Disney Thursdays: The Parks

Here's my brief rundown on the 4 main parks:

Magic Kingdom:  

First Park built.   Opened October 1971.  Dubbed "The Most Magical Place on Earth," it is themed and inspired by California's Disneyland.  Walt Disney felt the Disneyland layout and potential or expansion was limited.  The park is divided into 8 lands (Main Street U.S.A., Frontierland, Andventureland, Frontierland, Liberty Square, Fantasyland, Tomorrowland, Mickey's Toontown Fair).  It It's the "can't miss" park.  If you had only one day to go and/or could only afford one park. 

Iconic Structure: Cinderella's Castle

Signature Attractions (The three Mountains)

Space:  Indoor Roller Coaster

Thunder: Railroad themed Roller Coaster

Splash:  Water Flume drop

Parades:  Currently running Celebrate a Dream Come True Parade during the day and Main Street Electrical Parade during evenings.

Fireworks:  Wishes... A fantastic nightly show in the background of the castle.

EPCOT

Experimental Prototype Community Of Tomorrow, Epcot was originally dreamed (by Walt Disney) to be a model community to 20,000 residents.  Walt's death put an end to this dream.  Now a theme park,  it's divided into two sections... Future World: Multiple pavilions that explore innovation and technology. World Showcase: Pavilions representing 11 countries. Personally, this may be the Prenkert's least favorite park.  But, with Disney, "least favorite" is still fantastic.

Iconic Structure:  Spaceship Earth.

Signature Attractions

Soarin': A "Flyover" of California

Mission: Space:  A Space Shuttle similuation trip to Mars (I call it the Vomit Comet... can't do it)

Test Track:  A driving simulator.

Fireworks:  Illuminations.  Set over the Lake of the World Showcase, a great show.

Disney Hollywood Studios (formerly MGM Studios)

This TV/Movie theme Park has the majority of its attractions themed around the television shows and movies.  When it opened, it was a full-operating television and movie production studio.  Eventually, Disney downsized their productions and moved everything to California. Probably the least kid-friendly park, it does have the most Katylynn-beloved show in Playhouse Disney Live featuring the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse.

Iconic Structure:  The Sorcerer's Hat (was formerly the Earful Tower)

Signature Attractions:

Toy Story Mania: An 3D interactive shooting game featuring the characters of the Toy Story Film.

Twilight Zone: Tower Of Terror:  A drop tower thrill ride.

Rock n' Roller Coaster: A full throttle indoor Roller Coaster featuring the music of Aerosmith.

Parade:  Block Party Bash

Evening Show:  Fantasmic is a stage and water show featuring many of the classic animated Disney characters.

Disney's Animal Kingdom:

Dubbed by many a zoo, it is much more than that.   It does contain nearly every animal you would hope to see in a zoo (exception for me would be polar bears and aquatic life [aquatic life is at EPCOT]).  It also has some great attractions and shows that have no live animals involved at all.  It's the largest of the four parks in acreage (500).  Voted by many as their least favorite park, it is probably the Prenkert's 2nd favorite.  It is not a park you need to spend an entire day at, but possesses several "can't miss" attractions for us.

Iconic Structure:  The Tree of Lie

Signature Attractions:

Kilimanjaro Safaris - An African Sahara themed safari that contains live animals from the African planes.

Expedition Everest - A forward and backward moving Roller Coaster.

Dinosaur - A time traveling thrill ride adventure.

Parade:  Jammin' Jungle Parade

No Fireworks or shows in order to not frighten animals.