Our Great Disneyland Birthday/Graduation Adventure 2014 About This Page:

[joelsmom]

Prologue: The Back Story

So, there I was, way back in 2002, just back from our first trip as a family to Walt Disney World, a treat for my DS finishing kindergarten and my DSD, who as I told my DH, needed to go to WDW before she grew up. She was 14, and I thought her childhood would be incomplete without a visit to the Mecca of Central Florida. We had a great trip. We visited every park, took some days to swim and do DTD, and just generally had good family time. We were scarcely back home when my little man started talking about wanting to visit Walt's original creation, the original Magic Kingdom itself. That's right, Disneyland! Now, mind you, we live 2,100+ miles from Anaheim, so I said no way could we make that trip. It was too expensive. My sweet boy, recently diagnosed with Autism, would just have to research and YouTube Disneyland. Of course, he did, and that only added to his desire to visit it.

Fast forward 18 months, and my husband decided he didn't want to be married anymore. In fact, he told me he would never be married again. He changed his mind about 15 months ago, but that's another story for another time. He had a motorcycle and a burning desire to stay out all hours of the night. I am a homebody, and everybody knows it, so we had really come to live two separate lives. He didn't like mine, and I didn't like his. So, strange as it sounds, we were both broken-hearted to end our marriage. After all, we were splitting up our family. Well, let's just say any thought I ever had of trying to make the Disneyland trip went right out the window. I knew it would never happen. Single parent school teacher...can't do it...no way. Life got in the way. Still, my DS was a Disney nut, just like me, and I resolved to try to take us back to WDW. By the summer of 2007 we did just that. The cast of characters had changed some, eliminating two and adding my DM, and it was a nice trip, but DS Joel would just not stop asking for Disneyland! How could I get through to him that I just couldn't afford that trip? WDW was doable, especially with my mom along to split expenses, but I cannot make Disneyland happen, son! You need to stop asking. It's too expensive. Do you realize that trip costs twice as much as WDW? We made a combination of long and short trips to WDW over the years, for various events, but there could be no Disneyland.

After years, literally years, of him asking, he sort of stopped. I guess I convinced him we couldn't afford it. But something funny happened. About the time he stopped asking, I began to really want to make it happen for him. How could I do it? I had a mortgage, a car payment, a kid in school, and a teacher's salary! How? How? How? I decided the only plausible way was to get a second job.

So, back in the fall of 2013, I hired on at the local "major retailer" in our area as a cashier, just for the holidays, right? At the end of December, they decided I was one of the good holiday hires and asked me to stay on as "permanent part-time." After a very easy negotiation over work hours (they agreed to everything I asked for!), I agreed to stay on, knowing that this would help pay for our Disneyland trip, and I could make my son's life-long dream come true for his high school graduation. Would I be perpetually tired? Sure. Would it be worth it? Absolutely! So, by February 2014 I was ready to book our trip. I had done extensive research, including asking lots of questions right here on PassPorter, and I decided to book through Orbitz. The only down side was that I had to pay in full upfront. But, I had been saving since November, and I had a little savings, so in late February, I bit the bullet and booked the trip.

Oh, if we could've stayed on DLR property, that would have been beyond fantastic, but I am still a single mom school teacher. So, it would be the Tropicana Inn, right across the street, but we were going to Disneyland. I am a terrible secret keeper, so I told Joel to bear down and finish his senior year in style, and I would take him to Disneyland. He did just that, graduating with all As and Bs for his senior year. School is tough for him, but he works hard, and I am very proud. He graduated on May 16, and I ironed out all the final details before the trip. We would fly out of Knoxville on June 18.

[chezp]

What a wonderful back story and I'm so glad it all worked out for you, albeit it took some time, after going through such a rough time personally.

[Katie]

How wonderful you were able to make this happen for him. I am sure he will never forget you hard work. Looking forward to hearing more.

[CinderAbby]

Great start to your TR. The things we do for our kids - especially when they're on the spectrum. And it's amazing how when the more they ask, the less we can make something happen but the minute they stop asking, it's like it becomes a mission to make sure it does happen. I can't wait to read more about your trip.

