2013, how I will cheer your passing.

The waning days of December are a natural time for reflection – after all, that’s why we all write these year-end posts, no? After a challenging year, I find myself a bit more contemplative than normal. And while it could be easy to get bogged down by the bad things that have happened, I realize that in many ways it was largely a good year. It was an interesting year. It was a Disney-filled year.

Lest you think I’ve suddenly turned annoyingly optimistic, though, unless you are Bob Iger – who made an astounding $34+ million dollars this year – you can’t say it’s been a perfect Disney year. In fact, the introduction of MyMagic+, continued cost cutting, higher prices, and the reduction of experiences and entertainment offerings could leave a seasoned Disney fan awfully cynical.

So let’s take a look at 2013. First, my year in Disney, and then a few general thoughts on what this year in WDW brought us:

February: A planned trip to WDW, and an unplanned one a week later. CP and I gave Bay Lake Tower a try for a long weekend.  In addition to eating at Be Our Guest for the first time (and the only time we found it good), I also learned an important lesson about not mixing Casey’s corn dog nuggets with Manhattans. (Seriously…don’t try that at home.) After our weekend, I stayed on in Florida for work, and the day before I was to return home to Massachusetts a huge blizzard hit the Northeast, so my boss and I were stranded in Florida for three days. What to do? Head to Disney, day drink around the World Showcase, and have a spontaneous dinner at Victoria & Alberts.

I’ve made a huge mistake.

March: Back to Florida for work, so why not tack on a few days to see family and check out the Flower and Garden Festival? We take in a Red Sox spring training game, wade in the Gulf of Mexico, and finally see Art of Animation for ourselves. I have my first Lapu-Lapu. I ride the teacups with my grandmother for the first time since I was four years old. Time to put me in one of those weepy WDW commercials.

Oh look – “special nighttime effects!’

May: I’m not sure how we did it, but somehow we rationalized that we “needed” a quick (really quick: 48 hours-ish) trip down to WDW for some stress relief. To do it, we decided to Hotwire an offsite hotel, a mistake I’ll never make again. I also discovered I actually quite like Animal Kingdom. There were more margaritas, and more Flower and Garden Festival, which – by the way – looks a lot better in early May than it does in early March. We were annoyed by cheerleaders. And then, before we knew it, we were home. Forced to wait a whole three months (I know, I know) til our next trip, in…

In May, I finally learned to love Animal Kingdom.

August: The trip of high blood pressure. The trip of expletives. The trip of getting acquainted with Magic Bands and all things MyMagic+. Let’s just say it didn’t go well. I’m really bad at shameless self-promotion and generally can’t insist you read anything I write, but I would suggest reading the trip report for this disaster of a vacation. It’s a pretty epic tale, one that resulted in my first ever (politely) angry e-mail to Guest Relations after the trip. Which did nothing, by the way.

FINALLY.

November: A couple weekends of dipping-my-toes-back-in to WDW after enduring an unexpected and very painful breakup (and eventual divorce) in October. I wasn’t sure I could like Disney again after having a Disney-filled relationship fall apart. Through some good friends, some rumspringa-like shenanigans, and fresh eyes, I discovered that I really did still love Disney, warts and all. Yes, this is where the happy tears came in.

I walked on Main Street, saw this, and knew there was no way I could walk away from Disney, painful divorce be damned.

What did we I learn from these individual trips? Well, a few things, some good, some bad:

I’m a resort snob, but Moderates are okay. Listen, blame my family – my trips as a kid were to the Polynesian, the Contemporary, and then to DVC resorts. (Let’s be honest, though – this was back when stays at the Poly/Contempo didn’t cost quite the arm/leg/soul they do now.) When CP and I were married, we did okay enough financially that we could capitalize on AP discounts and stay at Deluxes for our once-a-year-trips. When we started going more frequently, our compromise was to try out a Moderate, and we started with Coronado Springs. You know what? It was great. I’ll be staying there again in a few weeks, and Port Orleans is next on my list. What can I say, I’ve grown as a human being or something.

