Another year, another wonderful MiceChat Anniversary and Gumball Rally! We had three jam-packed days of Disney merriment, but of course, what makes it so wonderful is all of you! This was one of our biggest and most exciting years ever, let’s take a look at what happened and review the results of the Gumball Rally as well!!!
Bowers Museum Event
This year we kicked off the weekend with three big panels at the BEAUTIFUL Bowers Museum! 300 of you joined us as we heard from the Disney Archives, the voices of Goofy and Donald, and legendary animators Mike and Patty Peraza.
The Walt Disney Archives treated us to a conversation about the exhibit they’ll be bringing to the Bowers Museum this spring.
A special surprise came from Robert Maxhimer, Exhibitions Manager and Head Curator for the Walt Disney Archives. The audience was in tears when it was revealed that the Mickey Mouse they were looking at was the original one Walt used in his famous Disneyland Railroad photoshoot for the opening of the park.
Next up were Bill Farmer and Daniel Ross, the voices of Goofy and Donald Duck. What a riot these two were! They spoke for nearly an hour and we didn’t want it to end!
Keeping the laughs going, Mike and Patty Peraza gave a presentation on some of the projects they worked on at Disney.
There were plenty of hilarious stories of the kinds of antics they got themselves into with the original Disney animators and Imagineers.
Mike even went over his original pitch for Goof Troop, start to finish. It was certainly interesting with Bill Farmer, the voice of Goofy, sitting in the audience.
If these two aren’t on the shortlist for Disney Legend status, they should be!
Gumball Rally 2020
Hundreds of teams crowded into the wonderful Anaheim Hotel (just across the street from the Guardians of the Galaxy tower) at 6 AM to begin competing in the annual MiceChat Gumball Rally. The Rally is a race through Disneyland to see who can ride the most attractions in a single day. Of course, there’s much more to it than that, and we change things up every year to keep the teams on their toes and the game fresh and entertaining year after year.
We surprised the teams this year with a twist. The theme was the 60th anniversaries of the Matterhorn, Monorail, and Submarines, but the story was that we were helping save the Gumball Child – we called the event Gumball Rally: Tomorrowland’s Edge! Attractions which had to do with the theme of the game were worth 3 points, but Fastpass attractions were only worth 1 point. Teams also had to send some photos to us to prove that they had completed certain attractions, which means we have lots of great photos to share this year!!!
The top 10 teams would get ribbons, medals . . .
or this AMAZING trophy if you came in first place:
Did you see the amazing detail on this trophy?
Teams were released from the hotel to head to the park at 7:15am so they would have a chance at Rise of the Resistance boarding groups. But they were all relieved to see that Rise wasn’t actually included in the gamebook this year!
our videographer, Trevor, documented the day, and the difficulty navigating the early morning Rise of the Resistance crowds:
Attraction selfies returned this year in a big way, expanding the options and available strategies. The Dustylorian asked that photos be sent to IG-11, the Gumball Child’s tough but lovable nurse droid, who was aiding teams in saving the cute little green guy.
https://www.instagram.com/p/B8VT4uJgvq1/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading
https://www.instagram.com/p/B8UJBBVHzMP/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading
We got the whole gang together in front of the Matterhorn to grab this epic shot:
The Mad Hatter even showed up! He had some fun with the teams, and kept things lively until we took the group photo.
The Rally came to a close at 7pm as all the teams raced to the finish line!
Gumball Game Show
While waiting for the scores to be tabulated (a lot of work this year because of all the photos we had to verify), Hastin Zylstra (our Monorailman) returned with a new game show: Disney Password!
Hilarity ensued when contestants struggled to guess the correct word. The audience was chomping at the bit to guess the password! And when all else failed, someone enviably blurted out . . . “Snow White.”
What some of you may not have known is that poor Hastin was forced to stretch the game out because the score team was still furiously scoring books and managing images. But just in the nick of time . . . the results rolled in . . .
Gumball Rally Results
After all the gamebooks were counted, we began announcing the winners of the Gumball Rally! First, a few staff-picked awards:
Special Team Awards:
And our newest category: Best Social Media went to Guten Tag, It’s Our Princesses! For all their amazing work documenting their Gumball Rally progress throughout the day, they received a highly coveted pair of exclusive Minnie Mouse ears.
The Top 5 Teams
#5. The ARIELists!
#4. Guten Tag! It’s Our Princesses!
#3. Coolant Runnings & #2. Junior Society of Explorers and Adventurers
#1 – And all the gumballs went to our top team: Gumball Yzma Poison.
Final Results
Because of the larger number of teams competing, we have scored through 75 this year instead of our usual 50.
