When Did WDW Become An Extended Vacation Destination?

[71jason]

Did anyone who wasn't local ever add Circus World to their trip? I remember looking at the brochure (favorite activity at the state welcome centers!) and thinking it looked like a rather unremarkable theme park.

Actually went as a non-local kid, probably around 1980, give or take a year. I got to ride an elephant, which was a highlight at that time of my life.

Flash forward 30 years after I eventually moved to Champions Gate--which didn't exist when I was a kid--and head to my local Target, only to piece together from the street names (Home Run Way) and abandoned parking lots that it sits in roughly the same location where I rode an elephant decades before.

But otherwise, yeah, overall pretty unremarkable.

 

[correcaminos]

Our trip in 1982 the summer before Epcot opened was I think 4-5 days. We did a couple of days at MK and a couple of days around Ft. Wilderness. We also went to other areas of FL at the time for a 2 week long vacation total. I don't think it was ever a 2-3 day trip for us until I had my AP and would do a long weekend.

 

[Map7711]

I remember someone I knew going there for their Honeymoon - when there was only one park. But I suspect that they made day trips to places that don't exist anymore, such as Cypress Gardens, etc.

Absolutely. We went when I was a kid. Late 70’s. One park. But we went for almost two weeks. Stayed off property. We didn’t go to the parks every day. We went to Sea World, Cypress Gardens, Busch Gardens, Cape Canaveral, River Country etc. Plus on non park days, we also went to the hotels (Mostly Poly)for the day to swim. This of course was way before that became a problem. We’d go swimming at Poly, then at night head over to Contemporary for the game room and the movie theater. There was plenty to do.