Vacation: Magic Kingdom Day 1

We started our day off with a bit of confusion. My recommendation is to check the hours of the park you're visiting the night before you go! They are always subject to change. I had checked the hours a while before we visited to make our schedule and it had said the hours were 9am-10pm. However, what we didn't realize until after we got there was that the hours had changed to 8am-12am. When we arrived at 8:15am, the park was already open. Luckily, it wasn't too busy so we were able to go to a couple of rides before the lines got super long. Big Thunder Mountain Railroad was closed for refurbishment so I have no comments on this ride. Also, Stitch's Great Escape was down while we were there so I have no comments on this ride either.

We started off with Astro Orbiter. I will tell you this. Owen and I sat very comfortably in this ride. My husband and Mom did not. It was definitely a tight fit for the two of them. It was pretty fun though. This ride is your typical up and down, round and round ride.

We saw that the Tomorrowland Speedway had a short line so we jumped over there. The cars don't go very fast and you can't actually drive them too much because there is a bar in the middle to keep you on the track. However, this means that our little 6yo son was able to drive the car. It seemed like it was nearly impossible to control the car. Even as a decent adult driver, it felt like I was bouncing all over the place. And while little kids may be able to drive, they may not be able to reach the pedal. Luckily, the pedal is in the middle of the car so an adult can easily press the pedal while the little one drives. It was a fun little way to waste time.

We had a FP+ for Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin and it was so much fun. It was similar to Toy Story Mania in Hollywood Studios, but it's also different and has it's own little story. This one actually has a gun that you shoot and you're able to control which way the car spins to choose what you're shooting at. However, it is a little difficult to tell what you're shooting at. There are all these little red dots to show where you're shooting, but it's hard to tell which one is yours. We had so much fun though.

Then we headed over to the Monsters, Inc. Laugh Floor. My tip is, if you're horribly afraid of being singled out in front of a crowd, don't go to this. Seriously! Most people are great sports, but my husband wasn't expecting this and was completely extatic at the end when he wasn't chosen. If you embarrass easily, beware! Despite all of this, I will tell you that I actually laughed quite a bit. Normally, I'm pretty hard to make laugh. A lot of things that kids find funny, I'm not impressed by. This was funny!

We decided to ride the teacups at Mad Tea Party next. We loved spinning. It's just like all your usual spinning rides. You sit in a teacup and spin the circle in the middle to make yourself go. This means you can spin as fast or as slow as you would like.

The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh was fun. It felt like we waited in line forever for this one though. Luckily, the line was pretty entertaining. The kids are free to play in one part of it while the adults stand in line. The ride is fine. While sitting in your honey pot, you go along on a story with Winnie the Pooh and all his friends. It's definitely a great ride for little kids. Our 6yo enjoyed it, but I think in a year or 2, it will be a little young for him.

We ate lunch at The Friar's Nook where we got pot roast mac and cheese and BBQ chicken mac and cheese. It was really good and really filling. Personally, I liked the pot roast better. I think it was because the BBQ chicken was a little sweet for me and had cole slaw on top (which would have been nice to know beforehand).

We got to meet Merida. When we first got there, kids got to try archery after they met her. However, a couple groups before us, one of the kids broke the bow so we didn't get to do it. That was pretty disappointing for our son. But that's not why we were there. Merida was so nice! She told Owen he reminded her of her brothers and she taught Owen the correct stance for archery. He really enjoyed meeting her.

We had a FP+ for Space Mountain so we went there. I was a little concerned that my son wouldn't like it because the whole ride is in the dark, but he loved it! It goes fast around in circles in the dark. That's pretty much the whole ride. You feel like you're going a lot faster than you actually are because it's so dark. That being said, it's a lot more fun than it sounds.

We decided to take a little break on the Walt Disney World Railroad around the park. There are 3 stops and you could seriously ride that thing all day because they never make you get off. That being said, we boarded in Fantasyland, went to Main Street U.S.A., then to Fantasyland, and finally got off when we got back to Fantasyland. There is a nice breeze while the train is moving. If you have your own stroller, you can take it with you if you fold it up.

My mom convinced us to go on “it's a small world” and that line was quite the pain. Part of that was because the outside part was all in the sun. Part of that was because the line was long. But I think the biggest reason that line was a pain was because the family behind us just refused to watch their daughter (2-3 years old) and she was out of control. She kept bumping into us, touching us, swinging the chains, going ahead of us, yelling, and pretty much just all around being annoying. Now, I work with kids so I'm not just sour toward them. However, I do believe in watching your children and correcting inappropriate behavior. Now, after we got on the boat (thankfully, not even the same one as the other people) we realized one thing. There is absolutely no leg room! Or at least, there isn't any in the front row. I mean, it's great to be in front and it looked like there may have been more room in other rows, but we definitely were uncomfortable. Oh, and have you heard the joke about getting stuck on this ride? Well, it may have only been for 10 minutes, but we were definitely stuck and the song just kept playing!

We watched the Princess Elena Royal Welcome by accident! We got to the castle early to watch the Friendship Faire and it turned out that they were welcoming Elena of Avalor right before that. It was pretty cool. She sang a song. I got a picture of Cinderella and Prince Charming in front of the castle so that was nice.

While we were waiting, we ate some Mickey bars, which are basically just dilly bars in the shape of Mickey.

So then, we stuck around and watched Mickey's Royal Friendship Faire. What a cute little show on the castle stage. There are SO many characters involved in this. Mickey, Minnie, Donald, Daisy, Goofy, Tiana, Prince Naveen, Rapunzel, Flynn, Olaf, Elsa, and Anna are all involved. There are 4 songs and we all thoroughly enjoyed watching. We were really close to the stage so I was concerned at first that we wouldn't be able to see that well, but that wasn't the case at all. Plus, there were fireworks at the end of the performance. It was great! It seemed like they were lip-syncing to the original voices which we really enjoyed because the songs sounded really authentic.

We had a FP+ for Splash Mountain and I'm glad we did. That line was long. It was really fun! There are 4 rows and our party was in the last 2. It seemed like the front row got the most wet and sitting in the back, we just got a light mist to the face. That was actually kind of nice because it cooled us down a bit, but we didn't get soaked so it was still fine to walk around for a while after that. Usually, Splash Mountain is all about that 50 foot drop, but there is a nice little story that goes along with the ride involving Br'er Bear and Br'er Fox going after Br'er Rabbit.

Pirates of the Caribbean didn't have a very long line so we went on that. It was ok. You ride a boat through scenes from the movies. It was kind of fun looking for Jack Sparrow. In some of the scenes he's kind of hidden so you have to pay attention.

My family was not interested in going to The Hall of President's, but my mom was so she went by herself.

We went to meet Pooh and Tigger. That line was deceptively long. Pooh and Tigger kept having to take a break every 20 minutes so we were there for about an hour. They were great though.

We just had to ride Dumbo the Flying Elephant. It's an iconic ride after all. This is the ride that everyone thinks of when thinking of all the ABC shows in the 90s when the families would go to Disney World and there was always that clip of them riding the Dumbo elephants. We used a FP+ for it after we used our original 3. It was just like the ride we rode first. You know, your typical up and down ride that goes round and round.

We then booked another FP+ for The Magic Carpets of Aladdin. It was the same as Dumbo and Astro Orbiter with one small difference. It had a spitting camel. If you want to get wet, you need to gauge the height of the spit and aim for that and hope that he spits right when you're going by. If you don't want to get wet, you need to go either high or low when he spits to avoid the water.

We decided to call it quits after this ride and make our way back to the resort. After all, we had to get up super early for our breakfast reservations.