Disneyland & California Adventure

After Easter Sunday's baseball game and dinner, we took off for Southern California and Disneyland. We planned a two day visit before departing for the American Southwest. This would give us one day at Disneyland and another day at California Adventure.

We had initially planned to drive as far south as possible Easter night and stay at a motel off of I-5. This changed when we crossed the Grapevine into the Los Angeles basin at around midnight. We decided it would be better to spend a little extra time getting to tomorrow's destination rather than fight the Monday morning infamous commute traffic. We pressed on and, fortunately, the hotel that we had reservations at for tomorrow, had a space for us tonight.

Our son was thrilled with the bunk beds. We slept in (for us) and didn't even miss the opening of the park. Our hotel came with a complimentary breakfast, which was about as bad as could be. Still frozen sausages just don't do it for me. I didn't eat breakfast that morning. Our hotel was right across the street from Disneyland, so all we had to do was walk to the entrance. This was much more convenient than having to drive, then park, then take a shuttle.

We spent the rest of Monday walking all over Disneyland. We rode Space Mountain (several times), Buzz Lightyear's Astro Blaster, Autopia, and even managed to get on the Matterhorn Bobsleds before the line got ridiculous. Splash Mountain, Big Thunder Railroad and Indiana Jones were exciting, but my favorites are still It's a Small World, Pirates of the Caribbean and the Enchanted Tiki Room. The Swiss Family Robinson's treehouse has been transformed into Tarzan's treehouse, but even so, it was fun to walk up. We also went to Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln, which I had not seen in over 20 years. It had just been redone and the animatronics is even better than before.

Again, this is not a conditioning hike, but it's still a lot of walking! We met up with some friends who have children in the same school as our son and had a nice dinner at the Blue Bayou with them. We were fortunate in that we were able to get the last available space at 7:15 pm! After dinner, we went to the Haunted House together and then our friends went to see World of Color, the water show that is currently playing at California Adventure. Our tickets were for Tuesday evening so we stayed at Disneyland for the rest of the day and watched the fireworks before going back to our hotel for the evening. It was nice not to have the explosions happening right overhead, as happened the last time we were at Disneyland!

The following day, Tuesday, we went to California Adventure. Our favorite ride there is California Screamin', a huge boardwalk style roller coaster. It's really my second favorite after the Giant Dipper at Santa Cruz Beach and Boardwalk. California Soarin' is also a wonderful ride which simulates flying over California. Our son likes Toy Story Mania which, like Buzz Lightyear's Astro Blaster, is a moving shoot-the-target ride. We also went on the Monsters Inc. ride, saw a parade near the Aladdin theatre, and then went on the Hollywood Tower Hotel ride. I had completely forgotten that this was a freefall style ride. Had I remembered I would have passed. I white knuckled it during all three freefalls, which probably was a good thing since our son was so concerned about me that he forgot to be scared.

The height of the evening came with World of Color, but also the most annoyance. This water show is a medley of all of the great Disney animated movies. The show is absolutely stupendous BUT you have to watch it standing. In fact, you pay extra to watch it standing. There is no where to sit down, not even a park bench. The show lasts about an hour and it's another hour before the show starts, so that's a total of two hours of standing. Whoever planned this out obviously did not think this through.

It was a wonderful two days and we all managed not to get too sunburned! We headed back to the hotel for a good night's sleep. Tomorrow will be a long drive to Williams, Arizona - our jumping off point for the Grand Canyon.