Updated 8/27/04~ FINALLY FINISHED ~Looby & family take on Disneyland! About This Page:

[BostonTeaParty]

The Candy Cane Inn sounds delightful!!

Maureen, here is a link to their website: http://candycaneinn.net/

Tina, you're a very loving Mom!! Looking forward to reading more!!

[loobyoxlip]

Day 1, Part 2



I wanted to take my mom around the park just to show it off, so we wandered through Frontierland, on through Fantasyland and into Tomorrowland. She spots the Astro Orbitor and says that looks like her kind of ride. The boys would like to go, too, so we all hop in line. It's only about a 10 minute wait until our rocket is ready. Jalen insists on going with me, so we take a rocket directly in front of Gma and Kylor. I get us buckled in then whip out the camera to take a picture of Ky and Gma. They were not paying attention. A CM sees me trying to get their attention and yells out 'Heh, smile for the camerawoman!' Well, that worked. Well, kinda. Kylor smiled. Gma just looks surprised. The CM then asks if he can take a picture of me and Jalen. He took the camera and I swore he pushed the button, but obvioiusly he didn't. No picture, and no negative that a picture had ever been taken or even attempted to have been taken. Oh, well.



After Kylor and Jalen skillfully landed our rockets back on land, we head on over to Star Tours. It is directly across from Astro Orbitor and only had a 5 minute posted wait time. I just led the way into the queue without telling my mom what to expect. If I had, I am sure we never would have gotten her on this ride. We are immediately put in row 2 and watch our pre-ride video. I still love this ride, even after many trips through space. After we exited, we found the stroller. Kylor is dying to go on Matterhorn, so I tell him we will go see the wait time. Jalen decides right before we get there that he does not want to go on this ride (that he enjoyed last year - go figure). My mom was quite happy with just finding some shade and waiting with Jalen, so Kylor and I hope in the very short line. We have always gone in the left line. I have heard the right line offers a different ride and have been wanting to try it, but not to be this time. We both enjoyed this ride as much as always. It is a true Disneyland classic. The little splashdown at the end always gets us laughing. As we exited the ride we can't find Gma and Jalen anywhere. Kylor finally spots them over on a bench. We check the time. One of our main reasons for coming by Sunday was to catch Who Wants to be a Millionaire. The first show starts at 12 and it is about 11:10. We (OK, I) decide to park-hop on over to California Adventure. There is shorts lines to get into the park and pretty soon we are surrounded by the joyful tune of 'Do you Know the Way to San Jose?'. The speakers in the entrance way of DCA are always playing California themed songs. I let my mom admire the faux Golden Gate Bridge and the beautiful metal sun and fountain before heading over to Hollywood Backlot. We turn onto the street for Millionaire and who do we encounter but Olie and Zoie just hanging out. Kylor decides he's too "mature" to meet them, so Jalen walks right up and gets a real cool picture with Olie: Then walks over to Zoie. The CM offers to take a picture of me with Jalen and Zoie also:

After our neat encounter with the Rolie Polie Olie characters, we walk over to Millionaire. I get FP's for the 1:00 show and we queue up for the 12:00 show. This is the first time we've ever waited in line for this show. They were giving away the floor seats by asking Disney trivia. The last question they asked for anyone who had a Missouri quarter. The girl next to us had one out and her hand up in about 3 seconds! They finally allowed us into the soundstage. I love going in here. It just feels so authentic. Of course I had to point out the cool floor to my mom. She isn't very observent. They did a great deal of yelling practice this time (more than usual, it seemed) and also the host spent an extra long time speaking to us before the show actually got underway. First fastest finger question goes up and whoever won must have been a CM or ineligible b/c he had a big X with his arms and they call down the 2nd fastest time: a 9 year old gets to the hot seat. She gets to take her dad up with her. She got up to 16000. They got a question about what another name for a handbag is. The answer was clutch, but with a 9 year old and dad they didn't know. They did the ask a perfect stranger, and ended up with a man! Luckily he did know the answer. After they were done, they posted the top audience scores and I was #3 Next fastest finger: The same ineligible person is the fastest and he throws up his arms in an X again. So they go to 2nd fastest time: a college guy gets it. He gets up to 32000 and they post the best audience scores. Seat #18 is in the first spot. It's me!! The host says 'Way to go, seat 18'. I beam. The guy next to me asks me how I get my finger to move that fast. I beam some more. LOL. Unfortunately the contestant in the hot seat and I blow the next question. And it's the end of the show. I am almost glad I wasn't in the #1 position. How depressing would that be to be the #1 position but not get to go to the hot seat b/c the show was over.



