The Magic of Disney World

When Walt dreamed up the idea of Epcot (Experimental Prototype Community of Tommorow, for those who didn’t know…. or as one of our bus drivers said, Every Pocketbook Comes Out Thinner), he wanted a community where people could see the future of technology. Yeah, I know it was a confusing sentence. We’re back to Walt now. Unfortunately, technology changes so fast it’s impossible to build a whole attraction with cutting edge technology. By the time you build it, it’s out of date. Bummer. So Disneyworld Imagineers created Innoventions, (more…)

Spaceship Earth…the icon for Epcot. Actually, the icon for Disneyworld itself. Nearly everyone recognizes the big, silver sphere that towers over Epcot. But until I went to Disneyworld, I had no idea what was inside the ball. I didn’t even realize anything was inside of it.

My son thought there was a roller coaster inside of there. Fascinating idea…but no. No roller coaster. Instead, (more…)

When Disney announced Test Track, it seemed that the opening would never come. Many people anticipated the thrill of riding the fastest and most innovative ride at Disneyworld. The opening was full of snags, as the ride kept breaking down. Finally…the day came. Test Track was open! No, I wasn’t there that day. I did look forward to riding it, though. We stood in line (okay, we used fast pass) and finally got on the ride. Our car screeched up the hill. It began the handling pass…and then broke down. After about 15 minutes, (more…)

Since Star Tours has always been a favorite of mine, I went into Body Wars with high hopes. Maybe my hopes were too high. Body Wars uses the same simulation technology as Star Tours, but it was much rougher and I didn’t find the story as engaging. Oh, well…you can’t have everything, right?

Just so no one gets the wrong idea, I did like Body Wars. The story goes like this: (more…)

Located in the Wonders of Life Pavilion, Cranium Command has to be one of the cutest, most underrated attractions at Disneyworld. The pre-show starts out with an animated film where “General Knowledge”, a drill seargant, is recruiting pilots to operate brains. Yes, you read that right. Brains. Buzzy, the class goof up, finds himself assigned to the volatile brain of a twelve year old boy.

You then move inside the theatre. The theatre is set up to represent the inside of a brain. (more…)

Outside of Innoventions sits an igloo. I know - strange place for an igloo. It’s called Ice Station cool, and it’s actually a glorified Coke store, but it is so creatively put together that we’ll ignore the blatant commercialism and praise it’s many good points.

When you walk inside Ice Station Cool, you’ll find a Coke station with free samples of different flavors of Coke from around the world. No, standard American Coke isn’t one of them, but they do have some unique and interesting flavors. (more…)

The following was written by my 13 year old son.

An easy to spot mirrored pyramid, Universe of energy is a 45 minute-long show/ride to give you a chance to give your feet a rest and cool off. Note the two acres of solar panels on top of universe of energy. Altogether, they create 15% of the power it takes to energize this attraction. That’s enough to power six houses!

The show begins with Ellen, who is watching “Jeopardy”. One of the contestants is Ellen’s annoying roommate, Judy. Ellen tries to keep up, but fails at the game miserably, espesially in the energy category. (more…)

The first 3-D film I saw in a Disney theme park was “Captain Eeo”, the completely forgettable Michael Jackson film that ran at Disneyland for a short time. So, needless to say, my expectations of “Honey, I Shrunk the Audience” weren’t overly high when I walked into the theatre. Thankfully, the Disney imagineers out did themselves with this one. They call it 3-D, but it’s actually more like 4-D. Not only do the images on the screen jump out at you, but (more…)

If you’ve been to Disneyworld before, you’ll remember Figment, the little purple dragon that used to have his own ride in the Imagination Pavilion. When Disney imagineers geared up for the Millennial Celebration, they decided that Figment’s ride needed to be redesigned. Which would be fine, except that they completely cut poor little Figment out of the ride. And anything else interesting. Fans from all over the world protested: How could Disney drop Figment? And how could they replace him with a ride so utterly boring and without…um…imagination? (more…)

The Imagination Pavilion at Epcot Future World doesn’t get much press, except among us die hard Disney fans. The Imagination Pavilion is one of the quirkiest, most underrated pavilions in future World, in my humble opinion.

Inside the pavilion you’ll find two attractions, “Honey, I Shrunk the Audience” and “Journey Into Imagination with Figment”, as well as a “play” area equally fun for kids and adults called “Imageworks: ‘What If’ Labs. (more…)