Disney Parks and Presidents!
Monorail: The 60th Anniversary Special!
WDW Recap: Part 1!
WDW Report: Mexico Pavilion’s own King Kong!
This week, we are at Walt Disney World! This is always a treat for us since we live on the west coast so we do not take a trip to these 4 parks lightly. Robert’s favorite park is EPCOT and they’re in the middle of their 20th year of the Food & Wine festival in the World Showcase area of the park. Unfortunately, EPCOT’s guests have a bad reputation for taking advantage of the libations at the park and proudly wear their drunkenness on their sleeves (or matching t-shirts.) This year is no different, it would seem, as Robert took this video Sunday night which has since gone viral!
The guy climbing had been bragging to his friends that he would climb the stairs and one in his group said she would join him. So up they went! Well, he did, but she was quickly pulled down by Disney security. As you can see in the video, he made it to the top without being apprehended. Many online have wondered what happened after the video cuts out here, and we’ll post that upon Robert’s return! Unfortunately, he was able to snake down the side and away from security. Robert even saw him later with his friends before park closing. We’re not sure that he was ever caught and are waiting for some official statement from Disney about it. The strange thing is this isn’t the first time this happened. When I went in 2012, someone had tried to climb up the temple and I got this response on twitter:
@remainseatedpls Done it and did it when I was 8 years old when park first opened. — ERRT (@OFFICIAL_ERRT) November 11, 2015
Since that video and story went viral, we’ve been lucky (depending on how you look at it when one is on vacation) to be cited on several major news outlets. Here’s a fun one:
And since then, the Mexico pavilion has gone from looking as it always has: 
To looking more like this:
They’ve added some plants which I actually don’t mind but they’ve also included a theme-less sign here. This is at least the temporary fix that Team Disney Orlando has come up with but it will be interesting to see how it evolves from here. Robert mentioned there’s a security guard standing by as well. EPCOT’s Food & Wine Festival comes to a close for 2015 on Nov 16th.
Stay tuned to the blog as we will be posting Robert’s full video here as well as podcasting about it next week as we return from our hiatus. What do you think about actions like this at Disney parks and does it affect your experience? Or have you seen this happen before at this or another park? Let us know in the comment section below!
Monorail Mondays!
In addition to Matterhorn and Mansion Monday pics, I love seeing the Monorail Monday pics on Instagram! Just like last week’s post, I created a “one stop shop” for you to see these right on your desktop in a rotating gallery that self-updates!
Now, when you search for Monorail Mondays on our site, Google, or just by bookmarking this page, you’ll have this nifty gallery below!
Happy posting!
Gallery provided by the good people at http://www.instush.com. Gallery refreshes ever 10-30 minutes. Some photos may not be of Disney’s Alweg Monorail or any other Disney park rides.
Throwback Thursday – Cranium Command at EPCOT!
I only went to WDW for the first time in 2012 so my knowledge about most things there is very limited — especially when it comes to classic and now legacy attractions like EPCOT’s “Cranium Command.” Today I was randomly scouring blogs and Reddit and found out about this attraction which occupied the Wonders of Life pavilion in Future World.
If you don’t know what “Cranium Command” was or want a simple refresher, according to Wikipedia, “It premiered on October 19, 1989; as of January 4, 2004 it began to operate seasonally, closing permanently on January 1, 2007.” You can take a look at WDW News Today‘s terrific video of one of the last showings of this attraction in 2005.
What a FUN attraction! It’s everything I loved about EPCOT when I saw it in 2012 and full of things many fans feel EPCOT is moving away from.
Sadly, here’s a recent look at what the pavilion is like during most of the year thanks to a brave YouTube-er that snuck in during the off-season:
When we went to Epcot, the pavilion was full of life as it was during Food & Wine. During the festival, it houses the Chase Card Lounge (closest I have come to being inside one of those fancy corporate lounges) as well as serving as the Festival Center for Food & Wine demonstrations, classes, shops, and more. It’s really a beautiful pavilion.
The strange thing is that while “Body Wars” has been dismantled and “Making of Me” has been removed, the theatre which houses Buzzy and “Cranium Command” remains intact!
And Buzzy still has a loyal fan base and is a sought-after commodity! Just check out the recent merchandise that has come out with this cranium commander:
With all this popularity, it makes one think about what the future of this attraction might be. Why keep the attraction intact? If it closed what’s now 8 years ago – why keep him around?
Here’s a theory I saw on a few blogs: does this look familiar to any Cranium Command fans?
How about now?
I bring this up because if you look at the trailer and premise, it’s pretty much the same idea as Cranium Command: your emotions are personified by characters driven by those very emotions.
It’s a timeless and relatable premise that Disney believes in. Is it possible that this attraction closed while this film was in development and refreshing this closed attraction was not outside the realm of possibility? If this film is successful (as most Pixar films are), there’s no reason not to keep this attraction around while the rest of Future World awaits a refresh.
What do you think? Is this an example of a film property layover you might enjoy? Maelstrom’s closure at EPCOT cause a bit of an uproar from the Disney Parks fans. However, the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage at Disneyland was initially met with praise from fans of the old attraction because it was being resurrected.
It’s all speculation for now, but if you know any better than we do, let us know in the comments below!
featured image source: yesterland.com
Our Top 5 Special Effects at Disney Parks!
Disney’s Hollywood Studios’ Tower of Terror 20th Anniversary Special with Mark Silverman!
Former Cast Member Nate Huckabone!
Pt. 2 of Disney Parks’ Price Hike
Disneyland opened in 1955 and had created something no one had ever seen. It was a wonderland that they saw unfold in front of their eyes on the Disneyland TV show but they really couldn’t grasp it until they saw it. And many only saw it a few times growing up. I know my parents probably only went to Disneyland once as children. My mother grew up out-of-state so that’s not uncommon, but my father was born in Los Angeles and grew up in Torrance, CA – a short drive to Anaheim. I was born in Los Angeles in ’84 and grew up in an annual pass starting with Fantasmic! and had one thru the ’90s. I then bought my own in college along with so many of my friends that also had them – and almost all of us have kept those APs active since.
This was a new phenomenon that had never been seen before. Yes, even though Disneyland is approaching its 58th anniversary, the paradigm is still shifting. It’s likely slowing down at this point but Disney Parks have had to adjust to this trend of life-time APs. Society has shifted so drastically since the 1950s. We are living in a world where if we want something, a majority of us are lucky enough to just get that thing. For those of us with parents that saw Disneyland as a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, Disneyland became a weekly activity. We are doing what they couldn’t – and we love it!
Unfortunately, this has led to crazy crowds at the parks due to locals getting off work, out of school, etc. to enjoy the luxury that is Disneyland and Disney California Adventure Park. What I’m saying is: the price hikes are mainly our fault and I, for one, take responsibility for it.
For out-of-towners, like I mentioned in the last blog, Disneyland is still a once-a-year and even once-in-a-lifetime opportunity. And Disney’s reputation of being the crème de la crème of vacation destinations makes $90-$95/day expected and less of a shock. However, what I’ve been seeing on the blogs and twitter feeds is that the APs are hurting the most here. So much so that even my family has downgraded to just the SoCal pass from the Premier we had just last year. And I think we started last year with Deluxe AP last year and upgraded for our WDW trip.
The unfortunate truth is that Disney Parks need to be able to plan for this influx of APs and vacationers. At DLR more than WDW, the APs descend upon the park and tie up parking with single-passenger vehicles, tie up entrances with sheer numbers, and fill the lines when merging numbers with single-day park guests. We wanted to go to Disneyland more because we could — but are we sure we should?
