The D23 Expo 2015 was the fourth Disney fan convention hosted by D23. Given my experiences over the years I have developed a pattern of behavior to avoid highly congested areas and long periods of standing as I found this hampered my overall enjoyment. Many of my friends invest a lot of time and energy in attending the presentations or purchasing that special keepsake and clearly have a completely different Expo experience than I do.
This year I attended Friday & Sunday of the D23 Expo. We arrived in Anaheim on Thursday afternoon picked up our badges and headed out to play at the Disneyland Resort. That evening when we returned to the hotel (adjacent to the venue as we’ve found that works best for us) my fun began as I checked off a bucket list item — — watching the Macy’s Parade Buzz Lightyear balloon being unrolled and prepped to fly. But on Friday morning I let the excitement get to me and broke one of my rules which is — avoid the event during its opening hour. Instead I ventured out with my family to the Convention Center shortly after the doors opened to find a mass of people and a challenge to discover where I should queue to enter the venue. As the frustration mounted we decided to abandon ship for now and simply found lunch back at the hotel. After lunch as we headed back to the convention center we stumbled upon the Disney Legend Richard Sherman, Marty Sklar and many others heading out after the recently concluded Legends Ceremony. I loved pointing out each one as they passed to my little dude. And then we headed back into the venue shortly before 1p without a wait and headed into the gigantic show floor area and almost immediately spotted Imagineer Joe Rohde chatting with other event guests. Stagepasses were still available for smaller presentations that had caught my eye but I opted instead to enjoy the show floor while my husband and son attended the Jungle Cruise skippers presentation. Throughout the rest of the day I simply wandered the expo floor chatting with Imagineers about their work at Shanghai Disneyland, watching the excitement as fans interacted with favorite celebrities (and got a little giddy myself), learned more about the wide variety of upcoming products coming from the worlds of Disney, browsed exhibits that teased upcoming films and took photos with props from recent releases. I sat in amazement watching Disney Legend Andreas Deja masterfully create various Disney characters such as Lilo, Tigger, Jafar, etc. And melted as my Disney “nerd in training” got excited at the opportunity to get a picture inside a real Skyway bucket. And then Day 1 was over.
On Day 2, we once again ventured in Expo about an hour and a half after the doors opened. Choo Choo Soul’s Genevieve was there and I’m a big fan of hers. I enjoyed watching her perform live and appreciate her message to the young kids — being cool doesn’t require showing skin. Stuck around for a bit of the trivia contest then wandered the show floor with my guys who weren’t attending any presentations today. However it was finally time to get in a queue as my little dude wanted to see the Disneyland Archives exhibit. Happily for me most of it was visible from the exterior not requiring a wait but my guys wanted to see things up close so I found myself in a queue. I enjoyed seeing the Abominable Snowman up close and without zooming by and had fun joining my son on the ground so we could look up into the mouth of the dragon head from Fantasmic. But I think our favorite portion by far was the oversized 3D images of vintage Disneyland. It was so exciting to have that window into the past. Then it was back to the show floor where we finally did a little shopping and some more celebrity spotting — Lesley Ann Warren, Karen Dotrice, and Tommy Kirk among a few others. Little dude was memorized by Mattel’s upcoming Radiator Springs premium sets and declared his opportunity to take a picture inside an authentic Peoplemover car, “A dream come true”. As the day came to a close we finished up our Expo adventure watching the talented Eric Goldberg explain the artistry of animation as he sketched early versions of Mickey Mouse and contrasted it with the familiar modern styles.
As always we left D23 excited about the Disney future, more educated about the Disney past and even more curious about both. Looking forward to the next one already.
