Katherine's Next Trip!

I have a few OPINIONS that I might categorize as “tips” that I have for you.  You might disagree, but I’m here to share what works for me and my group when we visit the parks.  Just remember that you need to do what works for you.  

ROPE DROP            

It’s capitalized because it’s important.  For you “non-Disney speakers”, rope drop is what you would call park opening time.  It is the BEST way to get on more rides with short lines.  When you think of sleeping in on vacation, other people do too, so most of the people in the parks take leisurely mornings and get to the parks just a bit before noon, and that is when the lines start getting REALLY long.  If you get to the parking lot or are stepping off the bus 45 minutes to an hour before park opening, you are in good shape.  

Guests staying on property that have the early entry benefits get to start heading to rides 30 minutes before park opening, but in the case of Magic Kingdom, Main Street USA opens a whole hour ahead of park opening (though it can always change).  Resort guests are directed to specific areas to line up at the “ropes” to have first crack at their most important rides, but everyone, no matter where you are staying can soak up all the atmosphere and get all the castle pictures you want with only a few people in the background.  Hollywood Studios and Epcot hold off property guests outside the gates (last time I checked) and Animal Kingdom holds them just a bit inside the gates I think?  No matter your resort status, getting into MK early is always fun.  

You can “walk with purpose” (which is what I call people/stroller dodging paired with power walking) and get to the holding area closest to your chosen ride and usually wait less than 20 minutes.  I have gotten on NUMEROUS rides during the early morning times reserved for resort guests that have lines longer than an hour most of the rest of the day.  If your family is ok with getting up early while on vacation, this is the MOST valuable tip to utilize your time wisely.  

Afternoon Breaks

            If you’re leaving your hotel at 6:45am (I’m looking at you Animal Kingdom with your sneaky 8am opening times that take me by surprise) I know you will be hungry for an early lunch.  After grabbing a quick lunch (because at restaurant opening time those lines are short too!), that early morning alarm might be coming to haunt you and the yawns might start taking over.  If you have your eyes on the prize of ending your magical day with viewing the fireworks, an afternoon break back at the resort might be just the thing.  Granted, I don’t take as many breaks as I used to since I moved away and have limited time at Disney that I have to make the most of, but even as an adult my family and I have gone back to the resort for an afternoon nap once or twice.  The lines are the longest, the temperature is at its highest, and many people are the crankiest in the afternoon, so it is the perfect time for a break!  

            Many kids get tired of walking across the parks to stand in ANOTHER line, so even a pool break for them to swim and play games is a way to get them moving and having different kinds of fun.  Even a combination of pool time and a nap can boost their energy to keep going until the late-night fireworks that you know they will enjoy.  

Eat at off times/Utilize Mobile Order

            A big part of my trips to WDW is the food.  Being able to get my food, find a place to sit, and eat a leisurely meal with low stress is very important.  Two ways to make that easy are to eat at off times and mobile order.  

If you’re rising before the sun (and maybe even eating a granola bar breakfast on the go) and hitting all the highlights in the few hours after park opening, you might be ready for lunch at 11am!  Trying to find a table right when the restaurant opens is WAY easier than juggling your tray while not trying to dump your drinks on the kids who just ran past you in the height of the lunch rush.  Since you are already ahead of the game in exploring the park, it might be time for a rest earlier rather than later. 

Mobile order is accessible at MOST of the WDW eateries.  Aloha Isle is amazing when you just walk up and pick up your Dole Whip!  You can schedule your meal anywhere from 5 minutes to hours before you want to eat, depending on demand, (like if you are just about to ride Haunted Mansion and want to grab lunch at the Columbia Harbor House afterwards, do a mobile order while you are about to enter the mansion and head over to eat after!) and whenever you arrive at the restaurant you can click the “I’m Here!” button and wait less than 5 minutes to have the Cast Members call your number and head to your table!  It makes it easy to get your food even in a busy restaurant. 

Ride Your Favorites RIGHT Before Closing

            If you were hightailing it across the park at rope drop, opposite to your favorite ride, by the time you got there, it might have a line lasting over an hour.  You don’t want to waste time waiting that long, but by the time you have managed short waits on all the rest of the rides during the rest of the day, how will you be able to enjoy it with a short line??  Take a look at the park hours.  Especially on days that the fireworks DON’T happen at park closing time.  Since the park is “open” until a certain time, you can get in line up to 1 minute before closing time.  If you remember how Lightning Lanes work, they don’t have return times AFTER park close.  If you are in line after park close, the ratio that is used to alternate between Lightning Lane guests and standby guests is eliminated, so every single ride vehicle is filled with standby guests, which makes it move MUCH faster.  Disney ALSO uses MANY techniques to get you out of the park faster, one which is inflating wait times to deter you from sticking around to ride more rides.  I have heard SO many reports of 90+ minute wait times posted with a 20-minute total wait at park close.  On those nights when the fireworks precede the closing time, position yourself in a spot that allows you to get back to the rides instead of exiting with the hordes of people in a mass exodus as soon as the grand finale ends.  Most of the rides will already have shorter lines by then and you can hit a LOT of the highlights as people are leaving the park, and by the time you hop in line for your bus back to your hotel that line will be shorter too!  

