Hey everyone! Where we last left off, we had been taking the Magic Kingdom by storm from rope drop to noon. We stopped for a snack in Frontierland, and what’s better to follow up a snack than another snack? That’s right, we were making a lunch out of snacks. We had to have one of our favorite Magic Kingdom meals, corndog nuggets from Casey’s Corner.
We walked to Casey’s through Adventureland, and that’s where Scott snapped a picture of the Zanzibar Trading Company.
This is one of the shops along the main walkway in Adventureland, near the flying carpets. Scott took this picture because it is a part of the backstory surrounding The WORLD FAMOUS Jungle Cruise (world famous for being world famous, of course). Lucky for you, as an ex-skipper, I can fill you in on the scoop. The story goes that the Jungle Cruise takes place in the 1930’s (sidenote: this is why Skips are discouraged from making current references/pop culture jokes, they root you distinctly in the “now” and take you out of the story of the ride. However, many skips still do, and I’m sure their jokes are funny). I will also point out that often the backstories of Disney Attractions are not as “concrete” as they seem. For example, there is and has never been one agreed upon backstory for the Haunted Mansion. If you asked five different cast members, you’d get five different answers. So here’s my take on the Zanzibar Trading Company/Jungle relationship as told to me by people with lots of Disney knowledge. The Jungle Navigation Company was formerly a jungle trading company. The evidence of this is seen throughout the queue in the contents of many of the large crates etc. However, the Zanzibar Trading Company opened shop and took over Jungle’s trading market putting the Jungle Trading Company out of business. So, the Jungle Navigation Company was born. The skippers who used to just drive the shipments are left needing a way to support themselves, so they become a tourism company, taking out boatloads of people on journeys through the world’s major rivers. However, these skippers were never truly trained for these tours or dealing with paying customers. This explains the sarcasm, the skippers’ reliance on jokes instead of factual information, and their haphazard style of dealing with the conflicts throughout the attraction.
We now return you to your trip report, already in progress where Scott and Alli were on the move for a special snack.
For those of you who have ordered during meal times in Casey’s Corner, you know it is a stressful experience. I can’t handle it. Well, I can, it’s just that I don’t want to, hahaha. So Scott and our friend were inside waiting and ordering. It always looks like the New York Stock Exchange from 90’s movies in there. Nightmare. So I decided to scout out a table. Of course there wasn’t an ideal set up, it’s Main Street after all. But I was able to find a standing table near the restroom by the First Aid. I was standing at the table with my bag and water bottle on it, using some hand sanitizer. I stood there for a minute or so when a family came out of Casey’s with a gaggle of children and trays. They looked around and just immediately flooded the table my things were on. Huh? I watched for a few seconds and realized that they weren’t just setting their things down and adjusting, they were taking the table. Now, had one of the parents said something like “could we please share this table, there’s nowhere else for our family to eat” etc. I would have no problem. In fact, if the family hadn’t been able to find anywhere else, I probably would’ve offered them the table. Though, it’s more of a table geared towards adults, being that the children could not even reach their food because the table is more of a bartop height. But nope, they said nothing, allowing their children to touch my things and surround me and generally make everything super awkward. I, being the confrontation avoiding type, just packed up my stuff, muttered something like “well, ok then,” and walked off. I knew Scott was still waiting in line so I had a bit of time to find somewhere else to go. However, I really wanted to sit in a place out of the hot sun and as close to indoors as possible. I looked across the street and decided on Tomorrowland Terrace. As I was walking there, I passed the tables with the yellow umbrellas by the ice cream shop and there were several open with enough chairs for us. I thought the terrace would be a better spot, and they have fans, so I continued on that way. It was a perfect spot. We were down in the area where they do the dessert party and it was just one other group of people and us.
We finally all met back up and Scott had a surprise. He got a frozen lemonade with a special souvenir mug. I love that Disney always knows to keep the souvenir cups clean and give you your drink separately. We love Casey’s, so getting a souvenir cup is a fun way to remember a spot we enjoy.
After finishing our food, we went to use our Haunted Mansion fastpasses for 12:25pm.
