Jew Posted March 16, 2006 Posted March 16, 2006 Wes is doing a great job summing everything up, so I figured I would just start this TR to add some of my thoughts and photos to go along with his. You can see his thread (along with 4 random pictures I posted on page 4) here: http://www.themeparkreview.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=23032&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=0 Anyways... I pretty much agree with his thoughts on Epcot. It's my favorite park because the food is awesome, it has a couple of good rides that you can reride forever (Mission Space and Test Track), and its so freaking big that it never feels crowded. Most importantly...it has the fire barge. All the awful 80's dark rides are just an added bonus good for one novelty ride per trip. I also like to think of this park as the "OMG we have all these giant pavilion building with crappy attractions just begging to be turned into awesome E-tickets" park...which is what I hope they do with Universe of Energy, Imagination, and Wonders of Life pavilions. Now on to the pictures. Wes made babies with the pina coloda jelly beans. I bet these guys thought they were awesome...Nobody ever buys sombreros from the Mexico pavilion and thinks they are the funny when they really aren't. Since Wes and Jim were unable to watch the Maelstrom post-ride movie, they did the next best thing: dress up as girl vikings and kill eachother. BOOOOORRRIIING. See...Unknown would be proud!!! Without the efforts of Unknown, Illuminations would not be possible.
Wes Posted March 16, 2006 Posted March 16, 2006 Dude, who's the *winner* behind me in the Jelly Bean photo?
Jew Posted March 16, 2006 Author Posted March 16, 2006 ^I don't know, but for not talking to her...YOU LOSE! YOU. LOSE. -Joey "another Inside joke from our trip" Mandel
ebl Posted March 16, 2006 Posted March 16, 2006 What was with those golden pigtails under the helmets? Eric
Jew Posted March 17, 2006 Author Posted March 17, 2006 Just trying to catch up with Wes here... Again, he summed up Magic Kingdom well. Another friend of mine who was in Florida summed up the MK by saying "it's clearly the park Roy built." Pretty much the only things it has better than its Anaheim counterpart is bigger trains, a fullsize castle, a few attractions (peoplemover, jungle cruise, pooh), and the fact it is just a larger park in general. Other than that, the place pretty much sucks. It really doesn't have the charm of the original Disneyland. Fantasyland and Tomorrowland are stuck between old and new themeing. The Toontown area is also halfass (due to the fact it was only supposed to be temporary for Mickey's birthday). The show quality (especially on attractions like Haunted Mansion) was definitely sub-par. -Stiches Encounter still blows (chili=not good). -Space Mountain=Matterhorn in a box (and that's not a good thing!). -Didn't bother to see Cinderellabration. -Everything else is pretty much a clone, and the unique attractions Magic Kingdom does have are fun, but extremely cheesy (Carousel of Progress, Hall of Presidents). -Wishes is definitely an improvement over "Fantasy in the Sky," but I guess I have been spoiled by "Remember...Dreams come true" and "Believe" and didn't think it was THAT great. -Dan got soaked on Splash Mountain. EDIT: I forgot to mention our awesome Autopia experience. I was wearing my USC sweatshirt, and as it turned out...the attendents in the station were all Texas students. Needlessly so say, some taunting ensued. Good thing one of them was hot, or I might have complained. But since one was hot, it was good times. However, there are a couple of things Magic Kingdom has that DLR doesn't that we took advantage of. One of those being the Magic Kingdom resort area. Magic Kingdom gets +10000000000000000000000 points for having Ohana on its Monorail loop. I ended up eating there three times (everyone else did two times). Seriously the most ridiculously awesome restaurant ever. It's a great deal ($30 for a complete meal...drink included) and the food is just amazing. The salad, wings, potatos, steak, pork, and dessert are out of this world. And for those of you who don't know...you get as much as you want! The food just keeps coming! Best. Restaurant. Ever. Dan and I also did something we had never done in our three previous visits: rent the searay boats to cruise around Bay Lake/Seven Seas Lagoon. We have always wondered what River Country looked like, so we figured what better way to find