Disney Adventures - Part Three

Day three of my Disney trip with Leilani started off with a pre-opening tour at Epcot. This tour was not on foot but done by SEGWAY! Think... Paul Blart Mall Cop. 

The Segway tour was fun. We learned quite a bit about the park and riding a segway was actually pretty fun. Driving on a downward slope was a little hairy at times... and it certainly was even more frightening thinking you would run into another park goer once it opened! 

If you don't know much about Epcot at Disney World, it is very different from the other parks. Half of Epcot is the "World Showcase" and the other half is "Tomorrowland." I won't get into the vision of Walt Disney, but it is pretty interesting what his vision was for what is now Epcot. 

After our Segway tour, we rode the "Soarin" ride, which is an aerial ride that takes you through the different areas of California. In hindsight, this ride was probably one of my favorites that we rode the whole time we were at Disney. It was very cool and wasn't roller-coaster-ish which still being exhilarating. 

Next we rode the "Mission: Space" ride and I did not like it. This was a simulator and you could pick two levels at which you'd like to ride. I chose the "tougher, more manly version" and wimped out royally. Pretty much thought I was gonna puke for about 30 minutes. Quite embarrassing. Leilani was a good sport but I'm sure she was thinking... I warned you Amanda... 

A very cool part of our trip was that it was during the Epcot Food and Wine Festival. We got a passport book that had foods from different countries and tried out many of them. Fortunately and unfortunately we had a dinner reservation at the French restaurant in France at Epcot. It was good but we had to cut our Food and Wine tour snacks early. It was quite yummy. I would recommend this event for adults and I guess adventurous kiddos. I believe they have it every fall and it really was a blast. However, because it does have wine and other beverages, I believe there might be an unusually high amount of tipsy and intoxicated individuals as the night draws nearer! 

I took this picture when we were in Germany at Epcot. Germany was modeled after the German city of Rothenburg , Germany. I thought it was pretty awesome because I have been to the actual city of Rothenburg in Germany when I was in middle school. My dad and I visited two of my very favorite people in the world, my cousin Doug and his wife Marybeth, who were living in Germany and we took a weekend trip to this amazing city. See this wikipedia link on information on Rothenburg. 

I'm fairly sure this was taken in Norway...

Food and Wine Festival

After the food and wine festival, we headed to the other side of Epcot and rode "The Seas with Nemo and Friends" and saw the show "Turtle Talk with Crush." 

We didn't do a few rides which I think would be really fun, especially if you were going with kiddos... "Living with the Land" and "The Circle of Life." We just ran out of time... there is seriously SO MUCH TO DO HERE!!!

We had dinner at Chefs de France. Remy from the movie Ratatouille joined us for dinner. :) Dinner was quite yummy and I had French Onion soup for the first time ever. It was good but a little too oniony for my tastes. Leilani, however, had a seafood soup and it was excellent!

Sometime after, or before, dinner we went to the show in America and also saw an a Capella group that was amazing. I loved hearing them sing and I believe Leilani said this is one of her favorites while she is here too... seriously amazing. 

I guess I thought since we were in Florida that it would be warm and I wouldn't need to worry about sweatshirts or anything long sleeved. Wrong. Leilani and I spent some time in the gift shop trying to find something to buy since we were both FREEZING in the evening. I wish I would have bough a sweatshirt the first day... it was considerably more chilly than I had expected!


Another random story of the trip... as we were heading from the countries back to the "other side" as I like to think of it, we ran into Alice from Alice in Wonderland. After a quick photo op, we headed on our merry way. We then ran into a very intoxicated woman who had been partaking in the Food and Wine Festival and the "bar" in one of the countries. I say "bar" lightly, because obviously at Disney, it is not the intent to go to a bar and get intoxicated. The lady informed us of much trivia about Epcot and proceeded to entice us to go to the bar itself. In Aggieville or another bar district, this might not have been that weird, but at Disney, it just seemed a bit out of place.

We found Mickey, Minnie and Pluto in one of the buildings outside of the Epcot sphere.

What a cute pic!

Probably my favorite character picture of the trip, aside from those with Ariel -  as she is my absolute favorite

The evening show at Epcot was good, as they all are. It was cool because it was over the lake and was more of a laser type program. Music plays all around you out of speakers that are hidden everywhere in bushes, trees, etc. Epcot was not my favorite show... what can really beat Cinderella's castle?... but very cool anyway. 

This might surprise Leilani, but I think my favorite part of the entire day was the O'Canada presentation in Canada. Canada is seriously a beautiful country, that I genuinely want to visit as soon as possible, and the presentation given in the video really highlights the country. Maybe it was also because I was dead-tired and it was a relaxing show... but who knows!?! I do know that I would like to take in every video and show the different countries have to offer in Epcot. Apparently I'm nerdy like that and I want to learn on vacation. :)