Week Forty: Six Day Workweek, Devil's Den, and Hoop Dee Doo Musical Revue

October 23rd (Monday): I worked at the mine from 11am to 11 pm and it was pretty good! I had a few tough groups while at grouper and station assist (the positions that put people into their rows) but aside from that, positions weren't bad. I had a little boy ask if I wanted a hug (always yes) which was cute, and had some really cute families come through FastPass. I was out there at the end of the night and had a little more leniency to let families through, so I let a little girl and her mom ride who had tried to go ride Soarin' only to find out the little girl was a hair too small. They came back around and the little girl gave me a "princess hug" which was ADORABLE. Also it's a lot harder to say no to people when it's late at night and you're sick of getting yelled at haha.

October 24th (Tuesday): I only had one day off this week (the Sunday - Saturday work week), and that happened to be on Tuesday. I got up early and went to Devil's Den with Martia and some circus friends! Devil's Den is an awesome underground spring you can snorkel/scuba dive in about two hours north/northwest (I think) of Orlando.

So we did that then stopped at Olive Garden on the way home for lunch, and ended our evening at Michaelene's house playing games and watching Dance Moms.

October 25th (Wednesday): I was at the mine from noon to 8:30pm, DREAM SHIFT. It started out good, then was kind of bad, then ended good. In the middle of my shift I was grouping and was being watched by my coordinator who told me every time I did something wrong, so that was stressful and made me feel like an idiot but it all turned around after that! AND IT WAS COOL ENOUGH I GOT TO WEAR MY JACKET. Also we had this older man on the train who was SUPER cranky. He "asked" me to pop his lap bar ("hey release my lap bar so I can switch with my kid") and switched seats with this small child. He then starts to turn so that his legs wouldn't just be under his own lap bar, and my coworker says "actually sir, your knees have to be under the same lap bar" and this guy goes "well why didn't you tell me that before I switched seats, that would have been more useful to know" and rolls his eyes. He gets his lap bar down but looks EXTREMELY uncomfortable so I ask him "sir, are you sure you'll be alright for the two and a half minute ride?" and he just goes "I'll be fine just leave me alone" LIKE OKAY SIR. Super rude, but whatever. My coord saw the whole thing go down and was like you guys did everything you were supposed to.

October 26th (Thursday): I had a 9:15am doctor's appointment in the morning for some chronic ankle pain that's been flaring up (I have to go get an MRI next Monday) and went to Animal Kingdom between the doctor and work. My friend, Katy, from my first program (the one we stayed with on our road trip down to Disney in Louisville) and her family were here for a few days so I met up with them in the park! We rode the Kilimanjaro Safari together and basically just walked around for an hour, then I saw Festival of the Lion King by myself and got lunch :)

I had a treat shift from 6:30pm to 12:30am! Last one of the season for me. It was a really fun treat shift, my mine train coworker Remy and I worked the exit candy barrels with a Mermaid ICP from New Zealand and a merchandise ICP from Australia. We had people taking photos with us, and we were in a bunch of live streams and YouTube videos so that was super fun!! I had a lot more fun this treat shift, people were just nicer and less greedy than last time.

October 27th (Friday): I worked at the mine from 9am - 5:30pm and I was SO tired. It was an 8.5 hour turnaround from the night before, so I felt exhausted for my shift. It was a great shift though, I got to pull tower TWICE (you get to sit in this position and not talk to people) and it wasn't too busy. We had a TEN minute wait (yes, a true ten) at 5pm!! INSANE! Also I had some guests in FP that didn't have FP's but were giving me so much trouble I just let them through and told them "next time....blah blah blah". Well the next party in line was a VIP tour group that had seen me getting low key harassed and just come up and say "we appreciate you Marin" and I really appreciated THEM. We don't get a lot of appreciation, so thank you tour group! After work I changed and went into MK to meet up with Katy and her family again. We rode Barnstormer, Mine Train, and Peter Pan, and got Sleep Hollow waffles for a snack/dinner.

