrow. I will be glad to share.

 

[mickeysaver]

I am worried for those who plan only to come for the fireworks at the end of the day. The park has no TS dining left at all for any meal. I had "fun" attempting to get something for us when I tried a couple of weeks ago when we finally decided to really do this. The park crowds are projected to be similar to a summer day. With all of the hype among the fans, the fact that Oct 1 is the beginning of Local Season, the weather is supposed to be PERFECTION, and the fact that it's MK on a Saturday, I am concerned that there may be some phased closing of the park. I hope that the park isn't at capacity and people find themselves without access to the park for the fireworks.

 

[mickeysaver]

We went. We encountered crowds that at 8:30 AM were so bad that there was no room to allow others through the ticket booths and into the plaza area below the train tracks. The lines to get up to the turnstiles was like a normal busy morning with the lines going all the way back to bag check with almost, if not every turnstile open. The crowds were unreal. There were all sorts of Disney suits around the front of the park, including Phil Holmes. I stopped and said a quick hello to him. I skipped asking for a picture. He is the nicest guy, but his smile is almost animatronic looking. (Sorry, but it's true that every time I see that animatronic at OMD at DHS, I think of his smile.)

We made our way up to the Hub area after finally finding each other again after becoming separated at bag check. We had no view of the castle stage. We saw some characters parade by, but it was nothing to have gotten up early for. We left the area before Meg Crofton began to speak, the baby was not interested in my needs for a Disney geek fix. We thought that by going on back into the park that the crowds would lessen. This was NOT the case. The place looked as busy as a normal day in July or August. After making the rounds and being surrounded by far too many people for comfort, we decided to go over to Epcot. We decided to do so by way of a meet & greet with Princess Tiana. It went well. Tiana was wearing a different dress than usual today. It looked like her parade dress. There was no Prince Naveen in sight today. Layna marched right up and asked to be picked up, asked for a hug, and then managed to sneak in a kiss, which took Tiana offguard, but she said that Layna was sweeter than a fresh batch of sugared begniets. So, we scored another great meeting with the princess that Layna loves best.

We decided to take a tour around the WS upon arrival with a stop to see if we could be among the first to see Duffy. We were in luck and there were just a few families in line. Layna loves her Duffy bear, so we were hoping that she would get over the nonface character fear that she had on our last visit, which had surprised us because she never had a problem with them before. Duffy worked his magic! Layna ran up and gave him a hug and a kiss on the nose. Thank goodness! We went around the WS starting at 11:30-ish AM. The lines at the F&W festival booths were very long in places. Like I thought Italy was pretty bad, but even worse was a line so bad in Poland that they had a constructed long roped off cue and the line went back about the same amount of people behind the end of that, which literally made the line about 5 times worse than what Italy had. Needless to say, while I was happy to grab some Ravioli for Gabby to try, I was not about to brave the line for Poland. I did however talk Gabby into trying some Moroccan food, which she actually liked and agreed that we should try that again soon. I love the food in Morocco. Anyway, we ate on a shaded bench as the baby napped in her stroller. We decided to go see The Seas with Nemo & Friends with the baby, which included her first encounter with Crush. She was very excited about all of the exhibits with the live creatures. She took particular delight in the Sea Horses, Crabs, and Dolphins. After that, we decided to head back over to the Magic Kingdom.

We got there and the park crowds had thinned a lot, but were building again. We went to Peco Bills for dinner and it was so packed, they opened up seating in the Tortuga Tavern area because there was no seating left inside. We decided to call it a day. There was some family drama stuff that really flared up for Gabby when we had just gotten back to the MK and when we left the restaurant, the crowds were getting uncomfortable again, so we called it a day.

I got a free button. I saw the $5 Cupcake that another guest had. He said there was nothing special about it other than they said it was special. The only thing that we bought to bring home was a Mine, Mine, Mine Onsie for Layna. I did not get any pins or special merchandise today. I got several great memories including the "jinx poke you owe me a Coke Zero" moments when we each said the exact same thing about leaving the MK park both times that we left the park today. I don't regret the way that things turned out. If I had gone alone, I would have missed some priceless moments with the little one and there just is no substituting the two out.

Overall, it was a great day of Disney magic, but it was not the best park anniversary celebration ever.

 

[OrlandoMike]

Video of the parade and castle show..

No Orange Bird!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bryUZl096TU

 

[OrlandoMike]

And Wishes...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gv-k_imV1iE&feature=player_embedded#!

 

[Gypsybear]

We were there...we had an 8:05 am ADR at CP with Pooh....OMG...the crowds were insane....getting into the park wasn't that much of an issue...getting out of the restaurant when the main gates had already opened was a definite issue.

We made a beeline for the gift shops to look for the 40th merchandise. Well, it was there, for a few mins.....it was total insanity. People knocking each other over, pushing, shoving, etc....I felt bad for the cast members. They were literally surrounded by 60-70 people each...it was awful.

I did manage to get a tee, only to discover that she gave me the one for women...so I bought the thing anyway. This was a good thing, as I learned later on.

So, in the meantime, my bear went over to the pin location, to try and get the "I was there" pin. The line stretched from Frontierland all the way to the eatery in Liberty Square that does the funnel cakes. They were told that it would be at least 2-3 hours before they would see the inside of the shop. So, he left.

In the meantime, we made another beeline over to the shop across the street, where the Jim Shore pieces would be signed later in the morning. It was AWFUL at best. People were literally breaking the Jim Shore pieces because they were reaching over each other, etc....

I did manage to snag an event piece from the "Room for 1 More" event...and managed to snag 2 MEN's Tee shirts for the 40th...

Finished paying and made it outside. Went to find my bear. He said he was in Tomorrowland, so I went to find him. Found him, worked our way to Main Street again, against the flow of traffic, and barely made it into line for the Jim Shore signing. On our way to the line, we did manage to see some of the "presentation" in front of the castle. Waited in line for Jim Shore for about 1.5 hours. Got my pieces signed, and we got the heck out of dodge. The crowds were insane. We did see the character parade down Main Street....it was fun seeing some of the characters we hadn't seen before....

The insanity of the day was NOT the way I wanted to remember my last day there...we were leaving after the Jim Shore signing anyway, but that just kind of soured the experience for me.

Oh, final thing...the reason I said that my purchase of the women's shirt was a good thing, is that an online friend of mine and I met at the parks on vacation. Well, I told her during MNSSHP about the upcoming 40th anniversary. She managed to change her plans and upgrade their tickets the next day to include park hoppers, so that they could be there for the 40th. Well, she had hoped to get a shirt of something of the event while there, but didn't make it through the throngs of people....when I found out she missed out, I let her have the shirt that I had bought....and that made her very happy....so all in all, that was a GOOD thing...