Like lemmings to the sea, we marched off to Orlando in January for what has become our annual visit to the House of Mouse. This trip was significantly shorter than past visits. With Henry in Kindergarten, we’ve had to limit our travels to school breaks. A teacher in-service day tacked onto the long MLK weekend provided a four-day window for our yearly Disney fix. We could visit during spring break or summer, but as experienced WDW travelers, we knew to avoid those high crowd seasons. As an added bonus, Mimi and Paw Paw joined us for the long weekend.
The weather was unusually cold for Orlando, which made for some chilly mornings at the resort bus stop but also helped keep the crowd levels down (MLK weekend is a popular time for Floridians to visit). Despite the compressed time frame, we hit all of our favorite attractions/restaurants: Cinderella’s Royal Table, Pirates of the Caribbean, Bibbidi Bobbidi Boutique, Soarin’, Maelstrom, and Oktoberfest in Germany. We also returned to the Be Our Guest restaurant for dinner and were lucky enough to be seated in the mysterious West Wing. Henry graduated to the grown-up roller coasters on this trip and tackled both Expedition Everest (Animal Kingdom) and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (Magic Kingdom). The former proved a bit too scary—not so much the coaster as the Yeti that jumps out at the end. However, his favorite ride remains the Barnstormer in Magic Kingdom (check out the video below). Vivian was fortunate—very fortunate—to meet two of her favorite princesses: Anna and Elsa from Frozen. We heard the wait to see them could be as long as five (5) hours! Miraculously, the line moved faster than anticipated, and it only took about 50 mins for Vivian’s turn. She was the last visit before Elsa went home for the day—we were that close. Mimi and Paw Paw gamely joined us for what they figured (between visits with kids and grand kids) to be their 20th+ trip to WDW. We packed a lot into those three days. On our last night in the park, we stayed until 9pm and saw Main Street Electrical Parade—something we have never done before.
And check out these videos from our trip:
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