October 28th (Saturday): I was supposed to be at the mine from 9:15am - 5:45pm but got an ER to go home at 4:15pm instead! Work was nuts, we were posting 160 minutes as a wait time for a couple of hours, so it was a true 160 minute wait. FP was INSANE, my leader was actually out front helping us because so many people were there and we were getting backed up and no one in the FP line had valid FP's and it was stressful. But on the bright side it was cold enough to wear my jacket at work :) AND after work I got to go to Hoop Dee Doo Musical Revue (restaurant/dinner show at Fort Wilderness) with Jenna and Kasia! Small world, we ran into one of our leaders Katie, exiting her show! She did the 6:15pm and we did the 8:30pm. Hoop is super fun, it's an all you can eat, family style restaurant that has bottomless sangria/beer/wine/soft drinks, salad, cornbread, mashed potatoes, corn, beans, fried chicken, BBQ ribs, man and cheese (by request), and DELICIOUS strawberry shortcake for dessert. In between courses there are six actors/actresses who sing and dance and are super fun. They were a mix of a performer and a stand-up comedian. Cast Members get 50% off, so it cost $37 per person including tip, and we were seated on the second story balcony. Also I got a birthday shoutout so that was fun! I would definitely recommend it, it's super fun and well worth the cast discount. The food isn't incredible by any means, but it's worth a trip :)

October 29th (Sunday): I was off today :) YAY!! I went to Epcot in the morning/afternoon with Martia and we rode Living With the Land and Spaceship Earth. Living With the Land had a FORTY MINUTE WAIT. When is the last time you saw that?! Luckily we had FP's for both :) We also walked the World Showcase (I walked it twice) and got some lunch and snacks. Food & Wine ends in two weeks, so you gotta take advantage of it now! I got home around 5pm and now I'm just relaxing and keeping up on the Seahawks game. Go Hawks!!

I've got a pretty easy two weeks coming up then MY FAMILY COMES TO VISIT AND I CAN'T WAIT!!!! The only bummer is that I have to work eight days in a row, but that's okay :) Also I got back to the normal evening/closing hours. The mid shifts were fun while they lasted :')

Driving Your Car VS. Taking the Bus (One Program With a Car and One Program Without)

I haven't done a blog post unrelated to my daily life in AGES so I decided to do one on having a car versus relying on the bus system. I feel like I have a really good grasp of this since I did a full program (Fall 2014) without a car, as well as January - March of my spring program, and have had a car from March - now (Spring/Summer/Fall 2017). 

First off, let's start with the busses. There is a bus to take you to every location you might need to go on Disney property, plus a bus that goes to Walmart, Publix (a grocery chain down here), the post office, and the Florida Mall twice a week. They will also have special events you can pay for once in a while to go to the beach, a baseball/football/soccer game, Universal Studios, Busch Gardens, the Asian Market, or some other Florida spots. Most of these busses include multiple stops, but it will always run the same route. I'll use the A and B routes as examples since I use those the most. The A bus will start at the Commons, then go to Chatham, then Vista, then Wilderness Lodge, then the Contemporary, and finally MK West Clock. Side note, West Clock is where working CM's go to get to Magic Kingdom for work, and you can't get to MK as a guest this way. A full trip lasts roughly an hour, but that's if you got on at the Commons and got off at the Commons, which is dumb. For me, it takes about 45 minutes to get to West Clock from Chatham, and about 30 minutes to get home. For a comparison, it's a 20-25 minute drive by car. So if I take the bus I generally leave the apartment an hour or an hour fifteen before my scheduled shift, and I'll leave 45 minutes early if I'm driving.

