Today I Learned......

[deno]

That WDW have removed the SeaRaycers!

I was looking to see if my now 13 year old was allowed to drive his own boat. It's been 5 years since we last visited and he always wanted to ride his own.

And now they are gone. One of the 'little things' that always meant so much to us. Grabbing a couple of those at The Poly marina and heading out over Seven Seas Lagoon and Bay Lake was a real highlight. Waving to everyone on the ferryboat and going right around the back of the Contemporary and then over to the Magic Kingdom entrance and on to the Grand Floridian.

Apparently they didn't make money for the company but, to me, they are much a part of WDW as Cinderella Castle, they just seem to have always been there.

Gutted actually,

 

[MichelinMan]

That WDW have removed the SeaRaycers!

I was looking to see if my now 13 year old was allowed to drive his own boat. It's been 5 years since we last visited and he always wanted to ride his own.

And now they are gone. One of the 'little things' that always meant so much to us. Grabbing a couple of those at The Poly marina and heading out over Seven Seas Lagoon and Bay Lake was a real highlight. Waving to everyone on the ferryboat and going right around the back of the Contemporary and then over to the Magic Kingdom entrance and on to the Grand Floridian.

Apparently they didn't make money for the company but, to me, they are much a part of WDW as Cinderella Castle, they just seem to have always been there.

Gutted actually,

All fits into the narrative of having to pay more for less.

We hired a pontoon boat whilst staying at the Poly last trip, and went all the way over to the old Discovery Island. Really enjoyed that. They are still available I beleive.

 

[McCrae]

That WDW have removed the SeaRaycers!

I was looking to see if my now 13 year old was allowed to drive his own boat. It's been 5 years since we last visited and he always wanted to ride his own.

And now they are gone. One of the 'little things' that always meant so much to us. Grabbing a couple of those at The Poly marina and heading out over Seven Seas Lagoon and Bay Lake was a real highlight. Waving to everyone on the ferryboat and going right around the back of the Contemporary and then over to the Magic Kingdom entrance and on to the Grand Floridian.

Apparently they didn't make money for the company but, to me, they are much a part of WDW as Cinderella Castle, they just seem to have always been there.

Gutted actually,

I wonder if their are other reasons….

The most obvious could be staff shortages.

At BLT a number of other water activities are no longer available such as Jet Ski’s.

Their could of course be health and safety concerns regarding potential accidents, it may also be in response to the terrible incident where the young child was killed by an alligator.

Hope we see a return of more water activities.

 

[PalmettoPath]

When we were there most recently last month (March 2022) we asked the Cast Members working boat rentals about this at the Contemporary. They told us that within a few months after the pandemic hit, maintaining the fleet of SeaRaycers across all WDW properties became too much. They were sitting idly in the water with no attention and not being run. They said the engines were gumming up due to no maintenance and they were just sitting there essentially getting algae stained and gumming up in the engines/gas lines. If you've ever had an outboard you know that they do need to be run to keep them in good shape. They said after awhile, many wouldn't even start and with so many of them spread across all hotels they just couldn't maintain them (no staff). So essentially they quickly became a big liability. They got an offer for the entire fleet and decided to sell them. It was an aging fleet after all. This explanation made sense to me. We asked if anything will be back to take their place. (WDW old timers will remember the variety from the early days, including those round spinning ones you could rent, lol). Obviously these CMs didn't know if anything would replace them (we tried at least) but they did say they hadn't explicitly heard about no more new watercraft at all. We shall see.

 

[McCrae]

When we were there most recently last month (March 2022) we asked the Cast Members working boat rentals about this at the Contemporary. They told us that within a few months after the pandemic hit, maintaining the fleet of SeaRaycers across all WDW properties became too much. They were sitting idly in the water with no attention and not being run. They said the engines were gumming up due to no maintenance and they were just sitting there essentially getting algae stained and gumming up in the engines/gas lines. If you've ever had an outboard you know that they do need to be run to keep them in good shape. They said after awhile, many wouldn't even start and with so many of them spread across all hotels they just couldn't maintain them (no staff). So essentially they quickly became a big liability. They got an offer for the entire fleet and decided to sell them. It was an aging fleet after all. This explanation made sense to me. We asked if anything will be back to take their place. (WDW old timers will remember the variety from the early days, including those round spinning ones you could rent, lol). Obviously these CMs didn't know if anything would replace them (we tried at least) but they did say they hadn't explicitly heard about no more new watercraft at all. We shall see.

This makes sense. They used to be very popular, hopefully new update equipment will return.