Walkabout The World - A Disney Podcast - A 25th Anniversary Tour of Disney California Adventure with Host Michelle

Episode Date: May 24, 2026

Hello Travelers! This week, join host Michelle as she takes you on a walkabout through Disney California Adventure celebrating its 25th anniversary. Enjoy the sounds of Buena Vista Street, Grizzly Peak, Paradise Gardens, Pixar Pier, San Fransokyo, Cars Land, and Hollywood Land. We are listener supported - contribute to the Dole Whip Fund via Google or Apple Pay. Thanks! Walkabout the World is now on TikTok! Come follow our visual companion to the audio podcast at Walkabout.the.world.pod on TikTok And of course, visit us on Instagram and at walkabouttheworld.com - find links to all the things - attraction episodes, Insta accounts of all the hosts, and even how to buy your own Walkabout shirt!

Hello, travelers, and welcome back to Walk About the World, your favorite audio walk and talk with a friend around the parks and resorts of Walt Disney World and Disneyland. Each week we record live in the parks to provide you with a new auditory experience with every episode. If you enjoy what we bring you each week, we are listener supported, so for free to show your appreciation by clicking the Dole Whip Fund link in the show notes that will allow you to donate as much or as little as you'd like and buy us a Dole Whip or Mouth-shaped Treats, but mostly it helps out with quad hosting fees and lets us keep doing what we love to do

as we bring you with us around the parks and resorts. So thanks for being with me today. I'm Michelle, and this week we're at Disney California Adventure. Now, California Adventure is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. Not too much fanfare from Disney itself, but that's not going to stop us from celebrating a great park. So since we're celebrating DCA, I thought, why not kind of just walk the park and talk about what it used to be and kind of what it is now. And just let you take in the sounds of DCA. I feel like it's an unappreciated park, but it is near and dear to me.

I have a lot of memories here. And yeah, let's just kind of walk around. and see what we can hear. We are making our way through Buena Vista Street. Formerly Sunshine Plaza. Sunshine Plaza was kind of designed to look like a postcard if you were to receive one from California. It had the big California letters outside of the park.

And then as you walked in, it had murals on each side of the street that just was California. Right now we are going underneath the bridge. What was formerly the Golden Gate Bridge, where the monorail travels over. Just a little insider baseball. If you go on the monorail now, you're still able to see some of the structure

of the Golden Gate Bridge. Carthay Circle, The restaurant sits now, we used to have a sun and, like, wave fountain. It was, like, not the icon of the park, but it was the first thing you saw when you walked in the gates. It was just a huge, like, reflective sun. And then the fountains itself were, like, waves. And I don't know if this is entirely true, but I was told that the wave, The waves were synced up to the tides of the ocean,

so it would vary depending on what time of day it was, how big the waves are. I don't know if that's true, but I was told that when I was a kid, so... I don't know, I'll take that for what he will. Let's make our way towards Grizzly Peak. Originally Grizzly Peak was Condor Flats, and it was themed more of a high desert airfield, and now it is Grizzly Peak. more structured sports, an airfield, and like a national park.

All right, we have soaring. The soaring is a DCA 1.0 attraction, especially right now, because it is soaring over California. But usually it is soaring over the world, which technically would make it reimagined and not necessarily this is DCA 1.0. But right now, DCA 1.0. California Adventure opening day attraction. Grizzly River Run. We're going to take one of my favorite hidden paths here. It runs, like, behind the queue of Grizzly River Run.

It kind of takes you down this backway path. So one of my favorite water features and all the Disneyland Resort here. As we walk down this path, you get a really good look of Grizzly Peak. And it's got to be, like, one of the best views in the park, I believe. We are about to walk underneath the lift for Grizzly Over Run. This puts us out on the other side of Grizzly Ever Run. Paradise Gardens, which I think is the only thing left that has any sort of ties to Paradise Pier, which is what Pixar Pier was originally.

A Little Mermaid attraction. Little Mermaid is in the same building that was used to your golden drive. which is a show about California that featured Whoopi Goldberg. I don't remember too much about it. I just remember her statues on the side of the stage game to life. That's really the only memory I have of it, but it uses the same structure and the entrance is actually the same. On the left we're coming up on the Golden Zephyr, also a DCA opening attraction. What I like about the gold is the goal.

What I like about the Golden Zuffer is that one of the spiels while you're waiting in line calls you a rocketeer. Little nod, the Clipsicord. And on our right, another opening day attraction, Corn Dog Castle. Very important. Probably not as good as the little red truck in Disneyland, but that's okay. Still very good. Another opening day attraction, jump in jellyfish. Goofy Sky School.

Now, before it was Goofy Sky School, it was Monholland Madness. Seam track, everything's pretty much the same. It was just reimagined and added goofy to it. This is the silly symphony swings, formerly known as the Orange Stinger, which was essentially the same ride system, except it was enclosed in an orange. and you were flying with the bees. At least that's what I remember. I remember there being bees on the side of the orange as you were going around.

