Disney Adventure World: A First Look (and a Very Happy Daughter)

The lake changes everything.

That was my first thought stepping into Adventure Bay at Disneyland Paris’s newly renamed Disney Adventure World. A large central lagoon, landscaped paths winding around it, bridges, greenery, and the kind of space that makes you want to slow down. The old Walt Disney Studios never had that. Now it does.

We were there on March 23 for an Annual Pass preview, six days before the public opening. We’d driven down for an extended weekend and I’d been fighting a cold since Monday. None of that mattered much.

On timing: early preview dates like March 15 were reportedly packed and chaotic. March 23 felt like the sweet spot: still busy, but manageable.

Adventure Bay: the transformation Walt Disney Studios needed

Adventure Bay is the real achievement here. The lake, the paths, the overall landscaping: this is what elevates the park beyond being “the other park.” Walking along the waterfront between attractions feels genuinely pleasant, something I would never have said about Walt Disney Studios before. The nature work gives the whole space a sense of place it never had.

The new entrance to Pixar/Toy Story Land has also been improved. It was long overdue and makes that area feel properly connected to the rest.

Disney Cascade of Lights: spectacular, with caveats

The new nighttime show, Disney Cascade of Lights, takes place over the lake. It runs for 16 minutes and uses 379 drones: a mix of aerial drones and aquatic “ducks” that glide on the water surface, alongside fountains, projections, water screens, and pyrotechnics. It’s genuinely impressive, one of the most technically ambitious things I’ve seen at a Disney park.

What I’m less happy about: Tales of Magic, the castle show, will permanently stop using aerial drones. I get the reason: the castle drones are visible from Adventure Bay and break the illusion of the new show. But those drones have been part of the park’s identity for years and I’ll miss them.

Two practical tips if you go:

• Don’t end up at the back of the crowd. The barriers and crowd control structures are dense. If you’re not well-positioned, you’ll struggle to see the aquatic drones and the water screen properly.
• Avoid standing next to The Regal View Restaurant & Lounge. From that angle you lose the water screen projections entirely. The screen shows static images rather than video, so it’s not a catastrophic miss, but worth knowing.

World of Frozen and Raiponce Tangled Spin

World of Frozen is compact but crafted with care. One new attraction: Frozen Ever After, a boat ride through the world of Arendelle. The theming is well done and the ride is enjoyable.

In Adventure Bay, next to The Regal View, sits Raiponce Tangled Spin: a spinning gondola ride inspired by the lantern scene from Tangled. It’s a good ride. The ceiling is filled with golden lanterns, the gondolas rotate gently, and the setting is charming. My only complaints: it needs more audio to sell the immersion, and those ceiling lanterns are static. They don’t move. For a scene built around the most iconic visual moment in the film, hundreds of lights lifting and drifting into the night sky, a frozen ceiling feels like exactly the wrong choice.

The meetup

My daughter is a big Frozen fan. The royal meetup with Elsa and Anna inside Arendelle Castle was, without contest, the highlight of her day. Possibly her year. The moment she saw them, everything else stopped existing: the queues, the barriers, my sniffling. That reaction alone justified the drive.

The one thing that went wrong

We could only enter the new land at 17:45, which meant by the time we got in, the Annual Pass holder exclusive jacket was sold out. I knew it existed. I wanted it. It was gone. I’m still a little bitter about it.

Verdict

Despite being sick, despite the crowd barriers, despite the compact World of Frozen, despite the jacket: this was a great visit. The transformation of Disney Adventure World through Adventure Bay is real and significant. The park finally feels like somewhere worth spending a full day and evening. And I can’t even go back for two months.

I want to go back as soon as possible.

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If you want to see more photos from the visit, follow me on Instagram at @damoun.park where I post regularly about theme parks across Europe. And if you’ve been to Disney Adventure World already, I’d love to hear your take in the comments.