The Disneyland Book of Secrets 2014: One Local's Unauthorized, Rapturous and Indispensable Guide to the Happiest Places on Earth (131 page)

Upon entering the
Flik’s Fun Fair
area, Guests are confronted with towering clovers (can you find the lucky one with four leaves?), flowers, and blades of grass, various pieces of litter and human tools and artifacts that loom over visitors as if Guests, too, are as tiny as bugs.  Handled improperly, the effect could’ve been frightening for small children, but the curves, the soft materials, and the gentle palette of blues and greens adapted from the film flow from the “architecture of reassurance”.  The effect is cozy and charming, not unnerving.

Like the best districts,
“a bug’s land”
has a back story.  Why have the
Bug’s Life
characters constructed a tiny fun park for Guests?  Remember that
Flik
is an inventor, and that most of his pals are performers.  So the idea is that having glimpsed the excitement of the
Disney California Adventure Park
that sprang up around them, the
Bug’s Life
bugs decided to build their
own
little park. 
Flik
has the inventive know-how, and his pals know how to put on a show!

Within a very constricted space, the
Imagineers
constructed five attractions, all necessarily small but quite satisfying for little ones.  Winding paths, tall, dense foliage, and a miniature
berm
disguise how compact the land is, giving an illusion of greater space.  After 2004, the nearby
Twilight Zone Tower of Terror
, visibly looming over
Flik’s Fun Fair
, added to Guests’ sense of being incredibly tiny.

Time would show that
DCA
’s first foray into providing additional attractions for children and families still wasn’t enough to satisfy Guests or critics, but
“a bug’s land”
was nevertheless a very good start.  The success of
“a bug’s land”
ultimately led to the creation of another
Disney-Pixar
land for
DCA
. 
Cars Land
, which opened in 2012 (and required the demolition of portions of
“a bug’s land”
), vibrantly brings to life
Cars
’
Radiator Springs
.

“a bug’s land” Attractions

Bountiful Valley Farm
  (Closed September 8, 2010)

[
FastView:
 
Defunct.  This entry is presented because it’s of historical interest for
DCA
fans.
]

Bountiful Valley Farm
, once a part of
Golden State
, then part of
“a bug’s land”
on the outskirts of
Flik’s Fun Fair
, had some educational merit in its heyday (or “hay day” as the case may be) but those days have passed and the farm has been razed.

Bountiful Valley Farm
was an
Opening Day
attraction at
DCA
.  Dedicated to immersing Guests in the entertaining aspects of farm life (and that’s problem number one, since, while noble and sometimes remunerative, farming is often endless, backbreaking toil),
Bountiful Valley Farm
,
DCA
’s paean to California agriculture, intended to educate while it delighted.

Walt
had a positive connection to agriculture.  When he was a child, his family left the city streets of Chicago for the bucolic world of
Marceline, Missouri
, where his father
Elias
farmed from 1906 to 1910. 
Walt
had chores and helped with the farming but for the most part, because he was young, he experienced the farm and the small-town community from an idyllic childhood perspective.  He absolutely, unabashedly loved it and would always remember it fondly.

In 194
8
Disney
studios released
So Dear to My Heart
in Chicago, and then across the nation in January 1949. 
So Dear to My Heart
is a family film about a farm in the U.S. heartland in early 1900’s. 
Disney
’s
go-to child star
Bobby Driscoll
played the lead.  The film’s values were
Walt
’s values, largely shaped by his early life on the farm in
Marceline
with his hard-working family.  It therefore made perfect sense to include an agricultural attraction at
DCA
, a theme park devoted to
Walt
and
California
.

When it launched,
Bountiful Valley Farm
hosted agricultural displays, and was meant to introduce both city slickers and suburbanites to the bountiful world of farming.  How seriously did
Disney
take this attraction?  On National Agriculture Day in 2001, California’s Agriculture Secretary Bill Lyons, about sixty elementary school children, and about a hundred members of California Women for Agriculture gathered at
Bountiful Valley Farm
to celebrate. Even
Mickey
and
Minnie
attended in a then-rare
DCA
appearance.

Agriculture truly was and is a backbone of California’s success. 
When we think of California, most of us immediately see visions of Hollywood and film crews, surfers,
Disneyland
, sequoia trees, the Golden Gate Bridge, oil wells, and the gold rush, but it’s a vast empire of humble, dirt-under-the-fingernails farming and growing that has largely propelled and sustained the California economy.

In that light it made sense, in a theme park dedicated to California, to have an attraction focused on agriculture, but
Bountiful Valley Farm
was underwhelming. 
Disney
’s heart was in the right place but the attraction lacked the scope and
magic
of typical
Disney
fare.

Caterpillar
(the agricultural equipment company) originally sponsored the exhibit (for it was an exhibit more than an attraction) and displayed
Caterpillar
vehicles.  A large barn called the
Farmers Expo
was open, and Guests could enter it to study homespun agricultural displays and maybe see a show on the little stage, the
Ugly Bug Ball
, starring
Flik
and
Atta
.

