Waterfalls in WDW

Spike-in-Berlin

Spike-in-Berlin

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
The Empress Lilly said:
Bonus! Especially for our host, Wasserfall Spike. I've spend an embarrassing amount of my childhood playing in this pool and its slide and falls:

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OH - MY - GOD! Empress Lilly you definitely hit a soft spot of me with that very special picture. My good ol`Hilton Fontainebleau! How I loved it. Together with the Sheraton Bal Harbor (former Americana) it was my favourite hotel in Miami in my childhood and teens. We stayed there in 1982, 1984 and 1991 and I always loved it to the max. Especially, of course, the pool with its rockworks, waterfalls and caves. Remember the spas which were embedded in the rock behind the front section? The Lobster Boil? I saw exactly what you see on the pcture for the last time in 2007 only days before it was demolished. Today both of my favorite Miami Beach resorts are gone. The Sheraton Bal Harbor literally (busted for a 40-something storey apartment high-rise) and the Fontainebleau mentally and technically (BTW both are by the same architect, Morris Lapidus). Ever been in the new one after the "refurb" by the new management? We were there in 2010 for three days and hated every minute. The new garden and pool design is absolute crap, the arrogant staff is very rude (only if you are not some rich wannabe-celebrity of course who gives them huge tips) and incompetent and the entire resort has lost any of it's original atmosphere.
I keep the real, the Hilton Fontainebleau in my memories and my video I made in 1991 when I stayed there with my first big love.
Thank you so much for this picture Empress Lilly.
 
Crystal J

Crystal J

Member
This is now my favorite forumn - so I love waterfalls, am going to a local state park to shoot some tomorrow (I just got a new 10 stop ND filter). Thinking I surely can contribute some images to this forumn and went into my Flickr account - nohting - not a disney waterfall in site except the elephant section on the jungle cruise. Luckily I am going in May for a few days so this will be corrected - thank for all the great ideas!
 
The Empress Lilly

The Empress Lilly

Well-Known Member
Spike-in-Berlin said:
OH - MY - GOD! Empress Lilly you definitely hit a soft spot of me with that very special picture. My good ol`Hilton Fontainebleau! How I loved it. Together with the Sheraton Bal Harbor (former Americana) it was my favourite hotel in Miami in my childhood and teens. We stayed there in 1982, 1984 and 1991 and I always loved it to the max. Especially, of course, the pool with its rockworks, waterfalls and caves. Remember the spas which were embedded in the rock behind the front section? The Lobster Boil? I saw exactly what you see on the pcture for the last time in 2007 only days before it was demolished. Today both of my favorite Miami Beach resorts are gone. The Sheraton Bal Harbor literally (busted for a 40-something storey apartment high-rise) and the Fontainebleau mentally and technically (BTW both are by the same architect, Morris Lapidus). Ever been in the new one after the "refurb" by the new management? We were there in 2010 for three days and hated every minute. The new garden and pool design is absolute crap, the arrogant staff is very rude (only if you are not some rich wannabe-celebrity of course who gives them huge tips) and incompetent and the entire resort has lost any of it's original atmosphere.
I keep the real, the Hilton Fontainebleau in my memories and my video I made in 1991 when I stayed there with my first big love.
Thank you so much for this picture Empress Lilly.
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It was great, wasn't it? Peculiarly, our itinerary was pretty much the same as yours. Pretty much yearly throughout most of the eighties we'd visit the Fontainebleau for a few days to a week for relaxation and shopping, and then fly up to Orlando for Disney.

And yes, I totally remember those spas behind the rocks! I'd wager the local Cuban mafia still remembers me too, all the times three exited kids came running from behind the rocks to splash out in their whirlpool. :D Sucks to be them and their hussy and their $35 cocktails!

I've got so many memories of this place. The large restaurants, the arcade hidden a bit behind the escalators to the gardens, that pool, still the best I've ever been in. Thirty years ago that pool was more special than it is today, now that every resort has a tropical pool with rockwork and a slide and spas and islands and a cocktail bar. I remember eating freshly cut coconuts from the gardens. And Don Johnson jetski-ing up the beach dressed in a white suit over a pastel-coloured shirt...

I had a trip booked there not too long ago. With my father, for old times sake, and for whom Miami Beach is his little escape, the way WDW is mine. Alas, we had to cancel at the last minute. I don't think I'll ever go back now, the place has been redone, and not for the better from what I read. It is difficult enough to visit a destroyed FW and toonified MK, I dont need to pile on with more lost worlds. Better to leave this place to my memories. :)
 
Spike-in-Berlin

Spike-in-Berlin

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
The Empress Lilly said:
It was great, wasn't it? Peculiarly, our itinerary was pretty much the same as yours. Pretty much yearly throughout most of the eighties we'd visit the Fontainebleau for a few days to a week for relaxation and shopping, and then fly up to Orlando for Disney.

