Thursday morning we got up early and began the 2+ hour drive to Disney World. We pulled into the Epcot Center handicapped parking lot and made the short walk into the park. Mom and Amanda waited on the bench just inside while I fetched a wheelchair.

After a couple of pictures in front of the famed Epcot Ball, Amanda raced off to get fastpasses for the popular and always busy ride, Soarin', while Mom and I entered the Nemo ride. We waited inside, off to the side to allow others in line to pass us, until Amanda caught up. On this first ride, I sat with mom in one "clamobile" with Amanda in the one right after us.

The Seas with Nemo & Friends

The underwater adventure begins when guests approach the pavilion and see a striking new façade that features colorful appliqués of fish and sea creatures. Three Audio-Animatronics seagulls are perched on the rocks outside the pavilion, occasionally squawking “Mine, Mine, Mine,” just like in the film. Inside the pavilion guests enter a queue area styled to look like a beach -- complete with sand dunes, sea oats and the sound of cawing gulls and crashing waves. As guests dive deeper into the experience, they find themselves under the sea, looking up at the water's surface and the hull of a boat.

The immersion is complete as guests board "clamobiles" for an undersea voyage in a colorful world of coral and amazing animation. The vivid coral in the first three of nine attraction scenes was created by Walt Disney Imagineers in three dimensions to meticulously recreate the beautiful undersea world that was designed by Pixar for the "Finding Nemo" animated film. Guests first meet Mr. Ray and his class on a field trip and soon learn that Nemo has wandered off. The journey in search of Nemo includes familiar characters such as Dory, Marlin, Bruce, Squirt and Crush. These deep-sea friends inhabit a variety of vibrant vignettes, including a garden of jellyfish, a bubble-filled underwater playground, the menacing domain of Bruce the shark and the totally cool East Australian current where Crush and Squirt -- father and son surfing-turtle dudes -- chill out. And guests should keep their eye on the threatening and agile anglerfish that chases Marlin.

In the musical finale of the attraction, Nemo is happily reunited with his friends to the tune of a new song, "Big Blue World." Amazingly, the animated characters appear to be swimming among the real sea life in the actual aquarium containing more than 65 species of marine life.

After the Nemo ride we spent a few minutes observing the aquarium and got a nice view of some dolphins and a shark. We then walked over to the Journey Into Imagination ride, where all three of us, mom in the middle, squeezed into one seat for the ride.

Journey Into Imagination with Figment

Journey Into Imagination with Figment invites guests to an open house at the Imagination Institute led by Dr. Nigel Channing, who plans to show how the five senses can influence a person’s imagination.

Future World guests traveling through the colorful, energetic attraction stop for Dr. Channing’s demonstrations in laboratories to discover how the human senses are being studied to help “capture and control” the imagination. The stops are interrupted, however, by the free-thinking Figment, a mischievous dragon who tries to show the ever-practical Dr. Channing and his guests that the imagination works best, not when it’s controlled, but rather, when it’s set free.

Guests will encounter stimulating experiences:
· In the sight laboratory, Figment has fun with a vision chart to prove that there is more to the imagination than meets the eye!
· Sniff, sniff – What’s that aroma in the smell laboratory?
· In the sound laboratory, guests enjoy a symphony of delightful melodies as Figment shows how thoughts can appear by way of the ear.

The fun continues when guests are

invited into Figment’s house, which is

upside-down to show how imagination can really come “home” when you look at things from a new perspective. By the end, his impish antics convince Dr. Channing how much fun a free imagination can be.

After exiting the ride, we walked through the Imagination "library" where Mom conducted some music just by waving her arms around.
We then went right next door and watched the 3-D show, Honey I Shrunk the Audience.

Honey I Shrunk the Audience

Based on two enormously popular Walt Disney Pictures -- "Honey, I Shrunk The Kids" and "Honey, I Blew Up The Kid" -- the performance "on stage" at the Imagination Institute Auditorium features the original Szalinski film family -- the invention-happy professor, his trusting wife, Diane, their sons, Nick and Adam, and their frisky dog, Quark.
They are discovered "on stage" at the "Imagination Institute" where Professor Szalinski is to receive an "Inventor of the Year" award and demonstrate his Dimensional Duplicator and Incredible Shrinking Machine.
Guests don special 3-D "safety goggles" to protect them just in case the demonstrations go awry -- which, of course, they are bound to do, given Professor Szalinski's past record.
The 570-person audience is "reduced" to the size of a bread box, surprised by a herd of scurrying white-mice clones, caught in a shower of breaking glass, jarred by giant tennis shoes and shaken by the 90-decibel "WOOF" of a gargantuan dog -- among many surprises.


After exiting the theatre, we stopped for a few minutes and Mom, like the rest of us before her, became captivated by the shooting water spouts.

We then walked back to the great Ball and entered the Spaceship Earth ride. I sat with mom in front with Amanda in the back. Toward the beginning of the ride, as our photo was taken, Amanda stuck her head up between Mom and me and ended up usurping my rightful place in the photo and the story they make up for you at the end of the ride. It gave us some good laughs.

Spaceship Earth

Spaceship Earth Attraction is a 16-minute omnimover ride through time and space for Guests of all ages that features approximately 20 elaborately detailed, Audio-Animatronic show scenes that depict the stirring story of human connection and collaboration over 40,000 years—from the dawn of recorded time to the 21st century's internet age.

This classic attraction takes you from living in the past to picturing yourself in the future...literally. And the excitement doesn't stop when your Time Machine does, because that's when you get to experience Project Tomorrow–a brand-new interactive playground area where you can build, play, create, compete and explore.Bear witness to prehistoric man's first words, behold the hieroglyphics of the ancient Egyptians, follow the advanced system of roads amidst Rome, and journey through the Industrial Revolution and the Age of Information.


Over a dramatic 63-piece orchestral and 24-vocal musical score composed by Emmy-award winner composer Bruce Broughton, famed actress Dame Judi Dench relays the story of how each generation of mankind has paved the way for the next.

Science fiction author—and Disney fan—Ray Bradbury helped design the geodesic sphere and pen the original story of the attraction.Spaceship Earth Attraction omnimover vehicles—dubbed time machines—are equipped with interactive touch screens that ask you how you would like to live, work and play in the world of tomorrow. Utilizing image capture and face recognition technology, you can then enjoy a glimpse of your potential future self at the end of the attraction.After the attraction, be sure to spend time at Project Tomorrow: Inventing the Wonders of the Future, an interactive play area for Guests of all ages filled with challenging games and informative displays that showcase the latest technologies in medicine, transportation and energy management.