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The
Unofficial Guide to Walt Disney World 2003
(UK
customers)
SATURDAY 19th May 2001
BUSCH GARDENS & BROKEN LEG
Up late today – I knew it couldn’t last – after being late back from the fireworks.
This turns out to be NOT a good start to the day as things get progressively worse!
(I must say at this point that we've done Busch Gardens at least once on every trip to Florida and we LOVE this place - except today that is! We will come back here on our next trip to Florida - just hope today isn't representative of what to expect in the future!)
Breakfast at Ponderosa only to find it’s also heaving with Brits! – so busy that we don’t get on our way until 10:00 – bad move! We have a good run over to Tampa and arrived at about 11:15.
We are really miffed about paying $6 to park on a bit of wasteland and having to walk for ages just to get to the tram pick-up stop and the tram takes forever to arrive and people are pushing and shoving! When you think what you pay to park at Disney/Universal and the facilities I really wonder where the money goes at Busch Gardens.
We read that it should be relatively quiet here today but I think that everyone else had read the same book!
In we go and head straight for Rhino Rally – great it’s not working! A good start we thought, but hey never mind, we've got another BG day scheduled later in the holiday!
We head for the train to get a trip round the park but the queues! – so long that they are coming out of the door (and the platform is packed solid about 5 deep!)
OK, let’s walk through to Timbuktu and at least get the girls on some kids rides and keep them happy! Minor fairground type rides but they don't mind!!At least there’s not much in the way of queues here.
I head off to Congo River Rapids to see how the land lies and report back – 90 min wait – I don’t think so! – Aaaaarrrrgggghhhh! But Kumba wasn't so bad, only 30 mins, which I know Shaun loves, so I go back to relieve him from the childminding and send him off to Kumba! What a wonderful wife!!!
Off he goes gleefully to find - NO Fastpass / Express ticketing arrangement, CMs non-existent and kids running and cutting everywhere! What a shambles! Never mind, after 35 minute wait he gets to do the ride - excellent!! Makes contact with me via 2 way radios (so pleased with these yet again!) and arrange a meeting place.
He came back to Tanganyika Tidal wave area (I was stowing all our changes of clothes in a locker there - we just knew we'd go on the wet rides loads of times later!) - but we were disappointed that the tidal wave ride also has a 90 minute wait. We decide to take kids off to the rides in the Congo area and find somewhere to stop for lunch.
We tried to get into Der Festhaus (which 2 years ago in Spring Break time was empty at 1pm - we had really enjoyed this!), was packed and they were taking seating reservations! It’s now 2:20 and the troops are getting hungry. Track off to Zagora Café in Morocco. I queue for about 20 mins to get served while Shaun bags a table. To be fair the food was good – kids have usual burgers and chicken while we ate the steak fajita sandwich and roast turkey sandwich.
After lunch we went to check out Gwazi – Oh my a 75 min wait – what a surprise! Forget it! I think we've been spoiled by express/fast pass and BG really need to install some of those machines here. Even if it's just on 3 or 4 of the biggest rides to start with.
The main “problem” appeared to be that once again there were so many school outings here, amongst them were: -
Girl Guide troop 101
Pinewood Hills school
YMCA
Brighouse and Rastrick Brass Band
Dagenham Girl Pipers
Assorted marching bands
And many, many more!This formed about at least 30 coach-loads in the car park.
We chatted to some local people who said that they couldn’t believe how busy it was that day – perhaps all those organised trips would go home early and not stay until closing time? – NOT!
Ok, tirade over but I just wanted to get it off my chest!
At this point we threw away the plan and decided to make it a kids day so we headed off to the Land of the Dragons after collecting all our (unnecessary) spare clothes from the locker. They LOVE this area as there are loads of rides/attractions for them to do. We find a spot in the shade and let them get on with it. There are also wet play areas which cool them down, a large sand pit, a massive 'moonwalk' area etc. They are WELL happy.
