The Maz Endless Summer Vacation Part 1(WGTWDW Podcast #35)

Here is some more commentary and pics from Show # 35.  You can listen here or read.  Thanks again for stopping by.  Feel free to leave comments or questions

Show # 35

I want to start off by saying that we are really thankful we've been so lucky to travel as much this summer as we've done.  We've had slim years and it's great to take advantage of this time now.  Quinn will be starting college in a couple of years, so we decided to take advantage of the summer time to travel.
The Mazzilli Endless Summer officially started the weekend after the 4th of July.  Lesley's company has a great company picnic at Hershey Park that weekend.  We've been doing this for at least 10 years.  We go with friends from college and make it a reunion weekend also.  This year was the extra bonus for the Girls, One Direction was playing at Hershey stadium and they all had tickets.
We drove out on Friday and went to Hershey park that night.  That's our ride night.  We've conceded long ago that the rides on Saturday are not worth the lines about 1/2 hour after the park opens.  We usually pick two of the rides we could not get on the night before.  For me it's Fahrenheit and StormRunner. We spend most of Saturday at the water park part of Hershey.  A nice feature of the lunch is that you can go at 12:00 thru 6:00 as many times as you want.  Great deal!

  We had a great couple days at the parks.  The Girls all saw 1D and said the concert was great.  The guys stayed at the park and then did the required tour through the chocolate factory before heading back to the hotel and then to home on Sunday.  The plan is to get packed and then back on the road to Florida on Monday morning.  We re-packed the van and got everything ready and set out the next morning at 4:00 am.  One of the rules about driving down without my wife Lesley is that I cannot drive straight through.  We need to stop, which we did in Brunswick Ga.  The next morning we slept all the way to 7am to make up for the day before and got back on the road.

The plan for today was to stop in St. Augustine at the Disney Character outlet and then on to DTD.  We would then get in the room until 4:00pm.  The Outlet store was good but we made no big purchases this year.  We did get a new Antenna Topper,  Luigi's Tires. The key-chain remote for the car was not working so no beeps to guide us back to the car in the parking lots.   The antenna topper was key a couple times in finding the van. We always try to stop here or at the outlet store neat WDW each trip.  We usually find a really great deal.  They usually have the previous holidays stuff along with any movies that might have been big maybe a year earlier.

 We got back on the road and our next stop was Downtown Disney.  We did the regular walk-around the Marketplace and then took a walk to the West Side, something we have not done in a long time. It is so sad to walk through Pleasure Island and think of what it was at one time.  I tried to explain to the kids how it was and how fun it was to celebrate New Years Eve every night.  We walked all the way down to the new bowling alley, Splittsville.  the place is incredible.  We had plans to meet the BOGP guys later that week. 

On the walk back to the Marketplace we stopped at the D Street store.  This is a great place with a lot of cool things to buy.  On top of that were the really cool decorations in there.  I am convinced they inherited a lot of stuff from the since closed Adventurers Club (AC).  And speaking of the AC we passed it twice and even though they've done their best to hide it, it is still there and very much missed.  Before leaving DTD we stopped at Earl of Sandwich.  This is still the best/cheapest sandwich on property, but alas, the restaurant has lost a little of it's sparkle.  On the ride up from Palm Beach towards the end of our trip, we saw that they have Earls on the Fla Turnpike.

Our next stop was to check-in to our hotel.  We stayed at the Ramada Gateway and got such a great deal.  We got a tower room with 2 queen beds, a kitchen area with fridge, microwave and sink separate from the bathroom.   The tower rooms are about 5 years old and look great still.  We were on the second floor.  These were inside hallway hotel rooms while the other half of the hotel was the outside two floor motel type rooms.  I've stayed in both types.  I only recommend the tower rooms.  We paid $63 total a night.  We had a really great stay.  Parked right outside from the elevators, very close each night. Hotel had two pools, a Barbecue themed restaurant and a Ice Cream Counter outside the pool table and Ping Pong covered courtyard.

They had a lot of Disney decorations around property.  This place is 5 minutes, from the parking lot at DHS, no exaggeration. It is the first set of buildings you hit after getting off of World Drive going west.  Plenty of fast-food places and other types of stores.  CVS has everything and the fast-food is a change from the park food.  I think we did KFC for one dinner. 

