Last Days of Disney - Hollywood Studios

American Idol Experience - Jemima was too chicken to have a go!

Who knew Disney had hooked up with Lucas?  We weren't expecting so much Star Wars stuff here!  They had a terrific 'Star Tours' ride - something we did four times!  It's a 3D full motion simulator ride set in the Star Wars universe - and the story line changes every time you go on the ride. It was fantastic, the 3D was convincing and not 'hokey' and the changes in plot line made you want to go back again and again.

Max and Jemima riding an empire speeder

The ship we were (supposedly) going in on our Star Tour

Animatronic C3P0

Vehicle details

In the compulsary shop at the end of th ride, they had Build-a-droid (for a fee) - both Max and Jemima built a driod each.

Additionally, they had a build your own Light Sabre stand as well - and these are complete with lights on the blades and sound effects when you activat, deactivate, wave the sabre and clash with another sabre. - Max and Jemima were having battles in the back yard of the holiday house we were renting in Orlando.

Outside of the Star tours was the Paduan entrance training where they take Youngling hopefuls and give them some basic force and light sabre training and hopefully they graduate as Paduans.  Unfortunately, in the middle of their training, Darth Vader appears! He encourages the younlings to come to the dark side and each of the trainees must fight off the dark one to qualify as a paduan. Of course they all manage to fend him off!

We also went to the indoor drive in theatre restaurant which had fake '50s cars inside the theatre  while we ate lunch and enjoyed the old movie shorts.

The history of hollywood showed of Disney's great capabilities with animatronics - even the ones that were supposed to look like real people looked, moved and sounded like real people.

Julie Andrews as Mary Poppins

Temple of Doom - Harrison Ford as Indiana Jones

The Wizard of Oz (note the shoes under the house)

Of course Cars was represented - in full size!

Also in full size was the 'Honey, I shrunk the kids' playground - very cool....

The Indiana Jones Stunt show was ten times better than the equivalent at Movieworld in Queensland and went for an hour or so.

Lots of yummy Disney themed treats in the lolly shop at Hollywood Studios

Toffee and Caramel Apples

LCM rice crispy Mickey shapes on sticks then decorated.