Indiana Jones "101"

As much as I wish this was a post about the history of this incredible attraction, unfortunately, it's more a rant about our inability to ride it.

First, let me explain this somewhat misleading title. While it sounds like a college course on the history of Indiana Jones, it is also the code Disney uses in the parks when an attraction goes out if service, something I'm sure they are hearing all too often.

This is one of my favorite attractions at Disneyland Resort, but it seems it is "101" far too often. While I am an annual pass holder, I don't live in Southern California so our trips are months apart not days, unfortunately. Even while visiting every couple of months, everyday that we visit Disneyland Park, Indiana Jones and the Temple of the Forbidden Eye is closed for some period of the day. Disappointing since we love this ride. On our most recent trip, we noticed that the vehicles were running surprisingly faster than usual, so it wasn't too surprising when the cars got backed up towards the end of the ride at the dark rat room. Although this time, the ride was so backed up, there were a couple vehicles queued up for the hallway of spears, and I have never seen a vehicle ahead of us stop in the middle of the hallway. Then, when we got to the boulder, the whole ride froze, Indy stopped mid-sentence, and after about 10 seconds, it reset and the ride continued to the end. And, surprise, surprise, by the time we walked out to the exit, the attraction was closed, 101. Now, Indiana Jones Adventure is one of the most popular rides in the park with a long line all day long, and in this case, it would seem that the Cast Members may have simply been running the vehicles through too fast, and the ride shut itself down.

Now, obviously I am not a Cast Member so I don't know the ins and outs of how the attraction works or park policies, but it would seem to me that if you have an attraction that is that sensitive, you would maybe be a little more careful with how you load guests. I would think a running attraction with a long line is better for park capacity than an attraction that doesn't work at all.

Admittedly, it is a very complex ride system, with each vehicle having its own on-board computer. I have heard that it takes about 4 hours to get the attraction started up every morning. However, Indy's counterpart is Dinosaur at Disney's Animal Kingdom, which, except for scenery and theming, is an exact copy of Indiana Jones. Even though it opened only a few years after Indy, it has no where near as many problems. According to someone who frequents both parks, while parts of Dinosaur's sets will regularly not work, the whole ride itself rarely goes 101. In those three years, the computer system may have been upgraded to allow for easier control of the ride, but if that was the case, I would think that after 17 years of operating Indiana Jones, Disneyland could have upgraded Indy's system. I would certainly be able to tolerate Indiana Jones being closed for a period of time, if that would cure it of its problem of breaking down all the time. It's not like it's helping park capacity by being down all the time anyway.

More John Carter photos released

As the opening of Disney John Carter approaches, Disney's bombardment of marketing is ramping up.  Don't expect the onslaught of advertising let up either, in fact, you can bet you won't be able to watch TV without seeing an ad for the movie in the coming weeks. Recently, a whole bunch of photos were released to help increase the excitement for the film. Here are a handful of them. They are pretty cool, so enjoy.

These show how the CGI was incorporated

Expanded California Adventure Announced

After much speculation as to the date of the opening of Carsland, Disney CEO Bob Iger recently got us a little closer to an official date, by announcing that Carsland will be opening in June. So now we have a month, just need a date.

Also, the Disney Parks Blog has announced the new lands the expanded California Adventure will have:

• a Bug's Land
• Buena Vista Street
• Carsland
• Condor Flats
• Grizzly Peak
• Hollywood Land
• Pacific Wharf
• Paradise Pier

This is a change from the current:

• a Bug's Land
• Golden State
• Hollywood Pictures Backlot
• Paradise Pier

The obvious additions of Buena Vista Street and Carsland come along with the knowledge that Buena Vista Street will indeed be considered its own land, Hollywood Pictures Backlot will change to Hollywood Land, and the current Golden State will be split up into Condor Flats, Grizzly Peak, and Pacific Wharf.

The former Golden State encompassed  what was known already as Condor Flats, Grizzly Peak, and the Pacific Wharf areas, so it just makes sense, that will name changes going around, they would simply reconfigure these areas into their own lands as well.

In the old California Adventure, the entrance wasn't much to look at past the turnstiles, so no surprise it wasn't named. The new entrance, Buena Vista Street, will be much more styled, bringing it up a little closer to the level of Main Street USA in Disneyland Park. It will also have its own attraction, like the Main Street vehicles, the Red Car Trolley, so it makes sense to make Buena Vista Street its own land.

So by changing Hollywood Pictures Backlot into Hollywood Land, are they getting away from the backlot theming all together? It appears they already have. There really are no more allusions to a backlot set anymore. While one could say the lighting rigs for ElecTRONica imply a backlot set, they will not be there for much longer. ElecTRONica will be ending in April and Mad T Party will be starting in what seems to be a more compact area in front of and next to Monsters Inc, not down the main street. So when all this opens in a few months, it will simply be a a street out of the old Hollywoodland era. So its fitting to rename it Hollywood Land.

I, for one, cannot wait until all the construction is complete and the walls are removed to reveal this new DCA 2.0 to the world.

Disney getting strict on FASTPASS

Touring Plans is reporting that WDW will be enforcing FASTPASS return times. Apparently, Cast Members have been informed to begin the enforcement March 7th. There is no word on if or when Disneyland may start this enforcement.

The new enforcement means you will no longer be able to return after the end of the hour-long return window, as was the unwritten rule in the past, although there will apparently be some buffer with 5 additional minutes at the beginning and 15 minutes at the end of the time.