All the busses are set up pretty similarly, I think they're all roughly 45 minutes on the long leg, and 30 on the short. Epcot is the exception because that route only stops at Epcot and is shorter as a result. Some busses only have pickup/drop-offs by request only which can lengthen/shorten a bus ride. For the most part, the busses are on time +/- a couple minutes, and if they are late enough that you're late to a shift your leader will normally take off the half point you'll get on your record for being late. The worst experiences I've had with the busses always involve coming home from work, since West Clock is the last stop before housing. What happens is CP's playing in the park for the day will get on at one of the MK resorts (Contemporary or Polynesian, so A or B bus), and when the bus get to us there's either only room to stand because the seats are taken, or on busy nights (AKA the night after the new CP's have gone to Traditions) the bus can only take a couple of us who just got off work and the rest of us have to wait another 20 minutes for another bus which SUCKS. That's mostly if you get off work just after fireworks, between 9:45pm - 10:30pm. Another crappy situation is when there are party nights and you get off around the fireworks, because they use special perimeter fireworks on those nights and have to close off two of the three roads that lead to West Clock. When that happens they send one special express bus that comes once every 45 minutes to an hour since the normal route can't come get us. So those nights I've waited for up to an hour and half for a bus to go home, which is awful.

When it comes to having a car down here, you have much more freedom, but you will also spend much more money. You have to pay insurance, gas, tolls, parking, and whatever activities your car takes you to. Right now gas is roughly $2.32/gallon for the cheap stuff and no one ever pays you for gas haha. The cost of a parking permit for housing is I believe $75 per session, so I had to pay another fee in the fall when I extended my program. The second fee is discounted, but it's still over $100 I had to pay (I know, nothing compared to college campuses!). I think the biggest advantage of having a car is grocery shopping, and getting outside the Orlando bubble. I have done SO many more things on this program than my first, mostly because I now have the freedom to go wherever, whenever.

I think that I would only bring a car if you're staying longer than a single fall/spring program or if you live relatively close to Florida. The busses are really convenient and FREE and take you most places, and chances are you'll make at least one car friend to adventure with. I'm from Seattle and definitely wouldn't have brought my car if I had only planned on being here for a spring program. I went in knowing I would be here for a year, so I brought my car and I think I've gotten my money's worth. I drive roughly four times a week, and bus three times a week, depending on my schedule. People complain SO much about the busses, but as someone who has taken a LOT of busses, I have only been late to work ONE time (back in 2014) because of the busses. There have been a handful of times after work where I've not made it on a bus due to capacity, but it is what it is. 

I think the biggest components you need to look at when deciding whether or not to bring your car down are these:

1. Can you afford it? You'll be making barely above minimum wage and if you're one of those people who know you'll drive everyday, can you afford gas, insurance, tolls, and parking?
2. Will it be worth the drive/shipment down to Florida and back up? It cost me roughly $500 to drive from Denver to Orlando with food and gas, and $1,000 to ship me car between Seattle and Orlando (one way). That's a lot of time and/or money when alternatively you could fly for $300 and take the busses for free. 
3. How much do you want to do outside of Orlando? I knew going into my second program I wanted to go to the Florida Keys, go to the beach more, check out some Florida Springs, and buy a Universal annual pass, none of which the CP bus regularly goes to. If you just want to soak up Disney, is a car really worth it when the busses go everywhere you want to go?
4. How much stuff do you need down in Florida? If you plan on moving down here or staying here for a while, you might have more stuff and driving your car could be better than flying with what you can fit and paying to ship what you can't.
5. Are you comfortable city driving? Florida is one of the most dangerous states to drive in, and if you're not comfortable driving in the city, surrounded by confused foreigners (both domestic and international), crazy taxi drivers, and angry locals, then it might not be worth it to have a car down in Florida. 
6. If you picked your roommates out ahead of time, will any of them have cars? If so then you can offer gas money and go on an adventure or two without having to bring your car down.

That's pretty much what I've got. I personally enjoy using both my car and the busses, but would stick to busses if I was only down here for four or five months. Some people's parents pay for gas and insurance and shipment/the drive down so that's an easier decision but if you're paying for everything, it's a big financial decision. Everyone is different when it comes to transportation but hopefully I gave some clarity to those of you looking for advice on taking/leaving your car!! 

Week Thirty-Nine: Car Problems and LOTS of Mine Train!!

