By the co-author of The easy Guide to Your Walt Disney World Visit 2020, the best-reviewed Disney World guidebook series ever.

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Amenities at Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort: The Settlement

(For the first page of this review of Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort, click here.)

THE SETTLEMENT AREA AT DISNEY’S FORT WILDERNESS RESORT

In the Settlement at the very north end of Fort Wilderness, you’ll find a shop, Pioneer Hall, where the wonderful Hoop-Dee-Doo Revue is found, and also the restaurant Trail’s End, a bar, a takeout dining venue, and other amenities.

CONSTRUCTION IN THE SETTLEMENT AREA AT DISNEY’S FORT WILDERNESS RESORT

The under-construction new Disney Vacation Club resort, Reflections, has taken out the western area of the Settlement.

Gone–at least for now–are Mickey’s Backyard Barbecue, the blacksmith shop, and the pony rides. Instead you get construction walls.

Gone at my last visit, but soon to re-open, is the Tri-Circle D Ranch, where Disney’s draft horses are stabled.

That’s the new stable peeking above the construction wall.

DINING IN THE SETTLEMENT AREA AT DISNEY’S FORT WILDERNESS RESORT

Fort Wilderness is really built for people who cook most of their on-resort meals in their cabin or campsite, not for dining in its facilities, but Trail’s End (and its bar, Crockett’s Tavern) is easy to get into.

Hoop-Dee-Doo Revue Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort and Campground from yourfirstvisit.net

In contrast, the storied Hoop-Dee-Doo Revue can sell out months ahead, so you typically can’t just show up at it and dine.

Here’s the reviews of each of these dining venues from our book from our book, The easy Guide to Your Walt Disney World Visit 2020


A full review of Hoop-Dee-Doo Revue is here.


You can find the current menu for Trail’s End here.


Crockett's Tavern Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort and Campground from yourfirstvisit.net

Crockett’s Tavern (above) serves both drinks and appetizers.  The current menu is here.

A final, simpler option is P & J’s Southern Takeout. The menu for P & J’s is here.

OTHER AMENITIES IN THE SETTLEMENT AREA AT DISNEY’S FORT WILDERNESS RESORT

Settlement Trading Post Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort and Campground from yourfirstvisit.net

Also in the Settlement area is another shop, thinner on food and much thinner on camping gear than the other Fort Wilderness shop at the Meadow.

Wagon Ride Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort and Campground from yourfirstvisit.net

…and various horse-drawn rides.

There’s also at times a bit of an opportunity to wound yourself woodworking and drinking.

Beyond all this at the very northern end of the Settlement is a lovely beach, Clementine Beach.

This beach used to be largely to the west, but that’s gone to Reflections.

The beach now stretches to the east, towards the old Marshmallow Marsh.

Marina at Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net
In this area you’ll also find a marina.

Boat to Magic Kingdom at Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

…and a dock where you catch one of the two boat routes that operate from here–one to the Magic Kingdom, and the other to the two other resorts on Bay Lake, the Wilderness Lodge and the Contemporary Resort. The Magic Kingdom boat takes 12-15 minutes, and operates every 10-20 minutes.

For those aiming to get to the Magic Kingdom before rope drop, usually the best strategy is to take the boat to the Contemporary and walk from there, as the Magic Kingdom boat often does not begin operating until 30 minutes before open.

(Transportation to the other parks is via the Outpost.)

THE POOLS AT DISNEY’S FORT WILDERNESS RESORT

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June 1, 2015   1 Comment

Photo Tour of a Tent Campsite at Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort

(For the first page of this review of Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort, click here.)

PHOTO TOUR OF A TENT CAMPSITE AT FORT WILDERNESS

Tent Loop Site Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Fort Wilderness’s tent campsites in loops 1500 and 2000 have a driveway big enough to fit a car, golf cart and a pop-up trailer, and a sand tent pad big enough for a couple of tents and a couple of dining flies.

Dining Flies Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

You are allowed to place a car, a golf cart, one camping vehicle or tent, and one additional tent; sites can be booked for as many as ten people. I saw several families sharing a campsite with two tents and hitting the ten person max.

Some more campsite photos from loop 1500:

Pop Up Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Campsite at Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net (3)

Campsite at Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Camping at Fort Wilderness from yourfirstvisit.net

Tent campers need more gear than tents. At minimum they need shelter from the sun and rain, but you’ll see many families with tents and coolers only.

Tent Camping at Fort Wilderness from yourfirstvisit.net (2)

A small family tent, a backpacking tent, and a cooler.