Outside
the
Farmers Expo
, fenced patches of ground were cultivated, and Guests could view California flowers and crops and read information about them on helpful plaques.  The crops were given a whimsical flavor by the statues of
A Bug’s Life
characters that adorned them.  On hot days, Guests, particularly the children, could dart through the leaky irrigation pipes of the
Irrigation Station
to cool off.

Now, my siblings and I know a little bit about farms.  We
were Army brats and consequently moved around when we were very small, but most of our childhood and teen years were spent in rural Massachusetts.  We lived in a countryside quilted with farms, large and small, sprawling tobacco farms and corn fields and little farms tucked away on rocky, hilly nooks near babbling streams or on narrow, cleared swatches between stretches of deep woods.

Probably because I have a genuine frame of reference for farms, at first glance in 2006
Bountiful Valley Farm
struck me pleasantly, but almost immediately, when I looked closer, I was disappointed and was disappointed even more on return visits.

The general, hazy outline wa
s right, the shape of the barn and the patches of crops, but it was all so sketchy and meager.  There was no depth of detail such as you find, for example, in
Disneyland
’s
Frontierland
or
New Orleans Square
.

By the time I
first saw
Bountiful Valley Farm
in 2006, the Caterpillar vehicles were gone.  On subsequent visits over the next few years I found the
Farmers Expo
closed (the building was commandeered for
backstage
use).

An old-fashioned red-
and-white
Kellogg
fruit truck replaced the
Caterpillar
vehicles, and an interactive display of old-time junk that kids could rattle, bash, and bang was installed—that was a big hit (literally)—but as 2010 dawned, the only truly fun part of
Bountiful Valley Farm
that remained was the
Irrigation Station
, which continued to soak Guests looking to cool off on hot summer days.

With its network of
sprinklers and oversized pipes and faucets, the
Irrigation Station
was popular with kids, although less so with the parents who suddenly found themselves with a soaked tot!

Other than
the
Irrigation Station
, the big draw here wasn’t an attraction, it was a restaurant, the now-closed
Bountiful Valley Farmers Market
.  This eatery served up fish, chicken, mozzarella sticks, salads, French fries, grapes, and snacks, generously portioned selections well-themed to the location.  The area was surrounded by a prairie of rustic picnic tables for plentiful family seating. 
Sam Andreas Shakes
served delectable, creamy shakes and ice cream treats whipped up on its tiny premises just across the way from the
Farmers Market
.

Despite the great
grub, this area was often lightly attended; on a weekday, it could seem like you and your party were the only ones in that area of the park. So beginning September 8, 2010,
Bountiful Valley Farm
was closed and the
Farmers Market
,
Sam Andreas Shakes
, and the farmland area–including the popular
Irrigation Station
–were soon demolished to make way for the
Cars Land
entrance area that includes
Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree
.  A few remnants of the district remain, shading into
Flik’s Fun Fair
to the east and
Cars Land
to the southeast.  Farewell,
Bountiful Valley Farm
.  We hardly knew ye. 
Did You Know?
  Before
Disneyland
was
Disneyland
it was 140 acres of walnut groves, orange groves, and strawberry fields.  The areas surrounding it were rural as well.  In the early days, Guests riding tall attractions–like the
Skyway
or
Rocket Jets
–that allowed them to see beyond the park’s encircling
berm
were more likely to see fields and crops than office buildings or hotels.  The area occupied by
Bountiful Valley Farm
–all of
DCA
, in fact–was the flat, paved
Disneyland Parking
Lot
from 1955 to 1998.  By tearing up the pavement and planting flowers and crops in the
Bountiful Valley Farm
district,
Imagineers
brought the location full circle and quite literally returned the land to its agricultural roots.
FastPass:
  No.  This self-guided area wasn’t a candidate for the
FastPass
system. 
Kid’s Eye View:
  [The
Irrigation Station
] was so fun!  Even if you’re older it was fun.

Flik’s Fun Fair

[
FastView:
 
Big family fun in a bug-sized land.
]

Launched on October 22, 2002, less than two years after the park opened,
Flik’s Fun Fair
focuses on toddler and family fun. 
Imagineers
sculpted a fanciful landscape of gigantic foliage, discarded objects, and popsicle-stick benches that creates the illusion that Guests have been reduced to insect size.  The concept?  In the spirit of
DCA Park
, the theme park surrounding them, the bugs who starred in
A Bug’s Life
have turned their patch of land into a fair, and Guests are invited to join in the fun!

Flik’s Fun Fair
offers five attractions, a hidden
Four Leaf Clover
, snack carts, rest rooms, drinking fountains, and intriguing paths that wind through it all.  Since the fair and all of its attractions were constructed at the same time, this area has a cohesive and coherent feeling.