I hope you're wrong (unlikely) and Uprising is right, because I will be headed to Epcot (at least it's the slowest of all Disney properties) this Saturday. BTW, I am a mosquito magnet. And I've never been bitten in an Orlando theme park. I suppose it's the lack of plants and sterility.
I was devastated when I found out it was closing. But you’re right, it was mostly for sentimental reasons, not because I would actually miss going there. I had probably only been there one time since the 80’s.
Where ya staying?? With you on mosquitos...there are lots of plants, though...and water as well. I think they control it otherwise. Even the discounts that have been feeding attendance don't apply over Easter...it's one of the busiest times of the year there. http://www.wdwmagic.com/Attractions...set-to-break-attendance-records-next-week.htm Magic Kingdom set to break attendance records next week? Apr 02, 2009 The Magic Kingdom may be about to break it's attendance record next week as guests head to the resort for the Easter break. The Magic Kingdom is scheduled to be operating it's maximum opening hours. Beginning on Sunday (and for the remainder of the week), the park will be opening at 7am for resort guests and closing at 1am, with 5 days of the Easter period having a resort guest closing time of 3am. For regular guests, there are 7 days of 1am closings, and 11 days of 8am openings. The upshot of all of this is that on some days, the park will be operating from 7am until 3am, and opening back the next morning at 7am. By the time you factor in late leavers and early arrivals, the hours begin to look more like 6am to 4am, with just a 2 hour downtime in between days. by the way...wdwmagic is to disneyworld what clutchfans is to the houston rockets...if you need any information before a trip, check it out....and allears.net, as well.
I'm sorry, but when the Alpine Sleigh Ride died, AstroWorld died. It just took them a while to take it off life-support. That was the best ride in the park, bar none.
What replaced this ride? I went there as a child in late 80's and teenager in early 90's so I don't even remember Alpine Sleigh Ride. I do remember that authentic ball in the front of the entrance. I loved it there as a child.
WOW. Crazy hours. I was there March 17-22 or so, IIRC. It Thursday / wed didn't seem too crazy. Seemed more busy a couple of summers ago when I went, we were there for some Microsoft conference. Got a private party to Universal Studios. It may have been busy, just didn't seem out of the norm for that area. They do have some damn good deals right now though, if anyone was thinking about taking the fam etc. I think if you stay 3 nights, you get 2 free at resorts etc.
Dude... I am on that board as... well, IROC it. And, fwiw... Urban legend and FALSE. http://www.snopes.com/disney/waltdisn/frozen.asp He was cremated and buried at a small cemetery in Glendale, CA after his family had a private ceremony. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Walt_Disney
I was surprised to see you post this actually. I was there March 15-22 and it was absolutely jam packed. I'm not doubting your perception of your experience but no matter what park I went to that week, the major attractions were all around two hour waits in standby without Fast Passes. Both days I went to Epcot, both Soarin' and Test Track had two hour waits by 11am and when I did manage to get my Fast Passes, the return times were something like 6pm. Ditto with Magic Kingdom, Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios. We missed out on Toy Story Mania completely because all Fast Passes were gone by lunch (he accidentally had a late start that day) and the standby line was 250 minutes. YES - that's not a typo, 250 minutes. I also missed Rock 'N Roller Coaster because of my poor planning and I had to make a choice between it and Tower of Terror to get a Fast Pass for (both had return times of 7pm) and I chose ToT because I'd never ridden it when I went the last time. The one time it was really nice was late night in Magic Kingdom when the parade and the fireworks started up our second night at the park. We had a room Club Level at the Polynesian so we'd seen the fireworks just about every night. We skipped them this night in the park and went to the rides while everyone lined up and walked on about 10 rides, including Splash Mountain (my daughter's favorite) five times almost without getting off. We just had to run around the queue and back to the ride. Ditto Pirates and Peter Pan, Haunted Mansion, etc. that night. We did more in those two hours than we managed our entire first day at the park. We had gone the Monday of our trip and only managed Fantasyland and the Adventureland half of the park in that one full day. Took another half day to finish it all. But I digress... There ARE a lot of good deals out there. I think the 4/3 package may be over as far as booking it. Maybe not, I can't remember now. But I do know that packages in August/September are gonna come with Free Dining. It's the 'come to Disney during Hurricane Season' Special. Let me add, too - with what I said earlier....we had an absolute blast. Everything we wanted to do really, we got to do even with the crowds. My wife hated the crowds, but I'm cool with it. I've been at the end of July when it's RIDICULOUS - and maybe that's what "Uprising" is comparing it to. It wasn't quite that, but it was comparable. Back then, we didn't even have Fast Passes to help. We just had to wait the two hours if we wanted to ride.