Tent Camping at Fort Wilderness from yourfirstvisit.net (3)
An un-guyed tent, a cooler, and a radio I learned to hate (headphones, people!!).

Tent Camping at Fort Wilderness from yourfirstvisit.net
A tent and a cooler.

So I’m gonna take you through my campsite and gear from my April 2015 visit (my seventh stay at Fort Wilderness, and fourth time tent camping there), as a way to illustrate some key points about what to bring and how to lay everything out.

LAYING OUT YOUR FORT WILDERNESS CAMPSITE

Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Your campsite will have a driveway, large tent pad, three fixed points–the charcoal grill, the power stand, and the water point–and one movable object, the picnic table.

Most will find plenty of room on the tent pad, but the largest groups–those with, for example, two very large tents and two large flies, one for dining and one for cooking and lounging–can find some space by moving the picnic table and its associated fly to the driveway. (This is often also a good move even with smaller gear sets in the full hook-up sites, as they have smaller tent pads.)

If you have enough room just on the tent pad for everything, the first step is figuring out where to set your tent and where to put the dining area. As you can see in the photos above, most families set their dining area and flies at the front of the space, and their tents at the back.  This has the effect of putting the more open and “social” space in the more public loop area of the camping loop, and the more closed and private space away from the loop roadways.

Well, I’d advise the opposite, for the simple reason that the charcoal grill is almost always at the back corner of the site. If you plan to use the grill, place your tent as far away from it as you can, and you’ll have both a simpler “kitchen” set-up and a safer tent.  The added plus is that your tent now serves as a bit of a view block, enhancing the coziness of your dining/kitchen/lounge area.

Dining Fly Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Here’s the layout of my site, taken from the back by the grill. When I took the shot, I hadn’t yet set up our chairs–they went in the space between the grill and the fly:

Living Room Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

The other layout point to consider is the use of the fixed stuff around your campsite for guy lines.

Stakes that Won't Hold Up to Wind at Fort Wilderness from yourfirstvisit.net

As noted earlier in this review, weather in Florida means you need lots of guys, and standard stakes like those shown above won’t hold up in the sand tent pads in weather.

Sand Stake Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

The best staking option for guys is twist-in sand stakes like that shown at the right above (available here; 15 inch screwdriver to use to turn them in not included).

But even better is just fixing your guys to the permanent objects around your campsite–trees, the grill, and the power point. These are much more stable than any stake, and save the effort of drilling in the sand stakes.

Guys Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net (2)

Note how for this corner of my fly I was able to use a tree and the grill for guying, and thus avoided any staking.

Five of my six fly poles (the four corner poles, and one of the two ridge poles) were fixed to something permanent, saving the effort of driving sand stakes.

So as you lay out your gear, look out for ways that by just shifting it a few feet, trees and other permanent features become more and less available for guying.

Guys Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Some trees do double duty. This one is guying both a fly corner and a tent corner.

I travel with 24 top-notch guy lines that I made with Kelty TripTease Lightline with traditional metal line tensioners at one end and bowlines tied at the other end, and another 30 or so older guys with no reflectivity and less useful plastic tensioners for lower-performance uses.

If you can comfortably move around your campsite without tripping, then you don’t have enough guys lines out. While check-out time is 11a, if you have the proper number of lines you’ll need to start undoing your guys a day or so before to be ready by then.

COOKING AND EATING AT FORT WILDERNESS

Dining And Kitchen Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Our kitchen set-up is the standard way we camp when it’s just me and my wife. We use the left side of the long two-level metal table at the back left of the image for food prep and clean up (there’s a sink at the right of this side, and the clean-up gear is on the ground under the table) and the lower right side for our chuck box.

I don’t think this table model is made anymore, but something similar is here. I saw a camper with a table/sink like this that also had a hookup for the water hose you’ll find at all Fort Wilderness campsites!  So jealous…

Camping Chuck Box from yourfirstvisit.net

Our chuck box is 15 years old and is so rusted I hold it together with a bungee cord. We’ve outfitted it with everything needed to prep, cook, serve and eat with the exception of wineglasses and big coffee mugs.  Most of what’s in it either came with it or is a kitchen cast-off, except I do have good knives in it. It’s always fully packed and ready to go so I don’t need to raid the kitchen or worry about forgetting stuff when we camp.

I can’t find equivalents at a reasonable price–this one is $250 and doesn’t even come with the pots, pans, bowls, cups, and utensils that ours came with–so when ours finally rusts into uselessness my sons and I will build a new one out of marine plywood.

