Disney World News: More Shows, Train Delay, Florida COVID Cases Surge

We’re back with another Walt Disney World news & rumor roundup. This one covers another dining spot returning, 2022 WDW Marathon themes, Brightline train delay, added showtimes at Animal Kingdom, surging case numbers in Florida driven by the Delta variant, and more.

Let’s begin with some good news. We haven’t had any major restaurant reopening news this week (presumably because the return of several shows at Walt Disney World took the spotlight instead), but the official Walt Disney World website was just quietly updated to indicate that Cheshire Café at Magic Kingdom will reopen on July 26, 2021.

This is great news for one of the Best Snacks at Magic Kingdom, the Cheshire Cat Tail! This is one of our tried and true favorites–it’s basically a Danish Chocolate Twist with icing to up the photogenic ante and make it resemble Cheshire Cat. This tasty treat is simple but works so well because the pastry is flaky on the outside, doughy on the inside, with the right amount of chocolate to add ample gooeyness. It’s relatively straightforward, but delicious!

Continuing with the good news, more showtimes for “A Celebration of Festival of the Lion King” have been added to the daily schedule at Animal Kingdom. Joining the lineup will be 9:30 am and 2 pm showtimes beginning on July 31, 2021.

This will bring the total daily showtimes to 8, with options every hour (aside from 1 pm) between 9:30 am and 5 pm. This is a very positive change, especially as crowds and wait times (including for this show) have increased at Animal Kingdom.

Next, runDisney has unveiled the race themes for the 2022 Walt Disney World Marathon Weekend, taking place January 5-9, 2022. The year’s event themes once again feature Mickey and friends.

Pluto is the mascot for the 5K, Oswald for the 10K, Donald and Daisy Duck for the Half Marathon, and Minnie & Mickey Mouse for the full Marathon. As always, Goofy and Dopey round out those respective challenges. This was all pretty much as expected–the Walt Disney World Marathon uses the same characters year after year. The medals and graphics should change–and hopefully feature inspiration drawn from Walt Disney World’s 50th Anniversary.

Walt Disney World has “confirmed” of what was announced earlier this week, with an update its official attraction page for the Happily Ever After fireworks, indicating it’s your “last chance to experience this grand finale to your day–before the show’s final performance on September 29, 2021.”

In Happily Ever After Ending “Permanently”, we expressed skepticism about whether Walt Disney World’s flagship nighttime spectacular is actually ending forever. Despite this confirmation, we stand by all of our commentary in that post.

In other scheduling news, character cavalcades showtimes are now available in the My Disney Experience app. If you go to the wait times screen and select the “entertainment” dropdown, you’ll see them. Previously, times were not posted to promote physical distancing and discourage guests from congregating and waiting for performances. However, with physical distancing now dropped, that’s no longer a consideration.

We view this as a positive change–the cavalcades are minor diversions, and while it’s nice to see them spontaneously, that’s sometimes easier said than done. I wouldn’t want to linger around Main Street to see a particular character, especially in the current heat. Given that these aren’t as ‘robust’ as full parades, it’s highly unlikely having these schedules available is going to cause overcrowding. (We’ve been in the parks a couple of days since this started and absolutely no one is standing around on curbs waiting for the cavalcades.)

In some disappointing news, the Central Florida Expressway Authority voted to delay indefinitely a decision over whether to allow Brightline Trains to build passenger rail beside State Road 417 on the way from Orlando International Airport to Walt Disney World and Tampa.

Proponents of International Drive, Universal Orlando, and Orange County Convention Center are pushing for an alternative route for Brightline that would service more of the tourism corridor. This route would be able to service many more theme parks, hotels, and related businesses in need of rail transportation to the airport. However, it could also cost considerably more and result in significant delays due to other construction along the corridor.

The privately-funded Brightline is forecast to finish its extension of rail from South Florida to MCO in 2022. However, construction of the MCO to Walt Disney World stretch has not begun, and even previously was not even scheduled to begin being built until 2024.

As yet another reminder, the Brightline rail is not a replacement for Disney’s Magical Express. (We’ve mentioned this several times, but claims that Brightline is the “reason” Disney’s Magical Express is ending keep coming up in the comments–that’s demonstrably false.) The tentative target opening year for that line is 2026. Given the delays to date, we’d bank on it being finished late, not early—and certainly not next year!

Finally, Florida was mentioned in this week’s White House COVID-19 Task Force briefing on July 21, 2021 as a hotspot for COVID-19. “Florida, Texas and Missouri, three states with lower vaccination rates, accounted for 40% of all cases nationwide,” said Jeff Zeints, the task force’s coordinator.

