One Little Spark…
Friday, January 9, 2015 - 9:00AM Eastern Time
Crowd level: Predicted 4/Actual 3
Hours: 9am-9pm
Extra Magic Hours: 9pm-11pm
Let’s get on some rides, shall we? Uh, sorry. Attractions!
Before we do, however, there’s something you should know about our family’s attraction-riding mindset going into this vacation. Due to a variety of factors (geography, finances, kids’ ages, other travel priorities), we viewed this as a once-in-a-lifetime event. We’d never been to WDW before, and it’s likely we will never go again. So we had three types of attractions we NEEDED to see:
- Unique Attractions – Those we don’t have in California.
- Comparison Attractions – Those we do have in California, but we’re curious to
see the differences (I’ll cover the wonderful phenomenon these create
later in The Magic Kingdom). - Nostalgic Attractions – Those that used to be in California but are lost to antiquity.
In other words, we wanted to see it all.
In order to maximize the number of attractions we’d be able to experience and minimize the time we’d spend waiting in lines, I utilized a secret weapon for theme park efficiency called TouringPlans.com.
For the uninitiated, TouringPlans uses mathematic and scientific formulas, employing research and data gathered from thousands of theme park visits, under any variety of real-time circumstances, to create the most efficient attraction/show/meal order possible.
Basically, I enter the attractions I want to experience on a particular day, and their computer culls the billions of possible touring order combinations (yes, billions.) to find the most efficient plan for me – so that I spend less time in queues (waiting lines) and more time enjoying the attractions.
If you’d like to learn more about their ninja voodoo sorcery, check it out HERE. It will blow your mind.
(Reader caution – The next 4 paragraphs will make most sense to fanatics of TouringPlans’ software. Feel free to jump down to “The Sum of All Thrills” to get on with the show.)
I’d decided to try an experiment that seemed to make sense to me. Epcot acts a lot like two parks, so I treated it a little like two parks to see if we could increase our touring efficiency in Future World, while maximizing the leisure in World Showcase.
I created a plan for 9am to noon, set to “Fast” walking speed, and focused only on the attractions with potentially heavy wait times; Spaceship Earth, Sum of All Thrills, Mission: Space, & Test Track. We have Soarin’ at Disney’s California Adventure, so we didn’t need to fit that extremely popular attraction in. We threw Ellen’s Energy Adventure and Innovations East into the fast-paced morning plan since we were already going to be over in Future World East.
EP AM (Bigs in AM).pdf (699.2 KB)
Then I made a separate plan for the rest of the day set to “Very Relaxed” walking speed and taking in The Seas, The Land, Imagination, Innovations West, and all of World Showcase.
EP PM (Bigs in AM).pdf (788.8 KB)
It worked perfectly… almost.
The Sum of All Thrills
Predicted Wait Time: 14 minutes
Actual Wait Time: 0 minutes
Our first ride at Epcot was the thrill ride simulator, The Sum of All Thrills. All advice suggested snagging FastPass+ for the big dogs, and catching SOAT first before the crowds catch on. So that’s just what we did.
DS was really looking forward to this one, I think more than most, because he likes to play Theme Park Studio at home. This ride gives him a chance to actually ride his creation. I can’t fault him for that. Many of my tween days were spent daydreaming with cousins about the amazing coasters we would create one day.
We weren’t the first ones there, but we were right behind them. We went straight to our giant touch-screen roller coaster creators and made the best rides we could imagine with the limited palette provided. I was paired with DW (my favorite), and the kids worked on theirs together.
After creating our coasters, the kids got into their simulator first - a ride pod on the end of a swiveling, swinging, swatting, swiping, swooping robotic arm. This put DW and I on the loading platform right in front of the control panel. From there we could watch the kids’ faces live via the puke cam as they were flipped around inside the ride.
The guy said it wasn’t a puke cam, but I could tell by his expression that the one thing he hates most in the world is to wipe up funnel cake chips from the 3D simulator screen. And I know he watches that thing like a hawk for the first sign of pre-barf glassy-eye.
When it came to our turn, the kids had to go down the stairs so they couldn’t watch our puke cam. Bummer. But I knew that some strangers would be up there watching us, so I took the opportunity to play for the camera. Screaming and shouting, I put on quite a show. It was most fun for me imagining what the next victims… riders were thinking.
One little problem was that the simulator seat didn’t seem to be made for human beings to actually sit in. I’m 6’2”, which isn’t giant, so I’m always surprised when something like this fits more like a sock full of rocks than a glove. I guess if a robotic arm is going to shake your body around like a martini, you don’t want to get too comfortable.
And finally, it’s super cool that you can take your creation home with you via the swipe card. Here are our creations for your enjoyment!
The Chindo’s and DW’s Ride Creation
(We chose roller coaster but it came out as a flying jet instead)
http://streamo.vo.llnwd.net/o41/sm/Arc-Worldwide/stntjet_HLbgN_BTmdL_F8mdL_HPsmR_outroR.mp4
DD’s and DS’s Ride Creation
(DS said he didn’t have enough time to make his as good as he’d wanted)
http://streamo.vo.llnwd.net/o41/sm/Arc-Worldwide/stntjet_LPftN_HXhgL_OHdfN_TDshR_outroL.mp4
Spaceship Earth
Predicted Wait Time: 1 minute with FastPass+
Actual Wait Time: Walk on with FastPass+
For me, Spaceship Earth is much more than the icon of the park. It’s the prelude, the overture of the whole EPCOT story. By exploring the history of human communication, it manages to reveal the unequaled beauty of mankind.
Take, for example, the scene representing the spread of printed news. An African American freedman, operating a whirring printing press, takes a moment to read the freshly printed headline; “Civil War Over.” In this brief glimpse, we experience a story of pain and indignity, courage and sacrifice, endurance and victory, faith and redemption, freedom and a future.
(Nevermind that he’s reading upside down)
That’s why it was imperative that I get my family on SE early in the day, because the whole narrative of Epcot flows out of it. Think about it. Walt’s unrealized vision for EPCOT and the Epcot that actually exists today are the continuation of the storyline in SE. A ‘future world’ that explores and advances the capabilities of man, and a ‘world showcase’ that brings distinct peoples and cultures together in one shared community.
It’s pretty strong stuff for an amusement park, but that’s what makes it so special.
One of the great benefits of visiting WDW as a newcomer is the ability to see the attractions as they are, not as they were. I listened to a lot of Lou Mongello before the trip and, while Lou can’t seem to utter a discouraging word about anything Disney does, he does spend a lot of time lamenting attractions and details that are lost to progress.
But for a newcomer, there’s no sense of loss when Dame Judi Dench says, “Thank the Phoenicians,” rather than Jeremy Irons or Walter Cronkite.
The kids loved SE, but not as much as Mom and Dad. We’re a homeschooling family, and while we don’t fly the freak flag too high, we do get pretty jazzed when we see the fruits of our (my wife’s) labor.
As we passed the Greek classroom where the man in red robes (one of my favorite animatronics, by the way) teaches his eager students, the kids spun around in their omnimover to tell us, “That’s Euclid!” I guess they immediately recognized that the tool he’s holding is a dead giveaway that he is the father of Geometry.
Who knew? My kids did. (grins)
http://assets1.touringplans.com/assets/attractions/ep02/3.jpg
After the ride, we spent a few minutes in Project Tomorrow. It’s nice that not all Disney attractions exit through a gift shop.
And yes, we pretty much just watched DS play the games. After all, he is the expert.
To be continued in Future World East…