DisLove Podcast with Vanessa and Kris

DisLove E145: Special Episode Our Disney Vacation Club Moonlight Magic Experience at EPCOT

• Vanessa Ferguson and Kris Johns • Season 5 • Episode 145

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Imagine strolling through EPCOT with the stars twinkling above and your favorite Disney characters around each corner—yes, even the elusive Miguel from "Coco"! Kris Johns and Vanessa Ferguson, are here to whisk you away on our enchanting escapade during Disney Vacation Club's Moonlight Magic event. Revel with us in the less-traveled pathways of the park and bask in the delight of meeting Minnie Mouse in her pilot gear.

As DVC members, we've discovered a treasure trove of joy in these after-hours celebrations, and we're eager to share our trove of tips with you. From strategically using your food vouchers to the mesmerizing allure of an exclusive fireworks display, we cover all you need to know to elevate your Disney adventure. Whether it's comparing the delectable offerings at EPCOT to those at the other Disney parks or discussing why Moonlight Magic triumphs over the usual after-hours events, we're dishing out everything that can make your Disney experience as captivating as ours. So, prepare to have a starlit evening of fun immortalized in your memories with our latest episode about the Member Exclusive Moonlight Magic Event at Epcot.

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Speaker 1:

Welcome to the Dizla Podcast with Vanessa and Chris.

Speaker 2:

I'm Vanessa Ferguson and I'm Chris Johns.

Speaker 1:

We would like to welcome you to show number 145 and for any listeners joining us for the first time. Our show typically features things we love at Disney and in each episode we will have a guest who creates Disney magic for our listeners at home or on their Disney vacations. Except for this episode, from vacation planners to product producers, our guests can bring Disney magic into your life. We do have some special episodes, like today, where we do not have a guest, but we'll get to that in a few minutes. And just as a reminder to our listeners, if you can take time to leave us a review on Apple Podcast or any other platform where you listen, that helps the show grow and, of course, helps us get more listeners. And before we get started, we have a message from our friends Eric and Alexa over at Babyquip.

Speaker 2:

And that message is don't hassle bringing all of those bulky strollers, car seats with you on the plane to Florida. Let Babyquip help you out. Our friends Eric and Alexa want to remind you that when you're planning your next Disney vacation with the little ones, make sure to reserve anything you need from them, including strollers, car seats to cribs and high chairs, with delivery directly to your resort. As your Babyquip independent quality provider, they will provide you with excellent customer service that is true by providing clean that is true useful equipment that is true. That will make your vacation easy. That is true. They will help you. If there's something that you don't see in the website, they'll help you connect with it. We've used them for several rentals for our daughter and our trips and we've had an amazing experience. Everything from the delivery to the quality of the equipment has been top notch, Not on top of that, Eric and Alexa are awesome pizza people, so let's support good people who are providing good service so that you can have a great time.

Speaker 1:

And if you just visit our show notes, you can get the link right to their website to make your reservation today. So, as I mentioned earlier, every once in a while we do do special episodes where we review something that we did that was a special event, or, like we've gone on cruises, we do reviews of those as well. So this is one of those special episodes and in this one we had a chance to experience something fun. Now this does I should give kind of an asterisk this only applies to individuals who are Disney Vacation Club members, or if you have a good friend who's a Disney Vacation Club member who can get you in, that's also a way to attend these. These are called Moonlight Magic events and we had a chance to attend one on at upcott on march.

Speaker 1:

First, and before we get started, chris, I was gonna ask you a trivia question. Let's go. So they have these moonlight magics at parks across. They have them in florida, in california. There is one disney park that in the united states that does not have moonlight magic. What park would that be?

Speaker 1:

Hollywood studios good guess, but it's actually magic kingdom and then in california I guess it's technically to magic kingdom in florida, in disney land, in california. So this event they have it at animal kingdom, at upcott, at hollywood studios. They actually also have it disney's typhoon lagoon and then in california they have at disney's california adventure. So this is a after hours event that takes place just for disney vacation club members and we'll get into the details about how you register, all of those sorts of things. But before we get into some of those Details, I wanted to ask chris and then I'll share mine as well just if you had to give your overall impression, what would you say about this event? Wonderful, that's it. Yes, well, I will add, we've done the after hours that you like, the ticketed events that you pay for. Versus this event, I would say they're on par or better.

Speaker 1:

I really enjoyed it a lot. It was a great experience because it can bind things that we like food, had special characters and rides. So overall that was super awesome and we'll get in again. Like I said, we'll go over some of those details now. Maybe you'll be a little, have a little bit more to add for this. What was your favorite thing that we did that night.

