The Bean Blog

Disney Day 5: Seeing the world

Dec 7, 2008 Seeing the world

If you couldn’t guess by the title, we spent day 5 (our last day at Disney) at Epcot.

The first thing we did was head to Spaceship Earth (or the big golf ball, as Lee likes to refer to it). Spaceship Earth takes you back in time to the cavemen and shows you how communication has evolved over the years from cave drawings to paper and books, radio, motion pictures and television. Near the end you answer a bunch of questions about what is important to you in your future. Skyler and I went healthy with our future. I don’t remember the ride taking our picture and using some mad Photoshop skillz to plaster our heads on cartoons bodies for the future portion. I think that’s a new feature. It sounds totally cheesy, but is really very cool, and hilarious.

After the ride Lee and I were waiting for the rest of our party (who were in the bathroom) when we ran in to a very cheery Disney employee. He said he was some kind of Dreameer or some equally corny job title. This is the Year of Million Dreams (or something like that) and as part of that promotion they randomly hand out free things like fast passes, a free nights stay at Cinderella’s castle, and other way cool prizes. He was one of those people who hands out one of those cool prizes. No, we didn’t win anything. He was just stopping to chat with us and see if we needed any help (since were just standing there). He told us that it (December 5th) was Walt Disney’s birthday. He said, “You’d think on Walt’s birthday we’d do something special. But we aren’t.”

He checked the time and said he had to get going. There were designated places and times for giveaways, but he couldn’t tell us exactly when or where that was. We seriously considered following him around until it was such a time and place, but instead we headed over to Mission: Space.

There are two lines at Mission: Space; a green line for pansies (like my mom…hi mom) who are prone to motion sickness and can’t handle jolts and turns and spinning and an orange line for those who want to feel the whole experience…vomiting and all. We all (except my mom) chose the orange line. It was a pretty cool ride. You feel like you are really inside a space shuttle on a space mission. You even get sucked back in to your chair at takeoff. Totally cool.

Then it was lunch time. Actually it was past lunch time. (Did I mention we never did get up that early any day this whole week? It was vacation. Vacation is meant for sleeping in, right?) So we headed over to the United Kingdom. Later I was thinking we really should have tried out a different world. After all, we ate in the UK last time we were at Epcot. Plus Keaton and I visited London and ate tons of crappy English food (am I just a really picky eater or does the food in London suck?). And my mom lived in London for many years. But we ate in the UK anyway. Although I didn’t really care for the Guinness BBQ sauce on my lamb, the apple crumble desert was very yummy.

We had fast passes for Fast Track so we went there next. I think Fast Track is a fairly new ride. It takes you through some road tests like auto makers do when testing their cars. As riders we played the part of test dummies. I had high hopes for this ride, but was pretty disappointed. We all agreed Fast Track was kind of lame. We needed more twists and turns and a little faster ride. But it was alright.

Next we made our way to the Nemo ride. The Nemo ride itself was ok, but it ends in an aquarium. I LOVE aquariums. So I was like a kid in a candy store. “Look at that fish. Did you see the dolphin? Look over there. Squeeee.”

Then there was the Crush show. You know Crush. The totally rad turtle from Finding Nemo. The Crush show is an interactive show. Crush takes questions from the audience. He even picked Skyler to ask a question. She asked him what his last name is. He said, “Turtle. What’s your last name?” When she said “Young” he told her “well that’s more of a state of being.” That Crush is such a kidder.

Keaton and Justis needed something from Germany to take back to their German class at school for extra credit. So we headed over there to pick something up. We also found a good spot to watch the IllumiNations fireworks show. All of the park have a fireworks show, but I think Epcot has the best one. And this time of year they added a little Peace on Earth theme at the end. Very, very cool.

While those who are not staying in hotels on property had leave, those of us with hotel cards got to enjoy the park for another couple hours. We hiked through the rest of the worlds and over to Honey I Shrunk the Audience. Keaton remembered this show from 10 years ago and was itching to see it again. And it was so much fun. These 3D shows they have at Disney are really a great time. Go see them all.

Next we stood in line for a half hour to ride Soarin’. It’s kind of like watching a movie at the IMAX. Only for Soarin’ you are dangling in the air so you really feel like flying through the mountains and over the ocean. You’re Soarin’ like a bird.

We ended the night with a little education boat ride through the Disney greenhouses where they told us about their new state-of-the-art ways of growing plants…without soil. Caleb picked this ride and as soon as we disembarked he turned to everybody and said, “I told you this ride would rock.” Clearly he’s not above boasting.

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Tags: crush, Disney, EPCOT, Fast Track, IllumiNation, Mission: Space, Nemo, Soarin', Spaceship Earth