                                          Hope and I went to DHS that night.  With Quinn coming back to the parks after the cruise and Palm Beach, he would be outside his 14 day ticket window if he went with us that night.  So Hope got her time with Dad. 

Our main goal was the American Idol Finale show.  That's where all of the days winners compete for an over-all winner.  We were lucky to catch a great one.  There were 5 people in the show, but we decided it was between two, and they were sisters.  How about that.  After a great show that was a lot more of a party than the day time shows, it came down to the two sisters.  The younger one won.  I really hope she takes advantage of that super audition pass that gets her to the front of the line the next time American Idol the TV show comes around.  Getting to DHS late we kind of just bummed around.  Fastpass for Tower and we went to the last show of Indiana Jones for the day.  One of our new finds was the addition of the Walter crate and mirror to the pre-show of Muppets.  Very cool seeing stuff like that.  Now get rid of that 3D guy and put Walter on the stage.

We also spent some time in the Animation Courtyard.  Inside the area where you can line up for autographs there are a lot of computer station that let you play with color, audio and other aspects of animation.  Hope and I spent some time on the console that once you answer some questions, determines what Disney character you are most like.  For Hope it was Ariel.  We looked back in pictures and I was Tarzan. We spent some more time walking around and shopping, but that was it for the night.  The next morning we got up early and headed out to DHS again to get on the big rides we missed the night before...and we had Quinn with us.  Quick note on Tickets.  I had an AP card with RFID and the kids had paper tickets we had gotten from Undercover Tourist which were the old type.  We needed to go to two different lines to get in the park.  We took care of this at

Guest Services and got them the newer cards.  If your staying on property this can be done at your hotel.  Our main DHS goal of the day was the Extreme stunt show.  We feel that if you have at least one major goal, you don't tend to wander around as much.  The oddest thing of the day was the line we saw early on.  We did the dash to Toy Story Mania fastpass and then had time to ride it.  This was about 8:45.  

 Our next stop would then be Rock n Roller coaster before the crowd gets heavy.  There was a big line down Sunset that split at the two rides.  The park was not officially open and this was the  line waiting for 9:00.  We did a quick 180 and headed to the GMR. We had a nice relaxing day at DHS.  Went on everything we wanted to.  Ate at the ABC Commissary.  A big treat was a preview of, at the time, the new Lone Ranger movie.  It was at the Sounds Dangerous theater and was about 15 minutes of clips from the movie.  It played a big part in me wasting a couple hours to see it on the cruise.  Very fun and we also got a souvenir button/pin.  We stayed until closing and due to not going to Fantasmic, we were able to get on Muppets and Star Tours a couple of times.  Back to the hotel for a swim and late dinner.
The next day was our Magic Kingdom day.  The goal of today was two-fold.  First, we had BOG Rest. dinner ressies.  Second, the kids wanted to try the new pirate game in Adventureland.    We  

 started the day and met a very special person on the way down Main Street.  The M.S. Fire Chief.  Quinn had taken off with our tickets for fastpasses, but Hope took a picture with him.  This was our first time in the MK with the new fantasyland open.  So after we met up with Quinn, we rode Space Mtn. and ran over to Fantasyland.  It was great.  We went right over to the Little Mermaid ride and rode it twice.  The queue activity was awesome in it's simpleness fueled by high tech. 

Every so often in the cave part of the queue, you pass all manners of ways at looking at a small crab on a pile of something specific.  Through a porthole in the wall, through a picture frame, in a big glass jug and more.  The game was simple, the animated crab would come out with an item.  If it matched the items around him I think you did nothing.  If he carries in something that does not belong, you'd wave your hand in front of the water and he'd take it off the screen.  I've got some
 
video I'll post after this.  We again had a great day at the park with a Crowd Calendar number of 9.  We used the fastpasses and and did a lot of non-ride things as we counted down to dinner.  The kids and I did the new Pirate's Adventure: Treasures of the Seven Seas.  This game is located in a little shack right past Pirates on the way to Frontierland.  You scan your RFID Band or card and begin the game.  There are five adventures and because the game keeps track of the ones you've done, you don't repeat them.  We were lucky enough to do all 5 maps and had a great time.  Perfect mix of Agent P at Epcot, the Sorcerer's game in MK and Pirates of course.  Good mix.  There were some very surprising effects, get ready to have a good time.rs
We were then ready for dinner and made our way over to the Be Our Guest rest.  We had such a good time here. 