My house...since I live in central Florida. I've already done a little research for this Saturday, since I haven't been to Epcot since I was a kid. I've gathered the best plan is to run to Soarin' to get a Fast Pass, and then run over and wait in line for Test Track, and then Mission:Space. I heard Spaceship Earth is easy to get on late in the day. I figure we'll try to knock out Future World by early-mid afternoon and spend the rest of the day in the World Showcase. How's that sound? Ugh...I'm not looking forward to the mobs though...
Oh, cool..didn't know you lived there. Good plan. Spaceship Earth is a walk-on ride a little later in the afternoon. Soarin' is really cool. You'll like it. If you like tempura, there's a great little tempura bar in the Japan pavillion of World Showcase...you don't need a reservation.
professor - yesterday (Tuesday) the magic kingdom was at full capacity. they closed the gates and stopped letting people in. get ready for heavy crowds this weekend.
Haha, yeah, I'll bet it was...... EDIT: Sorry, I thought this was a euphemism for something else. Didn’t realize you were being literal. Carry on.
Absolutely, head straight to Soarin. Believe me, you'll be racing there will everyone else in the park. In fact, if you time it just right you could get a fast pass for Soarin' quickly then jump in line for it and ride with a 30 minute wait right away and end up with two rides on it. Test Track, we followed your plan and managed to ride with about a 45 minute wait. Not too terrible. Mission Space was actually no more than 45 minutes most of the day. For World Showcase, it depends on how much you plan to explore each country. It can easily take up an entire day all on its own if you're into that kind of stuff.
Thanks for the heads up! I'll try to get there 30 min before opening. You know, I did a little more reading (also at wdwmagic) and they said the exact same thing you did about Soarin'. I'm going to do exactly as you said, thanks for the advice! BTW, Is there any advantage to going through World Showcase counterclockwise? I assume most of the crowd will go clockwise, maybe we can cut down on the mobs that way. And that huge pic is making it difficult to read this page.
Sometimes we do this...but the only ride attraction in WS is at about ten o'clock if you're walking from FutureWorld...it's the Norway ride...and those lines build up for that during the day, so if you can get there as WS opens, you'll get on quicker. Having said that, it sounds like you'll still be in FW when WS opens, anyway...so counter-clockwise is probabaly a good idea...unless you're looking for lunch at the Mexico pavillion.
I'd second this, especially about the Mexico lunches. GEEZ. The lines were as long as some of the rides. We ended up eating counter service in China, which was very tasty, btw. Counter clockwise is usually a good move at any theme park, really. Most casual theme park-goers will naturally go left. The exception to this is Magic Kingdom, where in my experience the best move is to go straight through the castle into Fantasyland, do whatever you want to do there and then work your way forward around from the back in whichever direction you're most interested in (Frontierland/Adventureland or Tomorrowland). Doing this (and remember I had small children) we managed all of Fantasyland, the Haunted Mansion, Country Bear Jamboree and Splash Mountain (BARELY) before the crowds choked the life out of the park around 11. Also though, we chose a breakfast at 8am at Crystal Palace which was one hour before the park opened. So when the ropes dropped...boom, we were off.
