Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party

My most favoritest reason for being here finally arrives! Magic Kingdom in FULL HALLOWEEN GLORY. Despite a strongly afflicting phobia of certain things with 8 legs (to the point where not only is the technical term for them absolutely too much, but even the common s****r term is generally avoided) Halloween continues to be my #1 holiday. It is undeniably difficult to avoid the thing which I hate most at that time of year but thankfully it’s on the spookier end of things enough that Disney chooses not to use it in decorations so I am SAFE!

Seriously – I had to speed read/half skip *that* part of Harry Potter once I figured out what was going on. Hells to the NO on ever seeing the film. Same goes for the Hobbit. At any rate.

We decided to take the bus over rather than deal with finding a place to park so late in the evening. Off to the bus stop!

I chose to do a loose pirate-y costume and Chris stuck with his tie-dye shirt. He snapped a few shots of me while we waited.

This is my psycho killer look. Hahaha – the shadows really set this one up.

Ah that’s better – more Arrgh and less AUUGGH. 

Shots of the sunset.

I liked the way the headlights hit the blockades.

They had these cool blow-up pumpkins for the party nights – this was the best I could do through the bus window.

In the Kingdom!

As we walked in – Thriller was indeed playing. As I came through the bag check area I was doing the dance: leg drag, twitch twitch, shuffle, turn. The woman running the desk got a huge grin and said “FINALLY! Where have you been all night. No-one has done the dance when this comes on!!” Then she starts zombie shuffling with me.  

There’s some CM’s dancing with kids in the “street” – everyone’s having fun boogie-ing down to the Monster Mash.

I was too shy to ask this family to pose directly – so I snuck a shot while a CM took their picture. It’s the entire Addams Family including Lurch!

We stopped in the Firehouse to get our Sorcerers of the Magic Kingdom starter pack, and exclusive party card. This can be used in the game, and is only given out to MNSSHP attendees who claim one.

After hearing about Hade’s plan to take over the Magic Kingdom we headed out to watch the parade since we were all roped in already.

Some still shots of the parade. We weren’t in the best spot but I expected to hit the next showing later.

I can not be the only one that finds Alice skinning White Rabbit’s face and making a mask out of it creepy?

These two were just so cute in their little Police outfits.

Here comes Hook’s ship! Check out the detail on that figurehead.

Jack was in top form – if you consider drunkenly swaying from the top of the mast top form.

Next was the Haunted Mansion crew. Oh man I was sad I only got this shot of the groundskeeper. He actually had his bloodhound with him!

The ballroom dancers looked amazing. Such excellent costumes.

He jumped in front of the camera and I couldn’t focus – but he’s mom’s favorite so he stays!

Vanellope von Schweetz

Ralph in a candy truck

Of course who better to follow all that sugar than Goofy with his Candy Co. contraption.

Finally the Villains roll in…

Bowler Hat Guy

Queen of Hearts

The one and only Cruella De Vil

Jafar

The parade ends and we head up Main Street. I get a shot of Minnie dressed up in one of the shop windows.

Man those glowing Mickey balloons tempt me every time…

I had to stop over at the First Aid station next to the Crystal Palace for an ace bandage (the walking and humidity were doing a number on my edema). At this point one of the projection shows started up on the Castle. I think this was “Celebrate the Magic” as it was too early for Hallowishes. You can hear me discussing the times in the video.

Halllowishes was supposed to start next but the Castle area was PACKED so we decided to head over to the Haunted Mansion for a special treat instead.

The Halloween party is the ONLY time you can have your picture taken with one of the hitchhiking ghosts in the hearse.

An unexpected bonus – I got to see fireworks surrounding the Mansion!  How awesome are these??

Video too:

I couldn’t help making a few extra photopass versions – love the frames you get with the Memory Maker shots.

After the fireworks show we stopped into the new gift shop – Memento Mori.

They have just about anything Haunted Mansion you could hope for for decorating your house. I walked out with a few must-have items myself.

First this lovely scarf – though I didn’t consider until I got home that a white scarf and purple dyed hair probably won’t last long. . . this might have to be decoration. It’s still awesome.

Then this hourglass – which I loved the first time they previewed it online. In person it’s even more detailed and gorgeous.

My mom had sent me a link to a cool souvenir option here that she knew I’d love – Spirit Photography. You sit for your photo and get to see your corpse-ly self created while you wait.

Because of the way it works it has to be one person at a time. They’re $19.95 each which is really reasonable for the 8×10 custom print. It’s a lenticular print: it has a plastic sheet with grooves so depending on the angle you see a different image, and it transitions between the normal shot of you and your haunted version.

We stepped inside to a little photo booth. The camera is set up to look like an old baffle style medium format camera.

The wallpaper is delightfully perfect. It’s in the style of a popular French wallpaper – scenic toile – which featured outdoor country scenes of people and animals.

After getting the picture done for each of us (the spirits were fussy and mine had to be redone a few times but it wasn’t too troublesome) we were advised to wait around the corner until the spirits rang the bell. Sure enough, just a few minutes later, a bell rang out somewhere beyond the walls, and our photos were “delivered by the spirits” and “magically” appeared inside a cabinet that a CM retrieved for us.

We chose to do a straight/serious face – and it’s actually hard to get a picture of the fully normal look. Which is why one of my cheeks looks sunken or makeup’ed.

Basically as you walk past, it transitions from one to the other. Super creepy! We LOVE them.

From there we decided to grab some food – realizing we hadn’t had much all day.

I love Magic Kingdom at night – all the lights on everything is so fun.

Check out the Pirates image on the Thunder Mountain.

We headed to Peco’s Bills and got a basic burger combo. The second Boo to You parade started up at this time but I decide not to try fighting the crowd for more photos.

After finishing our dinner, we went to Pirates of the Caribbean for a ride.

Our ride-through video:

We wandered around the far side of Adventureland and back to the Castle in time for the Villains Mix & Mingle show.

The whole show was so much fun – but miss Queen of Hearts was just rockin with her solo dance at the end!

Video:

It was 11:30 and we had just enough time to head into Fantasyland and Tomorrowland and ride something – which will make for a ride in all four areas of the park on the same day. Maybe not as impressive as one in all four parks, but hey, it’s an accomplishment to me!

First up was Fantasyland for the Mad Tea Party:

Off to Tomorrowland

Where we let our spinning stomachs settle on the TTA. The Tomorrowland Transit Authority PeopleMover is a 10 minute ride around Tomorrowland and even goes through some of the other rides. It’s a great way to relax and get some cool views of the park.

All of these were taken from the TTA ride:

After our tour we wandered out of the Tomorrowland area and stopped on the bridge for a few more pictures.

Finally we were some of the last few in the park. We stopped to get some pictures and video to remember it by.

A final shot of the fog creeping out from the railroad station

Projected pumpkin on the ground

This fuzzy plant was hanging out at the bus station. It’s so fuzzy! No idea what it is. Just fascinated with how cute it is.

With that – Mickey’s Not So Scary Halloween Party is officially over. Our trip thankfully is not! Tomorrow we go to EPCOT.