Florida day 8: Epcot

For the first time since we arrived, the weather today was absolutely perfect. Not only did it not rain at all, but you didn't open the front door into a soup of humid air. Nor did I reach the bus stop already soaked in sweat. In fact, it was what we'd call a pleasant summer's day in the UK. There was even a light breeze to keep the air moving. More of this sort of thing please!

After a long lie-in (didn't wake up til 10am, much to Tom's obvious annoyance!) we headed over to Epcot for a more leisurely look around the park, particularly in the areas we hadn't previously done.

Due to it being a Saturday, and the Food & Wine festival being in full swing, the park felt a lot busier than when we visited last week. However, the crowds seemed concentrated around the World Showcase, and Future World was pretty quiet, other than a bit of a queue on Spaceship Earth (because it's the first thing you see as you walk through the gates) and on Soarin' (because there always is).

We began in The Sea pavilion, where we went on the Nemo ride, which was a vaguely pleasant omnimover type ride with Finding Nemo animations and a few windows into the giant aquariums. From there we went across to Turtle Talk with Crush, which was a similar idea to the Monsters Inc. Laugh Floor we did in the Magic Kingdom on Thursday, only very much child-oriented. Once we'd done both of those we had a nice time watching the sharks, rays, turtles and manatees through the viewing windows.

Over to The Land pavilion where we grabbed lunch (a giant pork chop with cheesy mash and a caramel apple crunch for me) and popped into the Imagination pavilion to do Journey Into Imagination (with Eric Idle) and then the ultra-retro Captain Eo, featuring Michael Jackson!

It was then time for our first FastPass of the day, for Test Track, which otherwise had a queue time of about an hour. The instruction video lies when it tells you you can draw any shape you want - I drew a wedge shape and it bumped it into a round bulbous shape instead! Either way, we fiddled around with the selections and got into the vehicle to try it out. It's a good fun ride, but I'm not sure I'd want to queue an hour for it!

Straight after that we had a FastPass for Mission: SPACE, which is a sort of simulator-cum-centrifuge. You can pick whether to take the tame (green) or extreme (orange) version - of course we picked orange. You're each assigned a role on the mission: engineer, pilot, navigator and something else I forgot. I was the navigator, Tom was the pilot. At assigned moments during the ride you're told to press certain buttons, which can be easier said than done when you're spinning so much that you're pinned to the back of your seat!

Our next stop was Ellen's Energy Adventure. This was a very strange "ride" indeed. First you enter a pre-show area for a short video, after which the ride attendant warns you that the main show takes 37 minutes and you can't get off once it's started. This warning is repeated multiple times (evidently they've had some pretty stupid people on) as you take your seat in some massive wide "vehicles" - initially set out in three columns of two vehicles each. The whole floor is a turntable, which allows it to pivot you towards large video screens, and eventually the vehicles drive around into different parts of the building. It's quite odd (and rather slow), and the storyline is pretty America-specific in its references (Bill Nye the Science Guy, and Jeopardy make appearances). It's also a bit primary school science lesson in its level, but I think kids would find it rather boring, to be honest.

In another pavilion, there was part of the Food & Wine festival, with some sparsely-attended cooking demonstrations. However, what was interesting was the chocolate shop where different resort hotels had provided chocolate versions of Disney characters/attractions (see photos below).

We'd pretty much exhausted Future World by now, so headed over to the World Showcase to our third FastPass attraction. It was a good thing we'd reserved this one, as the main queue line was at 75 minutes. This is because tomorrow is the last day of operation for the ride (in its current state at least) so the locals and aficionados were out in force to give it a good send-off. Post-ride, the Norway film was showing in all its retro glory, so we stayed to watch it as well.

In the adjacent Mexico pavilion, what's usually a very quiet no-queue ride, the Gran Fiesta Tour, had suddenly sprouted a longish queue. We did it anyway as we weren't in a hurry and it was moving decently fast. The ride itself was another nondescript boat ride featuring the Three Caballeros (whoever they were - two birds and Donald Duck, if the video was anything to go by!) An even bigger queue, however, was for the Tequila stall!

