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Walt Disney World Railroad Review

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Walt Disney World Railroad

Fodor's Review:

Duration: 21 min.

Crowds: Can be substantial beginning in late morning through late afternoon.

Strategy: Board with small children for an early start in Toontown, provided you have your own fold-up strollers to carry along on the train. If you've rented one of Disney's bulkier strollers, which cannot be loaded on the train, you may want to stick with a round-trip so you can collect your stroller outside the railroad station after you get off. Or hop aboard in midafternoon if you don't see a line.

Audience: All ages.

Rating:

If you click through the turnstile just before 9 AM with young children in tow, wait at the entrance before crossing beneath the train station. In a few moments you'll see the day's first steam-driven train arrive laden with the park's most popular residents: Mickey Mouse, Donald Duck, Goofy, Pluto, and characters from every corner of the World. Once they disembark and you've collected the stars' autographs and photos, step right up to the elevated platform above the Magic Kingdom's entrance for a ride into living history.

Walt Disney was a railroad buff of the highest order – he constructed a one-eighth-scale train in his backyard and named it Lilly Belle, after his wife, Lillian. Another Lilly Belle rides the rails here, as do Walter E. Disney,Roy O. Disney, and Roger Broggie (named for a Disney Imagineer and fellow railroad aficionado). All the locomotives date from 1928, coincidentally the same year Mickey Mouse was created. Disney scouts tracked down these vintage carriers in Mexico, where they were used to haul sugarcane in the Yucatán, brought them back, and completely overhauled them. They're splendid, with striped awnings, brightly painted benches, authoritative "choo-choo" sounds, and hissing plumes of steam.

Their 1½-mi track runs along the perimeter of the Magic Kingdom, with much of the trip through the woods. Stops are in Frontierland and Mickey's Toontown Fair. The ride is a good introduction to the layout of the park and a quick trip with small children to Toontown in the morning; it's also great as relief for tired feet later in the day. The four trains run at five- to seven-minute intervals.

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