Aquatica, SeaWorld Orlando and Epcot 1/30/23

Yoshi · February 3, 2023

When I was at Busch Gardens last week and printing out my rewards at the kiosk, I saw there was an offer for $20 in Beach Bucks at Aquatica. I have been wanting to get there but never got around to it and $20 of free merchandise convinced me to finally go.

The entrance was themed well and there were a lot of kiosks to print rewards/tickets. The 2 stores I went to were mostly beach related items like water shoes, sandals, bathing suits and towels. There wasn't a lot of souvenir type merchandise other than magnets and keychains. I ended up getting 2 t-shirts from last year and a pen for just over $3 after the annual pass discount and Beach Bucks.

The first slides Whanau Way. These are 4 inner tube slides. The only have double rafts but allow single riders. They were a lot of fun and the drops at the end with 2 having a double down and 2 having a single drop reminded me of Patriot's Plunge at Dorney but with smaller drops.

I then went to Roa's Rapids. It was a river but not at all like a lazy river. There are no tubes and the current is really fast and it pushed you along the path of the river. I had never seen anything like it before and thought it was a lot of fun.

Taumata Racer is much better than Aqua Racer at Dorney or Toboggan Racers at Blizzard Beach that are some smaller drops with no turns.

Reef Plunge was another slide I was looking forward to trying. It's the first slides you see when you enter the park. It has an interesting queue with a suspension bridge in the middle. I liked how there were outlines of sea animals and blue rings that looked to light up from the sun. The part where you go into the aquarium tank was a little disappointing. You are moving so fast and combined with water hitting your face, you don't really have much of a chance to see anything. The slides were still fun. I was surprised to see they ended in a run out as I had thought they ended in a pool and looking at the original Dolphin Plunge, I saw they must have changed it since that did have a pool.

Because the park was so empty with nothing having a wait, some of the rides closed at 1 and others opened for the day then. I didn't realize they did that so I missed some slides I wanted to try like Tassie's Twisters (bowl slides).

I rode 9 slides and Roa's Rapids. Overall I liked Aquatica a lot more than Adventure Island and look forward to returning soon. I didn't take any photos as I kept my phone in the car to avoid the $20 locker charge.I ran into SeaWorld for around 90 minutes just to ride some coasters. Ice Breaker and Mako were only running 1 train but Ice Breaker was a walk on and Mako was a walk on to a 4 - 5 train wait (I rode 3 times).

Ice Breaker has become a once a visit ride for me with the backwards section and uncomfortable trains and restraints.

Mako was excellent as always. With it being the only hyper coaster in Florida, I'm glad it's a great coaster.

Journey To Atlantis showed a 30 minute wait in the app but was a 5 minute wait. I tried the front row for the first time because it was so hot out. That was a mistake since the smaller drop after the big drop before the second lift gets you soaked. The app then showed a 40 minute wait but it was still only 5 minutes. This time I took the last row and didn't get soaked.

Epcot was the third and final park of the day. Test Track had a 60 minute standby wait and the Lightning Lane line looked like it was at least 30 minutes. I rode 3 times and waited 5 - 10 minutes each time using single rider. I miss the original version (and World of Motion before that) but this is my favorite ride at Epcot.

I like that other than the standby line at Test Track and sometimes Soarin', nothing really has much of a line in Future World. I also rode Living With the Land, The Seas With Nemo, Journey Into Imagination and Spaceship Earth.

As much as I would have liked to have gone to the Magic Kingdom for 2 hours after Epcot closed, it was already a long day and decided to go home. It was a fun but tiring day.