Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage
| Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage | |
|---|---|
| Park | Disneyland Park |
| Land / area | Tomorrowland |
| Type | Submarine voyage |
| Opened | June 11, 2007 |
| Designer | Walt Disney Imagineering |
| Height req. | None |
| Status | Operating |
Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage is a submarine attraction in Tomorrowland at Disneyland Park in the Disneyland Resort, California. Opened on June 11, 2007, it retells the story of the 2003 Disney-Pixar film Finding Nemo using the lagoon, track and submarine fleet of the original Submarine Voyage, which operated from 1959 to 1998. Riders board a research submarine and view animated characters, projected onto screens hidden among physical coral and rockwork, through individual portholes.
The original Submarine Voyage
The first Submarine Voyage opened on June 14, 1959, as part of the same expansion that brought the Matterhorn Bobsleds and the Disneyland Monorail. Inspired by the USS Nautilus, the first nuclear-powered submarine, and its 1958 voyage beneath the North Pole, the attraction sent a fleet of eight vessels, built at Todd Shipyards in San Pedro, around a lagoon filled with animated sea life, a mermaid lagoon, a graveyard of lost ships and an encounter with a giant squid. It was one of the first E ticket attractions. The ride closed on September 9, 1998, with Disney indicating that it would return in a new form by 2003; that date passed, and the lagoon sat dormant, its future debated, for most of a decade.
Development
The success of Finding Nemo in 2003 gave Imagineering a story suited to the lagoon, and work began in earnest in 2005, when the lagoon was drained. The eight original submarine hulls were retained and rebuilt: their diesel engines were replaced with an electric induction system, seating was increased, and the exteriors were repainted in the yellow and blue of a research fleet. Pixar animators produced new animation for the ride, and the central technical problem — making projected characters appear to share the water with real sets — was solved with screens coated in reflective material and positioned among the physical scenery, an approach the team called dry-for-wet projection. The lagoon was refilled with some 6.3 million gallons of water and planted with hand-made coral and kelp durable enough for permanent submersion.
Experience
After boarding, the submarine appears to dive in a cascade of bubbles. The captain and first mate, voiced with Australian accents in keeping with the film's setting, narrate a trip along the East Australian Current. Riders pass through a kelp forest, an erupting underwater volcano and a sunken ship guarded by sharks, meeting Marlin, Dory, Crush and other characters from the film as the search for the missing Nemo unfolds. A sequence near the end simulates an encounter with an anglerfish and a squeeze through a narrow trench before the submarine surfaces to the sound of whale song. The full circuit takes roughly thirteen minutes, making it one of the longest rides at Disneyland. An above-water viewing room, the Marine Observation Outpost, offers the same show on screens for guests unable to use the submarines' narrow spiral staircases.
Refurbishments
The attraction closed in January 2014 for an extended refurbishment in which the lagoon was drained, its rockwork repainted and its coral replaced, reopening that September. It closed again with the park in 2020 and returned with Disneyland's reopening in 2021.