Disney’s Under the Sea – Voyage of the Little Mermaid

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In Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom, Fantasyland has always been a favorite place for Fantasyland Photo Opparents and grandparents to take small children and enjoy some of Disney’s more whimsical, milder rides and attractions.  These are the ones made for every age – low or no height requirements, no rough twists and turns, no scary surprises – The kinds of rides Walt Disney himself had a hand in creating so children and adults could have fun together.

As part of the Magic Kingdom’s new Fantasyland expansion, the Little Mermaid ride (officially:  Under the Sea-Voyage of the Little Mermaid) is an adorable tribute to Ariel’s story – full of all our favorite characters and Queue for Voyage of the Little Mermaidscenes.  Tucked beneath Prince Eric’s castle, guests board clammobiles for a fun and fanciful journey through familiar scenes – brought to life, straight from the movie!  As you approach the attraction, there’s a great photo op and most likely a Disney photographer will be standing by to snap your picture in front of a ship with Ariel as the figurehead!

The queue is full of clever surprises – so much so that I was actually disappointed that the line moved quickly and I couldn’t look at the details as long as I would have liked.  The queue starts outside where you’ll feel just like you’re IMG_3003at the seaside walking in and out of caverns carved by the ocean’s waves.  Look down and you’ll see a variety of seashells under foot.  Look along the walls and find starfish and barnicles.  Once you go inside, there are interactive parts to this queue involving Ariel’s treasures and some cute and funny little blue crabs.

The indoor part of the queue is cool and dark – as is the ride itself.  Lighting effects make you feel like you are truly going under the sea in your clam shell.  Unlike Epcot’s The Ride Vehicle for Voyage of the Little MermaidSeas With Nemo & Friends which offers a new storyline continuing where Finding Nemo left off, Under the Sea – Voyage of the Little Mermaid (similar to Peter Pan’s Flight) offers only a selection of scenes straight from the movie. This is what divides visitors’ opinions about this attraction – Little kids (and Mermaid fans) love seeing the familiar scenes reproduced in great detail and larger than life.  Big kids and adults are often disappointed by the scenes’ simplicity and how the ride offers nothing new or different – basically just replicates parts of the movie exactly (with low-tech animatronics to boot).

Judge for yourself!  This attraction is worth at least one visit for the experience.  The highly detailed, interactive queue is very well done and the ride itself is a great place to sit down and cool off for a bit fromScuttle the Florida heat.  This is a continuously loading attraction, so you may want to save a FastPass for something else as the line moves pretty quickly.  Personally, I liked the ride okay, but I LOVED the queue!  I have to agree with the folks that would have liked a little something new or different in the Little Mermaids story – there seems to be wasted potential.

Have you ridden the new Little Mermaid ride?  What did you think about it?

 

WDW Ariel and Eric in Silhouette Ariel Getting Legs Ursula - Voyage of the Little Mermaid WDW Little Mermaid's King Triton

 

 

WDW Adventureland – Jungle Cruise: 5 Great Things

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WDW Jungle Cruise“Only a true connoisseur of puns can appreciate the perfect execution, the art, the comic genius of the Jungle Cruise skipper.” – Lisa Green (yep, me!)

Puns are the most revered form of humor in my family.  I’m not sure what that says about us, but it’s true nonetheless.  Joseph has inherited the pun-appreciating gene and he and my sister, Sandy, are the undisputed family champions.  This love for all things pun-ny has a lot to do with our love for The Jungle Cruise in Magic Kingdom’s Adventureland!  If you consider the Skipper on every boat a comedic artist – The Pun is their medium of choice.  And that is, after all, what makes The Jungle WDW Jungle Cruise DockCruise special and unique – the quality of the entire experience depends solely on the talent of the Skipper and their ability to deliver their pun-intensive dialogue with just the right timing!

Just a couple of weeks ago, we rode the Jungle Cruise at Walt Disney World and Skipper Jeff (who was excellent) reminded us once again why this ride is charming, classic, and SO darned funny (well, to this family anyway).  I love every single thing about it!

Here are my favorite things about the Jungle Cruise, an Adventureland classic!

Spider WDW Jungle Cruise Dock1. While waiting in line, guests are treated to both sight gags (on the walls, overhead, on standing crates and cages) and sound gags.  As you get closer to the boarding area, you can watch the boats (they have cute names) come in and go out.

