MyMagic+

Do you look forward to more of Disney’s next generation advances like “MyMagic+”?

Tom Staggs, Walt Disney Parks and Resorts Chairman, wrote about MyMagic+ today on the Disney Parks blog:

“A major component of MyMagic+ is the new My Disney Experience website and mobile app, which gives guests planning their trip the latest information on all Walt Disney World Resort has to offer. We know that some people like to plan every aspect of their Disney vacation in advance while others like to plan very little, letting their day unfold spontaneously.”

“No matter where guests fall in that spectrum, My Disney Experience gives them the flexibility to plan as much or as little as they’d like to create the exact Disney experience they want. They can book dining and other experiences and reserve times for their favorite attractions, shows and more through an enhanced FastPass system, FastPass+. Once they arrive, they can use their smart phones to spontaneously change their plans in the moment, exploring our parks at their own pace and getting the most out of their visit.”

Articles:

“Disney unveils ‘MyMagic+,’ the centerpiece of its sweeping NextGen technology project” – Orlando Sentinel

“At Disney Parks, a Bracelet Meant to Build Loyalty (and Sales)” – New York Times

One bracelet to rule them all! ^_^ My preciousssss…

If you’ve ever read “Down & Out in the Magic Kingdom”, it seems we’re on our way to what Cory Doctorow wrote as science fiction years ago.

Here’s a thought: Guys! Guys! MyMagic+ can be abbreviated to MM+! (MickeyMouse) (MinnieMouse)

What are your thoughts on NextGen and MyMagic+ — leave a reply below or follow me (DisneyEcho) on Twitter and leave a comment there!

Still Smokin’ After The Fire At The Shed

A beloved restaurant and bar along the Mississippi Gulf Coast, known for its award-winning barbeque, burned to the ground on February 12, 2012. But it lives on despite that.

The only portion of The Shed BBQ and Blues Joint left standing was the original, tiny shed building that owner Brad Orrison built from, as he said, “stuff that I found.” Today, even that shed is burned and unusable.

The Shed posted on its Facebook page: “SHEDHEDS! We WILL rebuild and we WILL start slingin some QUE! The Original Shed may be gone, but it’s alive and well in the hearts and bellies of everyone that walked through those doors over the last 10 years.”

And that is indeed true. We visited The Shed this weekend and saw the charred remains of the old buildings…

…as well as what has temporarily been built to replace it.

One version of their logo now features flames around the happy Shed pig.

Ironically, last year The Shed was featured on the Food Network’s “Best in Smoke” TV show.

There’s still smoke there now, but not so much from the blackened ruins as from the new makeshift kitchen where pork, beef, sausage and chicken are slow-cooked over a wood-burning fire.

As their official website now says, “The Shed BBQ & Blues Joint Ocean Springs is open—in fact we never stopped smokin! We just had a slight meltdown. The Shed has setup ‘tempanent’ ShedStyle for temporary and permanent facilities down by the bayou so come Get Fed! Our hours are from 11 am – 9 pm 7 days a week and we still have music on Friday and Saturday. Check out our YouTube Channel or our Facebook page to keep up to date. We will see you soon!”

Yep, blues music still plays through the speakers, the stage for the live music is now relocated at the old boat ramp on the bayou,…

…the beer is nice and cold, and the BBQ is as good as ever.

It all tasted and felt just as good to be there as the other times we enjoyed The Shed, when we took the pictures below:

Watch this YouTube video to take a tour of The Shed.

Luckily, it’s still a great time to get fed at The Shed!

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The Land of Disney

This is a parody of adventure movie trailers. It was shot on iPhone at Disneyland in Anaheim, California and edited in iMovie. Enjoy it on YouTube or in higher quality on Vimeo.

New Official Disney Parks iPhone App Features Augmented Reality And Official Wait Times

Disney’s first official iPhone park app is available now for free in the Apple App Store. It looks great, is easy to navigate, and is the first Disney parks app to show official wait times for attractions and — get this — augmented reality using geolocation and your iPhone camera (more on that later).

The only trouble with the app is . . .

Would you pay $4.99 for a cupcake at Disney?

Yummmmm! Designer cupcakes now coming to a store in Downtown Disney at Anaheim CA (The Disneyland Downtown Disney, not the WDW Downtown Disney.)