A trick in Hollywood Studios that my friends have taken advantage of is while everyone is getting situated in their spot for Fantasmic! A LONG walk away from the rest of the park, go enjoy Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge for VERY short lines in some SPECTACULAR ambiance around Batuu in the dark!  The front part of Epcot at night, now called World Celebration, World Nature, and World Discovery, is usually less crowded with shorter wait times as well.  Animal Kingdom sure does clear out at the end of the afternoon too, so keep an eye on the last Kilimanjaro Safaris departure because some have said that the animals are more active as they get ready to have dinner and head to their homes for the evening.  

Now that you’ve planned YOUR trip, I am here to share MY favorite parts of a trip to Walt Disney World.  To help you get a better picture of what there is to offer, let me break it down for you by areas:

Magic Kingdom

Dole Whip

            This will ALWAYS be my top treat in MK, possibly all of WDW.  This pineapple soft serve (which is dairy free!) is always refreshing on a hot Orlando day, and always delicious as you are walking through the tropical environment of Adventureland.  I cannot set foot in Magic Kingdom without making sure I have a Dole Whip.  My go to is the pineapple vanilla swirl (which I believe is NOT dairy-free), but other people swear by the pineapple upside down cake topped with Dole Whip.  It is located at Aloha Isle, right next to Walt Disney’s Enchanted Tiki Room, an attraction that Walt Disney had a hand in developing himself!  You can even take your Dole Whip into the show and enjoy the air conditioning and being serenaded by numerous birds and flowers, just don’t upset the tiki gods! 

Since the popularity of the Dole Whip spread across the parks and with it, more flavors became available. I am including the Aurora Cone served at Storybook Treats in Fantasyland in my list of favorites.  Composed of Strawberry Dole Whip swirled with “blue” soft serve (I don’t even know what “blue” MEANS, besides your mouth turning that color!) and topped with white chocolate pearls, it has come VERY close to being a must have for me along with my beloved Dole Whip.  When my only preference when I order it is let it NOT be in a cone, they will sometimes just flip it over into a cup for me!  Much less messy and I can forego the cone (usually someone else eats it) and save all the room in my stomach for my Dole Whip!  

I have once eaten an Aurora Cone, intended to sit to watch the parade for the last time before flying home, realized I hadn’t had a true Dole Whip that day, and IMMEDIATELY gone to get one last taste before the parade, with TWO back-to-back treats!  Can’t miss either one!

Casey’s Corner

            I love hot dogs and one of my most frequent Disney companions is named Casey, so of COURSE we would grab hot dogs from the iconic Casey’s Corner at the end of Main Street USA while gazing at Cinderella Castle!  In college, it was the cheapest meal we could find to sustain us during our visits to Disney, so we were practically regulars (oh the days when we could get a cup of water and a hot dog for $4.81 as part of all day entertainment instead of being boring college kids that only went out to eat with friends for 2 hours!).  As in the real world, the restaurants get busier as the mealtimes approach, so stop here for an early or late lunch (or early dinner too, as late dinner with all the fireworks-watching people is NUTSO) for the best experience.  In my Disney travels I made sure I visited the Casey’s Corner in Disneyland Paris too!

Jungle Cruise

            Jungle Cruise is my FAVORITE ride in Magic Kingdom, because where else can you travel down 4 rivers from around the world in less than 10 minutes?  You are sure to laugh at the silly jokes from the crew of these alliterative boats, and you get the bonus of seeing the 8^th wonder of the world!  Don’t forget to take a picture!  Your enjoyment level does depend on the comedic skill of your one-of-a-kind skipper, so I hope you get a good one!  I have probably ridden it over 100 times and being that I rarely have had the same skipper twice it is at least always different, and the best skippers always throw in something new.  In college, my friends and I frequently rode it multiple times in a night, so much so that I thought I could “attempt” at being the skipper too!  One of the skippers who recognized us allowed me to try….it was NOT as good as the pros, but it was so fun!  That was back when there were slow times at WDW and Jungle Cruise didn’t have a 2 HOUR LINE.  My tip for this is if you don’t have early park entry access, head here at your “rope drop” time, since Adventureland isn’t open for the early park goers and everyone has a clear shot at it at the same time!  It is a slow loading ride, and the capacity isn’t as high as some of the other “big ticket rides” (I’m looking at you Pirates of the Caribbean), so the line ALWAYS gets long.  Your best bet is to ride it FIRST thing in the morning, grab a Lightning Lane for it, or ride it at park close.  It is a whole different experience at nighttime too!  If you go during the Christmas season, they turn it into “Jingle Cruise”, with a whole set of different jokes! 