Coronado? I like it.

Limited Time Magic gave me the agita. You know what was a great promotion? Year of a Million Dreams. That one worked; there were elements of surprise, tangible rewards both big and small, and a real conveyance of WDW as a place where dreams could actually come true if the YOMD team found you. Every promotion since then? Pretty meh. Limited Time Magic has maybe been the worst one to date. Yes, I admit there have been a few successful ideas, (the September Villains event, True Love week), but on the whole most LTM promotions have been merchandise-buying opportunities wrapped up in drivel. Personally, I’d love to see WDW abandon this needless “we must have a new promotion every year!” schtick. Focus on delivering a quality theme park experience all the time and you don’t need gimmicky promotions.

More limited time magic than Disney’s Limited Time Magic(tm).

But no agita compared to MyMagic+ frustration. There isn’t enough space on the internet to hold all of my rantings about MyMagic+. I swear, I really did start out with an open mind, hoping I’d be pleasantly surprised by this initiative and that I’d learn to see its value. After a 10-day test of it in August – and a secondary experience with it in November – I’m not sure I could possibly be more curmudgeonly about it the whole thing. Put crudely, it just sucks. The system is poorly designed, buggy as all getout, and does nothing (in spite of PR spin to the contrary) to make WDW vacationing easier or more flexible. Plus there’s the whole “Disney is mining your data and violating your privacy” thing. If you’re curious, here’s my Storify on all the problems I had with MyMagic+ in August.

Ugh.

When WDW does food well, it does it really well. When it doesn’t…it…really doesn’t. Eating at Victoria & Albert’s on a whim was the culinary highlight of my year, if not my lifetime. Compared to prix fixe meals at restaurants of similar caliber in New York City and Boston, the price you pay for a meal at V&A’s is a steal. The service is impeccable, the food thoughtfully conceived and executed, and the entire experience truly relaxing in a way that’s normally hard to find on property. I had other standout meals at Jiko, Artist Point, Kouzzina, and even (and especially at) The Wave. On the flip side, dinner at Be Our Guest was one of the few meals I’ve ever eaten that I pronounced almost entirely inedible. I’d rather eat a steak at Ponderosa than have one at Be Our Guest again.

Yes.

NO. No no no.

Disney and Starbucks got married, and DOMA was overturned. Coincidence? No, seriously, this is one marriage I am absolutely over the moon about. Yes I’m a coffee snob – I subsist on French press and pourovers and cafe au lait – but Starbucks has a time and a place, and I for one welcome our new coffee overlords. Not having to go off property for a decent cup of coffee? Sign me up. Moreover, I applaud Disney and Starbucks for a partnership that is a shrewd, strategic business decision for both companies. It actually reminds me of the initial Disney/corporation partnerships that underpinned the original EPCOT Center. Would “Walt have wanted” Starbucks on property? Who knows. But I want it.

Win.

I love WDW, but broader horizons are on the horizon. Familiarity hasn’t exactly bred contempt, but it has resulted in a slight dampening of excitement. That I have a trip coming up in a few weeks that feels almost perfunctory is something of a shock, and not one I’m altogether pleased with. So, it’s time to mix it up. Next month I’ll be heading to Disneyland for the first time (well, second, if you count my trip as a 15-year-old where I had the flu and entered the park feverish and delirious, rode it’s a small world and left. I don’t count that!), which fills me with excitement and anxiety seeing as I know next to nothing about how to “do” DL well. I still have a deposit down on a Disney Cruise, which will be novel not only because I’ve never cruised with Disney, I’ve never cruised…at all. WDW will always be familiar and comforting, even as it goes a bit stagnant. I’ll never abandon it, but I will cheat on it a bit.

So, what about you – what were the high/lowlights of your Disney year? Anything you loved or loathed? I’d love to hear about it in the comments, or on twitter at @WonderlandNerds.