While we will be saying goodbye to Splash Mountain at the Magic Kingdom at some undisclosed point in the future, it seems we may get to see the ride in the best state it has been in over the last several years before we say our heartfelt farewells.
This week, we noticed the return to service of the series of jumping fountains in the Laughing Place scene. This effect has been inconsistent since the reopening of Walt Disney World (and probably forever), but has returned to the ride at least once since last summer before breaking again.
The bigger news is the long-awaited return of the rocking riverboat in the finale of the beloved log flume. The boat once again teeters left and right as the animals sing, dance, and play music onboard.
You can see both effects back in action in our video below:
Maintenance crews have clearly been trying to give guests a great last ride on Splash Mountain as we’ve also seen them repair the jumping Brer Rabbit animatronic, as well as the projection of Brer Rabbit, Fox, and Bear running over the hill since July.
I’m calling it now: Splash Mountain is never going to actually close. The parks are bleeding money right now and even projects that are far along in the process (Tron, Guardians, the Galactic Starcruiser hotel) have all been severely delayed both because of a lack of staff and funds. Other previously announced projects (a lot of the Epcot stuff like Mary Poppins) have also already been canceled because of money issues There is no way they close what is still an immensely popular e-ticket ride for a refurb before at least Tron is finished to absorb the capacity and now they’re saying that won’t happen until sometime in 2022.
Add to that the fact that Splash merch has been flying off the shelves and the announcement of the change was met with a decent amount of backlash (not to mention the heavy rumors floating around suggesting that the announcement was never meant to be made at all and was done by a group of rouge employees) and I think they’re just going to let the refurb quietly fade away as the years go in, citing budget issues as the “real” reason it won’t happen
I really hope you’re right. It consistently has high wait times every day, and why put money into fixing an attraction that you’re ultimately going to re-theme. A LOT of people are fighting to save the ride. It just not make sense for Disney to give Tiana an old attraction when they could give her her very own ride and/or restaurant. It would always be compared to Splash Mountain.
Go now , the colder the temperature gets, the lower the wait times, my kids did it back to back this past week with literally maybe 5 to 10 min waits tops, including once when there was no one in the queue, CMs asked do you wanna go again. YES
I was there in early January. It was 48 degrees at about noon and the line was 45 minutes long. Also, temperature is not really correlated to the argument of replacing Splash Mountain with another IP. No matter what theme does or not go in there, the ride will always be a log flume where people will get wet.
Keeping my fingers crossed your right!!
I’m not expecting it to close in Florida anytime soon, but if the Disneyland version gets changed, my hope would be they just remove the Song of the South characters at WDW and bring over the extra America Sings characters from Disneyland to replace them. WDW’s Splash Mountain is bigger and better that Disneyland’s, and I’d rather see the WDW version become “America Sings The Ride” because I just have no faith that they will do anything other than have some cheap Princess and the Frog over lay of in Florida. I’d love to see a great Tiana Attraction in Magic Kingdom, they have plenty of space for one, but I just can’t see them “improving” WDW’s Splash with Tiana, It’ll be too expensive to change over the larger WDW Splash inside and out, and I agree I don’t expect it to happen in WDW at least not completely. Plus I don’t think Splash Mountain needs the Song of the South characters, to they’re like the Jack Sparrow figures being in Pirates of the Caribbean, the “story” they’re trying to tell doesn’t make the ride better. The America Sings characters and the scenery in WDW are what make it a great ride, and there are plenty more of those characters that have never been seen in WDW.
I hope they keep it open long enough to HAVE to do another large order of merchandise! GIT DAT MUNY!!
The change.org petition to save it got over 87,000 signatures which is way more than the ones the news were reporting for those wanting it gone. Hoping this stays <3
Save Splash Mountain!!!
What disney needs is to retheme Disneyland’s Splash Mountain because it makes perfect sense for a expansion to Disneyland’s New Orleans Square area. But Splash Mountain in Magic Kingdom didn’t make sense because it didn’t have New Orleans in Frontierland. And what disney should do instead give Splash Mountain a makeover into one of Disney Legend/Animator/Imagineer Marc Davis’ Western River Expedition, then build a Tiana’s Place restaurant in Tom Sawyer Island, and build a bridge that connects from Big Thunder Mountain to Mama Odie’s Bayou, and then build a new Princess and the Frog ride.
No they should just leave it as it is in WDW. And instead of hiding their past be upfront with it, teach the uneducated about the history of the tales of Uncle Remus and the culture significance of those stories and not try to wipe out African American Folklore. Disneyland – even though I’d hate to see it go, makes a little sense since Critter Country is so small – but WDW makes no sense at all.
Okay so they should reimagine Tom Sawyer’s Island build a lift bridge from Big Thunder Mountain for continuous access. Use 2nd island to build Mama Odie’s Home for either a ride or a show experience. Build a new Tiana’s restaurant on the 1st island the has a waterfront and a fireworks view. And shorten the riverboat route.
YES! Expert plan, though maybe I could see them either keeping the original rafts just for nostalgia’s sake, or doing something with the bridge like carving Tom’s name into the side, or even using the raft structures for it so it looks like all of them were just tied together.
Let’s hope this is a sign that they it’s going nowhere for a long time <3
It would make no sense financially speaking to fix so many portions of the ride over the past few months just to destroy it. I’m still praying at least the WDW is safe