It's what Tomorrowland should have
been at Disneyland
While Disney has been building and opening
the California Adventure park in Anaheim, the Oriental Land Company has
been working on a new Disney park clear on the other side of the world,
in Japan.
Like it's new California cousin,
Tokyo DisneySea park resides next door to the existing Disneyland park.
The similarity ends there however, because Tokyo DisneySea is not like
any park in California, or even the world. The Oriental Land Company has
broken the mold with a theme park full of detailing so incredible it can
easily be compared to -- if not surpass -- some of the most expensive
and richly themed hotels in Las Vegas, such as the Venetian and Bellagio.
MousePlanet is extremely pleased to
offer you the following photos, taken by Todd Meigan*, over a recent
weekend during a soft opening of the park. Todd is a regular contributor
to our MousePad discussion boards, and is our very own Tokyo insider. We
hope Todd's photos will give you an idea of the sheer wonderment and
amazement of the new park.
Part Eight: Port Discovery I
Text by Al Lutz
Before I start
today's tour, I just want to give a thank you to fellow MousePlaneteer
Lani Teshima - she was kind enough to help in obtaining the photos for
this series, and she organized them for me before sending them on for
the processing and layout. Thanks to her work with our photographer
Todd, (who we all thank yet again) we have this wonderful photo tour to
share with you.
We've gawked at the
Mediterranean Harbor and Fortress Explorations, we've hung out with
Mermaids in their Lagoon, and both Aladdin (on the Arabian Coast) and
Indy (in the Lost River Delta) got visited. That leaves three areas of
the DisneySea park we haven't been to yet, Mysterious Island, American
Waterfront / Cape Cod, and Port Discovery.
Looking at our
guide map - it turns out that right next door to the Lost River Delta is
Port Discovery. So let's make the jaunt over in that direction. As you
can see in our introductory photo (above) they have taken a whole
different approach here than in the other areas, sort of a retro
Tomorrowland look. The shot is taken from the Disney Steamer Line off
shore, looking into the area.
(Again, a quick
note about the photos you will be looking at - a few of these shots were
taken at dusk, and were originally very dark. I've done some work on
them to lighten them up so you can see the details - but that may mean
that some of the colors could be a bit off from what the actual location
may look like.)
The following three
photos are blow-ups of the shot above - the first shows Stormchaser (a
new attraction, apparently it uses both buildings)...
...in the middle of
the photo below you can see a red Aquatopia vehicle, think Motor Boats
with a water obstacle course, and you have an idea of what this is...
...and finally to
the right is a shot of the Aquatopia tower and loading area. Kind of a
Fritz Lang Metropolis look isn't it?
Below is the
Stormrider attraction at dusk...
...the shot above
(thanks to its high resolution) allows us to get close-ups of some of
the areas within it...
...even the
lighting fixtures are varied, some looking like globes, others
reflecting off a suspended panel, even others looking like futuristic
palm trees. Note the cool radar and other radio type antennas at the top
of the buildings. Even the aluminum banners are out of this world.
Below is a close-up
of the adjacent building...
... and then we
take a closer look at the entry ramp area below - that's Tokyo Bay out
there from what I understand.
CONTINUED
