Cars Land’s first visitors head for the dancing tractors
It didn’t take long for the families to swarm Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree, one of the three main rides at Disney’s California Adventure’s Cars Land, which opened to the public Friday morning.
Tractors zipped around in circles, not unlike the Mad Tea Party ride at Disneyland next door, swinging the passenger-bearing trailers behind them. In the background, Mater, the rusty tractor character from the “Cars” films voiced by comic Larry the Cable guy, sang a rotation of square-dance ditties to banjo and fiddle accompaniment.
Visitor reactions to the ride, and to Cars Land overall, were generally positive from a first-day crowd of admitted Disney fans.
Blas Guerrero and his two children, Adriana, 14, and Blas Jr., 9, from Pleasant Hill, Calif., come to the Disney parks in Anaheim every three years, Guerrero said. They used to be season-pass holders, but despite being big fans, this season’s price hike made it too expensive.
“It was a huge surprise,” he said.
Nonetheless, he said, they got a five-day park-hopper pass for this occasion. And during that time, they plan to take advantage of the food and shops.
“We’re going to be grubbing it up today. Eating, playing and buying some T-shirts,” Guerrero said.
This is music to the ears of Disney execs, who hope that Cars Land turns around the California Adventure park, which has been an underperformer since it opened in 2001.
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