Animal Kingdom Update: 15th Anniversary (PART 3)
Welcome to PART 3 of this Disney's Animal Kingdom Theme Park update (PART 2 can be found here).
Let's continue exploring the park by venturing deeper into the Asia section of the park:
We heard that the Yeti Palace Hotel will debut the same day the Yeti of Expedition Everest will get fixed:
Walls are up around the food truck (a quick service location), which is currently being refurbished:
Face the Forbidden Mountain:
More walls nearby:
It's a very small area, so it should be nothing major:
Doesn't this look like a perfect spot for a new nighttime show like World of Color?:
Moving on to DinoLand U.S.A.:
Walls are up around the Theater in the Wild (housing Finding Nemo: The Musical):
Walls are up around the Theater in the Wild (housing Finding Nemo: The Musical):
A look around Chester & Hester's Dino-Rama!:
The moving parts of these dinosaur cut-outs were not working:
...and this particular dinosaur was even missing a leg:
A few more photos:
Still one of our all-time favorites:
That is all for today. Thank you as always for reading, and have a great rest of your evening!
I agree with you guys. DAK probably is the best designed theme park Disney has in the US, rivaling DisneySea. Too bad it does not get as much recognition as it deserves. The park has great potential. While MK and DHS focus more on movies and characters, I feel that Epcot and DAK could be the more "real-life" parks at Disney World. Hopefully more great additions are in store for this great park. A new family dark-ride, re-do Dino-Rama, and Avatar should make this park fantastic.
ReplyDeleteIn addition they should bring over a rethemed Mystic Manor for Asia and a rethemed Grizzly Mountain for Dinoland.
ReplyDeleteI agree with everything you both said.
ReplyDeleteExcept AVATAR. That has no place in Animal Kingdom.
There are much much much much much better and more relatable franchises they could use there instead.
It still amazes me that Disney hasn't figured out that Avatar will not fix Animal Kingdom. The park desperately needs something that is already successful. Bringing in the following rides will make this parks revenue skyrocket.
ReplyDelete1. Indiana Jones Ride
2. Mystic Manor
3. Journey to the Center of the Earth
When I was at the park in Jan. I said the same thing you did. That HUGE lake is a PERFECT spot for World of Color. It would do some much for the park:
ReplyDelete1) Finally give it a nighttime show. After 15 years, it needs something to keep people in the park at night.
2) It would draw people AWAY from Avatar once it finally opens since it is on the other side of the park. This land should hopefully get more people into the park and keep them there late into the evening.
3) It wouldn't scare any animals which is the reason the park never had a firework show.
If you have never seen World of Color in person, it is BY FAR, the best nighttime show Disney has ever done. Youtube videos do not do this show justice. World of Color would make this park a "must visit multiple times during our trip" type of park just to see this show.
This is what Animal Kingdom Should Do:
ReplyDelete1. Get Ride Of Avatarland
2. Add Journey To The Center of the Earth
3. Redo Dino land so it looks more real and less carnival
4. Add a Mystic Manor
5. Unique Sub ride with all under water creatures
6. World of Color, showing off all Disney(Animals) like lion king, jungle book and so on.
Wow, so many great ideas! Thank you very much for sharing! Here's a list of what we would personally love to see coming to Disney's Animal Kingdom (all just wishful thinking, of course...):
ReplyDelete1) AVATAR Land;
2) Australia;
3) Beastly Kingdom (in some way, shape, or form);
3) New theming and attractions for Dino-Rama;
4) An attraction similar to Mystic Manor.
5) A better Rafiki's Planet Watch.
6) A new nighttime show similar to World of Color (something without fireworks, due to the animals).
I just don't get Disney.
ReplyDeleteAnimal Kindom is an amazing park.
But it's guests think there is not enough to do (a opinion I don't share).
Their solution, a rollercoaster in and around a mountain. Very low capacity, hardly a story and fun for only a very small part of the customers that come to WDW. For the same money a splash mountain ride could have wowed guests, taking them trough an exciting trip trough India, the markets, towns, culture, tempels and in the end the Yeti. That would have helped guests comming to AK.