Back in Future World we visited the Sum of all Thrills, which was a more high-tech version of the "design your own rollercoaster" attraction we did last night at Disney Quest. From a similar concept (select pre-defined elements, then enter a simulator to experience the result) you've a more sophisticated ride system of a robot arm, as opposed to the "spinning barrel" design of the older Disney Quest version.

Our dinner reservation wasn't til 8pm so we took a leisurely stroll anticlockwise around the World Showcase, looking in the various shops and laughing at the price tags in the UK pavilion ($8.95 for a packet of Tunnock's Wafers?!) We also watched a circlevision film about Canada, featuring a standup comedian neither of us had ever heard of, and got a photo or two of us in front of the lagoon, with Spaceship Earth (the big golfball thing) in the background.

Dinner was at the Biergarten in the German pavilion. An all-you-can-eat buffet, you're sat on tables with other people - to one side a nice American extended family - grandmother from Nevada, her daughter from San Francisco, and two others we didn't get to chat to. The grandmother was rather chatty and thrilled to find out we were from London, though when I expressed my liking of San Francisco she agreed and voted it her second favourite place. On the other side were a local couple from Florida. The waiter was German and rather cute. I was given Diet Coke in a beer mug, which amused me. Tom had 4 small glasses of beer all at once (there's a word for it but I've forgotten it). I went to the buffet, ignored the salad counter and filled the plate with sausages, schnitzel, potato, and beef roulade. Figuring that was enough, when I'd finished I filled another plate with one of everything from the dessert counter - strudel, bavarian cheesecake, cookies, black forest gateau, melon, berry coulis, and a pear sponge. All of which were delicious - if I know one thing, it's pudding!

Walking the food off around the rest of the World Showcase, we got as far as China before deciding to head back and find a decent viewing spot for IllumiNations. We chose the frontage of the Italian pavilion, where we had a decent view over the lagoon of all the boats. The fireworks went off from quite nearby so we had an excellent position for the show. Oddly, someone had timed IllumiNations for the same time as Wishes over at the Magic Kingdom, which from where we stood was in the background. Thus, as our show was going on, there were the occasional bangs and flashes from the other firework show in the distance!

The park closed immediately after IllumiNations had finished, so along with everybody else we made our way back out of the park. On reaching the bus station the queue for our resort bus was already rather long, and the bus that was there filled up pretty rapidly, so much so that by the time it was full there were still nearly a dozen people in front of us. Like a well-oiled machine (no pun intended) Disney had thought of this, and 2 minutes later another bus pulled up ready to drive us back to our resort in comfort!

Tomorrow: Hollywood Studios for the first time. Exciting, eh?

Florida day 7: Animal Kingdom & Downtown Disney

Today dawned bright and early (but mostly bright) with an early bus to the Animal Kingdom, one of the remaining 2 parks I hadn't yet visited. The bus stop was packed so we were worried we'd end up crammed in, but actually there were seats for everyone. That's more than could be said at the park - once through the security bag check, we discovered long queues at the entry gates for some reason - evidently most people had decided to turn up at the same time!

Having fought our way through the throng, we navigated to our first FastPass attraction: the Kilimanjaro Safari. Anyone who's visited Chessington's "Zufari" will be familiar with the idea: you're loaded onto large off-road vehicles to be driven round a wildlife reserve. Unlike the Chessington one, this is a) massive and b) quite nicely done. We got up close with some zebras, as well as getting a good view of giraffes, hippos, elephants and even crocodiles!

From there we walked through the Pangani trail, where we saw a selection of animals, including some gorillas. Half of it was closed for building work so it was a short trip! At this point, our queue time app suggested that Expedition Everest had a short wait, so we headed over. Of the Disney "mine train" type coasters, this was definitely my favourite - the indoor backwards section is fast and disorienting and the drop's pretty satisfying too. Getting the expression right for the on-ride photo, however, proved challenging! We liked the ride so much that we got off and went round again for a second go!

Having started fairly early, we realised it was a long time until our dining reservation, so started looking at what else we could do. Annoyingly we'd just missed the start time for several of the shows (or the next show was a long way ahead) so instead we walked the Maharajah Jungle Trek, where we saw enormous fruit bats, as well as some sleepy tigers.