Data from Johns Hopkins University shows Florida is averaging over 6,400 new cases per day, which is nearly twice what it was a week ago and four times the average from one month ago. According to the data, Florida also tops California and Texas, which both have daily averages of under 5,000 cases.

More recent numbers from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention paint a worsening picture. The CDC reported 12,647 new cases in Florida for July 21, 2021 (the most recent date for which there’s data). That’s a number of daily infections not seen in the state since late January during the post-holiday surge prior to the vaccination effort gaining momentum.

That’s 22.9% of the U.S. daily caseload, and more than the total reported for the entire country prior to Independence Day. There were also 8,988 cases reported on July 20, 2021. This increase is also reflected in the CDC’s seven-day rolling average of cases in Florida. That went from 1,839 on July 1 to 8,911 on July 21 per the CDC’s data tracker.

In his most recent health briefing earlier this week, Orange County Mayor Jerry Demings said, “I wish there was more I could do to protect you. But you hold the key to your own destiny. You can protect yourselves by simply getting vaccinated.”

“Sooner or later, if you’re unvaccinated, this virus is going to march right into your household and the consequences can be severe,” Demings said.

As previously reported, during last week’s briefing Mayor Demings officially recommended all residents, vaccinated and unvaccinated, to consider wearing face mask indoors when in crowded environments. During this week’s conference, the mayor said he had explored “all options” for prevention including re-imposing a face mask mandate but concluded his hands were tied.

In the latest report from the Florida Department of Health, Orange County and Osceola County each had positivity rates of just above 12%. Note that these numbers are from last week due to less frequent reporting by the state. With that said, hospitalizations, ICU admissions, and deaths are continuing to decrease, meaning that cases could be decoupling from deaths and other negative outcomes.

With that said, AdventHealth announced that all 7 of its Central Florida hospital locations will add additional visitor restrictions, limit elective inpatient cases, and require masks hospital-wide. The status change comes after the number of hospitalized COVID-19 patients at AdventHealth hospitals more than doubled in the last two weeks. The hospital system is seeing its fastest rate of increase during the course of the entire pandemic.

Orlando Health, which operates the second-largest hospital in Central Florida after AdventHealth, has not announced any changes in COVID-19 restrictions. Orlando Health has indicated that it is reviewing all options due to the increasing incidence of COVID-19 in the community and its hospital system.

Unlike past waves, there is a disparate impact thus far in July between the vaccinated and unvaccinated. While breakthrough cases can occur in the vaccinated, the people who have ended up hospitalized with severe COVID-19 are almost all unvaccinated. AdventHealth is reporting that 95% of their inpatients with COVID-19 are unvaccinated. At Orlando Health, it’s currently about 90%.

It’s also worth noting that mid-July of last year saw cases peak in Florida before significant drops in the fall. At the time, that was widely attributed to the hotter weather driving people indoors where transmission is more likely. The circumstances are likely the same here, along with the more transmissible Delta variant ripping through the population, impacting mostly those without prior immunity of some sort. As before, we are sharing these developments since it’s local news that may be relevant to out-of-state vacation planners who might otherwise miss it. As a “compromise,” I’m going to bite my tongue and withhold color commentary on this topic and would request that you do the same in the comments.

Planning a Walt Disney World trip? Learn about hotels on our Walt Disney World Hotels Reviews page. For where to eat, read our Walt Disney World Restaurant Reviews. To save money on tickets or determine which type to buy, read our Tips for Saving Money on Walt Disney World Tickets post. Our What to Pack for Disney Trips post takes a unique look at clever items to take. For what to do and when to do it, our Walt Disney World Ride Guides will help. For comprehensive advice, the best place to start is our Walt Disney World Trip Planning Guide for everything you need to know!

YOUR THOUGHTS

What do you think about all this Walt Disney World news? Disappointed about the Happily Ever After ending confirmation or the Brightline delay? Pleased to see more dining and entertainment showtimes being added? Thoughts on the runDisney themes? Keep the comments civil, as this is not the place for politically-charged arguing, antagonism, personal attacks, or cheap shots. We will be heavy-handed in deleting comments that cross the line, even if it’s only a single sentence. You are not going to change anyone’s mind via the comments section on this blog, nor are you going to change Disney’s rules or public policy. If you wish to shout your opinions into the internet abyss, that’s why Facebook was invented.