October 16th (Monday): I was off and had a pretty chill day. I spent the afternoon at Disney Springs so I could use up my Starbucks birthday reward (you can redeem at Disney Springs but not at the park Starbucks!), and also did some shopping. I bought my dad his birthday gift (OUR 40% DISCOUNT JUST KICKED IN YASSSSS), bought myself a few things from Sephora, and also bought myself some bath bombs from Lush. Then I got lunch at Earl of Sandwich and headed home. At home I made some homemade Guinness beef stew and mashed potatoes, which all turned out great.

October 17th (Tuesday): I was at the Mine Train from 3:45pm - 12:15am. It was a pretty good shift, I got to remove a train from the track for the first time since training which was exciting. On the downside, Pirates went down (AGAIN) and told everyone they could use their FP's at the Mine since Pirates wasn't going to come back up at all that day. UGH. So that sucked because then we had a giant FP line. Our coords told us to honor their FP's since it's not the guest's fault that the Pirates CM's gave them the wrong information, so we did, but it sent our FP line out the door and around the corner. Which is why other attractions aren't supposed to send guests to us as a form of guest recovery. But it's fine, oh well, the rest of the day went well.

October 18th (Wednesday): I was off again and went to the Florida Mall with my roomie, Martia. We went to Bath & Bodyworks, Yankee Candle (always), Sephora, a few clothing shops, and went to the food court for lunch. After shopping we went home and a few hours later I took my car in to the Toyota dealer to get my window looked at. Well, 1.5 hours later I find out I have a broken window and have to go back on Friday to replace it. Joy. Not the most fun way to spend a day off ;)

October 19th (Thursday): I worked at Mine Train from 7:30am - 4pm and had some REALLY cute kids. I had one little boy reach his hand out to me while he was sitting in his row on the Mine Train (I think he was showing me his wristband), so I go up to him and am like "oh hey, are you giving me a fist bump?" and he gave a little fist bump with a little explosion at the end. SO CUTE. His dad was dying laughing. We also had a mom who waited until her and her daughter were seated in the Mine car before asking to throw out her kid's lollipop. So she HANDS this half-eaten thing to my coworker as if he should go throw it away and my coworker just chucks it into the track hahahaha. He's been here since the Mine opened so he gets away with stuff like that. Also, we had a really nice, cool morning but it heated up pretty quick into a nasty hot afternoon. PLEASE JUST GIVE US THE 60'S AND 70'S.

October 20th (Friday): I had to take my car in to get fixed at 9am, and since it was a three-hour job, Martia was kind enough to come pick me up and we went and got massages! So that was really nice :) After I got my car back I went home to change and eat then drove to work. I worked at Mine from 2:45pm - 11:45pm and it was really good!! I KILLED station assist, which is the person at Mine who's like "party of six? Rows 1, 2, and 3" so that felt good. It's a REALLY fast-paced position and most people hate it, so it feels really nice when you do it well. Also Pirates went down again and we got guests coming to us from them (insert huge eye-roll here). It's tough because you don't know when guests are lying or telling the truth about their paper FP's they got since they were close to the front of the ride/on the ride when the ride broke down. The FP's literally say "EXCLUDES SEVEN DWARFS MINE TRAIN AND PETER PAN'S FLIGHT" but people come up and are like "they said we could use it here because......." and that's a big pain. Because you want to accommodate the guest if they were given the wrong information, but normally the guests just weren't listening close enough or the CM didn't explain it well enough. So we end up accommodating a lot of that and have a terrible FP backup, which then causes our standby line to slow down and all of a sudden these guests that saw us posting a 60-minute wait are now waiting 80 minutes and getting mad. It's a domino effect and it sucks.

