We spent the last of our 6 Florida theme park days at Magic Kingdom. The timing of our day revolved around our spot in the Virtual Queue for TRON. We had a much lower group number (40) for TRON than we had for Guardians of the Galaxy (100) two days earlier. That meant our estimated callback time was earlier – 11:30 am. This was a pretty good time for teens – not so early that they grumbled over not sleeping late enough but not so late that the parents were itching to go.
We actually got the alert that our number was called at 11:45, just as we were pulling into the parking lot. Perfect timing! We had an hour to enter the line but didn’t waste much time. We happened to catch the parade as we were walking down Main Street and stopped to watch a few of the characters go by. After a few minutes though, we continued on our way to Tomorrowland.
Our wait for TRON was less than 40 minutes, and it didn’t feel bad at all. And what a great ride! We really loved this one. The ride itself is a motorcycle, and it is more of an authentic motorcycle experience than Hagrid’s Magical Creatures Motorbike Adventure at Universal. To ride it, you have to sit on the bike seat, kneel on the knee pads, and then lean forward. There are leg restraints that rest on the back of your calves and a back restraint that comes down to keep you bent forward. I will say that I didn’t feel especially graceful getting on or off but once situated I was comfortable enough. There is an accessible car (called the Lightrover) at the back of the train if you have size or physical restraints that keep you from riding the regular bikes comfortably. (Or if you simply prefer it!)
Although the seating is unique, at its heart TRON is a traditional roller coaster. Featuring high speeds and lots of twists and turns (but no upside downs), the coaster is just pure adrenaline-filled fun. You shoot off at 60 mph, take a lap around the outside, and then pick up even more speed when you come back inside. It’s a super fun – but short – ride. We loved it.
One note – this ride requires you to put your phones in a little compartment at the front of the bike. Between the speed of the ride and not actually having my phone on me, I was worried about how they would match up our ride photos to our account. And we did, in fact, get someone else’s ride photos in our account. While we were on line for our next ride, I filled out the missing photo form online and we ultimately got the correct ones loaded to our account. I’m so glad they found them for us because they were great!
After TRON we headed to Space Mountain, which ended up being a pretty long wait. We had packed our lunches and ate on line, helping to pass the time a little. Space Mountain is dated and predictable but still fun. We rounded out our time in Tomorrowland with Buzz Lightyear’s Space Ranger Spin. This one is always a ton of fun and brings out the competitive spirit in the family. At one point the ride froze, mid-spin but we were able to keep shooting. It was lucky for those who were actually facing a target and not the back of another star cruiser!
At this point, we had done 3 rides in 3 hours (and 6 parks in 6 days) and maybe had a little bit of theme park burnout. Since TRON had been our main goal at Magic Kingdom and all the rides we were even vaguely interested in had a long wait, we decided to head back to the hotel.
We hit the pool, had some dinner, and then my younger son and I decided to make the most of our last night there. At around 8:30 we headed back to Magic Kingdom to experience some of the Disney magic at night.
It was neat to see Main Street all lit up, with the castle illuminated in blue at the end. Our strategy here was to hit a few rides both before and after the night show, Happily Ever After. Since the show started at 9:00, we only had time for one ride. We initially planned to do Haunted Mansion first but the line was too long so we made a quick bee-line to Pirates of the Caribbean.
We then quickly made our way back to the castle to watch the nighttime show. We got decent view from the side of the castle, although we were on and off again stuck behind a kid on his parent’s shoulders who was blowing bubbles that somehow kept ending up directly in our faces. The Magic Kingdom nighttime show has morphed from a fireworks show to a fireworks “extravaganza” that includes lights, lasers and projection mapping.
I’ll be honest, it was all too much for me. It was sensory overload (as many things are at Disney but this seemed worse than most). The projection mapping showed scenes from various Disney movies, set to music and lights. The problem for me was that the images were projected onto the castle, a structure with unusual shapes, sizes, and surfaces. Trying to make out all the different images on an oddly shaped surface is much different than watching it on a flat screen. It just didn’t work for me. I could often hear the characters or the song but not figure out where their image was. It just felt like they are trying to do too much with this show. The fireworks were my favorite part and I found myself wishing it had just been music and fireworks.
We stuck it out to the end but quickly made our exit and headed back to Haunted Mansion. We got in quickly this time and enjoyed the campy scariness of the ride. My son couldn’t believe that he and his brother had been too scared to ride this on our last visit.
Next up was Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, and we checked out Tiana’s Bayou Adventure on the way. Splash Mountain had been one of our all-time favorites and we were sad that we were a few weeks too early to ride it’s re-themed replacement. Thunder Mountain was fun as always though, and we enjoyed riding it in the dark.
We finished up Big Thunder Mountain a little after 10:30 and debated whether or not to get on line for Seven Dwarfs Mine Train. My son was still on the hunt for the perfect t-shirt so we decided to forgo another ride and head to Main Street for some last minute shopping. He found what he was looking for and we wrapped up a really fun evening at Magic Kingdom.
This was definitely the latest I’d been out at the parks and we had a ton of fun. The park takes on a different vibe after dark and we enjoyed taking it all in (as well as the shorter lines!). We had debated whether or not to go back and I am so glad we did. It was the perfect ending to a great trip.