2. The design of the boats was based on the steamer in the movie African Queen (one of my all time favorites!).  While you wait, listen carefully to the announcements!  The dock manager’s notices over the P.A. set the tone for the rest of the experience.

“Any travelers who may need to exchange foreign currency during their voyage needn’t worry. There are banks all along our rivers.” – Jungle Cruise Dock Announcer

Sailing on WDW Jungle Cruise3. Once you board your boat, you’ll meet your skipper and set off on your journey around the world (along famous rivers).  Here’s where this attraction will capture your heart!  Yes, the jokes are cheesy!  Yes, the animals are fake!  Be ready to embrace the experience in the spirit it was intended – not to impress and delight, but to charm and entertain.  To truly appreciate all the Jungle Cruise has to offer, you must be willing to give both the skipper’s dialogue and your surroundings your complete and undivided attention!

4. The scenery is a masterpiece of real plants and totally fabricated situations.  In WDW Jungle Cruise Skipper Jeffcaves, floating along quiet pools, among ruins, viewing the backside of water!  The Disney details (like the puns) are plentiful!!!  Pay attention to the plane wreck – you’ll see only half the plane.  Why?  Because the other half (the front) is over in the Studios in the Great Movie Ride!  Do you know what scene it’s in?
“We’re in the Amazon in South America, where things grow larger than life, such as the butterflies on our left and on our right. Their wingspans grow from 12 inches to a whopping 1 foot!”  – Jungle Cruise Skipper

“See my jeep? I had a little trouble getting it started this morning, but I don’t know how they got it to turn over… oh well.”  – Jungle Cruise Skipper (The jeep has been turned upside down…get it?!?)

Butterfly on the Jungle Cruise5. The jokes just keep coming, the adorable animal animatronics surround you, the skipper guides the boat along the river until you’re back at the dock once more – Friends, this is Disney at its finest!  Some famous people got their start as Jungle Cruise skippers – Kevin Costner and John Lasseter among them. Yes!  Even Weird Al Yankovic sang a song about the Jungle Cruise called “Skipper Dan” – check it out on YouTube here.

We can’t be the only super-fans of the Jungle Cruise – shout out now and leave a comment if you love the Jungle Cruise like we do!WDW Jungle Cruise Jeep

 

 

WDW Jungle Cruise's Boulder Side

The Boulder Side of the Jungle Cruise

 

My Disney Experience – A Fair and Balanced Review

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WDW Bus Stop at Old Key WestUp until our recent visit to Walt Disney World, I could only speculate about how I would use all the new bells and whistles of the My Disney Experience, MyMagic+, FastPass+, and MagicBand.  I researched, I planned, I chose my ADRs (Advance Dining Reservations) 180 days in advance, I purchased MemoryMaker, I customized my Magic Band, I selected my FastPasses 60 days before I would need them.  I played by the rules, so to speak, and fulfilled what I considered all the new requirements for a visit to my favorite vacation destination.

The Good News:  For the most part, the WHOLE of our experience was a positive one.  I’m going to be completely honest in the rest of this article – not to whine, but to tell you how our experience really was – for us.  We always have been and still are HUGE Disney fans.  Please don’t misunderstand comments that seem to be complaints – to be fair and balanced, I need to point out areas that can be improved or that didn’t work well for our family.WDW Mickey Pretzel

We did not experience any glitches with linking our party in the My Disney Experience / MyMagic+ system, selecting FastPasses, etc.  The convenience of using a MagicBand for resort room access was awesome!  Our MagicBands were comfortable, lightweight, and non-irritating.  After selecting a PIN for use with our MagicBands for charging purchases, I’m certain we did spend quite a bit more money than intended – the process was so darned easy to use!  Touch the key pad, enter the 4-digit pin, enjoy your purchase.  Snacks, souvenirs, meals, drinks – the bill really racks up fast!

