Spaceship Earth is the first thing you see on entering Epcot. At 180 feet, it is the highest structure and is central to Future World. Take a look at it in these photos and see if you agree it is a beautiful geosphere.

It is also a wonderful ride, a journey through the history of communication from Stone Agers learning to speak with each other, to developments of alphabets, paper, writing, printing, to electronic communication of today and a concrete and entertaining peek at the future (love those flatscreen monitors!). This attraction was created with the collaboration, of Ray Bradbury, one of my favorite Science Fiction authors, the Smithsonian Institute, many specialists, including consultants from a number of notable universities, and is sponsored by AT&T.

TIP: you may be tempted to make this your first ride. A lot of people like to ride this first, so watch the lines, they can be their worst in the morning and often improve late in the day. Walk past it to the right a couple hundred feet and you will run into the Tip Board, this is very accurate in informing how long lines are at Future World.

The Disney tv show, Inside Out, recently stated Spaceship Earth weighs 16 million pounds. When I was there in 1986 it was said to weigh one million pounds. My notes from both visits quote the same dimensions, 954 panels, 2.23 million cubice feet of space. Except for one other discrepency: Early notes have 164 feet in diameter and ten years later, we have 165 feet in diameter. That wouldn't seem to increase weight 16 times. Guess someone's calculations have changed.