My trip report and observations - new and improved 2010 version!

[marni1971]

After 3 weeks, 16 time zones, 16500+ miles, 9 flights and 4 rental cars I`m home with jet lag from hell and so many great memories (and video and photos!) from my 2 WDW and first DL trip

I`ll try not to dwell too much on Disneyland where I can help it, and won`t go into Vegas since it`s OT suffice to say it is one crazy, amazing place. I`ll also steer clear of Universal Hollywood apart from saying the tour is stunning, Kong 3D is great, the theme park was mainly a disappointment and Mummy LA is very poor compared to USF.

Also, some of this will be old news since I havn`t ploughed through 3 weeks of news and rumours yet.

Soooo.... back to August 28th, and in some sort of order of things, Orlando.

Magic Kingdom

Tarps on Main St were noticable. Same elsewhere. Nice to see a lot of TLC and money still being invested. MISICI is still popular. During last week the crane was up on the castle - first time I have seen it myself ever - and no pyro was used during Dream Along with Mickey since work was being done during the day. Bad show or a nessecity? Wishes was as good as ever, and still popular, though one windy night the last 2/3 of all rooftop launches were scrubbed offering a very strange and patchy show. This show will be around for a good while yet. And will get even better with time.

Hall of Presidents and Haunted Mansion still look fresh and very good

Splash Mountain looked great with its new(ish) lighting and the only effect I didn`t see was the hilltop projection. Even Rabbit was jumping! Last week I saw an evac each day 3 days running. On Saturday one of the added water jets for the splash was falling onto the walkway. Not blowing in the wind, actually landing on the footpath. Caught a lot of guests by surprise. Misaligned maybe?

BTM was running okay, but Tumbleweeds bathtub wasn`t spinning and the earthquake lift (B) had no moving rocks and no projection. Would it really be hard to get the physical falling rocks working again?

Fantasyland..... wow. Work is going on 24/7. Wall land it maybe, but things are happening. Crane on site lifting concrete pannels onto Mermaid. Only rode Pooh, and despite the line work it looked great. Even the smoke ring effect worked!

Tomorrowland... the speedway is a smelly ugly mess. You can tell I`ve ridden DLs Autopia recently. Had no desire for SGE, TLF or Buzz. I had bigger things to try. But first, COP - looked good, half full theatres, but on Saturday Johns mouth in Act one was static the whole show. Very bad. I reported to the greeting CM who did seem concerned.

And now... Space Mountain. Probably already discussed over and over. The offboard audio that had been installed slowly since December was turned on and I was lucky to ride the first day. I also recorded it thankfully, since on Day one it worked very well. Some music leaks into the load areas, the comm chat is still very audiable though. All airgates stilll lit and both sides used duel load when needed. Some UV overhead lighting at load not working. Still no safety video audio. But moving on....

My first ride when the audio was turned on had fx from the SSE 1982 ascent tunnel playing on the lift hill. I think. I`m beginning to think I imagined this, I really hope I got it on tape. It wasn`t playing this past weekend. Omegas lift signs are already failing - one was flickering, one was broke. Riding Alpha on the day the music was turned on was great. There were no real patchy areas of audio, I heard the music the whole ride. Accoustics wern`t too bad, and despite the music not being (or able to be) timed to the ride it worked quite well after a fashion. The topmost part of track, where the ride passes above the load lifts, there is clearly a platform of speakers now built above the track. Spot fx work well, and again on my first ride the flat loop at the end of the ride before the brake zone had a great whoop whoop sound, getting faster and higher in pitch as the car span round - something missing when I rode multiple times last week. Ahh, last week - the whole audio was a bit of a mess. Both sides had patches of no music. I really hope it`s still a work in progress. It was an addition to the ride that worked when I first rode. The cheap way of doing it maybe, but a clear plus. Now I`m not sure. Both re entry tunnels are way out of sync audio wise as well.

