Official Fantasyland Expansion Q & A (Mickey gets evicted) PART II

[CentralFloridian99]

It looks beautiful! I'm going to MK Sunday, and if anyone's been there yet, does the circus open at opening or a specific time?

 

[lsulindy]

I am so excited for photos/video of the area to come out - I can't wait to see how everything looks!

Edit - the train station is also opened! And they've added Storybook Circus to the maps:

I find this very interesting (re: future openings timeline) that the Casey Jr. water area is on the map, but the other half of Dumbo is not.

 

[popsynic]

I find this very interesting (re: future openings timeline) that the Casey Jr. water area is on the map, but the other half of Dumbo is not.

I see what you mean. They have excluded the second Dumbo in the image, but included the water play area. I's Presume the map would just list/feature the attraction as Dumbo and not list each carousel separately. So must mean the water area will be opening before the second dumbo.

 

[DisneyFive]

You know what struck me (and I have no idea why this stood out to me...) The cast members having bare legs. It looked so odd because normally any costume that has leg showing requires them to wear nylons, right? I mean, I know there are some where they wear shorts and no nylons, but it just looks strange to me... Maybe it's the black capris and pasty white legs

Hah! Funny you say that because it's the first thing that caught my eye as well, since it just looked so different than what I'm used to and a little "off". It will help keep them cool in the inferno months of mid to late summer though.

Dan

 

[siwash23]

Wow, what a bummer. I missed it when I was right there about 1/2 hour before they opened it. I was in corner of Fantasyland with my family on Monday at 10AM riding the Teacups and next door riding the Speedway about the same time. I looked over towards Dumbo and the Barnstormer and there was no activity. I didn't walk down the walkway though and just assumed there was no opening since WDW just changed the Dumbo Refurbishment dates on their official calender to 3/1 to 3/30. The fact that the rides were not running at 10AM didn't give me any reason to think they would be opening that day.

That will teach me not to check DIS, the blogs and Twitter while I am at the parks and resort. When I saw the dates were changed on the official calendar when I looked on Saturday, I just figured we missed Dumbo and did not investigate further.

The funny thing is that I would have made my way down there to check it out if they would have just left the calendar showing that Dumbo would open on the 12th. It did still say that when I left last week even though some sites were reporting it was pushed back to 3/31. I can't believe they changed the calender when they did end up opening on the 12th as they have been reporting on their calendar for months. I know it is a soft opening, but it still doesn't make sense to change their site to show they are no longer opening on the 12th when they obviously had this soft opeing planned when they did change the calendar last week.

Oh well. I guess we will see the entire expansion the next time we go .

 

[mlittig]

This is all so exciting I can't wait to see it all in person next month

 

[crazycatlady]

Oh,I have no way of knowing. All I have seen posted is "late 2012". But if they ARE doing a grand opening of Be Our Guest (still rumor) the first week of November, I think they'd have to soft open it in October.

Is that a pretty credible rumor (as far as a rumor can be credible )? We are going Oct. 18th to the 28th, and now I am wondering if I should push our trip ahead a week.

 

[mkacar24]

We are here now and rode Dumbo and Barnstormer tonight. Both rides are the same as they were before, just better themed. The colors in the circus area at nighttime are very nice. Busy day at the magic kingdom but manageable.

 

[mom2rtk]

Is that a pretty credible rumor (as far as a rumor can be credible )? We are going Oct. 18th to the 28th, and now I am wondering if I should push our trip ahead a week.

That was from a CM in one of the Disney restaurants posting here on the DIS. But it's still pretty far alway, so I'm sure timelines can change. We're debating between mid-November and mid-December. I want to go November, but find myself leaning toward December just to be sure we catch it all. I'm thinking we might head west to DL next year and really want to catch all of this phase since it could be a while before we get back.

 

[DanBoris]

Is that a pretty credible rumor (as far as a rumor can be credible )? We are going Oct. 18th to the 28th, and now I am wondering if I should push our trip ahead a week.

You really need to take these dates with a whole shaker of salt. Storybook Circus was orignally going to open early February. Then not to long before opening it got pushed to March 12 and then it got pushed to March 31st, but soft opened on the 12th anyway. The later in the year you go the better change of the BatB and LM areas being open, but there is still no gaurentee they will even be open by the end of 2012.

Dan

 

[joannalh]

I'm just back from Disney and was in MK 2 days ago (March 14th). Funny thing was that I just assumed none of the new stuff was open because of the talk here about further delays. It wasn't until almost 10:30 that I really looked at the map and realized that Dumbo and the Barnstormer were on it, so we headed over there. Despite it being a busy park day, there was virtually no line at either, so I think people just didn't realize they were open. I will post some pics in a little bit, am still going through them all.

 

[Corrine 1973]

Well of course the small part of FLE opened the day after I left to go home. Well I knew that was probably going to happen anyway, I am very excited to be able to go back next May with my DD when almost everything should be done. (Everything but the Mine Train I believe.) But while I was there I did get a couple of shots of the castles that I wanted to share. I know we have all seen them a hundred times by now, but here they are.

 

[Berlioz70]

PHOTOS - Aerial views of the Fantasyland construction site

 

[Zuzu03]

Great new pics!!! Can't wait to see it for myself in 5 weeks. I'm always amazed at the size of the expansion, so exciting!

 

[joannalh]

Some pics from last week (March 14):



Dumbo, beside the circus tent:




View of the castle while on Dumbo!


Great Goofini/Barnstormer:

 

[jkpmac]

Great Pictures, can't wait until next year!!

Can I assume that the interactive part of Dumbo is still closed?

 

[DisneyGirlInOz]

Great Pics. Very excited to see it in person. I have seen some pics at night and it looks soooooo good.

All I need is for the BOGR to be open in November

 

[shalom]

So obviously we have images to represent:
Barnstomer Attraction, Casey Jr. Water Play Area, Dumbo Attraction, Pete's Silly Sideshow M&G.... and then there's Humphrey?!?!

I was scratching my head over Humphrey as well. If you're going to have a Circus Bear, why not Bongo? But if your theory on a food cart is right I suppose Humphrey makes more sense -- besides, Bongo wanted to escape the circus, while it's easy to imagine Humphrey thinking the circus is a great deal for a hungry bear!

 

[Berlioz70]

Visited SB Circus yesterday and tried to grab a couple pictures of things I didn't see a million images of already:

Future entrance to Dumbo's interactive queue:

There were several tracks like this running all sorts of different directions:

This one came to an end, just behind Dumbo:

Skins are being prepared for one of the tents:

New light fixtures, hanging mostly behind the construction wall:

 

[PoohsFan1]

Thanks Berlioz70 for those pictures....it is nice to see something new that hasn't been posted a lot . Just wondering if the track that ends right behind Dumbo, is that a nod from the old into the new? What a great tribute if it is. I can't wait to see all of this first hand on our trip .