Alright lets dive right into this one shall we? Now for everyone who does the college program, you will find in almost every DCP blog or website online that there is an unspoken bucket list every DCP should attempt to accomplish while on their program. Some are simple like get the kitchen sink with roommates to see a proposal on main street. Then there are the full-day challenges like 4 parks in 1 day. I wish I could emphasize that like 4 PARKS 1 DAY. It’s one of those things that either needs its own background music or a sinister DUN DUN DAAAAA after it’s said. The reason I say that is because this challenge is definitely not for the faint of heart. Now I’m sure your reading this and either wondering what the heck is 4 parks 1 day or that really doesn’t seem that hard. Well I was naive like you all once until I took this challenge on with two of my roommates. (Videos of our adventure is posted below)
For those who are unaware, 4 parks 1 day is a challenge where you must successfully go into each of the 4 main theme parks (Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom, Epcot, and Hollywood Studios) in one day. But there are rules and mini challenges that must be accomplished once inside each park. Once arrived you must eat one food item (preferably something you’ve never tried before), meet one character (basically impossible without a Fastpass for time purposes), and ride one attraction. In order to complete this mega-challenge you definitely need to be ready to have an early start to your day. At first I was, like many of you, asking myself, how hard could this be? I had seen various vlogs from other DCPs stating how exhausting and hard this challenge was but I still didn’t understand as to why. After a lot of convincing from my roommate Emily, Sabrina and I agreed to attempt the challenge.
The day started off with Magic Kingdom. We snagged some last minute reservations at Be Our Guest and knew we couldn’t pass up on the opportunity; so food for Magic Kingdom was checked off the list. Next thanks to my hunting skills we rode Seven Dwarfs Mine Train with a nasty Fastpass I dug out of trash juice. Thus our ride was checked off. Then we decided we’d just go pay the boss man a visit for our character meet in greet. We thought this was a great idea until we say that 95 minutes worth of other people wanted to see him too. This idea was very quickly shut down for time and sanity purposes so instead we scurried on to the next stop: Animal Kingdom.
At Animal Kingdom we rode Dinosaur. This ride is definitely my favorite ride in Animal Kingdom but may or may not have been a scarring situation for my two roomies. Who doesn’t want to travel back in time and get chased down by dinosaurs? Apparently not my roommates. Anyways after they calmed down we got some fruity drinks that counted as our park food from a little stand next to Expedition Everest. They were so good and definitely refreshing which was much needed at this point in the day. We gave up on the whole character meet and greet portion of the challenge due to time. So after our refreshers we were off to Epcot!
Now at this point in the day we are hot and tired (and slowly dying). For our Epcot ride we decided to choose The Seas with Nemo and Friends mainly because it had the shortest wait time. Something about being underwater in a cold air-conditioned aquarium really reminds you just how exhausted you really are. Like I said before I didn’t think it was going to be this tiring, but something about running from one place to another just to complete a challenge will leave you fatigued. Once we got off the ride we head towards the top of the Figment ride. Thanks to good old DVC Sabrina we gained access to the Disney Vacation Club lounge that resides above the ride. Up there we may or may not have taken up an entire wall of couches and passed out for a half an hour. Lets just say the people up there weren’t too happy with us. Whoops. Anyways it was super pretty and relaxing up there. I got a little mini tour of the place in my video below. Since we were too lazy to move and get food, we decided out Epcot food was going to be the complimentary chips that were given to us by a nice DVC Cast Member. If that doesn’t prove just how tired we are I don’t know what does.
Once we get back on our feet and walk across the Boardwalk to our final destination: Hollywood Studios. When we arrive I swear they were playing like finish line music. It’s like they knew we were going. The main entrance looks like a beacon of hope and an ultimate achievement. Once inside we basically collapsed but we weren’t done just yet. Rockin Roller Coaster was our final ride to check off our list. It definitely helped with giving us a slight second wind. After that I got a giant cookie to celebrate, Sabrina got herself a big girl drink, and Emily got a delicious cream cheese filled pretzel, all completely our food requirement. This was when Emily noticed something suspicious. She noticed a Character Attendant Coordinator casually patrolling the area. This was odd because we couldn’t see any characters. So Emily being her curious self not so secretly followed him until we found out what he was supervising. Behind Rockin Roller Coaster there is an empty lot where at random times throughout the week they have what Disney calls “Character Palooza.” This is when a bunch of random character that don’t normally meet all come together for one giant meet and greet. So it’s safe to assume we ran over and met as many characters as we could. I’d say it definitely made up for not meeting characters in the other parks. We ended up meeting the Evil Queen, Aladdin, and Mulan!
After that we went home and passed out. It’s exciting to say we completed the challenge! For future DCPs, if you plan on doing this challenge at some point throughout your program (which you definitely should) mentally prepare yourself. It’s a long day. Get sleep unlike we did the night before. Do it on a day that isn’t going to be too hot and DRINK WATER! On that note I think this post is done! Check out Part 1 and Part 2 of our crazy 4 Parks 1 Day Challenge.
Videos: Toria’s Tales of Disney: 4 Parks 1 Day Part 1
Toria’s Tales of Disney: 4 Parks 1 Day Part 2
Toria's Tales 