So what does this mean for park-goers? Well, it simply means a little more planning will be involved in riding attractions. Gone are the days when you can run over to that popular attraction, get a Fastpass, and just come back later in the day.

Now, let's not forget that this has always been the rule concerning Fastpass return times, and it was even enforced early in the history of Fastpass. Disney has simply been lenient and accommodating to people's schedules and ability to return at their assigned times. But the time has now come when the rules need to be enforced again. With the future of pre-scheduled vacations with pre-scheduled ride times, the parks can no longer afford to let people return whenever they want.

While I do think it will take a little bit to get used to, especially for those who follow the guidebooks, which by the way have all been teaching the method of getting a pass early and returning later and therefore will all need to be rewritten, I do think it will help to keep Fastpasses for the more popular rides from "selling out" so fast. It will also help keep the Fastpass return lines more even, since they will actually be able to plan how many people return for a ride during a given hour. All in all, this will be a good thing for the parks and crowds, once everyone gets used to it.

De-theming of Disneyland?

"I don't want the public to see the world they live in while they're in the Park (Disneyland). I want to feel they're in another world." - Walt Disney


Disney Parks are known for their theming. Walt Disney created the term theme park when he built Disneyland in 1955. Until then, there were only amusement parks. Theming is what separates Disney Parks from places like Six Flags.


When you enter the Parks, you are immersed in the theme, transported to places like turn-of-the-century main street, Frontierland, and Adventureland. When you walk through New Orleans Square, you are in New Orleans. The theming is what drives these areas. Without it, the Matterhorn Bobsleds, Space Mountain, and Big Thunder Mountain Railroad are just mildly thrilling roller coasters. With it, they are brought up several notches to become some of my favorite rides.


Walt Disney understood this so much so that when he designed Disneyland, he created in such a way to keep the real world out. He didn't want his theming to be broken by the outside world, so he surrounded the park with a berm, which the train rides on top of, to keep the outside world out.



I found it very disturbing, on a recent trip to Disneyland, to find situations that totally disregarded the theming of the area.  For instance, walking through Tomorrowland, one should not expect to find Jack Skellington/Nightmare Before Christmas merchandise in the Star Trader or Cars merchandise in the Little Green Men Store or the It's a Small World Store, along with Phineas and Ferb. Walking though Adventureland, we also saw, front and center, Jack Skellington stuff in the Adventureland Bazaar, which actually had more stuff than Indiana Jones stuff, whose attraction is directly across the street.  



The stores themselves are wonderfully themed to their respective areas, on the outside, but by putting these things in other stores, we are taken out of the world that we are supposed to be in the second we walk into the store. Until Carsland opens this Summer, Cars really doesn't have a home in the Resort, so I'll give it a pass in Tomorrowland, being that the closest thing it has is Autopia. But, why can't it be in it's own store it the Autopia entrance, not Little Green Men. And, it certainly does not belong at It's a Small World.

What's slightly more disturbing is that Nightmare Before Christmas has its own store in New Orleans Square. Why does it need to be spread out throughout the park at all? In fact, Disneyland has shown that themed stores can work in the park. The stores in New Orleans Square are the only stores in the park that do not break their own theming. Port Orleans Curios and Curiosities only has NBC stuff. Pieces of Eight only has Pirates collectibles. Cristal d'Orleans has crystal collectibles.

There are a few possible reasons that Disney has disregarded the rules of theming.  The first being, and probably more obvious, is they want to sell merchandise.  The best way to do that is to have it as available to people as possible.  If someone is in Tomorrowland, they shouldn't necessarily have to go all the way over to New Orleans Square to get a Jack Skellington shirt.  While, I agree with this, I also believe that this is also the reason to have a place like the Emporium, at the end of Main Street. Everyone has to pass it on the way out of the park, perfect place to stock all the merchandise you could possibly want. Another excuse could be, Disney certainly knows how popular these characters are, and simply wants to get them out for purchase. Third, Disney may have simply overstocked themselves on Jack Skellington/NBC stuff and didn't sell enough at Holiday time, so they need to get rid of it. While I wouldn't doubt that this may be the case, I also have no doubt that this stuff would be in these locations anyway.

Matterhorn Bobsleds Withdrawals?

To ease the pain of not being able to ride the Matterhorn Bobsleds for 6 months, we present these videos of the ride from the Tomorrowland and Fantasyland tracks...enjoy!

Tomorrowland Track

Fantasyland Track

Update: Carsland Opening Date Set!

MiceChat's Al Lutz is reporting there is now an official opening date for Carsland: June 15th.

"The dates for DCA's grand re-opening event have finally been chosen. June 14th will be the media day and private celebrity party, and June 15th will be the official first day of operation for customers. There will only be a handful of days for AP Previews and soft openings for Cars Land in early June, and those dates aren't confirmed yet. June 15th will also kick off DCA's new operating schedule of daily 8AM to 11PM hours through the summer."

A few weeks ago, Lutz reported that the lack of wet weather this winter has allowed construction in DCA to stay on schedule, if not ahead of schedule.

Whether this all turns out to be true...we'll have to wait and see in the coming weeks, if/when Disney makes it official themselves

UPDATE: It's official! Disney has finally announced the opening date for Carsland and Buena Vista Street is going to be June 15th! DCA will be closed on June 14th for final preparations and media previews. Annual Passholder previews will take place a couple days earlier.

Now we'll just have to see how early they start soft openings