coasterdude5 Posted March 19, 2006 Share Posted March 19, 2006 Okay, so last Saturday, we finally pull into the hotel! After 14 hours of sitting I sat again while we waited to check in. We stayed at Shades of Green, which is a really nice resort for active and retired military. It's across from the Polynesian, but it's tucked away pretty good. I think part of it used to be the Disney Inn. It's really one of Disney's best kept secrets due to its location and the price! Anyway, we check in, go to the room, and then eat. Now for the coaster stuff. Sunday we went to Magic Kingdom (or is it THE Magic Kingdom) No, I want to skip ahead to the awesomeness of Tuesday! We get to Animal Kingdom, late as usual, so I had to dash to Everest just to wait for about 20 minutes, not bad. My dad was sick so I was waiting by myself, but no big deal! There was tons of stuff to see. So, I get in the middle with some lady, and we're off! We go through the first part and I'm like, ok, not bad! We start going up the second lift hill. and the train stops. The lady goes" this isn't good" and I said to myself, "wow, this sure wasn't in Erik's video! So after a few minutes the usual voice recording: "we have had to make an unscheduled stop, the train will continue shortly" yeah, that held me over for about 10 minutes. Then finally, I see three cast members making there way up the mountain. "We are making a routine evacuation" Routine....... One person was even dumb enough to ask if this was part of the ride. I asked the cast member and she said "something had gone wrong". So we got to walk through all the track before the lift and I got some pretty nice shots! And of course they gave us re-entry passes and I rode it. Very nice! Alot better than I had expected. The yeti seemed to come alot closer than he did in the videos! I'd give in a 8/10. Can't get that shot in too many places!! Ooooooh! Mountain!! More random people! Expedition Evacuation!! (or is this part of the ride?) Random people in front of me! I wasn't too high up. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kennywood!007 Posted March 19, 2006 Share Posted March 19, 2006 LMFAO!! Thats great....I wish I was on it, he well at least you got something positive out of the evacuation! GREAT PICS! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Twister II Posted March 19, 2006 Share Posted March 19, 2006 I got an evacuation on TTD from the launch pad, oh yea, be jealous I got to walk 10 feet of flat metal mesh. At least there wasn't anyone completely freaking out and having a baby. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phazan Posted March 19, 2006 Share Posted March 19, 2006 Thats cool you got to walk around the ride, AND you got to ride it. Anyway, sounds like you had fun on your trip. BTW, was that evacuation part of the ride? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Nrthwnd Posted March 19, 2006 Share Posted March 19, 2006 You got a couple of really great shots there, the ones at the end? Bet those two photos couldn't be taken from a moving tea train, lol! And it looks like (IMhO) yours is: The First E:E Walkback TR Congrats! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShadowLink79 Posted March 19, 2006 Share Posted March 19, 2006 Congratulations! You got to ride ~The Walkback!~ Ooooooooh! If you were higher... maybe you could ski off the mountain! ShadowLink79 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
PhishyBrewer Posted March 19, 2006 Share Posted March 19, 2006 Well... atleast you got some good pictures out of it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coasterdude5 Posted March 19, 2006 Author Share Posted March 19, 2006 Day 1: Magic Kingdom So we arrived at "THE" Magic Kingdom at 9:30. The crowds were pretty bad but not terrible. We rode the train around and then headed towards Big Thunder Mountain. The wait was only 20 minutes! It turned out to be 10. - Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (6/10) It was actually a fun ride, we sat in the back so we got a little airtime. It was alot faster than it seemed to be. A really nice ride. Then we headed over Haunted Mansion. You could somewhat say it was a walkon because within minutes, we were in the "sinking" room. - Haunted Mansion (5/10) This ride was alot better than I expected it to be! The effects were classic and great. The ride itself was alot longer than I thought it would be. Then we ate lunch at some Columbian themed place. Pretty good food and not bad prices. After lunch, we went over and saw Phillarmagic. It was a pretty cool ride with nice 3D effects. After that, we went over and rode the slow Indy Speedway twice because my brother liked it soooo much. After that I hightailed it over to Space Mountain and got a FASTPASS. While we waited for our time to come around, we rode Stitch's Great Escape. - Stitch's Great Escape (6/10) I never got to ride Alien Encounter so I don't know how