ParkMagic Podcast: Insider Tips To Plan Your Disneyland Adventure
Finding Your Perfect Disney Style with Ilana McBride from Loungefly
Feb 29, 2024
Robyn from ParkMagic
Discover the secret to perfecting your Disneyland style with the fashion-forward insights of style maven Ilana McBride, who has worked previously at Disney Style and currently is the Director of Marketing and Social at Loungefly. Ilana shares about how she creates he own Disney Style, including what Disney bounding is and how anyone can do it!
Grab your most comfortable pair of Mickey ears because we're also tackling the practicalities of a day at the happiest place on Earth. Last, but definitely not least!
Right now, our tools are just for Disneyland, but we hope to expand to other parks soon. Disney changes policies, prices, and shows often. Be sure to visit our website at Parkmagic.com or Disneyland's Website for more information.
Park Magic is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Walt Disney World, Disneyland, or Disney Enterprises, Inc. Walt Disney World, Disneyland, and Mickey Mouse are all registered trademarks of Disney Enterprises, Inc. Any use of third-party names or trademarks is for identification purposes only and does not imply, nor is it intended to imply, any affiliation with, endorsement from, or business relationship with any third party, including with Walt Disney World, Disneyland, or Disney Enterprises, Inc.
Discover the secret to perfecting your Disneyland style with the fashion-forward insights of style maven Ilana McBride, who has worked previously at Disney Style and currently is the Director of Marketing and Social at Loungefly. Ilana shares about how she creates he own Disney Style, including what Disney bounding is and how anyone can do it!
Grab your most comfortable pair of Mickey ears because we're also tackling the practicalities of a day at the happiest place on Earth. Last, but definitely not least!
Right now, our tools are just for Disneyland, but we hope to expand to other parks soon. Disney changes policies, prices, and shows often. Be sure to visit our website at Parkmagic.com or Disneyland's Website for more information.
Park Magic is in no way affiliated with or endorsed by Walt Disney World, Disneyland, or Disney Enterprises, Inc. Walt Disney World, Disneyland, and Mickey Mouse are all registered trademarks of Disney Enterprises, Inc. Any use of third-party names or trademarks is for identification purposes only and does not imply, nor is it intended to imply, any affiliation with, endorsement from, or business relationship with any third party, including with Walt Disney World, Disneyland, or Disney Enterprises, Inc.
Speaker 1:
Welcome to the Park Magic podcast, your place for insider tips for your next Disneyland adventure. Whether you're a first-timer or first-time in a while visitor, we're here to unwrap the secrets to creating and simplifying your dream Disneyland vacation.
Speaker 2:
Today we're talking about dressing in the parks and I have the best person in the entire world here to talk to us about dressing for Disney. Not only is she the director of marketing and social media for Lounge 5, previously she worked for Disney Style and she has more style in her pinky nail than I do my entire family's body. So I'm so glad to have Alana McBride on to talk about how to dress for Disney, because I think sometimes people come in with like there's this one way to do things and there are so many fun ways and some of them might even get you more attention from the characters, especially if you have a little one that's like obsessed with one.
Speaker 3:
Totally. There's so many different ways to approach it and the most important thing is that people are actually wanting to do that now and think about that before. So your experience of going to the theme parks now starts in your own home. Right, it's not just packing and making sure you have a water bottle and sunscreen, but like, how do I look to make sure that I'm going to have this maximum experience in the park? So, yes, that was part of my going on. What I did at Disney Style really was about creating just a concept of Disney Style. Think about that. That didn't exist a long time ago. It was just your more a graphic teed with a Disney character on it, and you hoped that that was cool and not sort of frowned upon, or, and now it is like an expression of your fandom that is so loved and is so mainstream. So there's so many ways to go about it.
Speaker 2:
What's your Disney Style? What's your go to when you're going to the park? I mean, I know that you have a pretty big following on social media, so when it's just you and you're not planning to take pictures, or when you're planning on going, what are some of the things that you think about when you're deciding what to dress for at the park?
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I think I very much am somewhat. First of all, I collect vintage Disney in apparel and accessories. So I really always like to wear that new, old thing that I just got that I'm really excited to take pictures in, and take pictures in that specific part of whatever land and really just paint this whole picture for myself. So I start there with some whatever vintage, new, new, vintage thing that I just got and build an outfit around that. That's really what my Disney Style starts with.
