Disney World With an Adult Rating : The park offers boating and golf and Pleasure Island, an enclave of bars, rock music and no kids.

Is this what Uncle Walt had in mind?

Walt Disney World has 43 bars now and a zone that’s rated “R”: No one under 18 can be admitted to Pleasure Island without an adult. And for good reason. You can’t walk two paces without stepping on a loving couple. They’re everywhere, like June bugs.

“The majority of visitors to Walt Disney World today are adults,” according to Disney World publicity manager John Dreyer. For kids, it truly is a small world after all. They have only the Magic Kingdom theme park; we who have already experienced zip-a-dee-doo-dah have the rest of the 29,000-acre complex. To give you an idea of how big this is, consider that the new, enlarged Disneyland in Anaheim will take up only 550 acres.

When Walt Disney World opened on this brush- and pine-dotted flood plain 20 miles southwest of Orlando on Oct. 1, 1971, rooms in its first hotels--the Contemporary Resort and the Polynesian Resort--were cavernous, built to hold a family of five. Later, the Village Resort was built, easily accommodating six, and in some villas, eight. Now, at the new Caribbean Beach Resort and the newer Port Orleans and Dixie Landings, the rooms, albeit with two double beds, will be truly comfortable only for two.

The park began to change in the late 1980s when Europeans started to pour into Walt Disney World, enjoying the sun and the cheap dollar. At the flashy Chefs de France in Epcot Center, Disney World’s high-culture international theme park, they could order a meal designed by chefs Paul Bocuse, Roger Verge and Gaston LeNotre for a third of what the meal would cost them at home. The British could order steak-and-kidney pie, truly awful at home, and find it delightful when made with American ingredients at the Rose & Crown Pub, also in Epcot.

In June, 1989, Walt Disney World opened up a new adult attraction: Pleasure Island. Today this is a fantasyland of gold bustiers and black leather, an adventureland of dirty dancing, a tomorrowland of video disco.

At the far end of a footbridge over Buena Vista Lagoon, close to Disney Village Hotel Plaza, Pleasure Island holds six nightclubs, four restaurants, 11 shops and 10 movie theaters. For adult thrills, a club called CAGE! throbs with heavy metal sounds in an underground atmosphere of girders, twisted steel beams, catwalks and blackness. Nearby, the piped-in fog is thick at Mannequins Dance Palace, a high-tech disco with a revolving dance floor and long, tall drink glasses that appear to glow in the dark.

Less threatening, for gentle folk, are the Neon Armadillo Music Saloon, for country music, and the XZFR Rock & Roll Beach Club, for

oldies. There’s a comedy club, too, and a mystic, magical emporium called the Adventurers Club, where masks and shrunken heads talk to you and dancing is unthinkable. Your bar stool sinks after you sit on it. This spot is a good bet for the plastic-pocket-protector crowd.

A live rock band plays outdoors on a plaza in the center of the island from 7 p.m. to 2 a.m. The band counts down to midnight to celebrate New Year’s Eve with fireworks every night of the year. The real shock, considering that this is Walt Disney World, is that beer is sold on the streets.

Even the shops on Pleasure Island cater less to the lady than to the tramp. Jessica’s, located on the fashion spectrum between Frederick’s of Hollywood and Victoria’s Secret, specializes in see-through red lingerie.

At the entrance to Pleasure Island is Walt Disney World’s best buy: the Portobello Yacht Club, the only restaurant for miles around that serves great food at bargain prices.

At lunch you sit outdoors at bistro tables overlooking the lake, and as you sip your sangria, your waitress suggests the fettuccine with smoked Norwegian salmon. It comes with a salad, a pitcher of olive oil, a loaf of sourdough bread and a bowl of butter and a whole roasted head of garlic, all for $8.95. My wife and I, not usually fans of garlic bread, polished off two loaves. Oh, and another pitcher of sangria.

Then we went boating. All it takes is a driver’s license and $11 for half an hour to rent a motorboat at Walt Disney World. They’re available at Walt Disney Village right next to Pleasure Island as well as the Grand Floridian Resort Hotel, the Contemporary Resort Hotel and the Polynesian Resort Hotel. The boats are Water Sprites,

small and buzzy. You sit right at the waterline and you feel like you’re flying. This is a real kick. You couldn’t pry me out of my Water Sprite with a crowbar.

Walt Disney World will be celebrating its 20th anniversary until Oct. 21, and park managers have added 20 attractions to bring back old customers and lure new ones. Unlike other resorts in these recessionary times, Disney World has not cut prices at its hotels. Instead, they simply built some new ones: the Caribbean Beach Resort, Dixie Landings and Port Orleans, all starting at $85 per room, much cheaper than the older hotels.

Among the new attractions are two additional golf courses, for a total of five courses and 99 holes. Walt Disney World now bills itself as the “Magic Linkdom.”

