The Lively Kitchen

This is my attempt to both recap our recent Disney World trip and offer my tips for anyone traveling to Disney with relatively young kids.

A- Akershus.  

Character Meals are a big thing at Disney World.  As in, if you want to do one, you best get reservations the minute you have the thought ‘hey, lets do a character meal.’  Reservations open up 180 days in advance (and I think 190 if you are staying on Disney property) and some of the really popular spots, like Cinderella’s Castle, fill up that day.  We weren’t on the Disney Meal Plan, so we choose to do only one meal.  I went with the Princess Storybook Dinner at Akershus in Norway in the World Showcase of Epcot.  I recapped most of our meal here.  It was a little spendy (like $40 for adults and $25 for kids), but it was fun and the kids loved getting to interact with each character.  Lunches are cheaper and sometimes easier to get reservations for, so that is another route to go.

B- Buzz Lightyear

See Buzz in the background?  

Buzz is one of my son’s very favorite characters.  He was beyond excited to meet him.  We found him both outside the Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Shootout in Magic Kingdom and in Hollywood Studios by Toy Story Mania.  In case you’re wondering how he signs the character autograph book with that big costume, he doesn’t.  He wisely uses a stamp.

C- Characters.  

Aside from the character meals, there are also characters throughout the parks all day and there are generally some decent lines to see each one.  Most kids have an autograph book (we bought ours in the park, as I wanted a Disney version with spots for pictures on the page across for the autograph) and interact with the character for a few minutes, take a picture and then get their book signed.  The autograph book has already become a prized possession of both kids and I think it’s a great little souvenir.

D-  Dinosaur Dig.

Our fourth and final day at WDW started in Animal Kingdom.  It is a beautiful park and we didn’t really do it justice.  All of us were wiped out by lunch time.  We found ourselves in the Dino Land section of the park and went into the Dinosaur Dig playground/’dig’ spot.  My kids were in heaven in what is basically a huge sandbox with fake dinosaur bones to be unearthed.  There are plenty of shovels and brushes and my daughter spent and hour and a half working on a section near the tusks.  The whole outer area of the dig sight was occupied by parents who were checking their phones, zoning out and enjoying having their kids occupied.  I had a few moments of thinking ‘we spent all this money and effort to come here today and they are playing in a sandbox?’ but I also enjoyed watching them run around and feel free to touch things and get down and play.  I think we all needed the decompression time.  Three cheers for the dino-dig.

E -Early arrival at the park.

We got there 15-30 minutes before opening each day.  I can’t imagine why you wouldn’t.  You can walk onto the popular attractions and get your fast passes early.  One of my favorite memories of the trip was walking down Main Street in Magic Kingdom (en route to FantasyLand) and watching my girl see the castle for the first time.  The moment felt almost private since there wasn’t crowds of peoples around, as there would be for the rest of the day.  We walked through the castle alone and the look on her face was one I will always remember.

F- Fast Pass. Use them!  We went at a relatively uncrowded time of year and still found the fast passes to be handy.  During busy times they would be key.  Each day we sent the husband off to get a fast pass at one of the popular rides as the rest of us walked towards a different popular ride.  He’d meet us there after getting the fast passes.  When we were there only one ride ran out of fast passes, Toy Story Mania in Hollywood Studios.  We had gotten our fastpasses at opening and by the time we made it back over to get second ones (around 11am), they were all distributed for the day.  If you don’t have a fast pass, you stand in the ‘stand-by line,’ which unfortunately for that ride, was 75 minutes for the whole day.  ps – that ride was one of our favorites.

G- Guests.

That’s what Disney calls you.  The employees are cast members.  I was generally impressed with the quality and number of the ‘cast members.’  They were quite pleasant and helpful.  During the rainstorm on our last night, we ducked into a gift shop and immediately a cast member got the kids involved in a game of Tic-Tac-Toe she had set up on the shop floor.

H- Honey I Shrunk the Kids playground (at Hollywood Studios).

 I played in this playground when I was a kid visiting WDW.  It was pretty incredible to see my girl on the same ant I once climbed on.  Hopefully they’ve cleaned it since then.

I – Incredibles!  

These were the characters my kid’s were most pumped to see.  We love this movie and the kids were adorably star-struck to see Mr and Mrs. Incredible and Frozone.  Unfortunately Dash, Violet and Jack Jack aren’t available.

J – Jungle Cruise.

Yes, the same ride that has been around for-ever.  And no, nothing much has changed since I rode first it 42 years ago (approx).  Much to my surprise, my kids LOVED this ride.  I think they enjoyed that the animals are clearly fake, as are the people.  All of the cheesy jokes the tour guide rattled off went over their head, but they were smiling the entire ride.  Who knew?

K – Kim Possible

This was probably the highlight of our day in Epcot, even more so than the princess dinner.  Upon entering the world showcase in Epcot, there are stations where you can register and get set up to do your ‘mission.’  It’s free.  You then pick up a real cell-phone that has been set-up for the game called your Kim-unicator (lingo from the show Kim Possible).  You  start a mission in one country and it takes about 30 minutes to complete.  It was crazy fun.  The technology is really impressive.  You get sent into a store or specific section in the country and, when standing in the specified spot, you press a button on your Kimmunicator.  After pressing, something actually happens, like a cuckoo clock coming opening up or a  picture lighting up.  The kids (and their parents) felt really powerful knowing that they made something happen.  We only did two missions, Germany and Mexico, as it was getting pretty crowded.  I’d love to go back on a less crowded day and do missions in each country.  As a side note, I saw groups of adults with no kids playing along, so you don’t have to be traveling with children to enjoy the game.  Also – I had read about this game before our trip, so I picked up a Kim Possible DVD at Half Price Books before our trip so my kids would know a little about the characters.

L – Lines App

I read all 1800 pages (approx) of the Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World.  It was really informative, if a bit wordy.  They have a website (www.touringplans.com) and an app called Lines.  It was very helpful and worth the $10 year-long fee.  You get real time line-lengths, as well as Fast Pass return time information which was so very helpful as we went through the day.

M-Z to be continued, along with our top five favorite rides and shows.