Tip Board

I recently picked up a copy of Birnbaum’s Official Guide to Walt Disney World. The 2004 edition. From time to time we are going to be visiting the Walt Disney World of yesterday, and any of the old guide books, official, unofficial, or otherwise, are perfect time capsules of those moments. Sprinkled within the pages of the Birnbaum 2004 are the Hot Tip! sections. Some of these can be wonderfully informative, if not a little gut-wrenching to read in the cases of now gone attractions, and some just make you want to stop and scratch your head. Let’s venture down memory lane and stop by a few of these tips.

¤If you’d like to get soaked on Splash Mountain, request a seat up front. - What really hung me up on this was that it implied you could stay dry by sitting further back in the log, when, in fact, there isn’t a dry seat in the house here.
¤Big changes are possible for Alien Encounter. As a result, the attraction may be closed for several months at a time. – That’s right kiddies, Stitch is coming to play. This would be a great notice, except that it comes right in the middle of two columns that are pumping the reader up with liens about the attraction like: ‘some of the most elaborate special effects ever employed’ and ‘something really is breathing down your neck.’
¤Avoid the mealtime rush hours by eating early or late: before 11am or after 2pm, and before 5pm or after 8pm. – In other words, don’t eat when you are going to be hungry.
¤Epcot is bigger than it seems, so allow yourself plenty of time to get from place to place. (It takes about half an hour to walk from Spaceship Earth to The American Adventure in World Showcase.) Keep this in mind if you have made priority seating arrangements at a restaurant or hope to secure a nice fireworks viewing location on the World Showcase promenade. – No truer words have been spoken, and this tip holds true to this very day.
¤Take a moment to study a guidemap as you enter Animal Kingdom. It will give you a sense of the park’s layout. The park times guide provides information about showtimes for Festival of the Lion King and other attractions. – As above, truer words were never spoken. The only addition I might have had was to study a guidemap the day, or week, before, because there is definitely going to be a test.
¤Taking a step away from the Hot Tip! section for a moment and slipping over to the Did You Know? segment: Many of the costumes worn by Animal Kingdom cast members are made of wood – actually, a natural fabric called lyocell, made from wood pulp. The pulp is harvested from trees grown specifically for this fabric. – Fascinating, you learn something new every day. This is definitely something I will be looking into more in the future.

And our last Hot Tip!

¤River Country, Walt Disney World’s original water park, was closed indefinitely when this book went to press. It is not expected to be open in 2004.