similar they were. The ride was fun and I'm not sure why everyone puts it down. It wasn't "awesome" but it was fun. Except for the chili dog. I'm never eating one again!! Then it was time for Space Mountain! - Space Mountain (7/10) This ride really made me look twice. I had no idea it was so open inside the mountain and that you could almost see to the top. The ride itself was cool to. Not fast but still a nice ride. After that we rode Carousel of Progress and it was pretty cool but a bit boring. Then as my Mom wanted to watch Cinderellabration, I went and got Fastpasses for Jungle Cruise which was dumb because there was only a 20 minute wait. - Jungle Cruise (4/10) This ride was okay, I guess it was our "enthusiastic" guide that kinda ruined it for me. Other than that, the ride was okay. The day overall was fun and the lines weren't bad at all except for a few and FASTPASS helped that. Action shot!! Animal Kingdom pictures later! Tomorrowland! DUCK!! Wasn't that bad! Spooky... Not really.... Shot from the lame Tom Sawyer's island. I can't believe I forgot to ride Splash Mountain!!! My kind of wait time! Castle shot! This sign apparently confused alot of people because they didn't see "Epcot" at the bottom. I see Big Thunder Mountain! Castle! People! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dandaman Posted March 19, 2006 Share Posted March 19, 2006 Some people say it ruins the magic, but if it meant I were in WDW, I'd love to have an E:E evac. Thanks for the pics so far! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coasterdude5 Posted March 19, 2006 Author Share Posted March 19, 2006 Here's some more pics from "THE" Magic Kingdom Another Action shot!! Silhoutte-lookin OH Yeah! I kept calling "Mass Transit Authority" People Mover, was I corrected!! Arcade next to Space Mountain! Space Mountain! carousel! more people! The sky was really blue. Look at that HUGE castle! Mainstreet Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Erik Johnson Posted March 20, 2006 Share Posted March 20, 2006 Wow, great Photo TR! You certainly got some exclusive EE pictures from your E-stop experience. Thanks for posting. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coasterdude5 Posted March 20, 2006 Author Share Posted March 20, 2006 Day 2: Animal Kingdom I really liked this park! Alot of people complain because it's "like a zoo". But I liked it. And what's wrong with zoo's? Of course, as soon as I got there, I hurried over to Everest. Side note: Disney really should've just named this ride MOUNT Everest, because that's the only thing I heard the ride called. Whatever. So anyway, if you read the first post you know about the everest evacuation. After that, we went over and rode Dinosaur. - Dinosaur (8.5/10) This ride really surprised me. I thought we were just going to cruise through a few rooms with a few bumps. Was I wrong! I rode it twice and still was amazed. After that I went back and rode ALL of EE. - Expedition Everest (9/10) The ride itself is massive. For me, the pictures didn't really showing. Yeah, from the parking lot, it does look like a mountain is eating a warehouse, but from the front, WOW. And you can hear the screams from a long distance a way as well. The theming is pure Disney. The realism is just uhhh... REAL. Like others, the line moved too fast, there was so much to look at. The actual coaster was very nice, I'm not sure what happens in the reverse indoor section, but it was intense! The "big" drop was also very nice, especially in the back. And the videos just didn't seem to capture how close the yeti comes to you. Very very awesome. After Everest we went and ate at Restaurantosaurus. What an experience. The lineS were out the door so my parents told my brother and me to go grab a seat. Every table was taken. We finally see a family about to leave so we inch towards the table. This man, maybe in his 40's, runs right in front of me and says in a sarcastic tone "oh, did you want this" and being nice, I said, "no, you can go ahead and have it". I'm not good at talking back to adults so we kept looking. Then we see another family getting up. I go over and the man at the table puts his arm in front of me so I couldn't sit down, and lets another family sit down. Pure evil! I've never seen people be so rude and agressive over FOOD! After we finally got a table, the food was there! Perfect timing. After that, we went and saw "It's tough to be a bug". They put too many people in the row so I was crunched in between two seats so I didn't really "feel" any of the movie. Then we got Fastpasses for Kali River Rapids and rode Dinosaur again. - Kali River Rapids. (6/10) I was really bracing myself for a drencher but I got my shorts a little damp. Other than the drop, the ride was very mild but had awesome theming so that made up for the ride. After Kali, we got in line for Kilamanjaro Safaris. It just goes to show you can't use FASTPASS on