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00:23The town of Rainbow Ridge was eventually restored,
00:26and the Rainbow Cavern's mine train was supplemented beyond the wagon loading area,
00:31which provided visual separation of its own from the rest of the park.
00:56A tree-covered berm helped separate the area and make it visually more frontier-like.
01:09Cascade Peak with its majestic waterfalls was added.
01:12The stagecoach, which had a nasty, top-heavy habit of tipping over with guests on board,
01:18and the covered wagons both closed forever in 1959.
01:21The new wilderness was now to be known as Nature's Wonderland, which premiered in 1960.
01:29The pack mule loading area was placed toward the front of Rainbow Ridge.
01:33The old black, green, and blue mine cars were repainted black, red, and yellow.
01:38With 1,700 feet of track, the ride was originally seven minutes long.
01:42But by the time of the expansion, there was 2,037 feet of track,
01:48making the ride through Nature's Wonderland a nine-minute journey.
01:51When Walt Disney was planning this attraction, he was not satisfied with the designer's creation,
01:56so he took the drawing materials home and drew up the entire ride himself.
02:00Sections of Nature's Wonderland, Living Desert, Beaver Valley, Bear Country, Olympic Elk.
02:06And the information for this attraction is the first use of the term audio-animatronics.
02:11The Bear Country area on the mine train in the land called Bear Country existed at the same time from 1972 to 1977.
02:19The cars were painted black, red, and yellow.
02:21The track was 30 inches wide and a quarter mile long.
02:24It cost two and a half million dollars.
02:26In 2022 dollars, it would be over 25 million dollars to build.
02:30The Rainbow Cavern's waterfall circulated over 270,000 gallons of water every hour
02:36to create the seven multicolored waterfalls.
02:39From Attractions Report 1965,
02:41Lowered to a C coupon in order to stimulate attendance
02:45and provide an adult appeal attraction in this category.
02:48Utilization is low on this attraction and lower price should increase attendance and cash rides.
02:54This change would also provide a C attraction in the area of Frontierland.
02:59From Wed Disneyland Dictionary 1968 features some 204 animals, birds, and reptiles of the American West.
03:06They are brought to life in Beaver Valley, Bear Country, and the Great Living Desert.
03:10Among many highlights of this seven-acre area are 75-foot-high Cascade Peak with its tumbling waterfalls,
03:18old unfaithful geyser shooting streams of water 70 feet into the air,
03:22and the beautiful Rainbow Caverns with seven luminescent waterfalls glistening in many colors amid stalagmites and stalactites.
03:31Nature's Wonderland is based on highlights of Walt Disney's True Life Adventure motion picture series.
03:37Visitors view the animal population from two modes of transportation,
03:40each departing from the quaint little town of Rainbow Ridge in Frontierland.
03:44Nature's Wonderland Railroad is a colorful open-air train patterned after the gold and silver ore carriers of a century ago.
03:52Each of the four trains is pulled by a brass-trimmed locomotive.
03:56Howdy, folks!
03:58Welcome to the little mining town of Rainbow Ridge, the gateway to Nature's Wonderland.
04:04As we head for the wilderness, a couple of suggestions.
04:07Please stay seated at all times and keep your hands and arms inside the train.
04:14The animals get mighty hungry.
04:16And, uh, no smoking, please, because we don't want to start a forest fire.
04:21Now, beyond these hills lies Nature's Wonderland.
04:25You're apt to see a whole lot of wildlife, so keep a real sharp hunter's eye.
04:31As we come out of this first tunnel, we'll be entering Beaver Valley.
04:35Looks like the beavers are building another dam.
04:38Yes, sir, they're really busy as a...
04:41Well, busy as a beaver.
04:44Them little marmots over the tunnel must be a whistling to all you pretty gals.
04:49I can't say I blame them.
04:50If you've never gone beneath a waterfall before, then get set,
04:54because we're coming up on Big Thunder,
04:57the biggest falls in all these here parts.
05:00You don't have to worry, though, unless the wind changes.
05:03Them other two falls, they call the twin sisters.
