Disney Blog at Magical Kingdoms

From 7 November 2011 to 8 January 2012, the magic of Christmas will descend on Disneyland Paris! The enchantment of Christmas pervades the Disneyland Park with unforgettable, unique experiences to be shared with family and friends. For two months, Mickey Mouse and his friends don their best finery to welcome Santa Claus; the Christmas tree — and snow — arrives on Main Street, U.S.A.; and the roofs of Sleeping Beauty Castle sparkle with a myriad of twinkling lights.

This year, to make Christmas even more magical, Mickey and Minnie’s new friend, Duffy, the Disney Bear, is coming to Disneyland Paris, too.

Get to know this new friend — just waiting to be adopted!
This year, a surprise awaits visitors. Duffy, the Disney Bear, will be arriving at Disneyland Paris for the Disney Enchanted Christmas! Duffy is not just any teddy bear — he has been lovingly and affectionately crafted by Minnie especially for Mickey. As Mickey was preparing for a long sea voyage, Minnie thought he wouldn’t be so lonely if he had a friend stowed away in his luggage. When Mickey saw the little bear, it was love at first sight and he decided to call him ”Duffy”. They travelled the world together, discovering new cultures. At the end of their travels, Mickey and Duffy shared their magical memories with Minnie. Duffy is a really soft teddy bear with gentle eyes — and he is absolutely irresistible! Duffy is a cuddly little bear who just loves new adventures and making new friends.
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Christmas and New Year are some of the busiest times at Walt Disney World. If you’re planning to visit during this time here are some tips to help-

Arrive early and if staying on-site, take advantage of Extra Magic Hour, both morning and night.

Have patience if you want to do the rides. It’s crowded and the waits will be long. Fastpass is your friend but arrive early and get a Fastpass for the attraction that’s most important to you first, as they run out quickly.

Make your Advanced Dining Reservations (ADR) early. However, if you don’t have one, Guest Services can try to find you something somewhere.

If you have an ADR, allow extra time for getting there if using Disney transportation.

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The Wave is located on the 1st floor at Disney’s Contemporary Resort and is described as featuring American cooking with world flavors.

It’s a restaurant we’d been meaning to try but hadn’t gotten around to it on our previous trip. Whilst at Disney’s Hollywood Studios one day we decided to stop by the dining reservations counter to see if we could get an ADR for dinner that evening. As luck would have it, we managed to snag one at The Wave for 6:20pm, although the Cast Member said we could probably get seated earlier if we arrived before our time. As it was, by the time we’d finished at the park, got back to Bay Lake Tower and changed, it was 6:10pm when we arrived.

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Here are our pick of the top Disney Christmas gifts this year:

FOR THE KIDS

Fisher-Price Disney’s Rock Star Mickey

Learn the secrets to being a classic rock star with the Disney Rock Star Mickey from Fisher-Price. Jam out as Mickey kicks across the floor, bobs his head to new tunes, and drops into a Mickety-Split. As you learn move after move, you’ll find yourself thinking: Now, that’s one talented mouse!

Buy from amazon.com
Buy from amazon.co.uk

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By Guest Blogger Vikki W.

Taking a baby to Disney really is easier than you might think. We took Ava when she was six months old, so I thought I’d put some things together that would help anyone else who was thinking of taking a little person too.

First things first. The most important thing really is planning. Of course, if you’re taking a baby this would probably seem obvious, but the devil really is in the detail. I think I over planned to be perfectly honest, and considered things that I never really needed to. However I tend to think that over planning is always better than under planning.

Important things to note for us in particular was that I was breastfeeding Ava when we went, so even though I did try and take note of bottle feeding facilites, I didn’t look at those specifically. Also, we were doing baby led weaning with her, which pretty much means she ate whatever we did – no purees or anything like that to deal with. To be honest, although this is easier all round anyway, we chose this method particularly because we knew it would be easier to do with a baby around as we wouldn’t have to worry about jars or warming food up.

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Cast in the “Disney’s Maleficious Halloween party “ show:

• A total of 31 performers on stage:

• Maleficent
• Dr Facilier
• Queen of Heart
• Snow White Queen
• Snow White Witch
• Jafar
• Captain Hook
• M Smee
• Cruella Devil
• 4 Disney Villains incl. Dr Facilier
• 4 Disney Villains incl. Dr Facilier / Heart cards
• 4 tarots cards
• 4 dragons ladies
• 4 Parrots

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An array of wet and wonderful new surprises help guests cool off as they enjoy soaking up the sun aboard the Disney Fantasy, Disney Cruise Line’s newest ship scheduled to set sail in March 2012.

AquaLab Debuts on the Disney Fantasy

On the Disney Fantasy, guests can splash and play in the AquaLab – a brand-new water play area on deck 12, near the entrance to the AquaDuck water coaster. Families can frolic among pop jets, geysers and bubblers in this fun and fanciful 1,800-square-foot space. As the story goes, AquaLab was created by Donald Duck’s nephews, Huey, Dewey and Louie, and features a variety of water “experiments” designed to drench the whole family.

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As you’d expect from a Disney Cruise ship, the Dream is truly a dream for children!

From the moment you arrive at Port Canaveral you’ll realise that this isn’t going to be any ordinary cruise!Providing you don’t arrive too late, you’ll find Mickey or Minnie posing for photographs in the terminal building, giving a small taste of what’s to come.

If you have an oceanview stateroom, kids will enjoy sitting in the over-sized porthole window. Verandah staterooms offer them the opportunity to sit outside, although little ones shouldn’t be allowed out unsupervised, and ensure that all kids know not to climb on the table and chairs. Even if you have an inside stateroom, kids will love having visits from their favorite Disney friends on the virtual porthole in every room. Infants are catered for with pak ‘n’ play cribs, highchairs and diaper bins, all available free of charge from your stateroom host(ess).

On-board fun begins soon after boarding with the Sailing Away deck party, which we’ve covered in more detail here.

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If you’re planning a Disney trip, or just want to earn a bit of extra money for something else, you can earn some by taking part in online surveys, research and writing reviews. While you’re not going to become a millionnaire by doing this, every little bit helps!

Some of the sites below pay in gift vouchers rather than cash, but you can use these to buy things for your trip, or just to use for Christmas presents or such like.

Obviously, some sites are better than others, so I’ve reviewed the ones that I’ve used to save you wasting time. I can only review UK sites, being UK based.

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By Guest Blogger Anthony W.

So at ridiculous o’clock (6:00am) I got up and had a quick bit of breakfast, then in the car and off to the Magic Kingdom, yay! Now at this point I really didn’t have a clue as to where I was meant to be actually heading as I assumed that the car park would not be open, however the car park was the best place to head for. After a short drive I pulled up to a booth at the gate and explained to the lady where I was going….. guess what…. she had no idea what I was on about so she just directed me around to the main car park. I pulled into the car park and walked around to the TTC, slight problem when I got there because all the gates were shut, however I found a random cast member who let me through.

Next problem all the monorail entrances were closed, I started to panic at this point as the tour was supposed to start in 8 minutes. Fortunately another nice cast member came over and asked what I was doing. After I explained they took me up to the express monorail station and spoke to a cast member on the platform, he got on his radio and then 2 minutes later a private monorail arrived just for me, I even got my own greeting from the driver!
“Hello to my one and only passenger, sit back and relax we will be at the MK in a few minutes so you won’t be late”

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