One the ground at the back right there’s a wheeled 60 quart cooler, a separate small collapsible drink cooler with a grab-through pocket, and a water cooler.

Hint: fill and ice your water cooler before you start setting up camp. I didn’t, it was 90 degrees with 80% humidity, and if my sister and brother-in-law hadn’t ambled by from their condo for a visit with water bottles, I mighta had heatstroke…

On the table itself there’s a standard two burner stove, a camp coffee maker, a cute tablecloth, and a battery powered lantern. (Propane, gas, or electric lanterns work fine too.)

If the boys had also been on this trip, the second cooler would be larger, and we would have brought another collapsible table and moved the stove to it, so that we’d have more room at the picnic table.

Dinner Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

At the back corner of the campsite is the barbecue grill.

Grill Gear Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

The height of the grill is adjustable above the fire by a friction fit, and the handles are designed to dissipate heat. But I always have fire gloves packed in my gear bag, so I used those instead.

I’ve also found that grills of this design don’t have enough airflow, so I usually pour the charcoal onto the top of the grill of a disposable little grill, to get air underneath. I forgot my charcoal chimney, so got match-light charcoal instead of the better-tasting regular charcoal.

I travel with three tarps and tons of poles, so normally would have had the food prep and dish-washing area covered with another fly, which if I was lucky in my layout would serve as a sun/rain protection rig as well. (The third fly is if I need more weather protection…plus how can having three tarps be wrong??) On this trip it rained so much that we just did prep at the kitchen table.

Speaking of rain…let’s talk tents.

TENTS AND SLEEPING AT FOR WILDERNESS

noted earlier in this review that with storms common at Fort Wilderness, there’s real value to having a high-mesh tent with a full-coverage rainfly.

REI Kingdom 8 Tent Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net (3)

Here’s my tent with its fly rolled up. Note that a third of it is almost all mesh, and the other two thirds have top to bottom mesh on the sides (warm air rises, and is replaced with cooler air from the bottom of the mesh) and full mesh on the top.

REI Kingdom 8 Tent Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net (2)

Here it is with the fly, before I guyed it out.

A full coverage fly on a mesh tent is finicky, in that it’s more complicated to roll the fly up during good weather and get it down when you are expecting rain than it is to just zip and unzip the windows you’ll find in a traditional family tent.

But it is much dryer, and much more comfortable to sleep in during rain, than a traditional family camping tent.

Rain Fly Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

See the traditional tent above. Its rainfly covers only the roof, so is of help only when a light rain is coming straight down. That never happens in Florida, so what you do instead is zip up all the windows.

All those windows, even when zipped, provide a bunch more points for potential rain penetration, and more to the point, zipping them up means you have lost all airflow. So the tent gets warmer and more humid, and more humid and warmer.  Water condenses inside and drips on you.

There are better ways to sleep.  The simplest and cheapest is to supplement your typical family camping tent with a big blue tarp pitched above it. See the image below:

Tent Camping at Fort Wilderness from yourfirstvisit.net

Now this particular blue tarp install isn’t right. The blue tarp needs to be twice as long and twice as wide to provide enough rain shelter that some windows can be open for airflow.

Moreover, it should be pitched with a ridgeline, not as a lean-to, as otherwise water will collect in the middle of the tarp until the lines fail from its weight and all that water is dumped into the tent’s open windows…

REI Kingdom 8 Tent Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Best, though, is a mesh body/full coverage fly tent like mine.

Power Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net
Because every site has electricity at Fort Wilderness, bring some extension cords and both electric and battery powered fans.

Have a fan blowing in at one end, another blowing out at the other end, and hang the battery-powered fan in the peak of the tent to promote hot air exiting, and you can conquer any weather.

Sadly, while there’s tons of little tents of this design aimed at backpackers, there’s very few big enough to function as a family tent.   Coleman used to have such a model, but I haven’t seen it in a while.  The REI Kingdom 8 (my tent) and Kingdom 6 fit the bill, but are very expensive. I got mine as my main Christmas present or we would not have paid so much for a tent.  If you have alternatives, note them in the comment form below!!

Another gear point to consider if you have room in your tent is bringing cots. Cots are more comfortable than sleeping on the ground in general, and the added airflow underneath can be cooler.

We happened to have a queen sized cot designed for and sold with an air mattress, so we brought it this trip.  We also brought a collapsible shelf unit that my parents got for camping decades ago.

