Star Tours...The Adventure Continues.

We were lucky enough to have the privilege of attending the Star Tours Meet Up at Disney's Hollywood Studios Early in the A.M. of Friday May 20th.  If you were not aware the original Star Tours was closed about 10 months ago to be completely overhauled.  Let us say that Disney and their Imagineers did an amazing job on this ride.  Now instead of one ride the Imagineers have created 11 different videos that randomize during the trip so in essence you could have 54 different rides.   Also the ride now utilizes a HD #-d system and it really makes it seem you are going thru space and planets.  Remember that this type of 3D is used to give the ride view depth of field and not Pop-Out 3D.  BUT, there is a few things that do give you that pop-out 3D. One in particular you receive a hologram message from either Yoda, Princess Leia, or Admiral Ackbar. The 3D is used to give you a really great "real hologram" effect.  We would love to share more but we don't really want to give away any spoilers for now.  

Lets take a look at some shots we got from the meet up event!

After being checked in at Blizzard Beach we were driven to the park and entered in the back and was welcomed by this amazing smoke filled tunnel. 

Planets were floating overhead.  These actually are Airstar lights and they are used for a ton of different things and many times they are used to light movie sets.  These were specially made to have the planet designs on them. How do I know this I actually learned something in film school.

Entering the tunnel it was a bit less foggy as we got in

Cantina band member surprised a bunch of us in the smoke

More of the band

A DJ/M.C. for the night

The entrance

New attraction sign

Inside the queue the old multi screen video wall is gone and this huge HD screen has replaced it and is about 3x bigger

R2D2 working on the "new" red Starspeeder 1000

C3PO looking amazing and working on things.
This is about where the queue changes from the past

Once you enter the next room you are now in a  intergalactic luggage terminal. If you look to your left you will see some droids ready to be shipped and Rex the old pilot from the original attraction. A sign on him reads "Defective" and he is mumbling lines from the past ride.  

Further on up is this droid who is x-raying luggage like a TSA person would do.  make sure to check out the scanning device its pretty neat, you see a real bag go in and a hologram of the contents.  

At the top of the ramp is this guy who has heat cameras on the people queueing.  I'm 98% sure that Patrick Warburton  is the voice for this fellow

A nice display of the ship 

Here is Greedo after taking a flight with us

Last a couple more pics of the planets in the sky

Again all we can say is that this ride is amazing. Sorry there was no photos of the ships but that stuff really hasn't changed from the old attraction.   We strongly suggest going to Hollywood Studios soon and riding this amazing overhaul.

Update..Refurbs new ride announcements..HHN!

Well, It has been a few weeks so we thought it was time due for an update. If you're planning on visiting and Jurassic Park River Adventure is one of your favorite rides, be prepared for some disappointment. It has been closed due to refurbishment. I guess it's better than for it to go this way than to see a non functional T-Rex or any other dinosaurs. This refurbishment is definitely long overdue.

Universal has just announced that they will be placing a new mini-golf attraction right at City Walk! The themes for this will be Universal Horror films and 50's Sci-Fi. Its due to open early 2012..We will definitely be roaming about to see if we can get any pictures of the construction.

I assume we all know by now, Jimmy Neutron is no more, well in a sense. Jimmy Neutron will only be running during peak times up until later this year and will be replaced by a new ride. Slowly but surely, Universal has begun the diminishing of any traces of Nickelodeon by painting over "Hey Arnold" on the side of the building(pics to come soon). The announcement of the new ride will be announced on May 19th but the new theme is most likely going to towards 'Despicable Me'. Also in the ride rumor mill, is that both Disaster and Terminator will be being replaced with new attractions as well. Due to the popularity of the new Kong 360 3D attraction in Hollywood, they're looking to bring it to Orlando as well in Disaster's place.

And now for some HHN news! If you don't know what HHN is, it's one of the worlds best Halloween attractions, Halloween Horror Nights. I myself have been coming to Orlando every year for about 15 years for this, and now that I have moved here..it's easier to get some dirt on what's going on! Their permits have been filled and approved for whatever it is they may be doing. I would say keep an eye out on HHH.com in the next few weeks to see if there's any updates, because it's almost that time! Unfortunately I believe they will still keep it in JUST the Studios again this year, which I hope will change in the next few years because HHN has truly outgrown itself. Coming up with Fast Passes for the Haunts just doesn't seem to be enough anymore. Even on NON peak nights you can find yourself waiting in line for haunts up to 2 HOURS!

What do you think the Icon and themes will be?

Lets go see a Triceratops

The Last couple weeks have been busy here in Orlando, but this year during busy seasons Universal has reopened one of my favorite things Triceratops Discovery Trail.  

Lets see how it looks!

The Entrance

 The Walk In

 One of the 3 pens

 A food dish but I don't know for who

 The Queue. Take note of the flat green box infront of the screen.

 Animal cage in bushes

 Tractor thing and some chow

 It's chow time!

 A bunch more queue that's closed

 Dino tracker

 Tranquilizer Box

 Some sort of something

 I spot a raptor cage

 Remember that flat green box, well its a control panel and its not very hidden( well they just need to close the case)  at all but it does not seem to be used anymore.  

 You can see in this pick that stuff in the queue sat for a long time and then was moved

 There she is

 "Hello there random arm, I will eat you now"

 Smile

 Sad

 Side shot

You can see here in this blurry shot that the trikes still lift one leg

Overall thoughts:  We are super happy that this is open again!!! But lets us say that we were disappointed that not all the queue was open and by the looks of it it wont be anytime soon.  The thing that made this attraction so special was that it was an experience seeing all the JP tools and science behind the "day to day" operations of JP. We get a little of that not but not much.  We also find it sad because people don't find that interesting, its experiences like this that make theme parks stand out than an amusement park.   We will say that we were happy to see a smaller child very excited to see the trike.

Note: You cannot pet the trike like you were able to do years ago when this was new.