The Yacht Club

So I spent the other day at the Yacht Club on their concierge desk and had an AMAZING time. I just love the resort! It’s so cool. Totally nautical themed, very well done (as per usual in a Disney resort). The Yacht and Beach are considered one resort, kind of like Jambo and Kidani are both part of Animal Kingdom Lodge. They are right next to each other and share that magnificent pool that I was telling you about, which is GORGEOUS, by the way!! The beach resort looks and feels amazingly beachy (shock and surprise) and the yacht is full of sailing memorabilia. One of the things that I absolutely love about picking up shifts in other places is that you meet so many interesting people. Everyone at the Yacht Club was so sweet and wonderful and I had a such a great time.

One of the gentlemen that I was fortunate to work with is a fantastic gentleman named Scott. He told me some marvelous stories. You know those people who are really good at telling stories because they just know how to lay the verbal groundwork to really get you involved before he finishes the story. He and I quickly got into sharing Disney trivia. When one Disney junkie meets another one, things get real! So I just wanted to share this story that he told me because I think it really shows why the Disney company is so special.

Scott’s little brother was born 05/05/55, which is very close to the opening date of Disneyland (07/01/55). The boy’s mother took them to Disneyland when it had only just been open for a few months. Their mother loved it there so much that they started coming all the time. She even told the youngest brother that Walt had built the park especially for him on his birthday. So the little boy would always look for Walt in the firehouse on Main Street that had been his offices during construction. Everytime they went to the park they would lose the little brother and would find him trying to climb up the fireman pole to see Walt. As Scott and his brother grew up, they continued to love Disney and all the work that he was doing. In grade school, the youngest brother had an assignment to write a paper about his ideal American. He chose Walt. We wrote a beautiful essay about how wonderful Walt was. Turns out that his teacher lived on the same street as a Disney cast member. The teacher gave the letter to the cast member and the cast member passed it on to Walt’s secretary. Months later, the little boy received a letter from Walt Disney himself. The little boy was overjoyed. The letter thanked him for writing the essay and included some pieces of memorabilia that were signed for him. So years go by, the family still stays in love with Disney. Scott comes to work at Walt Disney World. The brothers get to chatting one day and the younger brother talks about how he has all these neat pieces of memorabilia but he doesn’t actually have his essay. So he called Disney archives, not really expecting much, he explained his story to the cast member and she said she’d look and to call back in a week. So he did and the cast member was SO excited to tell him that not only did they find the letter, but they found it in the contents on Walt’s desk that had been there when he passed!! All those years and the letter was still that close to Walt.

That story gave me chills when he told it. How amazing is that? I just loved it. And this is why people love Disney so much. People get emotionally connected to the company and Walt’s vision. It was simple, he wanted a place where families could have fun together and be safe and clean. People have emotional ties to this company more so than most others. For a company of it’s size, it still remains true to  it’s roots and really follows the groundwork that Walt laid. The company cares about people because the cast members care about people. And we care about people because that’s what Walt would have wanted us to do. I truly feel like I am helping keep Walt Disney's dream alive each and every day!