October 21st (Saturday): I had a circus shift and worked 2:30pm - 11pm and it was slow when I got there since that was during the parade, then it got pretty busy, then calmed down again. But we had a LOT of guests in the park today. Close in numbers to what we had on the 4th of July! Dumbo A was a big pain in the butt like always and went down a few times for unusual noise. I was there for one of them, and maintenance is so used to us calling that they are close enough they can be over in less than five minutes haha. It only took us seven minutes to power down, power up, cycle, and get approval to continue loading guests. If that happened on a rollercoaster it would take at LEAST 45 minutes until guests could be loaded again. Also we had a BUNCH of issues with little kids riding without parents, or parties splitting up, and it was so inefficient. That's a mix of error on the CM telling people how many Dumbos their party will get, and parties not listening. Shockingly, all that bad stuff aside, I had AWESOME guest interactions!! Lots of families that were willing to chat with me and share their highlights of the day, and super cute kids. So that was really nice. OH and we had really nice and cool weather. Also, funny story, I had a gentleman ask me if Cirque du Soleil was by Dumbo. No sir, that would be in Disney Springs.

October 22nd (Sunday): I started off the day with a Fantasyland East CP event hosted by one of our leaders, where we basically got paid to eat pizza and chips and listen to our leader from 12:45pm - 2pm. GREAT way to start my day. Then I was supposed to be in rotation at Mine from 2pm - 7:30pm (BABY BABY SHIFT) but my coord asked if I wanted to go home early (the answer is always yes) and sent me home at 5:15pm instead! FANTASTIC DAY. Work itself was great, I pulled all easy positions! Side note, the Jonas Brothers were in the park today! They rode before I started work, but that's pretty neat. Also we had to call security on two different parties, I don't know what one the parties did but the other were two boy/men (maybe in their 20's?) who were making disgusting and inappropriate comments to a 13-year old girl in front of her mom. Naturally mom freaked and security was called. I don't know how everything turned out, but there was yelling, and management got involved.

And that was my week!! Insane that we're already at the end of October. WHERE HAS TIME GONE. Also the next two weeks I don't have a since circus shift so that's weird. BUT THE WEATHER IS SUPPOSED TO COOL DOWN PRAAAAIIIIIIIISSSSSEEEE.

Week Thirty-Eight: Celebrating My BIRTHDAY!

October 9th (Monday): My roommate Martia and I were both off, so we spent a full day in the parks!! We started off at Kona Cafe for breakfast in the Polynesian, and I got the Samoan. It was basically eggs benedict with hash instead of an english muffin. Then we went to Magic Kingdom and rode Buzz Lightyear, PeopleMover, Mine Train, Speedway, and did Philharmagic. Martia and never done Speedway, PeopleMover, Philhar, or Mine Train, so it was a day for trying new things! Then we went to Animal Kingdom and rode Expedition Everest and Kali River Rapids (for the first time ever!). It was RIDICULOUSLY hot. After DAK we found a boba place and got bubble tea! It's called Quickly, and it's a delicious chain restaurant.

October 10th (Tuesday): I worked at the Mine Train from 11:15am - 12:15am, so it was a LONG day. Overall it was a good shift, and I pulled a lot of different positions. I pulled grouper twice, a position I hadn't picked up since training, but it went pretty well!!

October 11th (Wednesday): Okay talk about the busiest I've EVER seen Magic Kingdom at night (since late January anyway). We had a 35-minute wait at Barn at 8:30pm!!! It's almost always a walk-on at 8:30pm. We also had a solid 30-minute wait for Dumbo at that time which was just so weird. SO BUSY. Apparently a lot of people who rescheduled because of Irma picked this week to reschedule? Also Wednesdays are Extra Magic Hour nights, but still. So busy. Our FastPass line was down to greeter for a solid hour at Barn. Unfortunately one side of Dumbo kept going down which was a HUGE pain, but I surprisingly had a lot of awesome guests to chat with. Most notably, a trio of older men who were really fun to talk to. I was at the circus from 2:45pm - 1:15am.

October 12th (Thursday): I had a late 5pm - 11:15pm shift. We were back to a nice average/slow day and I was a Barn pretty much the entire shift. Before work I made muffins and did laundry, super thrilling. But work was pretty good! Much better than the day before.

October 13th (Friday): I worked from 9:15am - 8pm and it was a great shift. I pulled ringmaster a few times, and a task, so that's always fun. And around 6:30pm I got to go do area clear, which is checking to make sure people in the park have wristbands for the party. Mostly we just walk in a line, but we do have to turn around a few of the guests who didn't pay for the Halloween Party.

