Currently there are strollers stored in the entry room
“Lame,” I said.
“Blech,” echoed McGeorge.
“Well, at least now we know where to go to get a free wheelchair,” a chipper Newmeyer chimed in. “Seriously, I’m sure all the good stuff is down the stairs.”
I nodded in agreement, and we started the trek down the two stories of stairs. We were almost at the bottom when I thought I heard a noise, freaked out, and ran back up both flights, two steps at a time. The guys followed, freaked out by my freak-out. We got back to the top room, trying to stifle our heavy breathing.
Looking down the stairway from the entry room
“What the fuck, Kinsey?” whispered an out of breath and out of shape Newmeyer.
“Ssshhh, shut up, I heard something.”
We all listened intently. Not a sound.
“Goddammit, Kinsey!” sighed an exasperated McGeorge. “Newmeyer’s fat heart can’t handle this shit!”
I laughed, Newmeyer scowled, and we started walking down the steps again.
At the bottom was a sign warning about asbestos. “Weird,” I said, as the other guys nodded in agreement.
We opened the door and found ourselves in an empty hallway. Another door was on the left, and the right seemed to open out into a tunnel… The Utilidors! We turned right, walked down to the tunnel and stopped short. Passing by us were Goofy, without his head on, his flamboyantly gay “handler” who was talking to him “in character”, and Snow White, who Goofy was heavily flirting with.
“Now Goofy,” intoned the handler with a high-pitched lisp, “I don’t want to hear any of that sort of talk!”
Goofy grabbed Snow White’s ass as well as he could with his huge padded hand. She gasped and punched him in the nuts. He laughed, obviously protected by the costume’s padding, and tried to grope her left breast. She sighed and kissed him.
The handler continued to blabber on. “Goofy, that sort of behavior simply isn’t appropriate! Mickey is going to punish you when he gets home!”
They walked past the tunnel entrance, and we glued ourselves to the wall as they went by, going completely unnoticed.
“What… the… fuck?!” I murmured. It was like some crazy alternate reality down here, like we really had gone down Alice’s rabbit hole.
“Let’s follow them!” said an overly excited McGeorge. “Snow White is hot!”
Seemed like a reasonable plan. We certainly had no idea where we were going, so why not follow people who did? We stepped out into the tunnel… and nearly got run over by a battery-powered golf cart silently barreling down the middle of the walkway.
“Watch where you’re going assholes!” yelled the driver.
Shaken but undeterred, we continued onwards, following Goofy and his two admirers. Journey’s “Separate Ways” played through the speakers overhead, followed by Bryan Adams’ “Summer of 69”. No Disney music down here, assumably to offer a respite to the Cast Members from the constant barrage of it in the park overhead. Although whether Bryan Adams was a sanity-saving alternative to the Sherman Brothers was certainly debatable.
The Utilidors under Fantasyland
A wide variety of Cast Members passed us, costumed, half-costumed, or in street clothes, completely oblivious to our presence. It was like we were invisible. So we kept walking, even when our Goofy-led escorts turned off and went up a random stairway. The one-foot wide stripe painted along the wall of the tunnel eventually changed color, and after stopping to stare slack-jawed at a full-color version of our ASCII map on the wall, we ascertained that this meant we were entering a different “land”, in this case going from Fantasyland to Tomorrowland.
“Hey, I just realized something,” I said, turning to the guys. “We had a hell of a time finding this one entrance. It’d be a lot easier to find them by coming out of them rather than trying to track them down from the outside.”
“Yeah, good idea!” exclaimed McGeorge.
“I agree,” said Newmeyer. “That’ll save a ton of time. Let’s go up the next stairway we see.”
So we did, and on the way up a group of Cast Members going down the stairs squeezed past us. We nodded to them and continued on, still stunned that nobody seemed to care that we were down there. At the top of the stairs we were greeted with a scattered mess of clothing racks, filled with t-shirts ticketed with ridiculously marked-up price tags. Boxes piled high along the walls were filled with stuffed animal versions of the characters. The room easily contained $10,000 worth of merchandise, and there was nothing stopping us from grabbing a handful. But just then a female security guard turned the corner. We froze, not knowing whether to run and hide or stand our ground. I made the decision for us.
“Excuse me, M’am,” I started. “It’s our first week here, and we’re a bit lost. Just trying to get out to Tomorrowland?”
She turned and pointed the direction she’d just come from. “Right down that hall,” she said cheerfully.
“Thanks!” we all said at once, as she continued down the stairway we’d just come up.
We breathed a sigh of relief and walked down the hallway she’d pointed to, coming to a set of double doors. We opened them and were blasted with blindingly bright light. Stepping outside, as our eyes adjusted to the daylight we turned back to see a pair of white doors, framed in silver and surrounded by a blue wall. As before, nothing there drawing attention to itself; no signs, no fancy ornamentation. Just plain white doors.
The Utilidor entrance in Tomorrowland
“Awesome,” sighed McGeorge.
“I just about shit my pants when that security guard came by,” said Newmeyer.
“She didn’t care! Nobody cared!” I laughed.
