"Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides" World Premiere - Pre Show

It was a cloudy but bright day...

by Mark
Okay, so where does my adventure begin?  Shall I start with the fact that I saw more celebrities than I ever have in my life?  How about the way the fans took leave of their senses when they saw Johnny Depp?  I got it!  Let's start from the beginning; well, my beginning in the stands anyway, before the celebs even showed up.  I did have a pretty full day, and before Mr. Depp was even in the park.  I know!  Let's make this about the ones who entertained me while I waited for hours.  Yes, I said hours.

Chad and I arrived at The Park around 10am to see that the black carpet had already been laid out and the bleachers put up.  We had heard earlier that morning (from Stephanie) about the "crazed" fans (crazier than us, anyways) who had been waiting at The Resort since midnight.  I will admit we were scared about there not being any good spots left.  It didn't help matters when we had to turn around on the way out because Chad had forgotten to change camera lenses on our way out the door.  Thankfully in terms of seating, boy were we wrong.  There were a few people, but not many.  Most of the people who had waited overnight were seated up and down Main Street USA, but there was still plenty of seating at the end of the street and all in front of Sleeping Beauty Castle.  We headed down Main Street to find a bleacher near the end practically empty.  We grabbed the first seat about halfway up the stands (on the end of the aisle no less!) that we saw and commenced to waiting.

I knew that I would be on my own, since Chad was doing the Premiere from the media area (I hate him), but he did wait with me for several hours until one o'clock rolled around.  That time went by fast.  I was going out of my head when he left.  I had to find something to do!  Should buy a book to read?  No, I remembered I couldn't read.  Should I buy a coloring book?  Nope, I didn't have any crayons.  Should I buy crayons?  No coloring book.  Point I'm trying to get across is I had nothing to do for the next few hours, except text Chad every so often and tell him how much I hated him.

Then something miraculous happened; a bunch of silly pirates appeared.  Silly pirates, says you?  Aye, silly pirates says I.  Some were as tall as buildings (outhouses maybe?).  Others loved to juggle.  They even had a pirate band who would play such classical pirate hymns as "Yo-Ho" and "Oh Susanna."  Once in awhile you would get a pirate who would come and make jokes at (and of) the fans who were waiting.  It was awesome!

At one point, one of the tall pirates even climbed up the bleachers to give us quite a show.  How they did that on stilts is beyond me.  Another one was dressed like the Black Pearl, and blasted cannon balls at us.  Where can I buy one of those?  And how many of you can say that you have seen a pirate riding a unicycle?  Well I can!  I wonder how many pirates on Tortuga can ride unicycles and why there weren't featured more in the movies.  Ah well...

If you were curious at all (and who wouldn't be?!) about what the names of the pirates were, well you can consider yourself lucky, because I can name them all.  "Felipe."  That's right, they all had the same name.  I don't know if it was an homage thing or what, but it was pretty darn funny.

I would like to say a hearty "Thank ya, yar!" to all of the pirates who kept me entertained during the day.  You kept me laughing throughout the whole time I was there.  You know what?  Maybe it wasn't so boring after all!