Cinderella Castle First Lighting of the Season – “A Frozen Holiday Wish” Photos & Video at Magic Kingdom

Hi everyone!

It was a rainy day yesterday that held off briefly so that “A Frozen Holiday Wish” could kick off the holiday season at the Magic Kingdom. The park is now mostly decorated for Christmas, beginning November 1st – just hours after Halloween ended, and the majority of decorations were placed within a few days time. Our article on that is here. The lighting of Cinderella Castle has been an annual tradition at Walt Disney World since 2007, back when the Fairy Godmother granted Cinderella’s wish of a sparkling castle. This is the 5th year of “A Frozen Holiday Wish“, which features Elsa, Anna, Kristoff and Olaf. I can’t believe it has been that long! Here is a look from yesterday, including some photos of the Christmas tree and Rainy Day Cavalcade before the show.

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The floral in front of the Main Street Train Station is different than it has been, with Mickey being a wreath instead of an ornament. It is a nice change.

The first stop was the Main Street Train Station, as much to get out of the rain as to take some photos. This was a couple of hours before the first lighting.

Benches were plentiful, and this was a nice view and my first time seeing the tree this year.

The garland replacement decorations were also added since my last visit.

We noticed the Rainy Day Cavalcade, which I have rarely seen – it is a lot of fun, definitely catch it if you have a chance sometime! This replaced Move it!, Shake it! Dance and Play it.

Mickey, Minnie, Goofy and Donald were in this car.

Genie and Stitch were up next.

I took some video clips at this point, and we have full video of the cavalcade, which also includes Nick and Judy, Baloo and Woody with Jessie.

Around 5:30pm I moved back up to the train station because it was raining again, which allowed for some nice evening shots. Fortunately the rain soon stopped for a while and the show was able to go on.

It was a pretty night for the castle lighting once the rain lifted.

There was work being done on the castle stage, with shrubs taking up a lot of space normally used by guests (hopefully that will be done within a couple of days). I didn’t get as good a spot as I normally would, and stood to one side instead of with a straight-on shot.

Here is our video of the show.

Elsa is trying to decide if she should light the castle, since she doesn’t live in it.

Anna and Kristoff say she should.

It doesn’t take long for her to decide she will turn the castle into ice and snow.

Olaf is also on stage by this point.

It takes a minute, Cinderella Castle goes through some changes (projections) to get to the point of being lit.

I had been photographing between these two parents with kids on the shoulders until this moment, but the kids then got very excited about the fireworks. The lighting of Cinderella Castle is always pretty incredible to see.

Olaf, Elsa, Anna and Kristoff.

I will wait until the first Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party to get better photos with my tripod, but here are a few.

Here is one last look from the Main Street Train Station. And soon, the rain started again – I am really happy that the first Cinderella Castle lighting was able to go on, with the small window of time that it could have.

We will have much more from the Christmas season in the next couple of months! Look for Disney’s Hollywood Studios coverage this week, as well as Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party photos and tips this weekend.