We spent the rest of the day down in The Utilidors, going up every stairway, finding every entrance into the park above. Each time upon turning to see where we’d exited, we were greeted with a nondescript doorway, leading from the ultra-clean faux reality of The Magic Kingdom into a dirty, dingy, ill-kept hallway leading to a stairway. The transition was always jarring.
Random CM not caring we’re down there
We found the employee bank, the costume rental window, multiple break rooms, and a cafeteria. The best find of the day was a doorway that led to an alcove under the seating in The Hall of Presidents, and it was almost like being under the bleachers in a stadium. We amused ourselves for a while listening for the audience to filter in and then beating on the underside of the seats during the show, laughing as people screamed about the ghosts of dead presidents.
Hall of Presidents Utilidor entrance
Eventually the day drew to a close. Exhausted from endless trips up and down two flights of stairs, we stumbled down Main Street, and drove back to our hotel. We spent the evening dangling our feet over the third floor walkway outside of our room, drinking beer, smoking hand-rolled cigarettes, and excitedly going over the details of the day.
Walt Disney World had become fun again.
In the years since I’ve continued to visit The Utilidors, never once encountering any sort of resistance. In fact, even post 9/11, I’m still shocked by how lax security is down there. Some highlights:
Went back down with McGeorge and videotaped the entire walk from Frontierland to Tomorrowland with the videocamera held by my side. It was shaky, but produced some great shots, including a Chip/Dale head poking out of a dumpster and a semi-costumed Cinderella making out with (and getting felt up by) a random CM against a wall. Broadcast this video on the student TV station at my prestigious Ivy League university at least 200 times, and never received any feedback. Apparently I was the only Disney Geek at school.
As a summer camp counselor I brought down two separate groups of 15 teenagers as part of a fake “tour group”. Acted like a tour guide, walking backwards the whole time and pointing out specific landmarks to the gawking kids.
On a recent trip with my mom, who is admittedly not a risk-taker, I got fed up by the blockades setup for the daily p
arade. We had Fast-Passes and needed to get from Frontierland to Fantasyland to ride Peter Pan. So I dragged her, my wife, and my little brother down the Hall of Presidents entrance, through The Utilidors, and back up to the castle door. I think it was probably the most “dangerous” thing she’d done in 30 years, and she’s still telling her friends how cool it was. When she asked how I knew how to get down there, I told her the story above and her response was, “Well, at least you weren’t into drugs and sex like everyone else your age.” Sigh.
Google Earth has made finding the Utilidor entrances from the comfort of your own home fun and safe. It’s like a scavenger hunt! For example, load up Google Earth and type in coordinates Lat 28°25'10.69"N, Long 81°34'53.32"W, with an eye altitude of 30m (go to the Ground-Level view of around 100ft). You’ll see a lovely 3D rendering of our first and most beloved Utilidor entrance, WITH THE FUCKING DOOR OPENED!!!
BACKSTAGE AT EPCOT
While there is no complex Utilidor system at Epcot (just a very small set of rooms under Spaceship Earth) there is an extensive backstage area that circles the entire park, along with some very interesting sights to be seen. If you want to see some of them legitimately you can take the “UnDISCOVERed Future World” tour, which, for fans of the park who probably already know most trivia, is 75% fluff, 25% cool stuff. However, it’s just as easy to get backstage yourself and walk around!
Probably the easiest access is from The Land. There are two ways to get backstage from this pavilion: you can either go out the large set of doors on the bottom floor to the left of Soarin’, just past the bathrooms. If you sit there waiting for your significant other to finish taking a massive dump chances are you’ll see at least a few CMs exiting through these doors. The other way to get backstage from The Land is to hang a sharp right immediately after getting off of Soarin’, instead of walking down the exit hallway with everyone else. There’s a single door that leads outside.
Path from Soarin to Omnimover maintenance area and back out to Imagination
Both of these exits will place you in the back of The Land, and you can travel east to get behind the Imagination Pavilion. On the tour they show you an area in the back of Imagination, across from the Canada Pavilion, where the 3D glasses are washed. But of more interest (and what is not elaborated on in the tour) is that next to this glass-washing station is the repair area for the Omnimovers used in the ride. If you’ve ever wanted to see up close the underside of an Omnimover you can duck underneath the raised track and take a gander. Spare parts and repair tools line the walls, and you can even walk back to the left to see where the track splits off from the main ride, designed so the disabled cars can be moved off the main ride track without having to pick them up with a crane or forklift.
Once you’re done browsing this area you can exit back into Future World through a door that leads to the rear of Imagination, near the almost always empty restrooms on the right side of the pavilion.
Another relatively easy access point is via the Mission: Space queue. Apparently when they built this ride they expected a much larger crowd, because there is a huge abandoned stretch of queue on the side of the pavilion. The easiest way to get to it is to go up the ramp on the right side. This leads to a winding area, and just before the line snakes into the building there is an exit to the right that leads to a loading dock. Take the steps down and you’ll find a dirt path that actually runs under the Test Track exterior track, and from there to a series of parking lots and roads that wind around the entire park. If you head south you’ll find the Costuming and general CM building on your left. It’s worth looking at, as there’s no ID required to enter. Continue south past China and around the docks where they store the Illuminations globe, and you’ll find yourself behind the “Africa” area, which was once supposed to house a Pavilion (and might still yet, if Disney execs ever get their asses in gear and throw some more cash at Epcot). The land is cleared, but there’s nothing there except a dumping ground for old props and Food and Wine Festival booths. What’s dumped back there seems to rotate (and rot) but right now the boneyard features various ride structures and is the rumored burying ground of some of the 20K Leagues subs!
