When you’re going to Disney World with your family, the last thing you expect is for what was supposed to be a trip with you and your mom to suddenly turn into a trip revolving solely around you.
Hi, I’m Ethan Burks, self-proclaimed Disney nut, and son of Upon a Star Travel Advisor Susan. Our trip in May was supposed to be a trip with just the two of us, tackling three parks in three days — Hollywood Studios on Saturday, Magic Kingdom on Sunday, and EPCOT on Monday. This article should roughly follow the same general format as my mother’s “One Day In” series!
However, Friday evening, the night before we were due to disembark from the Disney Treasure in Port Canaveral, my mother fell ill, and by Saturday morning wasn’t feeling much better. So, I got her all settled into our room at the Contemporary, then did what every self-respecting college kid does… run off, leaving my mother to rest, and enjoying the parks on my own.
The author doing his best “Soyjak Pointing” meme impression. It’s not very good, but he had a good giggle over looking ridiculous.
Despite having done at least a dozen Disney trips in my life, this was the first time I’d done anything of this scale on my own. I’d gone off and done rides on my own, sure, especially things my mother doesn’t like to ride — things like Tower of Terror, Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster, and Expedition Everest are the ones that come to mind — but I’d never done full days on my own, much less what wound up being two days solo.
So… how does a twenty-something (who can’t drink yet, alas) traveling solo through Disney find their way around the parks? Well. luckily for me, I had some experience on hand having done Disney since I was five. I knew that since I was getting to Hollywood Studios late, I probably wouldn’t get to do the big rides — Smuggler’s Run, Slinky Dog Dash, or potentially even Toy Story Mania — without standing in an hour-plus line. I could do it, sure, but my phone battery would also drain very quickly standing in line, by myself, without anything else to do.
However, the first thing I did wasn’t any ride. Rather, it was lunch. (Look, I was hungry. Plus, we already had lunch reservations, so the timing shook out quite nicely.) So, off I went, back to Woody’s Roundup Rodeo BBQ — something that had been on both of our bucket lists as something to try at Disney! Despite having been to Hollywood Studios several times since it opened, we had somehow never made our way back there for a meal… and boy howdy were we missing out. Being a family-style restaurant, I was still very pleasantly surprised by the quality of food as well as just how much food they brought out. I made a valiant effort at taking down most of the meats, but I will admit I fell painfully short by a wide margin of being able to eat it all especially when it came to the sides. Dessert (of course, I had dessert—I’m a college kid!) brought with it a delicious banana cream pie in a jar… mmm. Still good to think about even now. When I think of everything I did during the two days my mother wasn’t well enough for the parks, this was the thing that I most wished she were there for. The quality and theming of the whole restaurant were amazing, and the cast were all amazing!
After that, it was finally time for me to tackle some rides. As is logical for anyone having just eaten a big meal, my first stop was… well, it was supposed to be Toy Story Mania. Unfortunately, almost that entire day, Toy Story Mania had been down, and it continued to be down when I got out of lunch. Sadly, I never got the chance to enjoy it this trip due to the crazy long lines even after it opened. Oh well.
Instead, I decided to take a hike across the park over to MuppetVision 3-D for what would be my last experience of Jim Henson’s final project (at that theater… right? Please, park overlords?) and I made sure to take it all in as much as I could. I took my time walking through the queue, trying to take in as much as I could, and then a few extra photos of the prop containers at the front of the waiting area. Despite it still being nearly a month before closing at the time, the show was already starting to feel full, a pleasant change from how empty that theater usually feels. I’m going to miss that theater. It’s such a fun show and a love letter to Jim Henson’s legacy.
Just an interesting little tidbit I like to bring up whenever I’m discussing Hollywood Studios, on the subject of ride closings: Hollywood Studios is — at least so far as the American parks are concerned — the only Disney park without any of its opening-day attractions left open (The Indiana Jones Stuntacular opened a few months after the park did, in August, while Star Tours opened in December of that year), as the last one to close was The Great Movie Ride closing nearly a decade ago at this point. I suppose that’s what happens when a park opens with a now-astonishing seven total attractions.
After that, I moved to what I internally dubbed the “Star Wars Mini-Day”: Star Tours and Rise of the Resistance. While I would’ve loved to do Smuggler’s Run, I just couldn’t justify standing in that long of a line especially when it’s so isolated from everything else I was still planning on doing in the parks.