[pamcarey]

What a great story, and what a great mom you are to make this dream come true for your DS!

[joelsmom]

Chapter 1 - The Big Day Arrives, Part 1

Although school had been over for three weeks, I was still working some in the evenings at the part-time job, trying to schedule appointments with doctors and dentists, and finish all the last-minute details for the trip of a young lifetime. Oh, did I mention that I was also having kitchen remodeling done (on a budget, of course)? My part was to put primer on the cabinets, so that they could be painted when we got home from the trip. Let me tell you, this primer is a seemingly endless quest. There's still a little to do. Yet, I type a trip report! But I digress. Last minute details were looming. Somehow, they got done, at least enough of them for me to feel comfortable leaving town for a week. So, on June 18 I was up and at it at 4:30 am. By 6:30, my mom had arrived to transport us on the 45 minute drive to the airport. After loading the car and giving the house one last check, we were on the road by 6:45. We breezed through security at the airport. They gave us a pre-screened status, and we didn't have to remove shoes or go through the body scanner. I was surprised, but I surely did not complain! So, with bags in hand and on wheels, we made for the gate. We were assured our flight was on schedule, and I got us "green tags" for our carry-ons, since the plane we used from Knoxville to Denver was pretty small and had limited overhead bins. All regular carry-ons were gate checked.

The first leg of our flight was uneventful. Time passed pretty quickly, even though it was about 3 hours. Joel and I occupied ourselves by playing electronic bowling on his iPod and working a crossword puzzle together. Before we knew it, we were in Denver. After deplaning, we found a quick lunch at Wolfgang Puck Express and found the gate for our connecting flight to John Wayne Airport, Santa Ana, California. This was another on-time flight, uneventful, and two hours after take-off, we were walking through John Wayne Airport.

We followed the ground transportation signs to Super Shuttle. We had opted for shared van service. It was the most economical, and I am pretty budget conscious. Now, here we encountered our first real issue of the trip. I had voucher in hand to verify our pre-paid status, and everyone else in our van had either a voucher or confirmation number on a smart phone. Still, the Super Shuttle staff there at the airport seemed confused as to the number of people who should be in the van. They checked, re-checked, and checked again and again, to the tune of about 15 minutes worth of time. In the end, nobody changed vans, and everyone rode to their respective hotels. To this day, I don't understand what the hold-up was. I just waited patiently, as did everyone else, and we all got where we were going, albeit a few minutes later than hoped. I figured if I had tried to drive it myself, it would have taken me more than that little 15 minutes to figure it all out.

Despite all my research, I was a little apprehensive about the Tropicana Inn and Suites. You know, you read all kinds of things on TripAdvisor, and I had no personal experience with the local hotels. All I knew was I couldn't afford the Disneyland Hotel! So, when we arrived at the Tropicana, I walked into the lobby at about 2:00 pm local time with a little trepidation. I identified myself, presented identification for check-in, and asked if they could stow our luggage until our official check-in time of 4:00 pm. The front desk staff graciously offered us a room that was immediately available, even giving me a choice of first or second floor. I chose the second floor, based on the fact that the hotel has exterior corridors and I thought it would be less noisy and removed from most foot traffic around the hotel. Very soon, we were at our room, near the back of the hotel. It was indeed very quiet all week in our area, but the nicest bonus was the room itself - newly refurbished, with sparkling new white linens on the beds and equally sparkling, fluffy white towels in abundance. Everything was spotless! Immediately, all my anxiety about this hotel went away. We would be just fine here for our week in Anaheim...and we were.

I have a couple of photos of the room that I will post soon.

[pamcarey]

The room sounds great! I stayed in a hotel directly across the street when I went to DL in 1990, but I can't remember the name of it.

[chezp]

Yay - you've made it!

[MayraLR]

Great start!

[joelsmom]

Chapter 1 - The Big Day Arrives, Part 2

We were successfully settled at the Tropicana Inn, and I felt good about everything there. So, the next step was something that I had thought out and strategized and asked about here on PassPorter, getting groceries for most of our breakfasts. Joel was on board, so we set out for Katella Avenue and the Food 4 Less store. I knew this would be quite a walk, but we really didn't have anything to do that afternoon, and we needed breakfast food. So off we went.