TTA Peoplemover.... is it me or is it busier after a simple name change? The first welcome spiel is far too quiet, the second sentance is almost a surprise since it is at normal level. The zig zag tunnel music variation that played briefly in Space Mountain has gone, replaced with the new Morrow/Johnson spiel (nice) and SMs music can be heard. Visuals in the mountain were also nice to begin with - lots of stars all over, a new galaxy on the side wall, and lots of meteors and comets (!) flying around on both the coaster and TTA. Last week the new galaxy was gone, stars were dark at lower levels and one star projector was clearly stuck. Again, hopefully a work in progress since the additions if they work are a definate plus.

More parks next....

 

[marni1971]

Epcot

SSE was still looking good. The descent is still plainly missing since the money ran out. Nice additional star curtains both at start and end of descent. The horrible white blob projection is still in 180top, and the earth is still too bright, revealing the junk, ride track and roof of the building. And turn up the volume of the area music!

Energy isn`t getting better with age, and a lot of the diorama smoke was missing. Shame. Both sides of M:S were walk on. Wonders is still sad and a great waste. Same as Odyssey. The times we rode Test Track all our cars had working speakers and LCDs. Robots were static then working, barrier test car was out of sync with ride vehicles (it hit too early) but the ABS cones were working last week!

Imaginations glass is a disgrace. There are twice as many triangles due to the lines of grime on the pyramids. Imageworks walls are still up but all toys are still working behind them. Pavilion may go dark soon for a few days to remove Kodak logos.
Captain EO was playing to 3/4 full theatres. And to applause. Not seen it in a theatre for 20 years and it was pure EPCOT Center. The floor works better here than in DL, where they try to sync the movement to every msuic beat. New in theatre lighting is great, but was it really too much to add lasers and smoke? Loved how wrong the preshow intro was, talking about Magic Journeys but using O'Canada! B roll footage. Geeky!

Last week had workers touching up The Lands main roof, and painting on The Seas roof. Seas with Nemo was still effective as a dark ride, but the Kuka needs more light. Maelstrom looks great - new dark lighting or UV Lights? AAs were all working very well, fx projections were very clear and even the lift hills face eyelids were working. No smoke of course and the North Seas cloud projections were missing, but the rigs derrick flame projeciton was working again. All great to see.

Ate quick serve in Mexicos new Cantina on opening afternoon. Lots of suits and surveys around, food wasn`t bad and the view was interesting. The seats need unbolting though. Also ate in Italys new Piazza. Not bad value when 3 adults have the foot and a 1/2 pizza. Very nice. As was the area and building, but indoors was too noisy.

ROE was like a work in progress. Some pyro was missing the first week, and Norways searchlight is out for repairs. No perims all trip due to wind, one show didn`t use the standby barge pyro when perims arn`t used. There may also be an issue with the perims north of Mexico since the new gazebo is in the safety area now. The NW fountain barge blew a pipe last week and had a geyser the whole show, was fixed the following night. ALS shells had issues some nights. No comet one night, no explosion the following night. Lasers looked good, should be even better next year. Was great to see the single color units working well in Italy, China and Japan. And finally, the red flickering floating shells half way through Chaos are finally back in perfect show sync after so many years!

A word about the Innoventions fountain - help! The LEDs are still good, but several jets don`t work, some are really out of alignment (including 2 air launchers) and there are several leaks. Bad show. Expecially after seeing WOC and the Bellagio shows....

DHS - get rid of the stage infront of the hat! So tacky. As if the hat isn`t bad enough. Lots of streetmosphere on Hollywood and Sunset. TSMM still insanely popular. Nice unload airgates. New scenes are fun. Star Tours needs its signs removing; it took 3 CMs outside to stop many guests asking if it was open, despite the rope across. Put up a better barrier and an explanation sign. Inside wall was visible at old line split. Thanks to the CMs before it closed BTW for help with my video taping
RnRC was looking good inside and out. Tower was good, but ascent VVC audio is so out of sync it is embarrassing. Not that the average guest would know. Bravos corridor end projector was burnt out one ride, the bellhop called it in straight away. Unload speakers need attention; distorting and crackling to hell. And Foxtrot (or was it Echo) still has the Nightastic image capture on the end projection. Tacky. It did work well though in the eyeball. Couldn`t bring myself to see Fantasmic! since Disneylands is so amazing. Even without Murphy.

