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DL Trip Report
April 19, 1998 |
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All photos were taken on an Olympus D-600L digital camera, at a resolution
of 1280x1024. This makes these photos the highest resolution and largest
size (in more way than one) on the Web!
The large pictures are quite large, but you'll find them to be worth the
download in many cases. A few were downsized, and some were edited in Photoshop
as well. But they're pretty raw, overall. Note that the large photos
are upwards of 300k! But they are well worth the download. I'll put a
to the lower-left of photos I think are first rate.
You can click on the thumbnails to see the
larger pictures!
I arrived at the park at around 6:20. I noticed, after taking
the Katella exit from north I-5, that there were signs pointing you in many
directions for DL parking. Including a right turn onto Clementine (Grand
Hotel?), and also a right, instead of straight (to West St.) at the Harbor
intersection. Weird.
I was in the park at about 6:30. It was time to make my rounds.
Tomorrowland
Since there wasn't much sunlight left, I decided to check out as much
of TL as possible, to get in all the pictures I could. The Rocket Rods were,
of course, being tested. But nothing was open except for Redd Rockett's.
I passed on this-- I went there last time, and I was in the mood for a croissant
sandwich at Cafe Orleans instead (where they don't give me my MKC discount
anymore.. growl..)
Above: You can see the Rocket Rods spire above, from the TL entrance
side, then looking at it from the other side. It sure seems kind of 70's
to me..
Above: The mural above the Premiere Shop (which was closed) is coming
along. The sun (right??) is cool, and the photo on the right is absolutely
stunning (IMHO).
Back to the Rocket Rods for a minute. They were testing quite a few..
I don't count anymore. One of them (with an older gentleman, whom I assume
is an Imagineer, riding) was playing a very cool space-like sound effect
as it took off and returned. It also made a weird but pleasant beeping sound
every once in a while. Cool!! Once again, no rides for me ; - (


Above: An awesome photo of Space Mountain's new paint job. I
assume it's still not done but it looks GREAT. This is my new desktop background!
The metallic effect is neat!

Above: Speaking of metallic effects, in this nice shot of Innoventions,
you can see they've added a similar effect to the upper ring of the building.
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Top Left: This is the cool new Monorail sign that is at the base
of the speed ramps. I didn't get to ride since the monorail went 101.
Top Right: The even cooler new Monorail sign in the day time..
Bottom Right: .. and a very poor shot of it at night. It kind
of has a roller coaster of neon shoot around it, then it makes a monorail
in the center of that sun thing (you can see that in this shot, just not
very well). |
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Above: Later that night, I took this shot of the Astro Orbitor.
A bit blurry, but neat.
Fantasyland
Above: I got my first close-up look at the new Fantasyland Theater
(aka Mammary Mountain). It looks pretty high tech but BOY IS IT AN EYESORE!


Above: The monorail (broken still I think) heads past the Matterhorn
at dusk. A great shot.
Toontown
Note that I'm not telling this story in order of where I went. I hit
Toontown then proceeded to wander all over the park, though I didn't take
anymore pictures except for the one of Main Street (below). I rode Indy,
Space Mountain, Pirates, the DLRR, and saw the end of Fantasmic from the
gallery (I'm there for dessert one of these days!). One note of Pirates:
Pirate hat's off to WDI for an excellent update, which happened this winter.
They completely darkened the first drop, added super lighting effects, and
finally got some good fog in the ship battle scene. It was amazingly realistic!
Plus they fixed up that pirate battle on top of the fort. One thing I thought
was strange was no music in some scenes after that. Weird.
Left: The new "freeze shop" (forget it's official name)
sells $6 (!!) slurpee-like things in big plastic bottles.
Right: I never noticed this before, but it sure was funny looking,
so I snapped it.


Above: Anybody notice something missing? Guess it finally gave
way and the cab plunged to the ground ; - )
And
Finally...

Above: Dusk on Main Street USA. It was a beautiful night. Too
bad I had to leave.
Well, that's it-- I hope you liked it! I'll be there 100% for
sure on May 22nd (or earlier if those Rocket Rods soft open) so look for
many more photos in the next month or two!
All content and pictures are ©1998 Jeff
Keller and are for personal use ONLY! If you want to reproduce these
for any other use, permission from the author is required!