Magic Kingdom's Baked Potato

Looking for something different to eat at the Magic Kingdom? Something healthy and filling? There is a little known food item available: Baked Potato! You won't find it on any quick service or kiosk menu, and it is only available in one spot.

How do you find them?

Go to the market square and go to the cash register. Simply order a baked potato. It is that simple!

Mission: Space's Space Race at Epcot

Just when you think you have spent many many years to see everything there is to see at Disney, you come across something you've never seen before. That is what happened to us at our latest visit to Epcot.

I have had no interest in Epcot's Mission: Space ride. Riders are placed into a small ride vehicle and shaken violently to simulate blasting into space. Uhm, no thanks.

My youngest son heard about this ride and became very excited. He really wanted to ride it, so, we let him. While he road it, the rest of us went to Mission Control to wait. Mission Control has an indoor playground and three different video games. We fell in love with one of the video games: Space Race.

Space Race has two space craft racing to a space station. The mission control operators have to upload space ship repairs to the space craft. And four astronauts have to apply those fixes. We played this game for hours, then returned another day to play some more.

You can see an exciting video of the game here: http://youtu.be/4nBhDlLRz34

Ice Cream After Disney

We regularly reward ourselves for a long day at Disney by having Ice Cream. And the best place to get ice cream is Twisty Treat on west end of Rt 192.

For $10-$15, the four of us can eat as much ice cream as we can stand! The best deal is the twisty (which is like a McDonald McFlurry). The kiddie size is huge and the large is impossible to eat.

The staff at the Twisty Treat is great. They are energetic and happy - they must snack on the food while they work.

Really up for a challenge? Try the brownie boat Sundae. It is like a banana split but made with brownies instead. It is huge!

We highly recommend Twisty Treat. Check them out!

The Best Disney Fireworks Show

What is the best Disney Fireworks show? To answer this, we are going to look at several factors: Fireworks, timing and theme to music, viewability, wait times, and crowd levels.

4. Epcot's Illuminations - This show ranks the lowest because it has the worse viewability.
Unless you are in certain locations, there will probably be a tree or building blocking your view. The special locations with good views are very crowded and standing room only. The show centers on a spinning globe in the center of the lake - but the globe is so small that it is nearly impossible to see what it is projecting. Those issues aside, the fireworks and laser lights are excellent.



3. Hollywood Studio's Fantasmic - Seeing this show usually means arriving early and standing in a crowded shoulder-to-shoulder line for 30-60 minutes. Sure, you get to sit during the presentation, but you have to stand forever in line! Often, the huge amphitheater fills, so, if you don't get in line you might not get a seat. The presentation is old and tired - it has been around since the park opening with very few improvements. Nevertheless, it is a good story, the fireworks and effects are well themed, and viewers do get to sit during the show.






2. Magic Kingdom's Wish's Night Time Spectacular - Many people will put this at the top of their
list, and for good reasons. Fireworks around the castle are just... tradition. It wouldn't be a trip to Disney World without it! Disney has done much to improve the show over the years, including projections on the castle itself, and expanding the viewing area so that more people can watch. However, even with these improvements it can become very crowded and the view is easily obstructed by trees or lamp posts. The fireworks are themed well to the music, but sometimes it appears they are just throwing up fireworks to add volume.  When Jiminy Cricket says "Look, it is the blue fairy" and they fire off a blue fireworks... weak. While some of the fireworks are unique and spectacular, many are just filler. Regardless, this is an amazing show worth watching.



1. Hollywood Studio's Frozen Summer - Our favorite for now two years in a row is the Frozen
Summer Fireworks. The show begins right after a dance party that gets the crowd rocking. The fireworks are themed perfectly to the music, and the snow effect at the end brings you into the story and follows you as you exit the park. The music is very popular - even the cast members can be seen getting into it. Unfortunately, like all the shows except Fantasmic,  there is no place to sit. And like Illuminations, the streets can get crowded. But this ranks #1 as our favorite fireworks.

Instead of read about it, why not see it? To see the Frozen Summer Fireworks, click here: https://youtu.be/vii4skvbXTM

Disney Fourth of July

In 2014, we saw the Sci Fi Fireworks in Celebration. This year, we decided to spend the evening of the Fourth of July enjoying our villa. Little did we know that we could see the Magic Kingdom fireworks from the second floor bedroom. And that nearly every neighborhood within site would be doing their own fireworks show. The sky in every direction was filled with fireworks!

We contributed by burning sparklers and morning glories in the front yard.

We did catch the Disney Fourth of July fireworks up close on July 3. At first, the fireworks were delayed due to rain. But then the skies cleared and we were able to see the firework! You can view the Fourth of July Spectacular fireworks here:

https://youtu.be/07YyH72hUoM

We experienced something we had never seen before after the fireworks. Disney opened the doors to a path behind main street for a quick exit. We took the path and bypassed the main street crowd, arriving just inside of the train station! I don't know if Disney is doing this every night or just during special events, but, this was our first experience.

We had a great fourth of July at Disney!

