Yes, we love Disneyland and most things Disney. Yesterday, we headed again to the park for a really fun event called Mouse Adventures. We did this back in the spring and entered the non-competitive division and had a great time.
Basically, Mouse Adventures is a scavenger hunt in Disneyland (they go to Florida, too). The group of people who run the event are not affiliated with Disney, but they do have Disney’s permission to run the event. Teams of 2-4 people spend hours in the park completing quests. Knowledge of the parks and Disney are helpful.
Back in the spring, the “101″ Division was only in CA Adventure. We had about 6 quests to complete and it turns out we won first place of all the new families that day.
So, when entries opened for the Fall event, we decided to enter the Basic Division. It’s a really fun event. We heard there were over 800 people competing on almost 300 teams. The group is really creative and t-shirts and costumes are everywhere.
We decided to channel Phinneas and Ferb and go as Agent P. I picked up these shirts at Disneyland a few weeks ago.
We customized the back of our shirts, too.
If you can’t read this:
Dude’s shirt “Curse You Perry the Platapus!”
My shirt “I Know What We’re Going to Do Today”
Dancing Girl “Mom! Phinneas and Ferb are Doing Mouse Adventures”
There was a t-shirt contest, but entries needed to be turned in about a week ago, and I didn’t have time to make the shirts until Saturday. We had a good time with the shirts and received a lot of compliments. Although, we were really confused when people commented that we were Angry Birds. C’mon, people – Disney show – Disney land….
Anyway, we checked in at 9AM yesterday (at one of the hotels) and received our instructions. By the time we all go into the park (Disneyland only this time) and received our quests, it was about 10:45. We had until 3:30 to complete our quests.
Each kid got a task to be in charge of. Dude’s was tracking down the shadow quests that were the wait time signs. Dancing Girl had a quest that involved teeny tiny pictures of different parts of rides. She organized them by ride and got most of them figured out. (after figuring out which ride they were, we had to put them in chronological order and then use the accompanying letters to decode another clue). MMT is an excellent puzzle person, so he was actually able to decipher the puzzle without all the info.
I highly recommend doing this with a child’s memory for detail and a person with a logical puzzle mind. It was a total team effort. Although there were a few moments of disagreement, it was actually a fun day of working together.
There were 2 quests that we didn’t even have time to do. It was all rather challenging, but pretty fun.
Then there were the trivia questions. The theme of this event was the Twilight Zone. The event creators put together some fantastic trivia questions that were really challenging. No technology was allowed. We knew the answers to maybe 25% of the questions. Many were connections between Twilight Zone and Disney and we had no idea. Luckily they were multiple choice, so we at least were able to put something down.
After turning in our score cards, we hit up our usual favorite lunch. And then spent some time enjoying the sights at Disney. The park is all decked out for Halloween.
The kids were so wiped out (we were kind of task masters pushing them through the quests 
), we actually watched a parade.
Then we wandered through Downtown Disney and got some ice cream. Awesome dinner of champions is a Haagen Daz Brownie Sundae, right? And no trip to Downtown Disney is complete without a stop at the Lego Store where the kids blew some allowance money on a Lego set. At least it’s one thing they can agree on and they pool their funds to buy stuff.
Then, it was awards time back at the Mouse Adventures ballroom in the hotel.
Again, there was a family division for the day (families with kids under the age of 13 – I think there were 16 teams in the category). And…. we won!!
So, our Disney obsession (although nothing compared to some of the people there) and MMT”s puzzle abilities really come in handy for a fun event at the Happiest Place on Earth.
Now, my kids are already planning shirts and a team name for the next one.
If you can’t read this:
Oh my gosh, I’ve never heard of this before! We adore Disneyland! Before the girls were in school we had APs and drove down to the park a lot, now we only make it once or twice a year. I must find the information for the spring competition, that sounds so fun!!
Nicole recently posted..Too busy to blog
Yes, check it out. It’s a lot of fun. Lots of fun Disney addicts.
What a cool event! And even cooler that you won!
Coco recently posted..Wordless Wednesday (The Sundae Edition)
Thanks! My kids are already planning our shirts for next time.