The Valley of Mo’ara at Disney’s Animal Kingdom

The Valley of Mo’ara Review at Disney’s Animal Kingdom

The Valley of Mo’ara Opened On: May 27, 2017.

See this page for all of the Disney’s Animal Kingdom attraction reviews.

While the alien landscape located just down the path from Pizzafari is officially called “Pandora – The World of Avatar,” you’ll spend the majority of your time in the Land exploring what’s known as The Valley of Mo’ara.

This map may or may not help.

This might actually make the layout more confusing.

You’ll remember that virtually every point of interest inside Pandora is located on the pathway furthest  inside the Land.

Arguably, Pandora remains the greatest overall achievement for Disney Imagineering.

The Valley is incredibly immersive.

Despite few people caring much about the Avatar franchise, you won’t hear many complaints about the landscape that Disney created.

The natural lighting helps change how the environment looks throughout the day. Visit during sunset, and oranges, purples, and reds fill the sky.

Here’s a look down at The Valley from the Flight of Passage queue.

And a similar picture taken at night.

Here’s daytime.

And nighttime. The angle obviously isn’t the same, but those are the same two waterfalls and rockwork.

The bioluminescence may be hit or miss. It’s definitely worth visiting Pandora before and after dark if you can swing it. The colors may not be as vibrant at night as they appear in some pictures. This is probably due in part to the vibrancy setting in Lightroom. It also has to do with how recently Disney touched up the glowing paint.

Here’s the same waterfall earlier in the day.

The sheer amount of layering of the “real” and “fake” elements creates such a rich depth. Just in this picture there are fake and real rocks, fake and real plants, fake and real vines, fake and real trees, and a whole lot more. There’s also virtually nobody else in sight, despite this being a busy time of day.

Most guests will want to spend 15 to 20 minutes looking around The Valley.

Somewhat surprisingly, the Land rarely feels congested. This is despite the multi-hour waits for the two rides and the popularity of Satu’li Canteen, Pandora’s excellent quick service.

It may just be that there are so many winding pathways that people end up back out on Discovery Island or into Africa before they realize it.

Disney allows guests to enter the queue for Avatar – Flight of Passage until just a minute before Disney’s Animal Kingdom closes. So if the Park is closing at 9pm, and Flight of Passage is posting a 75-minute wait, you can still get in line at 8:58pm. This is important for two main reasons. First, getting in line at the end of the night is usually your only opportunity to wait less than an hour to experience the ride in standby.

Second, The Valley of Mo’ara is also open for at least an hour after the Park closes and guests stream out of Flight of Passage. That final hour is also a great opportunity to walk around and take some pictures with few people around. If you’re exiting Flight of Passage late at night yourself, then you’ll be able to walk out of the Park with few people around. It’s a great way to end the night. Here’s a video walk-around of The Valley should you have interest.