October 14th (Saturday): I was off because IT WAS MY BIRTHDAY!!! Yay!!! I spent the afternoon in Animal Kingdom (my favorite park) with Michaelene, and we got to ride Dinosaur, Everest, Kilimanjaro Safari, and Primeval Whirl. And of course we saw Festival of the Lion King. For lunch we went to Restaurant-o-saurus for kids chicken nuggets BUT they make you get yogurt as a side now!!! So no double fries :'( So Michaelene and I split an adult chicken nugg instead. But that was sad. We also ran into our old circus coworker who is now DAK photopass!

After DAK we went back to Michaelene's house and she did my makeup all pretty, and we met Jenna at Boma for dinner!! SO GOOD. It was also nice to dress up for once.

October 15th (Sunday): I had a nice and easy 2:30pm - 8:45pm at the Mine Train and it was an easy day. The only bad part was that Pirates of the Caribbean went down and their Cast Members told everyone they could use their recovery FP's at Mine Train. Which you can't, the screen will flash blue because those types of FP's exclude Mine Train and Peter Pan. Well since literally every guest had been given the wrong information and came straight for the Mine, our coordinator had us let them all through. And that made our FP line SUPER long. But oh well, it's fine.

Week Thirty-Seven: First Mine Train Solo Shift & A BUSY Week

October 2nd (Monday): I was lucky enough to get a three-day weekend, so I wrapped that up with Monday! I went to Blizzard Beach with two of my roommates and we did just about everything but the body slides. So tat was a lot of fun, and nice and relaxing. After Blizzard we went to Cast Connections (a discount Disney store for Cast Members) and I bought my sister a birthday gift (shhhh, it's a secret). Then we headed off to Epcot where we did a lot of eating and drinking, and rode Soarin'!

October 3rd (Tuesday): I was at the circus from 10:15am - 9:45pm (but was supposed to be there until 11:15pm, I GOT AN ER FOR ONCE IN MY LIFE!!!!!!). It was a great day of work. We had nice cool (ish) weather with a breeze, and lots of awesome guests. I got to talk with a Swedish family who had a Maren in their family, so really similar name to mine. That was a fun connection. I also had a SUPER cute kid at Barn who got off the ride and was so excited that she runs up to me for a high five. Well I wasn't fast enough with my high five and she was so excited that she just gave me a hug instead. Really adorable, made my day.

October 4th (Wednesday): I worked in the circus from 10am - 8:30pm and it was BUSY. I got to work a nice mix of positions which was nice, but I was stuck at ringmaster when one of the Dumbos broke, and since we were including the play area in our line, a lot of people were inside the tent. Well it sucks when that happens because we start calling people back into line REALLY slowly (due to operating out of one Dumbo instead of two) and people are now waiting in the play area almost twice as long as they were told. Not fun to deal with. Also, we were using the crash kit for a lot of the day (our backup system using paper cards) because our pagers were broken. So basically Dumbo was broken all day.

October 5th (Thursday): I was in the circus from 5:45pm - 12:45am and I GOT TO SEE CASSIE!!!! Cassie is one of my really good spring CP friends who went back to school after her program ended, but she came back to visit this weekend!! She is one of the girls I went to the Florida Keys with. AWESOME to see her again, she was at MK for the Halloween party, so she came and saw me at Dumbo :) Which went down AGAIN. Like always. Luckily it was pretty slow. We also had a new CP accidentally emergency stop Barn instead of just stopping the plane in the station (you have to power down and power back up when that happens which takes forever), so we had to go down for an hour or so. Poor girl, she felt so bad.

October 6th (Friday): I was at the mine from 1:15pm - 12:15am and it was my first shift out of training!! I had a pretty good day, I started off with all easy positions, then picked up some harder ones as the shift went on. We went down for weather for an hour or so, and we went back up I had the pleasure (sarcasm here) of being at merge. Merge is the position that merges together FastPass and standby, and after any kind of downtime (when the ride is down, generally for weather or maintenance) there is a GIANT FP line. And since FP gets first priority, standby takes ages to move. Which makes people really mad. So that was fun to deal with, but oh well. Overall a good shift!

