Norway in World Showcase, Epcot park in Walt Disney World

This area is built as a square representing a Norwegian town or village. The fortress-like restaurant is modeled and named after the Akershus fortress in Oslo, guarding the sea approach to the city.

The wooden church is a replica of the traditional Stave Church in Gol in Western Norway, dating back to 1212; the original is one of very few surviving ancient wooden churches left in the world.



A mock-up of a Viking longboat sits outside and serves as a playground for kids.

The shops are decorated with large wooden trolls and sell assorted Norwegian goods, including clothing, candy, and statuettes of Norse gods and trolls. The courtyard of the pavilion contains the entrance to Maelstrom, a boat ride into Norway's past and present.

Maelstrom ride is a Viking boat with Vikings, cursing trolls and oil platforms. The ships are modeled after those sailed by Eric The Red, who colonized Greenland and was central to the Vikings' discovery of North America, 5 centuries before Christopher Columbus.

Kringla Bakeri Og Kafe is a bakery, featuring assorted Norwegian pastries, such as cream horns and open-faced salmon sandwiches.

The Norway pavilion is the most recent nation to be added to World Showcase. It opened in 1988.

The original idea was to create a Nordic Pavilion that would combine elements from various countries into one exhibit. Three countries were consulted, but it finally ended up with investors from Norway raising the US$30 million required to create an exclusive national pavilion. Disney contributed the other one-third of the construction cost. In 1992, the investors sold their stake to Disney.



References:

http://wikitravel.org/en/Epcot

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Norway_(Epcot)

http://disneyworld.disney.go.com/parks/epcot/attractions/norway-pavilion/

http://disneyworld.disney.go.com/parks/epcot/attractions/maelstrom/

http://disneyworld.disney.go.com/dining/akershus/

A Guide To Drinking Around The World at Disney's Epcot http://buff.ly/1RlE4ZH