Speaker 2:

Well, number one, we had awesome time with our friends. Linden sheldon, yes and just. It was nice because it's a special event for dvc owners. We had a great time with our friends. Linden sheldon is part of that. We were able to just really have access to the park In a much more relaxed sense and from we enjoyed food and wine we don't know the food part, not the wine part, but on top of that, really I think the main thing was just because your member owners it's awesome to be able to really enjoy the park in a much more relaxed pace and to get on rides that you want, to get around and just have the overall, just to have fewer people in the park, which, again, I think people being in the park is part of the energy. But as at night the weather was just right, it was just perfect for the four of us to enjoy everything that disney had offer.

Speaker 1:

I will say my favorite thing was probably the unique characters that they had out, so I will Go over a little bit details about that, but there was characters in their outfits that you never see at the parks, and our daughter loves cocoa. We were able to get our photo with me, miguel and Miguel is I've never seen him out anything, so it was just those were some of the things that were Awesome that I really enjoyed. And then the other thing I was gonna ask you, chris, would you do it again?

Speaker 2:

one hundred percent yes.

Speaker 1:

So I think there's some events that we've done at disney that we're like that was nice but Don't necessarily have to do it again. This is something that I think I would go out of my way to do again. So just to kind of go over how it works. So this Event they have certain dates during the year. They announced at the beginning of the year like what the dates were going to be. I think it was actually in December. They released all the dates for this year. So most of the parks had two dates. So Animal Kingdom had two dates, epcot had two, california venture there's two dates at Typhoon Lagoon and then there's also a date at Hollywood Studios. So it just depend on the park. And here's how it works.

Speaker 1:

So you have to register, pre-register, for this event and what happens is there are certain dates that the registration opens you. Not only do you have to be a Disney Vacation Club owner, the second part is that if you have a reservation at one of the Disney resorts, then you get a Early advance registration for this event. So it just really was sheer luck that we were able to. We had already planned a trip. We were going to the House of Mouse Expo that was being held in Kissimmee. So we already had a reservation for that weekend, which meant we had early access to reserve Tickets. So what happens is, if you're familiar, I'm sure most of you have done some sort of virtual queue for Disney, and it's very similar for on the website, where if you're registering for a cruise that's just being released or tickets for something, you get in a queue at a set time and and thankfully our friend and she was on at the same time, so we were both trying to get tickets. So that way, no matter who got tickets, or if we both got tickets, we were all able to go. And with that, once you get the tickets, what happens is that Obviously, you are able to go in.

Speaker 1:

But one thing I didn't realize and maybe it's just because we're such new DVC members, but it was there was I hate to use the word free because you're already paying for DVC but it was no cost, no additional cost to go. So that was a surprise to me, because I was in the queue and I thought, oh, I got my card ready, just like with the regular after hours. I thought there was gonna be a fee, but there's no charge for it, which was super awesome, and each person or like on our membership, we were able to get tickets for five people so that, like Chris mentioned, linda and Sheldon came with us. So we were able to use four tickets, and that's a great bonus too. So even if you're traveling with other people or if you like our friends, linda and Sheldon they live down there. We have family that live down there, different people you can invite other people to come with you or if you have a larger family, hopefully five tickets is enough. That was one thing that is super nice.

Speaker 1:

So you get the tickets and how it works is the day of the event when you go in. They have just like they do for the Christmas Party or any of those. They have stations where you go, show your ticket thing on your phone and they give you a wristband. Another thing that they do there is, besides giving you a map with a lay out of what's going on that night, you get three food vouchers, which I have to say a big thank you to our friend man. She, her and her husband had been to the one a few weeks earlier and she gave us some tips. Number one as soon as you can get your food vouchers. We went about 5 30. I think you can go as early as five. Use those vouchers.

Speaker 2:

Yes, eat first. It's one of those things, because we saw a number of places either a run out of food or be they close down early, so you may very well see. Well, you know this event goes to how long did it go till till one till one. Food is not available till one o'clock. So, with that, eat first, then go enjoy the rides.

Speaker 1:

So we were able to because Nan had given us that heads up. We went to the food or the. It was. The flower and garden festival was going on, so there was the all of the stations throughout world showcase and then in future world where you could go, and we got things from the flower and garden festival. So that was nice. Each person gets three, so it's a good amount. What we did is we decided to skip like a dinner, because we knew we were going to get these vouchers, and we just had a snack and we said, had a couple appetizers in Mexico, and then we got our food vouchers and we just started going out, because those lines start getting longer the closer you get to the events start time.

Speaker 1:

So the event officially starts at 10pm. As you know, epcot closes technically at nine o'clock. Then they have the fireworks show and then they go into this special event. So you'll have your wristband already at that point and as you go around, things start slowly shutting down. There are a few of the food places that stay open later, but by this point most of the food and the flower and garden festival food kiosks are going to be closing and so we had already used our vouchers by this point. It does take some effort, though you don't realize that three vouchers unless you're using them all at one place. It takes a while because we ate at the honey kiosk. I know we went over to the. You guys got lobster tail.