And yes, I totally remember those spas behind the rocks! I'd wager the local Cuban mafia still remembers me too, all the times three exited kids came running from behind the rocks to splash out in their whirlpool. :D Sucks to be them and their hussy and their $35 cocktails!

I've got so many memories of this place. The large restaurants, the arcade hidden a bit behind the escalators to the gardens, that pool, still the best I've ever been in. Thirty years ago that pool was more special than it is today, now that every resort has a tropical pool with rockwork and a slide and spas and islands and a cocktail bar. I remember eating freshly cut coconuts from the gardens. And Don Johnson jetski-ing up the beach dressed in a white suit over a pastel-coloured shirt...

I had a trip booked there not too long ago. With my father, for old times sake, and for whom Miami Beach is his little escape, the way WDW is mine. Alas, we had to cancel at the last minute. I don't think I'll ever go back now, the place has been redone, and not for the better from what I read. It is difficult enough to visit a destroyed FW and toonified MK, I dont need to pile on with more lost worlds. Better to leave this place to my memories. :)
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Yes it was great, absolutely unforgettable golden childhood memories. I was in the arcade a lot because in Germany any kind of videogame arcade is forbidden for minors under 18 yrs and I could only play Galaga, Defender etc. when I was in the USA. And the pool was actually a piece of the history of hotel architecture. Of course the Fontainebleau was a part of history already far before it was built. If you have seen Goldfinger, there you see what the Fontainebleau looked like originally, it had a normal swimming pool with a diving tower and even an ice rink (on my first day in the F. in 1982 I searched the entire hotel for the ice rink only to find finally out that it was removed during the 1970ies refurbishment. The new lagoon pool was not created before the late 1970ies and was a prototype for many other hotels and even after so many other hotels also built their lagoon pool, the Fontainebleaus one was still one of the best. In May 2007 while my GF was still sleeping in our room in an absolutely awful hotel about 1000 feet away (we only had planned to stay there for a night before driving to WDW) ) I walked down the beach promenade and by the Fontainebleau. It was already a construction site and many parts of the Chateau had been demolished but the pool area was till untouched and after I spoke with a man from the security he allowed me to take a last walk around it. It is beneath my understanding why I did not run back to the hotel, grabbed my camcorder and filmed every single detail because the entire pool area was about to be demolished but I kinda blew it. When we were back at Miami Beach two weeks later it was to late, everything was gone.
And concerning your plans to go back a last time, you did right to cancel them. I regret SO much, that I went back a last time, it really is gone, it's only a hollow shell remaining, with a complete new filling, it's extremely greedy (remove something from the roombar and it is billed after 10 seconds automatically, even if you didn't drink it), it is overkill in a BAD way (telephone in the bath, a TV above the toilet but NO adequate soundproofing of the facade, you even hear the AC outlets on the roof at the 11th floor) and to talk about the pool and garden: Take a closer look at it. The pools are mostly very small, not connected, so most of them are mere decorative elements, the main pool has NOTHING special, no waterfalls, no spas, no rocks, no slides, no landscaping whatsoever and some pools are surrounded by roped cabana sections for the "wealthier guests" which pay 200 or so bucks extra a day for a cabana or some other "special" areas. It's an absolute icecold location, with rude and incompetent wannabe-models as staff which treat you accordingly to the size of your wallet. I am quite sure the concept will flop in the end and the hotel will be ruined by the new management.
 
Spike-in-Berlin

Spike-in-Berlin

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Is there a waterfall on Ton Sawyer Island?

It's quite shocking that the outer waterfall in Norway/Maelstrom ist STILL walled up. I cannot believe that this should take years.

Isn't there a waterfall at the new restroom area in Fantasyland with the Rapunzel Tower from Tangled?
 
Spike-in-Berlin

Spike-in-Berlin

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Tom Morrow said:
You guys forgot the best one, Schweitzer Falls, named for famous African explorer, Dr. Albert Falls
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No, Schweitzer Falls were already mentioned in my opening post and I think there also was already one picture shown here. But of course I am grateful for any pictures in this thread, many waterfalls have a different appearance depending on the perspective.
 
Spike-in-Berlin

Spike-in-Berlin

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
The Empress Lilly said:
The Poolynesian! (bad pun alert!)

Previous:
polypoolpc.jpg


The new vulcano version:
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Thanks Empress Lilly, I don't even want to know what the Nanea Pool will look like after the "defurbishing" of the Poly. BTW, doesn't the present pool remind you a tiny little bit of our good ol' favorite Fontainebleau lagoon pool?*sigh* (Waterfall with an integrated slide, caves and fake rockwork)

There are quite a lot of waterfalls on the Kilimanjaro Safari, two right at the beginning at the hippo pool, the upper one quite large, could be the largest in KS.
 

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