Speaker 3:
I also do I dabble in Disney bounding, because with who I am and what I do, I do enjoy a good Disney bound, particularly around dapper days. Or if I'm going with a group of friends and they don't, they're kind of lost on what should I wear and how do I? You know, what should I dress in? And I don't know. I don't usually like take pictures in the, let alone in a, disney park. What do I do? Then? I kind of steer us in the direction of oh well, why don't we all Disney bound in like a group Disney bound? And then, of course, being somebody who works at Lounge Fly, it always ties back to which bag am I going to wear? What is the new one? And sometimes I like to wear one that hasn't been announced yet, because I do see people taking pictures and getting posted and putting that little teaser out.
Speaker 2:
So for somebody who doesn't know how would you describe Disney bounding? Because I think that there can be a little confusion when people think it's dressing up as a costume. It's a little different.
Speaker 3:
It is definitely not a costume. It's really dressing inspired by the characters in your everyday clothes. So if you have to pull in costume pieces, then that is you're not Disney bounding. You're putting together a costume and the parks don't allow costumes for over a certain age, so I think it's 14. I think so, and so Disney bounding is you're taking your own sort of creative style and making it inspired by a character or a ride or a.
Speaker 3:
I've seen Disney bounds of doll whips and all sorts of stuff and really taking that color palette of whatever you're trying to be inspired by and then having sort of like icons within your look that represent that character. So if you were a Winnie the Pooh Disney bound, for example, you would maybe do a red shirt of some sort, a yellow bottom of some sort and maybe like honeypot earrings or something, or little bees around a bracelet or something of that sort. But again, these are all pieces that you can find in regular stores everywhere. I love to go thrifting for Disney bounds because it really is just kind of piecing together different things. What I love most about Disney bounding is that you can also play with the different kinds of styles. So you might do a 70s Winnie the Pooh Disney bound and that would feel very different. And so you can do Winnie the Pooh 15 different times, all looking very differently. So that is sort of the fun, creative aspect of Disney bounding too.
Speaker 2:
The other nice thing about Disney bounding is you can use what you already have. So, especially if you're going to Disney on a budget, you're not spending $20 times 10 people for and you can coordinate your Disney bounds together to be like everybody from Peter Pan, and then it makes your group more identifiable as well.
Speaker 3:
Characters love to see fans dressed in Disney bounds. Of those characters, I have definitely met Winnie the Pooh as Winnie the Pooh once before. Yeah, the characters really interact with you a lot more when you are dressed in their character or inspired by their character, and then, of course, that makes for a great photo.
Speaker 2:
If you have a little one that's obsessed with Ahsoka or obsessed with Cinderella, they don't have to be in the full costume, but if they see that your clothing indicates like I'm a fan of yours, then I find that they do tend to gravitate towards that. The little one or adult.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, and something I really love. I did this with my daughter was not necessarily thinking directly about the character you might meet, but their world in particular. So my daughter had a denim dress with a little pink bow on it and she was Disney bounding as the fairy godmother. So when she met Cinderella, it was that completed the picture and the story and of course she was like three years old at the time as a fairy godmother with this much taller Cinderella, and those are the memories that I really there for me. She's gonna laugh when she's older, but I'm really there for me.
Speaker 2:
I think we should talk a little bit about matching t-shirts because I think a lot of times people when they're like, okay, I'm gonna play on my to end, this is nothing. If you love matching t-shirts, you live your best Disney life. We are not. I'm not trying to get people's yums, but I have found for me every time we try to do that either somebody spills on their shirt, somebody doesn't want to wear their shirt, or it's rainy and cold and now you can't see the shirts. The only time that it's really worked for me is when I had a group of like 180 teenagers that I was bringing to the park. Then you know, keeping the group together. But what are your thoughts on like matching t-shirts and like the pros and cons of that?
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I definitely think. No hating on the matching shirt game. If you are a matching shirt person, and that is, you've been doing it since you were little. If it's tradition, then that's what going to Disney is all about, is building and making these traditions. So I am all for that.