Next up was the bizarrely-themed DinoLand USA, which was like some sort of cartoon funfair. Primeval Whirl was pretty tame, but Dinosaur was an interesting experience reminiscent of some of the simulator rides we tried at Universal. No fancy 3D effects here though!

Just before lunch we did "A Bug's Life - It's not easy being a bug!", an entertaining 4D show with an animatronic ant (it makes sense in context). With a great bit of timing (not helped by some stupid people blocking the queue line to take photos) we just made it into the showing as the doors were about to close!

On leaving, it was around this time that we realised we'd misread the FastPass time for our actual go on Expedition Everest, and had nearly missed it! Thankfully we were able to push it forwards until after lunch!

Lunch was at the Yak & Yeti, an Asian themed restaurant. Those who know my relationship with Asian food in general may raise an eyebrow at this, but I had a rather tasty tempura chicken in honey sauce, with brown rice, which was rather delicious, followed by a Mango pie. Tom went for Cream Cheese Wontons in honey, which were good but incredibly rich.

After lunch we popped over to Expedition Everest for our allotted FastPass time, hoping that it wouldn't bash us around too much with our full bellies!

Finally it was the ride I'd been waiting for all day (as the weather was boiling hot) - the Kali River Rapids. The queue for this had been ridiculously long all day, and even with a FastPass it wasn't quick. Part of the reason for this turned out to be a rather haphazard loading process, where boats were being sent out half empty, which jarred against the usually very organised and professional Disney staff we'd previously encountered. Given the length of the queues you'd have thought they'd not want to waste capacity, but the people batching guests didn't seem to care that there were empty boats running, and ones where only a few of the seats were filled. No wonder it was busy!

On the plus side, I got drenched, which in the heat was absolutely blissful. However, we decided to call it a day after that so I got to leave a bit of a puddle on the resort shuttle bus. We were on it for quite some time, as it made an unannounced pickup stop at Blizzard Beach waterpark, followed by an unscheduled U-turn at the Boardwalk resort, due to some sort of incident on the route we would have taken. Oh and an insect bit me on the arm in the bus queue, so I stomped on it. The stinging little bastard.

Back at the room I showered and changed - our plan for the evening was to go over to Downtown Disney, the entertainment/shopping area they built to compete with Universal's CityWalk. A ferry boat runs from our resort over to there, so we took that, which was a pleasant way to travel. The Downtown Disney area is a bit of a building site right now as they're revamping it into "Disney Springs", which meant a lot of hoardings and temporary footpaths!

Disney Quest was our initial call - a 5-storey building filled with arcade machines and bizarre indoor attractions. We played some retro dance games with Japanese songs nobody knew, plus a bit of Pacman, before exploring some of the other attractions. On one floor was a "Design your own rollercoaster" activity - you used a screen to put elements together to make your own rollercoaster, and then boarded a simulator to ride it. The rather dated technology may have promised more than it could deliver, as while the upside-down parts worked very well, hills and speed just weren't coming through.

Even more bizarre was the Jungle Cruise game downstairs, where you sat in a rubber dinghy on top of what looked like the base of a bouncy castle. As it bounced around, the idea was you rowed with oars through a simulated river. It didn't seem to matter what you did (though at one point we went in circles for a bit) but eventually we reached the end, or at least I think it was the end...

The whole building had the air of a mid-90s cinema multiplex arcade, including the staff uniforms.

We mingled with the crowds as we walked right across to the opposite end of the area, where our chosen dinner venue was Wolfgang Puck's. Tom had a meatloaf and I ordered a pizza. Tom's meatloaf arrived. My pizza didn't. Tom ate his meatloaf. My pizza was still not there. Tom began his dessert. My pizza remained imaginary. The waiter popped over to see how we were doing, at which point I hinted that I'd be doing a lot better if it'd turned up...

To be fair, when it did, it was perfectly nice and piping hot. The Creme Brulee was fine as well. Just a shame that it took so long to get it. By this time it was around 11pm and we knew we needed to start heading back as the boats cease operation after a certain time. Thankfully there was a water taxi dock nearby. Unthankfully it was swarming with flying things - thankfully not the bitey type this time! We were quite glad to get on the boat and across to the other dock where we caught the ferry back to our resort.

