WDW Day Trip: September 2012

Lake Buena Vista, Florida: After several failed attempts, we finally made it back to Disney World to renew our passes and visit the parks. This is our first trip back to Disney since my wife fell and injured herself at Hollywood Studios in January. We decided to go to the Magic Kingdom for the day.

We originally planned on renewing our passes back during the January trip, but after having to depart early due to the fall, we did not get it done. But the staff of Disney worked with us on getting the renewal accomplished and honored our original passes. They reinstated our passes, gave us the renewal rate and transferred over our credit from the previous account. They truly showed that they are there to serve their guests.

The day trip to Disney is a rarity for us. Because of the three hour one way drive, we typically make a weekend out of it. But finances and scheduling prevented that from happening at this time. So I had forgotten how inconvenient it is to go to the Magic Kingdom for the day. You wait in line to get into the parking lot, wait in line for a parking spot assignment, wait in line for the tram, wait in line for the monorail or ferry, wait in line for bag check and then wait for pass check. You already waited in line at least five times before you are even in the park, I guess it's a preview of what to expect. The drawback to parking in the fourth largest parking lot in the world that's is a half mile away from the park entrance.

We got a little bit of a late start leaving the house and after getting our passes a guest relations, we missed park opening. This was a good thing and a bad thing. We missed the open cattle call and stampede of the rope dropping but replaced it with having lines at the attractions.

Unlike most trips where we have a plan and stick to it, we did a lot of jumping around today. We started off by riding the Tomorrowland Speedway since it tends to get busy fast.

Then we went to check out the recently opened Storybook Circus portion of the Fantasyland expansion. The circus is located in the area of the park that once housed Mickey's Toontown Fair. They did a good job with the renovation. We started off by riding Barnstormer. Then we rode Dumbo. Adding the second set of ride vehicles and Fastpass has made a great improvement to a historically slow loading ride. Another great benefit to the ride was moving a good portion of the ride queue indoors into an air conditioning, a huge benefit in the Florida heat and sunshine.

From there we traveled across the park to Liberty Square and the Haunted Mansion. Along the way, we took a look at the construction work at the rest of the Fantasyland expansion. The project appears to be making good progress. Beast's Castle dominates the skyline along with the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train not too far behind. Then we grabbed a funnel cake at Sleepy Hollow before reaching the Haunted Mansion. The line for the Haunted Mansion was not that long and there was the ability to skip the cemetery portion of the ride queue and head straight to the mansion, a great timesaver.

Afterwards we headed to a family favorite, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. No matter how man times I ride this or other rides, I still notice a different detail I have overlooked in the past. It's amazing the amount of detail the Imagineers put into these projects. We then tried to ride Splash Mountain but the 45 minute wait had us decide otherwise. So we moved to Adventureland and Pirates of the Caribbean.


Another goal for this trip was to visit the few attractions we have not done yet on our quest to do it all. One of these attractions was the Enchanted Tiki Room, but it was closed today. Another one was the Liberty Belle riverboat and it was in service and at the dock so we hopped aboard for the 20 minute cruise on the Rivers of America with great views of Frontierland, Tom Sawyer Island, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, the Haunted Mansion and other props along the river.

When we arrived back at port, we grabbed lunch. Since we were planning a large dinner, we had a quick lunch. My wife had a smoked turkey leg and my son and I had a Mickey Mouse pretzel. After gnawing on the turkey leg like a caveman, we headed to the Hall of Presidents for break from the crowds and heat. 

Often overlooked, Hall of Presidents is one of my favorite. Not only does it provide a seat and cold air-conditioning, it is a great historical look at our country. Since I am a history geek, it is one of my favorite. The only bad thing was the show malfunctioned early on, when the audioanimatronic Abe Lincoln tried to stand and give the Gettysburg Address, his hydraulics failed and he slumped over. My sense of humor got the best of me when I said to my wife that I didn't know Disney worked Fords Theater into the show....I thought it was funny but obviously not everyone else did.

After being ushered out of Hall of Presidents, we headed over to Tomorrowland to ride Buzz Lightyear, only to be greeted by an extremely large line. So we opted for Carousel of Progress and the Peoplemover to wait out the crowd. But it didn't work, the line was actually longer so we hopped on Stitch's Great Escape.

When Stitch was over, I checked the Lines app to find that most of the lines were too long. We tried to stay until the afternoon parade but fell an hour short with nothing else we wanted battle the crowds for so we headed to the exit.

While walking back to the car, we heard the race car engines from the Walt Disney World Speedway, home of the Richard Petty Experience. They allow you to watch the action from within the infield, so we decided to watch since we had time to spare until dinner. It was a lot of fun, brought back my love of live NASCAR racing and makes me want to go see another race live.

After watching a few sessions, we headed to Orlando International to watch some planes before dinner. A friend of mine always has awesome photos from here, so I wanted to give it a try. Plus it was extra intriguing since it was close to when all the larger jets from overseas start arriving.

Having never been to Orlando International Airport, I decided to use my Iphone to help navigate us to the airport....epic fail. It didn’t take long before we got lost. So I dug the Garmin out of the glove box and got us headed in the right direction.

As we got closer to the airport, I started to get excited. Plenty of jet traffic, at one point on the drive there were three jets in a row lined up for three of the four runway. This place was going to be a dream to take photos, except one major problem, it was huge. Unlike the airports I am familiar with, there is plenty of distance between the runways and not really a good place to get a view of all four runways. Plus the local law enforcement have strict rules regarding stopping and photographing making most places illegal to do so. 

So I tried B-52 park, just off the edge of the runway complex. No visibility at all, you could hear them but not see them. However there is a retired B-52 bomber that was pretty cool to see. Then we tried Airport Lakes Park but unfortunately by the time we got there, it was time to head back for dinner. So an hour and a half spent trying to get plane pictures and all I got was a retired park centerpiece.

After the disappointment, we hopped back onto the turnpike and pointed the car back to Disney. Luckily we found our way back quicker. We had dinner at the Trails End restaurant at Fort Wilderness. We love Trails End. It is a southern style buffet dinner. I have never had a bad thing from the buffet, it is always a great way to end a day at the park.

With full bellies, we hopped back into the car for the three hour ride home, ending another successful Disney adventure. Now that the weather is getting cooler, we will be making more trips to the house of the mouse and hopefully we will camp at Fort Wilderness. Until then, here is a slideshow of photos from today’s trip.