Old, New & Long Lost Friends, with a Side of Frump! FINISHED! DL TR started 1.20.14!

Chapter 13 - "Of course they're real! You can see them, can't you?"

Once we left the Enchanted Tiki Room, J had woken up from her name and was ready to go on one of her favorite attractions - the Jungle Cruise!

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Our skipper was Ben and he was BY FAR the absolute best Jungle Cruise skipper I have ever had! I couldn't tell if he was telling jokes that I had never heard before, or if he was just delivering them better than other Skippers, but everything he said had me in stitches.

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There also was an adorable girl sitting at the front of the boat near the Skipper who asked him early on, "Are the animals real?" Without missing a beat, Ben answered, "Of course they're real, you can see them can't you?" :rotfl:

I had to sneak a picture of the little girl when she saw the python - too precious!

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J was excited the rest of us could finally see the sleeping hippos (you remember, the ones she kept talking about when were in the queue for The Little Mermaid?)

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And everybody's favorite, the backside of water!

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Once we returned to Adventureland, Jack Sparrow was getting ready to do his show. We'd never actually watched it before, so we decided to stick around for part of it.

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When we were on the train earlier, J had seen Woody and Jessie meeting over by Splash Mountain. Since we hadn't yet been to Frontierland, we decided to go check it out and see if they were currently doing meet and greets.


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*sigh* I'm not going to ride that puppy.

Luckily, Woody and Jessie were out, and there were only a few people in line! I have to say, I'm SO GLAD that we had our trip and this experience before that "Andy's coming!" picture/rumor made it's way onto the internet! I feel so bad for the cast members who are dealing with the fallout from it now.

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J was started to feel pretty tired/cranky again, so we had a little trouble getting her to pose for a picture. We did get a brief smile out of her though!

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It was about time for K, A & J to head out, so we decided to do one last attraction before they left - the Country Bear Jamboree!

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Scott and I both really enjoy this show, and it was my first time seeing it since they had shortened it and I wasn't entirely sure what to expect.

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I was happy to see the animatronics themselves were moving fantastic, even though I was definitely taken back by the costuming change they did on Liverlips. What on earth did they put on his head??

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For those of you who weren't aware, the bits of chatter/interaction that occur between most of the songs was cut out in the later refurbishment, along with one entire song and small sections of two other songs. As a big fan, I definitely thought that the cuts made it feel a little rushed and I did miss the parts they took out. However, it was still a fun show and I think guests who aren't as familiar with it will still really enjoy it and not feel like it is lacking.

Once we left the Country Bears, we said our goodbyes to our friends. As they went to the exit, we made our way to Liberty Square so Scott and I could go on another of our favorite attractions in all of WDW - the Haunted Mansion!

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We generally wind up riding this many, many times during our trips to Disney, and this was the longest we'd ever been in MK without riding it once, so we were both eager to get over there!

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Unfortunately, this was probably the worst Haunted Mansion ride we'd ever had. There was a kid in the doom buggy in front of us who thought it would be hilarious to constantly scream throughout the attraction to scare his friend riding with him. Which meant that throughout every scene up to Madam Leota we got to hear a random obnoxious scream followed by "OMG I CAN'T BELIEVE YOU DID THAT AGAIN!" I get wanting to have fun and goof around in Disney (obviously), but not when it's at the expense of everyone else trying to enjoy the ride.

Fortunately, as soon as we got off the Haunted Mansion, I was able to immediately turn my day around!

@GertieTheDino89: My day is about to get very frumpy...

I knew from her Twitter feed that Jess (DisneyFreak508) was in the Magic Kingdom! Earlier when I was over by Splash Mountain, I had grabbed two Fast Passes for Big Thunder Mountain Rail Road. My husband isn't a big fan of that ride (WHAT.), so I sent Jess a text to see if she wanted to join me - and she said OF COURSE!

She was at BTMRR already by the time I got there, and I could see her looking around for me. I'm not sure if she noticed, but while her head was turned, I decided to walk right up in front of her and make a deer face at her until she turned around, haha.

We hugged and gushed about how excited we were to FINALLY get a chance to meet each other, and then ran over to the FP line. This was my first chance to see and ride BTMRR since it had completed its lengthy refurbishment, and I was so excited to see how fantastic it was looking!

