Motor Boat Cruise, May 1978
Ah, the simple pleasures of the Motor Boat Cruise! Sit in your sporty fiberglass boat, lean back, and relax. Fall asleep if you prefer, it won't make any difference - except that you'll miss some pretty scenery along the way.
I really like this first photo; it's like the photographer managed to get a nice composition in spite of him/herself. The trio of boats, with the yellow Peoplemover overhead and a sub or two in the background all add up to some grade "A" fun. I'm not sure I ever noticed the light on the bow of these boats; is it half green, half red?
I should have probably posted this one first, but it's too dark. So strange to see Space Mountain in the distance, it shows up so rarely on GDB!
27 comments:
Major-
Both of these are nice images. And as you say - bonus points for capturing the venerable Space Mountain. It appears as if the name of the boat is "Alice", or perhaps "Lice". (I'm hoping it is indeed Lice-!)
Thanks, Major.
Very, very nice shots of an attraction I really miss. Yes, the boats always had port/starboard directional lights on the bows. You wouldn't want to miss the dock now, would you?! ;)
It’s possible that the boat lights , like the PeopleMover mean “green” light means the guest boarding side and “red” running lights mean non-boarding side. So in this case green might mean Dockside.
The lights shown here are correct for real-world nautical operations. The starboard (right) side is always green and the port (left) side is always red.
I love the guy's striped shirt. It just seems to fit on a sailor.
Nanook, the boat's name was actually A Lice. Walt was a stickler for definite articles.
I had some fun recently trying to trace the routes of the Fantasyland and Tomorrowland Autopias and seeing how they interacted in comparison to today's ride. The Motor Boat Cruise added another layer to that - I never realized that it had two tracks before. And then you have the Subs below and the Peoplemover and Monorail above... man, that's good theme park design!
The motor boats were a calming area yet with all the activities in view. Just turn to your right and another mountain comes into view. Minus points for no monorail.
I thought the stripes fit in well,too.
I can't see the green and red well so I guess we'll just have to crash into the dock.
Thanks Major
Dz
Nanook, I always hoped to get the “Deer Tick” boat, but was often disappointed. That’s why, in every photo of me at Disneyland, I am crying.
Anonymous, honestly, until I scanned these pictures, I had never noticed the bow lights at all. But that’s par for the course for me!
Mike Cozart, I sure have no idea why those lights are there, so your theory is as good as any.
Chuck, for some reason it makes me smile to know that they added that little detail of the red and green lights to this ride that ran on a rail. They just knew that it looked good, especially at night.
Andrew, I sure never thought about the Motor Boats having more than one track, very interesting. I wish I could find a clearer diagram of how the tracks were arranged depending on the direction of the boats.
dzacher, those Monorails were fast, you can’t expect them to be in every photo! As it is you get the boats, the subs, the Peoplemover, and the Skyway, a pretty good selection.
Sure, let the kid drive. It was all fun and games until she revved the motor, headed for the bank and did her best impression of the "Live and Let Die" boat chase! They should have never let her watch that movie when it came on TV! YOU try acting like nothing's wrong while climbing out of a boat sitting directly on the walking path...Security was NOT amused.
I always love the motorboat pictures. Glad you don't have any with the awful plywood cutouts of Afternoon Avenue or whatever that was called that disfigured the banks on my last ride.
Seconding Chuck on the lights, the protocol is similar for planes, but has a maritime origin. The PeopleMover versions were probably just carrying on the tradition. Another instance of Disney using real-world components to add verisimilitude to the Park.
Also, there are a lot of "i"'s in verisimilitude.
Thanks Major!.
JG
Mississippi Verisimilitude:
The 4-“i’s” to see
The Mississippi bayou
In the POTC
@Chuck - A perfect explanation. If you would like to become a nautical know it all on lights, check out this website https://www.marineinsight.com/marine-navigation/understanding-the-importance-of-marine-navigation-lighting/ Scroll about 3/4 way down and it will explain how the ship will appear at night.
You will also notice this light combination above the entrance to the Mark Twain and Columbia, just above the turnstile, and other places throughout Disneyland.
Always your pal,
Amazon Belle
I thought a verisimilitude was a bug. I stand corrected.
My mom taught me to spell Mississippi, m i crooked letter crooked letter i, crooked letter crooked letter i, humpback humpback i. She was never wrong.
Dz
I was so busy trying to decide which of the people mover segments I wanted to get in that I didn't notice the skyway bucket in the distance. Now I'm torn. Or I am hyperventilating breathing through a mask.
These have turned out to be great scans!
Dz
DZ, it is also a bug, but remember what the Major always tells us - this is a family blog.
Here's my guess on how the two Motor Boat tracks were arranged. This is going to be useful when I'm trying to get into college, right?
Major, it's little details like that light that made people fall in love the Park. That and free toilet paper.
Andrew, that first photo you posted is one of my all-time favorite Disneyland aerials. Not only is it an interesting angle taken in sharp focus, it's a great reference for the Park from an interesting period in its development, just before the big expansion projects that started in the early '60s and continued through the opening of Bear Country in 1972. Much of what we see there is now gone or significantly altered. And I always enjoy a look at the original Monorail shed (the first of three).
As one guy that never actually rode the ride to another guy that never actually rode the ride, your guess about the Motor Boat tracks looks pretty reasonable to me.