Speaker 2:

Yes.

Speaker 1:

That was good. We went to the America Pavilion and I know I got the gumbo, which was super good, and I got a banana pudding. You guys had some Mediterranean food.

Speaker 2:

We did. We had a kebab.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, was it good.

Speaker 2:

Delicious.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, so you get some different. For I mean, how often is Disney going to give you a voucher to get lobster tail? So that was nice. We enjoyed those and what we? We kind of made a decision we go to the parks enough, and we knew we're going to be back at Epcot.

Speaker 2:

We skipped rides this time we did Again the really the focus. We've been at Disney to so many times and so as part of it the allure was not necessarily the rides, but being able to be there with friends.

Speaker 1:

Yeah. So if you, if you have kids that are really excited about doing some rides again, this is a great time because the lines were very minimal. I think the only thing that had a decent line was Guardians of the Galaxy, cosmic Rewind. But we decided we were going to do the characters, because there are characters that either only come out in these outfits at special events or they are in these locations for this particular event. So we went first. We lined up in Mexico.

Speaker 1:

Chris was the first one in line for us to see Miguel from Coco. So that was super cool to see Miguel, and I'm hoping maybe he'll be on the treasure, where they're going to have the Coco themed restaurant. But seeing Miguel was fun. He did a video for our daughter because she wasn't with us on this trip, so that was a neat thing to experience. And then we headed over and you have by the new Walt Dream statue in that plaza in the center and right, with Spaceship Earth behind. They had Mickey there in his like traditional, his tux outfit. I think that was a cool thing to have Walt and Mickey together.

Speaker 2:

It was. It was really nice and again, that's really the part of the allure of the midnight magic was just being able to get seeing the iconic characters quickly.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

That's the main thing. And for many times you'd be waiting for a long time. And then again I got to see that old duck In his in his lumber quack outfit. He was a lumberjack, he was in Canada and I said he's a lumber quack.

Speaker 1:

Yes, that's, that was Chris's favorite joke of the trip. So we did see Donald and his lumber quack outfit. We saw a goofy in his. He looked like a Sherlock home, like he was in a Sherlock Holmes detective outfit. And the UK. We saw Minnie Mouse as a pilot and the land pavilion. So she was up at the upper level with the hot air balloons behind her. So that's her pilot outfit. One of our friends from California, let us know that that's actually the outfit she does for meet and greets at California adventure. So we had never seen that before. So those were the characters we did.

Speaker 1:

We did get in line for Esmeralda over in France, but this was the morning we had flown in and we had been up since 3 30 in the morning and we just they as Meralda went on a break and they said it was going to be well over 15 minutes. So we got out of that line. But there is, as Meralda is in France. They also had Mushu in China and then, which we didn't make it to, and they had one of the characters from Guardians of the Galaxy and I'm forgetting off the top of my head, but you, so we got, we were in that time frame, we were able to get all except for three of the characters, and we could have gotten as Meralda. We were just too tired to stand in line, but it was just so much fun. Besides the food vouchers, they also have ice cream that you get, so we had a couple of ice creams delicious and so that was super nice.

Speaker 1:

They do keep a few of the places open for you to buy drinks and stuff like that, unlike if you've take went to a regular after hours event. You get the ice cream, so the Mickey bars, the cookies, like the sandwiches that are with the cookies and cream, and I think they had the fruit bars. So those are what you get at the moonlight magic. At a traditional after hours you would get that popcorn and then also the beverages, the 20 ounce beverages. You do not get that there, so that those are a little bit of nuances, a few differences, but overall this was really a nice event. It does run from 10 to 1 am, so that can go by pretty fast because that's not a lot of time.

Speaker 1:

But I think if you really Make a plan, which is what we did, our plan was we were doing characters. We ate first. We did characters. Our friend Nanna I also have, she called our. Actually I called her that day and she gave us lots of tips. She said for the characters you can be in line and then as soon as 10 o'clock hits, they start the opening. So that's how we were able to see Miguel so quickly.

Speaker 2:

Yes.

Speaker 1:

And so she gave us the tips about the characters, she gave us the tips about the food, so passing those along to you, get those food vouchers early, use them early, get in line for the characters even before it starts. And the last special thing that they had, which we did watch, was they had a Exclusive fireworks show for us too.

Speaker 2:

Yes, it was wonderful.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I was expecting it to be much shorter and not as elaborate for a special fireworks it was very elaborate yeah that's what it was.

Speaker 1:

Very nice. It was on par with I mean it was a shorter version of what the regular nighttime shows are, but for being a special thing that was just for the DVC members it was awesome and we did stay and watch that. So that was at 11 o'clock. That's only once, so you'll want to make sure you plan around that. So what we did is we did the characters Towards the back, so we did make or we did Miguel, then we went over and did Mickey in that center area so we were able to walk right back up and watch the fireworks. So that was super nice as well. But really there's all kinds. It's a great event.