As we were waiting in line, Jess and I talked about everything from how her DCP was going, my love of Gertie, our plans for the rest of the week, and Disney in general. It seriously felt like we'd known each other forever and were just old friends who happened to run into each other randomly! We were directed towards the last row (WOO!), but when our train came, we weren't able to ride. The lap bars had gotten stuck, and the two kids who had been in the seat, instead of telling a cast member (or just riding again - what was wrong with these kids?) they decided to squirm out of the lap bars while they were still down. It's the policy for the CMs once the lap bars are down not to raise them (unless it's an emergency), so we waited for the next car. The WILDEST RIDE IN THE WILDERNESS was more amazing than I remembered! I couldn't wait to get back on later to take some photos!

After the ride, Jess had to rush off to meet her friends in line for Tiana and Naveen, so we took a quick picture before we went our separate ways.

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FRUMPS UNITED!

We were getting hungry again by this point, so we went over to Pecos Bill's and each got the taco salad - which was mainly just an excuse to overdo it at another toppings bar. YUM!

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My and Scott's phones were getting close to dying and it was starting to get chilly so Scott wanted to change from shorts to jeans. Magic Kingdom was having Extra Magic Hours tonight, so we decided to make a brief run back to the room and get ready for a loooong night at MK!




 
A good skipper makes all the difference!

Hahahha I don't remember the sleeping hippos thing... hmm, maybe that's because I had to skip that update. ;) I can't wait until I can go back and read all of everyone's updates that I missed! :laughing:

Seriously can't stand annoying people like that... like are they not even remotely aware of all the other people around them trying to enjoy their day? Geeze.

Fun meet!
 

The exaggerated fake screams and hollering bothers me too. Especially at HM. It's even worse when the offender is an adult which I've experienced a couple of times. Love the taco salads at Peco Bills!
 
Woo hoo on visiting Disneyland!! :woohoo: I seriously fell in love with that place last year, and I hope it is not too long before we are back for another visit. You are going to love it!!

I love getting a really great skipper on JC. They can really make or break the entire ride experience!!

Aww, how fun that you met up with Jess! Now I feel like I remember reading about that on her CP thread, but I guess I didn't put it all together at the time?Or I was not reading your TR yet, maybe? :goodvibes Either way, so cool! :thumbsup2
 
Hey Theresa, congratulations on Disneyland! I was lucky enough to get there last year, and it is every bit as amazing as you can imagine.

Country Bear Jamboree is def an all time family favourite. I remember going to Disney as a kid and that's all my grandfather wanted to do... ALL DAY! :rotfl2:
He just loved Big Al. :lovestruc

Oh God, the "fake" screamers at HM, or any attraction for that matter. So annoying. :furious:

How awesome that that you were able to turn that around by meeting Jess. I swear she's becoming the most sought after meet at Disney. Plus... no line! :goodvibes
 
I know I've talked about it on twitter with you, but I'm so excited for you to go to Disneyland! It's such an awesome experience!! I am looking forward to hearing all about it. I can't WAIT to go back again in November, eeeee!

Hahaha I love Jungle Cruise.. and that little girl is too cute! That ride never gets old.

OMG, that whole Andy's Coming thing is probably the worst thing I've ever heard for characters. Seriously, if I hear that in September I'll probably have to yell at someone. What a headache! It's kind of amazing how some internet meme can get around like that and spread like wildfire.

People who ruin rides like the Haunted Mansion infuriate me. The two biggest offenders are on Haunted Mansion are the kids who scream because they thing they're hilarious, and people who take flash photos non-stop. It's one thing to take a photo or two, but when you are snapping them over and over again to get a terribly mediocre/blurry photo, you are not awesome in my book. The WORST is in Madame Leota's room when someone takes a photo across from you, and then their flash has blinded you for the remainder of the ride. Yeeeeep. Blergh.

Aww yay for meeting Jess! I actually met her during our trip, as well, haha. She's a popular gal! :goodvibes
 
You go to Country Bear Jamboree and don't post any photos of Big Al? This trip report is BS. ;)
 
OMG take meeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!!!!!!!!! lol that's so awesome !!!!

I wish I could take everyone!

oh I love that you got to meet Jess n it went so well,you both look great in that pic!!!

Thanks! Meeting up with Jess was definitely one of the highlights of the trip!

A good skipper makes all the difference!

