Everland: Korea's Disneyland

If there is a surefire way to get any of my students to pay attention, it is to mention Everland.  They might not remember what they had for dinner or what their favorite TV show is, but most kids can talk for a while about Everland.  So, if kindergarten age kids talk about it, then it is obviously a place that Bessie and I had to see.


First off, lets talk about the pronunciation of Everland.  For some reason, Korea has a terrible habit of naming things that most local citizens cannot pronounce.  First, there's a "v" sound in it, which Koreans don't have, so that turns into a "b".  Second, Korean words never end in a consonant sound, so there us an "uh" sound added to the end of it.  In true Korean form, Everland turns into "Ebuh-land-uh".  But, I digress.

Everland, like most themeparks, is divided into different lands.  First, there is the Global Fair, which is just the entry/exit point to the part, but Global Fair sounds a lot niftier.  True to the name, though, the buildings are a hodge-podge of your stereotypical buildings from around the world.

Next, there is Zoo-Topia, which is pretty much a large zoo.  I had a lot of fun looking at the monkeys because who doesn't like to look at monkeys?



The best part about Zoo-Topia is a "ride" called Safari World that is a little more like Jurrasic Park than it needs to be.  You basically board a bus that looks like a cross between something used for prison inmates transport and a zoo animal.  Then you are driven into an area where there are bears and lions roaming around.  Since the drivers throw food at the animals, there's no shortage of bears and lions approaching the bus.  With buses going in and out every 2 minutes or so, it's only a matter of time before the lion decides that the people inside the bus would be much tastier than the little pieces of food thrown at them.  Then again, we did see the bus driver high five a bear, so maybe they are pretty tame.


The next area is called Magic Land.  I think they just ran out of cool themes, so they called it Magic Land.  We didn't spend a lot of time here, but the old school Fun House, was pretty fun.


There is also the American Adventure section, which would have been cool, but most of the rides were having "maintenence".


Lastly, there is European Adventure.  In addition to having some halfway decent beer, European Adventure hosts the steepest wooden roller coaster in the world, called the T Express.


The T Express lives upto the hype and is quite the ride.  In addition to being the steepest in the world, it also has the 7th hightst drop in the world, is Asia's longest ride (3 minutes long), and is Asia's fastest roller coaster.  Seeing as I used to work at an amusement park, most roller coasters don't scare me, but the first drop on this one makes you think twice about why you are doing this.


Apparently most riders are also concerned about their safety on the ride, which is why they make you watch a mandatory safety video that is probably longer than the ones you are forced to watch when you ride an airplane.