January 27 and 28 – Epcot and a Day Off

The Skyliner to Epcot was working today.  Turns out it comes in to the park at a “back” entrance, right by France in the World Showcase section of the park.  

Were several American White Ibis hanging around in France.

We immediately headed to the Ratatouille ride.  This was new to us.  The lines had over an hour wait but we were in within about 10 minutes.  These passes are great.  The attraction was great with small pod vehicles that roamed through the "kitchen".  Most of the scenes were some sort of projection on screens and not physical animatrons.  Somehow we didn't get any photos on this ride. 

We also visited the Impressions of France.  This was a video tour through France.  Beautiful.

World Showcase Lagoon.

Some photos of Japan.

We spent a bit of time visiting some of the other countries in the World Showcase.  Japan had an exhibition of kawaii, or the Japanese cuteness culture.

We also watched the Japanese drummers.

We had lunch at the creperie restaurant in France and then headed the UK on our way to the "front" section of Epcot.

 We wandered through Disney on Broadway, an exhibition feature props and costumes from various Disney Broadway musicals.

Rose from Beauty and the Beast

Costume from Aladdin 

Magic Lamp from Aladdin

Costumes from Aladdin

Masks from Lion King

Lion King

Costume for Pumba in Lion King

Costume Beading

We took the Soar’in Around the World ride (movie of many sights around the world) and Image Works.  Image Works was a showing of three shorts by Disney and Pixar.  Very fun.

Other entertainment we hit today included the Disney Pixar Short Film festival where they showed several of their shorts.  They were so very creative.  

We also took a ride through the Living with the Land.  All of the produce that is grown here is used in the restaurants in the park.

A Sweet Potato "tree"

We also rode with Nemo and Friends...a 3-D ride so none of the photos came out,

and Frozen Every After, in Norway.

Some chalk drawings.

The number of strollers in the stroller parking "lots" was staggering.  They even had cast members stationed at the lots to help control the chaos.

We had dinner in China.  Our waiter turned out to be from Xining, China where we visited on our third trip to China.  He was blown away when we told him we have visited there.  He said he was the first person from Xining to work in Epcot and we were the first guest he had ever met who had visited his home city.  We showed each other photos and had a lovely, but short, visit.  

Then we decided to head back to the room.  Along the route to the Skyliner. 

Unfortunately, everyone else seemed to have the same idea.  The backup at the Skyliner was huge.  It was the longest wait we had since we arrived at Disney World. It wasn't broken, there was just heavy demand.  And a lot of people in scooters, which took a bit longer to load. 

On the 28^th we decided we needed a break from all the walking so took the day off.  We spent it in the room working on travel items, photos and other housekeepy type things.  We had lunch at the fast food grill near our room and took the bus to the main building in our complex for dinner. They had Key Lime Tarts there so, of course, we had to try one.

It was very good with the added bonus of a Key Limy sauce on it.