out then to go right up next to it. Dan got a little too close and got stuck in the mud, which was quite funny. He also took all the pictures, so you'll probably see some in a Westcoaster.net update. But anyways...that was a real fun/relaxing way to kill an hour and a half. You can get some good air from other boats wake on those things, and it's always cool to see the resort from a different point of view. The last thing we did that you can't do at Disneyland is the "Magic Behind our Steam Trains" tour. This is what I'll cover in my photo TR, since Wes pretty much took care of the rest and I didn't take a lot of pictures at Magic Kingdom. He also didn't want to wake up at 6AM for the tour, so he doesn't have pictures of the tour. Basically if you have any interest at all in trains, I recommend taking this tour. The tour starts at 7:30AM in the Main Street station. You get to see Main Street completely empty, get introduced to your guide, and learn a little bit about how the train operates (the signals, procedures, etc.). Then it's off to the roundhouse on the Lilly Belle (something guests normally can't do since they only use that train for the park opening show). They pulled the train inside the roundhouse, but for safety reasons we weren't actually allowed to get out inside the roundhouse. The train pulled back out into the yard, then we got out and spent about an hour learning all about the mechanics of the trains. After that, it was time to watch them fire up one of the other engines (the one we would be returning to the park in). The "fireman" gets to hold a ball of fire in his hand and throw it into the boiler! Coolest. Job. Ever. Then we get to watch them do all of their safety checks (testing the equivilant of their e-stop, running a block to see if the train stops, and the extremely loud "popping off" of the boiler) before heading back into the park. The park was now open and we returned to the Main Street Station to hear the story behind the Magic Kingdom railroad. Pretty boring stuff unless you have an interest in trains, so it was cool for me. K...that's long enough, so I'll stop now and upload some photos. That's how Walt would have rolled. The Broggie poking out of the roundhouse. The "controls" for the Roger E. Broggie engine. A view from the train yard. Off to the roundhouse we go. It's Main Street. And it's practically Empty. Craaaazy. It's artsy because it's from the ground AND Jim is standing in the picture! Dan looks so thrilled to be on Splash Mountain
Hattuchili Posted March 18, 2006 Posted March 18, 2006 Great pictures, Joey. To sad I missed you guys here! --Soren
JT3000 Posted March 18, 2006 Posted March 18, 2006 Just trying to catch up with Wes here... Again, he summed up Magic Kingdom well. Another friend of mine who was in Florida summed up the MK by saying "it's clearly the park Roy built." Pretty much the only things it has better than its Anaheim counterpart is bigger trains, a fullsize castle, a few attractions (peoplemover, jungle cruise, pooh), and the fact it is just a larger park in general. Other than that, the place pretty much sucks. You think MK sucks because you like DL more? It's the best park at WDW.
Jew Posted March 18, 2006 Author Posted March 18, 2006 ^I might be jaded by the fact I have been to Disneyland so many times, but the main reason I dislike the park is Magic Kingdom has nothing that interests me. In terms of Orlando parks...The only park I have less desire to visit is Animal Kingdom. Strike 1: It's always crowded. Strike 2: The show quality was disappointing. Strike 3: Most of the rides are clones (or real close to it) that I have been on at Disneyland way too many times. Strike 4: The unique attractions it does have are either worse (Space Mountain, Tiki Room, Buzz) or boring to begin with and not good for anything other than a courtesy visit (Stitch, TTA, Hall of Presidents, Autopia, Carousel of Progress...) It's not a bad park by any means...It just feels like Disneyland without the charm to me.
dandaman Posted March 18, 2006 Posted March 18, 2006 I did the Steam Train tour back in July 2003. Funny story they'd told us: About 2 weeks before, they'd stopped giving out souvenir spikes from the railroad, at the end of the tour. Why? Well, let's just say the airport officials weren't too pleased. We got souvenir exclusive pins instead, still have mine. Oh, and you're not the only one who did the Viking thing. Aren't I manly?
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