The whole FastPass+ thing was fine, but not as great as I’d imagined.  I was, perhaps, a bit overly optimistic.  We left a lot of FastPass selections unused!  Crowd levels were such that, for the most part, we didn’t need FastPasses for any other than e-ticket (headliner) rides and attractions.  Being forced to select 3 then only needing one or two Waiting for Toy Story Midway Maniameant that if we never used all 3 on a particular day, we totally ruined our chances to select more.  Yes, we could have changed our selections to something else in the same park, but then we’d have been more or less “forced” to ride out those passes to be eligible to get more – and we wanted more, especially for a different park.  Plus, the addition of the tiered FP systems in Epcot and the Studios really proved to be challenging and not as good as the old FP system for our family (your experience may be completely different!).

Getting into the parks seemed to be a LOT slower than in the past.  Especially for us since Raymond’s MagicBand almost never worked properly.  Remember Key to The World cards?  How you fed them into the card reader then the fingerprint reader’s light would come on?  Well now you touch the Mickey on your MagicBand to a reader and wait for a light to swirl around and around (on the reader, while you’re touching Mickey to it) before the swirling light becomes a bright, solid light – THEN the light comes on for the fingerprint DSCN3367reader.  Then you wait for the whole shebang to turn green- it’s much slower than the card reader!  Especially when one member of your party has trouble almost every time.  In Raymond’s case, the Cast Member by the MagicBand reader would have him try multiple times before calling over a Senior Cast Member with a hand held reader – who would read Raymond’s MagicBand, call him by name, and give him the go-ahead to enter.  This would have been okay if it only happened once, but we visited two parks a day and the process got tedious in a hurry.  It also felt like we were…how do I put this…appearing suspect.  I wasn’t embarrassed, really, but – we just felt singled out, stared at, scrutinized, again and again.  When you’re trying to use Morning Extra Magic Hours and you get held up every time…I’ll stop complaining now, you get the idea.

Splash Mountain Ride PhotoSo – to wrap it all up for you…

MagicBands – very convenient when they work properly.  Highly wearable – no complaints about comfort (I kept looking at mine as if it would tell time).  If Disney really wants this to be convenient, they’ll find a way to attach your discounts (Tables in Wonderland, DVC, Annual Pass) so you don’t have to carry all the cards!

MemoryMaker / PhotoPass – easier to use than the old system – just hold your arm out post-picture-taking for a quick scan of a MagicBand and you’re on your way.  Ride photos, character dining pics, park photos all together for one price with MemoryMaker.  If you’re Family Pic at Disney's Boardwalkthinking about it, pre-purchase for the $50 discount.  You can read my justification for forking over the $149 here.

FastPass+ – There’s a definite learning curve here.  I think I can do better on our next visit.  I strongly dislike the must-choose-and-use-three at the same park before getting the option to hop and pick again.  I also wasn’t a huge fan of having to use a kiosk to pick the fourth, fifth, etc. (versus being able to use the app, which you can’t).

MyMagic+ – There’s still some work to be done.  I believe the app is not as user-friendly as it could (and should) be.  It’s so slow!  Even when we were in a park – SLOW!!!Meg and Joe at Disney's Hollywood Studios

We had a GREAT vacation!  None of the problems we experienced were more than momentary annoyances.  No matter what kind of change you’re faced with, there’s always a period of adjustment.  I feel certain that Disney will address the existing system glitches.  I believe they will listen to guest feedback and make some additional tweaks here and there.  I am very much looking forward to our next visit to Walt Disney World in October to celebrate our 25th Anniversary – our first trip without children since my first visit in 1990!

Tim over at Dad for Disney has a great article on new versus old FastPass systems.  Check it out here.

If you’ve been to Walt Disney World recently, how was your experience with the new system?

 

 

 

 

 

 

Disney Dining Review – Raglan Road

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Raglan Road RisottoMaking ADRs (Advance Dining Reservations) 180 days before every Disney vacation has become a regular part of our trip planning process.  So much so, I’ve developed mental lists of table service restaurants that fall into three categories:  Want to go again, want to try, and not going back ever.  The first category is currently a medium-sized list.  I’ll admit that sometimes, restaurants land on it due to sentimentality rather than for outstanding food or service.  Over the years, a few places that made it into Category One at one time have fallen from favor due to a single really bad dinner.  Category Two is the longest list – there are still many places we haven’t tried yet.  A restaurant has to actually work really hard to end up a Category Three, but there are definitely some firmly entrenched eateries on that list.

