Tuesday, January 12 -
Epcot was every bit as fascinating as we expected. Plus more. I admit I wasn’t a huge fan of the idea but I ended up enjoying it way more than I thought I would. For one thing, the technology was amazing. Almost beyond comprehension. Difficult to describe the magnitude of the design and ‘imagineering’ that went into the creation of this huge place. Pictures and words can’t begin to scratch the surface of it, so I’m not going to try very hard. I remember going to Epcot as a child (btw who knows what Epcot means?); some things today were the same as then, but many of the things were new since I went in 1986 (who knows when Epcot opened to the public??). Can you tell the two hour drive to and from Orlando was spent googling Epcot and studying all sorts of random fascinations that amazed us?! If you don’t anticipate going in the next decade or so, google some of the rides. Photos weren’t allowed in many of the exhibits/rides; but you can not only find photos, descriptions, and explanations of how all the rides work online but also experience many of them on youtube. No way similar, but yet better than nothing . . .
Spaceship earth. Random fact: dome is constructed with a gutter system which channels all rainwater to the lagoon. Standing under the dome during rain – you’ll stay dry. This was our first ride, and everything about the ride was amazing. Can’t even begin to explain.
The Land – amazing farming/greenhouse techniques. Google for more pictures. For this exhibit, we sat in a slow-moving boat and floated through channels that wandered through a brief history of agriculture then several working greenhouses which incorporated pretty innovative ways to grow. For example:
Each melon was tied with rope to the trellis structure. Think we’ll try that next year.
This ride celebrated and encouraged imagination. A slow ride, but so much to see that we could’ve easily gone another time and not been bored. Impossible to see all the incredible technological feats, optical illusions, etc. This feature had the only two screens that weren’t working: with the exorbitant entry fee, we guests have the right to expect perfection, and we got pretty close to it. Grounds were immaculate. No trash. Music was orchestra throughout the park – beautiful. Park personnel – called, not employees, but cast members, were everywhere. Long lines were expected, but we usually didn’t have any wait. Only once did we wait about 30 minutes, and, while it was worth it for the experience, I don’t think you could pay me to go to Epcot during the peak summer season. There were so many people there in January!!
Weather was cool at first but soon warmed up, and we enjoyed another good dose of FL sunshine. And brilliant blue skies.
These fountains shot water from one pad to another. Fascinating.
Neat things to see everywhere.
Monorail was much admired.
On to World Showcase. Ten or so countries arranged around a lagoon. Each country represented had restaurants, shoppes, and cast members dressed in native costume speaking native language; some had native performers doing shows at scheduled times, and most had some educational activity about the country which we thoroughly enjoyed. Again, google for more pictures and information.
This was Germany I think (might be Italy?). We loved this music – sounded like Sound of Music soundtrack
My favorite part of the park: enjoying the Voices of Liberty while we waited for the American Adventure feature film to begin. Excellent group!!!! Youtube has videos. Random fact: standing at widest ends of the dome, you can whisper and person opposite can hear reflected from dome. Very neat!
Japan.
Japanese Taiko drummers were pretty neat.
Morocco.
Seveur Amusant (comical waiter and wine steward). By far our favorite show.
Loved the flowers everywhere.
Spaceship Earth after dark was beautiful.
IllimiNations fireworks show after dark was beyond description. Youtube has a pretty good video (considering…). Absolutely amazing. I only took this one picture; it didn’t turn out that great, and after that I was too busy watching. So much to see.
The other reason I enjoyed Epcot more than I expected to – I liked the wildish rides. I mean, I really liked them all - - - Mission: Space (signs all over, we were warned a dozen times: INTENSE, included a barf bag in case it was needed), TestTrack, Sum of all Thrills. And this is the mom who gets queasy swinging. Go figure.
And all the 360 circlevision films. Wow, amazing thing to soar over Canada and China. Loved it.
Left rental house 6:30ish. Got there 8:30. Entered park 8:50. IllimuNations fireworks show started 9:00, ended 9:15. Got back to house 11:40. No regrets. Most of kids say this was their favorite day. Good thing, because it was a big one!
Wednesday – slept in big time! Fruit farm was a disappointment – not an orange tree in sight! Really liked the fresh-squeezed orange juice and the kettle corn though – made a nice snack as we drove to a manatee viewing dock.
Very worth a stop. More than the dozens & dozens of manatees though, we loved watching little black-tipped reef sharks jump/flip out of the water. They were too fast to get a picture though, unlike these fat sea cows:
Power plant in the background inadvertantly became a refuge for these warm-loving animals because of the hot water it dumps in the bay. In conjunction with the state of Florida, TECO – Tampa Electric Company - has created a pretty neat wildlife refuge out of this phenomenon.
Boardwalk through mangrove tunnels.
Looking at more manatees, sharks, and many more fish – all visible from the dock.
From there, on to a little fishing village called Cortez. Dad was hunting for commercial ships unloading their catch, which we never found, but we did find some other gems - - -
Most of us were NOT hungry to eat at this little joint.
We wandered all over the docks like we owned them.
Ended up at a fish processing plant, got invited to come in, so did just that. Wandered around to see what we could see. Evidently when commercial ships do come in (learned that they don’t go out when it’s this cool – won’t go out for a few weeks yet 
A crew was just cleaning up this area, where they had processed (don’t know what that meant) some fish that had come in on a semi (?).
Anyway, kind of a *cool* little side field trip.
On to a little museum we happened to find:
Unplanned, unscheduled, but also enjoyed.
Last stop: supper. Dad wanted seafood, and not just the food, but the atmosphere, you know? Well, we certainly found it here:
A step above the first local dive we saw, with really good food, and lots of it.
Including but not limited to:
Alligator tail.
More wandering,
and back to the van, where this sweet little stray begged us to take her home.
Which, of course, we did not.
BTW – Epcot means -
Experimental Protype Community Of Tomorrow,
and opened in 1982.
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