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“You need to find these rich environments that not only are intriguing to go into, but also reflect places that Disneyland supports,” he said. “Splash [Mountain] had so many things going for it. It could be part of the south, where we start with New Orleans [Square] and progress out to plantations. There’s a backwoods quality to Critter Country/ Bear Country, so that, and the music, and the characters, was all brewing in my head.”
Plus, Splash Mountain threw a lifeline to a small bit of Disneyland history. Imagineering repurposed a menagerie of Audio-Animatronic animals from “America Sings” — a patriotic Tomorrowland show on the chopping block — for the new ride’s interior elements.
Building Splash Mountain, though, turned out to be quite a challenge. Imagineering worked closely with O.D. Hopkins, a firm with experience developing log flume rides for other amusement parks, but cost-cutting efforts caused the project many delays and, ironically, budgets to soar.
During one test run, the climactic descent down Chick- A-Pin Hill left riders drenched. “I got soaking wet one day and had to go out and change my clothes,” Baxter told the Los Angeles Times in 1989. “The tradition of Disney is that nobody is ruled out. It’s a negative if somebody says, ‘You guys go. I don’t want to get all wet.’”
To solve this problem, Imagineering reduced the number of riders per log from eight to seven and even switched out the ride vehicles for lighter fiberglass models. Anything to cut down on the force of impact at the bottom of that watery briar patch.
Whatever problems Splash Mountain faced during development, Guests loved the finished product from the get-go. It proved so successful that planning soon began for a Walt Disney World version. That one opened in 1992 and, despite some minor changes (including fewer Audio- Animatronic characters and a more Frontierland-friendly color palette), it captured all of the excitement and charm of the Disneyland original.
Expedition Everest: Legend of the Forbidden Mountain
At Disney’s Animal Kingdom, Expedition Everest upped the ante even further. In 2006, Joe Rohde and his Imagineering team created the world’s tallest artificial mountain, one which houses a thrilling E-Ticket attraction that sends brave riders up (and back down) the Forbidden Mountain in search of the infamous Yeti. But nothing about this perilous journey goes as planned, as the rickety train
cars careen wildly forward and backward on this ill-fated misadventure.
Much like Walt Disney drew inspiration from the actual Matterhorn, Rohde and crew traveled to Nepal for an up- close immersion study of both the Himalayas and the cultural mythos of the Yeti. They initially considered setting the ride in Bhutan, even planning a Bhutanese palace for the attraction’s foreground. Eventually, though, Rohde switched gears to Nepal. To make it all as authentic as possible, Imagineering explored the upper Kali Gandaki Valley — visiting and photographing the villages of Kagbeni, Marpha, Jomsom, Thini, and Syang.
Armed with enough ideas for a lifetime, they returned home and set to work translating rough concepts into three-dimensional reality. Their first clay model proved much too large — and it took another twenty-two failed attempts before finalizing the design.
Before tackling Expedition Everest’s exterior, though, a quick tip of the hat for the interior’s engineering magic. Fitting both the ride system and 5,000 tons of structural steel inside the mountain was a logistical nightmare — and, ultimately, another Disney triumph. The elaborate frameworks don’t actually touch each other, though do come as close together as six inches in many places.
The outside, too, required an innovative workaround. The problem? Imagineering could not use traditional scaffolding around the mountainous exterior. They needed to accomplish two things simultaneously: (1) get close enough to the mountain’s surface to carve and shape the rocky crust, and (2) view the mountain’s details from a distance to better spot areas in need of additional plussing. Scaffolding might solve the former, but would only obscure Imagineering’s far-away view, resulting in a less-polished Forbidden Mountain.
To sidestep the issue altogether, they used 2,000 beams (which looked more like toothpicks sticking out of the mountain) to build a stable workspace that wouldn’t block the view. These beams jutted out about five feet, allowing Imagineers to lay down planking to create places to stand and work. Quasi-scaffolding, as it were.
From there, six-foot squares of the exterior were hung and covered in concrete. Lots and lots of concrete. In all, over 30,000 bags of the stuff were used on the project. And, before it all dried, they applied large pieces of aluminum foil to the concrete, removing them only after the foil had imparted a rougher facade to the mountain. Disney wasn’t
Photo © Garry Rollins
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