Hello, everyone! Having just returned from Walt Disney World, I thought this week I would share with you my experiences in the form of a trip report. We arrived in Orlando just 3 days after hurricane Charley, and I was a bit concerned that we would get caught up in the aftermath of the storm… But to my surprise, it really had little impact on things.

The only time we were really affected by the storm was when we were trying to get from the airport to our resort. Having booked a package through Walt Disney Travel Company, we were dependant on Mears Transportation to shuttle us back and forth from the airport. Now, I’ve been to Walt Disney World many, many times, and have used Mears almost every time I’ve flown. I have always found them to be very quick and efficient. This time, however, we waited nearly 45 minutes just for a shuttle to our Disney hotel. As it would turn out, this was probably the longest wait we had during the entire trip! From what I could tell, the delay was caused by a combination of a shortage of drivers (due to the storm), and some of the busses and/or vans were damaged (also from the storm). So, I don’t really blame the fine folks at Mears for the delay, but that really was the only snag in the entire experience.

Rather than going day-by-day, I’ll discuss my observations organized by park. Let’s start with the Magic Kingdom. The park looked as beautiful as always. The first thing I noticed was that the trees in the “Town Square” area seemed a lot smaller than I remembered! Now I know that Disneyland recently removed some old trees that were larger and replaced them with smaller ones to provide better views of the fireworks, however I didn’t remember hearing the same for Magic Kingdom. I figured either the same thing happened here, or the new trees were the result of damage to the old trees from the storm. Anyone out there know the truth?

While riding Splash Mountain, I noticed that several effects weren’t working. These were just small things that as a repeat visitor I picked up on. Several of the animatronic figures mouths were not moving along to the audio tracks, and the scene with Brer Bear hanging from the tree in the trap was also broken. Brer Bear was just sitting on the ground, and you could see wires coming out of the rope where it attaches to the mechanism that slowly moves him up and down. There were several other small details of things that were not working as well. It really was the worst condition I have seen that ride in. I hoped that the malfunctions were the result of the maintenance department spending so much time on damage control from hurricane Charley that they just had not gotten to the small details yet. This must have been the case, because when we returned a few days later and rode again, nearly all of these effects were once again working.

In the Haunted Mansion, there were a few problems in the graveyard scene. First, the singing busts were horribly out-of-sync with the rest of the chorus. It was almost as if they were signing different songs altogether! I’ve experienced them being maybe a half a beat off, but this was entire chunks of lyrics! They were a good 4 or 5 seconds behind the rest of the chorus! It really was a disjointing experience! Also, the first few times we rode, there was a piece of dialogue in the narration that did not play at the end of the graveyard. The line, “Ahh, there you are. And just in time! There’s a little matter I forgot to mention… Beware of hitchhiking ghosts!” We rode at least twice when this line was left out. Gladly, the last time we rode, that had been fixed, but the singing busts were still way off!

Over in Fantasyland, the entire area of the former 20,000 lagoon is now behind construction walls. I didn’t see or hear much going on behind them, and there are several other websites with photos. It’s basically just a bunch of dirt, folks! Not much to see! But the most entertaining construction wall is located in Tomorrowland…

The area around what will be “Stitch’s Great Escape” is also entirely walled off. It’s covered with faux newspaper headlines. And, if you listen closely, you can hear Stitch creating all kinds of racket behind the wall. It really did help to get me excited about experiencing this attraction once it opens!

Speaking of Tomorrowland… We thought for a minute that a new thrill ride had been added to this area of the park! While riding the Tomorrowland Transit Authority (formerly known as the People Mover), we were surprised when our train of cars slowly coasted to a stop at one point. I figured the operators had stopped the ride due to someone standing up, etc. However, we suddenly noticed the train behind us heading toward us at full speed! Needless to say, there was a slight bump, which then propelled our train forward again while the train behind us crawled to a stop. It seems as though a section of the Linear Induction Motors that propel the cars had lost power, but once we were bumped ahead, the next set grabbed the cars and continued to propel us forward. I watched with anticipation the reactions of the people in the cars behind us as the train behind them then bumped into them and the process repeated again and again! And, just as I thought we were in the clear, we hit yet another patch where the motors had gone out. And so, we got to do it all over again! It was kind of like crossing the ride with bumper cars! While I enjoyed the added thrill element, simply for the surprise it delivered, apparently the maintenance people were not as keen on keeping it around permanently. As we were exiting, I was preparing to mention something to the Cast Member, however there was already a manager on scene, and I overheard the CM saying something to the effect of “…maintenance said not to load anymore passengers…” We rode a few days later and the ride was back to normal!

We also had a chance to view the spectacular Wishes fireworks show one evening. Having seen the show before, I am very familiar with the sequence of events. However, there was one regular who was mysteriously absent from the show… Tinkerbell! I’m not sure what happened, but she did not make her famous flight from the top of the castle to somewhere backstage in Tomorrowland. My guess would be that perhaps there was some storm damage to the wire she glides on during her flight, and it has not yet been deemed safe to use. If anyone has more info, send it my way so I can clarify!

Well, folks, it’s looking like I have more to report on than I originally thought when I started this article… I think I’m going to have to stop here, and continue on with my adventures next week! At that time, we’ll pick up with Epcot! Until then, I’ll see ya real soon!