I am looking above and seeing how much I am typing.  Listen to the show and I'll just post some more pictures here to cover the last two days of the Turf part of the trip.

 

 

Epcot and Animal kingdom to follow!

 

 

 





The MagicBands at WDW are Almost There!

WE are back from our huge trip to Florida and I promise many posts to come. 

As I was going through pictures I came across three pictures I took at the Contemporary Hotel.  I just want to make a quick comment about them.  We had gone down to Disney World and stayed at the Pop Century. We were hoping to see if they were using the new magicbands there, unfortunately they were not so we went to the parks normally. We used our tickets for the RFID entry so that was kind of cool. However, when we were at the Contemporary on our MK park break, we stopped at the store in the concourse.  I noticed that they already had T-shirts out for the Magicbands.  We heard stories about how they would have decorations for the magic bands like they do for crocs.  What did they call those, Niblets? Giblets?  Jiblets?...whatever.  What caught our eye was that they had these three T-shirts which I have pictured here.

The first thought that came to mind was, "Wow, just a little odd to be promoting a new technology in such a way.  And, their not even available at every hotel yet."  Of course the second though was, "it's disney so this new Tech must be tested out the butt and from what we saw last week, this is going to be your new identity when at WDW so let's make friends through merchandising."  In addition to the stuff we've been hearing about charges and park entry with the band, we discovered that you will now be storing your Test Track car and I assume anything else you can customize and save like Sum of All Thrills and anything else they come out with.  I'm basing this on being able to store those things on Quinn's Room Card and my Annual Pass on this trip.  We also saw many Scanning stations set up at various rides.  Very scene appropriatly camouflaged of course.  I think this one was Tower of Terror.

Back at the Contemporary, they also had different covers for the magicbands.  For example, you could make your band look like Minnie mouse polkadots or Mickey Mouse colors.  I can't wait to see what else comes out about with the Magic Bands

Show # 34 of the "WGTWDW" Podcast

 

Hello and welcome to the Marathon show that has become # 34!  On this show we Spin the Wheel of Attraction and get one of our Favorite attractions a WDW.  We then discuss different types of technology that The Disney Company is using in the parks.  After that, Tom from Wis. joins us for another addition of the Fan Meet and Greet. So welcome back and thanks for listening. 

On this show the Wheel of Attraction smiles on us and lands on one of the best attraction in WDW, Muppets 3D.  All of us love this ride and the pre-show just as much.  There are so many hidden details hidden in there, it is so cool.

Rats fishing in the Fountain

 We mention the clap-boards and the crates on the show and I want to repeat it here.  Read everything in that pre-show room.  Make sure you even read the words on the side of the 3-D glasses containers as you walk into the room.  Along with the static displays, there are the TV's there are multiple sets of three TV's so people can stand all over the pre-show room.  The gags they show on that TV are classic.  It makes waiting so enjoyable.  Check-out Sam the Eagle and Gonzo below:

 

 

We next spend some time talking about some of the technology that keeps us impressed with the Disney Parks.  From the new RFID technology to the other forms of great stuff.  We all were talking about what we knew about the new RFID stuff.  When we were there on Spring Break we saw the display at the old Odyssey Rest. 

It was very cool seeing these.  Even though this was in April, the word is they are still not ready to give out yet.  We were hoping in July, but a little birdy told us...nope.  We then discussed the Tower of Terror drop computer, the Haunted Mansion hitch hiking ghosts,the new BOG Animated Rose and the lanterns at the American Adventure.

 We really look forward to hearing from our listeners and we think that the Fan Meet and Greet is a great way to do that.  We would love to hear from you in either audio or email.  Email us at wgtwdw@gmail.com and let us know anything you want about your Disney like inside and outside the parks.  Your first time at a Disney park or your favorite character and why.  Anything that you want to discuss is welcome.  On this show we hear from Tom from Wis.  and his first time to the parks and trips to follow.  Tom also had some great news in that he and his wife are expecting 2 Princesses in the near future.  Congrats!  Start studying up on all of those princess names and stories.