All Hail Magic Kingdom

We have vacationed in Florida for five summers and we have become familiar with the daily rain showers. The humidity rises all morning until mid afternoon when the humidity is thick enough to swim through. Then the skies open up and it rains hard for thirty minutes. Once the humidity is washed out of the air, the clouds go away and the sun returns.

What we aren't used to is back to back days with huge storms.

We were in the Magic Kingdom passing the mine train when I overheard a voice on a speaker recommending everyone move indoors and seek shelter. Apparently the approaching black skies were bringing nickle size hail! And you know what all these warnings mean? Yep! Time for one more ride!

We hopped onto the Winnie the Poo ride. At the end, the ride dumps passengers off at a gift shop. The problem was that no one wanted to leave the gift shop and go into the storm. A steady flow of exiting riders was filling the store and raising tempers. People were yelling at each other as room to move became a premium.

Then, as if out of a Hollywood movie, a five hundred proud women drives her golf cart sized scooter into the gift shop in attempt to get out of the rain. This scooter was huge with a roof and steering wheel. And she was knocking over display stands and running people down until her cart couldn't go any further into the store.

By then, we had our rain ponchos on and I suggested we get out of the store before things became ugly... Uglier. We passed by the wreckage and slipped behind the golf cart to make our exit.

We entered the storm with blistering rain whipping our face and we ran to the Cosmic Ray's Starlight Cafe.

The cafe was packed with others who had escaped the weather. The place was packed and had the raunchy smell of humanity. A wet and hot and sticky smell. Adding to the aroma? There was a guy sitting on the floor and when he stood up he ripped a fart that was so loud I swear I hear an echo and saw two small children downwind get knocked off their feet.

We found some wall space and broke out a picnic on the floor to pass the time.

Eventually the storm calmed down enough to allow us to leave Cosmic Ray's and enjoy the rest of the park. It was a wild time at the Magic Kingdom today!

Epcot day 2: When it rains, it pours

1:30 am our phone rings. As is normal in such cases, I rolled over and went back to sleep. But sleeping wasn't in the cards.

It was my daughter in New York that is house sitting. The refridgerator was hot and everything in the freezer was melting! 

The next three hours was spent transferring as much food as possible into another fridge, then cleaning and troubleshooting.  Finally at 4:30 we gave up and left the refridgerator unplugged. The rest of the contents were a loss and a friend in our hometown would spend hours in the morning trying to fix it.

It is difficult to not worry about things that are so far away.

As a result of spending the night working on the fridge, we had to sleep in and we got a late start to Epcot.

A late start was OK because it gave us an excuse to drink taquela shots and margaritas near Mexico. I don't know if it was the heat or dihydration or drinking it too fast or what but the alcohol hit us fast and hard. So hard that Linda had to sit on the floor at the China 360 movie to keep from falling over.

The Illuminations fireworks started over the Epcot lake. As we watched the Disney fireworks, nature started a fireworks show of its own behind our backs. A massive thunderstorm was moving in - so large that the weather radar had painted the area red, indicating severe storm. The map showing lightening strikes was covered in lightening bolts. We decided to run for it, but only made it from Japan to Germany before the skies opened. We ducked into the bathroom area for cover and tried to wait the storm out.

A large gathering of survivors huddled near the bathroom area for shelter. Lightening was striking all around us, and the rain was coming down sideways.

We watched the weather radar on Linda's cell phone as we each put on rain ponchos. 

Occasionally someone in the survivor group would panick and decide to run for it. Five steps out, they were drenched with lighting flashing all around them. They would soon vanish into the night, never to be seen again.

Finally, the radar showed the red mass had passed over our location and we were finally orange. Orange on the map meant heavy rains and lightning strikes. We decided our ponchos wod protect us. We left the safety of the bathrooms and the other survivors and make our way across Epcot.

The only people running for the parking lot were those with ponchos. Some people became very creative for ponchos, using everything from trash bags (I hope they were clean) to Disney store bags.

The Mogadishu Mile was made famous in the movie Black Hawk Down. US Rangers fighting in Ethiopia were left behind by their armored carriers. As a result, the Rangers had to run back to camp. Our race through this monsoon was our Mogadishu Mile.

I remember joking at one point "I didn't know Epcot transformed into a water park at night". Sidewalks became flooded with several inches of water thus soaking our shoes, yet we ran on.

Disney has regular marathons in which running enthusiasts can run across the Disney property. I have always wondered what it would've like to run in a Disney marathon,  and I think I now know. As we were running through yhe storm, others who had found shelter anywhere they could were cheering us on! The only difference is that after a Disney 5K, you get a metal! We should have received a metal for the Nemo 5K.

We finally reached Epcot's giant golf ball that houses Spaceship Earth. A large number of people were gathered under the ball for protection. Gathering under tallest object in the park during a thunderstorm is a horrible idea. We pushed our way through the gathering and contined on.

By the time we made it to our car in the parking lot, it had stopped raining. Figures. 

Our ponchos failed to protect our shoes and offered minimal protection from the driving rain. Soaked, we climbed into the can, proud we survived the Epcot Mansoon.