< PREVIOUS ] [ 2001 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >
For some time, it has been almost impossible to watch
the tube without seeing ads for the new Disney
California Adventure,
which is apparently a theme park
that compresses the most popular Golden State attractions
(wineries, movie studios) into a few acres next to the
Disneyland park.
There was a time when I wanted to go to Disneyland. That was when I was about 10 years old, and for some reason I thought that you could go there be a pirate like Captain Blood for a few weeks, swinging on the rigging and taking whatever you wanted -- damsels, gold, other ships -- at sword point. Or you could be Davy Crockett for a while, fighting bears and protecting virtuous homesteaders from the vicious tomahawk-wielding enemies of progress and civilization.
The truth came after a fellow Cub Scout returned from
visiting his cousins in LaLa Land. He had also assumed
that Disneyland was a sort of live-in fantasy, and after
his personal inspection, he sadly informed us that It's
really just an amusement park with rides like Lakeside or
Elitch's. They wear costumes, that's about the only
difference.
Thus cured of any desire to visit the Magic Kingdom, I was willing to ignore the Disney California Adventure until I remembered that whatever happens in Colorado usually happens first in California.
So we could be looking at a Colorado Adventure theme
park, situated near a large airport, that would provide our
visitors with the Colorado experience
without
forcing them to endure the travails of venturing into areas
where cellular telephones do not operate reliably and
chicken-fried steak appears on the menu.
Upon entering the Colorado Adventure park, visitors will be cautioned not to get too close to the rodents -- they may look as friendly as Mickey and Minnie, but they could be carrying hantavirus or bubonic plague.
But they could go to the arena, where they'd watch exciting contests, like the effort by Doug Dean, speaker of the Colorado House of Representatives, to kill a bill that would allow Coloradans some protection from telepredators.
Visitors should be warned, though, that they might become participants, rather than spectators.
For instance, they might have to sit in judgment of actual life-and-death matters. Our legislature has experimented with many other methods to insure that the death penalty is imposed -- trial juries, trial judges, special three-judge panels -- and it's entirely possible that the crowd in the contest arena might be pressed into service: thumbs up or thumbs down.
But the major attraction at the Colorado Experience, as at most amusement parks, would be the rides.
The thrilling Colorado back-country spewt expedition would include a rockslide that closes the narrow shelf road, and as the driver starts to back up, a washout opens to the rear. Venturing up a side path means getting buried to the axles in mud, and after the hailstorm settles down, the lightning bolts close in.
Naturally, all this is the result of mechanical contrivances that operate on a tight schedule, but it is what many visitors want, and better they get it in a park than in our real back-country, where search-and-rescue costs money.
As for other rides, every river guide I know has had tourists ask about the location of the giant underwater chain that pulls the rafts down the river, and some say that tourists refuse to believe that there isn't any such chain.
So, give people what they want -- a float trip with the rafts connected to chains, like the tin ducks at a carnival arcade shooting gallery.
And why make them actually climb 14,000-foot peaks when we have hypobaric chambers and Imax screens whose supernal views would never be marred by clouds?
Many tourists don't like to admit they're tourists -- they say they want to fit in with the locals. The Colorado Experience should accommodate them by allowing them to get on the same ride as residents.
That, of course, would be the process of taxpayers
getting taken for a ride
whenever the state wants to
subsidize some wealthy corporation that has expressed
interest in moving here.
The Nike Ride
and the Ziff-Davis Ride
never really got going, but now there's the chance to get
taken for the Boeing Headquarters Ride,
and if
visitors to the Colorado Experience really want to pay to
participate in our strange little rides, there's no reason
we should stand in their way.
The scary thing in all this, though, is that the Colorado Experience theme park could be the upside of our reliance on California's cultural and economic leadership. The downside? Suppose we start following their lead on some other matter, and we get rolling black-outs along with astronomical utility bills.
< PREVIOUS ] [ 2001 Index ] [ Ed Quillen HOME ] [ SEARCH ] [ NEXT >