WDW Ride Guide Podcast

Holidays Around the World at Epcot is your chance to celebrate traditions from other cultures around the globe. This means the World Showcase comes to life with seasonal food, music, and costumed entertainers. Each pavilion puts on a unique display that invites guests to join in the fun. If this is your first visit to Epcot, you may get a little spoiled with all of this extra magic. If you are familiar with this part of the park but new to the seasonal flavor, you are in for a real treat! Today, let’s take a few minutes to detail what each pavilion has to offer. Because I tend to veer left when entering the World Showcase, we will start at the Mexico pavilion and work our way clockwise around the Seven Seas Lagoon.

Hello there fellow riders and welcome back to the WDW Ride Guide. I’m your host Ben Crain and I am excited to have you join me today. Last week we started exploring the holidays at Walt Disney World when we looked at Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party. When that podcast released the party had not started yet, but when this episode hits your ears the party will be in full swing. One update I want to share is that we have learned the party is going to include Frozen favorites Elsa, Anna, Kristoff, and Olaf. Yes, the Frozen Holiday Wish is back this year and Elsa will be transforming Cinderella’s Castle into a frozen masterpiece. This is the show we referred to as the Christmas Dream Lights in the podcast. Hopefully, all the Frozen fans listening will be excited to hear this news!

Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party is a seasonal event at the Magic Kingdom that transforms the park into a winter wonderland full of special entertainment including one-of-a-kind nighttime shows and a Christmas parade. You can also taste seasonal speciality food offerings, and watch a unique fireworks spectacular. If you love Christmastime and you love Walt Disney World, then this party is your wish come true.

You are about to enter one of the most iconic rides in all of Disney history known as the Haunted Mansion. This is the culmination of Walt Disney’s love for haunted houses. His dream to have a haunted ride in every theme park has materialized in a most fun way in the Magic Kingdom. The ghostly home was built in the English Tudor style, commonly seen in the Hudson River Valley in New York. It sits atop a hill overlooking Liberty Square. By day it looks like an unassuming run down house. By night it takes on a truly creepy character. Once you step through the wrought iron gates you are in for a ghoulishly good time!

The palm trees lining the street sway in the cool evening breeze, bordering a path leading to Disney’s Hollywood Studios signature ride, The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror. Here at the end of the street lies the deteriorating Hollywood Tower Hotel. It has a strange presence, simultaneously inviting and foreboding. As the two little boys look up at the hotel extending into the night sky, they have two very different reactions. One fills with a sense of excitement, the other a paralyzing fright. The mother holds the hands of both little boys and assures them everything will be all right. This promise may be one she regrets. You see, this family of four thinks they are boarding another ride, but they are about to enter The Twilight Zone.

Be sure and stop by the Monsters, Inc. Laugh Floor next time you are in Tomorrowland. This sometimes overlooked show is a lot of fun for the whole family. The indoor theater provides a nice place to sit down and cool off when it’s hot outside. It may not be scary, but it is a great showcase of the funniest monsters from Monsters, Inc.

Experiment 626, otherwise known as Stitch from the animated film Lilo & Stitch, is the rambunctious, rude, out-of-control alien that has taken over this corner of Tomorrowland. Stitch’s Great Escape! is a dark ride that harnesses riders into a theater in the round and subjects them to some truly unpleasant sensations. So, what makes this experience such a stinker? Well, let’s go back in time just a bit, before Stitch arrived on the scene.

Welcome to the Harambe Village, home of the Kilimanjaro Safaris expeditions! This ride takes you through a 110 acres of the African Savanna in an open-air vehicle. Along the way you will see 34 species of exotic African animals including lions, elephants, giraffes, and zebras. Your tour guide will drive you through some rough terrain to get you back to the best viewing areas. Be prepared for an animal encounter unlike any you have experienced before!

The Maharajah Jungle Trek is a self guided walking tour that brings you face to face with beautiful tigers, huge bats, and many other endangered species of wildlife. This tour is not your typical walk through the zoo though. This is Disney, so you know there is a rich story behind the Maharajah Jungle Trek. According to Disney Imagineers, you are about to meander through the ancient ruins of a kingdom in Anandapur. While the rajahs ruling over this kingdom go further back, the story of the Maharajah Jungle Trek begins in 1544 with King Bhima Disampati.

This True Life Adventure has been running at the Magic Kingdom since opening day in 1971. Today, boats of explorers can have a good laugh as they sail through the Amazon, the African Congo, the Nile, and the Mekong River. This week we explore the corniest cruise on Earth! Come along for a ride aboard the Jungle Cruise.