Tomorrow: Epcot again, but not until the afternoon!

Florida day 6: Magic Kingdom

After a hectic few days dashing around, today was much more sedate. Having been absolutely exhausted the night before, I started the day with a lie-in while Tom went to the pool for a swim and to do some laundry.

When he returned we had a leisurely walk up to the bus stop and got one to the Magic Kingdom. It was boiling hot and sunny so we picked up a Dole Whip Float (my first, but hopefully not my last, as it was delicious). We had an early FastPass reservation for the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train, which would otherwise have been a 50 minute queue. A nicely-done little family coaster, but I'm not convinced I'd have thought it worth the full queue time!

After that we popped across to the Haunted Mansion, which I rather enjoyed, despite it frequently stopping! It was almost refreshing to have somewhere the staff weren't beaming at you. We pondered that, in the Disneyland Paris version, you'd not be able to tell if the staff were acting the part (disdainful sneering) or just being typically French 

Lunch was at Be Our Guest - it was a good thing we'd got a FastPass for it, as they were turning away walk-ups! Although we'd pre-selected our meals their system appeared to have lost them so we had to re-do it. It's a bizarre experience, as you're told to find an empty table and help yourself to drinks, and a member of staff comes over to deliver your food. We were trying to work out exactly how they pinpointed the right table for the right meals. Probably something to do with the Magical Tracking Bands!

That afternoon we'd booked FastPass for Splash Mountain and Big Thunder Railroad. Splash Mountain's main queue was busy, so we were glad to skip it, but Big Thunder was surprisingly quiet - a walk-on, in fact, so on getting off we walked round and jumped back on again. We decided to cancel our actual FastPass reservation and try to get one for Space Mountain (still my favourite Disney ride so far), which we managed.

There were a couple of hours to kill in between, so we did the Country Bears Revue (cheesy and tacky so of course I loved it), the Jungle Cruise (hilarious - particularly when the skipper started quietly singing It's A Small World through the tunnel) and then headed over to Tomorrowland. The last time we'd been up there, the Peoplemover was down, but this time it was running and had no queue, so we went for a trip before our Space Mountain time.

Space Mountain was as good as ever, there's something particularly satisfying at a nice long ride where you can't see where you're going! After that we had a nostalgia trip on the Carousel of Progress, followed by the Monsters Inc Laugh Floor. I wasn't sure what this last one was, and the pre-show videos suggested it'd be characters from Monsters Inc telling jokes. What I hadn't banked on was that the characters were being voiced live, and that the people doing it had a camera trained on the audience, with whom they could interact. Needless to say it was very funny indeed.

Finally we experienced the Stitch's Great Escape attraction, which was fairly bizarre. A pre-show sets you up as a new prison guard at an alien containment facility. You watch as they demonstrate aliens being teleported in, and are then summoned through to a high security chamber where a more dangerous creature is incoming. Yep, that's Stitch. What then follows is some very odd experience where some over the shoulder "restraints" come down, there's various flashing lights and animatronics and a bit of water spraying... and that's apparently that. I wasn't entirely sure what to make of it!

Heading back to the park entrance we caught a boat to Fort Wilderness, where we were doing the Hoop-dee-doop Revue for dinner. This was the closest I've seen Americans get to pantomime, with singing and dancing and incredibly corny jokes, plus plenty of audience participation. The food was fairly simple (fried chicken, ribs, mash, sweetcorn, cornbread, beans, and a rather tasty strawberry shortcake to finish). Cornbread was... interesting. My first thought was "why have they given us a cake and some butter?" The chicken was fine, and the mash very buttery, but the strawberry shortcake was so good (and Tom was quite full) so I ate about 2/3 of the (rather large) portion they put down between us!

After that we got the bus back to our resort, complete with wisecracking driver who alternated between corny jokes and facts about the rides and resorts we were visiting. Returning back at around 11.15pm meant we could have a comparatively early night ready for an early start tomorrow morning for Animal Kingdom.