 

One last thanks go out to Jim and Kim over at Once Upon a Time Travel.  They're the people to contact the next time you travel to Disney! Contact them through their Facebook Page or at

(504) 304-4904

 



Behind-the-Scenes at the Making of Monsters U.

Ever since college-bound Mike Wazowski (voice of Billy Crystal) was a little monster, he has dreamed of becoming a Scarer—and he knows better than anyone that the best Scarers come from Monsters University (MU). But during his first semester at MU, Mike’s plans are derailed when he crosses paths with hotshot James P. Sullivan, “Sulley” (voice of John Goodman), a natural-born Scarer. The pair’s out-of-control competitive spirit gets them both kicked out of the University’s elite Scare Program. To make matters worse, they realize they will have to work together, along with an odd bunch of misfit monsters, if they ever hope to make things right. Screaming with laughter and oozing with heart, Disney•Pixar’s “Monsters University” is directed by Dan Scanlon (“Cars,” “Mater and the Ghostlight,” “Tracy”), produced by Kori Rae (“Up,” “The Incredibles,” “Monsters, Inc.”) and features music from future Rock and Roll Hall of Fame inductee and award-winning composer Randy Newman (“Monsters, Inc.,” “Toy Story 3”).

Disney Insider is giving fans an exclusive behind-the-scenes look at the making of Monsters University, sharing one scene from the film as it is transformed from a sketch into the final frame that will appear on screen through Pixar’s six-step animation process. Disney Insider combined these six images into an animated GIF to give fans a real sense of the animation progress.

New Technology in Epcot's American Experience

One of the things that impresses me the most about Walt Disney World is their sense of technology.  It seems that while some other amusement parks find something that works and sticks with it for years and years, Disney never waits until something is obsolete to replace or upgrade it.  Some of the biggest complaints from WDW world fans is when a ride is replaced or updated.  This idea of updating technology and staying in the fore-front has been part of Walt Disney's ideals from long ago.  Here are some really great quotes from Walt Disney about this:

"I believe in being an modivator."

"Whenever I go on a ride, I'm always thinking of what's wrong with the thing and how it can be improved."

"It's something that will never be finished. Something that I can keep developing...and adding to."

"Disneyland will never be completed. It will continue to grow as long as there is imagination left in the world."

"EPCOT will be an experimental prototype community of tomorrow that will take its cue from the new ideas and new technologies that are now emerging from the creative centers of American industry. It will be a community of tomorrow that will never be completed, but will always be introducing and testing and demonstrating new materials and systems. And EPCOT will always be a showcase to the world for the ingenuity and imagination of American free enterprise."

And one of my favorite Walt quotes:

“Around here, however, we don’t look backwards for very long. We keep moving forward, opening up new doors and doing new things… and curiosity keeps leading us down new paths.”

Well one of the "new paths" is now found at the American Experience in Epcot and we were happy to see this the last time we were there.  The American Experience pavilion has three main areas.  The first is the Main Lobby, where there are great paintings and where the Voices of Liberty perform.  The second area is the gallery exhibit called National Treasures and the third is the main show area. 

Inside the National Treasures area the WDW Imagineers have introduced of of those new technologies in the form of a 3d imaging lamp, to tell the story of the items on display.  I wish I had taken more video.  Here is what it looked like:

 

 

This is such a great way to grab the interest of the park guests as they walk through the exhibit.  Let me know what you think.  Have you seen these new lanterns?  Post your thoughts below.

Show # 31 of The "WGTWDW" Podcast

Hello and welcome to show # 31!  On this show we take a break from the conversation and spend some time with sounds from the parks.  We've done this kind of show before and I personally love to listen to these kind of shows.  I'm a Disney Geek to the core, so even hearing sounds from the parks gets me really happy. 

 

On other Disney Podcasts that do this I love to listen, figure out where the clip is from and then see if I get any memory responses from when we did or saw what we were listening to.  As we do shows like this down the road, consider them a tribute to Paul and the Window To the Magic Podcast.  He owns this idea with is Disneyland park walkthroughs, Awesome

I mentioned on the show that these audio clips came from video, so below are the video segements I got these from.  There out of order and I might have missed one or two, but most of the are there.

