It’s one of the most iconic love stories in Hollywood: Snow White and Prince Charming fall madly in love… except this time it wasn’t scripted. Ginnifer Goodwin and Josh Dallas, the beloved faces behind the fairy-tale couple that saved Storybrooke every Sunday night on ABC’s Once Upon a Time, have spent the last fourteen years proving that sometimes the greatest love stories we watch on screen are nothing compared to the ones that happen when the cameras stop rolling.

And now, in a heart-melting new interview on the podcast Table for Two with Bruce Bozzi, Ginnifer has finally revealed the exact moment she knew Josh Dallas was her forever — and it happened not in a candle-lit Vancouver forests or on a soundstage in front of a green screen, but on a sunny California afternoon in the happiest place on earth: Disneyland.

Yes, the same Disneyland where dreams come true, where grown adults wear mouse ears without irony, and where, apparently, soulmates recognize each other while hurtling down a runaway mine train at 35 miles per hour.

“We weren’t even dating yet,” Ginnifer laughs, her voice still carrying that bright, bubbly Snow White sparkle even after all these years. “We were just co-workers who had become really good friends on set. I had a couple of annual passes burning a hole in my pocket, and I said, ‘Come on, let’s go play hooky for a day.’ He said yes before I finished the sentence.”

That day would change everything.

Picture it: early 2012, before Instagram stories, before TikTok, when two actors could still sneak into the park with just baseball caps and sunglasses and feel semi-anonymous. Ginnifer, fresh off the first season of Once Upon a Time, still buzzing from the chemistry that had fans shipping “Snowing” harder than any couple since Ross and Rachel. Josh, the charming Brit-turned-Prince with the megawatt smile and a laugh that could melt butter, tagging along because, in his words, “I’d never properly done Disneyland and I wasn’t about to miss my shot.”

They did what every self-respecting Disney adult does: started with churros, raced to Indiana Jones Adventure, fought over who got to drive the Autopia cars (Josh won), and then made a beeline for Big Thunder Mountain Railroad — the wildest ride in the wilderness.

As the train climbed the first lift hill, Ginnifer turned to Josh and warned him, “Just so you know, I scream like a banshee on this one.” Josh, grinning ear to ear, shot back, “Good. I plan on screaming louder.”

What happened next lives rent-free in Ginnifer’s heart to this day.

The train crested the peak and plunged into the first drop. Wind whipped their hair, the iconic Western soundtrack blared, and Josh Dallas — 6-foot-1 of pure, unfiltered joy — threw both arms straight up in the air like a little kid, turned his face to the sky, and bellowed at the top of his lungs:

“THIS IS THE BEST DAY OF MY LIFE!”

Not “this is fun.” Not “this is awesome.” The BEST day of his life.

Ginnifer, clinging to the safety bar and laughing so hard she could barely breathe, says something inside her chest simply clicked. “I looked over at him in that moment — hair flying everywhere, arms up, screaming like a maniac with the biggest smile I’d ever seen — and I thought, clear as day: ‘I am going to marry this man. I don’t know when, I don’t know how, but that’s my husband.’”

She didn’t say it out loud. Not then. They were still just friends, still pretending the electric current that crackled every time their hands brushed on set was “just acting. But from that drop onward, something shifted. The rest of the day blurred into a golden montage: sharing a Mickey pretzel on Main Street, Josh winning her an oversized Stitch at the Midway Mania game and presenting it like a knight offering a rose, sneaking kisses on the cheeks for photos that neither of them posted because it felt too precious to share.

By the time the fireworks exploded over Sleeping Beauty Castle that night, Josh had his arm around Ginnifer’s shoulders “to keep warm,” and she was resting her head on his chest, both of them pretending they weren’t already falling.

Three months later they were officially dating. Two years after that, on April 12, 2014, they married in an intimate sunset ceremony in Los Angeles surrounded by fairy lights, peonies, and every single cast member from Once Upon a Time ugly-crying in the front row. And eleven years later — with two beautiful boys, Oliver (born 2014) and Hugo (born 2016), a mortgage, soccer practices, and the kind of comfortable, chaotic love that only comes after you’ve survived diaper explosions and pandemic homeschooling — Ginnifer still gets tears in her eyes talking about that single moment on Big Thunder Mountain.

“I didn’t fall in love with Josh because he was Prince Charming,” she told Bozzi, voice cracking with emotion. “I fell in love with him because he was the kind of man who could ride a roller coaster in Disneyland and genuinely, without a trace of irony, declare it the best day of his life. That’s the heart I wanted to raise children with. That’s the heart I wanted to grow old with.”

Josh, who surprised Ginnifer by calling into the podcast live, laughed through happy tears on the other end of the line. “Babe, I still stand by it. That day WAS the best day of my life… until the day you said yes to marrying me, and then the days our boys were born. You’ve just kept raising the bar on ‘best day ever’ for thirteen straight years.”

Cue collective global sobbing.

The internet, predictably, lost its mind.

Within hours of the podcast dropping, #DisneylandProposal and #SnowingIsReal were trending worldwide. Clips of the interview racked up 28 million views in 24 hours. Disney fans flooded Ginnifer’s Instagram with photos of Big Thunder Mountain at sunset, captioning them “This is where dreams come true.” One viral TikTok sound — Ginnifer’s tearful “I am going to marry this man” layered over the actual ride audio — has been used in over 400,000 videos, mostly couples recreating the moment on roller coasters around the world.

Even Disneyland got in on the magic. The official Disney Parks account posted a throwback photo of Snow White and Prince Charming meet-and-face characters with the caption: “Sometimes the fairy tale writes itself. Congratulations on 11 years of happily ever after, Ginnifer & Josh 💍✨” followed by a surprise announcement that Big Thunder Mountain would be running a special “Snowing Sweethearts” night in-park event next Valentine’s Day, complete with commemorative “Best Day Ever” ears.

But perhaps the sweetest reaction came from their Once Upon a Time family.

Lana Parrilla (Regina), Josh’s on-screen stepmother-in-law, posted a tear-streaked selfie: “I KNEW the day you two disappeared to Disneyland and came back all glowy. Told everyone ‘they’re doomed/in love.’ Proudest evil queen ever. 🖤”

Jennifer Morrison (Emma Swan) shared a never-before-seen behind-the-scenes photo of Ginnifer and Josh stealing a quiet moment between takes: “You could watch you two look at each other like this for the rest of my life.”

And co-creator Adam Horowitz simply wrote: “We wrote ‘I will always find you.’ You two proved it. Forever grateful the universe put you in our story.”

Fourteen years, two kids, countless red carpets, and one global pandemic later, Ginnifer and Josh still credit that single drop on Big Thunder Mountain as the moment the universe whispered, “Pay attention. This one’s forever.”

They still go back to Disneyland every year on the anniversary of that day. They still ride Big Thunder first thing in the morning. Josh still throws his hands up in the air and screams that it’s the best day of his life. And every single time, Ginnifer leans over, kisses his cheek, and whispers, “You were right then. And you’re still right now.”

So if you ever find yourself hurtling down Big Thunder Mountain and you see a handsome guy with salt-and-pepper stubble throwing his arms up like he’s flying, and a beautiful brunette laughing so hard she’s crying next to him — don’t stare too long.

That’s just Snow White and Prince Charming, still writing the final chapter of the greatest love story Disney never had to script.

Because some fairy tales don’t need a castle. Sometimes all they need is a runaway train, a fearless heart, and the courage to scream to the whole world that this — right here, right now — is the best day ever.

And for Ginnifer Goodwin and Josh Dallas, every day since has simply been the sequel after sequel of the same beautiful truth.