Welcome to High Five! This is my list of top 5 experiences on a vacation. These are obviously opinionated pieces, and are subject to change. We’ll cover everything from parks to restaurants, from character experiences to attractions, this will be YOUR guide to my personal choices at this moment for your vacation. I’ll also list a few of my favorite things about each choice, so I hope you enjoy High Five!
As we begin our journey together, I feel like I’d start off by listing my personal favorite Magic Kingdom rides. This is a generic list of just rides, and soon down the road we will take a look at rides for kids, rides for teens, and so forth.
We will start from 5 and go to 1.
5Big Thunder Mountain Railroad – Frontierland – Big Thunder is one of the Magic Kingdom mountains and is full of a lot of western themed fun. It is a roller coaster, but as most Disney coasters go, it is fun for mostly everyone. As the safety spiel says, “This here’s the wildest ride in the wilderness!”. Big Thunder is one of my favorite rides to go on when the sun goes down. It’s lighting is perfect and features some of my favorite moments on a ride at Disney. For kids wanting to have a first roller coaster “experience”, this is probably one of their best bets, along with another one that we will cover later on. My least favorite part about this ride is the restraints. It’s a bar that comes across your laps. If you’re riding with your child, you often times may find the child sliding side to side, as the bar stops where the adult often is. Big Thunder is a great experience for families, and if you’re at the Magic Kingdom, this is a definite must do.
4Pirates of the Caribbean – Adventureland – I found myself struggling to add Pirates, but not for any reason other than this is one of a few rides within Magic Kingdom that I do every single time within the park. It’s changed a few times over the years, adding characters from the Pirates movies such as Jack Sparrow. Pirates is one of those “rite of passage” rides that if you’ve never been to this park, you must find a way to do it. The storytelling and animatronics alone are worth the time, but it is an entire experience. The area music features music from the movies, but once you enter the queue, you hear some of my favorite queue music known to man. Pirates is a great experience for anyone, and even has a tad bit of thrill within the small drop at the beginning of the ride. Don’t worry – it’s not a deep drop, just enough to cause a small splash within the water underneath your boat. All in all, it’s worth your time to give Pirates of the Caribbean a shot. The overall experience is one your family will be talking about the minute you exit the attraction!
3Haunted Mansion – Liberty Square – As a kid, I was terrified of this ride. To the point where I never rode it on any of my previous trips until I got older. Upon riding it, I learned it was not intended to be scary – as a matter of fact, it was funny. Haunted Mansion is a technical marvel that if you’re looking at all of the special effects while riding it, you’ll be constantly blown away. There are special effects galore. The music is supreme and it’s one of a kind for you on your first time, and the times after that. Riding Mansion is an experience in itself, and with Pirates and Mansion, they both exude “Disney Parks”, with the animatronics, the story, the music. I don’t want to spoil any of this for you, so I will wait for you to ride it yourself! If you’ve ridden it however, you know what experience I’m describing!
2TTA PeopleMover – Tomorrowland – Ask anyone that’s been to Magic Kingdom, and they will tell you: ride the PeopleMover. It’s a simple concept, really. The PeopleMover has been at Magic Kingdom forever, but it’s popularity stems from the fact that it travels through every campus within Tomorrowland, not to mention its an absolutely perfect place to rest. It’s perfect in that you just sit and enjoy the breeze, not to mention have some of the best views of any place in the world. Having an eye in the sky looking down at Tomorrowland is people watching at it’s finest. Traveling through Space Mountain, Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin and Mickey’s Star Traders, the TTA PeopleMover is as close to a perfect attraction as you can get. The line may be long somedays, but it goes fast because it’s constantly moving and anyone can ride it.
1Seven Dwarfs Mine Train – Fantasyland – Look, I don’t make the rules. And this choice is probably controversial, but Mine Train is simply the best. From the animatronic show scenes to the coaster experience, Mine Train blends the best of what Disney offers: story and innovation. The story of this attraction, seeing the story of Snow White from the perspective of the dwarfs, is a clever and fun one. The innovation lies within the coaster cars (mine carts that swing slightly while going around twists and turns) and the animatronics (projected faces). I share a birthday with Mine Train (May 28) and it may be a personal choice, but Seven Dwarfs Mine Train encompasses everything I need out of an attraction. This is also the other coaster, if your kid is looking for a “first” coaster, to ride. Mine Train does it all and it’s fun for every single person in your party. The only negative, is the ride time. It’s a little over a minute long, which is entirely too short. But it just makes you want to ride it again!