New and Closing ride trip Orlando July 2017

[Kenban]

I decided to take a 3 day weekend trip down to Orlando and wanted to ride as many of the new 2017 attractions and with the announcement of several Disney rides I also wanted one last ride to remember them by.  Expect spoilers about the rides.

 

Fun Spot

First I went to Fun Spot Kissimmee to ride Mine Blower.  I rode Mine Blower several times, except for one really abrupt transition the layout is frantastic.  The Gravity Group did a great job with design, it has good pacing and is a fun compact coaster.  The issue I have with the ride is that the trains shuffle through the entire course.  I suspect the problem is caused by differences in how different wooden coaster manufacturers build the track.  The coaster is still brand new and very smooth but I worry how it will age.

 

Universal Orlando

Then off to Universal Orlando to ride Race through New York starring Jimmy Fallon.  This is Universal's first queueless ride.  They have already announced that they plan on making all future rides queueless as well.  While plans change I expect to see it on the Fast and Furious ride opening next year.  In some ways this ride reminds me of King Kong.  Both look spectacular and have very intricate lines.  The exterior of the building looks very good, but the lobby and holding area are very good recreations of the style of Rockefeller Center.  Universal used real stone and Marble and it shows.  

How the queueless system works is that you are required to get a ticket with a return time at which point you are given a colored card.  You can spend as much time as you want in the Lobby which has displays showing all of the Tonight Show hosts and has a period accurate TV showing clips for each host.  After you are done here you walk up the stairs to the actual waiting room.  This room has a stage with frequent live entertainment based on skits done on the Tonight Show, it also has seating and a number of large touch screen TV's you can play games on.  Every few minutes the lights change color and if they match your card you can go and finally ride the ride.  Actual wait times once I was upstairs was around 10-20 minutes but I have heard it can take 45.

Finally the ride itself, you wear 3D glasses which while they look the same as the glasses for Gringotts they seem larger and I had trouble keeping them on my face, they just wanted to fall off, and it seemed to be a common problem with the people who were on the ride with me.  It is basically a large motion platform staring at a projection screen.  Which I am really starting to not like about Universal, I want physical props and sets when possible.  This brings me back to King Kong, both rides are basically just a 3D movie with a ride system.  On both rides I love everything that is actually real and while I enjoy the projections I just feel little desire to ride either attraction more than a few times.  While the ride is brand new it just feels like something I have already done many times before.  Also the ride is called Race through New York, and yet only the first part of the movie occurs in New York City, I think I would have prefered more actual video of New York and less CG.  I do wish this ride system was used on Minions because that ride is a little too jumpy I think I would like it more if it was smoother like Race through New York.

While I was at Universal I made sure to ride Dueling Dragons (Dragon Challenge).  There are a huge number of rumors the ride is going to be closing soon and it feels like this is the end for the ride.  Both sides still run extremely well and it feels like it is in good enough shape Universal could sell them if they wanted.  Assuming there is a park which wants to purchase the ride.  At present the ride has metal detectors in the line and you are required to place everything in lockers including your wallet, cellphone, keys, etc.  At least the lockers are free but I still hate this.  The fact that they no longer duel still bugs me and while I understand why they stopped dueling it makes me question why they have the metal detectors.  It feels like it should be one or the other not both.  I am going to miss this ride.  Even without the dueling they are still both good coasters, but riding them is annoying, I hate leaving my cell phone, keys, and wallet in a locker and from personal experience I know the fingerprint scanners can screw up and open the wrong locker.  A few years ago I forgot my locker number, luckily they have a forgot locker number option but as I found out my fingerprint was a close enough match it opened the wrong locker at which point I had to find an employee to lock that locker again so that the items could not be stolen, but this also disables the fingerprint so the true owner cannot open it without an employee.

 

Walt Disney World

I started my second day with a quick visit to Hollywood Studios primarily for The Great Movie Ride which is closing August 13th.  The Great Movie Ride was the only ride in the park when it opened and with its closing I do not believe a single attraction from opening day will remain.  Star Tours and the Indiana Jones stunt show both opened the first year but did not open with the park.  The ride is slow but enjoyable.  Disney has already announced they are keeping the exterior of the building.  Which makes me hope the queue will remain largely intact.  I feel like I might miss this ride a little.  But with how dated the ride is maybe it is time to move on.

