Saturday September 9, 2000
After a long day yesterday, Roger and I decided to take it easy and slept late. By the time we were up and ready to go it was already 1pm. We headed over to the Dixie Landings food court for some lunch. I ordered some spaghetti and Roger ordered the Chicken Salad. My spaghetti was less than thrilling and was no where near as good as the stuff they serve at Redd Rocket’s Pizza Port at Disneyland. We then caught the bus over to EPCOT.
As we disembarked the bus, we noticed that it was beginning to rain. By the time we hit the first canopy, it was downright pouring. It poured non stop for at least 10 minutes before it let up. We then decided to make a run for the next canopy. By the time we arrived, we were both soaked. After another 5 minutes we decided to try for the entrance area. Halfway there, it poured again and we dashed under a nearby overhang. Completely soaked we decided the heck with it and ran over to the entrance where we were able to purchase Ponchos. I didn’t want to get one since I had one back at the hotel, but I had no choice. We entered EPCOT and headed over to the Universe of Energy. Ellen DeGeneres and Bill Nye the Science Guy provided a humorous look at energy with a little help from Alex Trebeck. It was definitely funnier than the last time I was here. Checking in with the Test Track, we discovered it was closed due to the weather so we headed over to the Living Seas.
The Living Seas is an interesting concept, but not really that exciting. We skipped the movie and went onto the tram to the aquarium area. The fish and dolphins seemed disinterested and our stay in this pavilion was short. We then headed over to the Land pavilion, which albeit cheesy, was a tad more interesting than the Living Seas and Roger enjoyed the boat ride through the experimental agricultural areas. Done with the Land, we headed over to the Journey into Imagination pavilion. We skipped Honey I Shrunk the Audience (it’s the same as Disneyland), we went onto the Journey into your Imagination ride. It was nice that they used the same character that was in Honey I Shrunk the Audience played by Eric Idle. I wish they had kept more Figment, for his appearance at the end of the ride was out of the blue. Overall the ride was OK and despite the fact the old song from the previous version of the ride was gone, I enjoyed it more.
Heading out to the World Showcase, I heard the Test Track up and running so we headed over. Finally, we were able to ride it. The ride was super-cool and on the straight-away we hit 70mph and it was quite a rush. I recommend it to all who come to EPCOT. After this ride, we headed over to the World Showcase and Roger picked up a Passport to get signed in each country. First stop – Mexico.
The Mexico pavilion had some sculpture from Pre-Colombian Mexico and some shops and a Boat ride. I am not quite sure what happened to the boat ride, but it was called Journey in Time and the ride seemed more like Journey through Mexico. From Mexico, we transitioned to Norway. Norway has a cool boat ride called “Malestorm”. It is definitely the best boat ride in EPCOT and features a few surprises. From Norway, it was off to China. They had a circle-vision movie called “Wonders of China” which is the same movie they used to show at Disneyland every now and then. Roger got some good shots of various parts of the pavilion. While we were in China, the Tapestry of Nations was going on and it was a great parade. From China it was off to Germany and Italy.
Roger continued to get his passport signed. In Italy, there was a group of musicians playing classical music on modern electronic equipment. Our trip continued on to the US, Japan, France, UK, Canada, and the Millennium Pavilion. All of the pavilions offered shops and restaurants with items from their respective countries. It was sad that the US Pavilion featured standard Disney fast food. Oh well. Each person who signed Roger’s passport was very courteous and offered info on their countries. Our favorites were Jose in Mexico, Ben in Germany, Oliver in France, Hiroshoko in Japan, and Leon in the UK. The Millennium Pavilion offered 23 other countries. Everyone there was friendly and Kudos goes to Sweden for a great exhibit on the four seasons in Sweden (and no, they were not all snow).
By the time we finished, Illuminations was over and the park was closed. I still had not eaten dinner, so we took the bus back to the hotel. Once again, we dined at the food court (by this time the only thing open). It was a tad better this time, but I did buy the all you can drink mug which gets me free drinks at Dixie Landings and Port Orleans whenever I want. It was then time to go to bed. We want to get an earlier start tomorrow to go to the Magic Kingdom. I did notice that the pics of the UK and Canada didn’t come out, so we will have to return on another day to get pics of them.
