Disney finally announced the opening date and menu for the newest indoor table service restaurant – Roundup Rodeo BBQ – in Toy Story Land in Hollywood Studios Disney World!

Drum roll….

It’s opening March 23, 2023!

You will need reservations but they haven’t announced when you can start booking yet. I’ll update here once I hear a date.

This will be themed like the rest of Toy Story Land. Using his toys, Andy has built this western style restaurant for his friends in his backyard. The fun decor is made up of his toys and games, like the rest of the land. It’s located on the right side, after the big Woody character, as you walk into Toy Story Land.

The meal will be brought out family-style for the whole table and consist of traditional American BBQ favorites. You start with cheddar biscuits and an assortment of fruit and garden salads. Then, you get a platter of house-smoked meats consisting of ribs, brisket, sausage, and chicken. A plant-based version is available upon request also. You can choose four sides for the table from a selection of slaws, baked beans, potatoes, mac & cheese, and veggies. Of course, there has to be dessert too. You can choose from a selection of cakes and pies. There will also be a variety of alcoholic and non-alcoholic beverages.

No word yet if this will be all-you-care-to-enjoy, but that’s what it seems like. It seems reminiscent of other family-style restaurants like Garden Grill. This all sounds delicious though! Can’t wait to try it!

Feel free to contact me if you want to chat about planning a Disney trip.

Pics ©Disney

The EPCOT International Festival of the Arts starts today! It will run from January 13 – February 20, 2023. This festival will showcase the fine arts, performance arts, and culinary arts.

A key component of this festival will be the unique food booths showcasing dishes with a more artistic flair. Some look almost too pretty to eat!

Another highlight is the Disney on Broadway Concert Series where major Broadway stars perform songs from Disney Broadway musicals. Shows take place on select days at 5:30pm, 6:45pm and 8:00pm at the America Gardens Theatre in the America pavilion.

For the latest list of performances, visit the concert series page often as performers can change.

If you want to guarantee yourself a seat, you may want to book a dining package. Some shows will fill up fast.

Throughout the day around the World Showcase, other musical acts will also be performing.

One of the most unique features of this festival will be the many opportunities to see and participate in artistic activities yourself.

Artists will be showcasing their paintings and even painting live during the day. You can also join your fellow park-goers in painting a giant paint-by-numbers type wall mural.

Other artists will be drawing the most amazing 3D chalk art images on the sidewalks that you can then take pictures with. You really look like you’re inside that drawing. They’re incredible!

There will also be new photo ops, PhotoPass Magic Shots, plenty of merch, and many other fun activities. This is a short but unique festival. Try to catch it.

For more details, visit the EPCOT International Festival of the Arts page.

As always, feel free to contact me if you want to chat about planning your Disney trip.

Pics ©Disney

Disney released tons of news recently! Besides revealing the opening date of the new Tron ride and the restart dates for the nighttime fireworks shows, which I’ve detailed in my last two posts, they just made even more surprising announcements for Disney World.

Starting Jan 10, 2023, complimentary self-parking is returning for guests staying at Disney Resort hotels.

Disney Resort hotel guests also continue to receive complimentary standard parking at Walt Disney World theme parks, daily early theme park entry (with valid admission and a park reservation) and complimentary on-site transportation options such as buses, monorails and Disney Skyliner.

Coming in the next few months, some park reservation policies will be relaxed. Annual Passholders will be able to visit the theme parks after 2pm without needing a park reservation, except on Saturdays and Sundays at Magic Kingdom Park. Currently, you have to make a park reservation for your first park of the day, no matter what time you intend to go. Pass blockout dates will continue to apply like they do today.

Passholders will also receive access to Disney PhotoPass lenses and one complimentary Cinderella Castle Mural of Memories experience (age restrictions apply).

Also beginning in the next few months, guests purchasing Disney Genie+ service will receive digital downloads of their Disney PhotoPass attraction photos taken in the park on the day of their purchase, at no additional charge. Attraction photos are taken while in the parks at more than a dozen of our most popular attractions.

---

Incase you missed it, other recent changes include:

• the ability to modify Disney Genie+ attraction selections in the My Disney Experience app (instead of having to cancel your existing one before you can book the new ride or time, which was risky)
• automatically making theme park reservations for you if you purchase 1-day, 1-park specific tickets directly from Disney (you still have to manually make park reservations if you buy tickets from a third party or if you buy multi-day tickets)
• allowing you to modify or cancel dining reservations penalty free up to 2 hours before the reservation time, instead of 24 hours previously.

There are currently promotional discounts of up to 25% off of standard resort room rates for Florida residents, Annual Passholders, and Spring visitors.

For summer guests, there is a dining gift card promotion for guests booking a room and ticket package at standard rates.

If you would like to chat more about any of this information, feel free to contact me.

Disney has announced the opening date for the new Tron ride at the Magic Kingdom in Disney World!

drumroll please….

April 4, 2023

Are you excited? According to Disney…

The story of TRON Lightcycle / Run picks up after “TRON: Legacy” where Kevin’s son, Sam Flynn, has opened a second gateway into a digital world called the Grid. The first portal was built at Shanghai Disneyland with the original TRON Lightcycle Power Run.

When guests enter the queue at Magic Kingdom, they’ll feel as if they’ve been digitized and transported to the Grid for a special Lightcycle race. It’s your Team Blue against the Grid’s menacing Programs, Team Orange. Your goal is to be the first to race through eight Energy Gates and secure victory. The attraction will be one of the fastest coasters at any Disney theme park in the world.

If you belong to any of the Disney affinity groups, keep an eye on your emails for possible preview opportunities.

And as always, feel free to contact me if you want to chat about planning your Disney trip.

Pic ©Disney

Did you hear?? Disney just announced the return dates of two old nighttime shows at Disney World!

