Photo TR: Disney World Marathon Weekend

I spent last week in Orlando yet again for the WDW marathon weekend. This was my third year at this event, but my first time doing the "Goofy Challenge", which is running the half marathon on Saturday and the full marathon on Sunday. I also threw in the 5K race on Friday just for laughs. Taiko LMAO!

The 5K race was a nice course through the Animal Kingdom. I went to the theme park formally known as MGM for a few hours after that but left early to relax for the next race. We stayed at Port Orleans Riverside and walked around there for a bit too.

The half marathon will be coming up next! Here's the first batch of photos...

Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 12:17 pm Post subject:

Wow, you are a runner. Goofy challenge and the 5K!!!

We also just stayed at Port Orleans Riverside for the first time and really enjoyed it.

Thanks for the TR, looking forward to the rest.

Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 12:20 pm Post subject:

Uhh, were at WDW, again! I am really a bit jealous. But you got some nice shots for us, that is great. It looks like you had a good time there, as always. I am looking forward to the next bunch of pictures.

Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 1:01 pm Post subject:

^^When I was younger, my family and I used to stay at Port Orleans Riverside (when it used to be Dixie Landings) so it was especially nice to be staying there again.

Another thing I loved about the resort is that I was actually able to walk to the start of both the half and full marathon. So I got at least an extra hour of much needed sleep, since last of the buses left at 4am.

On Saturday morning, I headed over to the start of the half marathon at around 5am and still had plenty of time before it began (at 6am). I really took my time through this race to save my energy for the next day and wasn't out to break any world records.

The course basically goes from the Epcot parking lot up through the Magic Kingdom and then back, going through some Future World in Epcot. There were some characters out and about in the Magic Kingdom so I took breaks by taking some pictures with them. I have more from the full marathon, though. They were all taken with a disposable camera, so you'll notice that they're not as clear as the others.

After the race, I relaxed for a while and then went to the Animal Kingdom. I didn't take a ton of photos, but I didn't spend much time there anyway.

Ok, on to the photos!

Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 1:02 pm Post subject:

Awesome, I ran the half marathon this year (and for the last 4 for that matter). Im doing Goofy Challenge next year since I'll be old enough, so I'm looking forward to that. Anyways, great TR, glad there is another runner on the board...

Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 1:20 pm Post subject:

Wow, I didn't know Disney did stuff like that, but it's pretty cool! I'm not much of a runner myself but I would do that just for the free crap lol. Looks like you had a great time!

Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 3:36 pm Post subject:

Now on to the final race, the full marathon. It began with another early start with a nice walk through Port Orleans over to the race corrals. The weather was mostly decent, maybe a little on the warm side, but the rain stayed away until after the race.

This course started off near Epcot again, and we actually went through part of Epcot in the beginning this time. Then on to the Magic Kingdom again but instead of returning to Epcot, we went to the Animal Kingdom. After that was a whole road of nothing until MGM. I felt pretty good up until those last 6 miles and I just couldn't run anymore. So I mostly walked through MGM, the Epcot resort area and then back to Epcot to the finish line.

I was exhausted but glad that I did it, and was even happier to be going back to a different resort, the Animal Kingdom Lodge. I've visited AKL before but had never stayed there. We stayed in one of the new Disney Vacation Club Villas. It's considered to be a "value studio" so it was a little small but still lovely.

After burning off a billion calories, I was ready to eat a nice big meal at 'Ohana. We had a fabulous window seat and got to see Wishes from there. Then saw the Electrical Water Pageant which I had never seen.

Marathon runners got free entry into Pleasure Island so we stopped by there. I really don't care for PI all that much but will go for free. I didn't stay that long anyway because all I wanted to do was sleep.

More photos! Epcot is up next...

Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 3:36 pm Post subject:

Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 3:36 pm Post subject:

The next day was spent at the Magic Kingdom. I was still pretty tired so we just relaxed, but still got to do everything we wanted to since it was so empty! I'll just get right to the pictures. This was the last Disney day so Universal is up next.

Posted: Sun Jan 20, 2008 3:37 pm Post subject:

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