October 7th (Saturday): I was supposed to be in the circus from 10:45am - 10:45pm but called in sick. I changed my medicine brand and think my body just reacted weird because I was nauseous with a pretty bad headache. I slept until NOON so I guess I needed it? Well I spent the day lounging and relaxing and trying to calm down my body haha.

October 8th (Sunday): I worked in the circus from noon to 8:30pm (DREAM SHIFT) and it was SO BUSY. We were posting an hour wait at both Barn and Dumbo and things were nuts. Also it was disgustingly hot with no breeze so everyone was sweaty and cranky. We were almost at park capacity so I guess some people really do recognize Colombus Day and go places for that weekend? Who knew? It was an ADVENTURE at Barn, I started off at grouper where I had a family with a kid too short to ride that was angry they waited in that line to be told "no" (yes, valid reason to be angry, mistakes happen). So I had to deal with that, but luckily my coordinator was up there and could give them some free FP's, and I let them do a rider switch in the station. So I think it ended up okay, but that was pretty crappy. Then I rotated to Barn main panel (the person who pushes the button to lock lap bars and send the plane and stuff) and got the call that we went down for weather. So that was also fun. And I ended my day at merge, AGAIN, right after we went 102 for weather. So another half hour of a giant FP line and angry standby guests. So fun.

It's been a stressful week, but hopefully things will get better as the weather cools down! I'm REALLY looking forward to some cooler days :)

Week Thirty-Six: Wild Africa Trek & SO MANY PHOTOS

There are going to be lots of photos in this post so brace yourselves.

September 25th (Monday): I worked a 3:45pm - 9:45pm circus shift and it was really good!! I had a lot of fun guests, and a dance party with my coworker Jasmine because we were so bored at Dumbo Fastpass and greeter. CUTEST STORY THOUGH: I was closing the play tent and this little girl goes "hello!!" so I went over to go chat with her, and note that she was probably four or five years old. The first thing she does is show me her earrings so I said something like that "wow, so you're like a big girl now, right??" and she goes "YEP! I'm also wearing underwear!!" and proceeds to lift up her dress and show me. Her mom couldn't stop laughing but was also mildly mortified hahahaha. So anyway I turn to my coworker Katie and was like "Katie, she has earrings AND underwear!" and it was adorable. Made my day.

September 26th (Tuesday): I trained at the mine train from 5:45am - 12:15pm, so exactly 8 hours after I got off my closing circus shift. My alarm didn't go off in the morning but LUCKILY I happened to wake up and check the time. Apparently sometimes the push notifications (notifications that turn up on your lock screen of your phone) will get stacked in front of your alarm, so the alarm won't go off until you unlock your phone and acknowledge the push notifications. So anyway, I had an instagram live notification that I think was blocking my alarm, but both alarms went off as soon as I unlocked my phone (even though it was 20 minutes after they were supposed to go off). At work we opened tower, so the position with all the camera and the big panel and there's a LOT to do. So we opened that, took over a few positions, read a lot, and were already done at 12:15! We took over wheelchair assist at one point, and that person helps guests with wheelchairs to load the train if they need assistance, and parks the wheelchair/scooter/ECV/stroller. Normally you'll have a couple parked but we had NINE which is insane. It all started with a party of ten that had three, then they just kept rolling in after that. So that was crazy.

After work I went to Animal Kingdom with Jenna and we did Wild Africa Trek!!! SO AMAZING!! We had a special cast discount for the month of September which was $50 + 50% off the normal price, about $75-80 instead of $200. WAT is a three-hour tour that includes some walking (think nature walk rather than hike), being driven around in a special safari truck, and a snack on the savanna. At the very beginning they gave us name tags and water bottles (to keep forever!) and fit us in our harnesses. We were only allowed to take items that fit in the vest pockets, or items that were attached to us. So no bags allowed, but I took my DSLR camera, my GoPro, and an extra battery. Jenna took her phone and some chapstick. We walked through Gorilla Falls until we got to the backstage trail entrance, then walked up to the hippo exhibit! We got to strap in and stand above the hippos, watching the animal caretaker feed the hippo lettuce and watermelon!