From the Tropicana to Katella Avenue is a quick walk, probably about five minutes. From the corner of Katella and Harbor to Food 4 Less is another story. About 30 minutes later, I began to wonder if we had missed the store along the way. Now, it was a beautiful,afternoon, and we certainly weren't suffering with heat or sweat, but I was wondering if I had missed something. I kept telling Joel, "I'm sure it's just past this next intersection," and he always went along with it. He really is a good soul, a real trooper, and he hardly ever complains about anything, but let's just say it's a long walk to Food 4 Less. After a while, though, you get to the point that you don't really want to turn back, because then you've walked all that way for nothing, and I wanted my food! So, on we went. After a grand total of about 45 minutes, there it was, to the left, just as it was on the maps I had seen. Thank goodness! We went in, got a cart, and I told Joel that we should be careful about the weight of what we bought, because we would be carrying it back to the hotel. When we were finished, the only heavy items we had were drinks. Joel took one bag of those, and I took the other. Everything else was easy to carry. We had a total of 5 plastic bags, but it wasn't too much to handle for the walk back. We set out on our return trip.

Just about 45 minutes later, we were climbing the steps to the second floor of the Tropicana again. I put Joel in charge of opening the room door all week, and this was his first test. The locks on the doors are just like at WDW, except you of course have no Magic Band. He swiped his card key near the scanner on the door, and in we went. Our mini adventure to get groceries was a success, and the added bonus was that I could eat whatever I wanted for dinner, since I had gotten plenty of exercise that afternoon!

We put away and organized the food and breakfast supplies, and I suggested that we take little break to rest for a bit. That turned into about 30 minutes of TV and wifi. Then we got up, cleaned up a bit, and headed out for another walk, this time to get our first look at Disney property in California. Our first night's dinner would be at Downtown Disney! Get the camera!!!

Now, this was an easy, breezy walk! You walk across Harbor Blvd. at the pedestrian crosswalk, enter Disneyland Resort, and you soon begin to hear the music of Disney!!!!!! YAY!!!!! You are walking through what they call the transportation center, where buses run from the parking lots. All the buses have a Toy Story theme, and they transport visitors from the Buzz, Woody, and Jessie parking lots. There are also lots of ART buses, as well as other hotel shuttles that move in and out of this general area, but none of that interferes with your walk. Pedestrians have a straight path walkway to security, where your bags are checked. Then, you enter what I think is best described as a courtyard. On your right is Disneyland. On your left is Disney California Adventure. Straight ahead is Downtown Disney, our evening destination. By the way, Disneyland and California Adventure are probably 50 yards from each other. Park hopping is so easy and nice to do. Some days we did it several times, but that's another installment in my tale.

After our trek to Food 4 Less, we were hungry. We had tentatively planned to eat at ESPN Zone, which is near the back of the DTD area, so we wandered through most of DTD, but we didn't go into any stores, because we wanted dinner. We found ESPN Zone and found we had to wait about 30 minutes. At first, we sat to wait, but the allure of the video arcade upstairs was too much for Joel. We went up the hefty flight of stairs and found a few games to play before our pager went off. Back at the bottom of the steps, we were quickly seated. More on dinner in the next installment.

[chezp]

I'm not surprised you were hungry after that trek!

[pamcarey]

That was quite a walk! I hope you don't have to wait too long for dinner.


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[Huntermom]

Glad our son's dream came true. I often found cross country air fares for less than down the east coast. To me, Disneyland is a great component of a vacation. The first time we went there was no CA and I found my next few visits disorienting. Nothing seemed right but I did love the ease of moving from park to park and DTD.

[dutchdisneyfamily]

That was quite a bit of walking to get to the store! I can't wait to hear about your next adventure.

[joelsmom]

Chapter 1 - The Big Day Arrives, Part 3

First, let me apologize for taking so long to get to this installment. I've had a very busy few weeks since we returned from our trip, and for a day or so I've tried to find time to relearn how to post pictures inside posts. I haven't got the hang of it yet, but when I do, I will post some pics.