DAK - same as always. Big park, not enough attractions. Dinosaur is missing too many effects. No strobes in vortex tunnels. I heard new lasers have been added this week but didn`t have time to look. They arn`t the original vortex lasers I`m told. And after riding Indy in DL I`ll have a hard time enjoying this ride as much as I used to. Everest is so sad. No steam. One waterfall. Poor Yeti. At least the bird on a stick made a surprise appearence.

Next I`ll look at how Universal now compares to Disneys parks, and some thoughts about Disneyland compared to parts of WDW.

 

[Dayma]

Great updates thanks!

 

[marni1971]

Okay... part 3. Despite being jet lagged I`m checking and saving my pics and video. So I have some time to type.

Universal Orlando will never overtake Disney, nor dare I say be as popular, but the `other 2 main parks` in central Florida are giving the Mouse food for thought, and rightly so. First I will get it out of the way; the CMs are not of Disney standards. Most are very nice, some are as good, but on the whole they are slightly below Mouse levels, not that all CMs in WDW are the same either. And please, get rid of the hawkers in your face from the bag check area all the way through the park gates. Wanna buy this? Need that? Want a photo taking? Stand still and smile... Grrrrr....

Now, onto the fun. Show quality in both parks is still getting better and better. Plenty of smoke effects, hardly any missing (even on The Mummy), even Jaws had everything but the flame trench. Yes, it saves money in the quiet weeks, and given its cost I`m not surprised. Shame, but I understand. At least it does work.

Rip Ride Rockit is still a great ride. Or I should say was. Kudos to Universal engineering and safety for doing what they did when they did. I can`t go into detail but they did a fantastic job, did what needed to be done on the side of caution, and thankfully it isn`t bad news. During our whirlwind visit we noticed the park upkeep was great in both parks, The Mummy, Jaws and Simpsons all looked great and were popular, as were the parks themselves. It was great to see a lot of people everywhere. In part due to the new things in IOA, in part due to the new 2 parks on one map (hey look! They have that in the other park, let`s go there tomorrow) - in all the resort finally looks like it is getting the attendence it deserves. Let`s hope it keeps up through the coming year.

And speaking of next door, IOA has a new area. It`s been covered web-wide, so some thoughts; forgive me if I get names wrong since I`m not a fan of the Potter films (all the more for hats off to Uni for allowing non-fans to enjoy the additions). The land itself is stunning. The details, from the smallest building items to the store windows to the dressing. All amazing. The castle, when you turn the corner from Hogsmede, is as good as any other parks best vista. And the ride... first I have to say Dragons Challange needs a better entrance. Tear down the wall next to the arch. The ride is too hidden.

But onto the new ride. Forbidden Journey. My humble opinion? Amazing. Simple as that. The stunning effects in the line, the load area, the ride itself.... all move park experiences to a new level. It isn`t without flaws; look hard enough and you can marvel at the Kukas next to you (okay... you don`t have to do that) and some transitions from screen to set could be better but as an experience it is in a class all its own. The speed and smoothness of the ride vehicles, the size of the sets and the moving (and proximity) of the set pieces, the fx, the immersion.... Disney should be rightly concerned and a little sad they didn`t do it first. We rode 3 times. The first was total sensorary overload. Only by the 3rd ride could I begin to take things in. Lines varied from 90 to 30 minutes, and they actually kept moving. The biggest issue with the line was people stopping to take in (and take photos) of various parts of the preshows. Also there is still conflict with the ride seats and people of certain body dimensions, something Uni still needs to rectify, be it the test seat being wrong or the new ride seats being unavailable / not able to be actually tested by said people. Hopefully this issue will be resolved soon so as many people as possible can enjoy this amazing attraction. Spiderman is still great, is still popular, but the new kid in town takes the crown. IOAs new addition has already paid for itself due to attendence and merchandise, word of mouth and rightly so. It shows proper investment can still bring higher returns. And allows the park to push forward with even bigger ideas. TDO need to take heed. In this area they are now playing catch up.