Speaker 1:

I know our friends had also attended one at Animal Kingdom and then we had some friends that had done one at Hollywood Studios. People kind of said Epcot's a really good one to do because of those food kiosks for the festivals You're able to. Those vouchers you get for food are essentially the equivalent of a snack credit if you're on the dining plan. So there's a good value of what Options there are. Our one friends who went to Animal Kingdom said you kind of get stuck in that like French fry zone, french fry popcorn with the vouchers. So if you're looking at dates, definitely Keep an eye out for Epcot the.

Speaker 1:

We did attend the last Epcot one but there are, from what I understand, they'll continue to have these and release new dates. There are still some upcoming animal kingdom, typhoon lagoon and then, of course, hollywood Studios. So it's a great thing and I know we have some friends that have been able to register at that later date If you did not have a resort reservation. Our one friends even were staying earlier in that week and Annette and she was able to add an extra day to be able to their reservation and then they were able to get those tickets for Moonlight Magic as well. You don't have to have a reservation but if you do have one again, like I mentioned, it gets you that chance to enter the queue sooner and it's an earlier date that you're able to. But overall I liked it. I think I liked it even more than the traditional after hours.

Speaker 2:

Yes.

Speaker 1:

Now I can say I'm probably comparing apples to oranges, because we've not done an after hours at Epcot but we have done like the late night hours at Epcot for like deluxe resorts and those sorts of things. So overall it was great. We had a lot of fun with our friends Linda and Sheldon. We also had some great tips from our friend Nan and her husband. So it was really overall a great time and we would highly recommend it, like I would. If we had a trip coming, I would adjust my dates to try to go to it.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I would you know. Again, if you're a baseball fan and you happen to be there in March, go see baseball and then during the day, relax and then put those hours. Because again, the nice thing is you might say well, it's only X number of hours You're going to get so much more frequency and enjoyment. Where you're not standing in line, you're not waiting in line and whatever weight you do have will be far less than what it would be during the day.

Speaker 1:

Correct, so I'll share the links to the page that talks about One Light Magic. We'll share lots of our photos as well, and so overall it was a great experience we highly recommend, and if you don't own DVC, just ask one of your friends who does to get those tickets and invite you along for the night. So today, because we are not having a special guest, we're going to move right into our two minute trivia and our wisdom from Walt Quote. So, chris, you are up with trivia.

Speaker 2:

So we're talking about DVC.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

And the question is how many destinations can you use DVC points? According to the Disney Vacation Club website, I'm assuming you mean Disney destinations, right? Exactly on their website, on the Disney website, how many possible different locations across the world?

Speaker 1:

I don't know the exact number, so I'm going to go with 16.

Speaker 2:

Try again. This is worldwide.

Speaker 1:

I know, I think there's 12 in Florida, I think there's two in California. I'm going to go with 35. Then You're looking at me like it should be way higher.

Speaker 2:

Wrong. What is it 118.

Speaker 1:

Wow, that must be with the exchanges and everything, huh.

Speaker 2:

These are again Disney labeled events, so, whether it be Disney Caribbean Beach Resort, oh yeah, because you can switch your points. All the way down to going to Africa. And again, these are on the Disney website.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I guess, because you can go on adventures by Disney, you can use the Disney cruise.

Speaker 2:

Antarctica and Patagonia Expedition Cruise for only 1,350 points.

Speaker 1:

Man, that would be a huge amount of points. How many points do we have? We only have 200. Yes, so I don't think we're going on the Antarctica Expedition. Yeah, I didn't think about that. Yeah, because you can go to adventures by Disney, Disney cruise, lots of things very interesting. Now, that's good trivia to know. You could be a salesman for DVC Chris.

Speaker 2:

I should, actually I want to credit, because I'm the one who brought up us buying DVC.

Speaker 1:

OK.

Speaker 2:

Disney owes me. I'm the salesman, I'm the one who originated the sale.

Speaker 1:

Ask our salesperson.

Speaker 2:

Mickey, you owe me.

Speaker 1:

All right, so let's end out today with our quote from Walt Disney. Why do we have to grow up? I know more adults who have the children's approach to life. They are not afraid to be delighted with simple pleasures and they have a degree of contentment with what life has brought. Sometimes that isn't much either. So thank you so much for joining us on this episode. Don't forget to check out all of our other episodes on our Buzzsprout page and follow us on social media for more Disney magic. Thank you again for joining us on this episode of the Dizlove podcast with Vanessa and Chris. I'm Vanessa.

Speaker 2:

And I'm Chris.

Speaker 1:

And I'm Chris, and I'm Chris.

Speaker 2:

This podcast is not affiliated with the Walt Disney Company or its holdings, and it is intended for entertainment purposes only.