Disney World!

Six months ago Irv and I decided it would be a great idea to book a trip to Disney World in December.  Covid numbers were going down and the world was beginning to open back up again.  Who knew that the Omicron variant would decide to make an appearance just days before our trip was set to begin?


We were vaccinated and boosted just like all intelligent people are so we decided to take our chances and get on the plane.  After all the trip was booked and paid for and our Disney tickets were set to expire on December 17th.


Months ago Disney said they were instituting a reservation system to control the amount of people who came into the parks each day.  We were under the assumption that the crowd size would be controlled.  Boy, were we wrong.  Since we were staying at a Disney resort we took full advantage of the early opening hours for resort guests.  (We didn't go on vacation to sleep in, did we?)


Christmas decorations at Disney are always magical although I didn't think they were as magical as years past.


The gardens at Epcot are always wonderful.


Disney recently implemented their Genie+ service.  For a fee each day you can select the attractions to use the Lightening Lane with.  This used to be called Fast Pass which was free.  Basically, with the Lightening Lane you can bypass the long lines and go to the front.  Lots of catches though--you can choose your first Lightening Lane at 7 am, but you can't choose a second one until after the park has been open for two hours.  Then you can select another one after you used one of the previous Lightening Lanes.  There are still a few hiccups with the Genie+.  One day there were technical difficulties that kept us out of it for several hours.  Overall, the $15 per day per person fee was well worth it.

Then there are the popular attractions at each park that the Genie+ doesn't cover.  For instance the brand new Ratatouille ride at Epcot.  For those rides you can purchase the Lightening Lane for an additional fee that ranges between $7-$10 depending how crowded the park is.  We purchased two of these during our stay--Ratatouille and Avatar.  (There is also a virtual queue for Ratatouille that opens at 7 am.  All the free queue spots were gone in six seconds on the day we visited Epcot.)



Epcot stays open until 10 pm and it is amazing at night.




The fireworks started at 9:30 in the lagoon at Epcot and they were amazing.  This was one of my favorite things during our trip.  Nobody knows how to entertain like Disney.


Here's the end of Day 1 and this trend continued for the next three days.


It was very foggy when we arrived at the Magic Kingdom.


There's nothing better than a Mickey waffle for breakfast.


Unless you add Nutella and some fruit.  


Happy 50th Disney World!



The next day was Hollywood Studios.  We got there early and waited in line for the Rise of the Resistance attraction since it also didn't qualify for Genie+.  I really don't know much about Star Wars, but these Storm Troopers are impressive.


Santa was there too!


Our last day was at the Animal Kingdom.  We used Genie+ to get on the safari ride--one that always has a very long line.


They put on a fantastic kite display in the lagoon.


We finished early at Animal Kingdom so we made our way back to the Magic Kingdom because I was in search of a 50th anniversary shirt.  We had park hopper tickets so after 2 pm you can transfer to another parks if you'd like to.


I never did find the shirt so then we went in search of a Dole Pineapple Dip and popcorn in Adventure Land.  We waited almost an hour for the pineapple whip even though we used Disney's mobile order app.  One thing Disney really needs to improve on is its food service.  It's slow and very inefficient, but I realize they might be having staffing shortages like the rest of the country.

By the time we started heading toward the exit it was getting dark and all the lights were on.  Beautiful!


Disney requires masks in all indoor areas including any lines you have to wait in.  For the most part people were complying.  They have also eliminated close up encounters with the Disney characters, but have very innovative at finding new ways for kids to see their favorites.  All the Disney princesses were waving goodbye to us as we were leaving.


I'm a Disney fanatic.  We figured out that during the last six years we have gone there five times.  Normally this first week in December is really slow and you can just go from ride to ride.  Not this year--I think there were lots of people like us who just needed a vacation.  As you may have noticed from some of my pictures it was wall to wall people.

Farewell until next time!





Comments

polcat24 said…
Oh my Gosh!!! It was a zoo, of people!!!
December 17, 2021 at 7:21 AM
Yogi♪♪♪ said…
I think there is a pent up demand for entertainment. I love the photos but man the waiting in lines would drive me bonkers.
December 20, 2021 at 5:47 PM
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