My First Disney Trip
Not every trip to Disney is going to be all “Butterflies and Rainbows”. Unfortunately, my first trip to Disney is one of those trips. It was supposed to be an AMAZING experience, and don’t get me wrong, it was a pretty great opportunity. However, it was also somewhat of a nightmare.
It was my senior year in High school, and our High school band got the opportunity to go on a Spring Break field trip to Walt Disney World. While the main focus of this trip was to learn, it wasn’t all work and no play. We still had plenty of time to explore the parks, so this isn’t why it quickly became one of the worst trips I have been on. Coming from Wisconsin, there are only two ways to get to Walt Disney World in Florida - fly, or drive, and our band director made the decision to take 150 of us on an almost 20 hour road trip across the country. Now, our Spring Break just happened to fall on the same week as the last game of March Madness that year, and we were going to be driving through the same area that this game was taking place. What could go wrong, right? Well, to answer your question, one of our busses broke down during a lunch stop, and unfortunately it wasn’t a quick fix. We needed a new bus. However, because of the timing of Spring Break, and the location of this hiccup, the closest bus we could find was 8 hours away, further north than where we had started this journey. So we spent a good 8 hours waiting in a “mall” with 4 stores, and 2 restaurants for this bus to make the trek from WI to IN.
After our 8 hour delay, things were pretty much smooth sailing the rest of the way to Florida. We were able to drive straight through, and honestly didn’t have to cut that much out of our first day. Day 2 is where things started getting hairy again. This was our Magic Kingdom day, and as part of our learning experiences, we got to March down Main Street USA, and perform at the Most Magical Place on Earth. I know what you’re thinking, this sounds like a dream come true! While yes, the experience itself was surreal, it was the aftermath that sucked.
Our Band Directors were all about professionalism. Because of this, they wanted us to wear our heavy Marching Uniforms for our performance. While I do think we looked pretty good in the parade, I don’t necessarily think that we were prepared for wearing these in the 90 degree heat and humidity. Not only myself, but plenty of others did not drink nearly enough water, and a lot of us ended up getting sick. I myself didn’t feel well the rest of the week, and one of the other students ended up having to go to the hospital.
Now, if you’re going to take anything away from this, make sure it’s this. I had the WORST experience with the Disney Magic on my first trip to Disney, but I didn’t let it dictate my future trips. In fact, I went back 4 years later, and ended up having the time of my life. Not every trip is going to be 100% magical. If you have kiddos that you’re taking with you, your kids aren’t going to become different children and act like angels just because you’re spending a lot of money on their trip. If you struggle with knee, hip, or foot pain, that’s not going to go away, in fact it will probably be worse. But if you go in with these expectations ahead of time, that this isn’t going to be a perfect trip, you’ll have a great time, and leave with memories to last a lifetime.
