Epcot Day Trip

Lake Buena Vista, Florida: Today we hitched a ride with my dad and sister to Walt Disney World. The two of them have gotten into the pin trading hobby and they were on their way to pick up a newly released Alice in Wonderland pin as well as to travel the park in search of pins to trade.

After checking the crowd calendar through Touring Plans, we decided on Epcot. They were forecasted to be the best park to visit with the lowest crowd level of all four parks. As we arrived on Disney property, we were greeted with thousands of people on the roads. There were people everywhere as far as the eye can see, so I was really starting to second guess the crowd forecast.

Turns out it is Disney Marathon weekend and this morning was the Half-Marathon. The thousands of people we saw were involved with the marathon and not going to the park. I was instantly relieved and as we pulled into the parking lot, it was surprisingly empty at the park. We arrived just 15 minutes before park opening and we secured a second row parking spot.

We entered the park and headed towards Test Track. But our journey was cut short by the marathon. The final leg of the marathon takes the runners through Epcot park and the runners had the right of way. So the park patrons were stuck in the middle of the park, waiting for breaks between the runners to be sent across the path and on to the attractions.

It took us about 15-20 minutes to finally get our chance to cross the path to continue our travels through the park. But once we did, we pretty much had the east side of Future World to ourselves. We took advantage of that to ride Test Track five times in a row before moving on.

We then ventured over to the other side of Future World. Because of the marathon, we had to take the long way around, accessing the west side of Future World through World Showcase rather then the direct route through the Innovations plaza.

We then headed over to the Seas pavilion to ride the Finding Nemo ride. We took advantage of the light crowd to ride Nemo. I really enjoy the aquarium and sea life of the pavilion, but the usually long lines are not worth the wait in my opinion. I liked the ride better when it was the Sea Base Alpha, the Nemo theme is quite tacky but the kids like it so it a win.

From there we headed over to the Land Pavilion. We skipped Soarin since its line had already reached 50 minutes. I like Soarin but my wife is afraid of heights so it’s not fair to her for use to wait that long for a ride she doesn’t like, I can do without it. We rode Living with the Land instead. The smell of the strawberries in the greenhouse made me hungry for strawberries.

We stopped for a snack at the snack cart outside the Imagination Pavilion. We all had soft pretzels for a snack. Soft is a relative term as they were anything but soft. I do not recommend getting a pretzel from here. It was not very good, save your snack for the funnel cake stand at the American Pavilion.

Then we headed into the Imagination Pavilion. We started by watching Captain EO. This was something we have skipped on previous trips, so we thought we might as well try it out today. It is an old attraction from the mid 80’s that has been reopened by Disney. It features Michael Jackson in a 3-D musical adventure. While it is quite outdated by today’s technology, it is amazing for its time. After Captain EO, we went downstairs to ride Journey into Imagination, the playful journey through the five senses with Figment.

It was then time to start our journey around the world through the World Showcase. We started in Mexico and worked our way around the lagoon. We made stops in Mexico to ride the Grand Fiesta Tour, in Norway to ride Maelstrom and in the American Pavilion to watch the American Adventure with various pin trading stops along the way.

Today we decided to stop and watch the American Adventure. It has been several years since we watched it. It’s not because it’s a bad show but I am more of a rides person and less of a show person. But the American Adventure is one of my favorites. It tells the story of our nation using Audio Animatronics to recreate vital parts of American History. It is a great show for history nerds like me.

The day quickly got away from us and we abandoned our original plan of park hopping to Hollywood Studios using the back entrance at the International Gateway. So instead we headed to the exit and quick ride of Spaceship Earth before we left the park. Once we left the park, we took a quick lap on the Monorail before hopping in the car to leave Disney.

Before hitting the highway, we stopped for dinner at Golden Corral. It has been a very long time since I have been at a Golden Corral. The food hit the spot and with very full stomachs, we embarked on the three hour ride home. Today turned out to be a great day for enjoying the parks.

The weather was perfect and the crowd wasn’t that bad. It started out rough with the marathon, however that wasn’t too bad. It sucked waiting to get across, but once we did we had that part of the park almost to ourselves for a while.

I am hoping to get back up to Disney again before our passes expire at the end of the month. I have not yet decided whether or not we will be renewing them. 2012 is going to be a big year for Walt Disney World with the opening of the first phase of the Fantasyland expansion along with the opening of the Art of Animation resort. So I am not totally sure if we will renew or change our passes out for Busch Gardens/Sea World or Universal Orlando for 2012.

Check out the slideshow below for photos from today’s trip.