Trip Report: Animal Kingdom
Reedy Creek I. D., Florida - 11/18/2003

"Always inspect the theater before the show starts!"

Before long, it became apparent that the crowd was racing for the Evil Fastpass machines at the entrance to the safari ride that takes customers out to see the animals. In television ads, Disney has coined the adjective, "nahtazu" to describe Animal Kingdom. And that's a fairly apt way to put it. The park is animal themed, but real, live animals are far from center stage at the park. They are on display at the back of the park, but generally not from the midways. The midways are made of carefully cracked concrete, canopied with a lush tree cover. I'm not certain what all the themes are, but the deeper into the park I got, the deeper the jungle got, though the village wasn't entirely primitive. A series of utility poles holding a tangle of way too many wires is evidence of the rural electrification.

It didn't appear that Kali River Rapids was ready to go, and I wasn't exactly interested in getting drenched, so I went on around the corner, and visited Discovery Island in the center of the park. In the center of the island is the enormous Tree of Life, covered with animal sculptures. Oddly enough, it's a man-made tree. It doesn't appear to contain any cookie-baking elves, but the tree is hollow, and under the center is a movie theater. It's a 3D-format movie theater, and like all movie theaters in Orlando, it's one where you are best to carefully inspect your seat and the theater before sitting down. The feature is a film called, "It's Tough To Be a Bug." I missed "A Bug's Life", which means I don't know the ant who was hosting the show, but it was a neat show anyway, apart from the unfortunate appearance of Claire de Rume. Disney just has to get four of the five senses involved 8x( .

When the show was over, I stepped across a bridge from which I could see in the distance the earthmoving equipment being used for the construction of the new mountain roller coaster. I think it's the only major construction in any Disney park not carefully concealed behind an 8' tall wooden barrier!

Well, you remember how Disney built a whole park out in California themed around...uh...California? They did it again. This time, they built a Florida-style roadside tourist trap right in the middle of the biggest roadside tourist trap in Florida! It's Chester and Hester's Dino-Rama, which features a gigantic orange dinosaur, an assortment of carnival games, TriceraTop Spin, Disney's fourth Roto-Jet-type ride (there are three in the Magic Kingdom), and of course, Primeval Whirl, a pair of off-the-shelf Reverchon spinning mouse coasters. Oddly enough, there are two of these coasters, but only one was operating. Well, that's not entirely true. Both coasters were operating, but only one was carrying passengers. In fact...this is the really odd part...the second coaster appeared to be totally abandoned, with no operators or attendants around, nor passengers riding, yet the ride was running continuously.

The ride is decorated with whimsical cartoons depicting dinosaurs trying to escape the inevitable meteorite which is about to wipe them from the face of the planet. The cars are decked out with old radios and automobile parts to make them look like mini time machines. And of course the whole thing gives a very familiar Spinning Mouse ride. I said hello to the r.r-c people in attendance (I remember specifically chatting with Ansleys and Westlands, but they were not the only ones...) and took a ride.

I guess I kind of approached this backwards, because technically I should have first gone to the Dino Institute. Across the street from Chester & Hester's Dino-Rama is the Dino Institute, a structure which could pass for a respected museum and visitor's center. It's a columned concrete structure with a fountain out front and a recreated dinosaur skeleton on the front lawn. I'm having trouble thinking of a specific example at the moment, but I've been in a fair number of places over the years that match this facade almost exactly, apart from the Evil (but today disused) FastPass machines and the waiting time board over the door. It looks like a museum lobby on the inside as well, but with a queue maze which goes back into the research portion of the institute. An overly enthusiastic researcher explains how we will be tracking, and hopefully catching, a particular dinosaur he is interested in, in clear violation of the safety guidelines established by the institute's more respectable scientists. Something about the timing of a meteorite impact which will wipe out most life on Earth. We proceed downstairs and queue up to ride in oversized Land Rover type slot-car vehicles which were apparently adapted from Disneyland's Indiana Jones attraction. The vehicle bumps and jerks noisily along the perfectly smooth pavement and up a ramp (something like a lift hill) through a tunnel and back several million years through time. This deposits us in a dinosaur-infested forest. Our vehicle bounces and rattles through the forest, stopping a couple of times to be accosted by a dinosaur or two, invariably not the particular dinosaur we're looking for. An alarm sounds to indicate that we had better get moving before the meteorite hits, and our search for the particular dinosaur is abandoned. He does show up just seconds before we make the time jump back to the Dino Institute, and on exiting the unloading platform we can see on security monitors that indeed, the dinosaur made it back with us, and was creating a bit of a ruckus. A neat extension of the "show". On the whole, though, it's a pretty mediocre ride. Why was such an elaborate ride vehicle needed to bounce around in the dark for a few minutes? Indiana Beach used to have a dark ride that did that! No dinosaurs, but hey, the ones in Disney's primeval forest are mostly lurking in the shadows anyway. I exited through the museum gift shop, and exited the grounds of the institute. This took me onto the grounds of Chester and Hester's Dino-Rama and through another gift shop, then back out to the road past the tourist trap. I opted for another ride on Primeval Whirl, then headed out to the park gates. After all, my primary goal for the day had been to visit Epcot!

--Dave Althoff, Jr.

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