In operation from October 1, 1971 to November 10, 1999, the Skyway at Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom outlasted the Disneyland attraction by 5 years and the Tokyo Disneyland version by one year.
Let’s take a trip from Tomorrowland to Fantasyland.
The first two photographs are from the Tomorrowland Transit Authority. I love how the second image has so much of the pylon in it.
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| Is this how you properly frame a photo? |
The rest of the pictures are from the Skyway gondola bucket proper as we head languidly towards Fantasyland.
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| I love the scope of Tomorrowland you can see here. |
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| Obviously, this trip was in 1997. |
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| Does turning the camera sideways make it moreĀ artistic? The Castle Cake in all of its glory. |
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| Yes, that is Mickey’s Toontown in the background. Goofy’s Barnstormer is obvious. Did you notice his pants ? |
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| At this time 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea had been closed for a few years. It was still a beautiful body of water to glide over. |
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| Fantasyland is always busy. This is an interesting angle since you can see the it’s a small world show building and Arial’s Grotto. |
Check out all of the people waiting in line for Dumbo the Flying Elephant. If you look a little closer, you can see that the queue is covered with umbrellas!
I have always been surprised by the lack of photos I took on vacations before owning a digital camera. But with each trip, I took more and more photos.
Do you have any vintage Disney photos you want to share?
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Here are some shots from early ’72, mid ’73, and mid ’74, not necessarily sorted. I’m the little boy in red in the stroller for some shots (not related to the man who was pushing it, a friend of my mom’s), and the boy in the yellow shirt.
Interesting facts one can see:
we rode in the front of the monorail at one point, and you can see the cranes doing the work on Space Mountain.
The Rivers of America was drained in ’72 as Tom Sayer Island was actually *not finished* when the park opened. From the monorail you can see the riverboat tucked away outside the park, in the same stream that houses the Seven Seas Lagoon parade floats (which are housed in that same spot to this day – the forest next to them now houses Spectromagic’s floats which I saw on a backstage tour in ’07).
Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, the infamous double-track version, can be seen in its exterior. sniff…
The indian village was still up as part of the train ride. Other aspects of that section of frontierland were still under construction, though I don’t know what they were building as Big Thunder was still years away (and they were still working out if Marc Davis’s unbuilt masterpiece of design would ever be done). It may be that they were clearing things out for Western River (knowing *something* would go there) and then had to stop when the decision to build a PotC was made after guest complaints.
Peter Pan got a really cool float to ride in the afternoon parade. I want one. š
Hey these are some terrific pics! One thing I’ve learned from filmmaking is that if one wants a dynamic shot, simply raise (or lower) the position of the camera. It’s hard to beat shots from the Skyway. Thanks for sharing.