Magic Kingdom: The Rides

 We spent two days at Magic Kingdom.  This park was really crowded on both days- so we arrived early and left in the afternoon.  The Murrays stayed all day on both days, and I think that they literally rode every ride and saw every show in the park.  The primary focus of both of our Magic Kingdom days was on the rides.  As I mentioned in an earlier post, the older kids are getting to the stage where they like the thrill rides, and the Magic Kingdom is the best park for this.

First on the list of thrills was conquering the Magic Kingdom Mountain Range- beginning with Space Mountain.  We rode this twice, and it is a lot jerkier than I remember is being.  The kids loved it though.

 It wasn't that scary for us adults, so we decided to ham it up for the camera.

Next up: Thunder Mountain, which I believe is the best ride in the park.  We rode this four times (and even got Gigi and Papa on it).

 The last "mountain" was Splash Mountain.  We were all able to ride this together (you can't see Julianna in the picture, but she is between Hannah and Kelly).

 We also got to go on the new Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, and it was really good.

 Of course, we had to ride the classics too.  The good news is that even though it was crowded, we didn't have to wait very long for the rides thanks to the Fastpass system.  I love those fastpasses.

Animal Kingdom

 Our second full day was spent at my favorite park- Animal Kingdom.  This was another long day.  We arrived at rope drop and left only one hour before closing.  We rode every ride and saw every show in this park.  There were a few stand-out moments, which I will discuss below.

 The kids' favorite ride of our entire vacation was Expedition Everest.  We rode it three times.

 We had fun exploring the trails and looking at the animals.

 The safari is always a favorite, and this year was no exception.

 One of my favorite moments of the trip happened during the Festival of the Lion King Show.  We arrived early and had the best seats in the house.  I say this because Olivia and Owen were chosen several times to participate in the show and interact with the performers.  At the beginning of the show, Olivia was picked to introduce the "giraffe" section.  (I have a video of her doing so below).  Later on, Timon the Meerkat joined the show and he came by and gave Owen a hug.  Then, some acrobats dressed as monkeys stopped and high-fived the kids.  And if that weren't enough, at the end of the show, both Owen and Olivia were chosen to participate in the closing musical number.  At the end of the number, Owen was held back to have the final interaction with Timon.  Timon told the kids that they all did a great job and said "especially you" to Owen.  This could not have gone any better.  It was definitely a "magical" moment.

 Another of my favorite Disney moments  occurring at Animal Kingdom was when our entire family rode Kali River Rapids together.  We were a party of 11, so we had to divide up for most rides.  But, the boats on this ride held up to 12 people, so we all got to ride together- and it was so much fun.  We all got so soaked- except for Daddy who somehow managed to avoid most of the water.  I have also attached a video of this.  I love this video because you can just see how excited to kids are.

Jedi Training Academy

 The #1 thing that we wanted to do on our entire Disney trip was to have the kids participate in Jedi training.  Both Owen and Olivia love all things Star Wars and the chance to "train" with a Jedi Master was something that they both wanted to do.  The only issue- sign up for Jedi training is limited and it's first-come-first-served.  While planning our vacation, I stressed about getting "in" to Jedi training more than everything else combined.  The general consensus seemed to be that we needed to show up an hour before the park opened, be first into the park, and run to Jedi sign-ups in order to guarantee our spot.  So, we showed up an hour before the park opened.  As we were walking to the gate (where we were going to be among the first to enter the park), we saw a employee holding up a sign that said "Jedi".  I asked her about it, and she was signing kids up for training outside of the park before it opened.  We signed up immediately, and were in the first show of the day.

 The premise of the show is that the kids are younglings training to be Jedi.  A Jedi master comes out and takes them through a few training exercises.  Then, Darth Vader and two Storm Troopers interrupt training to try and turn the kids to the Dark Side.  The kids then take turns using their training to battle Darth Vader.  It's a pretty cool show.

