Visiting Disney World in Orlando, FL is worthwhile because Walt Disney really was a pioneer of the Film Industry and Disneyland in California really was the first movie related theme park, but if you plan to visit Disney World (and we visited on New Year’s eve, which is the busiest day of the year), there is one rule to follow, namely:
You must be happy standing in line!
And the reason is that roughly half your day at a Disney Theme Park will be spent standing in line, so if you don’t accept that from the get-go, then you will be miserable all day, look at the wait times that we saw in the Magic Kingdom on the first day! Being one with the madding crowd is de rigueur for a Disney theme park guest! Of course you could buy the Lightning Pass in which case the waits are much shorter, but it just seems like Disney is piling on with the Lightning Pass although perhaps you could justify it by going on the best rides more than once, thus getting your money’s worth.
As we found out there was only one virtual queue and it was basically worthless, and we did not get to go on the Tiana’s Bayou Adventure. The rides in the Magic Kingdom are not that great, but in the Magic Kingdom you will see the parade which has Snow White etc. and is basically the start of Disney’s empire, although it seemed that the parents of the kids watching the parade were more excited than the kids themselves because these parents grew up watching Disney stuff but that is not true about the kids nowadays who see more of Harry Potter etc. There was one guy in front of me who must have been at least 30 because he had two kids and the kids were bored with the parade but this guy was so excited when the tin soldiers walked by, that one of the tin soldier in the parade came and shook hands with him! In 20 years time, people will be watching this parade as history!
Magic Kingdom also has the Hall of the Presidents which is really different, even in today’s world of automation, simply because of the subject. Back when I visited Disneyland in Anaheim, CA there was only the Lincoln Robot (or is it mechanoid ?), and now all the Presidents have a robot that moves in the final live portion of the exhibit but even now, it is still the Lincoln Robot that has all the best lines, so it gets up and moves forward and gestures with his hands as Lincoln gives the Gettysburg address, and it is really worth watching, whereas the other robots simply stand up and gesture. Also since we visited on New Years’s eve (30th not 31st), we got to see the live New Years fireworks display which runs on 30th and 31st, and is really spectacular in person.
In terms of quality (rather than Disney history) the Disney Animal Kingdom is much nicer and it has the Everest ride which is really something. There are bird shows every hour on the hour and there is a really nice safari (see the pictures below), I loved the fact that there was an Indian theme to several exhibits and the Yak restaurant is really nice too, there is a water ride and unlike in the Magic Kingdom there was almost no line for the water ride. We did it all wrong, because we went on the water ride and got soaked and then we bought water ponchos because it was raining. You should probably buy the water ponchos on Amazon before going to the theme parks! The Avatar ride was really good although, it is really more of a 3D movie rather than a ride!
After Disney World, we went to the Universal Studios. Keep in mind that the part where Harry Potter goes on the Hogwart’s Express train ride is only free if you buy the two theme park attraction, so it is not cheap. But right at the entrance we went on the Hollywood Rip Ride Rockit and (until I go to Six Flags over Texas) it was definitely the most exciting ride I have ever been on, and beat the hell out of the Everest ride in the Disney Animal Kingdom Theme park! Being Unversal Studios there were many 3D rides including a Harry Potter ride, a Mummy ride, a Transformers ride and numerous 3D movie rides where the wait time was really quite tolerable so we got to see them all!