I also would love to see The living seas at Epcot being transplanted to Animal Kingdom in a new attraction/world with a focus on real and mythical sea creatures. Here is how it could go:
ReplyDeleteYou are in a Greek village. On the hills are goats and the village houses some small critters common to Greece. There are restaurants and shops and an excavation site where we find a huge temple with beautiful statues. As we enter the queue we find the inner parts of the beautiful temple with hints of Atlantis and mythical creatures like the Charybdis (a sea monster whose inhalations formed a deadly whirlpool), Hippocampi (sea creatures with the fore-parts of horses and the tails of fish), Hydra (a 7 headed, land and water-dwelling, serpent-like creature), etc.
In groups of about 30 guests we are welcomed by a excavator who tells us they are on the brink of an exciting discovery, the entrance to Atlantis! As he explains the legend of Atlantis and what we could expect he continue to search the in caved tomb like room when he finds a hidden lever. All torches dim and an entrance opens. Trough fog we see a beautiful city on the bottom of the sea. While our guide is very excited and explains us that because of the air pressure in the room the water can't come in, the Charybdis swims up in the distance and creates a water vortex (yep like expertly done at IOA). We enter trough the vortex and come in a huge domed glass room. All around us is the biggest sea aquarium in the world. This part is a hub and there are 3 glass tunnels to explore. You can go through a glass tunnel to check out the animals in the sea. You arrive in an Atlantis palaces room with widows showing the main aquarium but also smaller tanks. Atlantians give information where ever needed. This part is also visit able from the outside. The other glass tunnel brings you in a smaller temple room. It also had big windows into the main aquarium but it also has a Hercules show. This is a small production that isn't the retelling of the not so good animated movie but tells the story about Greece and it's heroic stories about Hercules and his fights with the imaginative mythical creatures. The show is funny but also informative and correct.
The third and last glass tube brings us to the ride. An e-ticket ride about the attack of Atlantis by horrible sea creatures. Our carriage takes us on a ride with a unique and new to develop character that is part boy part seahorse. In a ride combining the best of the Spiderman ride and Disney's real audio animatronics and scenes the boy shows us the beauty of the sea and Atlantis when we get attacked by a huge Hydra. We round up all sea creatures like dolphins, whales and lots of small fish to fight the Hydra back into a vulcano.
I just got tired of people saying they want copies of this or that in the park, why? This is Disney they sould make as much unique experiances as possible.
Don I'm actually happy with EE. In they never put in Everest I wouldn't be going, so at least it is a start!
ReplyDeletethis park needs Indiana Jones and Journey to the center of the Earth
ReplyDeleteThe park will never get Indiana Jones, they already have Dinosaur, Indiana will work much better in DHS
ReplyDeleteMy ideas on AK fixtures:
ReplyDelete1. Avatar mini-land consisting of the E-Ticket Avatar flying simulator attraction with the merchandise shop/Table service restaurant and have the rest of the land comprising of Indiana Jones or Beastly Kingdome
2. Austrailia/New Zealand area put north of Asia
3. Mystic Manor type ride put in Dinoland and have it themed to dinosaurs.
4. Journey to the Center of the Earth sub attraction on Discovery River
5. Spirit of Nature nighttime water show
6. More animals on jungle trek
7. If any spare room, dedicate it to the animal cartoon Disney movies that don't have much presence in the other Wdw parks like Jungle Book, Bambi, Tarzan, even UP (Paradise Falls setting)
How about letting the Chester and Hesters Midway games be part of the admission where each guest gets at least one free game
ReplyDeleteLast Anonymous, I was thinking the same thing about adding in Disney Movies, After All People Go To Disney To Mostly See Disney Characters. A Jungle Book dark ride or water ride would BLOW me away
ReplyDeleteAK should have a nice Shoot the Chutes Ride, maybe themed to Avatar or something else, but not Dinosaur, that would be like J. Park too much
ReplyDeleteEveryone has been suggesting a World of Color clone or something similar for the park. I don't see how it would work as WOC was installed in a lagoon lined entirely by concrete which made for an easier install for the show. I think it would be difficult for Disney to install such highly advanced technology in the middle of AK's lagoon. World of Color as it is wouldn't make much sense in AK anyway. Hopefully with the opening of Avatar Land, Disney will introduce an entirely new concept for nighttime entertainment.
