Amity Island, Universal Studios

I admit that today's post is kind of an odd one; I decided to scan 15 (or so) old Universal Studios slides, and discovered that a third of them featured the shark-infested New England beach town of Amity Island. Is that a good thing or a bad thing? Can it be both? Anyway, I decided to post all of them together to purge them from my system. 

These first three are from February of 1988. We are in our Glamour Tram, and we can see Amity Harbor off to the right, along with a fisherman's dock, where old salts bought Dockers brand shoes and pants. Comfortable, but nice enough for dinner with friends! As often happens at Universal Studios, the surprise is a bit spoiled by the fact that you can see the tram in front of us being terrorized by a giant shark. Luckily, the tram hostess has implanted a post-hypnotic suggestion that will make us forget everything (and sometimes makes us believe that we are chickens).

Gosh, what a pleasant little harbor! I'm sure nothing bad has ever happened here. Many years ago, I met up with friends for dinner at Universal Citywalk, way up the hill above this scene. Getting there a little early, I parked in the massive parking structure, and from the top level I could see the harbor in the distance. Every minute or so, I would watch that boat with the fisherman get pulled underwater in a fountain of magenta "blood", and I could even hear his agonized screams. Then the tram would move on, and the boat would reset for the next performance. It was kind of fun.

We survived the shark attack (for some reason there are no photos of that exciting event), but as we rounded the bend we can look back to see the shark. He's not worried about the cops coming or anything. Which is pretty cool.

It's time for CELEBRITY CONFESSIONS. Well, OK, I'm not a celebrity, but I have to confess that I mis-dated these scans as being from 1969, which is stupid because the Jaws attraction (and even the movie) did not exist in 1969. So perhaps my fat fingers were supposed to type "1989"? Weirdly, I can't find the original slides now. Yes, I agree, it's a conspiracy, if you want to send me money, you can.

ANYWAY, It's interesting to see how this scene had changed in just a few years;  now the fisherman (Quint's brother Skyler) is facing toward us; if I recall correctly he would be pulled backwards into the water, which doesn't make a lot of sense, but at that moment we all believed we were chickens so it's OK. I've always enjoyed the famous billboard with the pretty girl saying, "Eek! Shark!". Didn't Amity double as Cabot Cove from "Murder, She Wrote"?

What in blazes?!? If I'd known there was a giant shark with foam-rubber teeth who can hop on his tail, I would have never gone on this tram tour. Somebody will be hearing from my attorney. Could it be YOU??

And now, as the sun sets into the west (hula music playing for some reason), let's all wave a fond farewell to Bruce "Sharky" Carcharadon (of the Long Island Carcharadons). I'm going to miss that guy!