Speaker 3:
But to your point, they put a sweatshirt on one person's cold one's, not whatever. So you do really have to find that thing that is going to be unified. And to me it's a lot easier to unify in something like a group Disney bound. Or what I like to do with my friends or my family is like we'll pick a character and we'll just say everybody wear Mickey, you know, like somewhere on you, because for me that means Mickey jeans or like vintage jeans that have Mickey on them. For my dad that means a graphic tee that he found that you know shop Disney that has Mickey on it. So it will have something that unifies us, but it's not necessarily like the exact. So that's one way you can go about it.
Speaker 3:
Another again is a group Disney bound I've done, where we were all 101 Dalmatians of some sort and it was very easy to identify us walking through the park in white with black spots. Another is just having like a unified, like when I go with my lounge fly team. If we have a matching lounge fly bag or collection, something that just signifies all of us together but isn't actual matching graphic tee, because those cost money too, that's a lot of. Those are a lot of money. Again, no hate on it If that is part of your tradition. It is definitely something that we see often, but really you know, making it your own or not feeling like you have to do that as what Disney style is, disney style means many things. Now you have more style in your pinky than I do.
Speaker 2:
But what I did when my kids were little is I would just make sure that the colors of the shirts all matched and then for little kids we had multiple shirts for spills and stuff. This way, you know, we could still have somebody who's dressed as mini, somebody who's dressed as cars, but you could, we would still in the pictures. We would look like we went together.
Speaker 3:
Yeah, I think that it's really just about what kind of what it means to you. You know some people when I go with my some of my friends who are not Disney fans, but I make them come with me because I'm like you will have a good time, I promise you, and I'm like we are gonna Disney bound because that is the easiest thing. And they might say like I literally only own a black dress and I'm like, well, guess what? There's a lot of characters that are just black and there's a lot we can do with that. I think we and we were each different.
Speaker 3:
We had somebody was Figaro in a black and white and someone is I was like I will supply the lounge fly bags that will help identify so that I can get the picture I want. But ultimately you're still going and feeling like, look, I'm Figaro, you know. And especially if you have a friend with you who might be a little bit more identifiable or dressed, because then again you're part of the whole story and it really becomes just like an added fun element, aside from rides and food and characters, dressing is just another piece of it, I think that the pictures can be so much more interesting and can change from day to day.
Speaker 2:
Like you know, kind of the feel of the match it up to the park, depending on what you're going to. How do you decide when you're looking at picking out clothes, like where to sacrifice comfort for style and when style needs to sacrifice for comfort?
Speaker 3:
Shoes are always gonna be comfort. I am never you will never see me in a park in an uncomfortable shoe. I will always start with the comfortable shoes. My outfit will always just sort of have to match to the shoe and then the rest of the outfit is always gonna be comfort. I am, again, a collector of Vintage Disney, so I do a lot of Vintage Disney t-shirts. A t-shirt is never gonna be uncomfortable for me at the park.
Speaker 3:
I also go to jeans. What I also like to do is, as a fashion fan in general, I like to look at current trends. I have Pinterest boards. I have lots of things of like this is a cool outfit, just a general outfit. How can I disnify that outfit? And so I might look up like oh shoot, it's gonna be really hot or really humid today at the park, so I might look up like literally hot, like summer street style on Google images, find some outfit that I like, and even if it's just like shorts, a t-shirt, but she's wearing a little bit higher sock and that kind of is cute, or a frilly sock to add a little bit of femininity or something, I might find something like that and go okay, I have that sock Instead of this t-shirt I have this other t-shirt that's a Disney t-shirt, or I have shorts that have Mickey's on them, or I can add pins to my denim shorts to make them more Disney, and so I'll just kind of work in that way too, to make something that is normal street style and just a cute outfit into a Disney look.
Speaker 3:
But it will always start with what is my day. I'm going to. Sometimes I'll just go to Disneyland and get drinks with a girlfriend, and if that is my day and I know I'm still going to do a lot of walking, but I'm probably going to be sitting outside Carthage people watching with a double pair of martini, and if that's my day, then I can be in a dress and maybe just have a jacket, and it's not getting in and out of rides and wondering if I need bike shorts underneath and I still feel more comfortable. But ultimately, if I know that I'm always there's an option for me to go on rides, bike shorts will always be with me. So yeah, I just kind of look at what is. What is my purpose of the day.