Right after the hippos we crossed a rope bridge over hippos territory, then another rope bridge over crocodile territory.

We got to do the same thing with the crocs that we did with the hippos, and got strapped to a cable line so we could safely check out the crocodiles!

After the crocs we got into our VIP safari truck and took a tour around the reserve, with longer stops for animals and in many cases, a closer up view than the normal safari!!

We stopped for lunch in the middle of the savanna with a FANTASTIC view, and got six little African-inspired snacks. They did have options for food allergies or vegetarians/vegans, so they were very accommodating. I am none of the above, so Jenna and I both got the standard which included a fruit salad with ginger/mint/honey, a chicken curry mango salad, some dried beef and prosciutto, shrimp, pita and hummus, and a salmon roll. They also had passionfruit/orange juice/guava juice mix which is DELICIOUS and we had like five servings. You get a 40-ish minute snack break.

Then we got back on the reserve and drove back out! We also got to donate (pre-paid for in the WAT cost) to a conservation group of our choice, so I chose elephants. Also please check out the shirt I wore (feat. kid's chicken nugget meal)

Overall it was an amazing experience and I would highly recommend it. We also saw Festival of the Lion King, rode Everest, and rode Na'vi River Journey where we ran into our old circus coordinator (she know coordinates at Pandora).

Jenna as a crocodile and me as a vulture.

September 27th (Wednesday): I had another opening training shift at the mine from 6:45am - 3:15pm. We opened tower again but there were tour groups coming in and out for like half an hour. Which was weird. This was a weird split shift day because we opened tower as a training group, but the rest of my shift was my assessment. So after opening I took my written test and we picked up every position so my assessor could see if I was competent. I passed! Yay! Also we went and met Pinnochio because they were doing a special cast event in the tunnels.

After work I went grocery shopping and made a delicious homemade strawberry guava lemonade.

September 28th (Thursday): I worked from 11:45am - 9:15pm in the circus and had a good shift!! The first two hours were actually spent in a meeting to go over our training, so six of us met with some leaders and we talked about what we did and didn't like! We were a part of a pilot training program (the first in WDW history!) so they wanted our feedback. So I actually worked the circus from 2:15 - 9:15. At work I had the cutest tiny little boy waving at me and blowing me kisses outside of Barn which was sooooo cute. Also I had a guest ask me if someone braided our hair for us, and if braids were required to work in the circus. Super funny, but we all just happen to prefer having braided hair for work. So that was a first. Also inspections came to our apartment and we passed.

September 29th (Friday): I worked a 3:45pm - 11pm circus shift and it was also a party night, so we had lots of guests dressed up in costume! Super fun. A little girl was dressed as Maleficent so I said something like "hello Maleficent!" and she kind of leans over and whispers "I'm a good Maleficent though". So that was cute. After work (I took the bus this day) we waited FOREVER for the bus, one girl had actually been waiting for TWO HOURS and FIVE busses skipped us. So a bunch of people called and complained. Sometimes this happens on party nights because they use perimeter fireworks and those kind of fireworks block the normal route. Super annoying though.

September 30th (Saturday): I was off! Yay! I went to Epcot in the afternoon with Jenna, then we popped over to Magic Kingdom and did a TON. We rode Pooh, Buzz, PeopleMover (Space Mountain lights were on because they were down and that was awesome), Space Mountain, Dumbo, Little Mermaid, Carousel, Peter Pan, Pirates, Haunted Mansion, Aladdin, Philharmagic, and watched both the parade and the fireworks!!! We also ran into TWO of our old circus coworkers who are now at Space Mountain and at Aladdin/Tiki Room/Treehouse.

October 1st (Sunday): HOW IS IT ALREADY OCTOBER?!?! I was off again and did nothing but cook, eat, and watch reruns of Psych. :)