everything! A 70 minute wait. - Kilamanjaro Safaris (8/10) This ride really impressed me. It wasn't my favorite ride but it was still fun. Especially seeing the look on my brother's face when the bridge started to "collapse". Priceless. We had an okay, kinda fake sounding tour guide. But the sights were still outstanding! Then we rode the train out to Rafiki's Planet Watch and looked around there. Since the park closes at 6:00, we were off, another awesome day! The park itself is pretty good but will get better as they add more. OH MY GOSH! Oh, its some dude's head! Look for another head appearence tomorrow! Whitish pink flamingos! A distant view PEOPLE! Not a very wet ride! If you go down the drop facing forward, anyway! Monkey playground! Darn, I missed the Tarzan show. How did they do it without supports? We'll never know.... Someone goes "that's a really long train!" More Everest stuff Exclusivness! Ha-ha! I have a re-entry pass!! I see monkeys! MOUNT Everest! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phazan Posted March 21, 2006 Share Posted March 21, 2006 Best update for this TR yet! Good to hear Everest was good, and yes I guess it should be Mt.Everest but oh well. Good to hear that was a fun day! Oh and I liked the flamingos! Oh and one more thing. I would have slapped that table stealing guy! well not really... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
resonancej Posted March 21, 2006 Share Posted March 21, 2006 It looks like there's not much to see on the EE evac. just parts of the lift hill and the intro track. Glad you enjoyed the ride, it's not too wild as far as roller coasters go but it's a lot of fun. I actually had the fortune of being on a rock n rollercoaster evac right as you run into the brake tunnel, they walked us thru the warehouse with the lights on and DAMN that's a small track...you spend the whole time running in knots. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coasterdude5 Posted March 21, 2006 Author Share Posted March 21, 2006 Oh yeah, the "expedition evacuation" was 95% sarcasm. It's just funny of how big of a deal the cast members make of it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
johnrose Posted March 21, 2006 Share Posted March 21, 2006 Killer report! Loved the mix of rides and random scenery. Keep it up! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kennywood!007 Posted March 21, 2006 Share Posted March 21, 2006 Great TR John! Can't wait to see more. LMAO of the pis of Everest with the two trains "Wow, thats a really long train! -Zack Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coasterdude5 Posted March 22, 2006 Author Share Posted March 22, 2006 Day 3: Epcot (day 1 out of 2) Epcot was my favorite park out of all six parks. Scary, I know. We got there and immediately rode Spaceship Earth. A very nice ride! (But not worth a review, ha-ha) Then we headed over to The Land pavillion and got fast passes for Soarin for SEVEN hours later. And this was only an hour after they had opened. This man was screaming at a cast member "two hour wait, this sucks, this sucks" It was pretty funny. Then we waited a long one hour for "Honey, I shrunk the Audience" it was okay, but not worth a one hour wait. Then we went and rode "Living with the land" It was okay, I would've liked it more if I was a farmer. Then we went over towards Test Track: - Test Track 9.9/10 The only thing wrong with this ride is that I wish it was longer! Without a doubt the best ride at Epcot. As some of you might know, I HATE HATE HATE spinning, so I skipped Mission: Space. It's just not worth getting sick for the rest of the day. Oh yeah, I don't care what anyone says, SINGLE RIDER LINE is the best thing that's happened to a park since.... I got to ride Test Track over and over because of it. I could care less if I was with the people I'm with, it's not like you're having a social conversation while going 65mph! Then we got some lunch at the Mexico pavillion and rode Maelstrom! Cool little short water ride with trolls! Then it was time to head back to Soarin'! People in the regular line shoot some mean looks as you're flying by in the FASTPASS lane. Oh well. - Soarin (8/10) I originally thought you'd get pulled up in front of this flat little movie screen and fly around. Was I wrong! The screen is somewhat of a bubble so it really engulfs you. The whole experience is really breathtaking. (I don't want to give too many spoilers away! Then we ate dinner at Oktoberfest (where was Soren?) and then we watched Illuminations. It was a really awesome day. Epcot Golfball.... more epcot pics later! Awesome restaurant! ball.... at night Crazy Off Kilter band golfball shot This duck was at the Off Kilter concert the whole time. I finally saw it in person!! Cool GM showroom! Awesome ride! Now I know why the floor at Ice Station Cool is so sticky! ME in front of the golfball. MAELSTROM! Cool El' Rio del Tiempo ride! best ride at Epcot! HEAD APPERANCE #2! For you, Elissa! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
