| # | Author | Message |
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| sherrytodd
Sun 5/18/2008 3:22p | Here's day five. I've been on a sailboat for 9 days with no internet access so haven't been able to post. The LP withdrawal has been terrible.
We got up at 5am this morning to get to the Magic Kingdom in time for The Magic Behind the Steam Trains Tour. We got to the TTC in time for the first monorail of the day. Unfortunately when you take the first monorail of the day it is a very slow trip as they have to go through all their start up and safety procedures. Something to note. If the park opens at 9am and you get to the TTC at 6:45am you will not have to pay for parking as there is no one there to take your money. That was $11 that we saved that day. We also had the very first front row parking of the day. I told DH I felt like National Lampoon's Vacation and we had just gotten to Wally World; completely empty parking lot and no people anywhere. I was waiting for the moose to tell us that the park was closed for the day.
We finally made our way around and to the MK entrance. It is a weird sight to see it with no people. We met up with our tour group and they let us in the entrance just in time to see the first train of the day, the Lilly Belle. Instead of pulling her all the way to her normal stopping point, they stopped her right in front of the station for us to take pictures. They don't use the Lilly Belle for guest use as it does not have the safety rails on the passenger cars so normal guests are not allowed to ride this train. They use it for the park opening ceremony to bring in the mayor of Main Street and the characters and then it is taken backstage for the rest of the day. As part of the tour we got to deadhead to the roundhouse on the Lilly Belle. DS was given the important task of signally the engineer. He had to pull the toggle twice to signal that it was time to go. Wait for the engineer to blow the whistle twice. Then give them the waive off signal and then shout, "All Aboard!" and hop on. And then off we went. There is no audio on the Lilly Belle so our tour conductor George pointed out all the sights along the way. We traveled around to the Toon Town / Tomorrowland Station. From there they chose DH to help with the switch and then we had to back onto the side spur to the roundhouse backstage. As we were crossing the road we had stopped the Circle D guys bringing down the first horse of the day to pull the trolley.
They backed the Lilly Belle into the roundhouse as we weren't allowed to run around there but we were able to see everything from there. They had all ready fired up the Roy O Disney and it was out of the Roundhouse and they were firing up the Walter E Disney. Looked like the Roger Broggie wasn't going to be going out that day. We got to take our pictures in the roundhouse and then they pulled back out and we got the see the Roy O Disney. They let us climb up into the cab and showed us how everything worked. It was time for the Lilly Belle to leave to open up Main Street so we said our goodbyes to our first crew. The best thing about our second crew for the Roy O Disney who would be taking us back was that it was a all woman crew. The engineer, fireman and conductor were all women. They showed us the entire start up procedure and then we were able to hop aboard. As they head out of the backstage area they have to check their safety system which is called MaPo. It is named after Mary Poppins as nothing ever goes wrong on her watch. They first have to heat up the boiler to see if MaPo will trigger once the boiler pressure gets too high and automatically release the boiler. Check. This is very loud. I guess the goal is to not allow this to happen on stage but it will happen every now and then and scare the you know what out of a lot of park guests. Well better that then an engine blowing up. When the boiler is blown off it takes some time for them to relight and get the boiler pressure back up. Then they run through a red block and then see if MaPo will automatically activate the emergency brakes. Check. They also have a system that monitors the speed of the engine that is in the first car. It will trigger a report if a train exceeds 12 mph. I guess that's a pretty major offence. Well we got through the safety system checks and back onto the main line just in time for park opening and headed around to the Main Street Station to drop us off and for them to pick up their first guests of the day. The rest of the tour is kind of a lecture/history lesson at the Main Street Station. For taking the tour you get a special pin. They used to give out golden spikes, but too many were confiscated by airport security so they switched to the pins.
After the end of the tour we headed straight to Tomorrowland, grabbed a fastpass for Space Mountain and then I upheld my tradition of kicking my families butt on Buzz Lightyear.
It wasn't very crowded at the park that day, except for The Jungle Cruise which had the longest line in the park at 50 minutes, while even Splash Mountain only got to 40 minutes at the hottest point of the day.
We wrapped up our day that evening and headed back to our front row parked car and back to the condo and threw a frozen pizza into the oven. Mmmmmm. Fine cuisine.
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| ShivaThDestroyer
Sun 5/18/2008 5:26p | sherrytodd. it sounds like you're having a great time and we miss you too! I love all the little technical details in your post and look forward to reading more. Take care and have some fun for your old smedertaining buddies who wish they could be there with you. |
3
| sun-n-fun
Tue 5/20/2008 10:59a | DH alwasy kicks our butt at Buzz. I hate it! One of these times....... |
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| SoThisIsLove
Tue 5/20/2008 11:45a | Awesome, sherrytodd. Made me feel like I was there with you... |
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| bloona
Mon 6/16/2008 1:45p | oh, I only just found this thread.
Id love to do a behind the scenes tour at WDW, love it.
One day.
well done on beating everyones score on Buzz...heee heee, I always try to do the same :).....proper wicked |
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| RockyMtnMinnie
Mon 6/16/2008 2:15p | Since you dug this up. There was one little detail that I forgot to include.
When we rode the Jungle Cruise, as we came around the corner where there are crocodiles on the shore, sitting under the jaws of one of the gators was the cutest pile of flufy, newly hatched baby ducklings sleeping. It was the most adorable thing I had ever seen. :) |
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| bloona
Mon 6/16/2008 2:24p | I got confused then.....thought hey you , this is sherrys holiday you imposter!
knew Id forget!
awww sweet, did you get a photo? |
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| RockyMtnMinnie
Mon 6/16/2008 2:37p | LOL! I knew I'd confuse someone. ;)
I got a video of the little duckies. |
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| bloona
Mon 6/16/2008 2:41p | I dont take a lot to confuse hun...lol |
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| RockyMtnMinnie
Mon 6/16/2008 3:26p | It's ok. Sometimes I forget who I am.
:) |
