Disney's Pirate and Princess Party

On our second evening in Orlando, we had prepurchased tickets to a new event at Disney World, the Pirate and Princess Party. While it sounded intriguing, very few people knew anything about it, so we went on a whim. It was a bit pricey and risky, considering weather might have made it a complete washout! Lucky for us, while it was cool that evening, the skies were clear and the day had been quite warm.

I ordered the tickets online and decided to pick them up on will call. Never having received the email confirmation they claimed they would send, I easily called Disney ticket reps for the confirmation number and then tried to figure out where I'd pick these things up. Another stroke of luck - on our Disney excursion to the Tri-circle-D Ranch, there was a ticket window with no one there. They were able to print out my tickets for me! We had planned on checking at the Wilderness Lodge as well.

Tickets in hand, the four of us returned that evening to the Magic Kingdom for the PPP. Because of the conference, we were unable to test the information given to K that people with PPP tickets can actually enter the park between 4-4:30 in the afternoon - that would have been really nice, but I didn't find that out until we'd returned home to wait for T, and then we had to drop of L at the airport, so we arrived at Disney that evening around 7:30, when all the PPP stuff began.

As we exited our car, it became increasingly clear to all of us that we'd forgotten one very important item - our costumes!! Apparently, you are supposed to dress up as a pirate or a princess for this event. I'm not sure how that major detail missed our attention, but we were obviously out of place in our plain clothes, and THAT was even in the parking lot!! I was happy to point out to my husband that I am not the "Disney Freak" that he thinks I am. We were completely surrounded by them, and I think he conferred with my assessment!

Note to anyone who attends this - don't take the ferry!! Take the monorail! The monorails run constantly, the ferries... well, the first one pulled out as we were walking down the ramp with about 10 people on it, the second one pulled in, unloaded then announced it was going out of service for the evening. The next one arrived with about 15 people to unload and then 15 of us got on. I guess everyone else had gotten the message, meanwhile, we missed 1/2 an hour of the party! We arrived at the Magic Kingdom around 8:15!!

Upon arriving we were given a small pouch - small being the key word. It was faux velvet, 4 inch square pouch, for collecting our "treasure". Along with that, we picked up a "treasure map" which indicated which rides would remain open, where the photo stops would be and X marks the spot treasure spots. There was a parade time and a fireworks show, viewable from all over the park. The entrance to the park was transformed to a smokey, colorfully lit, red carpet entry. Inside, in various areas, there were groupings of dancers, jesters, pirates, you name it. While it still looked like Main Street, you could feel the difference.

Because we had entered so late, we went ahead and found a seat in front of the bakery, grabbed a bit of dinner, and waited for the parade, which began at 8:30. The parade was short, had all the princesses and their princes on floats and then the pirates arrived. The Jack Sparrow in the parade was eerily the twin the Johnny Depp! Well, not in real life, but it looked like Johnny had joined the parade for the evening.

After the parade, we followed our map to Adventureland, passing by some really awesome photo stops. We completely missed the point of this evening, I'm sorry to say! Having never attended a Disney special event evening, we really had no idea that the photostops and the rides are the focal point of the evening. We were going for the "treasure"! As we turned into Adventureland, the girls received a pin set. Very skimpy here, Disney. As all four of us paid for and went to this party, we should have all received this pin!! It seemed as though they were only giving this out to children. It was a 2 identical pin set together - the girls got one to share. Very strange. Nothing for mom and dad, who had to pay more to attend! Needless to say, this set our expectations very high for the "treasure" aspect of this evening. Sorry to say, we were sorely disappointed!

For the rest of the evening, we hit every single treasure stop, which were marked by large spherical paper lanterns that had been placed atop of street lights. At each stop, we would walk through a roped off line, the end of which either a pirate or princess attendant would put some Hershey's chocolates or a plastic bead necklace in our pouch. (For a minute there, I thought we'd taken a wrong turn and ended up at Hershey Park!) It took us about 4 of these spots to realize that was it for the treasures!

We went on a couple rides, but had also passed some thinking we would never make it to all the treasure stops if we went on every ride. Big mistake! We passed up Pirates of the Caribbean with NO LINE for Hershey's kisses. Hmmm.... oh, and you could get a small bag of raisins at each stop if you wanted those instead. Kt started getting those for our hostess, K, stating, "Like mom always says, we paid for it so we might as well take it!" Don't you love it when they are old enough to "get it"!

As we entered Liberty Square, the fireworks show began. We choose a bench that faced the castle and waited, only to find that the fireworks show actually took place behind us! And all around us! It was a great show, had a pirate and princess story to go along it, and at one point had fireworks all around adventureland and frontierland! This show was definitely a highlight of our evening, and we were glad that they resolved the issue of the disappearing castle.

After realizing our error in thinking the treasures would be Disney related goodies, we started spending more of our time on the rides. We hit Small World, the Carousel, Buzz Lightyear until we finally quit out of pure exhaustion. We chose a photostop in front of the castle, with the belief that we were getting one photo for free included in the package. While that has been the case with other events, it was sadly not the case for this one. We could have filled up a photo card with unique pictures only set up for this evening, but we didn't! Instead, we had tiny overflowing bags of Hershey's treasures and plastic necklaces.

Our advice to anyone wanting to give this party a try: 1. Take advantage of every photostop and ride that is open. There is rarely a time like this when you have the park practically to yourself with no lines! 2. Buy your kids a bag of Hershey's chocolates and dollar store jewels and pass by the lines at the treasure stops! 3. Don't miss the parade or the fireworks show - they make the evening magical.

While this evening was not at all what we expected, I am glad we went. I think Disney could easily make this evening more magical by varying the treasures. My kids LOVE the Disney golden coin chocolates that Disney sells - I'm not sure why they didn't use those, except it was cheaper for them to use Hershey. We also had an eager little one who ran up to the first cast member she saw holding gold. It was not a treasure stop, but that cast member had two plastic gold "coins" that she plopped in the girl's bags - the only ones we saw that night. You would have thought they were real gold!! The girls treasured them all night as much more valuable than chocolate! Also, treat the parents like they really did pay $20 more each to attend this event - give them pins!

We finally left this event at midnight, just 1/2 an hour before it was over. We were wiped out, but knew we had a day at Sea World ahead of us. This time we took the monorail back to the parking lot, mostly because we were all freezing, but also because we didn't want a deja vu!

Pictures: 1. The girls and I on a nearly empty ferry to the Magic Kingdom. 2. A Cast Member was kindly taking pictures at the entrance. Unfortunately, the family before us refused to move! 3. Cinderella and Prince Charming in the Enchanted Adventures parade 4. A pirate ship in the parade 5. A "photo stop" you can see set up to the right of our picture. The girls were trying to mimic the minnie and mickey topiaries.