EPCOT Part II

Once we finished with The Land, it was time to head over for our Test Track fast passes. We had five minutes to spare. When we go there however, Kris commented about her legs burning. A quick inspection showed a couple of red spots on the backs of her calves. At first, Kris thought it was just a razor burn, so we got in line for the Test Track ride.

Alison was hesitant to go on since she saw how fast the cars were running. She is a little frightened of rides with high speeds, but I am working on fixing that. But here she is looking a little apprehensive as we wait in line:


Kris and Sarah thought it was fun, Ali was still a little scared and was screaming at the turns and high speeds... Personally, I wasn't too thrilled with it. I thought it was a little too hyped. Afterward, as with all the Disney rides, you get channeled through the gift shops. The test track moved us through a small automobile show room. We got to look at some new cars, and as much as I disagree with GM being owned by the government, there were some good prices on a couple of their cars ( I am beginning to shop for a replacement for my car). And, Kris got to actually sit in a new Camaro. Of course as soon as she did, a salesman was there to ask if we wanted any info on the new Camaro.



Once the Test Track was over, we went back over to the Nemo ride in the Seas. It took longer going through all the turnstiles than it did to actually stand in line to wait. Ali wasn't very impressed with it, but I told her at least we were inside in the A/C. Not that it was all that bad. The heat was actually pretty good, it was the humidity that was a drag. But I have to say even that wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. It was much worse at the Magic Kingdom the day before.

When we had finished the Nemo "ride" itself, we walked around to look at the aquariums they have full of tropical fish and the manatees. Ali wanted to go do the shark area, so we let her run around there for a little bit and take an interactive shark quiz.

After the Seas, we walked over to "Ellen's Energy Adventure". I remembered being on it back in 1984, but that was well before Ellen DeGeneres redid the movie. We got there about five minutes before the movie started. I didn't realize how long it was until we got there and saw the signs that said it was a 45-minute moving theater experience. I thought that would be another nice, long A/C ride during a hot part of the day.

When we finished, we walked over to Mexico to see if we could eat in the Mayan pyramid for some good, authentic Mexican food. When Sarah saw the menu, she decided she didn't want to have Mexican food for dinner. So I guess Mexican food in Wisconsin is a lot different than actual food prepared by Mexicans. We ended up getting a big plate of nachos, and Sarah settled for a churro. Ali wanted none of it. She actually said she had had enough of Epcot, was tired, and wanted to go back to the resort.

As we got our food and were walking to a table to eat. We came across Three Caballeros Donald Duck. It was my goal to have my picture taken with a character, and since there were only about five people in line, I set our food down and I took the girls to go have their picture taken.

I just had the Disney photographer take my picture, since I was trying to be quick and keep the pictures moving so the other little kids could continue having their pictures taken.

When we got back to the table with Kris, she remarked that her legs were still really burning. A check of her legs showed that there were now several more red spots all over her legs.


Her other leg looked pretty much the same. So since Alison wanted to go, and Kris's legs were to the point of not being able to walk since the heat of the sun and the heat coming off the pavement just making the burning sensation worse. Sarah wanted to have her picture taken over in the World Showcase in France so we decided to walk over there and then call it a day. We walked through Canada, and England on our way to France. I was hoping to get a little better picture of the girls in front of the "Eiffel Tower", but this was about as good as we could get:



Once Sarah got her picture, we started walking out. We were originally going to go around the World Showcase so we could go through all the countries, but because Alison was so tired and Kris's legs, we took the short way out.

The longest line we waiting in was about 20 minutes, and the crowds were very manageable. Just like the Magic Kingdom, not at all what I was expecting.

EPCOT

Tuesday the plan was to go to EPCOT. We had planned on going a little later (around lunchtime) so we wouldn't burn out like we did the day before at the Magic Kingdom. Well it wasn't so much burn out as it was finished everything was wanted to do. But when we checked the weather, it was supposed to be rainy in the afternoon, so we decided to hurry up and get ready and get to the park as soon as we could before we lost too much time to the rain.

We ended up getting there at 10:15 (the park opened at 9:00). After a long line waiting for bags to be checked, we got into the park and Alison wanted to go right on Spaceship Earth. She also wanted to take a picture of it so I let her have the camera.

The girls actually liked Spaceship Earth, which was a surprise to me. The whole history of communication through time was something I thought the girls would have no interest in whatsoever. But Ali said she actually like the ride. I think she liked the animatronics more than anything else. We went on it six years ago and it was good to see that it was actually changed from the last time we saw it.

After Spaceship Earth, Alison wanted to do the Kim Possible challenge. We ran our tickets and got our assignment, which was in Norway after 12:00. We had about a half an hour or so to kill so we decided to try the GM Test Track. But the wait was actually over an hour so we got fast passes instead and went over to the world showcase in Mexico.

Ali had heard the story for years about how the last time we were at EPCOT we got stuck on this ride. I actually like the Mexico pavilion anyway. I love looking at all the crafts and jewelry. So we went on the ride and showed the girls the characters from The Three Caballeros. I think when we get home I may break out the DVD to show the girls. But I think they liked it.

After Mexico, we went to Norway and got our Kimmunicator and assignment. Then we went on the Maelstrom . Sarah had told Alison all about it and had her all freaked out before going on. Then when we did it, it was pretty tame. In fact, it changed just slightly from six years ago as well. As soon as we got out, we started the Kim Possible mission and right when we did, the sky opened up and it POURED on us. We had to hang out in a little Norwegian cafe for about 20 minutes while we waited for the rain to stop. In the mean time I got the girls a cookie and I had a cinnamon roll.

Once the rain stopped Ali finished her Kim Possible mission. The only problem was she wouldn't let Sarah help her. So this caused some fighting and pouting. After Ali was done I told her that was it, because we wanted to walk around the park and not spend all of our time doing Kim Possible things. Besides, the things they had us doing were really kind of lame. Sarah didn't miss much.

When we turned in the Kimmunicator we started over to the Land of Imagination and the Figment ride. Once again, the wait was only about five minutes. Alison thought the ride was rather neat. The only thing that sucked was all the Kodak things at the end (making pictures editing them) were not working right. After trying for five to ten minutes we gave up. We stayed a little longer just because the rain had started again.

Once it had let up we went over the The Land. Soarin' had a long line and we couldn't get fast passes because we still had the ones from the Test Track so we went on the boat ride there. I forget what it was called exactly.

End of part one of EPCOT. More to come tomorrow.