Now we are entering Pixar Pier. Before it was Pixar Pier, it was Paradise Pier, and it was themed to, like, any sort of boardwalk you would find on the coast of California. Peretta coaster fly by us. We have the Pixar Palaround on. on our left. Mickey's Funwheel.

You can't tell the trend of DCA is to reimagine everything. Toy Story Midway Mania. Love us down, now surround you. Some moving names will test your skill like nothing else ever will. Kereda Coaster on our right. Kretta Coaster was originally California Screaming. And it had an amazing track to go with it by Dick Dale. It's still one of my favorite soundtracks.

We have some billboards that are Pixar themed. but also like California themed at the same time. Like if you're on the pier. Making our way out of Pixar Pier. And we'll probably go to the right here. We're going to go to the right here and go into San Fran Sokio, which is formerly the Pacific Wharf that got rethemed into the, well, fake city in Big Hero 6. So everything is themed after Big Hero 6 and San Francisco in this little land.

Coming up on one of my favorite views of, well, the whole park basically. Technically, it's the back entrance into Carsland, but really, this is the way to enter. And it's really beautiful at night. So we are walking along the outside portion of the... Radiator Springs Racers. So Carsland not an opening day DCA land. It was a parking lot, but I much prefer Carsland than a parking lot. We have Flows V8 on our left. Coming up on Luigi's tires, right, coming up on the Cozy Cone Motel. For each cone offers a different type of snack or beverage.

I found some baby duckies. Jamboree are now exiting Carsland. We have another amazing water feature, courtesy of Grizzly River Run. Let's make our way into Adventures campus. Spider-Man Meet and Greet. meet and greet, web slingers on our left. We have the Pim Test Kitchen,

a Quintjet on top of the building that is going to be our next big E-Tigate attraction. Coming up on our right, Guardians of the Galaxy, breakout. Used to be Tower of Terror, reimagined into the Guardians of Galaxy breakout. Avengers Campus, going into Hollywoodland. In Perian Theater, used to be home to

Aladdin. It's been empty for quite a while now, though, so just a very huge unused theater right now. Kind of depressing. Highwood Backlot portion. This area of the park used to get seasonal nighttime parties, if you will. There was glow, and then, of course, my favorite, electronica. and then they did mad tea party for quite a while but electronica was great

because you had the soundtrack from Tron just blasting and everything was like you were on the grid and they even had Flynn's arcade and they don't really do stuff like that back here anymore which is unfortunate Mike and Solace to the rescue

not an opening day attraction, but what was in there before, which was Superstar Limo, did so poorly when DCA opened that it was quickly reimagined into Mike and Sully to the Rescue. So not quite opening day, but pretty close to it. On the saddest part of DCA history, in my opinion, we are coming up on the former home of Muppets, or rather Muppet Vision 3D But yeah It used to be where the Muppets were

And now it's Mickey's Philharmed Magic Which I mean if you're gonna put a show in there You might as well bring back the Muppets, right? But if you look outside here I still have some remnants of Muppets that used to be here Like on some of the stuff up top You have some like glasses

I think there's an eyeball up there somewhere still too. But you can't really see it right now because everything's so overgrown. But yeah, this building makes me very sad. Opening day attractions, schmoozy's. We can get your smoothies and coffee and the animation building. The animation building is an opening day attraction, although it has changed a bit inside. they've closed off a good portion of it

and so now they have Turtle Talk and a meet and greet and the Animation Academy but you know let's go inside and see what's playing it inside there so I like walking into this building and just hearing the music from certain animated movies if it's frozen though we're going to bail real quick

just a heads up gotta be kidding me I just got so bummed out right now. I was hoping for something like Pinocchio, Dumbo, Peter Pan, Jungle Book, anything. But that's okay. Mickey's Philharmed Magic. Now, if you look, you can see where they put a poster over the spot where Gonzo crashed his motorbike into the wall. Is the hole still there?

Probably not. But I like to think it is. Opening day attraction, award winners, very important. DCA used to be, have like, it used to be a very punny park. There's puns everywhere. So I like that schmoozy's and ward weaners are still here. Because it just reminds you of, like, how much whimsy the park had at one point. We are coming up on Carthay Circle.

So I guess you can say we've come full circle. No, that was horrible. I'm sorry. I'm going to do it for me today, Travelers. I hope you have a new appreciation for. or DCA, if you didn't already. It's a gorgeous park with a lot of history, even if it's only 25 years old. So thanks for being with us today, travelers.

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I hope you enjoyed your time with me, and we like to end our time together with the hope and the promise that there's a great big, beautiful tomorrow out there, and we will see you in one of those tomorrows on a future episode of Walk About the World. Bye.