Alice in Wonderland, Dark ride in Fantasyland, Disneyland, California, US
Alice in Wonderland is a dark ride in Fantasyland at Disneyland in Anaheim, California, based on the 1951 animated film. It occupies two floors, the first Disneyland dark ride to do so, and guests board caterpillar-shaped vehicles beside an outdoor garden of oversized fiberglass vines and pastel grass. The track winds through blacklit scenes with painted plywood flats and ultraviolet fluorescents.
An Alice walk-through was planned in Disneyland's early years but dropped over traffic concerns; the dark ride concept resurfaced in late 1957 when Claude Coats designed it with Ken Anderson, Collin Campbell, Blaine Gibson and Bob Gurr. It opened on June 14, 1958, with a televised ribbon-cutting by Mousketeer Karen Pendleton dressed as Alice. The ride closed from September 6, 1982, to April 13, 1984, for Fantasyland's renovation; the present version opened in 1984 and was updated in 2014.
Guests ride in fiberglass caterpillar cars built by Arrow Development, fitted with three wheels instead of four to handle the sloping track; the same cars have run since 1958. Alice herself never appears in the ride: an unseen Alice, voiced by Kathryn Beaumont from the 1951 film, narrates at the start of each scene, so visitors see Wonderland from her point of view.
Anyone arriving in a wheelchair must transfer into the vehicle as the caterpillars are not wheelchair-accessible. The route runs partly outdoors on a spiral track and then shifts into enclosed spaces with dim lighting.
The outdoor ramp descends in an illuminated spiral and forms an unusual visible part of the track before the ride shifts into darkness. Following an inspection in 2010, additional handrails were installed along these sections.
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