At $4.95 each cupcake, Orange Co. CA Register says that price point is $1.50 higher than formerly most expensive in Orange county, CA.

Your thoughts? Check the link then reply!

The Cupcake Store kiosk is located in front of the AMC Theatres and Compass Books and Cafe, not far from the Disneyland Hotel.

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Disneyland PeopleMover, Innoventions replacement, Tomorrowland revamp, Frontierland expansion approved? Here’s why

The Astro Orbiter in its current location, seen here from inside the Plaza Inn restaurant, doesn't blend well with that area's turn-of-the-century theming and also clogs the entrance to Tomorrowland from the Hub (Disneyland's Central Plaza).

The buzz from Disneyland insiders is that the Suits in charge there know they need to increase the number of attractions in order to deal with that park’s crowded conditions.

It’s a great, big, beautiful Tomorrowland!

Because of that, rumor has it that Disney Imagineering projects have been approved to revamp Tomorrowland — including moving the Astro Orbiter out of that land’s crowded Central Plaza walkway and returning them back to the old Rocket Jets location, flying high over the heart of Tomorrowland with, get this, a new PeopleMover below it as well as a replacement for Innoventions in the old Carousel Theater/America Sings building.

I’d love to see all of that happen as well as a new attraction in that interesting building (hopefully utilizing its unique rotating ring section). It is way past time to evict the Elias family out of their Innoventions Dream Home on 360 Tomorrowland Way. They can continue celebrating their son’s “amazing” soccer goal elsewhere… or move with your lives on as you move out, Elias family. You’ve been hosting a party celebrating Robbie’s soccer goal since 1998. Is he even still living at home after all that time?

Add to the expansion project mix that Disneyland Resort president George Kalogridis at D23′s Destination D mini-expo admitted they “hear us” about bringing the PeopleMover back, so plans have been created to make that possible. He went on to explain what Disney has to do to make the attraction comply with today’s safety standards (adding a walkway alongside the track with railings and emergency exit staircases, etc.). Changes made to the park’s Alice in Wonderland attraction immediately come to mind.

The PeopleMover was a very high-capacity, short line, efficient attraction that in and of itself would help to alleviate Disneyland’s Guest overcrowding problem. Plus, they could bring back the TRON SuperSpeed Tunnel section to the PeopleMover — synergy with TRON Legacy! Having the 3,000 Guest per hour capacity of the PeopleMover back will be a great start to lessen Disneyland’s overcrowding.

Frontierland Expansion

But that’s not all. Word is that Frontierland will be expanded with at least one new attraction, an E-Ticket (i.e., a super attraction).

Before Frontierland can be expanded, though, room needs to be created for that behind the berm. That’s why Disney is looking into where offsite — but nearby — they can move the backstage Circle D Ranch horse stables (then uses trailers to transport the park’s horses to/from the park) to open up room behind the Festival Arena to expand Frontierland with a new E-Ticket attraction which might be themed to Johnny Depp’s upcoming “Lone Ranger” movie.

Good! Big Thunder Ranch can certainly use something more exciting than a log cabin and a petting zoo. Big Thunder Trail can be much more than a backdoor path to Fantasyland behind Big Tbunder Mountain.

I hope all of these rumored changes are officially announced soon and come to pass. With these additions to Disneyland — along with the improvements at Disney California Adventure — my opinion is that the Disneyland Resort will be better than ever. Reply with your thoughts about this!

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The food of Goofy’s Kitchen on Wed., July 30, 2008

The Characters aren’t the only thing that is great at Goofy’s Kitchen. The food served at breakfast is outstanding!

I guess Goofy was in his kitchen making more Goofyroni pasta.

Apple pie

The peach cobbler with the “Hidden” Mickeys tasted great!

Bread pudding

My favorite: creme brulet French toast.

Getting Started at Goofy’s Kitchen Wed., July 30, 2008

Character breakfast at Goofy’s Kitchen at the Disneyland Hotel with a group hug from Pluto, The Chef!

Last night Rich and 12-year old son were tired and achy and went on to the room from Disneyland. As I left Disneyland’s turnstyles after “Wishes” I think I saw, entering, Geraldo Rivera of FOX News Channel entering for some late night fun with his family. I’m fairly certain it was him, his hair us salt and pepper greying, certain type of haircut and nose profile. More “magic” to see a celeb there, but i’d rather it was Johnny Depp!

