Introduction: My Dad, Perry. This was his first Disney trip, and he was only here because it was my wedding. I was really hoping I’d be able to make him fall in love with the Disney Parks and possibly return with us again one day – but you’ll need to keep reading my report to find out if that will ever happen haha! He hasn’t seen many Disney movies recently, and when I asked him about Star Wars the response was “I think I saw the original ones when they were new?”. So yeah, not a big movie guy. He also did zero research on Walt Disney World, and allowed me to plan everything for him – so he was going into this entire week blindly. It was going to be exciting! Also – I live on the other side of the country from my dad, so I only get to see him once a year or so – I was looking forward to spending time with him.

I woke up excited! My dad was already here, I was going to take him to his first Disney Park today, and most of Luke’s family would be arriving today (along with quite a few of our friends). 

The first order of business for the day was breakfast. We had made a reservation at Olivia’s, so we didn’t have far to go.

After eating, we caught the bus to Hollywood Studios. My dad had no idea what Disney was going to be like, he had never been and didn’t really have a huge desire to ever go, but he told me he didn’t care where I got married, he would be there. I think he was already impressed though, “so, these buses are free and they take you right to the park?”. 

I told him to smile, and for some reason, this is the face he gave me…

Once we arrived at Hollywood Studios, we had to stop at the ticket gate to get Dad’s park tickets activated. He had purchased a 5 day hopper with the Canadian discount (or, rather, he gave me his credit card and I purchased a 5 day hopper for him haha), so you must show your passport before you can use them. 

Once his tickets were active, we entered the park. I think he was expecting a typical amusement park, so I could see him quickly taking everything in. We were already in our first Fastpass window, so we went straight to Star Tours – my Dad’s first Disney ride ever! I was so excited to see what he would think of the rides, and I was just hoping he wouldn’t get motion sickness and refuse to go on anything else for the rest of the week. 

We took our time walking through the queue line, it’s one of my favourites but you miss so much when you’re in the Fastpass line since you can typically walk at a normal pace. We stopped a few times, letting others go past us so we could point out different things to my Dad. He took pictures to show his Star Wars-obsessed great-nephews when he got home, he was impressed by the animatronics. 

I glanced over at my Dad a few times during the ride and the look on his face was priceless- he had the biggest, goofiest grin. His first Disney ride experience was a hit, I was so relieved! When we got off the ride, his only comment was “whoa!”

I stopped in the gift shop to take a picture of Jedi Stitch 🙂

We were close to being in our window for the next fastpass, but we knew we had a bit of time so we headed over to MuppetVision 3D. 

The posted wait time said 15 minutes, but it was less than 5 before we were making our way into the auditorium to find a seat. I made my Dad take a selfie with me and our pink 3D glasses while we waited for the show to start haha.

My dad loved this show. He thought the 3D was awesome, he was laughing… it hadn’t taken long for Disney to win his approval!

We headed over to our second fastpass, Toy Story Midway Mania. I think this area is so cute, I’m really excited to see Toy Story Land (I obviously wrote this part of the trip report awhile ago haha – I’ve been to TSL a few times now, and it’s adorable!)

They had already shut off the main queue line at this point, and both stand-by and Fastpass people were being held outside for the most part. This was because they were reconfiguring the entrance and the queue line to open up into Toy Story Land.

Luke insisted I sit with my Dad, and he went alone. I think it’s just because I beat him every single time on this ride haha. 

I did beat my Dad by a decent margin, although his accuracy was better than mine (and I’ve been on this many times before).