It was previously announced that the current shows at the Magic Kingdom and EPCOT would end also after the official 50th celebration end date, which would be March 31, 2023, but no details on when their replacements will start and in what form were given. They’ve finally given us those details.

The previous Happily Ever After show is restarting April 3, 2023 with new projections, and Enchantment is ending April 2nd, at the Magic Kingdom.

EPCOT Forever, the previous interim show at EPCOT, is also returning April 3rd until the new show is completed at the end of the year. Harmonious will indeed end and they are indeed removing the barges! This is quite a surprise since they invested so much time and money into creating them, but I guess the poor fan response led to their demise. Can we just have Illuminations back?!?

If you want to catch Enchantment or Harmonious before they end, or any other 50th celebration events or items, make sure to go to Disney World soon. Who knows what else might go away too.

And as always, if you want to chat about planning a Disney trip, feel free to contact me.

Did you know that Splash Mountain in the Magic Kingdom in Orlando will be closing as of January 23, 2023 for a complete retheming based on Tiana? Be sure to ride by the 22nd if this is one of your favorites.

The holidays have arrived at Disney World in Orlando! All of the parks and resorts are decked out in their holiday finest.

Cinderella Castle is providing a gorgeous backdrop for holiday projections. Huge Christmas trees and gingerbread houses have sprung up everywhere! Christmas music is pumping thru the speakers. The smell of holiday treats is wafting thru the air. Can you picture it now?

The Magic Kingdom is hosting the Very Merry Christmas Party on select nights. I did a post on it awhile back so I won’t rehash everything here. Check out the party post.

EPCOT will be hosting the Festival of the Holidays and the Candlelight Processional with tons of fun foods and new narrators, respectively. Check out my festival post about this also.

There will also be new entertainment and holiday storytellers around the World Showcase, including Canadian Holiday Voyageurs, Las Posadas with Mariachi Cobre, the Chinese Lion Dance and more.

The exciting new ride, Guardians of the Galaxy Cosmic Rewind, will even have a new seasonal playlist! Have you ridden that yet? It’s such a cool ride!

Make sure to catch the Santa Claus Merry Motorcade, where old St. Nick will travel up Hollywood Blvd at Hollywood Studios.

At Animal Kingdom, see the Tree of Life Awakenings – Holiday Edition, where the iconic tree shimmers each evening to holiday music. The flotillas will also have holiday touches and the Merry Menagerie puppets will again roam Discovery Island. They’re really amazing!

Many resorts will also have holiday decor, treats, and gorgeous trees or gingerbread houses. Be sure to go resort hopping. You don’t need to be staying there to visit them.

Disney Springs is also joining in the festivities with many shops and restaurants offering holiday specials. You can also partake in a Christmas tree scavenger hunt with the Christmas Tree Stroll.

The PhotoPass service will also have special holiday themed shots. Don’t forget to ask for them.

As you can see, there are so many ways to celebrate the holidays at Disney World. I haven’t even mentioned all of them. For more details, visit the Disney World Holidays page.

Feel free to contact me if you want to chat about your Disney trip. We’re in the process of planning our own holiday Disney trip. We love the holidays at Disney! So excited!

Pics ©Disney

So many changes have occurred in the last month or two at Disney World in Orlando! Here’s a quick summary. If you want more details on any of them, feel free to contact me.

Dining

• You can cancel table service dining reservations (besides prepaid ones) in the MDE app up to 2 hours before the reservation now. Previously, you had to cancel by the day before, else you’d incur a $10/person penalty.
• These restaurants are opening again:
  • Monsieur Paul – Oct 18, 2022
  • Kona Cafe – Nov 1, 2022
  • Akershus Royal Dining Hall – Nov 4, 2022
  • Takumi-Tei – Nov 23, 2022
• Tusker House all meals and Crystal Palace and Cape May Cafe breakfasts are back to self serve buffets instead of the post-Covid reopening family style.
• Pooh and friends have returned to Crystal Palace.
• Stitch and friends have returned to Ohana breakfast.

Parks

• Fantastic is reopening at Hollywood Studios on Nov 4, 2022! There are some changes and new scenes. Previews of the show look awesome!
• Blizzard Beach water park is reopening on Nov 13, 2022 with some new Frozen touches.
• Typhoon Lagoon water park will be closing for refurbishment on Nov 13th once Blizzard Beach reopens.
• Genie+ pricing is now going to vary based on how busy the day is rather than being a flat $15 each. It can range from $15-25 dollars approximately. You won’t know the exact price until you go to buy it each morning though, so have some wiggle room in your budget. The Individual Lightning Lane prices were already variable but most of those have increased as well.

• YES! Park reservations are still required and will be required into the foreseeable future, so make sure to make your park selection as soon as you buy your park tickets. You can always change parks later, but this way, you have access to some park each day incase they run out.

Resorts

• There are currently several discounts for Disney resorts for Disney Visa card holders, Disney+ subscribers, Florida residents, US military personnel, and Annual Passholders thru early 2023. Availability is limited and gone already for some dates, so be flexible and book ASAP.
• The Disney Skyliner will be closing for routine refurbishment from January 22-29, 2023. You will need to take the Disney free buses instead.

Events

• Christmas decorations are starting to go up at the parks!
• The first Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party starts on Nov 8, 2022 and occurs on select dates through Dec 22nd. Many of the dates are sold out already, so buy your tix soon if you’re interested in going.
• The EPCOT International Festival of the Holidays starts Nov 25 – Dec 30, 2022. Check the festival page for the latest list of narrators for the Candlelight Processional.
• The EPCOT International Festival of the Arts dates have been announced: Jan 13 – Feb 20, 2023.

I’ll update as more changes occur. As always, feel free to contact me if you want to chat about your Disney trip.