IS there anywhere more American than Orlando? You’d have a hard time finding a destination that presents a more distilled version of our brassy obsession for branding, our panache for stage-managing a spectacle, and our passion for going big.
Here, in the most popular vacation destination on earth, you’ll find seven of the world’s most visited theme parks atwitter with innovation and high-quality thrills. Disney commandeered a swath of land twice the size of Manhattan for its tree-filled, forget-the-world resort, which collects four full-day theme parks, two water slide parks, and a bevy of kid-crammed mega-hotels dressed with transporting themes.
It’s understandable that many visitors to Central Florida never leave the Walt Disney World Resort, although that’s not easily forgiven, because ten miles up the road, Universal runs two theme parks that trump Disney for technological twists, but not for traffic. Just across I-5 at SeaWorld, daily shows by Shamu the killer whale titillate you with the dangerous possibility that the star will suddenly remember its place on the food chain and gulp down a trainer.
If you can tear yourself away from the rides (and the interminable lines) long enough, there’s a secondary universe of fresh water springs and fishing lakes, granola student culture, gater-wrasslin’ nature parks, and more golf courses than you can shake a putter at.
Oh, and yeah — we sent people to the moon a few times from the region, too, on the Atlantic Ocean at Kennedy Space Center. Only in Orlando would that spectacular accomplishment get last billing, and only in America would that seem appropriate. If Disney and company ever went belly-up, the National Park Service would have to put a rope around the whole town and staff it with rangers. It means that much to every kid born in the last half-century.
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