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Disney’s Animal Kingdom

Image: DisneyI sincerely hope that you didn’t waste your outrage before now because I’m about to set you off. While I adore Pandora – The World of Avatar for its sublime theming, I believe that people have the pecking order of the rides backwards. Yes, I’m serious.

Avatar Flight of Passage

Image: DisneyI realize that you wouldn’t look at me any angrier right now if I implied that your mother is overweight and promiscuous. I feel pretty strongly about this one, though.

Even this long after its debut, Avatar Flight of Passage still maintains its status as one of the top five rides at Walt Disney World. And it currently has the longest wait of anything. You’ll feel lucky when you spend less than two hours in line for it.

I’m not questioning the greatness of Avatar Flight of Passage. If you love it, that’s wonderful. For me, it’s not “Soarin’ on steroids” like cast members love to say. It’s an augmented reality motorcycle simulator that happens to take place in the sky. I certainly like it better than another famous flight mimicry ride, Peter Pan’s Flight, and it’s on a par with Soarin’ for me. I don’t view it as so much better than I’m willing to wait twice as long to ride it, though.

Na’Vi River Journey

Image: DisneyI’m just going to say it. I like Na’Vi River Journey better than Avatar Flight of Passage. You can clutch your pearls in outrage all you want, but I stand behind this decision. I love Disney boat rides, and I also prefer anything that is slow and indoors, as demonstrated with a couple of my other underrated ride opinions.

Na’Vi River Journey represents the height of Disney’s current boat ride technology, with a stunning Audio-Animatronic at the end. Along the way, you’ll feel like you’re an imperiled visitor on Pandora due to the brilliant combination of digital screens and artfully crafted set pieces. It’s a more immersive ride experience than Avatar Flight of Passage, which matters to me.

I fully understand that others might not feel that way, but I’m more familiar with virtual reality than most. So, it doesn’t impress me in and of itself. On the other hand, Na’Vi River Journey has become the latest in a long line of rides of its ilk. So, it faces a lot of comparative competition. I’m deeply impressed that it stands up so well in the face of Disney’s storied history of boat rides.

 
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Comments

Yeah, Im gonna be the person that calls you out about Flight of Passage. And to use the arguement immersive is astounding. The river journey is sitting in a boat surrounded by a lot of pretty colors. Dont get me wrong, its gorgeous to look at but tends to have a decent wait for it too and I would not choose to wait nor wasted a fast pass on it. If the wait time is low then yes. As for Flight of Passage, anyone with more than two brain cells fast passes that ride. Judging by the 2 hour waits, not a lot of people fit that bill. When I first rode this ride I was in awe like a kid in a candy store. It is so visualling stunning, my eyes could never pick just one place to look. Its like the beauty of the river journey but zipping through it on the back of a banshee. You dip, soar, twist and turn on the back of your banshee. Which breathes by the way. The machine freaking breathes! It doesnt get anymore immersive than that. Soarin' could never. Lets be real, Avatar was only as successful as it was because of the beauty of its world and people. Definitely not the plot. You want to feel like you really are flying through all of that beautiful landscape on the back of banshee, you ride this ride. It transports you of Disney, out of Florida, out of this world.

Great picks! You're not the only one who find Flight of Passage less than amazing. I was much more emotionally involved in Universal's giant screen ride "Back to the Future." And Peoplemover doesn't get enough credit for being a multi-sensory journey that cruises around/through Tomorrowland just like the monorail sailing through the Contemporary Resort. I also love Gran Fiesta Tour but might give EPCOT's most underrated ride award to Living with the Land, a ride that never fails to delight. Thanks for this thoughtful list!

Disney has slowed down Space Mountain at least 9 times, and the ride is not as dark as it used to be. I know this because I used to be a vendor at Disney and one of the ride engineers told me that. Put the ride back to it's original speed and darken the room and watch people love it again. The problem with doing that is this is the Magic Kingdom. They slowed the ride down and lightened the room because people were complaining it was "too fast and scary".

I FIND EVERYTHING AND ANYTHING PERFECT AT DISNEY

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