Disney Day 3: Magic Kingdom and Disney-MGM Studios

We started our day by dressing in matching T-shirts that Susan had made for us. The letters of our names are written inside little Mickey Mouse ears in designs that Susan had made to order, then printed onto transfer paper and ironed onto T-shirts for us:

Our focus today was the Magic Kingdom, and we were there bright and early--in time to watch the show with which they open the park (a character from Main Street, U.S.A. comes out to announce that Mickey and other characters are headed our way on the Walt Disney World Railroad, and then there's some choreographed singing by her and several others until finally the train pulls up and numerous Disney characters hop off to join in the dancing and singing and to welcome us to the park). The Magic Kingdom is divided into seven areas; here's how we spent our time in each (not in chronological order)--click the links to see video clips:

Main Street, U.S.A.

• This is the section leading from the train station at the park's entrance to Cinderella's castle at the park's center. It looks like a turn-of-the-century street of shops with amazing architectural details and wonderful smells coming from the bakeries and all sorts of merchandise available in the stores and even from some sidewalk vendors.

• We ate dinner at the Crystal Palace, where we enjoyed a delicious buffet and the opportunity to meet several characters, who signed the girls' autograph books and posed for photographs; do you recognize Piglet, Eeyore, Winnie the Pooh, and Tigger?

These metallic Mickey Mouse ears were laid out in a heart shape on our table upon our arrival. Walt Disney World knows we are here to celebrate our anniversary (albeit the one that's upcoming next August), so they provided us with "Happy Anniversary" buttons for us to wear daily (and Disney cast members everywhere see the buttons and congratulate us); and this heart plus a certificate of congratulations were gifts to us at the Crystal Palace.

Tomorrowland

• rode Space Mountain (twice!), an indoor roller coaster that takes riders on a themed ride through the darkness of outer space (read: no light except for glow tape here and there in the distance to represent the stars of the cosmos--meaning that what's coming on the track ahead is completely invisible and unpredictable)
• rode Astro Orbiter, a ride similar to the TriceraTop Spin . . . only the whole thing is situated on the roof of a building so that riders are literally up in the sky while riding
• rode Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin, which works a lot like an arcade game in that riders shoot with laser guns at targets in order to rack up points, all while riding in cars along a track that takes riders through various rooms of aliens whom we're helping Buzz Lightyear to defeat

Mickey's Toontown Fair

• went to the Toontown Hall of Fame for an opportunity to meet more characters--autographs, photos, and hugs from Minnie Mouse, Pluto, and Goofy:

• boarded the Walt Disney World Railroad to Frontierland

Frontierland

• rode Splash Mountain (twice!), for which the ponchos from yesterday came in very handy--it's a log ride down a river that meanders through various animatronic scenes featuring Brer Rabbit and his gang before plunging down a 52-foot waterfall (signs warn, "You WILL get wet")
• rode Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (thrice!), a great roller coaster made to look/feel like an out-of-control mining car racing down a track through a mining town and tunnels, etc.
• explored Tom Sawyer Island, which we got to via raft; once we docked, we explored dark and twisting mining caves, a fort, precarious bridges, winding trails, and assorted buildings--like a gigantic playground surrounded by water

Adventureland

• rode the Magic Carpets of Aladdin, a ride similar to Astro Orbiter (in Tomorrowland, above)--just not located on the roof of a building!

• saw the Enchanted Tiki Room Under New Management, a show performed by animatronic birds suspended from the ceiling of the Tiki Room, requiring audience members to look up and around and behind them throughout the show to see all the action
• explored the Swiss Family Treehouse, an absolutely ginormous (fake) tree through whose branches we asended and descended in order to reach one room that served as a bedroom, another--several branches away--that served as a dining room, etc., all appointed with items salvaged from the Swiss family Robinson's shipwreck
• rode Pirates of the Caribbean, the ride that inspired the Johnny Depp movies, which in turn inspired Disney to add Depp's character to the ride--it was fun to see where all throughout the ride we could spot Captain Jack Sparrow

Liberty Square

• rode the Haunted Mansion, another ride that inspired a Disney movie, which in turn inspired revisions to the original Disney attraction in order to incorporate elements from the movie--lots of freaky special effects on this ride!

Fantasyland

• saw Mickey's PhilharMagic, a 3-D movie that had us jumping out of our seats as characters leapt from the screen toward us, splashed water on us (again, the seats spritzed actual water at us in synchronization with the action of the movie), and took us on an exciting, speedy, realistic-feeling flight on a magic carpet with Aladdin

By late afternoon, it was time to head over to Disney-MGM Studios for two evening events that Susan knew about, so we took a ferryboat across Seven Seas Lagoon to board a bus to Disney-MGM Studios.

It, too, has seven areas to explore; however, knowing that we'd be back to spend an entire day at this park, we just did some preliminary wandering and gawking tonight. We did eat supper at the ABC Commissary, but otherwise, our mission was to see these two things:

• The Osborne Family Spectacle of Dancing Lights, an impressive, incredible display of literally millions of Christmas lights decorating the facades of every building on the Streets of America and set to blink on and off in time to several selections of Christmas music blaring stereophonically throughout this section of the park--quite awesome

• Fantasmic!, a spectacular show of lights, fireworks, lasers, fire on the surface of the water, characters, huge puppets, boats, etc.--Mickey wordlessly (but with a loud musical underscore) battles the forces of evil working to turn his fantastic dreams into nightmares, and all the color and light and pyrotechnics stand out brilliantly against the pitch black of night

After filing out of Fantasmic!, we got some snacks, poked around a bit, and posed for random pictures:

Back in our room at the resort, we found that Elke had again worked her magic with the linens:

I suppose some of you are wondering just what kind of artfully decorated envelopes created by the Mobergs could inspire a Disney mousekeeper to craft such treats for us? A cynic would say that the money inside each day's envelope has something to do with it, but here are the envelopes themselves:

Tomorrow: Epcot!