Afloat in the Classic Disneyland Peter Pan’s Flight Ride

On Peter Pan’s Flight ride at Disneyland (and Disney World), you “soar high above the rooftops of London aboard a pirate galleon on an adventure to Never Land.”

“With a sprinkling of Tinker Bell’s fairy dust, away they all flew, heading for Never Land.”

The Peter Pan ride, no matter whether it is at Disneyland or Disney World, is always such long of a wait to get on. All of the Fantasyland attractions are very popular when visiting the parks, but this one, in my opinion, always seems to have the most continuous, long waits.

Fortunately for the InACents family, we get into the parks early, and before the majority of the crowds. So we hit up all the Fantasyland rides as soon as we get there so they are out of the way.

While riding in your flying boat, have you noticed the blocks on the floor in the first scene of the children’s room? If you look carefully, you will see they spell Disney and Peter Pan in a creative fashion.

One of the main difference between the ride at Disneyland and it’s predecessor at Disney World is how you load into the boats. At Disneyland, the boats are stopped at the platform for you to enter, whereas Disney World’s entry is on a continuously moving platform.

While the Disneyland version of the Peter Pan ride was the first to open (July 17, 1955), Disney World (October 3, 1971), Tokyo Disneyland (1983) and Disneyland Paris (1992) also have Peter Pan’s Flight attraction.

The original design and construction of Peter Pan’s Flight did not include Peter at all, because you were acting as Peter, flying through the scenes. Years later, Peter Pan was added after guest confusion.

I love the Disney dark rides, like Peter Pan’s Flight. However, I have always had one problem with them. They are too short. You quickly get whipped around the scenes, trying to immerse yourself into the story, yet everything is at such a fast pace, and then the ride is over.

While there are pluses to the whole fast ride experience, as it allows guests to move through the queue and onto other attractions, the overall experience is lost at such a rapid pace. Everytime I think back to our experiences in Fantasyland (at either park), I recall how fast we jumped from ride to ride, just to get them out of the way before the crowds. If you wait till later in the day, you could spend the better part of an afternoon in Fantasyland, and with limited time in the parks, it is not always feasible for a family.

Regardless, Peter Pan’s Flight is a classic, Disney ride, and a great feature to be sprinkled with pixie dust.

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