After the show I was ready to get back in the FastPass line, but my mom decides she doesn't want to do it again So we walked around DCA but being as it was a Sunday it was pretty crowded and the lines for Soarin' over California and Grizzly River Rapids were both in excess of 2 hours.



We were getting hungry, anyway, so we decided to walk across the main street and go to Denny's for lunch. We all ordered Cherry Cokes, as they were the kind where they add the cherry flavored syrup. My mom took one sip and said it reminded her of about 40 years ago. The waiter filled all of our glasses about 3 times each. Man that stuff was good. I had a salad with chicken tenders on top. It was huge and very yummy. My mom had the Moons over My Hammy and the boys had chicken tenders and macaroni and cheese. All the desserts looked scrumptious, but we were all way too full.



Coming up: Day 1, part 3 - we finally get to see Fantasmic! Disneyland style

[statelady01]

Thanks for the link Nancy! another great installment you have there Tina!

[FanOfMickey]

Another fantastic installment, can't wait to read more. After reading your report so far I now really want to visit Disneyland. I think I will plan on a trip for next year.

[Tara O'Hara]

Whoo-Hoo, Tina!! Another awesome day for you guys!! Can't wait to read more when I get back from you know where!!

[Colexis Mom]

Great update Tina!! You almost made it to the hotseat Love the pictures, and looking forward to more

[luvnwdwgal]

Great trip report Tina! Some day I would love to go to DL! Looking forward to your next installment........when you get back from WDW!

[goofy4goofy]

Great update Tina!!!!! Love the pictures!!!

Kelly

[disneyknut]

Great update, Tina! An almost hot seat !!
looking forward to more

[Jennifer2003]

Looking forward to the next installment!
AND, also looking forward to a WDW TR as well! LOL

[loobyoxlip]

Day 1 Part 3



After lunch at Denny's we walked back to our hotel. I am again very thankful I brought the stroller from home. It sure made all the walking around that much easier. It amazes me how Jalen can run around and play outside for hours and hours at a time, but when it comes to walking more than 10 feet at a place like this all of a sudden he's too tired. LOL. Kids!!



The boys are extremely excited to go swimming in the pool, so we throw on our suits and hit the pool. This a small pool, but the kids could care less. They are just happy to be in the water (as am I) It felt great on this very hot Sunday. The hotel also had a beautiful hot tub underneath a gazebo. I only got to try it once - it was too dang hot the rest of our vacation to even entertain the thought of soaking in HOT water. Yuck. After about 45 minutes of lounging around in the pool, we dry off and head back to the room. I took a shower and laid down to watch some t.v. but of course ended up falling asleep. Vacations sure to tend to wear a person out.



After my nap I feel quite refreshed. We decide it's time to head back to the Happiest Place on Earth and head out to the complimentary bus shuttle. They do ask to see your room key before boarding the bus, so I had to dig that out. This is when I decided I needed my Passholder pouch and I wore it the rest of my trip!



After being dropped off by the Candy Cane Inn bus we walked to the entrance for Disneyland. Poor Kylor is stuck with the backpack to hold all our goodies and always ends up having to open all 4 compartments to be inspected. Luckily he's very organized and almost always had it ready before we got to the tables. We headed right for Disneyland!



For some reason (now unbeknownst to me) I seriously thought my roller coaster fearing mother would be OK on BTMRR. The wait was about 30 minutes, so we got fast passes and headed on over to Fantasyland. On the little path between Frontierland and Fantasyland is where the new petting zoo is. It was never open while we were there, but you sure got a nice whiff of manure when you walked by there. P-U! I love Fantasyland at DL. The sun was starting to set and the carousel was all lit up. Just such a beautiful sight. The line to Pinocchio was non-existent. Actually on all the times we've been on Pinocchio there has never been a line. It's actually a cute little ride, so we hopped right on. After that the lights of the carrousel were calling us, so Jalen and I stepped into line. Kylor had long since decided he was too old for the carrousel Jalen made a beeline right for the horse he had pre-picked and hopped on. I fastened his belt, stood beside him and we went for our spin around Fantasyland. I just love this ride - it is so impeccably well kept. I would dare anyone to find even one piece of chipped paint or smear or smudge. I wonder sometimes how they keep it so darn clean. It is just beautiful.