Hahahha I don't remember the sleeping hippos thing... hmm, maybe that's because I had to skip that update. ;) I can't wait until I can go back and read all of everyone's updates that I missed! :laughing:

Seriously can't stand annoying people like that... like are they not even remotely aware of all the other people around them trying to enjoy their day? Geeze.

Fun meet!

Ahhhhhh I can't wait for you to go and see it for yourself and see your reactions!!

I always wonder the same thing about the people who do things like yelling on rides. I get they want to enjoy themselves, but why does their enjoyment more important than everyone elses? :confused3

There will be more fun frumpiness coming up soon!
 
The exaggerated fake screams and hollering bothers me too. Especially at HM. It's even worse when the offender is an adult which I've experienced a couple of times. Love the taco salads at Peco Bills!

Yeah, I think if you had to deal with an adult acting like that, it would be much worse. These were high school kids, and while I know not ALL teenagers are like that, I know my friends and I were from time to time, so I can let it go. Hopefully they'll grow out of it!

Woo hoo on visiting Disneyland!! :woohoo: I seriously fell in love with that place last year, and I hope it is not too long before we are back for another visit. You are going to love it!!

I love getting a really great skipper on JC. They can really make or break the entire ride experience!!

Aww, how fun that you met up with Jess! Now I feel like I remember reading about that on her CP thread, but I guess I didn't put it all together at the time?Or I was not reading your TR yet, maybe? :goodvibes Either way, so cool! :thumbsup2

Thanks! I'm so excited for this trip! It's going to be really tough trying to find a balance between seeing/doing everything and just trying to stop for a few moments to take it all in.

I agree with you about a Jungle Skipper being vital to how much you enjoy the ride. We had another one later in the trip who just didn't really seem to want to be there, which made US not want to be there.

Yep, I did make a brief appearance in her DCP trip report, but I think she posted it while we were still in WDW, so this TR didn't exist yet, haha.



Hey Theresa, congratulations on Disneyland! I was lucky enough to get there last year, and it is every bit as amazing as you can imagine.

Country Bear Jamboree is def an all time family favourite. I remember going to Disney as a kid and that's all my grandfather wanted to do... ALL DAY! :rotfl2:
He just loved Big Al. :lovestruc

Oh God, the "fake" screamers at HM, or any attraction for that matter. So annoying. :furious:

How awesome that that you were able to turn that around by meeting Jess. I swear she's becoming the most sought after meet at Disney. Plus... no line! :goodvibes

Thank you! I've been dreaming about going to Disneyland for years, it seems so surreal that it's actually about to happen!

Your grandfather sounds like my kind of guy, haha!

In the summer it's going to be crazy - Jess might have to set up a FP to accommodate everyone who wants to try and meet up with her!
 
It's been so long since I've done either the Jungle Cruise or the Country Bear Jamboree! I do love the back side of water, though! ;)

I hate it when people ruin dark rides. I get the feeling that people think that because they're in the dark, what they do doesn't matter because if they can't see other people, obviously no one can hear them. :rolleyes2
 
How fun that you and Jess were able to meet up! :goodvibes

I love the Jungle Cruise - it's always great when you get a good skipper! :thumbsup2

I haven't been to visit the Country Bears since their refurb - too bad they made cuts!
 
I know I've talked about it on twitter with you, but I'm so excited for you to go to Disneyland! It's such an awesome experience!! I am looking forward to hearing all about it. I can't WAIT to go back again in November, eeeee!

Hahaha I love Jungle Cruise.. and that little girl is too cute! That ride never gets old.

OMG, that whole Andy's Coming thing is probably the worst thing I've ever heard for characters. Seriously, if I hear that in September I'll probably have to yell at someone. What a headache! It's kind of amazing how some internet meme can get around like that and spread like wildfire.

People who ruin rides like the Haunted Mansion infuriate me. The two biggest offenders are on Haunted Mansion are the kids who scream because they thing they're hilarious, and people who take flash photos non-stop. It's one thing to take a photo or two, but when you are snapping them over and over again to get a terribly mediocre/blurry photo, you are not awesome in my book. The WORST is in Madame Leota's room when someone takes a photo across from you, and then their flash has blinded you for the remainder of the ride. Yeeeeep. Blergh.