ReplyDeleteI like the idea of a ride similar to Mystic Manor though. With the Avatar expansion already announced for AK, Disney should be putting money into Epcot and Hollywood Studios as they are the parks that need it the most.
Thanks for the update, by the way!
Thanks for the appraisal Paul. To the last anonymous, my idea for the Spirit of Nature nighttime water show would be constructed in my Mysterious Island concept and it would be in the center/middle of this area. Since we're talking about AK, I'd figure I'll drop some entertainment news in here. I've just been informed by a source who's closely associated with the Entertainment Management department at WDW that Mickey's Jammin Jungle Parade will be shut down and terminated by the end of this October. As you all are familiar, Eeyore is no longer greeting guests at AK anymore as the long line of eliminating characters there continues. In terms of Mickey's Jingle Jungle Parade, expect this to only be shown on weekends during the holiday season with one performance each day. Shifting towards MK entertainment, Festival of Fantasy from what I've been told will have 2 performances each day once it debuts until MSEP is ready to go after an extensive maintenance refurbishment of the floats. The Christmas wreaths that hang over Main Street USA will have to be taken down or reconfigured due to the large height of these new floats (26 units to be exact). For MK fireworks, by holiday season/Thanksgiving of 2016(MK's 45th anniversary),we will see a new fireworks spectacle take the high sky above Cinderella castle. Working blue sky title right now is "Dreams come Alive". Both of these projects will be headed by Steve Davison and his crew as he has stated on his facebook page periodically that he's dying to work some magic on a couple projects in WDW. So if you're complaining or upset about all the cutbacks in entertainment for the other parks (mainly DHS and AK), fear not as WDW/TDO are putting all their financial resources/marbles into these new MK projects and I guarantee you these new offerings will not disappoint. So long for now.
ReplyDeleteWOW, Anonymous! These great news you shared with us sound really great! Have you heard all of this from management or just some of those rumors (I've read about some of these things on WDWMagic and Theme Park Insider). Also, do you mind if we post these rumors on our home page?
ReplyDeleteThanks again!
I enjoy sharing info and am happy to contribute here OTPN Admin. I view these new upcomings as some good and some bad. Depressed and sad that Mickey's Jammin Jungle parade is leaving as well as Mickey's Jingle Jungle parade is likely to go bye bye. Slighest of slight possibility that Jingle Jungle comes out on holiday weekends. Again the big picture here is that TDO/George Kalogridis wants to allocate these financial resources toward Festival of Fantasy Day parade and Dreams come Alive fireworks spectacle for the MK. The other parks will have live/street entertainment similar to what New Fantasyland is offering. What I can say is that these new MK entertainment additions are going to be incredible and mind blowing. One more thing I screwed up on in my original post, the Christmas Garlands over main street will either have to be taken down or moved somewhere else due to the height of the new 26 Festival of Fantasy floats. In my original one, I said Christmas wreaths.
ReplyDeleteSo, yes you have my permission to post this on your home page. If I were you, I'd focus more on the AK parade(s) going away than Dreams Come Alive as that one is a little more blue sky but none the less is being considered. I have gotten this info from someone in Entertainment management, but sadly I can't reveal this source cause if I did, he/she would get in some trouble. Love your site btw.
thanks for the amazing photo updates--was having a rough day at work and home-logged on and saw this and it cheered me up-tks so much i really needed it--hope u get more and more pics of AK!!! its my fav park!
ReplyDelete