I'll save the full play-by-play for my trip report, but I wanted to share my overall thoughts on Pandora after spending 5 hours there today. For some small perspective, I saw "Avatar" once in theaters and haven't seen it since, so it's definitely not among my favorite movies, but I didn't dislike it either. That said, it's very clear that Disney has built a land that doesn't rely on a love of the movie to appreciate.
From the moment you cross the bridge into Pandora, you truly feel like you're in another world. The normal Disney touches you see at all the other theme park areas just aren't there -- and that goes a long way toward supporting the suspension of disbelief necessary to convince yourself you're on another planet (the fact that castmembers will often drop phrases such as "returning to Earth" or "back on Earth" helps too). Visually, the entire land is just stunning. I walked around multiple times and kept spotting things I missed on my first, second or even third pass. I highly recommend looking down just as often as you look up, as there are plenty of little touches built into the groundwork that are easy to miss.
I rode Na'vi River Journey more times than I could count (I want to say it was 6, but it easily could've been 7 or 8), and it might be my new favorite slow boat ride. It's a lot shorter than "It's a Small World" or "Pirates of the Caribbean" -- it's probably the same length as "Frozen Ever After", but I think the only thing FEA has going for it over NRJ is the drop. The visuals on NRJ are mind-blowing. They had us going through the standby queue, though with a fair amount of it roped off for quicker movement through the line. It seemed long enough with all the doublebacks that it could accommodate a multi-hour standby wait if necessary. There are fans every 15-20 feet, so the line won't be too bad to wait in, even in the summer heat (almost all of it is in shade too).
As I mentioned upthread, I couldn't ride on FoP, but I did go through the queue, which is probably the most detailed at WDW. It was hilarious/amazing to see people who were cruising through the queue as fast as possible get to the room with the avatar body floating in the tube and just come to a dead stop and go "whoa!" I honestly hung around in that room for a little bit just to see that happen over and over again. It was incredibly cool.
Because I was there from 9 a.m. until 2 p.m., I was able to try both breakfast and lunch. For breakfast I had the Cinnamon Swirl French Toast topped with Blueberry Cream Cheese Dollop, Passion Fruit Anglaise and Pork Sausage. The french toast itself was just okay -- not great, but not terrible -- but the blueberry cream cheese really gave it a kick. The pork sausage was somehow among the best I've ever had at WDW. It was thick, spicy, and really made the meal worthwhile. I also got the Pandoran Sunrise beverage, which was solid, though not as good as the complimentary juice I had at the Tusker House breakfast the day before.
For lunch, I had the cheeseburger steamed pods, which I was honestly skeptical about. So many people had said they taste just like a McDonald's cheeseburger, but I didn't believe that was possible. I was wrong. It literally tastes EXACTLY like a McDonald's cheeseburger. I have no idea how they pulled that off, but honestly I was kind of impressed. I also had both desserts (for testing reasons, obviously) and I much preferred the Blueberry Cream Cheese Mousse over the Chocolate Cake, though YMMV on that. The dad eating at the table next to me took one bite of his Blueberry Cream Cheese Mousse and acted like he'd just bitten into the inside of his shoe. He then apologized to me for potentially ruining the dessert before I'd even had a chance to try mine. I laughed it off, took a bite, and said "I like it."
In between I had a Mo'ara Margarita from Pongu Pongu, and I liked it a lot, though the boba balls took some getting used to.
Last, but not least, I had to buy a banshee from Windtraders. If you're going to get one of these, or honestly anything at Windtraders, give yourself plenty of time. The place was packed today, and I was in there at 10 a.m. I can't imagine how crowded it'll be when the place is open to the public. While I'm on the topic of Windtraders, this might be something that only mattered to me but their cooler had Seagram's Ginger Ale available for purchase. I love ginger ale more than any other soda, but it's usually only at the stores at the hotels and even then it's not even cold, so this was a nice bonus.
Basically, Pandora gets an A+ from me and I hope everyone gets to enjoy it at some point (and I can't wait to check it out at night at some point).
Sorry for the length. . . . . .
