We finally make it to the park itself.
It is amazing. I think it may be my favorite park scenery-wise, and I've been to all but Paris and Hong Kong. The detailing on the volcano, the centerpiece of the park, is amazing. Hardened lava flows that look real, small plants trying to grow between the cracks, and various vents spewing steam. It even erupts every so often! You can see the volcano, Mount Prometheus, from everywhere, of course. For a map of the park layout, click here. There is a Cape Cod area, a New York City area that reminds me greatly of Studios, a Mermaid Lagoon, a fortress area, a Jules Verne style Mysterious Island, and a Mediterranean Harbor. Gorgeous!
Disney Sea has a hotel next door, the Hotel MiraCosta. This hotel is built into the park. The wall of what looks like Mediterranean shops and houses along the water in this picture is actually the back of the hotel, and the upper windows are windows into guests' hotel rooms. There is also a restaurant inside the hotel that looks out over the water, Oceano, and a balcony area guests of the hotel can watch the evening show from. The hotels here are very expensive, and while I would have loved to spend a night in the MiraCosta, it was just not worth the extra expense.
Back to the p
ark. Luckily for us there aren't that many people there this day. We walked all around the fortress in the front of the Mysterious Island port, which has many old style inventions and interesting things. There are cannons that "shoot" and can even "misfire", an observation tower, a pendulum clock, and DaVinci's flying machine that you can sit in and pedal so the wings flap. The fortress is built into the volcano, and is the area in front of the volcano with the golden roofed buildings in the first picture. The second panoramic picture of the harbor is taken from in the fortress. This part is more of a historical place to walk through and learn about some interesting theories and discoveries, made by past scientists. Magellan's restaurant is in the fortress, and there is a map for children (and adults, though we didn't partake) to get stamps for visiting each of the discoveries.We headed into the Mysterious Island, inside of the volcano area to see the
two major rides here, 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea and Journey to the Center of the Earth. Both of these are based on novels by Jules Verne. We grabbed a Fast Pass for one, waited in line for the other, and ate at Volcania, a "buffeteria" restaurant, which is what they call a la carte restaurants in Tokyo Disney-ese. This is a Chinese restaurant built into the volcano, cooking the food through geothermal heating from the volcano, according to the storyline. The quickservice food places here are cheaper and have somewhat better quality food than the ones in the US. While I wouldn't say the Chinese food there was my favorite, it was all very good and a good value.20,000
Leagues Under the Sea has great theming and the water effects are great. Journey to the Center of the Earth goes through many of the major areas of the under the crust lands found in the book. Both are of course in Japanese, though most of the signage in the queue and elsewhere is in English, sometimes but not always with Japanese translations.
The Cape Cod area is very authentic. I can't say too much about the rest of them, but this one is definitely true to life! The architecture style, the lighthouse, the boats in the harbor, the vegetation and landscape - it all screams New England. Well, everything but the menu (click to see closeup):
Continuing though the American Waterfront area, you get to the Tower of Terror. Yup, there's one everywhere! In the American Disney parks, the Tower of Terror is T
he Twilight Zone Tower of Terror, and it is based on the show as well as the Disney Channel movie about the little girl and other people in the elevator. Here in Japan, The Twilight Zone is not understood, so they had to change the theming so the guests would enjoy the ride. Here is another ride where we didn't understand what was said, but the visual cues are enough to figure out what's going on. That and most of the props are in English. Basically, a rich guy, Mr. Hightower, collects artifacts from around the world, and really likes mystical artifacts. He is warned not to keep a statue, but takes it anyway. The statue curses him and makes the elevator fall. I think the drops are better than the American ones. I love the fact that the Imagineers were able to make the storyline so different from the American ones while keeping the thrill ride the same.Stay tuned for Part II!
No comments:
Post a Comment