I spent the rest of the day at Epcot.  First up was Universe of Energy the other ride confirmed to close on August 13th.  It has been a long time since I rode the ride and I now remember why I almost always skipped the attraction.  The preshow is 8 minutes and the ride is 37 minutes so you spend a minimum of 45 minutes assuming you arrive just as everything starts.  It is classic Epcot, an attempt at making an entertaining and educational ride.  Today I find it boring and I do not feel like I learned anything.  There are rides that I wish were still around, but at the moment I doubt this will be one of them.  I like the idea of the educational aspect of Epcot, but I am not sure it has ever been very successful.  Maybe it is time to move towards a more entertainment oriented view.

The movie for Soarin has been replaced so instead of just using video of California it now showcases sites from around the world.  I really was looking forward to this because I enjoyed the original and found myself wanting more.  The problem is that I found myself preferring the original ride.  There is one major scene at the end which features the Eiffel Tower but the problem is that the curved screen makes it look more like a C shape if you are off to the side.  But because it is the end it just sticks in my head and is what I remember of the ride.  Also the designers really overused the whole object flying at the screen to change to the next scene.  The original movie only had one transition and that was a cloud.  Stop the CG garbage and just show the natural beauty of the planet.

My last day was Animal Kingdom.  A park that is trying to become a full day or more park.  I have been to the park several times since Pandora started being built and this was what I was looking forward to the most.  Disney did not let me down.  The land itself is amazing, during the day it looks impressive and otherworldly.  The floating island just seems to hang in the sky and while you can tell it is supported by the tethers it is still very impressive.  At night you realize the ground is covered in UV paint.  I remember early previews where it was claimed you would be able to see the ground light up as you walk and if this exists anywhere I never saw it.  But the trees, plants, etc do light up.  If possible visit during both the day and at night.

Na'vi River journey is basically the same ride system as small world and other slow boat rides.  I think it is important to point out as far as I can tell there is no story or plot of any kind on this ride, it is purely a slow boat ride through an incredible looking landscape, with one animatronic.  I thought it was a very good merger of practical effects and projection.  The biggest problem is that nothing really happens, it looks amazing but that is it.  Once you have been on the ride it is likely not worth a long wait but it is a good ride.

Before I went on Flight of Passage I figured it would be an upgraded version of Soarin and I was not disappointed.  It is an upgrade but it feels like it is so much more.  The screen is larger so that you are much more surrounded, you have to look for the edges of the screen.  The ride vehicles are much more personal since they are individual seats.  The attention to detail is amazing for example there are air bladders which inflate/deflate during the ride next to your legs to simulate the Banshee moving and breathing.  This is a must see ride and is worthy of a long wait.  This ride and the land surrounding it needs to be cloned at other Disney parks, it is that good.  I enjoyed the ride so much I waited through the 2 hour line twice.

One of the new to me experiences is Kilimanjaro Safari at night.  Frankly I expected more, more lights and more animals.  I had seen a lot of advertising but frankly once it gets really dark out the lights are just not bright enough.  I would go at Dusk while it is still bright enough out to see.  Disney called it an eternal sunset but I really disagree.

Finally at the end of the night, Rivers of Light, the new show which is supposed to make people want to stay at the park until 9 or 10 PM.  Because of the animals the park is not able to use fireworks so they are stuck with light, fire, and water.  Which having been to California Adventure and seeing World of Color several times I felt that Disney would put on a great show.  If you are expecting a huge spectacle you might as well skip this show and see something else.  From a technical standpoint the show is impressive.  But at the sametime the show is much like most of the original park, devoid of DIsney IP, it is a radical departure from modern Disney parks.  The show is good but I feel many children will not enjoy it.  There was a boy near me who every time the fountains would turn off or the lighting dimmed would ask his parents if it was over.

 

I had a great three days and had a chance to experience most of the new or at least new to me rides in Orlando.  Flight of Passage is an incredible experience which has left me with a new favorite ride.  I cannot wait to see what Universal or Disney will come up with to top the experience.