Tron Lightcycle/Run

            I do love the mountains in MK (Big Thunder and Space) but when it comes to new rides, TRON IS SO GOOD.  The ride vehicle positions you like you’re riding on a motorcycle, so if you put your hands up like you’re flying (in front of you or behind you), it is such a powerful feeling.  It is WAY too short (as everyone agrees), but being digitized and racing against the most powerful and menacing Programs in the Grid is exhilarating and super fun.  Of course, the blue team is the best.  The indoor/outdoor contrasting elements are very neat, especially if you get to ride at night!  For our first ride we made sure to purchase a lightning lane at night (fought to get there against the exiting crowds after the fireworks, UGH) and it was even better than the daytime rides we did in the following days.  

Columbia Harbor House

            For those families that aren’t into hot dogs (or are at MK multiple days), Columbia Harbor House is an often-overlooked restaurant in Liberty Square with a wide variety of options to eat.  They have the theme park staple, chicken tenders, but the seafood focused menu with dishes such as a lobster roll, salmon, fried shrimp, and fish and chips is a menu that everyone can enjoy.  Fish and Chips is my go-to (sometimes the menu changes and it’s not on there though) and don’t forget to grab some malt vinegar packets!  Don’t be worried about finding a seat as the upstairs spans SEVERAL buildings and I have never had trouble snagging a table, usually I even get one of my favorite ones too!

Meeting Characters

            While you are traveling through the Magic Kingdom, you will probably spot some of the magical characters who live there.  Of course, everyone needs to meet Mickey Mouse once (or twice) in their lives, but there are so many more characters to meet!  Some of my FAVORITE character interactions are with the villains!  

Gaston meets near, of course, Gaston’s Tavern, and why wouldn’t he use a chance to show you how popular he is to have a tavern named after him nearby?  He will definitely oblige you in any request to make him the center of attention, especially a selfie where he makes sure he is the only subject.  

My absolute FAVORITE characters to meet in MK are Anastasia and Drizella, Cinderella’s Ugly Stepsisters!  They get very excited about any single princes that might be walking by, are creeped out by mice (especially Mickey), and always talk bad about my favorite princess, Cinderella.  Try to have some fun questions to ask any of the face characters you meet, and you never know where the conversation might lead!

Magic Kingdom Fireworks – Happily Ever After

            The perfect way to end a day in the Magic Kingdom is to see the magic come to life in the sky!  When I was growing up, the fireworks show at the Magic Kingdom was Fantasy in the Sky, set off from an area behind the Magic Kingdom and able to be seen from all over the park.  When I worked there, Walt Disney World premiered the MOST MAGICAL FIREWORKS EVER (in my opinion of course), Wishes: a Magical Gathering of Disney Dreams!  

I got to watch it from inside the castle every night at work, and I could even motion when each type of fireworks were being released.  I always tried to watch it from the end of Main Street closest to the castle for the perfect view.  It is my favorite show and will probably be for a long time.  WDW replaced it with Happily Ever After in 2017 which involved projections on the castle, and I was NOT impressed.  There was now no need to find the perfect spot as it was not cool in comparison.  Little did I know, the show they debuted for the 50^th anniversary of WDW, Disney’s Enchantment would be even worse.  I think it relied too heavily on projections to be a magical fireworks show.  

I was SO HAPPY when they brought back Happily Ever After, which goes to show you, you don’t know the good you have until it’s gone.  The last big trip Casey and I took we made sure to get a good spot in front of the castle to see Happily Ever After’s return, but we were lucky enough to schedule our trip on a week that had fireworks 4 times!  We decided to check out a new viewing spot behind the castle, and IT WAS AMAZING!!!  As we stood behind the carousel, fireworks were going off all around us, from buildings near the castle as well as the ones shot off from behind the park!  I looked around at all of the people watching with me, and what else did I see?  Princesses coming to watch too!  They were all mingling with guests and dancing with little girls in dresses and it was MAGICAL.  We did that a few more times and they were there every time!  I heard that it was the “Year of the Princess” or something like that and since Princess Fairytale Hall is just steps away from the carousel, they came to enjoy the show as well!  I can’t promise that still happens, but if you don’t care about the projections or have seen the show before, try viewing it from Fantasyland.  You get a whole new experience and there are definitely less crowds.  Disney fireworks are the cherry on top of a magical day.  

I hope my tips and favorite parts of Magic Kingdom have put some ideas in your head and helped you start to dream about the magical trip of your dreams to Walt Disney World, stick around for my favorite parts of the other parks too! You can bet I will be including these on my next trip!