Disneyzone News - March 2001 Issue - TEXT VERSION This is the text-only version of the DZ News. This version will not include any photographs, special charts, calendars, or graphs. Please note that Disneyzone is not affiliated with Disney in any way. We are a group of Disney World enthusiasts who want to assist you in making the most of your next Disney World vacation Newsletter and content Copyright © 2000 & 2001 Disneyzone - Please do not alter or copy any or all of this material, or use it on a website, or printed media without prior written permission, from Disneyzone or from the individual article's author.. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ When Should You Go? Having trouble deciding when to go to Disney World? It is a tough decision. Many people can only go during summer, or spring break—then you really don’t have much of a choice. But if you do have a choice, here are some things to think about! Weather - How well can you stand the heat? Humidity? Not well, then avoid late spring, summer and early fall. You can see in the chart below that some months have much more rain than other months. Don’t let that stop you from choosing a particular month. August has a lot of rain, but all that rain usually falls in an hour time frame each day. The rest of the day its sunny and nice! You can see the average high and low temps, too. That should help you choose the time when you would like to go! Next thing to think about is crowds. All holidays are crowded! Whenever school is out is when the masses go to WDW! So avoid holidays if you don’t want to hassle the huge crowds. The chart below shows some of the least crowded times to go. Some parks handle crowds much better than others. In my opinion, Magic Kingdom always seems crowded! If you want others’ opinions on when to go, check out the message boards. You can get tons of useful advice! Good Luck Choosing! Chart below from www.disney.com (this chart will not be supplied in the text only version) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Visit the Message Boards! One of the most popular sections on DZ just happens to be the Message Boards! You can post questions/answers/advice or just hang around and read what others say! We have a very friendly, helpful group on the boards! Give it a try www.disneyzone.net click on the FORUMS link! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Who Wants to Be a Millionaire? Play It! - A Visitors Perspective A Disney Guest’s Experience By: Shelly T. aka SAMAES My family and I visited WDW in April. To our delight, the game show Who Wants to Be A Millionaire was open at Disney-MGM Studios. We play the game consistently at home and we were very excited at the chance to play it live! The game is located on Mickey Avenue just past The Adventures of the Little Mermaid. Each game seats 650 people and each game is played for about 30 minutes. They have FastPass tickets available. If the stand-by line is very long, by all means use the FastPass. They seat from the FastPass line first and then fill in the empty seats with the stand-by line. We played the game 3 times. One time we used the FastPass, the other two times, the stand-by line was less than 30 minutes and it was worth the quick wait. Inside, the studio looks just like the TV version. The seats are banked all around the circular stage and there are 3 big screen tvs which are used to show the questions and the results. (If possible, try to avoid the top rows of seats. The lights and cables block the full view of the big screen tvs.) The stage is a glass floor with the funky silver designs inside. There are 10 fastest finger seats around the hot seat and "Regis'" seat. These 10 seats are general seating. They do not indicate any preference in playing the game. Obviously, Regis is not the host, but the WDW hosts do a great job. Once the audience is seated, they go over the general rules. No flash or video photography, no eating or drinking inside the studio, etc. And, they also have a few Millionaire rules, for example, even if you know the answer, don't shout it out, like we all do at home. And, there are 3 lifelines - 50/50, Ask the Audience and Phone a Complete Stranger - where someone on Mickey Avenue is asked to come to the phone to assist! Instead of dollars, they award points to each question - in the same scale as the game - 100, 200, up to 1,000,000. The other rules are the same as the TV version, you can stop at anytime for if you answer a question incorrectly, you drop to the zero, 1,000 or 32,000 level. If they run out of time while you are still in the hot seat, you come back in the next game as the hot seat contestant and continue your play. In front of each seat is a number and a keypad with A B C and D on it. The number is your seat number and the keypad is used for answering the questions. Every member of the audience answers each and every question. The answers are used to tally the Ask the Audience poll and they are used to determine the next person in the hot seat. Throughout the game, they show a ranking of the audience answers to show the ranking