Thanks again to Jim and Kim over at Once Upon at Time Travel, contact them when making plans for your next trip. 
And for Quinn, Hope, George and Ed, thanks for listening.  Email us at WGTWDW@gmail.com  and go to Itunes and give us a review.  And, we're up on Facebook.  Stop by and give us a LIKE!  Enjoy the videos!

We took this first video a while back, but it's still great.  Sam the Eagle is so straight and get's taken by Gonzo and Rizzo the Rat, Classic!

 

The next clip is Yehaa Bob Jackson who performs over at the River Roost at the Port Orleans Riverside Hotel.  This is a great show and if you ever have the chance, please go.  I've gone three times in the last 4 trips. It's a great place to Meet up with friends!

 

 

This is the Animal Kingdom Parade.  As I mentioned on the show, we're not Parade people anymore now that the kids are older.  But as we were walking along a Cast member was cutting off the walk-way to set-up for the parade.  Well, since we were there, we watched the parade.  Very fun!

 

 

 

Here is part of the Captain jack Tutorial.  I actually had put two different videos together to give you more of a taste of the show.

 

 

And now the Nemo clip.  This is such a great show, as a father the message really hits home to me.  This is a broadway quality show.  We've seen it every time we've been in AK.  Very cool to see the same actors as we go back doing different parts.

 

 

In this next clip, these guys are great.  If I could only play an instrument like these guys can. It's always worth a couple minutes to stop and watch a couple of songs.

 

 

 

And the last clip for today, is of course, Wishes.  We love this fireworks show.  I've watched my kids grow up from them sleeping through it, to the ear plugs and hugs to get them through it.  Now there telling us where to watch from.  Priceless!

 

Monstrous Summer at Disney

A little while ago, the Execs at WDW put on a presentation at Epcot with a couple of our favorite Monsters as special HUGE guests.  The parks are happy to announce that this is going to be a Monstrous Summer of fun.  To start off, they are once again throwing  an all night party which is happening at the Magic Kingdom Park in Florida and Disneyland Park and Disney California Adventure park in California. The parks will stay open from 6 a.m., May 24 to 6 a.m., May 25, 2013.  Wish I could Go!  For those that missed it, here is the way it was announced.  Thanks to Ricky at Inside the Magic for the great video.

Her is another version of the video I found.  It looks like they did a test run first.  The other thing to take note is that the above I had assumed was on the back of SpaceShip Earth, but could not tell.  The below video of this announcement is done in an empty Epcot and it is defiantly the front of SpaceShip Earth.  Thanks to the Disney Parks Blog for getting this out there for us.

I was also lucky to find this third video of the event with some great behind the scenes interviews of the Imagineers who put this together.

Habit Heroes at Epcot

This is Hope's turn at a Blog post, so welcome our second guest blogger, Hope.

On Tuesday March 26, 2013, Dad, Quinn, and I went to Epcot. The one thing that stood out to me was an attraction in Innoventions. This attraction is called “Habit Heroes.” Habit Heroes is an attraction for all ages. Last time we went to Innoventions Habit Heroes was closed. This time it was open. Anyway, in this attraction you go through three rooms. The first room has sixteen circles spread evenly out on the floor. Each circle had a sensor in it to indicate your movement. When everyone takes their place on a circle a cast member explains what we will be doing in the attraction. The one thing the cast member teaches you is that when she or the agent says, “Now is the hour,” you have to say in return, “To build our power.”    The whole idea is that there are three villains who try to make you stay unhealthy. There are three agents who help you defeat the three bad guys. One bad guy makes you dehydrated, his color is blue. One makes you be lazy and not go outside and exercise and his color is red. The last one makes you eat unhealthy, his color is green. These three bad guys are invisible so you cannot see them in the real world. The first room was defending ourselves and how to throw moves to beat the bad guys. You follow different move patterns as sensors detect if your doing the move right and moving shapes on the big screen show your movement.

The second room was protecting our city and has guns set up along two walls.  Groups of three for one red, one green and one blue.  We each then shot the bad guy that matched our color gun as he came down the screen. The third room was protecting our world.  We ran around the whole room touching the colored card the CM gave us to lights on the wall to match the bad guys coming down to get us. 

Well we won.  We also got a nice rubber bracelet to match the color that we played.  Dad got a Red one, Quinn got a Green one and I got a Blue one.  We had a really fun time with this and hope to do it again.