New this year at Disney-MGM Studios, the third and newest theme park at Disney World, is Jim Henson’s MuppetVision 3D show. No dumb Sesame Street stuff here. This is very funny. People old enough to know better keep ducking as mysterious flying objects appear to be coming straight at them.

One of Disney’s great theme restaurants, the 50s Prime Time Cafe, is around the corner from the Muppet show. With ‘50s restaurants popping up all around the country, Disney had to go them one better, and it did. This is no place for kids, unless they’re nostalgic for a time they never knew. At the 50s Prime Time Cafe, youth is positively a drawback.

You fill out your own reservation card here, with first and last name. When your table is ready, a hostess will sing out, “Oh, Barry, time for dinner!,” just as if you were playing down the street. Once you’re seated, a waiter is likely to plop himself down at your table uninvited. But not for long. A waitress will grab him by the scruff of the neck and say, “Billy, don’t you go disappearing on me! Now you go get yourself a haircut this minute!”

Every group is seated at a private booth with an old black-and-white TV showing episodes of “Father Knows Best,” “The Donna Reed Show,” “My Little Margie,” “Our Miss Brooks,” “Dennis the Menace,” “Sergeant Bilko,” “The Dick Van Dyke Show,” “Topper” and “I Married Joan,” all dealing with eating.

A hostess passes by and calls out, “Elbows off the table!”

I ordered the meat loaf, not a brilliant idea, although it did come in a cute three-compartment plastic dish like an old-time TV dinner. My wife’s choice of Aunt Selma’s Chicken Salad was a much better one. It had a dried fruit taste that neither of us could immediately identify, although my wife was a home ec major. Suddenly we had it. Jujubes! A short stroll away is “The Great Movie Ride,” where you glide in an open car through living, riveting and sometimes terrifying sets for “Casablanca,” “The Wizard of Oz,” “Alien,” “Public Enemy,” “Singing in the Rain,” “Mary Poppins” and “Raiders of the Lost Ark.” The surprise appearance of the slimy monster from “Alien” is always good for a few screams.

Time for a drink. It’s always time for a drink at Walt Disney World. About half its bars are in the hotels; the others are scattered throughout the park, excepting, of course, the Magic Kingdom. And closing time in Florida is 4 a.m. The Catwalk Bar in Disney-MGM Studios overlooks the Soundstage Restaurant. Props hang from the ceiling. A glass of Beaulieu Vineyards Chardonnay will set you back $7.50 here, but a Coors is a more reasonable $3.25. Peel-your-own shrimp runs $7.95, and pumpernickel snacks covered with Parmesan cheese cost $2.25.

Everybody’s favorite drinking spot is the Rose & Crown Pub at Epcot Center, with Guinness stout and Harp lager on tap and Stilton cheese, Scotch eggs and miniature chicken-and-leek pies.

After the theme parks close, Pleasure Island is a favorite spot for alcohol, but the theme hotels are a close second.

The hotels at Walt Disney World, all 20 of them, are mini-theme parks of their own, and not necessarily subdued. After a glance at the coral-and-turquoise Swan and Dolphin hotels--the Dolphin even has an exterior waterfall--you’ll wonder just who is running the show here, Mickey or Bugsy.

You can choose from an Old Florida setting at the Grand Floridian, a South Pacific setting at the Polynesian, the New England seashore at the Yacht Club, the French Quarter at Port Orleans or Key West at the Vacation Club.

You can choose your epoch, too: the 1870s at the Beach Club, the 1850s at Dixie Landings, the future at the Contemporary.

With theme hotels, you get theme bars. But don’t expect them to match up. Narcoossee’s at the Grand Floridian specializes in yards of ale. The Rip Tide Lounge at the 1870s-theme Beach Club serves wine coolers and California wines.

My own favorite place to stay is Walt Disney’s Village Resort. There’s no theme here at all. You know you’re in Walt Disney World only because you get Mickey Mouse toilet paper. The resort consists of free-standing and clustered villas scattered at a distance along the shores of Buena Vista Lagoon. Most are designed with floor-to-ceiling glass, facing a dense growth of trees. You feel like you’re deep in the woods. Out of sight but close by are six swimming pools, streams, running trails and eight miles of bike paths.

Most desirable are the “treehouses,” at $305-$325 a night. These are eight-sided houses on stilts. The second story is ringed by an outdoor deck where you eat, drink or nap in the treetops. It’s a lazy life. The management will even stock your refrigerator for you.

If you can tear yourself away, Chef Mickey’s Village Restaurant is nearby. The food is good, and the fun quotient is high. Grown men wander through the bar area wearing mouse ears. There’s nothing on TV but cartoons. Drinks include Down and Out in Beverly Hills (vodka, rum, gin, tequila, triple sec, Coke and sweet-and-sour syrup)and Turner’s Hooch (peach schnapps, banana liqueur, white creme de cacao and apricot brandy with orange, cranberry and pineapple juices), both $4.75.