I got to knock out a couple of new (or, rather, new-to-me) sequences when I did Star Tours, so that’s always a win. I got to ride twice, too, almost consecutively; I knew I’d have enough time to do so between when I exited MuppetVision and my Lightning Lane for Rise of the Resistance (more on that later!). The first time I got to return to Kashyyk and go whizzing through the trees with the Wookies before jumping to Geonosis and observing the initial phases of construction of the Death Star long before it became the formidable weapon that destroyed Alderaan. The second trip threw my fellow guests and I into the middle of the Boonta Eve classic podrace on sandy Tattooine, chaotic as that always is, before plunging us into the waters of Naboo avoiding Qui-Gon Jinn’s infamous “bigger fish” all the way through the planet’s core before crashing into the Theed Hangar.
With my healthy dose of comedic R2-D2 and C3-P0 received, it was on to say hello to my other favorite droid…
This little guy!!! BB-8 has long been my favorite droid, and I’d absolutely ride Rise just to get to see him again even if it is only briefly. Rise is… well, I’d hate to say it’s my favorite ride in the park, but it’s definitely way up there. It’s hard for me to pick favorites in this park along with what’s still remaining to do… those rides being, of course, Tower of Terror (which I got a fantastic photo on) and Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster (which might be my worst ride photo in a long time). Additionally, as far as I can remember, riding Rise this time was the first time I’ve ever come up on the side facing the AT-AT that doesn’t have the big chin guns, and is instead a stormtrooper firing what looks like a heavy repeating blaster (think a laser Gatling gun) at you instead!
Tower of Terror was first today, as it was hot by now (3:30 PM in mid-May doesn’t seem like it should be all that bad, but oh, boy was I mistaken) and I was in need some of some good old-fashioned chill… s. (Pun’s a work in progress. Haunted Mansion host, I am not.) The line moves surprisingly quickly for that ride, and it never fails to catch me by surprise just how little standing time there usually is especially for a ride with a pre-show that transports you into the Twilight Zone. Plus, there are tons of fans scattered throughout the queue, even outside, making it the perfect ride to get a little bit of a breeze and some cooler air on a warm, muggy Florida day.
The author (blue hat, right side)’s ride photo from Tower of Terror, proudly throwing up his college logo like it’s a basketball game. He has no recollection of being behind a straw hat, but apparently it was there.
After that came Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster… and the wait that nearly killed my phone battery. Word of advice to any solo travelers to Disney: Bring an external battery for park days as due to the warmer weather (and inconsistent Wi-Fi) your phone battery will drain quicker than you might expect it to. Alas, mine had just been recalled due to fire risk (very much Not Good), so I didn’t have one with me on this trip. Right before I was due to be entering the pre-show to meet Aerosmith in their recording studio, the unthinkable happened… the ride went down. And it went down for a while. Ten minutes stretched into twenty and still, the cast members couldn’t tell us when — or even if — the ride would be back up. By this point, though, I was too far into the queue to back out now even if I wanted to (good single rider queue, though. Almost always shorter than standby!)… so I waited. And waited. And watched in dread as my phone battery slowly ticked lower… and lower… and lower… and then FINALLY the miraculous words of “Alright, we can start sending you through again!” were uttered by a cast member (and there was much rejoicing). From there, I got what may be the worst ride photo of me in this decade (I’m not kidding, it’s bad. Word of Advice: try not to close your eyes on that entire ride. The camera will inevitably be at the worst angle relative to you as soon as you blink.)
By that point, though, I was tired. I hadn’t slept well the night before (I’d been out grubbing it with some mates the night before on the cruise for our last night, doing karaoke amongst other things), and, just to kick me in the pants, my phone battery was almost gone. So, instead of pushing it out to try and make it through dinner and potentially even to Fantasmic!, it was time for me to bounce on day 1 of the trip.
It’s… a weird experience, though, going to the parks by yourself — and Hollywood Studios is definitely one of the toughest parks to have to go solo in. Magic Kingdom was much easier the next day, and I would imagine that EPCOT (especially during a festival season!) would also be significantly easier to do. I will admit I’m not sure about Animal Kingdom. AK is still almost a half-day park for me and my folks just because there’s not always a ton there that we do.
For anyone wondering, my mom did make it into the parks later in the trip, but I did love having this unique day on my own to explore Hollywood Studios.
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