Speaker 2:
So, for those who aren't familiar with the Disney Lymph of Pain, at the end of the day can we kind of lightly talk about why those bike shorts are so important? Cause we went to Disney World and my daughter was like I'm going to wear this skirt and I was like that's a bad idea. And she's like no, I'm going to wear the skirt. So halfway through the day I was like I'm going to buy you these leggings because you've learned your lesson and we're not doing this again. So just to save somebody cause it hurts, let's talk about the why the bike shorts are so important.
Speaker 3:
Bike shorts or leggings if it's colder, I mean those will never go out of style in a theme park. It really just is not. Even if they are not stylish in one day, they will never go out of style in a theme park because you can wear them with a big baggy shirt, you can wear them with a crop top. So there's just many ways and it will always be an acceptable trend in that in the park, because of the comfort.
Speaker 2:
Well, and I'm a little more pooh shaped than you are. So for me, the leggings, or, like I have, these bay leaf, bay leaf tennis skirt that has shorts underneath and it stops the chafing which, when you're, I mean cause you're walking seven to 15 miles a day. You know, on a, on a damaged Disney day if you're, if you're there like going to like really ride the rides, if you're like a not a pass holder but a single day ticket holder, and so I think sometimes people underestimate how much cause you're, especially when it's warm, how you need to think about how that will impact the rest of your day.
Speaker 3:
Even so, even if you come wearing, I still my recommendation is still come wearing the Spanx would bring extra. It just is what it is. If you're starting at Road Drop and your rides all day, my husband did one day. He claims he's not a Disney fan, but let me you guys decide if this is a Disney fan. He made himself and his friends a bingo card front and back laminated bingo card With all the rides, got there at Road Drop and did every single ride on both parks at Disneyland and Disney's California Adventure and and did it in the full day, except for the rides that were shut down. Did every single ride. Tell me that that's not a Disney fan? Okay, first of all, laminated bingo card. I didn't do that, he did it himself. So anyway, but in him, in doing that, he's like we didn't account for the fact that, like we're soaking wet on this ride and going on this ride, and that I'm like you didn't, you didn't know the rules of the locker.
Speaker 2:
And I think that's one of the things like season Disney people have an on. The whole purpose of this show is to help normal people have amazing times at Disneyland. I usually will save Grizzly River Run or what will be Tiana's Bayou adventure till right before we're going to go take a nap or go back to the hotel to rest, because you're going to need it. You might need to change after that, and then I always bring flip flops or crocs or something. I'd bring some sort of sandal to change into for those rides, because wet socks, I feel like, are the death of a Disney day.
Speaker 3:
Oh yes, that's. That's genius also, because flip flops don't take up much space. Crocs might take a room, but definitely don't just to go on those rides. I just, I just tuck my feet in the sides of the and hope for the best I well.
Speaker 2:
So the last time I went, I went right before it closed for refurb and I packed my sandals, but I have two pairs of the same flip flops. I packed literally two left feet, oh so, but I still wore them because, again, I have no styles.
Speaker 3:
I was still worn them, for sure.
Speaker 2:
I was like I don't want to because it was cold. It was January and you know, I was like I'm not going to have wet socks in January, because that's not. That's not what I want to do.
Speaker 3:
Yes, and that's also if you, your strategy works. If you also are staying at the hotel and or you're staying in one of the hotels, you can go back and take a nap, change, et cetera, but if you are really just coming in for the day, I mean, that's the beauty of lockers. Sometimes, if I know that I'm going to change outfits, a lot of like creators and stuff get a lot of backlash for changing outfits, for different photos. But you know what To each their own is what I say. And if I know that I'm going to have a total changeover of my outfit for the day, those lockers really do come in handy.
Speaker 2:
And they're really. I think that people like think about California as like sunny California and it is, but like it's like schizophrenic weather. I mean the weather just changes so much. You know you might need three layers in the morning and one layer in the. Can you talk about how you, how do you like think about the layers, especially for little ones that might get cold faster?
Speaker 3:
First of all, I have a strong belief that it's 10 degrees warmer in a Disney yes, it really is. So, whatever, whatever you are thinking, add 10 degrees. So I am. I'm big on layering. I'm big on layering even just in the ways that people might not think about layering, like sticking a turtleneck under a T-shirt, for example.
