It's a song everyone knows, "Innn the tiki tiki tiki tiki room". Today this landmark attraction is celebrating its 50th anniversary at the Disneyland resort and I could not be more excited! A celebration of this type of attraction means more special merchandise in the park yay!. This attraction is like none other and was really a first of its kind and was meant to be a extension or private room of the now extinct Tahitian Terrace. Walt Disney actually wanted to fill the room with live birds. Then he realized there were..... consequences to having live birds sitting over peoples food....you catch my drift. So he scrapped that idea and wanted to put in mechanical birds, but no that wasnt good enough either. He wanted to entertain the guests till the idea struck. Inspired by the vintage mechanical birds he thought that if they could make something so small sing and move then he for sure could do it in his park. There wasn't a name for such technology yet. So the term Audio Animatronics was born. Imagine having to be the imagineers working at WED enterprises. I myself would of called him crazy. Those employees AND Walt Disney were nothing but pure wizards. Now audio animatronics are so common place but in the 1960s this was cutting edge technology!
I think Walt Disney has always been a tikiphile. In fact I am sure of it. This was also during a time in american culture when they were obsessed with all things Polynesia. So on June 23rd 1963 the birds sang words and the flowers bloomed! you even had to pay separately(75 cents!) to get in and as a preview they placed a barker bird and wouldn't that just draw you in? Walt Disney had actually sponsored the show himself for the first year it was opened which is why it is named Walt Disney's Enchanted Tiki Room. Of course by now it is rightfully sponsored by Dole. Anyways, I consider it a tiki mecca because almost every tikiphile I know makes their way to visit haha. Its such a nice relaxing spot where there is a preshow and the show itself. While you are waiting you are greeted by the tiki gods and given a history lesson about pineapple. Its much more interesting then it sounds I promise. While you are in the preshow there is a lovely little juice stand where you can the dole whip or a spear or even just juice (all pineapple of course).
I love this attraction because its fun and has the tiki appeal and a great escape from the busy park at any time of the day. This is a place I could talk forever about but I will just leave you with my pictures :) HAPPY ANNIVERSARY!
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