05:08Reckon that's because they're always babbling.
05:11We're coming into bear country now, folks.
05:14And while we're crossing the old trestle, you gotta sit real still.
05:18No telling how long she's gonna last.
05:21You know, bears are one of the most playful animals there is.
05:25Lazy, too.
05:26All they want to do is lay around and scratch and fish and swim.
05:32That is when they ain't sleeping.
05:35You know, nature's wonderland is awful pretty,
05:38but sometimes she can be a mighty rugged place to live.
05:42Out here in the wilderness, the struggle for survival leaves only the strong and sometimes the lucky.
05:47Say, look on that bank across Bear Creek there.
05:52Now, there's a real struggle for survival.
05:55Two stags are battling for them cow elk.
05:59Maybe you folks can tell me, though,
06:01does getting two women folk mean you're the winner or the loser?
06:05Never could figure that one out.
06:06As we pass through old Natural Arch Bridge,
06:12you can see the great living desert down below.
06:15You know, the desert's a dry place and full of some pretty mean varmints.
06:20You gotta be careful of sidewinders, wild pigs, and even mountain lions.
06:25But the desert's got her beauty, too.
06:28The yellow streaks are running through them sandstone cliffs are called Coconino.
06:33The red, we call them Shupai.
06:36Now, ahead of us, folks, is a giant saguaro cactus forest.
06:41The desert heat sometimes gets to you and makes these here cactus take on strange shapes like animals and sometimes even people.
06:50Aha! Look down there on your left.
06:53Them wild pigs is caught up with old Mr. Bobcat.
06:57He's in kind of a sticky situation.
07:00Say, ever hear of the devil's paint pots?
07:03Real mystery of the desert.
07:05Bubbling pots of mud in all kinds of colors.
07:10This is geyser country, too.
07:12Uh-oh! There she blows!
07:14Sure glad you all brought your raincoat.
07:18Unfaithful.
07:19Look out now!
07:21Hey, hey!
07:21You folks in them last cars be ready.
07:24She's a-threatening again!
07:27You know, I hear tell a long time ago, dinosaurs roamed this area.
07:32Of course, all you find now is cactus, snakes, and coyotes.
07:37And sometimes the sun-bleached bones of an ancient animal.
07:41There's the voice of the desert, the coyote.
07:46Now, folks, we gotta get through balance and rock.
07:48Specs. Capacity 1,190 per hour.
07:50Capacity per train 74.
07:51Cycle time 10 minutes 50 seconds.
07:52Load time 1 minute 20 seconds.
07:53Unload time 1 minute 20 seconds.
07:54Trip time 9 minutes 15 seconds.
07:55Dispatch interval 3 minutes 34 seconds.
07:57Trips per hour 16.
07:58Distance traveled 2,200 feet.
07:59Speed 2.8 miles per hour.
08:01Here are some of the valves that control some of the water effects.
08:07Views from inside the caverns.
08:13That is a cruising beaver there.
08:16Or one with a leak.
08:18Or one that ate the wrong kind of food last night.
08:23If you look quickly, you'll see a raccoon with a really hyper tail down there.
08:30Right over there.
08:30Yes.
08:31When you come out on the other side of Longa River, we go under Big Thunder Waterfall,
08:35the largest waterfall in Disneyland, and the namesake for Big Thunder Mountain.
08:42Now, I'm going to say something terribly un-PC about the next two waterfalls,
08:46but believe me, it's in the script from the ride.
08:50These other two falls we call the twin sisters.
08:54I guess that's because they're always babbling.
08:59Bad.
08:59I didn't ride it.
09:01I didn't ride it.
09:01You know, on with our journey, we come out through this tunnel,
09:05which you may recognize at the back of the Bear River there,
09:10which is still in place.
09:11Notice the mules up above going over this.
09:14Check out now the bear animation.
09:18There's some really good stuff in here.
09:19But they were all, you know, covered with real fur, and they're in real water that's dirty.
09:24And you can imagine the upkeep that Disney did.
09:29Now, that trussle, a little bit of that was remaining up until a couple of years ago,
09:33and then it finally, I guess the termites got to it, and it caved in.