Speaker 3:
I bring thinner layers that are packable in my lounge fly to put on under my T-shirt and so I bring like a turtleneck to put under my shirt and then, like I said, like the leggings to go under my, or tights I bring tights sometimes to go under my shorts. So, just like, coming up with unique ways to layer without taking up a lot of space is is a challenge but is totally doable. And then with little ones which I only recently figured out because I have a four year old and now a five month old Truly, they're so small at this, at that age I will talk about when they get a little bit older, but at that age they're so small you bring a big old blanket and that's it. They don't even need it. Like you know, they don't want to put on a jacket, somehow. That doesn't work, but a blanket does.
Speaker 3:
So I just break a blanket over on the stroller. But yes, when you get past the one, the four year old to the 13 year old in layering, you probably have to pull out those strategies of under layers and in addition to the over layers. But you know you can get it. You can get a beanie, you can get things that are ad warmth with minimal space.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, I love beanie scarves, gloves, those little hand warmers, and they don't take up much space. But a scarf really does warm you up more than you would. I think it does.
Speaker 3:
And then on the reverse too. An old friend of mine told me to get one of those fans it's like a neck fan when we went to Disney World.
Speaker 1:
Yeah.
Speaker 3:
And that was such a lifesaver. When I was so, so hot, I just wore the style again. Comfort first, style second. But it's not like a neck fan is really that unfashionable, let's be honest. And so I just had that neck fan on and that's all I needed.
Speaker 2:
There's me who's like we're just going to get there, we're going to survive. We can try to match the same colors, but that's about as far as I've gotten. But then there's the other side, where you might have so focused on the outfit that you don't get the memories because you're wearing shoes that are painful and now you're grouchy.
Speaker 3:
When I see people wearing heels in the park and it's not like Dapper Day where I know they're just going in to take a picture and then leave you. Yeah, when I see those people, I'm like you're missing the point Truly. You're missing the point Because, above all, it is about having a good time and making memories, and so the only memory you're going to have is oh, my feet really hurt, even though I looked cute. And Disneyland is I used to say this when I worked at Disney is that it makes for a great backdrop, but it isn't made to be a backdrop. And it is the most Instagrammed place in the world, but it wasn't built for that. That Instagram only came, not that long ago.
Speaker 3:
So I always sort of stress that the yes, you should capture the photo. I'm all for getting pictures of your outfit and feeling like that confident and empowered. There is something so empowering about like I dressed cute, I feel I'm feeling myself and I match this small world wall and I am living my best Disney life. That is. I stand by that with my whole heart. But ultimately, if you're in pain doing that, that's not having the memories and feeling that empowerment and that confidence.
Speaker 3:
So when I see people walking down Main Street in heels and struggling, I am like, please, let me help you. I can tell you so much, oh, um. And then the other thing is that, if you like, going back to what I said in the very beginning that if you really are like I don't even care, I just want to be comfortable, I'm going to wear like this I have a goofy shirt and I'm just going to wear shorts. You think that that is not dressing up, but ultimately you're making that choice. There's a devil wears product quote in here somewhere, but you're making an active choice to wear the goofy shirt. You're probably going to go meet goofy. Goofy is going to point out your shirt. You're going to have this great memory just because of that shirt and that is why dressing for Disney is part of this memory making and part of the magic.
Speaker 2:
I think that that's so perfect because I think sometimes when people look at Instagrams, we see the shiny, happy, perfect moments of that trip and I think that sometimes it can get like, well, I've got to try to aspire to that. But I think that the beauty of what you just said is do what you feel comfortable and what you feel confident, doing what your budget fits, and you can see that that's not going to make or break your trip. It's going to be part of the 1,000 things you do. That will be like little places for magic to happen in the day.
Speaker 3:
Cast members are instructed to look for those things. It is not like. It's not like. Oh, you got lucky that somebody mentioned that you were wearing a goofy shirt. It truly is part of the experience. It's an entirely 360 experience and that includes things, compliments that are being told, like everything that is built into the story to make you feel like you had this great time, and that starts again in your own closet by putting on that goofy shirt.
Speaker 2:
So let's say somebody has never been to Disney, they don't know a lot about Disney style, but their little one loves Frozen. Can you give some ideas of like? If you didn't have the immense knowledge about Disney that you have, where would you start to build?
