It wouldn't be any stranger having a paddle wheeler cruising the Carribean than it is having a sailing ship of the high seas plying the Mississippi.

I can't imagine retheming the Mark Twain. It still works if you think about it.

Course we'll all just have to wait and see. Maybe it'll never even happen!

I have mixed feelings. Like most of us here, I have memories of how it used to be, I miss the secret tunnel to the fort. I enjoy the lack of crowds and the views. We like to feed the ducks, early in the morning. This is another classic Disney dilemma, how do you add new things with out upsetting us old geezers. My kids love running around the place, just like I did. I think there is unrealized potential that could be tapped into, if it's done right. I hope they don't go the way NA suggested they might, with off-the-shelf equipment. I talked to my 5 year old son about it, he said he likes TSI just the way it is, probably because he's used to it. I'm sure if he grew up with the pirate themed island, he would feel the same way about it if it was changed.

When I was in school (not all that long ago) Mark Twain was still taught in like seventh grade. I doubt you will run into any small child that has read Huck Finn. And no, I don't think kids are getting a real education in school. And I think that many parents try to pick up the slack, but with school days lasting seven hours and then an hour or more of homework, when is all the slack picking up going to happen? Only 15 minutes of every hour in school is spent on actual instruction, and the rest on classroom management/bathroom breaks etc., so teachers don't have a ton of time either. There is a ton wrong with schools, but I don't blame the kids for it. Or the parents, honestly. Most of them are just doing the best they can.

First of all, I don't know why you would say that it's a given that your sources are incorrect. I happen to disagree with you this time, but I certainly don't automatically discount your sources.

And I do agree that the mass marketing aimed at kids is harming their minds and imaginations. But, I think you need to go past video games and movies. Go to Target and try to find an open ended toy. It will be tough. Most toys are centered around characters, or are electronic in some way. You have to do your research now to find good toys whereas fifty years ago no one was pushing Dora (or Mickey) so hard on kids.

I just don't think that kids have changed much. I think they aren't being provided with enough oppportunities or stimulation, but I hardly think it's a "kids these days" issue. Or a "parents these days" issue. I think on the whole it's a lot tougher to be a parent in the age of technology. Marketing is everywhere. We don't watch TV with commercials or play with characters or wear them on our cloths, but even with all those things the marketing aimed at kids is impossible to avoid.

I definitely think someone should be attacked for this, but I think it should be Hasbro and Mattel and not the mom and dad who you see with a kid with a gameboy. Chances are they both work and perhaps don't have the time or the means to research better options. Or it may be that the kid has been at home reading classics all day and he just happens to be playing a video game now.

And I don't really care if they make it Pirate Island, but I hope they do it in a general way and not movie themed.

Some adults here in Phoenix have tried to get Twain banned from schools because he dared to use the "N" word in his writings. Who cares the theme is that racism is abhorrent, but these adults are hardly literate anyway.

Can I make a request when/if this is done? Build a freakin' bridge from the Hungry bear across to the Island and over to Frontierland. Granted there would be some problems making sore it was high enough to allow for the ships to pass, but I hate the congestion at Splash Mountain. Only one way into and out of Critter Country sucks.

I was thinking tunnel (under ROA) instead of bridge, but I couldn't agree more.

A tunnel or a bridge would be a huge undertaking. I doubt they will do either.

I never read the books. Yet I know the story of Huck Finn and Tom Sawyer. How do I know them? I saw the movies. If these kids know about Jack Sparrow through movies, why can't they know Tom & Huck from them as well? In fact, wasn't the movie "Tom & Huck" a Disney movie?

Besides, a good way to get the kids to know about these stories is to promote them by having attractions at Disneyland. Rebuild the fort, add new technology and infrastructure, and better bathrooms and a store and snack area. Have a story time there so the kids get to know who they are as well. But don't ignore the island and do a half-assed rehab on it and wonder why no one goes over there.


I thought about that as well, but then that would spoil the mystique of the "Island" if you could walk to it. Although a CM tunnel would be good for supplies and staffing if they put in more services. And a bridge would be an eyesore to the river, and a pretty big undertaking.

Also, I wonder if they could keep the Indian Village if the Island becomes part of the Caribbean?

Don't forget, they also need a time portal ... because the time of Caribbean piracy is NOT the time period of New Orleans Square or Frontierland.






(Oh, but Frontierland and NOS are not the same time period as each other. nevermind)

Put in a tunnel and have it as a "En-Masse Secret" entrance to the fort