09:36But the tunnel is still there.
09:38So, you know, if we can come up with an idea, I thought about could we get Big Thunder to go over there,
09:45but there just wasn't enough energy in the track to make a loop around there.
09:49See, these little furry guys were beautifully taxidermy.
09:53They weren't taxidermy.
09:55They were covered with artificial fur, bear fur, but quite good animation.
10:01This predated audiometronics.
10:04They didn't have that word yet, and they hadn't really been synced to a recording.
10:08They were triggered by animation.
10:10Just animation, yeah.
10:12That's what it was.
10:13Look at that guy in the water there.
10:14He's already broken, I think.
10:17You'll see fish leaping over there now.
10:19Yeah, there are a few.
10:20Look at the guy kind of cruising around out there.
10:23It looks like a real bear.
10:24It does.
10:24And what kind of a track would that be?
10:26He's just going left and right and forward and backwards.
10:29That's pretty amazing stuff.
10:31Love to see that drained.
10:35So, I think we come now to a very debated point,
10:40and I think we're going to solve it for you today in the next scene,
10:44which is the fighting elk stags.
10:47Some people believe it was on the right side of the track,
10:50which you see it here, so that's absolutely true.
10:53But some people also believe it was on the left side of the track,
10:57and the ruins of where those two guys were fighting
11:00is still there on the other side of the train.
11:03Now, why on earth did they move it over there?
11:05It wasn't just to put an owl, which was here in the later years.
11:09And it really turns out that there was a problem
11:12with some of the live ride vehicles in this area.
11:14So, look back behind the trees.
11:16You'll see some movement.
11:18Yep.
11:18And there is the problem.
11:20These guys don't like to work with people on their back
11:23when there are giant animals that are bigger than they are fighting.
11:26So, I fully believe that's why they moved to the other side.
11:32Through that arch bridge lies the living desert,
11:35which was probably the most famous of all nature.
11:37Great sweet shot here.
11:38Yeah.
11:38Did you have an idea of how it was?
11:39The yellow streaks are soup pie, and the red are coconut.
11:43No.
11:44I worked the ride for one summer.
11:47Okay.
11:48The cactus still exists, some of them, at least down in Florida
11:51on Big Thunder Mountain Railroad at the flash flood scene.
11:55And they took on strange shapes during the heat of the day,
11:58so they were very animated looking.
12:00The devil's paint pots are followed by geyser country.
12:03Again, all of these were very familiar to kids of this era
12:06because we got them month in and month out at school
12:10in our nature classes.
12:12They would speed the train up here as you went around this,
12:15but that geyser was always designed so it sprayed everyone
12:18kind of nicely as you went around this curve.
12:22Now, that was the key frame.
12:24Yeah, we see that a lot.
12:25The icon from Living Desert.
12:28Don't have very much here of these rocks,
12:31and it's probably because they really didn't look that convincing.
12:34But they were fun.
12:36To an eight-year-old, they were really fun.
12:37And then the last thing you saw was this old cat
12:40who played out in the narration at the end and said,
12:42if a bobcat has jumped on board,
12:45tell him to jump out and catch another ride.
12:47But between that was the most beautiful part of this ride,
12:50which in those days they couldn't capture on Technicolor film,
12:54and that was the gorgeous rainbow caverns created by Claude Coates.
12:58And to this day, I think it was one of the most amazing things,
13:01and we've got to find a way to do something like that somewhere.
13:04kind of milk,
13:07and we've got to find the littleoit criston
13:11widate going on.
13:13Yeah!
13:13Sure, you said it!
13:14I used to say that it's quite surprising.
13:16And it's как зацператором из Fr strengthen days!
13:17That's the fact that the Grant Mahler
13:18and McLean are doing what easy to find.
13:19When you do something like that,
13:19it's just a weird thing that your first time I always get the kind of do
13:20is the catchphrase about.
13:23Now I want to sharenomers,
13:27you can see your best,
13:29so it would be a negative thing,
13:31you can identify as an animal domain.