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Hello everyone,
Yesterday the Disney Parks Blog made the surprising announcement that Disney's Electrical Parade (fondly known as the Main Street Electrical Parade to fans) would be coming to an end after a final performance on 9th October. In an odd twist, they also announced that it would be moving to Disneyland in California for a "limited engagement", "early next year". As always, Disney are completely vague as to what they mean exactly - "early" could mean anywhere from January to April, and of course "limited engagement" could mean a month or six months! Even stranger still, just last week as I reported here on the blog, Disneyland are ending their popular Paint the Night parade, but instead of that moving somewhere else, the most recent update from the DPB suggests that Paint the Night will actually remain at the DLR and return for holiday events! Having two electrical parades at one park, that could potentially switch out depending on the day/season/event is quite odd, especially since it leaves WDW without a nighttime parade.
Disneyland Paris yesterday released its Halloween press release, and everything sounds just about the same as it has for the past couple of years. That isn't altogether a bad thing since the Halloween season there has been quite strong and reasonably successful in recent years, so there isn't much need to change the formula I suppose. Returning to Parc Disneyland this Halloween season will be Mickey's Halloween Celebration, which is their daily Halloween cavalcade (not quite a full parade, for those wondering). It’s Good to Be Bad with the Disney Villains!, which stars Jafar, Cruella, the Queen of Hearts, Captain Hook, The Witch, Frollo and Dr Facilier, will also be returning to the Castle Stage. Daisy and Stitch will appear at Costume Corner (Daisy replacing Minnie this year), and Maleficent will return to the Castle Courtyard. Rumours have gone around the internet of other character appearances, such as Marie and even Cheshire Cat - but I'll say what I always say: nothing is certain until Disney says otherwise, and even then, things can change on a daily basis! All we know right now is what I have mentioned above. Disney's Halloween will run from 1st October until 2nd November, with Disney's Halloween Soiree ticketed event featuring on 31st October, as per usual.
Tokyo Disney Resort revealed its Christmas offerings yesterday, and since much of it was new last year (TDR tend to have a three-to-five year life cycle of its seasonal entertainment), it wasn't much of a surprise that it will all be pretty much the same. At Tokyo Disneyland we can expect the return of the Disney Christmas Stories parade, the Christmas version of Dreamlights, and the seasonal overlays to the bands, Haunted Mansion and the Country Bears, and other minor entertainment. At Tokyo DisneySea we can expect to see the return of A Perfect Christmas, Colors of Christmas, and again, the overlays to regular entertainment such as A Table is Waiting and the bands. We were lucky enough to be in Tokyo Disney Resort for Christmas season last year, and you can read my report about it here on the blog!
That's everything for today. Have a great day everyone.
Dan. |
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Hello everyone,
Earlier this week the Disney Parks Blog announced that the entertainment added for the 60th anniversary of Disneyland last year would all end on 5th September. The Disneyland Forever fireworks, the Paint the Night electrical parade, and the current version of World of Color would all have their final performances on that date. In addition, Fantasy in the Sky fireworks will return to Disneyland park Fridays through Sundays only.
With Disneyland Forever leaving, it means that we will no longer see Nemo swimming high above Sleeping Beauty Castle, and potentially Tinker Bell. When we saw Fantasy in the Sky, when they ran it for a while in 2015, there were no flying characters in it at all.
The loss of Paint the Night is the most detrimental to the park. With the scaled back fireworks performances, and Fantasmic! being down because of the Star Wars Land construction, it leaves Disneyland park with very little in the way of nighttime entertainment - especially Monday through Wednesday.
Over at the Walt Disney World Resort in Florida the Disney Parks Blog revealed that a brand new show starring the Muppets would be coming to Liberty Square in then Magic Kingdom, in "October" (DPB being as vague as ever). Sam Eagle, Kermit the Frog, Miss Piggy, Fozzie Bear, The Great Gonzo and James Jefferson will all appear in a new show outside the Hall of Presidents. The description makes it sound as though throughout the day there will be numerous different performances, retelling popular stories from American history. It is interesting that WDW have chosen to introduce the Muppets to Liberty Square since they decided to re-theme and rededicate the area around Muppet*Vision 3D (at DHS) as Muppets Courtyard recently. It would seem the Muppets (who were cancelled from ABC recently also) are making a belated comeback to WDW!
The Magic Kingdom is set to welcome Princess Elena of Avalor from 11th August, starting with a special welcome ceremony that will be live streamed on the DPB. Then, from 12th August, multiple times per day, Cinderella and Prince Charming will join Princess Elena at the Castle Stage for a musical performance. The show is a "limited time" happening (again with the DPB being vague), so catch Elena while you can!
From 7th until 31st August, guests who purchase the WDW Memory Maker will be entitled to a special private greeting with a Disney Princess inside Heritage House (Liberty Square), at the Magic Kingdom. Terms and limitations apply. Check the DPB for all the details.
Finally, I have been continuing to add more and more new content to the site, and you will now find brand new pages loaded with photos for the following character-filled experiences at WDW: Mickey's Royal Friendship Faire, Minnie's Summertime Dine, and the Royal Sommerhus.
