Magic Kingdom

We spent the second day of our vacation at the Magic Kingdom. It is quite a place. First, we parked in the parking lot, caught a tram to the Transportation and Ticket Center (TTC), then had a choice of taking a monorail or ferry to the park. We chose the monorail, thinking it might be a bit faster. It moves faster, but also has to stop a couple of other places before you get to the park, so it probably takes about the same amount of time. Anyway, we arrived at the park gates, went through the mandatory bag check and finally made it inside. There we were greeted by Chip & Dale, as well as several other characters. We stood in line for a few minutes to take pictures and get autographs. Once inside, we found ourselves on Main Street. We weren't exactly sure where we wanted to go and ended up heading over to Frontierland. There, Anna discovered her favorite ride in the whole park--Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. It is a fairly tame roller coaster--no upside down loops, but several good turns and dips. It also moves pretty fast. I think we ended up riding that at least four times during our vacation. Next to that was Spash Mountain. It was not operating when we first got there, but they soon had it up and running. Emily loved it! She talked Brian into sitting in the front and they got soaked! We wandered over to Adventureland and rode Pirates of the Caribbean. It was pretty much the same as I remember it from my teen trip to Disneyland.

I don't really remember what all we did that day. Lots of rides. Lots of waiting in line. Lots of walking. We did go to a good show called Mickey's PhilHarMagic. It is a 3-D animated show. It also has some "4-D" effects, such as water mist, yummy aromas, etc. I highly recommend it. We also got to meet many characters along the way, including Ariel, who is Emily's favorite princess, and Cinderella, who is Anna's favorite. We had to stand in a L-O-N-G line to meet her, as well as Snow White and Belle, but it was worth it because Anna was so happy! We ate lunch in the park, but went back out to our car in the parking lot to eat sandwiches for supper. (Another money-saving effort--we packed a cooler each day with sandwich meat, fruit, chips, bread, water...and would usually eat that instead of the expensive and mediocre food in the parks. We also all carried backpacks with water bottles and snacks.) After supper, we returned to the park, on the ferry this time, and rode some more rides, etc. We watched part of the night time parade--WOW! It was pretty good, with lots of lights. We also watched the fireworks, although we didn't have a great view from where we were in the park.

It was pretty late when we headed for the exit. We took the monorail, which turned out to be a big mistake this time. We were going along fairly well until we were almost to the TTC. Then our driver announced that the train in front of us had broken down and that maintenance was trying to get it fixed. To make a long story short, we sat on our train for 45 minutes. They finally had to tow the other train and then we were able to go ahead. Most everyone maintained their good spirits and we chatted with the other people in our car. Fortunately, no one was claustrophobic or had to go to the bathroom. The girls slept on me, so that was a bit uncomfortable, but at least they didn't whine. :)

All in all, it was a pretty good day. We didn't even come close to seeing and doing everything we wanted to at Magic Kingdom, but we planned for two days at this park, so we knew we would be back later in the week.

PS--Miles logged: almost 12!


Trivia question: Do you know which chipmunk is Chip and which is Dale?
Leave your answer in the comments section. I'll check back and give the correct answer in a few days.