Aww yay for meeting Jess! I actually met her during our trip, as well, haha. She's a popular gal! :goodvibes

Wooooo Disneyland planning!! I'm sure I'll have plenty more questions to ask you before we head out there!

What baffles me is that it seems as though the "Andy's Coming" thing is something they haven't done in several years...so why did it only become a viral sensation now??

I haven't had big issues with people taking photos on HM while I'm riding it, but we ALWAYS seem to encounter it on Pirates. I get it happening once if you forget to set your flash to off, but the whole ride? No bueno.

I don't blame everyone for wanting to meet up with Jess, she's just that awesome. :goodvibes


You go to Country Bear Jamboree and don't post any photos of Big Al? This trip report is BS. ;)

YOU'RE BS.

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It's been so long since I've done either the Jungle Cruise or the Country Bear Jamboree! I do love the back side of water, though! ;)

I hate it when people ruin dark rides. I get the feeling that people think that because they're in the dark, what they do doesn't matter because if they can't see other people, obviously no one can hear them. :rolleyes2

Country Bears is one of my husband's all time favorite attractions, so we always go there at least once during our trip! Jungle Cruise we'll generally go if we can either get a Fast Pass for decent time, or the wait is under 20 minutes. We generally luck out in one of those situations!

I really don't understand what goes through people's minds when they do things like that! I'm guessing it's also partially just being so wrapped up in their own experience, they either forget or are oblivious to the fact that there are other people trying to have a great experience as well. Who knows. :confused3


How fun that you and Jess were able to meet up! :goodvibes

I love the Jungle Cruise - it's always great when you get a good skipper! :thumbsup2

I haven't been to visit the Country Bears since their refurb - too bad they made cuts!

I was so excited that our trip not only overlapped with Jess's DCP, but that we were there before she officially began her training so she had some free time to hang out with us for a bit!

I almost always enjoy myself on the Jungle Cruise, but yeah, it's definitely an elevated experience when you have a great skipper!

If you get to see Country Bears during your wedding/honeymoon trip, I'll be really interested in hearing what you think of the current version! (you know, in addition to hearing about the wedding and whatnot, haha)
 
Chapter 14 - Enchanted Tales With Belle and Brickering



I'm going to split this post into 2 parts to be courteous to Marissa who will FINALLY be seeing New Fantasyland in just a few weeks! EVERYBODY REJOICE, WOOO!!! Marissa, read on and I'll tell you when to stop and move on to the next post =)

When we returned to the Magic Kingdom after charging our phones for a bit (and watching more Stacey), they had the RFID entrances open! I started to take a picture of the "turnstile," and was telling the cast member how excited I was that they were operational, and she offered to take a picture of me using it.

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For those of you who haven't experienced this yet, it was incredible simple. You place your KTTW on the Mickey head, as you would to enter your room, and when the light circling the Mickey head starts to spin faster, you place your finger on the biometrics scanner. Yes, unfortunately, that is still part of entering the parks, but I do understand that it's to eliminate people sharing tickets. If the light turns green, SUCCESS! If not, they'll have you try it again. We'll discuss what happens later if you can't get the finger scan to work, heh.

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Welcome back, Orange Bird!

Celebrate the Magic and Wishes had already ended by the time we re-entered the Magic Kingdom, so we decided to just take our time and wander around. We went in the Emporium to browse through the current merch and see if there was anything we were interested in buying.

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They had a lot of the 2013 merch out, - I really liked how they were incorporating the park icons, although I am one of the people who prefers the Earful Tower as the DHS icon versus the Sorcerer Mickey Hat.

While we were in the Emporium, I overhead a young boy say "I love Disney World. And I love you, Mom." PRECIOUS.

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I love the castle at night. I'm assuming you do too, so here's a bunch of pictures of it!

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I'd heard that Storybook Circus looked awesome at night, so I was eager to head over there to check it out.

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It seriously lives up to the hype! I love the lights, the colors around Dumbo, the entire environment there is seriously perfect. I was even more impressed seeing Storybook Circus at night than I was while we were wandering around during the day.

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Once we finished there, I was ready to head over to see New Fantasyland at night! (And Marissa, that is your cue to exit! Please click HERE!




Is she gone? Alright, that was really just a distraction, everybody talk about Marissa now!!!


Kidding, kidding. Aw, I love that girl. Okay, back to the TR!