After disembarking the horsies we walked around Fantasyland. I noticed the parade had started and thought maybe that would lessen the line for Dumbo, but no such luck. I guess most people had already seen the parade or didn't care to. We did, however, notice the line to Mad Tea Party wasn't very long. We were behind a couple and overheard the couple ask the CM if the teacups were indeed unspinnable now. She explained that the spinning mechanism had been tightened and she had found the best way to get the cup spinning was to pull the wheel towards you while turning. HA! I decided once we were on to try out this advice. Let me just say the teacups are pretty much unspinnable. Unless you're super strong to begin with, just sit back and enjoy the ride, b/c all you will end up doing is getting frustrated and maybe even pull a muscle if you try to spin these teacups! Very disappointing as this was always one of our favorite rides. What did make up for it was the fact that it was dusk and the teacups at DL do not have a cover over them. There are dozens of paper lanterns strung over the ride and when they are turned on at night it makes the ride so pretty and such a nice experience.





After the Mad Tea Party it was time for us to use our FastPass on BTMRR. Back to the manure smelling path and onto the entrance. Very short wait and we are on. My mom goes with Jalen and I take Kylor. We are seated in front of my mom and Jalen. At various times throughout the ride I told Kylor to look back and see if Gma is OK. He said she rolled her eyes a few times. LOL. Well after we got off, suffice it to say, my mom was not very happy with me. She admitted that she almost lost her lunch after the first turn. Whoops. I've almost thought of BTMRR as a pretty tame ride. She was seriously mad at me, I think, as she barely talked to me the rest of the night Now I won't get her on anything!!



It's about 8 so we decided to try to stake out a spot for Fantasmic! Let me tell you, an hour prior is not enough time to allow yourself to get a good spot. There are a minimal numer of seating areas available. We ended up down by the Haunted Mansion standing for an hour waiting for the show to start. During this time, Jalen decided he HAD to have some Cheetos and threw an all out total tantrum b/c I said no. At one point he ran away from me, rounded a corner, and while looking back to see if I was following him, ran smack dab into the handle of someones stroller. Of course, now I'm the hero and he comes running back to me crying and screaming. It turns out the handle had gone right into his open eye. Ouch. I brought him back and put him in his stroller. He was out in about 2 minutes. Definite overload today!



Fantasmic! finally starts and boy oh boy. I definitely see why people praise this version over the WDW version. The only downside is having to stand. I definitely prefer the bleachers at WDW. But the show itself has such neat features. Since the lake is so much bigger at DL, they use the Mark Twain Riverboat loaded up with characters at the end. They also utilize the Sailing Ship Columbia, which makes its rounds on the lake with a dueling Peter Pan and Captain Hook as well as various other pirates swinging from ropes over the water and engaging in some great stunts. It's a definite must-see if you're ever in DL.



Jalen finally woke up at the very end of the show. There was a huge crush and mad dash of people leaving the park after the show. Luckily we all stayed together and got out of the park together. We decided to just walk back to the hotel rather than dealing with the line for the shuttle. It ended up being a great walk, as I got to the the Tower of Terror all lit up with a purple glow.



We all piled into bed and were out pretty fast, but not before Kylor declares tomorrow's first ride must be Splash Mountain.



Coming up: Day 2 - I lose Jalen!!

[Jennifer2003]

Thanks for the update! i would love to see Disneyland some day!

[CRCrazy]

Oh No!!!!

You can't lose cute little Jalen!!

[dsnytina]

*Tina*:
Hello again, my favorite Passporter!
So glad your trip is going well so far - I can't believe you're in WDW right now!
Are you going on the 2005 Cruise? Come on the June 4-11 with us!
Say it isn't so - you lost Jalen? I'm sure you found him ASAP and had a wonderful rest of the vacation, but hurry back and tell me so!
Your namesake,
~Tina~

[goofy4goofy]

Wonderful installment!!!! I love the photos too!!!

Oh no! You lose Jalen?!?!

Kelly