At 43 square miles, Walt Disney World comprises the largest theme park complex in the world. Currently there are four major theme parks, three water parks, a sports complex, a nightclub area and a shopping district as well as over 20,000 hotel rooms on the property.

This area of RideZone will be broken into sections dealing with each park. At times, it will be recommended to go to other sites for more complete information as there are many excellent Disney sites on the Web.

Walt Disney World

http://disney.go.com/DisneyWorld

Even though Walt Disney had great success with his Disneyland^Æ Park in California, he was displeased with all the development around the park which didn't fit in. When planning his second park, he decided to buy enough land to avoid the problem. An area near Orlando Florida was chosen.

Walt died before the park was completed and his brother too over the project renaming the park Walt Disney World from just Disney World to show it was his brothers project.

In 1971, the Magic Kingdom opened and has been a success ever since. Over the years, improvements were made but in 1982, a second park was added called EPCOT^Æ. Not quite as Walt intended but it still had the flavor of the idea. Again there were changes and updates until the third park arrived in 1989 - the Disney-MGM Studios. The Animal Kingdom was added in 1998 as the fourth major park. Along the way, there were three waterparks added as well.