Part 4
December 4, 2001
As I mentioned, I came up with a schedule the night before, and I actually managed to stick to it perfectly this morning! It went like this:
8:00- wake up
8:30- Eat breakfast
9:00- Be at bus stop
9:30- MK
I think the fact that I was really excited today helped me to get going quicker. Why was I excited you ask? Today was my day to do the Keys to the Kingdom tour!! We met next to Town Hall (Nobody was eating corn there this morning, so it was obvious the DIS convention was really over! ;) ) I met Bob, who was in charge of meals, who gave me a menu with our lunch choices, and asked what I’d like that day. I explained that I’d just had a wisdom tooth out, and that I was also having problems eating, so I really couldn’t eat anything on the menu, but that just a lemonade would be fine by me. Bob was really great, and was asking me about several other options of things he could get me to eat- he was determined to search the Kingdom until he found lunch for me!:) It was wonderful that they were willing to go the extra distance to make things great.
Next we met our tour guide, Matt from Ohio. He told us that he’d only gotten 4 hours of sleep, so he was hyper and ready to go! I found out that one other lady on the tour was there alone, so we decided that we were long lost friends, and talked most of the time J After brief introductions of our group, we were ready to go! He told us what the Keys to the Kingdom were, and told us to watch for examples as we walked down Main Street. We sat by the piano lesson window over on Center Street and discussed them. We also stopped to look at the windows on the second story of the Main St. buildings along the way, and Matt told us the stories behind them. There are three theories why Walt has the window on the ice cream shop. 1- that Walt loved ice cream, so it seemed like the place he’d like to be, 2- his window faces the castle, so he has a good view ;), and 3- he gets to say goodbye to everyone as they leave the park from there. We stopped to take a close look at the sign for the Crystal Arts store (How nice of them to name a store after me!!!) At first glance, it looks like the lettering is printed on clear glass, but if you look at the other side, the letters are still facing the correct direction- it’s a mirror! Hard to explain, stop and look at it sometime!
In Tomorrowland, Matt pointed out that all of the benches are different heights off the ground. It seems that when they were building MK, they couldn’t get the slope of the concrete right, so they just kept pouring more ;-) Therefore, in some parts of Tomorrowland, the concrete beneath your feet is just a few inches thick, and in some spots, its as much as six feet deep!
We ate lunch at the Columbia Harbor House, and Bob had brought me some macaroni and cheese! I love Bob! Your seats are marked by a little card with your name on it and a Keys to the Kingdom pin. I was sitting at a table with an older couple, and Matt, who I had decided by now that I was going to have to marry ;) (If any of y’all run into him at WDW, could you kindly tell him that some chick in Missouri wants to marry him, and send him this way?) I had noticed that all the CM’s had the name of a ride or movie on the bottom of their nametag, which had confused me, because you’d see someone working in Animal Kingdom whose pin said Magic Kingdom at the bottom. I asked Matt about it, and he said that for the 100 years of Magic celebration, they all got to chose their favorite Magic memory, or favorite attraction, etc. to be printed on the bottom of their pins. Matt’s was the Haunted Mansion! A man after my own heart, I tell ya! ;)
After lunch, we were off to… the Haunted Mansion! YAY! I’d gotten this tour confused in my mind with the one where you actually get to go backstage and see how the ballroom is set up (I guess that’s Backstage Magic), so I was disappointed that we didn’t get to do that, but there’s always next time! Matt explained that the “Official HM Story” is simply this: It’s a retirement home for ghosts. Of course, the cast members and fans of the Mansion have come up with their own stories over time, and Matt told us the one he liked the best.
Master Yale Gracey, a pirate had had many wives, and had finally decided to settle down with his latest girl, Emily. He built the mansion for her as a symbol of his affection. A few days before the wedding, Master Gracey found Emily in the attic with another man! Filled with rage, Gracey decapitated the man, only to have Emily tell him that it was just the tailor doing some final fittings for the wedding! Emily was so upset by what her future husband had done that she threw her wedding ring out the window, and then jumped out as well. Gracey was so upset that this woman he had decided to give up his life as a pirate for and settle down with was gone, that he killed himself. All of the haunts of the mansion are “happy haunts”, except Emily, who is upset that her home is now a tourist attraction, and so she pushes you out the same window she jumped from when you are in the attic, and you “die” (this is where your doombuggy rotates and you descend 6 feet). The ghosts throw you a party to welcome you to the graveyard, and the area with the hitchhiking ghosts is supposed to be the crypt! Little Leota brings you back to life at the end (I forgot why, oops!) This was similar to a lot of the stories I’d heard, but I like this version! I also learned that Paul Frees, who is your “Ghost Host” is also the voice of Tony the Tiger! I just can’t look at Frosted Flakes the same way anymore!!
On our way back to Fantasyland, we saw Captain Hook run by on the balcony of the castle, and then Peter Pan a minute later! He stopped to chat with us for a few minutes- how fun! Now it was time to go down to the Utilidors! We entered through one of the Fantasyland shops, and we were in a whole new world! The hallways were all very plain, and it was odd to be surrounded by CM’s that didn’t necessarily smile as we walked by! Its so weird to think that all of that is going on beneath your feet at MK! We saw the wardrobe area, as well as the room where they keep the wigs, and a few other locations. We weren’t down there very long, really, but it was a neat thing to get to see.
