Max's Vacation Review - Walt Disney World

It’s been a while since I’ve posted one of my weekend movie reviews so I decided to post a review of my recently completed vacation to Walt Disney World. Yes, I know volumes of books have been written about the place but, as always, my take on things can be somewhat different. You, the reader, as always, are free to share your memories and experiences.

This was a last minute trip so there was really no planning on our part. We booked everything Tuesday morning and showed up Friday. No maps, no “how to” books, nothing. I grew up around Six Flags so I was expecting a nice, landlocked amusement park but soon found a city unto itself. That place is freakishly huge! We soon got accustomed to the buses and the layout of the place.

Extended Park Hours - Not a good thing. A few nights a week, one of the parks will stay open longer for WDW Resort guests. Good thing, right? The whole park just for the WDW folks? Wrong! What happens is that all the WDW Resort guests decend on that one park and create a huge log jam. We hit Magic Kingdom on their extended evening and found more people and fewer rides open. Not a good combo. We left earlier.

Dining Plan - If you eat two full meals a day, this is a good thing but we were finding that we were forcing food down just to take advantage of the thing. Also, no one told us we need to book reservations so far in advance. We had a hard time finding places with spots open but in the end it all worked out. Plan runs $40 per day per person. Would I have spent $160 a day on food for my family? Probably not. We would have been better off eating one large meal per day and snacking the rest.

Epcot – Ok, neat place but the Tour of Countries was a disappointment. Nothing but gift shops. The best part was the Canadian band that rocked out with bagpipes. We had lunch at an English pub (only place with openings, see comments above) and I was reminded why we don’t have English restaurants over here.

Disney Princesses – I heard so much about them and failed to see one. Dangnabit, Max!

Magic Kingdom Parade and Fireworks – Wow! Make sure you are in front of the castle to see the show.

WDW Guests - Humans are weird. And we’re fat! When its hot and you’re at an amusement park, people tend to wear things that show every roll, every flaw, etc. I can say this because I need to lose 25 pounds but we’re a world of fat people! 90% of the people in wheelchairs and scooters were not handicapped but simply too fat to walk. And these folks and their families would scoot to the front of the line. Somtin wrong ‘bout that!

Rides – Some of the rides are dated but overall, all of them were enjoyable. The worst one we experienced was the “Honey, I Shrunk the Kids” 3-D show at Epcot. The show is about 20 years old and needs to be put to rest. The wait directly outside the theater was terrible. No AC and they crammed about 400 people in that room. A lot of the shows/rides were simplistic but when you’re hot and tired, those are welcomed at times. Oh, on the safari ride in Animal Kingdom, our guide, who was acting scared with reports of danger ahead, sounded like she was having multiple orgasisms with her “oh’s”. It was getting somewhat embarrassing.

TV Stations in the WDW Resorts - ABC, ESPN and Disney were your choices (well, a few others but you get the point). We got hooked on the “7 Top Attractions at WDW” loop that featured Stacy. She was high on something. We had her lines memorized by the time we were done.

Weirdest Sight - A group of Hindu Monks in their orange robes and wood sandals in line to ride the Arrowsmith Roller Coaster.

Epcot – Ok, neat place but the Tour of Countries was a disappointment. Nothing but gift shops. The best part was the Canadian band that rocked out with bagpipes. We had lunch at an English pub (only place with openings, see comments above) and I was reminded why we don’t have English restaurants over here.

The Rose and Crown is a pub, not a restaurant. That's an important distinction. You have a pint, maybe a black and tan, and if you want to eat the most you get is fish and chips. Those were pretty good last time we had them. For anyone going down, about the reservations, folks staying on grounds used to be able to make reservations a day ahead for the restaurants. Also, at Epcot, if you have a pass that lets you go in and out of the parks, you can exit the park at the back between England and France. You've got some excellent restaurants at the Yacht & Beach Club and at the Boardwalk hotel. If you're at the Magic Kingdom you can take the monorail to one of the hotels there. They've all got restaurants that tend to be relatively empty during the day.

The bakery at France is world class and the pastries sold on carts at Canada are also quite good. And don't forget the Churros at the Mexico pavilion. My favorite restaurants at Epcot are the 9 Dragons at China and the seafood place at The Living Seas, The Coral Reef (you watch the fish through huge plate qlass windows right next to you). And the restaurant in the German pavilion was a fun experience. The rotating restaurant at The Land pavilion was also reliable. At Magic Kingdom Tony's Town Square at the front of Main Street served reliable American Italian food and Cinderella's Royal Table inside the castle was a lot of fun. At MGM Mama Melrose's and 50's Prime Time Cafe were reliable and, for a "secret" retreat, there was the Catwalk bar. An out of the way bar that you could unwind in without a lot of "those nasty tourists" all over you.