Penny wishes will be made at Noon PDT, 2 pm Central, 3 pm Eastern or earlier. For all Disney Echo members and those they know and for anyone’s special wishes I hope they come true!

Time for breakfast!

  

 

  

Above, pictures of us with Pluto, taken by the Disney photographer with our iPhones. To the left, the same pose using the photographer’s camera, as it looks in the frame. We liked it so much we bought it. We also had Disney add it to our Disney PhotoPass PhotoCD.

Goofy was there, of course, with plenty of his Character friends — many of whom were different than we saw last time.

 

Goofy surprised Michael, looking very relaxed leaning on the back of the booth.

 

I tried not to look too Goofy!

 

 

Mulan posed with us, too.

 

Baloo looks like he’s about to pounce on Michael — or was that his food?

 

Both Chip and Dale were there.

   

Alive was charming with her British accent.

 

Here’s Goofy, re-entering after a break, coming from a Cast Member area.

 

Oops! Goofy made alot of noise dropping all those pots and pans. He was making his specialty: a mess!

The commotion attracted attention, and soon kids were dancing with Goofy and his pals.

 

 

Not everything was perfect at Goofy’s Kitchen, however. The booth we were assigned to needs to have obvious holes in the padded seat and back fixed.

 

 

Other parts of Goofy’s Kitchen looked great!

 

 

There’s even a semi-private dining area.

Fine art is on the walls:

 

 

Outside, major changes were being made to the area seen from inside Goofy’s Kitchen — so major that construction walls were put up to hide most of the work from view.

Disneyland Dream Suite Winners: If it’s Tuesday, it must be Monday’s winners

The Tuman family: They stayed in the Disney Dream Suite Monday night.

They were staying at a relative’s house (the home of the young man in the group) visiting, and went to Disneyland on Monday. The older man there in the picture was picked to win, so they went back to the house, packed up things to stay overnight, and returned to Disneyland. They all were at the Plaza Inn being treated to breakfast with Minnie and her friends the morning after staying in the Disneyland Dream Suite, and that’s where we met them and heard how it all happened. The man had just come out of Fantasyland attraction around 9 am when he was picked by the Dream Patrol Cast Members.

Cast Member Ben is making sure their morning is going well.

To Wine Country Trattoria from Paradise Pier on Monday night, 7/28

After seeing Paradise Pier, we headed towards the Golden Vine Winery for our dinner reservations at Wine Country Trattoria.

We were walking this way, as these unknown people were also doing. Look how uncrowded the park is as the sun is going down!

We walked past the Golden Dreams theater, with the recommendation from Lisa to see the attraction sometime that week, so we did another day (and we enjoyed it).

We only saw this much of the Pacific Wharf-themed part of DCA, but Lisa told us about the Boudin Sourdough Bread Baker Tour and the beer wagon/microbrewery on the other side of these buildings.

Dinner at Wine Country Trattoria

From Carol: Foodies will want to dine at the Vineyard Room upstairs, but know they just lost their chef to Napa Rose at the Grand Californian. Our waiter was Mike who was soooooooo knowledgeable about wines and food pairings, he’ll make a good sommelier someday. They have an outdoor counter service of only wine tastings. And you can book VIP priority seating outside to dine, enjoy fine wines, and watch Electrical Parade. It’ll cost you to do that, though.

See Deb Wills AllEarsNet.com Disneyland/DCA section for menus.

Wine Tastings at Wine Country Trattoria,
seen before we entered with Lisa / Jiminy for dinner.

Dessert: Fresh Orange Sorbet

Taken by Carol Koster of Rich Koster’s dessert, served inside a frozen orange while watching Disney’s Electrical Parade while eating dinner with Lisa at Disney’s California Adventure Monday night.

After the very-enjoyable, leisurely dinner with Lisa (the way fine dinners are supposed to be), served by the Trattoria’s excellent staff, we headed back to Condor Flats to use our FastPass for Soarin Over California… although we thought the park was staying open another hour later than it was, but it wasn’t (so our FastPasses were wasted).

We headed out of Disney’s California Adventure and walked through Downtown Disney towards the Disneyland Hotel.