the main street usa area is so awesome during the holiday season. the decorations are beautiful and we got to see a horse-drawn trolley first thing in the morning--
the riders were two little girls who had obviously been by the bippity boppity boutique--a new feature at the magic kingdom and downtown disney where girls can get hair and make-up done to match their princess dresses. and THEN they wear the princess dresses to the park for the rest of the day. honestly, i think the idea is cute but totally impractical for a day at the theme park.we started in tomorrowland and worked our way around the magic kingdom. we, of course, had to hit space mountain (which is being renovated but was running that day) and the new rides there: buzz lightyear's space ranger thing, monster's inc. laugh floor (which used the same technology that turtle talk has to interact with the audience) and stitch's escape (which i still remember as being alien encounter and one of the scariest rides disney had.)
then around to toontown and fantasy land...
liberty square, with the haunted mansion...
frontierland with splash mountain and big thunder mountain railroad...
and finally, adventureland with pirates of the carribean and swiss family robinson's treehouse.
we did get to meet the newest princess, tiana, who is in the new movie, "princess and the frog." they had several riverboat shows that featured new orleans-style jazz music.
but this was the princess that i waited to see--forgive me for the crappy picture. actually, forgive justin. you'd never guess that he had a 12.1 mp DSLR over his shoulder when he snapped this on his phone...
we also had plenty of parades to catch--
and some last-minute shopping along main street--i do love that garland!
this was a cool display for the hat shop--you could actually make your own personalized set of ears with different hats, ears and appliques to choose from.
we made our way back down to the castle for "cinderella's wish" which i realized was the lighting of the castle with the icicle lights. i had seen this on the disney travel specials and was so glad that we made it! we have a video of it, but i recorded it sideways and we need justin's computer to flip it the right way. so i'll post it later. but it was spectacular...
we ate dinner along main street and stayed around that area for most of the evening. honestly, it didn't take us as long to do magic kingdom as we had expected. by mid-afternoon we had done the major rides that we wanted to do, and that was even on a saturday with longer waits that we had had all week.
so we found our spots for spectromagic and enjoyed the nighttime parade.
i've always enjoyed this parade--so cool to see everything in lights!
and then hung around for a little bit longer for the final fireworks show, "wishes." i tried to capture tinkerbell as she flew down from the top of the castle, but with the long exposure, she was just a blur. i think the following pictures make up for that, though...(purple! gold!)
really cool firework here...
(can i tell you how much i loved that that mickey balloon was in the frame? it was just perfect.)
and this is without a tripod. i was worried they wouldn't turn out, but the fireworks are so bright that it ended up giving plenty of light.
and finally, my favorite one. though that's very subjective. i really love them all!
after the fireworks ended, we made our way out of the park with the herd of people leaving. i was excited to sleep in some the next morning--we had no definite plans and didn't need to be at a park at opening, and we had to pack. so after another "standing room only" bus ride, we were home and crashed.day 5 coming soon...
a few more pictures here
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