One Mom. One baby. One Awesome Disney Trip! (Part 2)

Dear World,
Recently I started a post about traveling to Disney World with my daughter without another adult. You can read my tips and tricks from the first part of the journey here.

(Part 2)

We left off at the changing station/restrooms, right before diving into the rest of the park. One big change that happened since the last time I've been to Disney was the FastPass system. It used to be set up so you go to a ride's entrance, get a FastPass printout, and come back at the designated time slot on the card. Well, things have changed! Now you go to one kiosk to get all of your FastPasses, but the default amount is three. I think there is a way to upgrade to get more, but three was plenty for us. If I had known about the new system, this would have certainly been our first stop. However, I had no clue, so by the time I figured out where it was, most of the rides I would have wanted a FastPass for were not available anymore. Live and learn. So, if you're planning a trip, make this your very first stop! It is located right behind Cinderella's castle, to the left of the carousel.

After you make your selections, they ask you to take a picture with your phone-- so here it is.

Let's talk about stroller parking. Outside nearly all of the rides, there are little "parking lots" for strollers. There are always employees standing around, sometimes rearranging them so they're all easier to access. There is a huge honor system at work here. Now I'm not saying I would trust leaving a diamond necklace around there, but I wasn't about to lug my diaper bag onto every single ride, so it was left with my stroller, unharmed. I don't think any other parent at Disney World is going to loot your stroller, and I'm pretty sure if someone walks up to a stroller without a baby, that would seem pretty suspicious. If anything does get lost, I'm sure you can report it to the employees and they will keep an eye out for it. I made it through the day with everything in place and no worries.

Congo Connie! I love the boat names.

Anyway, our first ride was the Jungle Cruise. Since the line and the actual ride are all outdoors, this is a good one to start with before it gets too hot. We traveled in March, so the weather wasn't terrible, but if you're going during summer, it helps to know where you can avoid the heat. Knowing that my 9 month old is cool with boats, I thought this would be a good start to see how she reacts to the animatronic robots everywhere. Well, she seemed more fascinated by the other people around us than the actual ride experience. If you've been on the Jungle Cruise, you'll remember that the most entertaining part is your tour guide. Every time I take this ride, I hear a different set of corny jokes. My mom asked us later on if the gun scared my baby, because she remembered the gunshot at the end of the ride. I hadn't remembered a gunshot and probably would have skipped it altogether if that was my expectation, because I know my little one is jumpy. When I was pregnant I saw a human cannonball at the circus. The noise was so loud that it made her jump (in utero). Our guide, probably noticing that there were many small children on the boat, acted like he was about to shoot the gun, holding it up and warning us "this might be loud," and instead yelled "GET OUT OF HERE!" Whew. Dodged a bullet there, so to speak.
We went to retrieve the stroller after the Jungle Cruise and headed down towards the "Liberty Square" area. We skipped the Pirates ride and the Haunted Mansion, because baby is jumpy. However, these are both a lot of fun if you think your little one is up for it. The Pirates ride has a pretty intense dip towards the beginning, which makes me nervous about holding a little baby. She may have loved it, who knows. But if she didn't, there would be a screaming child ruining everyone else's time for the whole ride...so I wasn't going to take my chances. The Haunted Mansion is intended to be scary-ish, so that's a no brainer for me.
Our next ride was It's a Small World, which happens to be my favorite. This also turned out to be baby's favorite! She looked around all over the place and was so excited that she didn't want to stay sitting. I let her stand on my lap (while I securely held her, praying she wouldn't try to jump overboard) as she looked all around at the dancing "dollies." It's a Small World is awesome because the boat ride is slow and gentle, the line always moves pretty quickly, and there is sweet, sweet air conditioning. The line is mostly indoors. This is a good relaxing break from the sun.

"It's a Small World"= Air conditioning

The Peter Pan line was pretty long and we didn't get a FastPass for it, so we unfortunately skipped that ride. After It's a Small World, baby fell asleep, which meant it was lunch time for me!
I asked an employee where a restaurant was that allows strollers. Many of the restaurants have stroller parking, much like the rides, and don't allow strollers inside. The recommendation I got was Cosmic Ray's over in Tomorrowland. This worked out because our first FastPass was for the Buzz Lightyear ride, which is my second favorite. We made our way over to Cosmic Ray's where I ordered a barbecue sandwich and fries, and a giant bottled water in an attempt to stay hydrated. An employee carried the tray for me so I could push the stroller to a table. It is always helpful to find an extra set of hands! If you're doing this alone and nobody offers to help you with something like that, just ask. People are happy to help. I chowed down and was just finishing in time for baby to wake up. While she was still in the stroller, I quickly visited the restroom before getting her back in the Kinderpack.

Stroller nap= lunchtime for the mama

After lunch, we got through the FastPass line to the Buzz Lightyear ride. We literally waited five minutes, which is why the FastPass is awesome. Baby enjoyed the ride because there was a  big red joystick that moved our car around. She started playing with that and was having a blast!
Our next ride was Dumbo, which she didn't seem very impressed with. This ride also has a joystick that you can use to make your car go up and down, but ours didn't work. This is another outdoor ride, so I was feeling the need for air conditioning again. We headed over to the very back of Fantasyland, which has also been renovated since my last visit. There used to be an area called "Toon town" where you could tour Minnie Mouse's house. This has been replaced by circus-themed areas. We went into a giant tent to meet Daisy Duck and Minnie Mouse. There is a cute outdoor splash area where little ones can cool off. Since baby isn't walking yet, we skipped that, but did purchase a stroller fan because it was getting pretty warm out.
I could feel my energy winding down, so I wanted to go ahead and get our last FastPass out of the way, which was meeting Ariel. The Little Mermaid ride had a super short line, so we squeezed that in first. Baby totally freaked out when she saw Ursula. Screams everywhere. Also, despite the very quickly moving line, the ride was stopped. While we were in the room with Ursula. Greeeat. Baby cried the rest of the ride and calmed down after I got her out and back in the Kinderpack, which is her safe place. We then headed over to "Ariel's Grotto" which was super charming. Baby really liked Ariel and started petting her fin! Ariel was a pro, so I'm sure she's used to that sort of thing.
Baby was clearly tired, as evidenced by the screaming fit on the last ride, so we started making our way to the park exit. She fell asleep in the Kinderpack and slept through a very noisy parade on Main Street! Once the parade was over, we had access to leave the park.

Stoked about the parade.

Overall, I think the trip was a success. If I could do it differently, there isn't much I would change. Stay tuned, next time I'll be blogging about our trip to Puerto Rico!

Love,
Stephanie