| 1 | Gumball Yzma Poison |
| 2 |
Junior Society of Explorers and Adventurers
|
| 3 | Coolant runnings |
| 4 | Guten Tag! It’s Our Princesses! |
| 5 | The ARIELists! |
| 6 | The Millennial’s Falcons |
| 7 | The SUBTROPICS |
| 8 |
Cinnamon toast and tacos on the floor
|
| 9 | Smuggler’s Life For Me |
| 10 | Caterpillar Room Survivors |
| 11 | We Found Samantha |
| 12 | Mouseketeer Racers |
| 13 | Yeti, Set, Go! |
| 14 |
The Famed Arts & Crafts Movement
|
| 15 | Spaghetti Yetis |
| 16 | Inglorious Blasters |
| 17 | Bibbidi Bobbidi Booze |
| 18 | Bobsled Ballers |
| 19 | Askins Brothers |
| 20 | Team BADD |
| 21 | T-Town Tinker Bells |
| 22 | Scruffy Looking Nerf Herders |
| 23 | Ric and Ryan’s Bobsleigh’s |
| 24 | OO-DE-LALLY |
| 25 | A Flamboyance of Flamingos |
| 26 | Los Disney Amigos |
| 27 | Sleeping Beauties! |
| 28 | What Would Dory Do? |
| 29 |
Move Along…To Infinity and Beyond
|
| 30 |
Tricky Dick’s Transportation Company
|
| 31 | Frontside of Rock |
| 32 | Disney Roomies |
| 33 | Uncountable Chicken Nubs |
| 34 | Lost Falls Expedition |
| 35 | Nu? Orleans2 |
| 36 | The Game Day Packets |
| 37 | Magical M&M’S |
| 38 | Trident |
| 39 |
Captain Nemo and the Yoda-ling MonoWailers
|
| 40 | Team Casper |
| 41 | Talk Tiki to Me |
| 42 | Brier Brats |
| 43 | Churro Crusaders |
| 44 | Rey’s Riding Rebels |
| 45 | Yeti Sleddy Go! |
| 46 | The Unidentified Flying Oddballs |
| 47 |
Over The Water & Through the “horn”…
|
| 48 | Skip the Drama Stay With Mama! |
| 49 | The Emperor’s New Crew |
| 50 | Pooh Crew |
| 51 | Initowinit |
| 52 | Meximagineers |
| 53 | Nevertheless She Resisted |
| 54 | Harold and the girls |
| 55 | Bibbidy Bobbidy Bleep! |
| 56 | Jason and the Aquanuts |
| 57 | Where’s the party AT-AT |
| 58 | Tink’s Bells |
| 59 |
Felt Cute, Might Eat a Frog Later, IDK
|
| 60 | The Emperor’s New Crew |
| 61 | Mandalorian Child Care Services |
| 62 | Hit Me Batuu One More Time |
| 63 | and ALWEG we go! |
| 64 | Magnificent Mini Mice |
| 65 | The Ugnaughts |
| 66 | Once Upon A Toon In Hollywood… |
| 67 | MountainEARS |
| 68 | Archers |
| 69 | Mission to Gumball |
| 70 | The supinators |
| 71 | The McKinnons |
| 72 | Baloo’s Clues |
| 73 | Hit Me Batuu One More Time |
| 74 | The Return of the 2319 Jedi |
| 75 | The California Adventurers |
Points are a bit relative this year since they do not correspond to the number of attractions completed, but rather, whether you were able to complete the higher point questions. As a result, we are simply listing places this year (as we do in years when the game is not based solely on 1 ride = 1 point)
While you may contact [email protected] for assistance with your score, please keep in mind that our staff is not permitted to discuss possible point deductions, disqualifications, nor change a score. Each packet was scored by 5 individuals and the top 25 places then scored and verified again.
If you completed this challenging Gumball Rally and had a good time, let’s face it, you won!
The Hard Working Staff
We simply could not have done this without the countless hours put in by our volunteer staff. The Gumball Rally takes months to pull together and costs us tens of thousands of dollars to produce. The one thing that keeps us going is seeing all the happy faces return at the end of the night, and the wonderful response to this heartwarming event.
- Event Producer: Dusty Sage & MiceChat.com
- Gamebook Writer: Matt Juergens
- Graphics & Book Layout: Anthony Hays
- Team Communications and Registration Lead: Michele King
- Staffing Coordinator: Tiffany Wilhelm
- Game Show Host: Hastin Zylstra
- Marketing: Alanna Omidvar
- IG-11 (game day communications): Team It Doesn’t Matterhorn!
- Scoring Lead: Matt Juergens
- Trophy Design: Topher Hays
- Photography Lead: Scott Attula
- Additional Photographers: Ashlee Fortenbach, Greg Hales, & Brian Pinsky
- Videographer: Trevor Perez
- Sponsor Relations: Jenn O’Brien Chavez
- Crew of hundreds: And HUGE thank you to the dozens and dozens of additional volunteers and spotters in the park on the day of the event, helpers for the Game Show, Bowers event team, Sunday meet-up helpers, influencers who helped spread the word before the event, teams who shared the joy, and all the rest of you who helped make the Rally run smoothly!
And we couldn’t have afforded the event at all if it weren’t for our fabulous sponsors:
EVENT SPONSORS
Discount Disneyland Tickets
MiceChat has partnered with Get Away Today to provide you with discount tickets to Disneyland, Universal Studios, Knott’s Berry Farm and other southern California attractions. Click through and find yourself a deal – HERE.
Book a stay at the Anaheim Hotel!
This mid-century marvel of a hotel is located directly across the street from Disneyland and has recently been completely remodeled with your comfort and an eye toward the luxury of the past in mind. The Anaheim Hotel has the largest pool in the area, a comfortable jet-set lounge, and one of the most popular (and best) pizza restaurants in Southern California. You can currently save up to 20% or more by using our link: The Anaheim Hotel Mice Chat Deal: Save 20% – OR – Call reservations at 714-772-5900 and ask for the “MiceChat Rate.”
Anthony Hays Design
MiceChat and Gumball Rally graphics, design, trophy, and awards are created by Anthony Hays and his production team. We are in debt to their awesomeness.
THANK YOU !!!
We are so thankful for you and your support! It was an amazing Rally and MiceChat Anniversary weekend. While we can’t reveal the date or theme of the 2021 event just yet, we can tell you that next year is the 20th anniversary of Disney California Adventure. We will definitely mark the occasion. Be prepared for something EPIC that we have never attempted before.
DON’T MISS OUT
So you don’t miss out on the announcements of our upcoming Rally and events, please join our Gumball Rally Facebook Page and/or sign up for the MiceChat events email list.
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