Day 1: Feb 2nd and 3rd, 2006. Our Trip Begins (Or... The Trash Can Talks)

Cast of Characters:

Beth: That's me! Hi! Long time Disney Nerd here. This is my 2nd trip to Walt Disney World (From here on out it shall be known as WDW. Get with the Acronyms people! We Disney Nerds love 'em!). My first trip was in 2000 with my little brother and I remember very little from that trip. I feel like this is my first trip. Which is good because its everyone else's first trip.

Mark: My very best friend in the whole wide world. Love this guy so much! Its thanks to him that this trip is possible... on SO many levels. Thanks to him and the fact that he's a Disneyland Cast Member (CM) we get into the parks for free and 1/2 of our room! Son of a discount! That's a good deal! He runs a little website (with my help... can't let him get too cocky.) called MouseHub.com. It's great... check it out.

Matt: Our very near and dear friend who helps out on Mousehub. Matt is a good guy with a good heart and a demented mind... and that's why we like him. His favorite park is DCA so I was very excited to see how he liked everything at WDW. Matt is as giddy school girl about this trip!

This day actually started out for us on Feb 2nd. We all worked earlier in the day and then finished up last minute packing. Once Mark and I were done we took showers since we’d be on a plane all night and then going to the Magic Kingdome once we arrived in Florida. There was no shower pit stopped planned in out agenda for that day so we had to get clean the day before. We thought maybe we’d take a little nap before getting on the plane… yeah right. Instead we watched “I love the 80’s” and grew more and more impatient waiting for Matt to show up. He did… Finally! I think Mark almost had a heart attack in anticipation. Matt had stopped to eat. But not Mark and I. Nope… we were going to eat at the airport since we had plenty of time there and we didn’t want to get hungry on the red eye flight.

We head over to the Adams’ who were nice enough to drive us to the airport. We went inside for a little bit so Mark could help his sister and then we all piled into the car and off to the airport we went! Once we were there we lugged our luggage in (9 days and we each had just one carry on and one personal item. No checked luggage at all. Damn we’re good. Actually… I packed Mark’s bags so I’m extra good. LOL!). We checked in and headed through security. I had to wait for the guys because their collapsible tripods looked suspicious. Soon enough we were headed to the gate. Great! I was starving. And I know if I’m hungry, Mark has to be ready to devour a whole cow. But wait! What’s this?! Every singe restaurant is closed? It’s only 9pm! Thankfully Matt came prepared and he had snacks. Mark had goldfish and I had a rice crispy treat that tasted like banana… weird! Then a coffee shop opened and we got Danishes. Mmmm!

Finally it was time to board. For some reason we were “Zone 4” and Matt was “Zone 5” so we waited to board with Matt. We got settled, had a little snack on the plane. Matt liked the smoked gouda and licked his little container clean. After that I dozed off and on for 2 hours. I assume the guys kept themselves entertained.

One the plane, looking pretty. Or handsome as the case may be.

Soon we were landing in Atlanta. HURRAH! We could eat real food! If Cinnebon counts as real. While I used the bathroom to freshen up from the plane the guys went crazy and decided that the trashcan talked… Hello guys! This isn’t PUSH.


“Hi, my name is Trashy McTrasherson. Mark and Matt think I talk.”

Back on the plane we go… 7am Atlanta time… 4am our time. I stayed awake the whole flight. And was it ever a bumpy flight. Especially at the end… it was bumpy like a rash on a baby’s behind. I felt a big hand attached to a 6’4 body reach for mine. Awe… sweet! We arrived on Orlando in one piece. And… what’s this?! Clouds??? Clouds!!! And what is this wet stuff? RAIN?! Ewww! But we are troopers and we didn’t care. What’s a little rain? I moved from Seattle to SoCal. I can handle this stuff!

We took the airport monorail and chug-chugged our way to Disney’s Magical Express. It was really easy to find and really easy to check in. We got on the buss and tried to wait patiently for the bus driver… but we were so excited!


Waiting impatiently on the DME bus.

We FINALLY arrive at the Pop Century. We run as fast as we can with our roll-y luggage to get out of the rain. We check in and HURRAH! Our room is ready. Its about 930am when we get to our room. We decided to unpack as no one really liked the idea of living out of a suitcase for 9 days. We unpacked and bought ponchos to keep dry. Then we hopped our first bus to the Magic Kingdom.


