I'm out here in Orlando for a training conference, which begins tomorrow. I decided to check out the parks today. Holy cow, was it crowded!! Consequently, I don't have much to report, as I experienced mostly crowds and not much in the way of attractions. Nevertheless, enjoy reading my little mini trip report...
Got to Epcot at about 10am. Rain was coming down pretty steady, but not too hard. I had assumed that it would be a "walk onto everything" kind of day because of the rain and the fact that it's the middle of the week. Boy was I wrong! It was pretty crowded. I went immediately to Soarin' and was kind of surprised that they didn't have the single riders line operating. When I asked the CM if that line was open, he said, "not today". I'm curious if anyone knows, what determines whether or not to have that line open?
Anyway, for the most part I like the queue for this Soarin' much better than the one at DCA. Of course, that could be due to the fact that the DCA version pretty much has NO QUEUE themeing to speak of. I still wish, though, that when you got to the actual ride vehicle the themeing would be better. You walk in and the first thing you notice is the big movie screen. I can't believe there was no way for them to hide that until the actual ride begins. At Back to the Future, they do a wonderful job of hiding the screen until the start of the ride. Anyway, still an enjoyable ride nonetheless.
After Soarin' I decided to stop by the Living Seas. It had actually been a while since I'd been in there. I actually like how they've converted a lot of it to Nemo themeing. And I have to say I was very impressed with Turtle Talk. I thought it was very cleverly done. I loved the part with Dori and the blue whale (won't ruin it for anyone who hasn't seen it).
From there I made my way over to Mission: Space. They did have the single rider line going so I got in it. They gave me this little red card that they told me to give to the CM at the end of the line. A couple of strange things about this: 1. No one else in the single rider line seemed to have this (and a few of them did seem to be together...I thought this line was for people riding alone). And 2. no one ever collected the little card from me. I ended up giving it to the CM that you see right before you board and she seemed a little annoyed about it.
After Mission: Space, I decided the crowds were getting to be a bit much to handle. So I thought I'd head over to DAK where it would surely be much less crowded. I was wrong.
The parking space I had at DAK was almost right next to where the tram picks up. As I was pulling into my parking space, the tram was there and the driver and I made eye contact. I thought, "Oh cool, he sees that I'm parking and he's going to wait for me." I hurried to hop out of my car so I wouldn't have to make him wait and just as I got to the tram, he started to pull away. The tram was mostly empty too. That was kind of strange. I was way out in the Dinosaur section of the lot, but decided to walk rather than wait for the next tram. When I got into the park it was just as crowded as Epcot. Still raining a bit, but not too bad. I rode Primevil Whirl, checked out Lucky the Dinosaur and walked around a bit. I was surprised to discover that Everest doesn't look nearly as big as everyone made it out to be. In fact, I was kind of taken back by how small it looks. I had pictured something much larger. I also noticed that from the parking lot, you can see what looks almost like a show building attached to the back of it. You can't see this from the side of it that you see in the park, but I'm hoping they will cover that up so you can't see it from the parking lot.
I didn't do any other attractions at DAK, but just pretty much walked around and enjoyed the scenery. Then I decided to head over to MK.
I got to MK and immediately braced myself for the crowds. I got there just as the parade was going. I watched a little bit of that and then I got on the train and took it to Frontierland. By this point I as craving a turkey leg like nobody's business. I inched my way through the sea of people to the turkey leg cart, only to find that it was closed. So I made my way through Fantasyland (dumb move on my part) over to Tomorrowland. There I picked up a Galactic Gobbler. I scarfed that down and then looked around. Didn't ride anything else because the lines were too long and fastpass times were several hours away on Space Mountain and Stitch.
Now I'm back at my hotel, and will probably head back out there tonight. I didn't visit MGM yet, and I want to check out the new Lights, Motors Action stunt show.
One observation: I noticed a LOT of the CMs there were Chinese. Are a lot of them CMs who are training for Hong Kong? Just curious if anyone knows.
Got to Epcot at about 10am. Rain was coming down pretty steady, but not too hard. I had assumed that it would be a "walk onto everything" kind of day because of the rain and the fact that it's the middle of the week. Boy was I wrong! It was pretty crowded. I went immediately to Soarin' and was kind of surprised that they didn't have the single riders line operating. When I asked the CM if that line was open, he said, "not today". I'm curious if anyone knows, what determines whether or not to have that line open?
Anyway, for the most part I like the queue for this Soarin' much better than the one at DCA. Of course, that could be due to the fact that the DCA version pretty much has NO QUEUE themeing to speak of. I still wish, though, that when you got to the actual ride vehicle the themeing would be better. You walk in and the first thing you notice is the big movie screen. I can't believe there was no way for them to hide that until the actual ride begins. At Back to the Future, they do a wonderful job of hiding the screen until the start of the ride. Anyway, still an enjoyable ride nonetheless.
After Soarin' I decided to stop by the Living Seas. It had actually been a while since I'd been in there. I actually like how they've converted a lot of it to Nemo themeing. And I have to say I was very impressed with Turtle Talk. I thought it was very cleverly done. I loved the part with Dori and the blue whale (won't ruin it for anyone who hasn't seen it).
From there I made my way over to Mission: Space. They did have the single rider line going so I got in it. They gave me this little red card that they told me to give to the CM at the end of the line. A couple of strange things about this: 1. No one else in the single rider line seemed to have this (and a few of them did seem to be together...I thought this line was for people riding alone). And 2. no one ever collected the little card from me. I ended up giving it to the CM that you see right before you board and she seemed a little annoyed about it.
After Mission: Space, I decided the crowds were getting to be a bit much to handle. So I thought I'd head over to DAK where it would surely be much less crowded. I was wrong.
The parking space I had at DAK was almost right next to where the tram picks up. As I was pulling into my parking space, the tram was there and the driver and I made eye contact. I thought, "Oh cool, he sees that I'm parking and he's going to wait for me." I hurried to hop out of my car so I wouldn't have to make him wait and just as I got to the tram, he started to pull away. The tram was mostly empty too. That was kind of strange. I was way out in the Dinosaur section of the lot, but decided to walk rather than wait for the next tram. When I got into the park it was just as crowded as Epcot. Still raining a bit, but not too bad. I rode Primevil Whirl, checked out Lucky the Dinosaur and walked around a bit. I was surprised to discover that Everest doesn't look nearly as big as everyone made it out to be. In fact, I was kind of taken back by how small it looks. I had pictured something much larger. I also noticed that from the parking lot, you can see what looks almost like a show building attached to the back of it. You can't see this from the side of it that you see in the park, but I'm hoping they will cover that up so you can't see it from the parking lot.
I didn't do any other attractions at DAK, but just pretty much walked around and enjoyed the scenery. Then I decided to head over to MK.
I got to MK and immediately braced myself for the crowds. I got there just as the parade was going. I watched a little bit of that and then I got on the train and took it to Frontierland. By this point I as craving a turkey leg like nobody's business. I inched my way through the sea of people to the turkey leg cart, only to find that it was closed. So I made my way through Fantasyland (dumb move on my part) over to Tomorrowland. There I picked up a Galactic Gobbler. I scarfed that down and then looked around. Didn't ride anything else because the lines were too long and fastpass times were several hours away on Space Mountain and Stitch.
Now I'm back at my hotel, and will probably head back out there tonight. I didn't visit MGM yet, and I want to check out the new Lights, Motors Action stunt show.
One observation: I noticed a LOT of the CMs there were Chinese. Are a lot of them CMs who are training for Hong Kong? Just curious if anyone knows.