Menu items range from beef stew and barbecued chicken to salmon lasagna, at $11.25 one of the more expensive dishes. The thick menu includes recipes for every item, and like nearly everything at Walt Disney World, it’s for sale.

Reasonable prices are the exception at Walt Disney World restaurants. Victoria & Albert’s at the Grand Floridian, for example, charges $75 per person for the fixed-price six-course dinners. Romance is included in the price: roses and Godiva chocolates for every couple.

A night in one of the Grand Floridian’s rooms will set lovers back a minimum of $220 a night and a maximum of $1,400 for a three-bedroom suite with parlor and wet bar. While this is the most expensive hotel on the grounds, prices at most are steep. Rooms at the Contemporary Resort start at $180, for example.

One way to beat the system is through the Magic Kingdom Club. Membership is free to those who qualify. Employees of federal, state and local governments as well as most medium- and large-sized corporations are eligible. Discounts on room rates officially range from 10% to 30%, but with upgrades your discount can be much greater.

My wife and I rented a one-bedroom vacation villa with study late last January at the Village Resort. The listed off-season price was $250 a night. It cost us $122.50 with a Magic Kingdom Club discount plus a free upgrade from a less expensive suite during a slow week. For our $122.50 we got a fully equipped kitchen, dinette, living room, a study, a master bedroom with a king-sized bed, a full bathroom and a separate lavatory. We had walls of glass and a cathedral ceiling, a forest view and tons of privacy. Yet we were less than a minute from a bike trail, a jogging path, a swimming pool, Buena Vista Lagoon and a stop for the free bus to take us anywhere in Walt Disney World, including Pleasure Island.

Guests at Walt Disney World hotels don’t have to drive anywhere. Free buses take them to the two water-theme attractions--Typhoon Lagoon and River Country--as well as Discovery Island, a wildlife sanctuary great for hiking and picnicking, and Ft. Wilderness, a trailer camp with entertainment and restaurants. And of course, more places to drink--and shop.

A few words about shopping: If you need it, don’t buy it at Walt Disney World. One day I needed a jacket. The cheapest one I could find, a silver-satin number with an MGM logo on the back, $19.95 at home without the logo, was $110.

Still, there is one item that cannot be had at any price: gum. Walt banned it. Dirtied the park.

GUIDEBOOK

Thoroughly Modern Mickey

Getting there: United and Delta fly nonstop to Orlando for about $350 round trip, with advance-purchase and Saturday night-stay requirements.

When to go: Lines are shorter and hotel prices are lower during what the Disney people call the Value Season: April 26-June 6 and Aug. 16-Dec. 19.

Admission: One-day, one-park ticket, $34.85; four-day passport to all three big theme parks, $122.50; five-day “super pass,” $160.55. Each of the smaller parks charges a separate admission to those without a super pass.

Packages: Delta is Disney World’s official airline. Delta Dream Vacations start at $799 for four nights, including hotel, air fare, rental car, all admissions and a breakfast with Mickey Mouse, and from $429 for a three-night Orlando economy package. Call (800) 872-7786 for more information.

Disney-owned hotels: Grand Floridian Beach Resort; doubles start at $220. Near the Magic Kingdom.

Disney’s Caribbean Beach Resort; doubles start at $85. Near Epcot.

Disney’s Village Resort; suites start at $175. Near Pleasure Island.

For reservations at all Disney-owned hotels, call (407) 934-7639. Magic Kingdom Club members should call (407) 824-2600.

Non-Disney hotels: Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress, 1 Grand Cypress Blvd., Orlando, Fla. 32819; doubles start at $175. Call (800) 233-1234.

Hyatt Orlando, 6375 W. Irlo Bronson Memorial Highway, Kissimmee, Fla. 34746; doubles start at $89. (800) 233-1234.

Walt Disney World Dolphin, 1500 EPCOT Resort Blvd., P.O. Box 22653, Lake Buena Vista, Fla. 32830; doubles start at $185. (800) 227-1500.

Where to eat: Victoria & Albert’s, Grand Floridian Resort Hotel. Hand-written continental menus, six-course fixed-price dinner for $150 per couple without wine. (407) 824-2383.

Portobello Yacht Club, Pleasure Island. Glamorous waterside Italian dining; $20 for two without wine. (407) 934-8888.

Les Chefs de France, Epcot Center. French nouvelle cuisine; $70 for two without wine. (407) 828-4000.

Rose & Crown Pub, Epcot Center. Steak-and-kidney pie; $40 for two without ale. (407) 828-4000.

Chef Mickey’s Village Restaurant, Disney Village Marketplace. American comfort food with novelty drinks; $25 per couple without Down and Out in Beverly Hills. (407) 828-3723.

50s Prime Time Cafe, Disney-MGM Studios. “Leave It to Beaver” atmosphere; $20 for two without malted milk. (407) 828-4000.

For more information: Contact Walt Disney World, P.O. Box 10000, Lake Buena Vista, Fla. 32830, (407) 824-4321.