Extinct Attractions - Porto Paradiso Water Carnival

Welcome to Extinct Attractions. This week, I took a look back at an attraction that helped open perhaps the most magnificent theme park ever made.

Last week, Muppet*Vision 3D officially closed its doors at Disney’s Hollywood Studios, marking the end of a glorious three-hour finale era of Muppets content. It’s a bummer that we’ll never get to experience the show there again, but it did make its last holdout long after the closure of the Disney California Adventure version.

However, fans of the park won’t have to go too long without seeing a bunch of members of their favorite gang with the Electric Mayhem set to take over Rock ‘n’ Roller Coaster at some point in 2026. While it likely won’t match the beauty and grace that was Muppet*Vision, I am glad that we’ll still have some kind of Muppet representation in the park sooner rather than later.

Via D23 

One of the few resorts that has never really had Muppets representation is the one in Tokyo. The Muppets must have never been a popular enough brand in Japan to justify an entire attraction and quite frankly the ones that existed wouldn’t have quite fit in anywhere in those parks, especially Tokyo DisneySea upon its opening on September 4, 2001.

WIth the entire park designed around water and how it affects a variety of different types of life, there is of course a gigantic lake at the front of the park, which needed some kind of show, obviously. The Tokyo parks are some of the busiest in the world, so the more activities, the better. With that in mind, the Porto Paradiso Water Carnival was born, making its debut along with the park on September 4, 2001.

The show took a little while to get going with the beginning consisting of a barge just sailing around along with a hefty amount of narration in Japanese (that my two weeks there unfortunately did not help me learn enough). From there, some performers appeared dressed in Venetian outfits that were highly reminiscent of The Hunchback of Notre Dame (so much so that my wife walked by and said “Oh, are you doing a show based on Hunchback?")

These dancers were the star of the start of the show, performing tricks and providing a general sense of carnival whimsy. It fit the land, Mediterranean Harbor, perfectly.

Via Flickr 

But then things got real when some water skiers came into play, leading the charge for the main mouse himself, Mickey. He was on a giant float in the middle of the lake along with the rest of the Fab Five. Because of the vantage point of the show, it was a little difficult to tell what all the ships looked like, but the coolest one was one that was themed like a pirate ship.

From there, it was basically just a mix of musical numbers and the Fab Five sailing around the lake, over and over.

Via Biglobe 

I’ll admit, the story was a bit hard to follow since it was all in Japanese, but the scope of it was pretty impressive, especially for the first show that the park had in that area. You’d be hard pressed to believe that the park had just opened. It’s just a classic Tokyo Disney move to absolutely dominate the theme park show space, even if the Porto Paradiso Water Carnival was a bit repetitive, with a song seemingly called “Listen to the Sea" played a lot. But the songs were pretty catchy and we got to see Goofy in a really fun-looking outfit. Hard to beat that right?

The show actually lived a pretty good life, sticking around until May 7, 2006 before eventually being replaced by The Legend of Mythica. I haven’t covered that one yet, but based on the name alone, it seems like it’s going to have to be yet another fun Tokyo Disney show.

Via Christine Rees 

As always, don’t forget to check out my interactive maps of the Disney Parks throughout the years where you can watch or learn more about all the attractions from every Disney park around the world.

Thanks for reading and have a magical day!