Mark and Matt look excited at the thought of Tie Dyed Cheesecake.

WOW! We finally arrived at the Magic Kingdom. After years of saying we were going to go… we actually made it! Everything was huge. And wet. LOL!


We made it!


Mark and Matt in front of the train station.



“Its so big!” That’s what she said…



It’s so much larger then my old Emporium at home! (Ours is prettier on the inside.)



Matt and Mark make their way into the park. (Hey… it rhymes!)


Our first stop was Stitch’s Great Escape. This ride is the bane of Matt’s existence even though none of us has ever been on it before. And let me tell you… we were not missing anything by not riding it. I may not remember much from my previous trip but I can tell you Alien Encounter was much more interesting. I never felt like Stitch was anywhere near me. Luckily I held my breath for the “Chili Dog Burp”. Matt said it almost made him throw up... Mark liked it. LOL! But then… chili dogs are his favorite food.

We rode Space Mountain (I thought I was going to lose my best friend to decapitation! Dang those beams are low!! But it sure was fun.) the Tomorrowland Transit Authority (Or the People Mover to those of you who know Disneyland.) and Buzz Lighyear. Bleck! Our ride wins on that one.


I meet a friend in Tomorrowland before heading to Fantasyland to eat. I forget his name…

We were all pretty hungry by that time so we headed over to Village Haus. WDW food is SO much better than Disneyland food. Where as our Village Haus serves crappy burgers that are always cold, WDW’s serves Italian food. I had an Italian Sub, Mark ate pizza and Matt had a Panini sandwich.




Mark and Matt wait to order our food. Hurry up guys! I’m starvin’!!

We road Pirates (Poop! We only rode it that one time the whole trip) and Splash (YEAH! Awesome ride and thanks to our ponchos we didn’t get anymore drenched than we already were. Mark love love loved this version. He works Disneyland’s Splash in case you didn’t know.). Matt dragged us on to Aladdin’s Magic Carpet ride in the pelting rain. I’ve never seen a guy so excited on a spinning ride. LOL! By this time my pants were wet up to my knees (Drat! Sometimes being short like a pirate missing both of his wooden legs sucks.). Noelle called me and said she was on her way to meet us. (Side note: Noelle is a sweetheart of a girl who I’ve had the pleasure of knowing for a while now. She’s from NorCal and just moved to Florida a few weeks before we arrived to do the Disney College Program for 3 months.) I was very excited to see her!


Matt dresses up by Pitates. Ole!

We did Mickey’s Phillharmagic to get out of the rain. It was really good. I liked it more than I thought I would because I am NOT a fan of the crappy CGI they use for classic characters. It makes them look like poop. But I really liked this! I did think that one of the scents they used in one scene smelled like bathroom air freshener but all in all it was very enjoyable and everyone else thought so too. We did the Tea Cups (Much faster than ours!) and Pooh and then Space again.


Mark, Matt and Noelle on the Tea Cups.


Noelle and I on the Tea Cups.


Mark and I… He said he was pretending to drink tea… but it looks like he’s pretending to do something else if you ask me!


Matt and Noelle… Whoooosh!


Best look ever on Mark’s face. LOL!


By this time the crew and I were dragging. Noelle understood that we were wet and tired so we headed out of the park at around 5pm. We caught one last look of the castle and I ran into my favorite characters! Chip and Dale! w00t!! We said our bye’s to Noelle and headed back to the Pop.


Walt and Mickey know that its really Disneyland’s 50th


Ch-ch-ch-chip and Dale!

Once we got back to the Pop, we bought the refillable mugs that we can refill for free our whole trip. This is a GREAT deal. I know we ate something but I can’t for the life of me remember what it was. We headed back to our room stopping to take pictures at our birth decades and then crashed hard core.


Ok, ok so I only made it into the last 2 weeks of the 70’s but who cares.


I love the 80’s!!

So… this was just about the longest post ever. The next ones shouldn’t be as long since I won’t be cramming so many days into one post. If you made it this far… congratulations! Leave me a comment, let me know you’re still alive, how you like it so far and if you have any questions. Look for the next day coming soon!