Did you know that on June 11, 1929, Walt Disney filed a trademark application with the United States Patent Office for the image of Mickey Mouse!

Save the date and your appetite because Orlando Magical Dining Month returns September 2008 for another season of low cost dining!   Beginning September 1, some of Orlando’s finest restaurants will offer $29 or $19 prix fixe three-course dinner menus sure to delight your palate and your wallet. The third annual Orlando Magical Dining Month features a wide range of popular restaurants and cuisines, including:   Emeril’s Tchoup Chop – One of the world’s most celebrated chefs, Emeril Lagasse, blends flavors of Asian and Polynesian cuisine incorporated with his signature bold “kick” of spice in an exotic Pacific Seas environment.
Roy’s Hawaiian Fusion Restaurant – Roy’s has become well-known throughout the world for its Hawaiian Fusion cuisine, featuring the freshest local ingredients, European sauces and bold Asian spices with a focus on seafood.
Graze Restaurant – Familiar American classics take on global tastes at this hot new restaurant in trendy Thornton Park. The modern bistro features such favorites as sea scallops, elk rack, filet mignon, Maine lobster and braised buffalo short ribs.
The Oceanaire Seafood Room –This 1930s supper club-style restaurant features more than 25 types of seafood and shellfish flown in daily from around the world.  Other participating restaurants are BICE Ristorante, Le Coq au Vin, Fifi’s, The Beacon, Jeffery’s Restaurant, Vines Grille & Wine Bar, Bubba Gump Shrimp Co. and A Land Remembered.

Flitting around like Tinker Bell, virtual visitors can now explore  Walt Disney World Resort from the comfort of their own home!  It’s all part of a new online re-creation of Disney World available on Google Earth called “Walt Disney World Resort in 3D.”   From the Magic Kingdom to Epcot and much of the rest of Disney World, you can now fly around, taking a closer look a the attractions and scenery through close-up pictures, descriptions and even videos – all while never leaving your computer! The program offers an Internet-based, computer-animated tour of the four theme parks and 22 hotel resorts at Disney World, all organized geographically on Google Earth’s virtual world map platform.To create the virtual tour, Disney photographers shot 100,000 photographs which were turned into 1,500 three-dimensional models of everything from Cinderella Castle to park benches. Google also added another 216 Disney World pictures, renderings and descriptions to further enhance the Disney World virtual exploration.

The largest package of user-generated content and the most sophisticated 3-D content posted on Google Earth, this program allows you to casually wander through this virtual Disney World with a ground level view.  While touring, you can click on any of the 276 icons embedded in the map at Disney attractions and hotels, bringing up more pictures, more video and more information.  Or you can link back to Disney’s associated Web sites.

Summer is here and it’s never too early to beat the heat at SeaWorld’s exciting new water park, Aquatica!

Stated summer hours at Aquatica at 9 am til 10 pm for the general public.  However, effective immediately, guests arriving with pre-purchased tickets will be guaranteed entrance as early at 8 am - providing an extra hour of wet and wonderful fun.

Both kiosks and ticket windows will be open at 8 am to transfer vouchers for admission.

Aquatica, conveniently located adjacent to SeaWorld Orlando,  is Central Florida’s newest adventure water park…offering guests a variety of up close animal experiences, high speed thrills, sandy beaches and waters from the  serene to the extreme!  With 36 water slides, six rivers and lagoons, and more than 80,000 square feet of beach area, Aquatic provides myriad attractions that zoom, float and splash guests through amazing animal habitats and undersea adventures!

Winding rivers throughout Aquatica offer two different journeys.  One river carries guests through gentle waterfalls, past exotic birds and into an undersea grotto with thousands of colorful fish.  The other river offers more intense thrills, jetting riders through rolling rapids, rushing geysers and racing waters!