Here's a web page with menus for all of the restaurants at the WDW parks and hotels.

The exhibits in the international portion of Epcot were set up like Worlds Fair national presentations. The 360 films at China and Canada are beautiful. And I dearly love the animatronic show in the American pavilion. They had PCed it the last time we were there, about 6 years ago, but some of the really good stuff was still in it. Today, more people know who Will Rogers was from that show than from almost any other source. That's worth a lot.

Magic Kingdom Parade and Fireworks – Wow! Make sure you are in front of the castle to see the show.

Staking out a good spot for the parade and the fireworks is a real trick. If you find one it's well worth the time you have to spend waiting. We had a ritual when we'd go down. We'd go to the big "department store" at the front of Main Street. In the back of that, closest to the castle, is a working barber shop done up as it would have been in the 1890s. My sons and I would each get our haircuts there. It turned out that the barber shop quartet who works Main Street would hang out there between gigs. We got to be friends with 8 or 9 of the guys who were in the rotation for the Dapper Dan's. Most were retired guys, but one was younger. Turns out his aunt and uncle lived in our town back in Tennessee. One day I was working in my yard and this car stopped out front. This guy got out who I knew I recognized but for the life of me I couldn't place the face. When he started to sing, however...... It's one thing to see someone you've come to know in the Disney cast down there. It's quite another when they come visit YOU!!!! Those guys would help us get a good spot down near their area on a regular basis, which was fun.

Rides – Some of the rides are dated but overall, all of them were enjoyable.

The rides that mattered to us were:

Magic Kingdom - Pirates of the Carribean (PCed the last time we were there, probably updated for Johnny Depp's version), Haunted Mansion, Country Bears Jamboree, Peter Pan Adventure, Mr. Toad's Wild Ride (I think that's gone), Small World (reserved for hot days - it's the coolest place in the parks), Carousel of Progress (only open on really busy days), Jungle Cruise (nostalgia... plus I met Joe Montana and his family on that ride... want to see the video... there's my kid, there's the snake, there's Joe Montanna, there's the elephant...)

Epcot - Energy, Geosphere, Living Seas, The Land, Imagination, CommuniCore, Mexico (coolest place at Epcot on a hot day), American Pavilion. If you have the time see if you can arrange for the back stage walking tour at the land (if they still do it). It's free and you get to see all of the real stuff going on in those green houses and hydroponics gardens. Beautiful. Also find out what other group tours they have. They used to be free.

MGM - back stage tour (walking) / back lot tour (riding) (they used to be one thing, we were on the 6th tram on opening day), Animation (probably closed now), Star Tours, Muppet 4D (you have to wait, after the show is over, to watch the "arrows" disappear back in the wall)

Animal Kingdom - Safari, Bugs Life, Dinosaurs (whatever the name is) - we were also at this park opening day and spent the least time there of all of the "main gates." Most of what is there now wasn't there before we stopped going, such as the brand new Himalaya roller coaster ("Yeti Adventure," or some such).

You also didn't mention our favorite part of WDW: Pleasure Island. To be more precise, The Adventurer's Club at Pleasure Island. My kids practically grew up there (yes, at a bar at DisneyWorld). We became quite good friends with several of the regular cast members. We spent 7 consecutive Christmas Eve's with those folks. They were part of the family... a very funny part of the family, but a part, none the less.

Can you guess that we had annual passes for almost 10 years? And, no, we have never lived in Florida. We could make the drive from Memphis to Orlando in one straight shot, if we put our minds to it.

Towards the end of our "Disney Era" we actually spent more time over at SeaWorld, where we also made some good friends, primarily the trainers at the Killer Whale and Dolphin areas. We also ended up treating all of the parks as parks. We'd go, let the kids roam free and do what they want, and we'd sit and read or talk. It was lovely. My favorite thing to do on vacation was to sit in the Shamu Stadium between shows, reading my current "vacation book" and watching the trainers work with the whales. We actually developed relationships with the whales during this time. When we'd come down each time the first time the whales saw us they'd react. The trainers told us that was how they reacted to trainers and other park workers who had been a part of their lives. That was special. They recognized us.

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