Raglan Road Irish Pub and Restaurant falls firmly in the first category.  We’ve never had a bad meal there.  To be honest, the consistency of good food and great service at Raglan Road has been impressive.  Raymond and I like the atmosphere so much, we’ve been know to drop in for a cold beer on an afternoon just to hang out, relax, and soak up the atmosphere for a while.  Raglan Road Menu PicOther than consistently tasty fare and nice wait staff, that’s about the only “usual” thing about Raglan Road – because, and I mean this in the best possible way, every experience there has been different!  A special dinner, unique for every visit.

Our most recent Raglan Road dinner was on May 25th, 2014.  We had an ADR for 7:30 pm.  We’d been up since 3:00 am to catch super early flights to Orlando.  Raymond, Joseph and I had been at a wedding in Dallas and flew from there, Megan had been at her boyfriend’s college graduation in Louisiana, so she flew from there.  We all met up to change planes in Atlanta and arrived in Orlando early enough to spend the entire afternoon in Magic Kingdom.  After getting soaked (thank you, rain ponchos, you did your best) in a flash-flood-like torrential downpour that struck just as we exited Pirates of the Caribbean, we began to make our way to Downtown Disney for our much anticipated meal.

Our plan was solid (we thought) – take the monorail to the Contemporary, catch the Downtown Disney bus from there and arrive at Raglan Road in plenty of time for our reservation.  We walked as briskly through Magic Kingdom as possible through the deep puddles and pouring Raglan Road Breatrain.  It was about 6:15.  We’d made our way to the Contemporary’s bus stop by just before 7:00.  We waited.  The rain stopped.  Busses came and went.  Still we waited.  It was nearly 7:30 before the Downtown Disney bus pulled up and, even though once we got there we practically sprinted through Downtown Disney, we arrived at Raglan Road at 8:10 (almost two hours after we started trying to get there).  We were wet, tired, and hungry.  Not to mention really, really late.

We had no expectation that we would be seated – and even though we overheard the hostess tell the party in front of us the wait would be two hours – we thought we’d see if anything could be done.  I didn’t have high hopes (or low hopes or any hopes, really) that we would get a table that night and I’d already started thinking about what our alternatives might be. I explained that we were a wee bit tardy and the hostess asked (with a beaming smile), “What was the name?”  Note:  I do not recommend testing the limits of the ADR system and do not in any way believe that if you show up for dinner 40 minutes late you’ll be seated, but on this day….we had our table within 10 minutes.  I can only believe it was a pinch of pixie dust exactly when we most needed it.  We hadIMG_3163 just enough time to get our buzzer, head into the bar for a cold Guinness, and pay our tab before the buzzer sounded. Our table was in a dark alcove by a back door – not in the middle of the action (we thought) but perfect for the four of us since we love to have lively dinner conversation.  Our server, Brett, was absolutely fantastic!  He explained menu items, made recommendations, was friendly and made us feel welcome – also special, like we were his only table.

The menu at Raglan Road offers a great variety of people-pleasing dishes designed for every taste.  Chicken, steak, salmon, scallops, shepherd’s pie, Guinness stew, vegetarian choices – good, hearty selections.  Dinner starts with bread service – a dense, delicious Irish bread with a scrumptious dipping sauce!  I can recommend with enthusiasm the “Kiss Before Shrimp” and “Nom Nom Wings” appetizers as Meeting the Raglan Road Irish Dancerswell as the “Braised Be Beef”, “Mammy’s Roast Chicken”, and “Raglan Risotto” entrees and also the “Garlic and Herb Roasted Potatoes” from extensive side dish selection.  (We were, sadly, too full for dessert.)  See the full menu at Raglan Road’s awesome website here.

Raglan Road dinner includes excellent evening entertainment.  Every hour on the hour, seven nights a week (from 5-10 pm), talented Irish dancers perform to lively (and live) Irish music. On the evening we were there, we were enjoying the music and dancing from our table in the back.  And then (more pixie dust!), the dancers were beside our table for a little dance-off.  We were able to meet them and visit with these happy, enthusiastic performers – one of the best moments of this vacation! (Follow the Raglan Road Irish Dancers on Facebook here.)

Raglan Road currently accepts the Tables in Wonderland discount card.  If you’re on the Disney Dinner at Raglan RoadDining plan, Raglan Road is ONE table service credit (lunch or dinner).

Have you had the opportunity to enjoy a meal at Raglan Road?