REI Kingdom 8 Tent Interior Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

So here’s what the interior of our tent looked like, overall…

Bed Side Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

…closer on the bed side…

Dresser Side Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

…and closer on the cabinet side.

We also brought pillows, a comforter, and sheets for the bed.

Packed Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

The point is that while you can sleep on the ground in a sleeping bag, you don’t have to.  Take anything that will make you more comfortable that you can fit in your car!

The shelf unit folds up to the tiny wooden thing on the right of the blue and white cooler, and below is how small the cot is when folded up:

Cot Folded Campsite Tour Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

THE COMFORT STATIONS AT DISNEY’S FORT WILDERNESS RESORT

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June 1, 2015   8 Comments

The Comfort Stations at Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort

(For the first page of this review of Disney’s Fort Wilderness Resort, click here.)

THE COMFORT STATIONS AT FORT WILDERNESS

At Fort Wilderness’s 15 comfort stations you’ll find bathrooms, laundry rooms, ice machines, and resort information and notices.

They are generally air conditioned–though on my last visit, the air conditioning in the men’s side of the comfort station between loops 1500 and 1600 wasn’t working, although that in the laundry room was going strong.

Of the fifteen comfort stations, one is by the quiet pool in the Cabins area, and one serves the group campsite Creekside Meadow (it’s accessible from loop 2000 as well). The other 13 are scattered among the 20 camping loops at Fort Wilderness.

Simple math will tell you not every loop has its own comfort station, so you will sometimes see people saying things like “Don’t stay in Loop 1000, it doesn’t have a comfort station.” Such comments are largely silly, as there is a very close comfort station in loop 900.

If you do the math for campsites per comfort station including shared comfort stations, you get 13 loops with about 60 campsites per comfort station. Anomalies are loops 400 to 800, with over 110 sites among them per comfort station, loop 1100 with about 25 sites for its station, and loop 2000, with two (or three if you count Creekside Meadow) comfort stations for its ~70 campsites.

Premium Site Disney's Fort Wilderness Resort from yourfirstvisit.net (2)

The only point of concern here is loops 400-800 with just two comfort stations serving ~235 campsites, but these are premium campsites intended for honking big Class As and fifth wheels, all of which have their own baths, many nicer than mine at home.

So unless you are tent camping in a premium loop–which you should not be doing–don’t let the presence or absence of comfort stations in a loop much affect your loop choices.

Bulletin Board Comfort Station Disney's Fort Wilderness resort from yourfirstvisit.net

The comfort stations are cute little buildings with a lot of helpful notices on their outside walls. Examples are above and below.

Bulletin Board Comfort Station Disney's Fort Wilderness resort from yourfirstvisit.net (2)

Items covered include menus for the dining options at Fort Wilderness, movie and other activity schedules, and various rules–e.g. about what kind of portable fire-pits can be used.

Ice Fort Wilderness Comfort Station from yourfirstvisit.net

Outside you”ll also find a coin-operated ice machine.

How Much Ice Fort Wilderness Comfort Station from yourfirstvisit.net

It turns out that my drink cooler is the perfect size for getting a load of ice.

Laundry Fort Wilderness Comfort Station from yourfirstvisit.net

In the center inside is a laundry room with washers and dryers.

Laundry Drinks Fort Wilderness Comfort Station from yourfirstvisit.net

Cold drinks and various laundry supplies are also available here.  Right now, it’s all quarters–there’s a change machine–but laundry rooms at Fort Wilderness are expected to move to a mix of quarters and credit cards soon.

On either side of the laundry room are the restrooms.  They are clean, bright, well-appointed, have plenty of hot water, and for most but not for me are air-conditioned. You need your MagicBand to access them late at night.

Sinks Fort Wilderness Comfort Station from yourfirstvisit.net

Sinks and toilets are on one side…

Showers Fort Wilderness Comfort Station from yourfirstvisit.net

…and the other side has showers.

Shower Fort Wilderness Comfort Station from yourfirstvisit.net

Each shower area has an outer dressing area and an inner shower area, and one of them has extra accessibility features.

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June 1, 2015   8 Comments

A Friday Visit With Jim Korkis: Sid Cahuenga

Welcome back to Fridays with Jim Korkis! Jim, the dean of Disney historians and author of Jim’s Gems in The easy Guide, writes about Walt Disney World history every Friday on yourfirstvisit.net.