We went back behind Splash Mtn, where was first smelled and then saw the building that takes in all the trash. Yuck! Its funny how Splash just looks like a warehouse from the back, and yet its so beautiful inside! Back past Splash was the area where they store the parade floats. Because the 3:00 parade was at 2 today, our schedule was a little off, but we were able to go in and see the Spectromagic floats up close, as well as a really neat map on the wall of an aerial view of MK taken in 1981. Its neat to see how big the buildings really are, as well as what’s changed since then. We learned that Pirates actually takes place in two different buildings, and when you go down the 1st drop in the ride, you’re actually descending into the 2nd building! The ramp at the end brings you back up to the ground floor. We also saw one of the spare domes for the “snowglobe” floats, and learned that if someone were to collapse inside one of them, the would be blocking the exit door, and therefore there are CM’s around the parade route with jigsaws just in case they need to cut someone out! Eek!
We walked back up to where we’d started, with Matt showing us some more windows and pointing some things out along the way. He told us about a wedding that had been held at the castle the night before, and was talking about how much he would love to get married there. Have I mentioned I’m going to have to marry this man? Sadly, I think its unrequited love.
I know I’ve left out details somewhere, as my notes from that day really aren’t all that great. We did ride Pirates at one point, but my mind has blanked as to when :) After our group said our goodbyes, I walked up Main St. to take a few pictures of the windows that we’d learned about, and bought some postcards in the Emporium. I’d been sending Kelly a postcard a day, and wanted to send one from MK, but didn’t have any stamps with me. After some asking around, I found out that they are sold in Town Hall (A handy tip I need to remember!)
I went back to POR, and went straight for the food court, which was PACKED with people! I got a pizza, which I took back to my room while I watched TV and relaxed. Our tour had been about 5 hours total, but it seemed like a lot less, and we did a lot of sitting. I was still exhausted, however! It felt great to kick back and relax. I found that I had a message on my voicemail that made me VERY happy. My tour at the Animal Kingdom the next day was supposed to start at 8:30, which would mean I would need to be awake by 6:30am, which is 5:30 my time, and basically impossible for me! However, my voicemail told me that due to some filming for Walt’s b-day celebration, the tour had been pushed back an hour and wouldn’t start until 9:30! An extra hour to sleep! I was very, VERY happy to get this news!! I had been so scared that I wouldn’t wake up for my tour!
Nate called and asked how quickly I could get to MGM, because they were going to see Fantasmic. I really wanted to go, so I said I’d be there ASAP! I grabbed my things and ran to the bus stop. We still had well over an hour before it started, but you know how quickly seating fills up! He told me he was saving me a seat in the back row of the Beast section, so I really wanted to make it! However, I sat at the bus stop and watched MK busses go by. I watched Epcot busses go by, and I watched AK, DD, TL, and every other bus in the WORLD go buy. Ever time I saw one approaching, I’d jump up, only to be disappointed. The couple sitting at the bus stop was laughing at me because I kept begging each bus to be a MGM bus, and then got all sad when it wasn’t ;) I ended up waiting 45 minutes for an MGM bus, and didn’t get to MGM until 6:10, when Fantasmic had started at 6 :( A quick call to Nate decided that we’d meet after the show, so I hung out by the exit- the show was already near the finale when I got there. Because there would be so many people, we decided it would be better to meet under “The Hat.” I remember laughing before my trip at how one trip report had referred to it as “the HAT!!!” I love how everyone has their own name for it ;) Nate gave great directions- “You can’t miss it- its one big ass hat!!” (The Hat may here forth be referred to as the “BAH”) While I was waiting for Nate, I shopped underneath the HAT!!, and got the Magical moments pin shaped like the HAT. I was sitting on a rail getting the batteries to work when Nate came up and found me. We’d been talking in emails ever since he posted the NASTEE trip report (Nate And Spencer Trip ExtrordinairE) a long time ago, and we were VERY excited when we found out we’d be at WDW at the same time! I’d been lucky to have Dan’s company on the night of my 1st WDW day, but I was getting tired of being all alone now, so getting to hang out with Nate and the Passporter group (Mostly the family of Passporter Cruella, and therefore nicknamed the Cru-Crew). We went off to see the Osborne Family Spectacle of Lights, which most of the other Fantasmic-goers seemed to do too, as it was really full! We dined on pez from the Spiderman pez dispenser Nate had picked up at Universal that day as we walked along, and tried to remember which house was the Golden Girls’. Its SO hard to tell at night, we kept saying “That’s it! No, that one! Oh, here it is!”
After the lights, we all went our separate ways, as Nate and the Cru-Crew were staying off property that night, Brant (aka Joe Carioca on the Passporter boards) was at the WL, and I was at POR. We had plans to meet up on the 8th for the Passporter Christmas deco tour, but planned to call and decide things before then.