I love the Haunted Mansion, who doesn’t? All good Disney fans seem to have a soft spot for this attraction and I totally get why. The highlight of my college program was getting to do a lights on walk through of the entire attraction, which for some, is a part of their every day job! The tour guide who walked us through knew a wealth of information. I’m not sure what my favorite part of this attraction is. It used to be a very clear winner: the attic room. But I really enjoy the dinner party room as well, as walking through the room was an awesome experience and we were able to see a lot of things not visible from the ride vehicle. But back to the attic room, here’s one tidbit I will share. Each of the different vignettes obviously represents one of Constance’s ill-fated marriages. As you move through the room, the vignettes become more and more extravagant, as she married someone with more money each time. This is shown in a few different ways. Each of the marriage vignettes is accompanied by a birdcage. The birdcage from the first scene is small and modest, and as you travel through the room the birdcages become larger and more extravagant. Not all of the cages are easy to see, because of the darkness of the room, but try to look for them next time! My other favorite thing to look for in this room is a familiar set of dishes. In the last scene to the left, look down on the ground next to your doom buggy. You will see a box of white fine china dishes with a floral pattern. These dishes are the same dishes used in restaurants at the Grand Floridian, the height of luxury. They are the dishes you use during the afternoon tea that I am a huge fan of, so I love this bit of trivia!
After the Haunted Mansion, we headed back to Main Street for a wake me up from Starbucks. We got our usual drink, iced caramel macchiatos. Refreshments in hand, we headed towards the Carousel of Progress.
I sat next to a boy who was somewhere around my students’ age. I always find myself talking to random middle schoolers in crowds because that’s what I do all day every day. The adult man sitting in front of the boy was wearing one of those rice paddy hats from Epcot, which I was worried would obscure the view of the boy sitting next to me. Wouldn’t all adults in theaters know to remove a large hat? Anyway, I volunteered to trade seats with the boy but he was either too sweet or too shy to oblige. Throughout the show, the boy and his father were singing the song and pointing things out to one another, it was adorable.
After leaving Carousel of Progress, we got Fastpasses for the Little Mermaid at 2:45. We were trying to get a fastpass for any of the mountains within the next few hours, but they weren’t available.
The next thing we had to do was decide on where to watch the Festival of Fantasy parade. We knew this was something we wanted to see, but I’m not one to stake out parade route spots far in advance, especially not in the sun, so we were just going to take the approach of “seeing what we could see.” Meaning, we were just walking around and trying to find somewhere passable. Somehow, some way, we ended up in Liberty Square by the Hall of Presidents. Do you remember the small shop that used to be located by the exit of HoP? They had a smattering of president related merchandise as well as Nightmare Before Christmas items. Well, that shop was gone and instead the room was simply filled with various wooden furniture. Honestly, it didn’t feel totally permanent, but in that moment we stumbled into the most perfect Festival of Fantasy viewing location for us! When we first entered the room, there were people sitting at most of the tables and along the windows in the front of the shop, facing the parade route. We took a spot on a bench in the back of the space, figuring we’d be able to see over and around them when it came time. However, once the parade was close, virtually everyone in the room ran outside to have a closer view. So we moved up to the benches connected to the windows. That’s right, we were seated, we were indoors, we were directly in front of large windows to watch the parade! Here’s the real kicker: we had been searching for a spot to do some device charging, namely our camera’s battery. In the window benches were power strips with tons of outlets!
The heavens parted and angels sang! Our spot was perfect and took no time to stake out, plus it was completely shaded and no one was crowded around us. I highly recommend trying this spot out next time you watch the parade! That is, if the shop is still randomly full of furniture.
One thing I really enjoyed about the parade was the incredibly elaborate costumes the performers surrounding the floats were wearing. I much preferred it to the performers in the old daytime parade, who were all wearing similar outfits (from what I remember). I am not typically a parade person, but I was really happy I took the time to watch the parade. Plus, we were able to charge up, which we would’ve had to sit around and wait on anyway!
I think we’re going to keep it short and sweet for tonight and leave off there. Thanks for reading and we’ll see ya real soon!
. Fantastic pictures - can't wait to see what happens next on your adventure!
