Na'vi River Journey
| Na'vi River Journey | |
|---|---|
| Park | Disney's Animal Kingdom |
| Land / area | Pandora – The World of Avatar |
| Type | Boat dark ride |
| Opened | May 27, 2017 |
| Designer | Walt Disney Imagineering, Lightstorm Entertainment |
| Height req. | Any height |
| Status | Operating |
Na'vi River Journey is a boat dark ride in Pandora – The World of Avatar at Disney's Animal Kingdom in the Walt Disney World Resort, Florida. Opened on May 27, 2017, it carries guests in reed boats along a fictional river through a bioluminescent Pandoran rainforest, ending with an encounter with a Na'vi shaman figure. It is the quieter of the land's two attractions, the other being the simulator Avatar Flight of Passage, and it has no height requirement.
History
The attraction was built as part of the Pandora expansion announced by Disney and James Cameron's Lightstorm Entertainment in 2011 and constructed from 2014 on the site of the former Camp Minnie-Mickey area. Animal Kingdom's lead designer for its original development, Joe Rohde, returned to oversee the Pandora project, which was the largest expansion in the park's history to that point.
Na'vi River Journey soft-opened on May 26, 2017, and opened officially with Pandora on May 27, 2017. Unlike Flight of Passage, which recreates a Na'vi rite involving a banshee, River Journey was conceived as an observational ride: a journey into an alien ecosystem presented on its own terms, without a conflict or a plot imposed on it.
Experience
Guests board boats styled as if woven from reeds, seating in two rows, provided in the story by Alpha Centauri Expeditions, the fictional eco-tourism company that operates in the Valley of Mo'ara. From the loading area the boats drift onto the Kasvapan River and into a darkened forest interior.
The ride, which lasts just under six minutes, passes scenes built from physical planting, projection and lighting effects. Bioluminescent plants glow along the banks, some reacting with light patterns as boats pass, while Pandoran animals appear among the trees and in the water, including viperwolves, hexapedes and fan-like creatures rising from the surface. Na'vi figures are seen at a distance, and leaves overhead are marked with animal footprints picked out in light. The score draws on music by James Horner and Simon Franglen composed for the Avatar films and for the land.
The final scene is a single large figure: the Shaman of Songs, a Na'vi Audio-Animatronic seated in a clearing and performing a song in the Na'vi language, with lyrics supplied by Paul Frommer, the linguist who created the language for the films. Her arms, hands and upper body move in a continuous, flowing performance, surrounded by smaller figures and glowing plants.
Design
The Shaman of Songs was widely described at opening as the most advanced Audio-Animatronics figure Walt Disney Imagineering had produced. Standing nearly ten feet tall in her seated position's full scale, the figure was notable for the smoothness and range of its arm and hand movements, which were designed to read as conducting and blessing rather than as mechanical gestures. The figure remains the attraction's centrepiece and its most discussed element.
The rest of the ride relies on layered techniques rather than on a single effect: fibre-optic and projected bioluminescence, screen-based animals blended into physical sets, and a soundscape of Pandoran wildlife. The ride system was manufactured by Sansei Technologies, and the attraction's hourly capacity is around 1,200 riders. Guests using a wheelchair or mobility vehicle must transfer to board the boats.
Reception
River Journey has generally been praised for its atmosphere and the shaman figure, and criticised by some guests for its brevity relative to its wait times. It is one of only a few boat rides in Animal Kingdom's history, the previous one being the Discovery River Boats of the park's early years.