Let me tell you right now, no matter how old you are or how old you may think you've gotten, once you step foot on the Disney grounds all of that melts away. Being at Disney immediately transports you back to your childhood and all those wonderful memories of your favourite Disney characters and the experience of the magical. You become 5 years old again. I can see why people like this place! After being at Disney for a solid four days the best way I can describe it is that Disney isn't a theme park, it's an experience. Every inch of Disney is well maintained and completely considered and thought of as to how it fits into the environment around it. Incredible.
Going to Disney I had two things on my to do list: get as many autographs as possible and meet Mary Poppins. For the autographs I realize I'm older and this is for kids, but I saw this as my chance to catch up on my childhood and no matter how embarrassing it would be, I decided to be brave and stand in the line ups and get the autographs. I was determined. As for Mary Poppins, she is the extreme ultimate Disney character for me. When I was a kid, that was the movie I watched over-and-over-and-over again. I loooooved Mary Poppins. This one was number one on my list, hands down. I was so afraid we'd miss her that we prebooked a Disney breakfast for later in the week because it mentioned she could be there. For our first day though, we had prepaid for the Disney fireworks dessert buffet on the Tomorrowland terrace. I hear this one fills up quick and has to be prepaid so we literally booked months in advance of coming.
That morning we got up really early and grabbed breakfast and the shuttle to Magic Kingdom. When we first got there we had to take a water ferry across the river at Disney to get to the park. When you enter the park you're on a remake of main street USA in the 40's or 50's I'd say. There's a city hall for guest services. I'd suggest stopping by here if it's your first visit or if you're celebrating an event because they will give you a button! :) There's an old style theatre front and a bunch of quaint looking shops. Lots of shops. (I love shopping)! Walking down a bit further there's a roundabout area then Cinderella's castle sits behind the roundabout. Sort of like Buckingham Palace does! We pretty much leisurely made our way through the park because we got there when it opened at 9:00am and our fireworks dessert buffet wasn't scheduled until 9:10pm that night.
When we first got in the park we seen snow white right away. I tried to get in her lineup but it was closed. So we kept walking and I seen Donald duck. I got in his line and he signed my autograph book and made a "call me" motion and blew me a kiss when I was walking away! My first autograph, and potential celeb date! We walked around the castle a bit more and seen the fairy godmother from Cinderella so I got in her lineup. She asked who my favorite character was and I said "you of course...and Cinderella". She goes "have you had a chance to meet her yet dear.....she'll be at the blah blah blah at 10 o'clock.". Pretty funny stuff. The actors stay so much in character; they are amazing at what they do.
After, we headed over to the merry go round ride. When we were on our horses mom caught the tail end of Mary Poppins going around a corner! Holy crap! In a very discreet rush we bailed off the ride and went to see if we could find her. I turned the corner in a flurry and there she was! She was signing autographs and I was able to get in her line - I couldn't believe my luck! For the kids in front of us she was asking them "do you know what you want to be when you grow up? You don't?!! Well do you like dogs?" and she would carry on the conversation from there. When they were getting in line for their picture with her she said "now all stand up straight, don't slouch. Spit spot". Just like Mary Poppins! When I got up to her I said you're my favorite Disney character and this is my first time here. Then all of a sudden this peter pan character comes up to her and starts asking if she's seen someone. The boy who flies or something.
And then he was like "well maybe you can get your sidewalk drawing friend to draw a map of never never land and then perhaps we can find him". Then Mary Poppins told him "if you see him please tell him I'm expecting him for tea later". So funny! I'm sure I stood there with my mouth open the whole time looking dumbfounded. Then she apologized and turned around to me and said "I'm sorry dear, you were saying...". Then I told her again what I had said and she replied "well then I guess you're well versed on the subject of me" and I said yes and she said "well good. That's my favorite subject too". Hilarious! Then she said "what's your favorite thing about me" and I said because you're practically perfect in every way (I have no idea where that answer came from but I was impressed I came up with it on the spot especially considering how distracted I was at the moment). And she said "well then you've quite turned out well yourself I see". It was so funny. Then she wished me a good day at the park. Mom got this picture of me talking to her and I look like I'm six and in awe of her. It's pretty funny. This totally made my day!
Then we set off for the rest of the park although I was pretty distracted at this point because of my amazing Mary Poppins encounter. We ate lunch at Pinocchio's something Haus. We wandered through frontier land and saw the Country Bears performance. One of the bears looked and sounded like Carroll Baker and another sounded like Kitty Wells. We went on the scary White ride which was like a roller coaster car that drove us through a fun house basically. Although I hear that's no longer there. We rode Aladdin's magic carpets in Fantasyland which was fun. The entire day was completely magical and felt like I was writing a new chapter in my childhood.
At the end of the day I remembered we had missed the it's a small world ride so we went on that. That was extremely 70's and looked like something Walt Disney himself had made. It was cute and extremely nostalgic. After I came home I researched that ride a bit. It has quite a history, originally built for the first Walt Disney Land in California and one of the most popular rides because of what it represents. Apparently Walt Disney didn't live to see the opening of Walt Disney World in Florida, he passed while it was being built. Which is a shame but his essence and thumbprint is all over in every detail. Quite a visionary.
Randomly throughout the day they have street parades and shoot fireworks off at the castle. There's always something happening. We caught a bit of both of those. Before going to our dessert party we wandered back to the front of the park quite exhausted. We desperately wanted to sit down in air conditioning so we thought we'd catch a show at the Disney theatre. Sitting down to watch a show is the best way to cool off and have a rest. We went in the princesses line and it ended up being a meet and greet with the princesses! In air conditioning! We met Cinderella, Aurora the sleeping beauty, and Belle! Now that we understood what this was (I don't think a lot of people realized the characters were in there) we went back out and came in the Mickey line. We met Mickey and Minnie mouse! The two characters you most want to meet at Disney. And the two hardest to see!
Finally it was time for our dessert party. There were probably 30-40 people in line. We had an awesome table at the front of the terrace in Tomorrowland. I filled my plate with desserts and we had juice and coffee. We watched the electric parade before the show started. They did a light show on the castle that showed a hundred different art treatments. All of them were cool - I really loved that part. Then they did these amazing fireworks over the castle. They kept getting bigger and bigger. They did one that looked like a shooting star while playing "When You Wish Upon a Star" and it was so bright. We were so exhausted but it was so worth it to wait for the fireworks! Pretty awesome day. But Mary Poppins was definitely the highlight.
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