A short note here: As per the rest of the day, no CMs around - I think there ought to be someone at the entrance only letting family groups in!
Shaun goes off to ride Montu – Beer garden tempts him but he resists and goes straight to the ride. Guess what? – It’s broken – Aaaaaarrrrggggghhhhhhh! At least he's been on Kumba but the only ride I have been on so far is the tram from the car park!!!
So he comes back and sends me off to ride Gwazi, which was only being built when we were here 2 years ago.
Got to Gwazi only to find that the posted wait time was 45mins. Well, I’m not surprised because I’ve never seen a ride so badly run/organised/ supervised.(If properly organised it could have been around 20 minutes!) There’s no CMs in sight and it’s every man (or woman) for themselves! People just go up the ramp and push and shove themselves into some semblance of a line, plus lots of school kids just cutting in line in droves– Absolute Chaos! At the head of the line was the area where it split into the lines for each row of the coaster - here were at least 12 or so people in each line and no one to sort out single riders – MADNESS! Loads of teenagers were climbing through the bars and people in front were getting annoyed - awful.
They could learn a lot from Disney and Universal about queue strategy. Finally, I got about 5 from the front of my row when a woman got in the next car on her own, so I pushed my way to the front shouting “Single rider here, excuse me” and just got on the ride! In total I probably waited about 40 mins by this point and it’s now 6pm with only 1 ˝ hours until the park shuts!
Anyway, moan over, the ride was fast and noisy but good nonetheless.
I make my way back to Shaun and let him go off to try for Montu again.
Note from Shaun here, whilst Alison was away : -
DRAMA TIME IN LAND OF DRAGONS
We noticed that there was a distinct lack of supervision in this area with many teenagers running around screaming and shouting and subsequently knocking over small children.
Now, over on the climbing nets a big boy knocks over a small child. Small child gets foot stuck in the netting and falls over with a suspected sprained/twisted/broken ankle. Small child is seen by CM who phones another CM. Next we get a medically trained CM and others in attendance. Now it’s security who turn up to look at the situation. Minutes later the paramedics turn up , about 3 of them. What next? The Dagenham Girl Pipers?
All the time a lot of people are gathering round and offering advice like “that kid's injured!”.
To top it all a squirrel arrives to take a peek and goes away!
All the while I’m lying down resting on a wall and the Paramedics run over and give me a once over on the way in - even though it was meant to be for a 11 year old kid – Gosh I’m flattered! – Youthful good looks or what!
Drama over except I got talking to an ex-police detective from Washington DC about gun ownership! – where did that one come from?
Back to Alison!!
I send Shaun off to try Montu again.
Over he goes – at last a mere 15 min wait. He loves these rollercoaster rides!
He got back to the rest of the family and we rounded up the kids but by this time it was 7:20.(Park shuts at 7.30pm) We head back to the entrance via Timbuktu – and guess what? – Laura decided she wanted to do her first 360? roller coaster loop! – I’m soooo impressed! This was on The Scorpion for information. It's the only 360? ride all holiday that she was going to be tall enough for. I wasn't sure about her doing it - "it's only a lap belt" I screamed as Shaun dragged Laura off into the queue before she could change her mind!
We were very pleased and surprised so there’s hope for the girl yet! Next holiday, RnRC and Hulk!!!
We are thrown out of the park at 7:30 having done a grand total of 4 rides between us adults. I don't think I want to work out how many $$ per ride that comes to!!
We head back home via McDonalds. Big Mac 99 cents! – WOW!
We're all BUSCHED OUT!
Got back at about 10.15pm and I got some washing going whilst the rest went for a swim.
Crashed into bed at about 11:30
On the way back I spots a “mens” night club
me “Did you see that? There’s a club called The G – Spot”
Shaun “ Nope, I guess I must have missed it “
me “No change there then !”Tomorrow: Shopping and MGM
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