Ariel’s Adventure

Ride a Scallop Shell to the Bottom of the Sea

The Story Line on Paper

Ready by May 2011?

A new sort of dark ride is under construction at California Adventure, based on the 1989 animated hit, The Little Mermaid.

It’s a big-budget attraction — more on the scale of Haunted Mansion than Alice in Wonderland — and it looks like Team Disney expects this attraction to be a big hit.

Guests will hop on to a conveyance that will work in a similar fashion to the “Doom Buggies” in the Haunted Mansion — a conveyor belt next to moving seats. The seat is a scallop shell that holds two guests.

First guests meet the characters that live in both worlds, Scuttle and Sebastian, who will escort them down into the sea.

Along the way riders will meet and be entertained by the different characters from the story, as the blueprint shows. Even though it looks be be a major capital budget outlay, the attraction is not a thrill ride, so its appeal will have to come from oohs and aahs, not woo-hoos and yee-haws.

The magic will have to be in the details. There’s some bragging about how guests will feel as if they really did just drop into the ocean.

To see more about the ride, check out the displays at the Disney Imagineering Blue Sky Cellar.

It’s supposed to be ready in 2011, and there’s a large structure in place, but it’s hard to believe it will be all finished up in less than a year. Getting this hot new attraction done on time must keep a team of project managers up at nights.

Here’s to what looks to be a great new attraction.