Next; a look at Disneyland vs the MK, some thoughts and how things now stand out in Orlando after Anaheim.

PLUS, I did just find my TTA recording from August 29th. Space Mountains music was not operational but the lift hill DID have Spaceship Earth 1982 audio fx. I feel vindicated. I`m now looking for my onride of the first day of music.

 

[EaglesfanNJ]

What great and detailed updates/comments. Thank you so much!:sohappy:

 

[powlessfamily4]

Great updates!! So overall you felt Space Mountain was greatly improved?

 

[marni1971]

Great updates!! So overall you felt Space Mountain was greatly improved?

It has the potential to be. The dead spots in the music need addressing; they almost make the new music redundant IMHO. The way I heard it on day one was amazing. Not as good as onboard audio, but a definate plus for the ride. The spot fx work very well. As do the added visual fx. It is still not as good as the original refurb plans, and never will be, but a definate step in the right direction.

 

[powlessfamily4]

It has the potential to be. The dead spots in the music need addressing; they almost make the new music redundant IMHO. The way I heard it on day one was amazing. Not as good as onboard audio, but a definate plus for the ride. The spot fx work very well. As do the added visual fx. It is still not as good as the original refurb plans, and never will be, but a definate step in the right direction.

Awesome! I can't wait to ride it in November. I really like the idea of the music. :sohappy:

 

[JafarMaleficent]

i kind of wish i rode space on sat at MNSSHP. Martin did you attend that any day you were there?

 

[marni1971]

i kind of wish i rode space on sat at MNSSHP. Martin did you attend that any day you were there?

Yep, we were at the first MNSSHP last Tuesday. I should have noted this about the party;

Boo to You is the same

Mix n Mingle is to all intents and purposes the same, save for small lighting changes and a few altered dance moves, and the addition of a new villain (don`t shout - I havn`t seen the movie yet...)

HalloWishes is still lite, but at the moment is using as many shells as the original minus hellfires roof pyro

HM CMs really get into the spirit of things

Adventureland has a new party music loop, a pirate DJ playing commercially available pop and rock loosely linked to the party and land

The Mad Hatters Treat Trail was minus the end treats

 

[JafarMaleficent]

we went sat. it was awesome/ seen some characters that people on here said wouldn't be there and they won't be back next year. it was awesome glad you had fun Martin.

 

[WishIwasThere]

Thanks Martin. Love the update. Looking forward to reading your observations of WDW vs. DL having been to both in a very short period of time.

 

[Mukta]

I can't wait to hear about what you think of my home park. I hope your first visit here was pleasant!

 

[xdan0920]

Excellent updates.

Do you write down all of these things as you go? Or do you just have a great memory?

 

[mp2bill]

Great updates thanks!

Ditto. Also, can't wait to see some new videos on your website, Martin!

 

[828tnt]

marni, thanks for the updates! we'll be there in 2 weeks, so i really appreciate them.

btw, i'm still trying to talk myself into a uni trip on one of our days..... you may have done so.....

 

[mcjaco]

Thanks Martin.

Good to hear the news on SM...and great find on the SSE music!

Can't wait to hear your opinions on MK versus DL. :drevil:

 

[MaxsDad]

I actually felt that Dueling Dragons needed to be LESS exposed. A giant steel coaster seemed out of place in Hogsmeade, and it was also visable from the greenhouse area of the line in Forbidden Journey.

I understand the reason why it needs to be seen, but it seems to me the objective of making guest aware of it could be accomplished other ways without compromising the Fantasy of actually being there.

 

[PhilharMagician]

I am happy to hear your response to Potter. I hope this puts some fire into the hearts of WDC to climb back to the top. I will be waiting anxiously for the 2010 theme park attendance numbers. That will tell us a lot.


Great updates!

 

[ryno1982]

Martin, your opinion on Universal is nearly identical to mine. The Team Members at the entrance irritate me a lot, and really set the wrong tone for the day.

I'll be interested in hearing whether you thought Indiana Jones was better than Forbidden Journey.