of the top group. If your seat number is shown on the big screen, you are in position to be the next hot seat contestant! The questions are just as easy or hard as the ones on the TV show and some of the questions are tailored around Disney-related items. My little fingers worked very hard at punching in my answer to each question and I usually had the right answer but in our family, it was our 15 year old son who made it to the hot seat twice out of the three games we played. In his first game, he used all of his lifelines and stopped at the 125,000 point level. In his second, he had 2 lifelines left at the 8,000 point question and answered it incorrectly and dropped to 1,000 point level. After these games, we were escorted backstage where he was awarded his prizes. He received a Who Wants to Be A Millionaire - Play It pin for each point level he earned. He was also awarded a baseball cap for reaching the 1,000 point level and at the 32,000 point level, he earned a golf shirt embroidered with Who Wants to Be a Millionaire - Play It 32,000 point level Winner on it and the new CD version of the game. Winners at the 1,000,000 level, win an expense paid trip for 2 to NYC to see the show live and to meet the real Regis. The stage manager informed us that 2 trips had been won since the game started in early April. It's a blast of a game to play. The WDW version is realistic and very exciting. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Restaurant Review By Jerry S. I want to tell you about our wonderful experience at the Beaches and Cream Café at the Yacht and Beach Club. We did not plan on eating here, but we were late for our reservations at Cape May and didn’t want to wait for a table. We walked out and saw Beaches and Cream. It’s a cute little place. Not very big and if you hit it wrong you would be in for a long wait, but if you time it right you can sit down and have a delicious meal. They serve hamburgers and hotdogs, Veggie burgers, sandwiches, chili, french fries, onion rings, soup and the best part is the ice cream shakes, malts, sundaes, & more! I had a double burger with onion rings and they were both great. Wife is a vegetarian and had the veggie burger and really enjoyed it. They put lots of toppings on the burgers, they are very messy. We saved room so we could have dessert. I had a Mud Slide, which was a sundae with a big brownie, hot fudge, ice cream, oreo cookies all crumbled up, whip cream and a cherry. It was heaven. Wifey had a Banana Split. It was huge. All the regular banana split ingredients, but piled HIGH. There were several toppings, and she just loved it. We ended up sharing and got to have some double heaven. Our meal, including drinks and dessert was about $40, which really wasn’t bad. We were stuffed and happy. We came back 2 more times during our trip, just for dessert. You have to try Beaches and Cream - its yummy. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Park Hours, E-Ticket and Early Entry Days Chart will not be shown in this text-only version ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Kids’ Views By Ryan Family My kids are too small to express their thoughts so I figured I would do it for them. We stayed 8 days at the Contemporary resort and loved it. From all the info we got on DZ we really knew what to expect, and we had our PS reservations made, we had our naptimes worked out and even an itinerary worked out. This helped us really enjoy our trip. I can see how you could be really overwhelmed without prior planning. Because of our advanced planning our babies got relaxing naps in their own strollers, or in the room, our babies had relaxed parents and we all had a wonderful trip. Thank you DZ. Please put this in the newsletter so everyone can see what a help DZ was! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Fun Contests The current contest is an easy one. You just have to select some things you would do/buy if money was no object. The prize is a set of Cute Mickey and Minnie Beanies! Contest runs through mid-June! DZ Contest Page: www.disneyzone.net/contest.htm click on the NEW contest link to play! All prizes for the contests aredonated. A sincere Thank You to the generous contest sponsors. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Happy Birthday to: Ariane, 11, Cailyn, 9, Emma, Sarah, 6, Lonnie, 8, Ryan, 13, Scott, Gina, Wendee, Arlene, Samantha, 1 and every other DZ’er that has a birthday in JUNE! ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ THANKS to all the Disneyzone visitors for their help with the newsletter and the site!!! Tell your friends about Disneyzone! They can get their own copy of the Disneyzone News emailed to them each month, all they have to do is go to the site and register. They will automatically be put on the list. If you would rather, you may print it out or forward it. Newsletter and content Copyright © 2000 & 2001 Disneyzone - Please do not alter or copy any or all of this material, or use it on a website, or printed media without prior written permission, from Disneyzone or from the individual article's author..