Tuesday 14 June 2011

Open Sesame

I'm assuming that regular readers will have picked up on the fact that I tend to keep up to date with news from 'the World' year round, irrelevant of whether I'm about to move there for 2 1/2 months or not. I suppose following the news about WDW is my equivalent of supporting a sports team and following every trade, management change and red card.

Today I decided to look up refurbs, or, as I think they should now be spelt reFerbs! hehehehe

(All info can be found on Disney's Park Hours Page )

So at the moment nothing is scheduled for reFerb in my beloved Epcot which doesn't surprise me too much. All the pavillions in Future World have had reFerbs within the last few years (with the exception of Test Track) and in the countries it's usually more of a maintenance thing than shutting down for long periods.

In Hollywood Studios it looks like Voyage of the Little Mermaid is set for a reFerb from August 13th-September 3rd which is basically the last 3 weeks of my trip so I'll have to make sure that I see it plenty of times prior to August 13th, particularly as it's one of my favourites.

At Animal Kingdom, Primeval Whirl is closed my entire trip. I usually go on it once but I find it's one of THE most uncomfortable rides in Florida. The seat is really low and you just get thrown about into the safety restraints and end up with bruises on your thighs. It's a fun ride but I won't be shedding any tears about not being able to go on it.

At MK there are 2 attractions down. First is the Frontierland Shootin' Arcade. As a kid I was taught how to shoot an air rifle (how cool was my primary/elementary school!) so now and again I like hitting the shootin' arcade if I'm on my own just chillin' in Magic Kingdom but there are plenty of other attractions in Florida where I can shoot at things, the best 2 being Toy Story Mania and Men in Black: Alien Attack (over in Universal Studios). The other attraction receiving some Disney love is The Enchanted Tiki Room. I've already discussed this attraction in previous posts and did a video of the Under New Management version. It's currently set to reopen around August 15th so you can bet that I'll be heading straight there as soon as I hear the doors open.

The reFerb announcements for Blizzard Beach amuse me. Every year the waterparks shut down for a month or so for a spring (or rather fall) cleaning as is the case for Blizzard Beach from October 30th to November 30th but instead of just saying "park's closed" it says that the park is closed AND that all the individual rides are closed. No idea why! Maybe some people think that the attractions are open even though the park is closed. Who knows! Whatever the reason it doesn't really affect me because I'll be gone by then and I doubt that I'll be back as soon as November.

One more thing....

I've just found out (well I could have looked it up months ago but still :P) that Magic Kingdom is open until Midnight on Wednesday (which I'm guessing will be our Traditions day) with no Extra Magic Hours that night so I should be able to have time to visit all my fav Towers CMs from last year and be able to hit Magic Kingdom too! Best laid plans and all that but it's nice to know that I CAN do it.

For those that don't know Extra Magic Hours (which has various nicknames amongst CMs, none of which are original) is when the parks are open for the exclusive use of resort guests (i.e. you have to be staying at a Disney hotel). That means they're a no go area for CMs unless they're working them or staying in a hotel for a few nights. There's morning and evening EMH. The morning sessions are an hour long meaning the park opens at 8 rather than 9 and the evening sessions are 3 hours long which at MK means the park is open until 2-3am in the morning. If you can't use EMH then I usually find that the park with EMH (usually one morning and one evening per day) are best avoided. For example....on Tuesdays Magic Kingdom has EMH in the morning and Epcot has it in the evening so if I was visiting the parks that day I would avoid MK in the morning and Epcot in the evening. Makes sense?

I think last year I only worked once during EMH and that was during my week in Tomorrowland. If memory serves I was't there until closing though or the stores closed slightly earlier than the EMH hours. Towers was never open during EMH so the extended hours at Epcot never really applied to me. That was one of the many reasons why Towers was such a great location to work.

Right...that's enough for today I think. Until tomorrow!

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