MPH Travels: EPCOT Part 1

EPCOT is the second of the four Walt Disney World Parks here in Florida.
I remembered it vividly from the 1984 trip here with my parents. Pleasingly, it had changed little, and then only for the better.

EPCOT is a bit more geared toward the grown-ups. But a sense of wonder and fun is still required. That’s not to say that there’s nothing for the kids here. There’s plenty.
And everything here is educational, in a hugely entertaining manner. EPCOT is divided into two areas: Future World and World Showcase.

Future World is a series of rides and tours and attractions that immerse you in the bright, shining, hopeful vision of the future that Walt Disney believed in so strongly. It is good for the soul to be reminded of the hope and beauty and grandeur that people are capable of. And the rides are fun too…

The World Showcase is a series of Pavilions representing various nations from around the world. They are each representative in their architecture and art. Each has cafes, restaurants and gift shops specialising in the national dishes, beverages and goods. Many have educational rides and films, too. These documentary films are usually shown in Circle-Vision. In a Circle-Vision cinema, there are no seats. You stand in rows between handrails. The cinema is circular and there are about 8 movie screens running all the way around. The film is shot with a special 8-way camera setup, and projected from 8 projectors simultaneously. You stand and watch a film and you can turn around and look all around you. It is amazing. Especially with aerial photography.

Of course, EPCOT is most famous for its iconic landmark, the geodesic sphere that is the exterior of the ride Spaceship Earth. In Spaceship Earth, you sit is a small rail car and are taken on a slow journey through beautifully done, life-sized dioramas depicting some of the key moments in the history of human knowledge and progress, from the time of the cavemen to the promise of tomorrow. The narrator is Judy Dench. (Many of the rides, attractions and films here have a top-rate cast).
We also went on some other old favourites: The Universe of Energy and Journey into the Imagination.

Some rides that were new since my last visit were: Soarin’, Mission Space and Test Track. They were all three totally awesome fun. Soarin’ places you in a sort of ski-lift chair suspended well above the ground in a darkened cinema in front of a wrap-around IMAX movie screen. On the screen they show several clips of stunning aerial photography. The effect is breathtaking (almost literally). Your senses are fooled and you really have the illusion of soaring like a bird over the beautiful wildernesses of California. The sounds are also stunning (specially when you overtake a hang-glider and get close enough to hear his canvas flapping). The final straw in overwhelming your senses is smelling the sea air as you skim across the wave tops or smelling the pine trees and orange groves as you fly low over them. It is a beautiful experience. And Pia’s favourite.

Mission Space is a worthy successor to a ride that used to be at Magic Kingdom’s Tomorrowland, called Mission to Mars.
In Mission Space, you assume the role of an Astronaut candidate and the ride is basically a flight simulator of a mission to Mars. The capsule holds four people and each is given certain tasks to do. You undergo launch, orbital insertion and a slingshot around the moon to gain velocity. Then all goes black (while you hypersleep, of course) and when the console and screens fire up again, you’re in trouble, having hit an uncharted asteroid field in low Mars orbit. A hair-raising landing ensues. What makes this ride really special is that the rotating and reclining capsules actually sit on a giant centrifuge. So you pull real g-forces (2.5 g’s at times) and when you reach orbit, you get a magic moment of real weightlessness. Of course I loved it, but surprisingly, Pia did too.

Future World kept us giddily entertained all morning and into the late afternoon. Later, we began walking around the World Showcase, which encircles a beautiful lagoon. It became dark and we stayed for the fireworks and laser display. It was every bit as huge and beautiful as Magic Kingdom’s.
Again, it was late when we returned to our hotel…

Pia out front of Spaceship Earth