Thanks to being near the end of the Extra Magic Hours, the wait time for Enchanted Tales with Belle was down to around 25 minutes, which basically means that when you add in the length of the pre-show, you're only waiting outside for 5 minutes until you go indoors to check out Maurice's Cottage.

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While we were still outside I tweeted

@GertieTheDino89 I didn't expect all these lanterns in New Fantasyland to make me so happy.


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That's a really crappy picture of it, but I had to post so you knew what I was talking about. I promise you, it looks so amazing in person!

Once we entered Maurice's cottage, there was so much to look at! I love how they added in so many little details, like Belle's storybook and the painting with her mother.

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After you exit the first room, you're taken back to Maurice's workshop. This is another one of those pre-show rooms, like in Tower of Terror, where I wish I had more time to look around at everything they have placed in there.

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This is where they have the enchanted mirror, and AHHHHH the visual effect is as cool in person as it is in the videos!

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The animatronics in this attraction are phenomenal!

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Since it was pretty late by this point, there weren't a ton of kids in our group, so a few unsuspecting father's got pulled in to the action, haha.

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Seriously, can I recreate this room in my house? And have a copy of Belle's dress that I just wear whenever? Please and thank you.

The child they had cast as the Beast had last minute stage fright, so his father took his place. He was such a good sport about it and really got into his character!

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I opted not to take a character role in the show, since I just wanted to watch it and get some pictures, but I did get to interact with Belle during the performance of Be Our Guest, as she informed me "The grey stuff really is delicious!" Hm Belle. I don't know if I trust you. Let me ask the dishes.

I'm glad we were able to do this attraction with such a short wait time. It was really well done, and the reaction of the kids who were involved was absolutely precious - it's not something I would ever want to wait the 60+ minutes that we saw frequently during our trip, but I would go again!

After we left Belle's, we did a little more wandering around New Fantasyland.

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It was pretty close to park closing by this time, but do you think we were done yet?? OF COURSE NOT SILLY PEOPLE. IT WAS TIME FOR BRICKERING!

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Continued in next post




 
Chapter 14 - Enchanted Tales With Belle and Brickering (Part 2)


So, some of you may be asking, "What the heck is Brickering??"

It's a reference to Tom Bricker, owner of the site Disney Tourist Blog(which the DisBoards won't let me link to for some reason), a photographer who has made a name for himself by regularly staying in the parks well after closing to take some gorgeous night time pictures in an empty park. You can regularly see his work now on the official Disney Parks Blog. Personally, I don't care for his photos, but he likes dinosaurs, so I can look past that.

With being January and a slow time for Disney, the closing hours for the parks was relatively early, even with Extra Magic Hours, so I figured if I was ever going to try and pull a Bricker, it would be during this trip. The bigger question was - how would my 3 year old Point and Shoot camera fare in these conditions?

Unfortunately, the actual answer to that question is "Not great," but we did get a few shots I really liked! Since the attractions were closed by this point, this update will be mostly pictures, not much text.

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We were hanging around the park late enough that we managed to see something I had only heard about - the Kiss Goodnight! I was too enthralled just watching to take pictures, but luckily Scott grabbed a short snippet of it on his phone, which you can see by clicking the link below:

http://youtu.be/h1Cd35eUEFc

If you have the opportunity, you all MUST do this at least once. It is truly one of the most amazing Disney memories I have (and that's saying something).

This entire day had been so amazing and I just did not want it to be over. Even after the Kiss Goodnight, I wanted to spend as much time as I could just standing at the hub and on Main Street, taking everything in.

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Why must you try to make me leave Disney? WHY?

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I finally conceded...but not before running to the top of the train station to get one last picture.

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Farewell for now, Magic Kingdom. I'll be back soon.


Continued in next post

 
Great updates! Had to smile seeing the understudy dad playing the role of the Beast and being a good sport about it even though the cape was two sizes small for him. :thumbsup2

Love your pictures from after park closing which is something I would love to try. How much past closing time were these pictures taken? And were the CMs trying to usher you out at that point?
 
I totally read the title as "Enchanted Tales With Belle and BICKERING" and thought to myself, "Uh oh!" :lmao: I'm glad you were actually Brickering, not bickering. I had never heard of that myself, but it looks like fun! Love those ones you got looking down Main Street. :love:

Also loved the photos from New Fantasyland at night. I can't wait to see it all in person!!
 















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