SID CAHUENGA AT DISNEY’S HOLLYWOOD STUDIOS

By Jim Korkis

Jim Korkis on Sid Cahuenga’s One-of-a-Kind Antiques and Curios Shop from yourfirstvisit.netSid Cahuenga’s One-of-a-Kind Antiques and Curios shop, the home of Tinseltown Treasures at the front of Disney’s Hollywood Studios theme park, has been a familiar site to guests in that park since its opening day (as Disney’s MGM Studios) in May 1989.

While today the location is a MyMagic+ Service Center, it originally sold items that included posters of Disney movies, black and white portrait photos of Walt Disney, pressbooks from Disney films, celebrity autographed photos, books, costuming and more.

In fact, for sixteen years up to 2005, guests had the opportunity to meet and have their pictures taken with the friendly Sid Cahuenga himself. Actually, Sid was talented performer Danny Dillon, whose signed and framed photo once hung prominently just inside the establishment’s front door.

Dillon, who passed away at the age of eighty-two, was so iconic as Sid that the role was never replaced after his passing.

The name “Sid” was inspired by iconic showman Sid Grauman who owned and operated Grauman’s Chinese Theater on Hollywood Boulevard as well as other popular movie theaters. The name “Cahuenga” came from Cahuenga Boulevard, a major cross street that leads directly into the heart of Hollywood.

According to the Disney Imagineering created back story, Sid Cahuenga was a big movie fan. With his wife, they relocated from the Midwest to the Hollywood of the 1920s where they bought some land and built their small home.

Unlike other buildings at Disney Hollywood Studios, it is not based on any particular building but rather is faithful to a style associated with that time period, and also mimics the story of the Janes House.

The real Janes House was built in 1903 on Hollywood Boulevard, and rather than ebbing razed and a new building built on its lot, it was turned into a business and other commercial structures were built around it.

Sid Cahuenga's from yourfirstvisit.net

The Cahuenga house is themed to a similar story. Once Hollywood grew in the area where the house was built, real estate developers tried desperately to buy the now valuable property from Sid, but he continually refused. He and his wife did not want to move and they liked their new situation in the heart of all the expanded activity.

With a steady stream of tourists and shoppers now filling the street, Sid decided to make some extra money by displaying his collection of movie memorabilia he had accumulated over the years.

Jim Korkis on Sid Cahuenga from yourfirstvisit.net

He placed the movie collectible items for sale on his front porch and front yard just like an expensive garage sale. He was so successful that he expanded his business by transforming a few rooms in the front of his house into a store. He propped up items on bureaus, tables and even the fireplace.

He realized he needed to replenish the one-of-a-kind items he was selling so he got a large black flatbed truck, often parked next to his home.

Sid Cahuenga's Truck from yourfirstvisit.net

He would use the vehicle to buy surplus items from the studios or rummage through dumpsters behind the studios to recover items that had been thrown away.

Look in the back of the truck and see some interesting items including a figure from the Magic Kingdom’s defunct 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea attraction.

He had made many friends in the twenty years he had lived in Hollywood and some of those stars were only to happy to sign photos or give things to Sid which he promptly put up for sale.

Sid and his wife made a good living for decades until their passing.

*  *  *  *  *

Thanks, Jim!

Come back next Friday for more from Jim Korkis.

In the meantime, check out his books, including The Vault of WaltWho’s Afraid of the Song of the South?, and The Book of Mouse, and his contributions to The easy Guide to Your First Walt Disney World Visit, all published by Theme Park Press.

MORE DISNEY WORLD HISTORY POSTS FROM JIM KORKIS

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May 29, 2015   4 Comments

Next Week (May 30 Through June 7, 2015) at Walt Disney World

DISNEY WORLD NEXT WEEK: MAY 30 TO JUNE 7, 2015

The material below details operating hours, Extra Magic Hours, parades, and fireworks.

Disney World May 30 to June 7 2015 from yourfirstvisit.net

The same stuff is in the image, but organized by park, not by topic. For more on May 2015 at Walt Disney World, click here, and more on June, here.

Note that typos happen, and schedules change! If something seems odd, or if you want to double check, use the calendar links near the bottom to get the latest official Disney World scoop.

