The wild blue yonder will get a little wilder thanks to Goofy's Sky School. This coaster-style ride is frantic fun, and with Goofy as your flight instructor, you know that you're in for a wild ride! From his makeshift flight academy out on the edge of Paradise Pier, our fearless flying instructor is training aspiring pilots to soar - the Goofy way! Climb aboard your flight training vehicle and hang on as you take to the sky for a zany roller coaster ride up, down, around, over and through the clouds. Your flight will take you up 3 stories in the air as you journey over 1,200 feet of track.
Goofy's Sky School is a wild mouse roller coaster manufactured by Mack Rides. Walt Disney Imagineering have designed the theme for the ride based upon Disney's animated cartoon "Goofy's Glider". Riders board a plane and navigate a crash course of flying which features sharp turns, steep drops and sudden stops. Goofy is pictured on billboards throughout the ride teaching guests the step-by-step process of flying a plane.
Themed as Goofy teaching a bunch of new pilots how to fly, Goofy's Sky School is a designer wild mouse (sometimes also called a mad mouse). If you're not familiar with the genre, it's a small, convoluted roller coaster where the track dips and turns unexpectedly, presumably reminding its inventor of a mouse tearing through a maze. To define it more in Disney terms, the ride is similar to Space Mountain, only outdoors and therefore in the light. Goofy's Sky School is an off-the-shelf midway ride in which Disney has invested next to nothing in spiffing up. In other words, fun but nothing special.
Touring Tips
- A fun ride but also a slow-loading one, and one that breaks down frequently. Ride during the first hour that the park is open or use FASTPASS or the single-rider line.
- The queue is mostly shaded outdoor queue. Be sure to read the bulletin boards as you near the loading area for some fun back story and inside jokes relating to the conversion of Goofy's chicken farm to a flight school.
- The ride vehicles have individual lap bars, but the seats can be a tigh fit if you have a large torso or broad shoulders.
- Space Mountain with the lights on; may induce motion sickness; a retheming of Mulholland Madness, the previous ride in this location; must be 42" tall to ride; switching-off option provided.
Facts
- Inspired by the "Goofy's Glider," a 1940 animated short. Goofy's Sky School is inspired by Disney's madcap "How To" cartoon series of the 1940s and 1950s - especially Goofy's Glider (1940). Similar to the antics features in those classic cartoons, your flight lessons don't go quite as planned!
- Goofy's Sky School is only one of the many new additions to Disney California Adventure Park. Even more Disney magic is on the way! Find out about the exciting transformation of Disney California Adventure Park.
History
Goofy's Sky School originally opened on February 8, 2001, as Mulholland Madness. The attraction's original name came from the famed Mulholland Drive in Los Angeles, California, named after the famed engineer William Mulholland. Within the first month of its operation, three accidents occurred on the ride causing it to be shut for a short period of time for repairs. The ride vehicles were themed to the many cars one can find on the Southern California freeway systems, (such as Highway Patrol cars or Classic Surfer "Woodies"). At the end of the ride, a sign on the wall above read "Rental Car Return".
On October 12, 2010, Mulholland Madness closed for refurbishment and re-theming as part of Disney California Adventure Park's major refurbishment. On July 1, 2011, the attraction reopened as Goofy's Sky School. The attraction's re-opening is the latest in a series of moves to attempt to introduce classic Disney characters into Paradise Pier. It has been reported that Goofy's Sky School will be the location of a future E ticket ride.
The original Mulholland Madness ride was often criticized for being an "off-the-shelf", carnival-style ride with a weak theme. Brady MacDonald of the Los Angeles Times describes the re-themed Goofy's Sky School ride as "little more than a Band-Aid meant to hide an unseemly scar that earned the Anaheim theme park its on-the-cheap reputation". He goes on to say that an "ordinary Wild Mouse coaster doesn't belong in a Disney park and is an embarrassment" when compared with other Disney coasters such as Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, Space Mountain and the Matterhorn Bobsleds. He concluded by stating that "the ride should have been removed rather than remade". In response to the Los Angeles Times' critical review, Screamscape's Lance Hart points out that several other rides (such as Gadget's Go Coaster, Silly Symphony Swings, Jumpin' Jellyfish and Rock 'n' Roller Coaster) are also off-the-shelf and are seen at many other parks around the world. He states that "off-the-shelf rides systems are fairly hard to avoid these days. Sometimes you can dress up a ride system to look different and unique… sometimes you can't". Lance Hart concludes by saying that "a good wild mouse coaster would be in my top 3 must-have attractions" for a boardwalk style park such as Paradise Pier. Like Screamscape, others have been less critical of the updated ride. Several have stated that the ride is better than its predecessor and that it better suits the theme of a Disney theme park.
Hidden Mickeys
- One of the large Goofy signs topping the attraction features a Classic Mickey in the clouds, turned 45 degrees to the left.