Speaker 3:
those outfits, pulling out elements from the characters for your child but also for you. Like, mommy and me are going to have matching Elsa braids today because we're going to maybe see Elsa. That's so exciting and again you can pull out some of the colors. I also let my daughter bring one thing to Disneyland, which is probably not the best advice, but it does just kind of give her a sense of safety if she's not comfortable with a ride or just gets shy meeting a character or something. But I'm like, remember, you have that thing with you and so she will often bring or the first time she brought her Elsa doll. And so for her to bring her one thing that was Elsa, knowing she was going to go meet Elsa forget even meet Elsa, but just see her on a poster somewhere outside the park or see her in the window at World of Disney or something.
Speaker 3:
Just those small moments to that sort of resonate are huge, right that she doesn't know what she's about to get into. So I think that is whatever you can do to tie back to. We're taking this thing that you love at home and we're about to go make that real life and that's going to be really overwhelming for you as a child or as a just first timer, I guess, but trying to give that sort of sense of safety and that element of familiarity and stuff that the characters can interact with and speak to. So that's where I would sort of start. If I've never been to Disney, I would go OK. Well, elsa has a braid and I could put a braid in my hair no-transcript.
Speaker 2:
Back to that frugal fancy. If I can do a matching t-shirt for like a dip versus a Disney bound, that I can pull from my closet and then get genie plus where I don't stand in much in line, for me that's a. That's a better trade off. But I'm a I'm a big ride person, so that might not be the right trade off for every family, but for me I think it's a good trade off.
Speaker 3:
Something that I hear often is that I'm not good at Disney bounding or I don't know what I'm doing or like. Is this like you know? Sure? You chose four different dark blues instead of a light icy blue for Elsa, like there is no right or wrong to it, it's more just a I like. If I, if I said that I was, I don't know anything about Disney bounding, and I pulled out a navy blue dress and I put it on and I put my hair in a braid and I said I'm Elsa. If you are a Disney fan, you would go no, you are not. She never wears navy blue. But if you are not a Disney fan and you tell your child that you are Elsa because you're wearing blue and have a braid, that is 100% going to go over very well and and you can and you should just feel confident that you are making that memory and and you dressed up as what you think is Elsa and that is all that matters.
Speaker 2:
Yeah, there's no right and wrong answers. You know, and you know there shouldn't be any gatekeeping around dressing for Disney. It's just, you know, you and I know I feel like very few brands have distilled Disney characters as well as Loungefly has. So I think that another tip is you could just go to Loungefly, search for that character or search for that franchise, and then you know, I like, even if you just color blocks, so like if you had the you wanted to do your punzel, maybe your, your husband, wears kind of the green that's on the Pascal of your bag and you pick the colors that match. I don't know you again, you have more style. Is that something that you would recommend?
Speaker 3:
or, yes, totally, totally.
Speaker 3:
In fact I went, my husband who had never been to Walt Disney World and claims he's not a Disney fan who I dragged to Walt Disney World and I said you know, he had nothing to wear and I let him borrow for one day, let him borrow one of my vintage Disney shirts.
Speaker 3:
And for another day we were going to Epcot and I said we're gonna Disney bound as frozen, and he was Anna and he got chosen as Anna because that those are the colors that he had. We tried every character and ultimately I was like I have plenty of clothes so I probably can pull together most of the characters from Frozen. But he had a blue t-shirt and a like a maroon t-shirt, and then he had blue short and I said, layer these two t-shirts. One is gonna poke out the bottom of your of the other shirt and poke out the sleeves, so you're getting a dash of the light blue the burgundy is on top, and then you have your brighter blue shorts and black shoes. That he already had all. And he was Anna and next to me who was fully decked out, and we went with some other friends too and another a friend's boyfriend was Elsa and I was the Duke of Wastleton, all of us together taking pictures in, like you know where frozen is, and in Epcot.
Speaker 2:
I think that's great. I think it highlights who. You don't have to go out and buy a whole new wardrobe to Disney bound. Yeah, if people wanted to get to know you more or follow like what you're doing at Loungefly, what's the best way for them to to do that?
Speaker 3:
that is a great question, because I recently had another baby. I really am sort of keeping my life fairly private, but you can definitely follow along on Loungefly where I host our live streams. My dear friend Karissa and I'm also going to use this time as a very selfish plug, because Karissa and I are also creating our own Disney style account called the double pair martinis pair as PAI are, which will just be our fashion account. Sort of it's soft launched already, but it will have a hard launch with the March Disney bound challenge starting on March 1st. So you can look out for the double pair PAI are martinis, because if you've never had those double pair martinis at Carthage, you should.
