Thursday was Epcot day. For me when someone mentions Disney World I think about the big silver ball. It wasn't until we decided to go that I even clued in that Disney World consists of a number of different theme parks with Epcot just being one of them. We arrived a little after 9:00a and immediately tried to go on Soaring which is similar to "Flying Over Canada" and "Soaring Over California." Unfortunately there was already a 60 minute wait so we jumped on "Living With the Land". I had no idea what to expect and it turned out to be a boat tour of Epcot's green houses.
It was kind of neat to see all the different types of plants though it was all a bit too perfect for me. They obviously grow the plants in pots elsewhere and bring in the best ones and replant them. Everything was full grown, the same size and perfectly spaced. The hydroponics was interesting and I got some good ideas for growing things vertically. With my small garden at home I have to take advantage of every space I can. After that we went to the "Imagination Institute" which reminded me of Science World with some interactive stuff at the end of the ride.
The best part about Epcot for me is that our trip coincided with the Flower and Garden show. Spring obviously comes earlier down here and the plants are just starting to bloom. One of the first displays we went through was a butterfly garden. It was fully enclosed with various flowers as well as some butterfly huts where the butterflies were just coming out of the cocoons. Callie was definitely in her element. At one point she was just sitting in front of one of the information signs looking at the butterflies surrounded by strangers with us no where near. She was in another world.
We had a bit of time to kill while we waited for our next Fast Pass ride so we started to tour the country pavilions. Epcot is meant to display the various cultures of the world with many major countries represented, typically by a ride, a store and a restaurant. Not sure where we stopped but it seemed to represent the various islands of the South Pacific. Carter had a fun time playing the drums and we got a traditional hot dog. (Well, it was just a regular hot dog. Not sure why the hot dog hut was where it was.)
After lunch it was time to head to Test Track. Callie was a bit apprehensive but we told her it was similar to the Cars ride in Disneyland and we convinced her to go. Boy were we wrong. It was not as 'cute' as the Cars ride and started out with some pretty heavy twists and turns. The fast part at the end was also pretty incredible. At one point you are almost on your side as you go around a turn. The first few seconds were not what she expected and unfortunately she screamed the whole way. Carter however absolutely loved it.
Epcot was fairly close to Typhoon Lagoon which is one of the water parks, so instead of heading back to our hotel we decided to stop there for the afternoon. It was by far the best water park I've ever been to. One of the rides is more like a roller coaster. You are on a tube and there are points where you are actually being pushed up hill. The lazy river is also not so lazy. You can actually just sit and still move pretty quickly around. The wave pool was amazing with waves at least 5 ft tall. If we get a chance I think we'll try to go back
After the water park we headed back to Epcot to finish our tour of the country pavilions. The first one we went to was the Canada pavilion. Each of the countries is represented by the stereotypical icons of the country. For Canada this meant hockey, maple syrup and smoked salmon. The gardens were a scaled down representation of the Buchart Gardens in Victoria and were quite nice. The person working there was even from Surrey. (Even down here she said South Surrey and not Surrey.) Hockey was interesting in that all the teams were represented except for Ottawa and Edmonton. No loss there.
I stopped in England for Fish and Chips while the kids went on to the United States but they got side tracked with a game of "Agent P's World Show Case Adventure" in France. It was a fun game with a little hand held unit that showed you where to find the clues. The clues were interactive as well. In the picture on the right the books in the middle were actually a screen that showed where the bad guy left some DNA in the form of a piece of hair. In the end Perry was on top of one of the buildings and the hand held activated him sending him down a zip line between two buildings. Very cool.
We finished the day off back at the hotel watching Hercules. Three parks down. One to go.
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