Weren't there bouys along the route that the motor boats travelled? There is a system of colors and numbering for them in the 'real' world, so I wonder if Disney carried through on that detail too. I took an elective class back in high school (50 plus years ago) (yikes) and had a fairly good handle on that stuff, but only had need to use that knowledge once since. Been a long time. It seems to me if they got the lights correct, the bouys would be too.
W
Warren, looking at photos and a brief snippet of video, it appears that they did make an effort to use logically-marked buoy markers whenever possible. I think there were a few places where they had to get creative (which way is "upstream" in a pond?), but in general it looks right.
stu29573, while mom is driving the boat like James Bond in “Live and Let Die”, I would be cussing up a storm like Sheriff J.W. Pepper!
JG, I believe it was called “Electric Avenue”, by Eddy Grant. (Bad 80’s reference). I actually wouldn’t mind photos of Gummy Glenn because I don’t have any, and because it would be interesting to have pictures of such a disgraceful, cheapo addition. Paul Pressler strikes! Verisimilitude is a good word, almost as good as perspicacious (even though that word only has two i’s).
Lou and Sue, I’m not sure if that’s a haiku, but whatever it is, I approve.
Matthew, first of all you have to wear a captain’s cap at all times, like Thurston Howell III. I see that you have already begun your research and training, and soon it will be time to life the red-hot iron pot with your forearms, forever burning dragon scars, and marking you as a Shaolin Monk. Wait, what were we talking about again? I never noticed those lights above the entrance to the Mark Twain and Columbia entrance, time to go to the archives!
dzacher, some say verisimilitude is a bug, but to be more exact it is an amphibian.
dzacher, I think I would take the Peoplemover, given the choice, but the beauty is that you CAN’T LOSE either way.
Lou and Sue, I am too young and innocent to understand.
Andrew, the link didn’t work for me!
Chuck, are you telling me that I shelled out ten buck for Disneyland toilet paper when I should have gotten in for FREE? Vintage aerial views of the park are awesome, and I agree, that one from Daveland is amazing. There’s Holidayland! Is Andrew’s link working for you? Am I cursed because of that ancient burial ground that I built my mansion on?
Warren Nielsen, I remember buoys, but don’t remember colors. Or wee there lights on them too? Maybe at night. You had an elective high school class on boats? Sounds pretty fun. Were you planning on a career that involved the sea? Maybe you were going to be a genuine Mississippi steamboat captain.
Chuck, now I am wondering if the “pond” actually had a directional flow of some kind, however subtle?
Major, yes, Andrew's link worked for me - even the part where I had to type in my credit card information.
I guess there is a current of sorts that runs through the pond as part of the "Big River" system. According to Sam Gennawey of Samland, it enters the body of water on the NW side of the dock and exits on the other side.
They might also have just designated a certain path of the waterway as up- or downstream and used that logic throughout the attraction. I hope somebody chimes in who remembers or, better yet, actually worked the ride who can be a bit more authoritative.
Major, It was an elective class that a math teacher did. You had to have ALL your credits and whatnot to graduate BEFORE you could get into it. Mr. Witt was a cool guy who loved boating and there's a lot of math stuff involved with navigation. It was fun . . . then.
W
there's no point wearing a red-and-white striped shirt to Disneyland if you're not going to pilot a boat at some point. Hellooo,sailor!
Late post here. I’m more than 12 hours late reading the blog today.
If you look at the first picture, at the yellow boat in the background. Maybe I’m seeing things, but having a boat named the “widow maker” must mean the ride was far more exciting than I realized. Or......maybe I just need to lie down.
These are a great set of pictures. Thanks
I am super late today, too! It was a long hot day, today! And not fun, after discovering my air conditioner was broken! I guess it is supposed to be even hotter tomorrow! Wheeeee! (Not!)
Major, be glad that you never got the Deer Tick boat! You might have contracted Lyme Disease from it! Not funny, but it's the best I can do after a long hot miserable day self-isolating (going on week 6, now!)
Also I thought "Electric Avenue" was a song by Montgomery Ward. Again, the best I can do. It's 81 degrees INSIDE right now, and it's almost midnight. I'm losin' it!
Oh, and Andrew, good guess on the routes, but I'm pretty sure both boat routes went all the way out to the wall that separated the Motor Boat water from the Sub Lagoon water and then turned around to go back to the docks
And I also remember the buoys. They were small and cone-shaped and looked almost like they were inflatable, even though I'm sure they were probably made of a harder plastic. I seem to remember ones that were green and white and others that were red and white.
Budblade, "Widowmaker" was the name of Pecos Bill's horse in Make Mine Music, so, while an odd choice, that's not outside the realm of possibility. They may have had to reach pretty far into their catalog to find unique names to give each boat.
Andrews's research on multiple tracks is very interesting. I'm not sure I knew there were two motor boat tracks. Maybe there was only one running on the times I rode it, or maybe I'm just old and forgot.
Re current. As I recall, in the "rocky rapids" part, seen in a previous post, there were little jets of water upstream from some rocks to make it look like the water was cresting around them. This was similar to the effect in front of the Tuna Clipper, except those did not always operate. But the motorboat cruise otherwise seemed like flat water, any Dark Water system flow was too subtle for me to notice.
I sort of remember buoys, now that Tokyo reminds me. Seems like they resembled traffic cones and might have had numbers and stripes. Green and red seem reasonable since these colors would mark the direction of travel in a channel in real life.
Great discussions and information, thanks everyone.
JG
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