Speaker 2:
Do you like the lounge or do you like the restaurant better?
Speaker 3:
There is nothing like sipping a double pair. Martini, people watching talking about your love of Disney at Carthage.
Speaker 2:
Feeling fancy in the park and, yeah, having a nice cocktail, yeah, so, um, we do some. I guess we do kind of like this quick lightning round. So what? Yeah, and feel free to be like I'm not answering, but what do you think is the most underrated attraction at Disneyland or California Adventure?
Speaker 3:
Oh, my god, it's supposed to be lightning. I have to think of these fast, fast. When I am not sitting and having a cocktail, what I do like to do is get a pretzel or a snack and just ride the railroad all the way around. I feel like the railroad is used as a form of transportation to save you from walking, but it actually is a great attraction to just take the whole way around. Grab a snack I usually get a Mickey pretzel and you know and ride it as an actual ride to chill with friends and have this, you know, and get the air in your face if it's hot out. I feel like that I'm going to use as my underrated only because I feel like people use it mostly just as a form of transportation.
Speaker 2:
I feel like the train not only does these cool like vignettes between some of the stations that you can't see unless you ride the train all the way around. You're off your feet, you can enjoy, like you get away from the people, like you're sitting with people, but you're not like in a crowd as much. I feel like it's a great way to like decompress and like get ready for another wave or like do something as you're killing time between like a lightning lane or something.
Speaker 3:
I love having a snack on the train, yeah, and I think people see like a 15 minute line and they're like, oh, it'll be faster if we just walk, and it's like, no, it's also just a 15 minutes as compared to other really long lines for an actual attraction.
Speaker 2:
That has this amazing, cool history. There's this group of people on Facebook that they just get together and they ride the train all day Like they love. You know that? Yeah, like that's their gig is. You know, like some people go and pin trade like this group of people, like they just they get to. We kind of stumbled upon them because we were sitting there and we heard them talking about and I was like, oh, this is like a whole thing.
Speaker 3:
Oh my gosh, I got to look into that yeah.
Speaker 2:
And then what's your favorite quick serve location? My favorite quick serve location is probably jolly holiday Is it, we can officially go to Disneyland together, because that's my favorite too, is it Okay?
Speaker 3:
great. I mean, there's nothing like a tomato soup and grilled cheese combo, especially if it's a little out, but is that my favorite? Yeah, I think so.
Speaker 2:
I think I'll call that and I think it's a great place to people watch too, because you get to watch people come in and they're seeing the castle for their first time and you know like they're trying to decide which direction they're going to go.
Speaker 3:
So it's like one of my favorite in the ducks sometimes it's little ducks and the ducks yes, and I'm not if you're a newcomer to Disney, but I generally find that if I sit there I'm bound to run into somebody I know who is? Also some pass holder who's walking by and sees me, so I love that about it.
Speaker 2:
Well, I want to thank you so much for coming on. This has been so much fun. I always enjoy talking to you, so thank you so much for coming on to the show.
Speaker 3:
Thank you, thank you for having me. I love it and I'm happy to come back anytime. Robin, we didn't talk about this before, but do you want to do a lounge fly giveaway on your show? That would be awesome. I would love that I can give away a lounge fly, star Wars backpack and wallet to one lucky winner, one lucky listener.
Speaker 2:
If you go to parkmagic underscore tools and there's going to be a post there that says you know with you know the episode that we have here, and if you go and comment on that post, we will go back in a week and we will pick somebody from that post to win that lounge fly giveaway. So I want to thank you so much, that's so generous of you, and lunch fly, thank you, thank you.
Speaker 3:
Thanks for having me and hope to see you in the park soon. We'll have to plan a trip, yes.
Speaker 1:
Thanks for listening to this episode of the Park Magic podcast. For more tips and planning tools designed to help simplify your Disneyland adventure, visit parkmagiccom. If you enjoyed today's episode and want to hear more tips, be sure to subscribe to the park magic podcast, and don't forget to leave us a review. Your feedback helps us spread the magic even further. Leaving a review could also help you. Each month, we will be selecting one reviewer to win. A one hour planning session with Robin. Winners will be announced at the end of the first episode of every month. Thanks for tuning in and remember that we are here to help you have a less stressful and more magical trip to Disneyland.