Ok, that's all for today! Have a great day everyone,
Dan. |
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Hello everyone,
At the end of May Jon and I spent a week at Walt Disney World. We hadn't been down there since February since we travelled to Australia in the spring instead. You can read my currently-ongoing Australia trip report here on my Two Lost Boys blog.
In this part of my report I will be sharing with you our adventures at the Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom, the resort hotels we stayed at and visited, the Boardwalk, and Disney Springs.
Let's start with the Magic Kingdom. [ Read More... ] |
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Hello everyone,
The Walt Disney World website has been updated now to include dates for this year's Mickey's Very Merry Christmas Party at the Magic Kingdom in Florida.
There are going to be 21 nights of parties, in the following dates:
November: 7, 8, 10, 11, 13, 15, 18, 27 and 29
December: 1, 2, 4, 6, 8, 9, 11, 13, 15, 16, 18 and 22
Tickets have not yet gone on sale, and there is currently no other information about this year's event officially available. Once we do find out more, I'll be sure to post it here on the blog.
Yesterday the Disney Parks Blog announced the Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party dates, which can be found in my news post, here.
Have a great day everyone,
Dan. |
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Hello everyone,
Today the Disney Parks Blog announced the dates for this year's Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party at the Magic Kingdom.
There will be 29 nights of parties, and they are as follows:
September: 2, 8, 11, 13, 16, 18, 20, 23, 25, 29 and 30
October: 2, 4, 6, 7, 10, 11, 13, 14, 16, 18, 20, 21, 23, 25, 27, 28, 30 and 31
The Parks Blog has confirmed the return of character filled favourites, such as Mickey's Boo To You Halloween Parade and the Hocus Pocus Villain Spectacular.
They have not yet announced any further details on pricing and sale dates.
Once we find out more information, I'll be sure to post it here on the blog.
Have a great week everyone,
Dan. |
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Hello everyone,
For a few days rumours of a new special event have been floating around the internet of a special event coming to the Magic Kingdom during April and May. Today, the special events page on the official Walt Disney World website has details of the event, while the Disney Parks Blog has yet to announce it (at time of writing at least).
The event will be held from 10pm until 1am on April 28th and May 5th, and from 11pm until 2am on April 14th and 21st, and May 8th, 12th and 19th, 2016.
Tickets for the events are priced at $149 per person, including children, plus tax.
The website page gives little away, except that the event will keep open some of the most popular attractions in the park, such as the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train and Big Thunder Mountain.
As character fans we were hoping that this might be a special character event, but unfortunately all the page says is "Disney Princess Greetings at Princess Fairytale Hall" and "most popular attractions and Character Greetings". That point is interesting though because recently there have been a lot of sighting of the Disney Princes around the parks with the princesses (such as the Snow Prince at Epcot last week, and Prince Charming at Magic Kingdom the other day), which leads me to believe that perhaps they may appear at the event. That is my own speculation though, and you should not count on that for your planning purposes.
UPDATE March 23: The Disney Parks Blog today said the following (I quote):
This event will enable participants to enjoy more exclusive time in Magic Kingdom – with quicker than typical access to popular attractions like Space Mountain and the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train and character greetings like the ones in Town Square and Princess Fairytale Hall.
This very much makes it sound like that the character offerings will be the regular greetings, and nothing special.
Ticket numbers are very limited apparently, and you have to call Disney rather than book online.
If any more information is released, I'll be sure to update this blog post.
Have a great day everyone,
Dan. |
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Hello everyone,
In this third and final part of my Walt Disney World Christmas trip report we will be taking a look at our adventures at the Magic Kingdom.
Let's start at the front entrance of the park where we found the Toy Soldiers playing to guests arriving on the ferry! [ Read More... ] |
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Hello everyone,
Let's start today's news in Walt Disney World, where this week has seen the start of some unfortunate character cutbacks. At Epcot you can no longer meet Chip, Dale, Tigger, Winnie the Pooh or Princess Aurora, while at the Magic Kingdom Lady Tremaine is on her way out, too. The schedules no longer list those characters, and their spots are empty. Hopefully we will see improvements in other areas in the coming months, and these cuts are just temporary in order to bring new experiences to the parks.
Having said that, while there have been definite cut backs, at least one new character [ Read More... ] |
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Hello everyone,
In part one of my trip report I talked about our adventures at Epcot, Disney's Hollywood Studios and the Magic Kingdom. In this second and final part I want to share with you our experience at Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party (MNSSHP).
It had been a couple of years since we had been to MNSSHP because of all the other traveling we do, and the parties never change much anyway, however, this year there was enough that was new that [ Read More... ] |
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Hello everyone,
Last week Jon and I spent three days in Walt Disney World to experience Epcot's International Food and Wine Festival and Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party at the Magic Kingdom. In this first part of this report I will cover everything except Mickey's Not So Scary, as there are so many photos from that, it deserves a report of its own.
Let's start with Epcot, and the Food and Wine Festival. [ Read More... ] |
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