Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters: The Gentle Cars Land Ride

What Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters is

Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters is a trackless dancing car ride in Cars Land at Disney California Adventure, and it opened on March 7, 2016. It took the place of Luigi's Flying Tires, an earlier ride on the same site that used air to float the cars and was retired in 2015. The current version seats you and a partner on a bench inside one of Luigi's little Italian cousin cars. A group of those cars rolls out onto an open floor and performs a choreographed dance to festival music, swinging side to side and circling around one another. There is no track under the cars. They move freely and stay in formation through hidden positioning technology, which is what gives the ride its loose, lifelike feel. At heart it is a gentle, all ages charmer rather than a thrill ride.

How gentle it really is

This is one of the calmest rides in the park. The cars sway, glide, and swing around each other, but there are no drops, no inversions, no launches, and no sharp stops. The strongest sensation is a pleasant swinging motion as your car leans into the turns of the dance, closer to a slow waltz than a spin. That makes it a good fit for young children who clear the height, for grandparents who want to ride something with the family, and for anyone who finds spinning or fast rides uncomfortable. If a child is nervous, watching one full cycle from the queue usually settles the worry, because the cars look livelier in motion than they feel from the seat.

Why the dance changes

Part of the charm is that the ride is not identical every time. There are several different songs and matching dance routines programmed into the attraction, so the exact pattern of swings and turns your car performs depends on which routine is playing. One cycle might be a brisk tarantella and the next a slower number, which means a re ride is not just the same trip again. It is a small thing, but it is the reason regulars will hop back in line when the wait is short. If you only ride once, you simply get whichever routine is running, and any of them deliver the same easygoing experience.

The Deep Arrival Cars Land plan

Cars Land has three rides, and they sort cleanly by who they are for. Radiator Springs Racers is the headliner, a slot car style dark ride and outdoor race with a 40 inch height rule and by far the longest line. Mater's Junkyard Jamboree is a whip style spinner that swings you harder than it looks. Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters is the gentle one, with the lowest 32 inch bar and no real thrill. The smart play is to treat Radiator Springs Racers as the priority and ride it early or with a paid skip if you choose one, then use Luigi's and Mater's as low stress fillers around it. For a family with a child too small for the racers, Luigi's is the ride everyone can share, so it often becomes the anchor of the Cars Land visit rather than an afterthought.

Who should ride and who can skip

Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters is a great pick for families with young children, for multigenerational groups, and for anyone who loves the look and music of Cars Land and wants a relaxed ride. It is also a pleasant reset between bigger attractions on a busy day. The guests most likely to skip it are thrill seekers with limited time, who will get more from the racers and the coasters elsewhere in the park, and anyone trying to cut a long Cars Land wait down to only the headliner. There is no shame in watching this one from the rail. The cars are photogenic from outside, and the dance reads almost as well to a bystander as it does to a rider.