phazan Posted March 22, 2006 Share Posted March 22, 2006 Nice TR so far! Sounds like you really liked Epcot. Ive never been to WDW, but is Epcot a seperate admission like DL and DCA? And what about Animal Kingdom? Are they all separate parks? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coasterdude5 Posted March 22, 2006 Author Share Posted March 22, 2006 Yeah, they're all separate, and pretty spaced apart. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coasterdude5 Posted March 26, 2006 Author Share Posted March 26, 2006 Day 4: Universal Originally, we set out to spend one day at Universal Studios, and one day at Islands of Adventure. I just really wasn't impressed (lots of stuff broken down) so we did both parks in one day. Universal Studios We got in and of course I ran to the coaster I've been dreaming of riding simce it opened. And it was broken down. So we went and rode Earthquake. It was a fun ride, shorter than what I thought it was gonna be but the preshow stuff was cool. Then we went back to Mummy and it was opened with a 15 minute wait. - Revenge of the Mummy (9/10) This ride was everything I thought it was going to be. Since it was my first launched coaster, it really amazed me. The theming was also spectacular. I rerode 2 more times. (using the single-rider lines) (and yes, I have friends!!) After that, we ate lunch at some cool Irish place where you get free desserts, nice! Then we went over to Jaws. Broken. But as soon as we turned to walk away, "JAWS IS NOW OPEN!" So it was about a ten-fifteen minute wait. - Jaws (5/10) This ride was pretty cool. I guess our "skipper" kinda ruined it because he was so enthusiastic, I thought he was going to jump in the water and fight jaws with his bare hands. Still, a pretty cool ride. Then we went over to MIB but the line was to long so our group seperated and my side went and rode Mummy more! After that, we decided to go on over to Islands of Adventure Islands of Adventure Maybe it was just having a bad day, but this park kinda dissapointed me a bit. Lots of rides were broken down, and just the park itself wasn't as big I thought it would be. - Incredible Hulk (10/10) This is now my #1 coaster! There is just no beating the massive zero-g roll and all the elements. It was truly one of the best rides I've been on. So we strolled around some more and then decided to go back to the hotel. Now for my favorite ride of the day, FLAT ESCALATOR!!! Later Islands of Adventure! Sure it is... Loop! Its the famous jeep! I'm sorry, I didn't see any of the Mack Track, lol, it rhymes!! Cool Hulk shot. Ha... Not open... Sorry, I walked right past the entrance for this! HULK! Islands of Adventure! Swing monkey, swing! Cool animal planet live show! Sorry, I'm not waiting 40 minutes to ride this thing. Line was a bit too long. He's eating everyone!! Speaks for itself. Oh no, its the vertically challenged dudes! Finally! I never could figure out who this dude was! I had had my share of 4D movies! So close! Universal Studios! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Hattuchili Posted March 26, 2006 Share Posted March 26, 2006 Universal looks really cool. I can´t wait to go to the parks and it isn´t far away! --Sören Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
gmoney422 Posted March 26, 2006 Share Posted March 26, 2006 I have to agree! I haven't been on too many coasters yet, but The Hulk is my #1 so far! (Second to Medusa at SFGA.) I feel lift hills take too long, so a launch up the lift hill scratches me right where I itch! I went on the Hulk 6 times when we were there last year. Sad that the park had so many rides closed. Sorry you got a bad impression. It's really a great place when everything's functioning. But at least you got to ride the Mummy. That was my #1 before I rode the Hulk. Did you see the homage to King Kong in the treasure room? There's a statue of King Kong in the treasure room on the right side about in the middle. It's the only thing in the room really made of gold! Nice fun fact for ya...! - G "Don't judge Universal by 1 bad trip" Money Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
coasterfreak101 Posted March 26, 2006 Share Posted March 26, 2006 Great pics, John! Expedition Evacuation looks amazing! I wanna ride Did you ride Dueling Dragons? If not, wow! And what about Jurassic Park? Again, if not, wow! They both rock! Oh, and you are so not a good credit whore! I wait for kiddie coasters! You suck Again, great pics, can't wait for the rest of them! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dougr Posted March 26, 2006 Share Posted March 26, 2006 Evil thought: Is Disney going to see the sucess of EE and rebuild Matterhorn? Could be sacrilige. Could work. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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