OPERATING HOURS AT WALT DISNEY WORLD 5/30/-6/7/2015

The Magic Kingdom will be open 8a-1a 5/30, 9a-6p 5/31, 8a-12MN 6/1, 9a-12MN 6/2 through 6/5, 8a-12MN 6/6, and 9a-12MN 6/7

Epcot will be open from 9a-9p every day

Disney’s Hollywood Studios will be open 8a-10p 5/30 and 5/31, 9a-10p 6/1 through 6/4, and 8a-10p 6/5 through 6/7

Disney’s Animal Kingdom will be open 9a-7p 5/30, 9a-8p 5/31, 9a-7p 6/1 through 6/5, and 9a-6p 6/6 and 6/7

EXTRA MAGIC HOURS AT WALT DISNEY WORLD 5/30/-6/7/2015

The Main Street Electrical Parade at the Magic Kingdom from yourfirstvisit.net

Saturday 5/30 Morning:  none Evening: Magic Kingdom

Sunday 5/31 Morning:  Animal Kingdom Evening: none

Monday 6/1 Morning: none  Evening: Hollywood Studios

Tuesday 6/2 Morning: Epcot Evening:  none

Wednesday 6/3 Morning:  Animal Kingdom, Hollywood Studios  Evening:  none

Thursday 6/4 Morning: Magic Kingdom  Evening: none

Friday 6/5 Morning: none Evening: Epcot

Saturday 6/6 Morning:  none  Evening: Magic Kingdom

Sunday 6/7  Morning: Animal Kingdom  Evening: none

Mickey and Minnie Festival of Fantasy Afternoon Parade from yourfirstvisit.netPARADES AT WALT DISNEY WORLD 5/30/-6/7/2015

The Magic Kingdom:

FIREWORKS AT WALT DISNEY WORLD 5/30-6/7/2015

Wishes at the Magic Kingdom: 10p 5/30 and 6/1 through 6/7

Illuminations at Epcot: 9p every night

Fantasmic at Disney’s Hollywood Studios: 9 and 10.30p every night

Wishes at the Magic Kingdom from yourfirstvisit.net

SHOW SCHEDULES FOR WALT DISNEY WORLD 5/30/-6/7/2015

See Steve Soares’ site here. Click the park names at its top for show schedules.

LONG RANGE WEATHER FORECAST FOR WALT DISNEY WORLD 5/30/-6/7/2015

See this for forecasts.

DISCLAIMER

Everything is subject to change and typos! Check the Disney Calendars for updates and official schedules. These calendars can be found by clicking the following links:

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May 28, 2015   No Comments

The Pools at Disney’s All-Star Movies Resort

For the first page of this review of Disney’s All-Star Movies Resort, click here.

THE POOLS AT DISNEY’S ALL-STAR MOVIES RESORT

Review - The Pools at Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Each of Disney’s All-Star Resorts has two pools.

Review The Pools at Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.netThere’s a larger one between two accommodations buildings just outside of the central lobby/dining/shops area, and a smaller one back in a different area.

At All-Star Movies, the larger main pool is between the Fantasia buildings and is themed as the area into which Sorcerer Mickey empties water.

Here you’ll also find pool games played with Disney cast members, and evening movies.

The smaller one off to the side in the Mighty Ducks area, is themed as a hockey rink (but warmer!) is accompanied by Goofy.

The larger Sorcerer Mickey pool:

Fantasia Pool Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net (2)

From another angle:

Fantasia Pool Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Sorcerer Mickey:

Sorceror Mickey Fantasia Pool Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net (2)

The pool at night:

Night Fantasia Pool Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Movies show here at night.

Movies Fantasia Pool Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Each of the All-Stars has a different movie schedule, so also checkout what is playing at All-Star Music–an short walk away.

Kids Pool Fantasia Pool Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Nearby is an icy-looking kid’s play pool, the best at the All-Stars because it has both a pool area (as the others do)  and, uniquely, a water jet area. Note Disney’s restraint in not converting this to a Frozen theme.

Ping Pong Fantasia Pool Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

There’s also pool-side ping pong tables.

Play Area Fantasia Pool Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

A little away from the pool, between Toy Story and Fantasia areas, is a playground.

Bar Fantasia Pool Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

Between the pool area and the food court (and serving both) you’ll find this bar.

The Mighty Ducks Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net (4)

Deeper in the resort in the Mighty Duck area is the Duck Pond pool, themed as a hockey rink with Goofy in as goalie.

Mighty Ducks Pool Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net (3)

Another view of the Duck Pond pool…

Mighty Ducks Pool Disney's All-Star Movies Resort from yourfirstvisit.net

…and the pool at night.

None of the pools at Disney’s value resorts have slides.

TOPICS IN THIS REVIEW OF DISNEY’S ALL-STAR MOVIES RESORT

 

 

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May 25, 2015   No Comments