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[Kristof]

September 24, 2005

Typhoon Lagoon was on our shedule today!  The waterpark was nearly deserted when we arrived.  There were just a few people present.  The grey skies were probably the cause...
The theming looked so much better compared to Blizzard Beach, and so was the overall cleaness.  We first headed over to the new Crush 'n Gusher, which opened in 2005.  We had a great time in this one!  It was like a small rollercoaster, with lots of ups and downs!  
Next was the snorkeling in the coral tank.  The water was freezing and tasted horrible (salt).  But it was a great experience to see the sharks and other fish swim at the bottom of the pool.  The CM's here were very rude to the guests.  They were shouting and screaming constantly.  
We concluded our day here in the main pool which makes a huge wave. Quite scary to see a wave that big coming near you.

We got dressed and hopped on the bus back to Pop Century for a meal at the resort restaurant (delicious Lo-Mein).

We returned to Disney-MGM studios again for a ride on, ofcourse, Tower of Terror (yes, it's that good!).  We met Francisco later in the park and watched the Streetmosphere together.  Gracy is the best Streetmosphere performer ever!  She dropped her gum on the ground, but put it back in her mouth, because it was her last piece...  :lol:
And today was also the day that we finally saw the Chicken Little and Abbey Malley characters!  They're really cute!

Our day ended at the Magic Kingdom, for the last time during our stay.  We hadn't done Country Bears Jamboree yet, so that's what we did!  It's an audio-animatronic show with singing bears.  There were a few fans in the crowd who know the songs by heart, so that cheered everything a bit up.  

We watched Spectromagic in Frontierland, in front of the Country Bears.  Like I probably already said before.  The parade is very long, with tons of characters.  We prefer Fantillusion.  A lot more interaction and an actual story!
Wishes blasted off half an hour later.  We watched it on Town Square, it was quite weird that they let on all the lights on the square and the ones of the boutiques surrounding it.  Wasn't easy to film the fireworks decently like that...  

Keith and Francisco came to pick us up at Pop Century for a fun evening at their place.

[Dlrpfan]

I have just realised that you departed wdw on my birthday!

[Kristof]

September 25, 2005

Our last day was quite simple.  We re-did some attractions we like dat MK and Disney-MGM (but actually forgot to re-do Splash Mountain  :roll:  :cry: ) and ended our night at Fantasmic.

As said before, this is one of the best Disney shows we've ever seen.  Most fans probably already know what it's about, so I won't go into details about the story.  But here are some highlights that are worth traveling to Orlando (warning: spoilers).

- The Amphitheatre is really huge, Disney claims there are no "bad" seats, but we had the impression that the most choosen seats where the ones in the middle.

- If you arrive early, like we did on both occasions, the wait is really long.  CM's are trying to sell Fantasmic merchandise, and the most annoying Disney music (Disney Channel style) is playing loudly on the background. And since you're in the States, fans throw in a wave or 40.  

- When the show finally started, the crowds really went crazy, espcially when Mickey suddenly appeared on stage, something that's not common at DLRP.  This happened again by the end of the show when an animated Tinkerbell appeared on the waterscreen.

- The best part of the show starts when Mickey defeats Maleficent. That's when the build up for the "Grand Finale" starts with first Steamboat Willie and tons of characters (including for some kind of reason Villain Brer Bear). The emotional building up goes then in high speed and tops off with Sorcerer Mickey appearing on top of the mountain.  The crowds started cheering like their favourite football team won.

- The fireworks used in this show are quite small, comparable to our Wishes.  

- After the show, the whole Amphitheatre is a garbage belt.  It's discusting to see how people leave all their garbage right on their seats.  When most people have left, a huge amount of CM's come with large garbage bags to clean everything up.  We took our own garbage and put it in one of the bags, which actually amazed the CM who was cleaning up nachos, popcorn and empty bottles of Coke.

- Conclusion: this show HAS to come to DLRP.  An improved version will work very well.  Like Moteurs... Action, it can be performed all year long, if they build a sheltered seating area.  The use of fireworks can't be a problem either, since big fireworks aren't needed.  It's the show element and music that's the most important.

We took off again to our room and found the plush toys we bought the day before decorated in the curtain.  What a nice suprise by the cleaning crew.  

We've spent most of the night trying to pack our bags (bought to many souvenires) and had actually ask a bag to Francisco and Keith so we could bring everything back home.  

The next day, Disney's Magical Express picked is up early in the morning (it arrived 15 minutes too late...) and dropped is off at MCO.  We took our TED flight to Washington where we had to wait over 8 hours for connection to Brussels.  Somewhat boring, but thanks to our night flight, everything went really fast after a long sleep.  We arrived at Brussels at 07.35 am with lots of stories to tell to our families and this message board.

[Kristof]

DLRP versus WDW

Most WDW fans complain about DLRP being too small, too European and less magical.  Is that true??  Well for us it wasn't at all!  You know what they say: There's no place like home ;-)

Here are some pro's and contra's from WDW compared to DLRP.

(+)
* Certain attractions are really great: Tower of Terror, Philharmagic, Buzz Lightyear Space Ranger Spin, Test Track, ...
* Animal Kingdom: beautiful park, feels like our Adventureland.
* Food: far much better compared to DLRP, probably related to the food cultured at the United States.

(-)
* The Magic Kingdom: DLP is so much more beautiful, from Main Street USA, the castle, and the overall look of the lands.
* World Showcase looks nice from the outside, but most of the actual attractions are too old to impress first-timers.  Although movies like O-Canada and Impressions de France are nice, the style of the movie (especially the clothing of the people on the films) look too '70's.
* Bad attractions: Pirates of the Caribbean (that was before the rehab), BTM, Space Mountain, ...  Most of them have aged without being taken care off.  
* The Tiki-Tiki Room under new Managment: everyone knows how annoying Iago is...
* Christmas decorations at Disney-MGM Studios were being put up in September, causing lots of bad photos.

(Neutral) :|
* Cast Members at the US parks are said to be a lot more friendly then the Paris CM's.  That's not really true.  Most CM's are as equal friendly as the CM's at DLRP, maybe the elder CM's are an exception (but I don't know many unfriendly grandmothers )  Most younger CM's (maybe temp's?) don't seem to care about their job, they just stand there and do what they have to do. (probably same as in Paris).

I can't think of other stuff for now, feel free to post comments & questions.  Thanks for reading our Trip Report, which has finally been finished after almost a year.  :lol: