One of the best trips ever!

 

Expedition Everest was the name of a new ride at Disney's Animal Kingdom park in Orlando, Florida.

 

It was the brainchild of Joe Rohde, a Disney `Imagineer' and long-time yeti fanatic.

 

The idea was to create a ride in which travellers to Mount Everest were scared away by the yeti - the guardian of pure, unsullied nature.

 

Joe's researches, which we filmed, took him to the far reaches of the Himalayas to research yeti myths, so as to build an accurate representation of the beast for the ride.

 

The trip took in Sichuan and Nepal, talking to monks and villagers about an animal they clearly believed lived among them, and to the Qinling Mountains near Xian, in China, to check out the golden monkey - an animal which, like the yeti, lives on or about the snow-line, and gives clues as to what a high altitude primate might look like!

 

It also involved looking at traditional architecture and design, to incorporate into the village being built in Florida, and of course a trip to Orlando to film the ride in action.