It's all very civilised, seated only thankfully.
Onto DisneySea, "second gate" parks at Disney resorts worldwide are a mixed bag. Few of them are genuinely great parks in their own right, with generally relatively little to do compared with "castle" parks. On recent trips I've avoided researching parks I visit, something that travelling with seasoned veterans allows me to get away with. As a result I didn't really know what to expect from DisneySea, unlike most of the other major parks on the trip, though obviously I went in aware of its exemplary reputation.
DisneySea opened around the same time as WDS in Paris, but that's pretty much where the similarities end. DisneySea is, without any doubt, the most visually stunning park I've ever seen. From the entrance through Mediterranean Harbor (sic) with it's views of the centrepiece Mount Promethius to Port Discovery with the giant sea gates, seemingly leaking water from the ocean beyond (whereas in fact the monorail and service roads are between the park and sea, dropped down out of view). For me the highlight is the Jules Verne inspired area within Mount Promethius itself, and home to the park's standout and unique E-ticket attraction - Journey to the Centre of the Earth.
Due to my lack of research, I knew little to nothing about any of the park's dark rides - I knew the park had a version of Cali's Indiana Jones though as I've not done the original Disneyland that's all I knew about it. I also knew the park housed a local interpretation of Tower of Terror. I was entirely unaware of the existence of both Journey to the Centre of the Earth and the nearby 20000 Leagues under the Sea.
As with 'land next door, the park was extremely busy for the entirety of our 1 1/2 days we spent there. We benefited slightly from fastpass and SRQs where available and made full use of the opening hours, but the ride count was limited. I think on the whole we did OK, but waiting in excess of 30 minutes to get a drink is a bit of a misery, and many rides maintained queue times of 100 minutes or more (more like 180 min in the case of Toy Story Mania, even hitting 60 minutes by 8.03am, as I found on the final morning when I got up early to ride it). As is the case with a lot of Disney parks, the number of major rides is relatively low compared with the number of guests, and with the fastpass allocations being so high it means that queues aren't able to soak up the number of guests they were designed to, which makes the park feel much busier than it might otherwise.
What of the rides though? As you'd expect with Disney, the park excels in terms of dark rides. Journey was a clear stand-out for me. The atmosphere is set from the moment you enter the intricate queue line and is carried all the way through the pre show (this is how to do lifts, Merlin) to the phenomenal station area and onto the ride itself. It's not a particularly long ride, but it packs quite a bit in - I'm not going to spoil the experience here though, as it's best to go in not knowing what's coming!
20000 leagues is a "submarine" ride, though unlike Atlantis at legoland there's no actual water involved (they make a good effort of deceiving you though!)
Tower of Terror has a unique storyline - set in Hotel Skytower, the owner of which is an avid explorer and collector who by some subterfuge has ended up in the possession of a cursed idol. I missed the full details of the story as a non-native speaker, however the ride itself is much tamer than the Parisian version, yet they still felt the need to add 3-point seatbelts in place of the lap belts used on every other version of the ride - presumably they think the locals are too timid?
Indiana Jones was probably the ride I was most anticipating, having never ridden the Californian version, and it certainly didn't disappoint. I'm a fan of the ride system anyway (also used on Dinosaur in Florida), but Indi takes it to the next level as the vehicle speeds round attempting to avoids the various booby traps that Indi's adventures inevitably subject him to. A great ride, made better by the existence of an SRQ that's barely used resulting in minimal waits.
Toy Story Mania is basically the same as Florida's even down to the excessive queue time. It's an interactive dark ride - next!
Aquatopia is an early foray by Disney into trackless dark rides, though it's not actually a dark ride - rather a large shallow lake on which ride vehicles travel around subjecting riders to various water features. I think the wetness can be tailored according to season, we got off rather soggy.
Nemo & Friends Searider is pretty much an underwater version of Star Tours featuring Nemo characters in a much larger simulator. Not really much to say about it!
Sindbad was closed during our visit for scheduled maintenance.
One area the park does not excel in is its coasters - the park has just 2, Raging Spirits is basically a reskinned Temple du Peril, only with much longer queues (partially due to it only loading 1 train at a time rather than 2 as in Paris), the main difference though is the presence of multiple trims round the layout that totally neuter the ride. The one is Paris isn't exactly phenomenal, but this one is unforgivably bland - tamed for the local market(!). The other coaster is a junior Togo of no real significance, think a slightly less refined Vekoma Jr and you wouldn't be far off. There's also a Little Mermaid area home to half the Zamperla catalogue, and a few other carousel style rides dotted round the park, but I think I've covered the most important stuff.
In terms of shows, we only watched Fantasmic, which having seen the version in Florida was something I was fairly familiar with, though it's a bit easier here as it's just set on the main lake rather than in an amphitheatre so there's no worry about queuing to get in. I didn't really pay much attention to what other shows there were, as it's not really my thing.
As an overall package, it's an absolutely phenomenal park with 2 or 3 incredible rides. I'd probably rank it as one of my favourite parks, but the crowds and relatively low number of rides prevent it from troubling my top 2 of Europa and Cedar Point. I'd have enjoyed it more if I'd felt able to take it at a slightly slower pace and fully explore properly, without feeling time-stressed despite very long opening hours. Both parks at TDR are currently undergoing expansion, whether or not that helps with the crowds at all remains to be seen but either way the resort seems set to improve. I think on the whole it's already my favourite of the 3 Disney resorts I've done, mainly on account of how much better DisneySea is as a 2nd park to any other non-castle parks, but with bonus points for Ikspirai and the self contained resort arrangement. I'd certainly be up for a return visit in a few years when some new developments have opened, but it's not an immediate priority as there's still a lot on my to-do list - next summer, East and central US!
