The "centerpiece" of Magic Kingdom is definately Cinderella's Castle.
It is very beautiful and magnificent. The entire Magic Kingdom is really
filled with magic, especially to kids.
Our journey begun in Tomorrowland. We Encountered the ExtraTERRORestrial Alien. It was scary, but relatively short. Definately not for those who are afraid of the dark. I guess I got off easy, not having seen the Alien movies yet. Space mountain was one thing you just have to try when in Magic Kingdom. It is a roller coaster in space. This also is in quite dark environment. Then something for the kids: Buzz Lightyear's Space Ranger Spin. A traditional type ride where you can spin the wagon and shoot enemies with laser guns.
Behind Tomorrowland there is Mickey's Toontown Fair. The only ride there is the Barnstormer at Goofy's Wiseacre Farm. It is basically a kids roller coaster. Short and harmless. The rest is for kids to meet the cartoon characters. Hunting autographs is something American (and Japanese) kids love to do as well as posing in photos with the characters.
So we move forward to Fantasyland. Cinderella's Golden Carousel is an old-fashioned carousel with pretty horses. A kids must, though gives very little to adults. Dumbo the Flying Elephant has (you guessed it) elephants where you can ride around and around pushing or pulling a little knob for altitude. "It's a Small World" is a ride through waving dolls from all parts of the world with the song playing continuously. Pretty boring, I would say, but I guess it is fun for the kids. The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh was pretty and nice, just a traditional ride through large paintings that made up the adventures. Peter Pan's Flight offered a nice surprise. Just a traditional ride, but the wagon just started flying above the little town. I guess I am a little bit biased, I always liked Peter Pan. Legend of Lion King was actually a partly puppeted and a lot shorter version of the movie the Lion King. Snow White's Scary Adventures. Not all that scary, though, if you have read your bedtime stories, it does have a happy end.
We quickly stopped by at the Haunted Mansion on Liberty Square. Cute effects for those who have vild imagination.
Off to Frontierland. There it was, my favorite ride of this park. Big Thunder Mountain Railroad. It is a roller coaster ride in mining and mountain environment. Very nicely put together in a huge mountain. I would have rode this again, if we hadn't gotten too exhausted. Country Bear Jamboree was fun. Bears were singing country western songs, of course. Splash mountain was your chance for getting wet here. Huge line, but it was quite a lot of fun on a hot day.
Adventureland has another "old-fashined" ride, Pirates of the Caribbean. Sailing through skeletons and pirate fights is nice. Swiss Family Treehouse was beautifully built in a large tree. Nice view! The Enchanted Tiki Room Under New Management was filled with colorful birds and good music.
The main street is mostly just shops where you can cool off during hot
summer middays. Everything Disney seems to be there. But wait, no Disney
classics on video or DVD, what a shame! Then there were the parades
and fireworks. It is time to remember the magic. The girls were pretty and
characters came to life in these parades. The Elecrical Parade was
awesome, there must have been thousands of little light bulbs. The
fireworks were really truly worth waiting for. I have never seen such
beautiful fireworks. And just imagine they do it every night!
Indiana Jones epic stunt spectacular was nice work. We enjoyed seeing real
stuntman work. Those guys had been really practising their punches.
Honey, I shrunk the kids was a playground on unbelievably large grass.
Enjoyable place for the little ones, I guess. It is basically a
walk-through for anyone bigger.
Studios Backlot Tour has miniatures, models and puppets, pretty nice, but
long tour.
We had a chance to peek Backstage of Mortal Kombat. I guess it just might
have given a little more, if we had seen the TV series.
Voyage of the little Mermaid was pretty, film based and partly
acted/puppeted.
Bear in the Big Blue House must have been targeted to younger audience.
Also singing along to songs you have never heard is pretty hard.
The Magic of Disney Animation was really worth seeing. Robin Williams got
to be a cartoon character. Pretty awesome acting/drawing there. We also
got a peek of the drawing studio, although there was nobody there on
saturday.
Great Movie Ride was filled with classics, a must for a movie fan.
Rock'n Roller Coaster
sounded great but not worth 75 minutes wait in line. So we missed that
one.
Tower of terror
lived up its name. It is very realistic drop in an elevator, but not is it
only a drop, it is re-drop and re-drop. Yikes.
Mulan parade was great, but the weather was so hot that we felt we were
going to melt. Seats would have been great.
The longest waiting time was for Fantasmic! show. We sat for over an hour
to get pretty good places. The best sector was already full when we
arrived there.
Universal Studios has a movie-themed park.
My opinion is that it is great for a movie freak, but don't bother with
kids unless they are big enough to have seen the movies and not fear
sharks, gorillas etc. A scary place for a six-year-old girl definately. In
quite a few rides there is a waiting room for kids, but it does take half
of the fun out to take turns. Maybe we will visit this park again after
ten years or so.
E.T. Adventure took you to save their dying planet riding with your
starbound bike.
Twister ride is definately for those who want to see a cow fly! Neat
special effects. Kongfrontation took us to see King Kong really up
close.Earhquake - The Big One was very realistic, too. Jaws got you just
inches away from being eaten by the gigantic shark. If it sounds like I
repeat myself here, it is because the special effects were really awesome.
They really got you in the middle of all this.
The highlight of our day was Back To The Future The Ride. It is an awesome
ride where almost all feeling of motion is brought to you with visual
effects.
The Lost Continent on the other hand was not a kids place.
Poseidon's Fury takes you to a journey below sea and into a battle between
Poseidon and Zeus for control of the Lost City.
Dueling Dragons was magnificent, a dueling roller coaster where the cars
miss each other just by inches. Claimed to be the world's first inverted
duelin roller coaster. The tracks have different rides for added thrill.
The Eighth Voyage of Sinbad was a stunt show with some loud explosions and
fighting action. Not too scary for our little girl, though. Pretty much
fun, too.
Jurassic Park
felt almost like stepping into the movie, especially in the afternoon
thunderstorm. The movie theme playing in the background, dark clouds and
lightning. I ermembered the movie instantly!
Jurassic Park River adventure was a river raft ride with a beautiful
splash.
Triceratops Encounter took you to see a very realistic looking dinosaur.
Dudley Do-Right's Ripsaw Falls would take 75 minutes. We decide to skip it
and head on the other side to Popeye & Bluto's Bilge-Rat Bargers. It is
hot and humid like summer in Florida is. We laugh a little while waiting
in line and reading the warnings about getting soaked. We tried to peek on
the ones getting off the ride and yes, they were quite wet. I guess half
of the fun in the ride was the kids yelling and screaming. We did get
terribly wet, truly soaked. The good part was that in each raft there was
a place in the middle where you could store your shoes and wallet and
prevent them from getting wet.
Doctor Doom's Fearfall was one of those rides where you are rocketed into
the air just to drop you back to groud at speed to make your guts stay
uncomfortably high for minutes after the ride has stopped. The Amazing
Adventures of Spider-Man ride combines Back to the Future movie ride and
3D effects to a traditional ride. A definate must, the best ride I have
experienced so far. Seeing 3D image looking like you are falling from a
skyscraper makes it feel stomach churning real. Heat and moist are also
present. (Don't tell anyone, but I had to look away once or twice, because
it was too damn realistic.)
is awesome, too. This is the first coaster that made my better half want
to go again and again. You know, the usual coasters go slowly making you
anticipate the moment it starts going downhill. Not this one. It blasted
you right into the action.