Path from Mission: Space queue to CM Costuming building
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My off-limits escapades are small-time compared to the exploits of other daring souls I’ve met via the wonders of The Interwebs. McGeorge’s BBSs had transformed into “Al Gore’s Internet”, and suddenly like-minded souls started coming out with some crazy stories of WDW infiltrations that rivaled military operations. I’ve had the pleasure and honor of getting to know two of these brave characters, and both agreed not only to let me interview them, but to also allow a few of their adventure photos to be published.
INTERVIEW WITH SHANE PEREZ
First up is Shane Perez, a good-looking, well-spoken Miami native now residing in NYC. Shane received a certain amount of notoriety after exploring an abandoned rocket silo which still contained one of the most powerful rockets ever made! Thrilling video of him rappelling down the side of the underground silo (and nearly getting stuck) was featured prominently in the 2007 documentary Urban Explorers: Into the Darkness. This movie, by Melody Gilbert, focuses on men and women who, often at great risk to their safety, explore abandoned industrial sites, an activity known as “Urban Exploring”. The film examines their motivations for engaging in this high risk activity, and highlights the sense of wonder and beauty that these individuals feel from witnessing firsthand the crumbling and decaying architecture and technology of years past.
But Shane received even more attention beginning on Christmas Day, 2009 when he published a blog entry on his website, http://shaneperez.blogspot.com, featuring a detailed report of his trip to Discovery Island, Walt Disney World’s long-abandoned nature park. Discovery Island, located in the heart of Bay Lake, was left to rot years ago when the opening of Animal Kingdom effectively rendered the previously well-maintained zoo obsolete. Instead of bulldozing the property, Disney simply decided to leave it as-is and let nature take its course, turning it into an overgrown urban ruin that was an irresistible destination for Shane and his fellow Urban Explorers.
The gorgeous pictures from Shane’s evening on the island, along with his well-written travelogue immediately made it clear that he wasn’t a bragging punk kid trespasser, but was in fact an intelligent, talented individual whose admittedly outrageous story couldn’t be easily dismissed as hooliganism. The Orlando Sentinel eventually broke the story and soon it was being reported on by media outlets nationwide, making Shane’s previously underground celebrity status a thing of the past. Message boards at Disney fan sites buzzed with debate about whether Shane’s actions, although obviously illegal, were also immoral, or at the very least just really stupid. But Shane kept his cool, firing back non-inflammatory and well-reasoned responses to his detractors basically saying, “Hey, I’m not hurting anyone except maybe myself, and that’s none of your business.”
I caught up with Shane almost a year after his blog post was published, and he graciously agreed to answer my sometimes long-winded questions.
What’s your “day job”? Obviously Urban Exploring doesn’t pay cash dividends…. Or does it?
I do home theater installation and I also work as a freelance photographer for the NY Post.
Describe for me what you get out of Urban Exploring on an emotional, or for lack of a better word, “spiritual” level. In other words, what is it about UE that fills a need that isn’t fulfilled by normal everyday life?
I don’t really see it as an activity, it’s more of a way of looking at the world. It’s about satisfying curiosity about how things work and their history. It also encourages me to exercise my critical thinking skills and learn to take responsibility for my own actions. Normal everyday places are set up to be as safe and foolproof as possible. You can basically wander through life on autopilot and never have to worry about being hurt or killed, there’s always going to be a handrail or safety mea
sure in place to protect you from yourself. That is not so in the places that I visit and I feel like that encourages me to be a more capable and aware human being by gaining more understanding of my surroundings.
Is the danger a part of the appeal? Personally, I’d love to explore a lot of these places, but the thought of getting arrested, even more so than getting physically injured, serves as a fairly strong deterrent. If danger isn’t part of the appeal, how do you reconcile the obvious risks with the less obvious rewards?
Danger is not a motivating factor. I’d be just as happy seeing these places if it were completely legal and I had permission. Danger is everywhere really, you can get hit by a bus crossing a street, or slip in the shower and drown in 2 inches of water just as easily as you could get hurt by walking around an abandoned building. People may see what I do as “dangerous” but if you look at the numbers of people dying from heart disease, I’d say that it’s a lot more dangerous to sit at home and watch TV while eating junk food. I’m not a thief or vandal, so as far as arrest goes I don’t worry about it too much besides trespassing tickets which are usually just a fine.
Do you find yourself needing to justify these activities to your friends/family/coworkers? Do you come across a lot of people who just don’t understand your rationale? If so, how does that impact your relationships? I imagine if this is something you’re passionate about it would be hard to maintain a relationship with someone who didn’t understand risking your life for that passion.
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