It's possible to use Google Street View (or at least, panorama photographs that have been shared with Google) in some locations of the Disney parks and for some reason none of the faces have been blurred. However everyone looks thoroughly miserable in these photos. I wonder if it's because of the amount of walking involved, or if its because they've realised they essentially got scammed out of thousands of dollars for a multi-week holiday in hell?
Or maybe it's a candid snapshot and no one goes around with expressions of elation all over their face all the time.
And "thousands of dollars for a multi-week holiday in hell"? That's a lot of exaggeration in little space, the kind of hyperbole the Imagineers at Disney would create.
While, it will probably be a few thousand dollars depending on accomodation, travel, and the like, that's true of a lot of travel.
Multi-week? C'mon, Disney itself offers multi-day packages. Hell, on their site, you can only select up to 5 days worth of tickets. So on the outside, it's a week. And if you don't want to visit certain parks, you can probably do it in 2 to 4 days. Last time I went, we split time between Disneyworld and Universal and only stayed about a week.
As to hell, there is one thing I really appreciate about Disney and it's their absolute commitment to the bit and the buy-in they get from their employees. The dedication to the guest "experience" is nothing short of amazing. I also find it very honest in its way. They make no bones about this being performance first. The person serving pretzels, their job isn't serving pretzels, their job is to play the part of someone who lives to serve pretzels. It's fake, but it's honest about it. I don't think less of movies simply because they contain fantastic elements. We both know what I signed up for when I buy a ticket to see Transformers. Similarly, when you buy a ticket to Disneyworld, you both know what you're signing up for.
The longer I live, the more I wonder if traveling is something people actually enjoy. (And this is much worse, since its this faux-traveling)
There is quite a bit of pain from simply moving your body long distances. The reward must make up for this.
Beautiful views are the least rewarding part, those moments are fleeting, and there are plenty of more beautiful things you can see on your phone without leaving your bed. This is basically the goal of Disney, throw in some short physical hedonism from rides, and that is the experience. Only thing I'm missing is that having your own children smile will cause some intense pleasure thanks to biology.
However, call me a Platonist, but the best part of traveling is the knowledge. I remember physically feeling awful during my travels in Europe. The transportation was long, the food was so small portions I felt ill (until I learned you could get tuna sandwiches everywhere[Weight lifter walking 12+ hrs/day]), and outside the Sistine chapel, I had seen these views before. However looking back on it, and my favorite moments was learning about the history and learning about the area. Being physically able to walk from Aurelian walls to the colosseum and the forum was enlightening. A history book couldn't teach me this.
Traveling physically hurts, but it doesn't mean it wont be looked back fondly.
For what it's worth, I don't think your experience is universal. Fair enough, walking around all day does create some bodily discomfort, but personally I walk around in my home city a lot. So I'm pretty used to that and the discomfort is generally minor.
But in particular, you seem to not have a particularly good time with the food while travelling, which for me is often the best part of traveling while there, and the most memorable after the fact. In some ways, I travel to eat, and maybe that's a common alternative to your experience, to be fair, I think I'd like traveling far less if the food was generally bad.
I'm not fond of traveling either. For me to go somewhere, there has to be a friend (or friends) or family there to visit. I dislike going somewhere just to go, and have found that typically, it's not worth the experience. I travel to see people, not places or food.
I think that makes a lot of sense, both of my parents hate traveling. The point of my post was just to suggest that the parent's opinion wasn't universal, that some of us really do actually like traveling. There are obviously aspects of it that aren't great in the moment, cramming into a plane, jet lag. But generally those aspects are worth the rest of the experience.
I'm curious why you consider going to Disney faux-traveling. It's an opinion I hear often (and I once held) but everybody seems to get there for different reasons.
