Park Hoppin’ Attends the Tiana’s Bayou Adventure Opening Day
Today was the grand opening of Tiana’s Bayou Adventure, and Krista and Jay were there! Not there as in “on the ride,” because the crack of dawn was already too late to reserve your spot on the virtual queue, but they’ve got plenty of footage of the ride – which was actually running – in a livestream on the Park Hoppin’ YouTube channel, as well as the various shops and attractions that make up Tiana’s new section of Disney World. You can watch the full livestream right here on Park Hoppin’ (with a special guest!), and you can see Krista go shopping at the Emporium on Main Street (because Critter Co-Op, the Tiana’s Bayou Adventure merch store, isn’t open yet) for some furry woodland creature swag below:
I have some more information about the rest of the ride’s opening day from a source I’ll keep anonymous, except I won’t, and it’s Krista. The ride did shut down at one point today, but it was due to rain as opposed to a malfunction. (Wait times later in the day were 15-20 minutes, low for a Friday in Disney World, though this may have been because of the rain – or because it was deathly hot, as Krista and Jay remark in the livestream.) It opened up again later but was seating for virtual queue only; however, the virtual queue was listed as “not currently enrolling new guests,” while the standby line and Disney Genie+ were marked “not currently offered.” There were a good number of people wearing merchandise from The Princess and the Frog while a few had Splash Mountain shirts (because, in their infinite wisdom, Disney decided to replace the most popular theme park ride in the world), and some said the Tiana merchandise wasn’t worth it. There was a show centered on the ride that took place at 11:00 AM, footage of which you can see in the livestream, but not many attended. All in all, it seems like a decent enough debut, though as Jay says in the livestream, the next few weeks will tell if Tiana’s Bayou Adventure is a success. At least the ride functioned properly, as far as anyone can tell; after the past few weeks, that’s a win.
