This is going to be long but who doesn't love reading long posts on this forum about what people do and do not like about WDW vs. DLR and vice versa? A quick mention that if you like more info on WDW, check out Disney Food Blog. She has lots of great videos on YouTube and we used a lot of her helpful info when we planned our trip last September. Here goes:
Epcot is a fantastic park and completely unique to WDW with the exception of Test Track and Soarin. Test Track is Radiator Springs Racers but without any of the charm. It's basically a fast car ride. It's fine but not as enjoyable as RSR. I would spend an entire day there as you can take your time in the different areas of World Showcase. All of the lands there are interesting to explore. It's also a massive park that only has a few ways to get from one end to the other. So depending on where you stay, you may have to enter near Future World or World Showcase. We stayed at the Swan Resort which had a boat that took us to the World Showcase entrance. This was handy as we wanted to spend more time in World Showcase. The Biergarten restaurant in Germany is a unique experience as is a lot of the food at Epcot. I love to take the monorail around the park over to Magic Kingdom and the hotels that direction. I think it's a superior, air conditioned experience than the DLR monorail. I also enjoyed taking a round trip ride on the Skyliner from World Showcase to the Riviera resort and back. We timed it around the time the fireworks went off and watched them from up there. Living with the Land is a vastly underrated experience. Think the Storyland Canal Boat ride but indoors and centered around interesting ways to grow food. I wish I could say Journey Into Imagination with Figment was good but it's not. Hopefully it will be getting a retheming announcement at
D23. It is a shell of the superior version with the Dreamfinder from the 1980s. Spaceship Earth is my wife's favorite ride at WDW. We've never ridden Mission Space partially because we've heard it's awful and also because they tore down Horizons which was one of the best attractions Disney ever created. There are touches of it when you exit from Space Mountain. Definitely duck into the Mexico Pavilion and ride the Three Caballeros slow ride.
I love Hollywood Studios for Tower of Terror, Rock N Roller Coaster, and the Mickey & Minnie Train Ride. Guardians is great. Tower of Terror is great but IMO a superior experience as it is more of a scary ride versus the DLR fun ride. It's also a longer ride as your vehicle goes through a floor to eventually make it up to the ride lift. Star Tours is more unique there at least for the queue as you make your way through the Ewok Village and get up close to the AT-AT. That's also my childhood nostalgia coming out as that fascinated me as a kid. Galaxy's Edge is identical and skippable. Toy Story Land is not as good as Cars Land but is still a fun time and really well done. Slinky Dog Dash is a great, easy roller coaster ride and we enjoyed the Alien Saucer ride a lot more than we thought we would. It's a better version of Mater's Backyard Jamboree which could use some shade. 50's Prime Time Cafe and Sci Fi Drive In are two great restaurant options with unique dining experiences. Nothing like them at DLR. We've never done Brown Derby but people rave about it.
I have a lot of childhood nostalgia for Magic Kingdom as we went there as a family when I was young and not DLR. I'm going to break this up into a few paragraphs. I will disagree with some on here and say there are a lot of rides at Magic Kingdom that are superior to their DLR counterparts. Haunted Mansion is longer and looks a lot cooler at night than the DLR version. No Hatbox Ghost but I love the upside down staircases and the exterior queue is better. Space Mountain has a better queue, is better maintained on the interior, and has a better load system that keeps you into the idea that you're at an actual spaceport taking off to ride across the galaxy. And the exit queue harkens back to a time when Disney actually looked happily at the future and what it could bring. 7 Dwarves is a fantastic coaster with a great interactive queue, assuming they brought it back. They still have the Carousel of Progress which has Walt's fingerprints all over it. Yes, it's dated but it's so much fun and a great way to cool off for a little bit. They also still have the Country Bear Jamboree. I will never forgive them for getting rid of Mr. Toad's Wild Ride for Winnie the Pooh but at least we still have that at DLR. We also love the White Room finale in It's a Small World. The ride is not as good as DLR but that portion is great.
I love Tomorrowland at night. I think Tron is going to be a fantastic addition that DLR desperately needs. DD14 and I did the Halloween Party back in September 2021 and had the best time just being in the park late at night with easy access to rides. Plus you can ride an actual People Mover throughout the land and get some fun views of the rides and a glimpse of Walt's vision for EPCOT before he passed away. Eisner didn't ruin this version.
Be Our Guest is a fantastic dining experience. I would definitely recommend a dinner there as you are transported right into the movie. The other great dining experience to do at least one time is Cinderella's Royal Table. Even if your kids or party aren't into princesses, it's still awesome to get to eat a meal inside one of the Disney castles. Now for the price, they also should let you check out the Dream Suite up at the top.
I also really like Liberty Square. It's not as charming as New Orleans Square but it does really fit the Haunted Mansion attraction and Hall of Presidents is very enjoyable. Memento Mori's is a great shop if you like the Haunted Mansion. If you're looking for a quick service lunch, eat at the Columbia Harbor House and sit on the 2nd floor. It has a nice view of the River. MK also has the only non-princess version of Rapunzel in the US parks though solely as a restroom area. Sunshine Tree Terrace has the yummy citrus swirl and Orange Bird mascot. Pecos Bill is a fun quick service restaurant that has touches of the old cartoon spread throughout. Gaston's has the giant cinnamon roll and LeFou's Brew which is great for when it's really hot. Big Thunder I believe is reversed from the DLR version. A little small thing I enjoy about MK is there a lot of little pathways like from the left side of the castle over to Liberty Square or the right side of the Castle over Cosmic Rays. There's Cinderella's Wishing Well over on that right side that's a nice photo op. Another small path goes behind Ye Olde Christmas Shoppe over to Crystal Palace. Everything just feels more epic when you arrive at MK. The boat ride/monorail/shuttle ride. The walk down Main Street to the enormous castle. How much more open it feels. It's not as intimate and that's okay. I like doing it every 5 or so years.
Animal Kingdom is fine. I'm not a huge fan of it compared to most people I know as there's just not as much to do there for us. Maybe that's because we have really great zoos here in DFW and we've gone to world class zoos like San Antonio and San Diego. I do love the theming of the different lands. It really does that extremely well. It just always feels about 10 degrees hotter to me than the other parks. Expedition Everest is great though. I could ride that over and over and not get bored. The queue has great theming and interesting things to look at, similar to the small office in Indiana Jones. Pandora is good, I'm just not into those movies and I'm tired of rides you need glasses to get on. The river ride is unique and very colorful. We usually only spend half a day at Animal Kingdom.
Things I do not like about WDW: the heat, how spread out everything is, how you have to add an hour to any travel between the parks and your hotel which you absolutely have to factor in when booking a dining reservation, the crush for the shuttles and boats after fireworks, did I mention the heat?
As far as Universal Orlando, the Harry Potter portion with Diagon Alley and the Hogwarts Express are incredible. It also will remind you of DLR as the parks are within walking distance separated by CityWalk. The rest of Universal I was not as impressed with. Too much reliance on 4D rides and roller coasters. It felt like a souped up Six Flags. The hotels are great though and are a superior value to WDW hotels. The UO Fastpass >>>>>>>
Genie+.
. Have a great trip!! It has been too long since I've been to WDW to give meaningful advice though, sadly. I'll be asking the same questions when I get to do a WDW trip!
