River Country

[FlaFortCampster]

An old towel return box:

TCD

The blue plastic bottle sure isn't 10 plus years old. Think there have been other visitors to RC other than TCD.

 

[Born 2 Fish]

Dun told'ja, I camp there alltha time.

 

[FlaFortCampster]

Dun told'ja, I camp there alltha time.

So what's the bucket for???

 

[MadFF]

Very cool thread!

I have never been to River Country, but remember hearing something about it.

I do have a very vague memory of what I think was Discovery Island sometime in the late '70s... seem to remember a lot of birds, and possibly a large aviary / bird cage that you actually walked through?

When we were planning our trip to Fort Wilderness in October 2008 (My lord, already over a year ago?!?), it took me awhile to realize that the "cool island jungle bird place" - as I described it to my family - is actually closed.

Keep the memories and pictures coming!!

 

[SandrA9810]

There's very few, if anything, original to it's debute. Even Snow White got changed. The Country Bears is about the only thing that hasn't seen a change, but they did add the christmas show and summer vacation hoe-down, which both are gone, so it's back to the original.

The Oddysse building at Epcot is still in use. They use the kitchens to make the pizzas sold in the cart outside of test track. And the Grand Gathering dinners are held there. As well they usually house special events from the Food and Wine festival and Flower and Garden festival.

Even ToonTown used to have the stage show in the big tent before it got converted over to Character Meet and Greets. You can tell because of the way the floor dips and curves, only certain areas were filled in as needed for leveling.

The Tomorrowland end of the Sky Way ride has been recently torn down. Aparently they used to house the gandalas in it, but who knows what they did with it.

They took out the Galaxy Palace Theater to make more parking spaces and expand the Outdoor Foods storage building. Put in that stupid little stage for the Stitch show which got canceled after like a month... no pre thoughts into doing that one...

 

[jwilke55]

with disney closing river country water park for good,i would like to see them take down the park and give it back to nature.

 

[luvndisney358]

How sad about RC!! We had such happy memories there from the past. It's so sad to see it this way..... Thanks for taking all those pictures to share though.

 

[Cockburn Family]

Thanks for the great pics TCD...If old Walt was around I think he would have kept the place up...Im sure the Fort would have been his favorite place!!

But hey they did freshen up the Meadows Pool...lol

 

[Pluto's Gang]

WOW! When I was a kid, my family stayed at the Fort every year and River Country was my favorite thing to do there. Very, very sad to see it in that condition. I hope they do something with it in the future. Thanks for the pix and memories

 

[LovesTimone]

Looks like when they return to Jurassic park

This was my very first water park. I was in middle school or Jr High as some call it. Our church youth group went every summer once at the beginning and again right before school started. We loved it.
My best friend in high school parents are avid campers so we would go a few times a year. Wow this bring back lots of memories for me. I'm so sad to see a childhood memory stand in ruin. Hopefully Disney will either recycle it or let mother nature take it back over.

I not sure if I remember correctly, right before they closed RC. This is the last time that I remember going. I think that they let the campers use this as their "swiming hole" at no charge. I remember going with my friends family, and and we all went and I don't remember paying to get in. She has a big family 5 brothers and sisters and each got to bring a friend for the weekend. I know that they would not have been able to pay for all of us to go. It was a really fun weekend and bring back lots of memories for me. Thank you!!

You are so brave, How about some pic's of the Golden years across from POP.

 

[mitros]

with disney closing river country water park for good,i would like to see them take down the park and give it back to nature.

They tried........nature doesn't want it.

 

[Born 2 Fish]

So what's the bucket for???

Fish,,,

 

[Dsnyvryyear]

Thanks for the really detailed pictures. It is both great to be reminded of all the fun I had there and sad to see it getting older like the reflection in my mirror. I was there the opening year (And many more times) and it was unbelievable at the time. I think this was the first park with Multiple waterslides and one was the tallest I am sure.
I would love to get one of those signs for my pool area at home. How the heck did you get those pictures?

 

[Fasspass]

Wow that was wild. What are they going to do with this real estate?

 

[epcotster]

Here are some side-by-side comparison photos of River Country "Then and Now". Nice to see what the stuff looked like when it was in action compared to what it looks like today. This is Part 1 of 2 and may have been posted on this thread. I'm pretty sure Part 2 has not been posted.

(Part 1) http://www.imagineeringdisney.com/blog/2009/12/19/abandoned-disney-river-country-part-1.html

(Part 2) http://www.imagineeringdisney.com/blog/2010/1/3/abandoned-disney-river-country-part-2.html

 

[nealboy]

HOLY MOSES!!! I'm not even sure how I got to this page .. oh yea - I was looking at the extinct attratctions page on Flickr. ANYWAY!!

Dude - I have been saying since the 90's how fascinating it would be to "re-discover" DisneyWorld in hundreds of years. You know - once we are all gone and the earth re-claims Orlando. Can you imagine being an archaeologist ... stumbling upon the ruins of this ... kingdom ... where a Mouse ruled.

And as sad as it is to see a Disney park overgrown ... its SO friggin fascinating. Thank you SO much for this! I take it from some of the responses (don't have time to read them ALL) that you have gotten some other amazing pics on here .. I'll have to do some hunting! Thanks again!

Best!
Neal

 

[mom23Jz]

I remember this park frm my first trip to DW. My highschool senior trip. Going back years later I still had memories of it, but didn't remember where it was, it is all coming back now. Does anyone know why it was closed?

 

[Born 2 Fish]

WELCOME to the boards Mom ! Your first post,
There are lots of reasons that have been said over the years as to why,, the most popular is "bacteria/parasite" or something like that in the lake water in summer months.
If you read back in this thread you'll get lots of answers.
My belief is , they closed it down cause they opened Typhoon Lagoon.

 

[shel112676]

Great pics! Thank you for sharing them!!

Just out of curiosity...did you run into any critters while inside RC?? I'd imagine gators and snakes would take a liking to that environment??

 

[Disney owl]

How sad.
RC was open when we 1st visited WDW but we went to the other water parks. Our friends who we were on holiday with, went. & we still have the refillable cup they brought back.