TALLEST , FASTEST , CUCUMBERIEST WDW ’ S RECORD-BREAKERS
BY TIMOTHY MOORE
Driving from Dayton , Ohio , to Orlando , Florida , should take about 14 hours — plus an hour for gas , bathroom breaks , and the occasional McChicken , and maybe another hour to account for rush hour and the never-ending construction on I-75 . So when Dad got the family , packed into our faithful Ford Windstar , to WDW in just 13 hours back in 2000 , I felt confident we had just broken some crazy record .
Not to be outdone , Grandma and Grandpa , who were camping at Fort Wilderness and had invited us to stay with them for a week , had their eyes set on their own record . Those two Disney fanatics were going on month four of staying on Disney Property ( and they ultimately closed out the year at five months camping at Disney ).
Dad , Grandma , and Grandpa went to the right place for breaking records . While WDW is certainly not known for its abundance of extreme thrill rides that claim to be the tallest or fastest , the most magical place on earth is home to an abundance of superlatives worth noting .
THE MOST POPULAR PLACE ON EARTH The most notable — and unsurprising — record that WDW holds belongs specifically to Magic Kingdom . With 20,859,000 visitors in 2018 , Magic Kingdom earned a Guinness World Record as the most-visited theme park . In 2019 , Magic Kingdom broke its own record with 20,963,000 guests .
Disney probably isn ’ t too concerned about being overtaken any time soon ; in 2019 , spots two through four were also hosted by the mouse : Disneyland Park in California , Tokyo Disneyland , and Tokyo DisneySea .
THE ROYAL TREATMENT Let ’ s stay in Magic Kingdom another moment to marvel at Cinderella Castle , which holds the distinction of the tallest castle in a theme park at 189 feet , though Imagineers used forced perspective to make it look even taller . Imagineers originally intended for there to be 29 turrets in total , but when they realized numbers 13 and 17 wouldn ’ t be visible no matter where in the park you stood , they scrapped them . Instead , the castle boasts 27 turrets , though they ’ re still charmingly numbered 1-29 .
NOW I ’ M FREE , FREE FALLIN ’ For a time , Summit Plummet , the anything-but-chill free-fall slide at Blizzard Beach , held the title of tallest and fastest free-fall slide in the world , at 120 feet and 60 mph . While it has since been dethroned , this was an unusual honor for Disney to hold , as the theme park typically focuses on detailed , imaginative experiences over extreme thrills .
DON ’ T CASH THAT UNTIL MONDAY Imagineers wrote quite a hefty check to build Expedition Everest . Though it ’ s been 15 years since this Himalayan mountain sprung from the sandy soils of Orlando , Expedition Everest held onto the title of world ’ s most expensive roller
ABOVE : A rope-drop crowd helping to get those numbers up for Magic Kingdom ' s Guiness World Record . NEXT PAGE : Forced perspective makes Cinderella Castle look taller than its 189-foot size . PHOTOS BY JUDD HELMS