 Owen was the first of our kids to battle Darth Vader.  He remembered his training and did a great job.  Apparently, the force is strong with him.

 Olivia was next and she did not hold back.  I kind of felt sorry for Vader because she was really letting him have it.

 In the end, Vader was unable to turn any of the younglings to the dark side, and he was forced to retreat.  Because the kids were able to drive Vader off, they were officially made Padawans and they each received a certificate declaring them as such.  This was a definite highlight of our trip.

Hollywood Studios

I think that we chose the perfect time for a family trip to Disney.  The older kids are just getting to the point where they are interested in the more thrilling rides, and Julianna is in her "princess" phase.  The variety of activities offered by Disney really seemed to meet everyone's interests.

We spent our first day at Hollywood Studios- and it was a full day.  We arrived one hour before opening and stayed until closing.  I had only been to this park once before- and that was the year it opened (when it was still called MGM Studios).  This park has definitely grown.  Here are some of our favorite things from this park:

#1:  Tower of Terror-  One of the icons of the park is the Tower of Terror.  The older kids wanted to ride it, so Brian, Kelly, and I took them on it.  It was scary and fun- probably my favorite ride of the park.  It freaked Olivia out a bit though.  She didn't even want to look at it for the rest of the day.

#2:  Jedi Trainig- Both Owen and Olivia enrolled in the Jedi Training Academy.  This was so awesome that it's getting its own post.

#3:  Shows- There weren't many rides at Hollywood Studios, but there were plenty of shows- and we saw just about every one of them.  One of our favorites was Beauty and the Beast Live on Stage.

#4- Thrills-  Our first ride of the day was the Rock and Roller Coaster.  This was the kids' favorite ride at the park.  We probably would have ridden it more than once had the line not been so long.

#5:  Rides- Although there are not as many rides at this park as there are in others, we did enjoy those that were there.  Everyone especially liked Toys Story Midway Mania- an arcade-like game where you shoot at targets and compete against the other players in you car.

 #6:  Characters- We met several characters while at Hollywood Studios.  One of the most memorable interactions was watching Olivia play slaps with a toy soldier.

 #7:  Movie icons- We saw several props and characters from various movies- including an umbrella (a la Singing in the Rain), Lightning McQueen and Mater, and the carriage and glass slipper from the new Cinderella movie.

#8:  Fantasmic- Fantasmic is the large-scale, night time spectacular that is put on at Hollywood Studios.  I had never seen it before and really wanted to.  We booked a "Fantasmic Dining Package" so that we could get reserved seats for the show.  The performance was standing-room only, but we had seats front-and-center.  It was a great show and a great way to close out our first full day at Disney.

Happily Ever After

 After the kids got all dressed up and made over, we headed over to the super-fancy Grand Floridian Hotel to have dinner at 1900 Park Fare. The Happily Ever After Dinner was a character meal featuring Cinderella and company.  

 Our table wasn't ready when we arrived, so we had about fifteen minutes to check out the hotel lobby.  It was decorated for Easter with large eggs fixed up like various Disney icons.  There was also a classical pianist in the lobby who was playing classic Disney tunes.

 Once we were seated, we headed toward the buffet.  The food was pretty good, and there was plenty of it.  Before long, the characters started coming around.  The first to arrive was Cinderella.  She greeted Olivia as "Queen Elsa" and discussed plans to visit Arendelle.

 Cinderella was followed by a very mannerly Prince Charming.

 And then by the not so mannerly Anastasia.  She had already walked by the table a couple of times and had messed with Owen's hair each time.  He acted like he didn't like that (but he really did).

 After that came the aloof Lady Tremaine, who declared the goings-on at the meal to be "bibbidi bobbidi boring".

Finally came the very loud Drizella.  She and Anastasia were a hoot.  We were quite amused by their antics.  We had decided to only do one character meal at Disney (because they are $$). I'm glad we chose this one- it was lots of fun.