The Fabulous Disney Babe
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This week Michelle continues her look at Disneyland's never-built land - Discovery Bay
Travels Through Time: The De-Evolution of a Disney Attraction
Travels Through Time, also known as The Lost World and several other names, was to have been a boat ride, through which guests traveled through time and saw dinosaurs.
In September of 1976, it was planned as a multi-level E-ticket ride with layer upon layer of huge special effects. By October of 1976, it had be revised into an single-level E-ticket, with limited special effects. I don't know the reason behind the de-evolution of this particular attraction. It was probably monetary, or, possibly, the first version was just overkill.
Most of the attractions Disney creates morph time and time again from blank paper to opening day, and even then some.
The largest de-evolution, barring entire lands being cancelled, would probably be The Indiana Jones Adventure. In one working vision of the attraction, it would actually be a three-in-one: People would take the jeep into the attraction, where they would be split up, with some of the guests taking a mine-car roller coaster out of the attraction, and the rest working their way out of a creepy maze. Jungle cruise boats would motor through the temple of Mara, and even passengers on the Disneyland Railroad could catch a glimpse of the terrors of the temple as they rode by.
The final product is much less, but nevertheless an E-Ticket attraction. This was also the thinking of the Travels redo; make people's minds boggle so they'd eagerly rip their E-Ticket out of their ticket book and get back in the two-hour line.
Both versions start out at a house, in a boat decked out with all sorts of simple Victorian gadgetry. Both queues are lined with storytelling devices: maps, copies of reports on the various animals and ages guests would probably see later in the ride. One version, the September version, relied heavily on the 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea story, the other did not. In the first version, the boat would start off, with a live guide who had disappeared by the time the October version was released. The guide would inform passengers that there were two ways to The Lost World, a safe way, and a dangerous way, and that we were going to take the safe way. I wonder what's going to happen next?
Suddenly, Something Goes Terribly Wrong!
Just as the boat reaches the fork in the river, the current suddenly rises and forces it toward the dangerous way! After rushing through all sorts of scary rocks and rapids, the boat enters an opening in a rock wall ahead. The guide tells passengers that they are still heading to the Lost World, albeit by the more dangerous route. Once inside the darkened cave, the boat suddenly drops down into the inky blackness. When the guide turns on the spotlight, we are greeted by the bones of less-fortunate adventurers who have tried and failed to enter the Lost World this way. The light goes out, we go over another dark waterfall, and are deposited into an underground cave. The walls look like volcanic or coral rock, held up with rusty, leaking steel plates, some of which are really shooting out water, as if about to break. Through ingeniously-created windows, guests would see exotic and colorful fish and other coral reef creatures, signifying that they are underwater. The guide explains that Captain Nemo had the steel walls placed there for the safety of boats trying to reach the Lost World, but years of neglect and the corrosion of the sea water were eating away at the walls, and they might give at any time. Fortunately, the boat exits the cave and passes a creaking, bulging airlock door that looks as if it is about to give way.
Suddenly, Something Goes Terribly Wrong!
After guests are out of sight of the airlock door, it is heard creaking, then bursting apart, and a torrent of water pours into the cave the boat is now in. The force of the water pushes us toward another fork in the river, one side black, the other, a weird, glowing blue. Here guests see phosphorescent pools, swirling with colors under the ice. As we move on, they find ancient tombs and Viking ships frozen under the glowing ice. Cavemen have been frozen so quickly under the ice that their mammoth hunt is like a photograph. The ice is beginning to melt, so the boat must move on. Passing through a wall of steam, the boat enters Lost World, land of the dinosaurs. Huge butterflies and lush greenery greet the visitors, and the guide shows them ruins of a modern-looking civilization, telling them that Captain Nemo had no explanation for it. As they round the bend in the river, the guide informs passengers that they are almost in sight of the house and will be disembarking shortly.
Suddenly, Something Goes Terribly Wrong!