A lot of students in band and choir have been waiting for this trip since they first joined the activity. Junior Addison Kuonen is a member of choir and has been using the annual Butter Braid sale to save up for the trip. Kuonen says she is been looking forward to this week for years.

The journey begins March 10th. The students will enter the two charter buses that are available and begin their 20-hour ride to Florida. The bus will only be stopping for meal breaks and students are expected to sleep on the bus the night of their drive. They will arrive around 4:00 p.m. on March 11th at their place of rest for the next 5 nights. They are expected to room with 3 other people, but some people got lucky. “Most rooms have four people in it. We had to find friends to room with, but I have a room with only one other person, Addison Kuonen,” Caitlyn Nemechek, the junior, shared. 

On Sunday, the choir works at Hollywood Studios to record a song of them performing a Disney song. After this, the whole group will visit a resort to swim and relax before the rest of the busy week.

The group will visit Magic Kingdom on Monday and later in the day, the band will begin their clinic. At the clinic, the Disney employees will give the band two Lion King pieces to sight read and based on which one they play best, they will record the song. Then, the producers will play their newly recorded song over the live speakers while the credits roll on a large screen. The band has been preparing for this for months. At the beginning of the school year, the band director Russell Braun gave them music that he expected would be played in the studio. They have also been perfecting their sight reading skills throughout the year. Nemechek, a flutist in the band, said she is thrilled to play in a professional studio and see what it feels like to be a Disney musician.

That Tuesday is the time for the group to relax. This is done because the students and chaperones can get pretty worn out after so much park hopping. They will visit a beach on this day, eat at a buffet and go souvenir shopping.

Wednesday is the day Nemechek has been looking forward to the most. That is the day the group will visit Universal Studios. “I’m most excited for the Forbidden Journey ride in Universal,” Caitlyn told. Harry Potter and the Forbidden Journey is a ride located in the Wizarding World of Harry Potter part of Universal. This ride takes you through the hidden part of the Hogwarts building and shows you its characters throughout the way. 

On the last true day of their trip, they will visit Animal Kingdom. At the end of the day, the trip planners have arranged for the students to have a private viewing place for a fireworks show. When this is done, they will immediately load the buses and head home.

The next day, they will spend the whole day riding their charter buses, crossing many state lines on the way. They will arrive back at the school very late on Friday the 17th, likely overjoyed from their trip, but no dought exhausted from their long excursion and jam-packed schedule.