So, we were at ESPN Zone. When we were finally seated, after about 45 minutes of waiting, I found myself wondering what took so long. There were a number of empty tables in the restaurant. The place just wasn't that busy. Ah well, it didn't really matter at that point, did it? We were hungry. We were thirsty. We were seated. Let's order!

I started our drink order with iced tea, and then Joel asked our server about "sweet tea." Ah, my southern boy! Outside the southern United States, dear, sweet tea often doesn't exist. He seemed shocked by this, but then again, he'd never been outside the South! So, when the server pointed to the sweeteners on the table and offered him the opportunity to sweeten his own tea, he passed and instead went for a soda. If you're from Tennessee, that generally means ordering by the actual brand name, but in Southern California, we learned that soda is often used as a general term, unless you specify a particular kind. Drinks were delivered, and it was time for ordering real food. I chose a pasta with marinara sauce and chicken, and Joel went with chicken tenders and fries. What a surprise...NOT! Actually, the reason we chose ESPN Zone for this dinner was that many of the other DTD restaurant menus did not appeal to my picky eater. I can eat most anywhere, but Joel is a simple eater. and this place suited our needs.

The food took a while, but we amused ourselves by looking at the giant (and boy, do I mean GIANT) "board" at the front of the restaurant's interior. It is full of screens, scoreboards, and other sports related information. If you are a sports fan, this place would probably appeal to you at least once, just for the experience of seeing this giant display of multiple sports info. However, although I haven't investigated it myself, our server did tell us that this location was one of only two or three ESPN Sports Zones left in existence. So, if you're not at Disneyland, you might have to hunt to find one of these places.

The food arrived after several more minutes of waiting. It was good. If you're a real foodie, you probably won't go to this place, anyway, but for our purposes, it was fine. The meal was filling. The service was fine. The prices weren't outrageous. I think the entire meal cost just over $40, including tip. We paid and were on our way. Frankly, I wanted to get back outside and see more of DTD. We did make one more quick pass through the arcade upstairs, to finish using our previously purchased credits and collect a prize. That's right...a prize. In fact, Joel chose a giant inflatable baseball bat. Surely this was worth the 2,100 mile trip from Knoxville, Tennessee!

Finally back outside, I began to look for shops to visit. Some of you know, I'm sure, that the Disneyland Downtown Disney District is basically one long, narrow "pathway" that separates Disneyland Park from Disney California Adventure, and also connects to the Disneyland Hotel itself. Like the WDW version, it has a variety of shops, restaurants, and entertainment venues. So, off we went back in the direction from whence we originally came earlier in the evening.

I quickly noticed the monorail station. We didn't ride, but I knew that later in our visit, I would want to ride the monorail from that station to Disneyland itself. I'll have much more on that later. We didn't go inside, but I made sure to pause extensively outside the Lego store. I just love to look at all the Disney Lego creations that they display, and they had some beautiful ones outside this store. We ooohed and aaahed over them for a few minutes, snapped some pictures, and headed for Ralph Brennan's Jazz Kitchen Express. Why, you ask? One word...beignets!!!! This would be dessert for the evening. I ordered a half dozen to take back to the hotel. Now, here my only regret is that I didn't start eating them while they were warm. They were still fabulous later, but I can only imagine how much better they would be before they cool. Okay, so I skipped ahead a bit in the story. Yes, we made it back to the room with the beignets. We split them 50/50. We were stuffed. They were wonderful!

All right, back to shopping! We stopped at a place called Disney Vault long enough to see that they do NOT sell movies that have been placed in the "vault." They sell clothes, which did not interest Joel. Onward. There's an adorable little place called Marceline's Confectionary. They sell many of the same candies you see at Goofy's Candy Factory at WDW, but they were making "turtles" so that passersby could see them in the window. I chose not to buy anything here. Remember, I had beignets! I also took note along the way that there was an entrance from Downtown Disney into the Grand Californian. A few days later, we would wander through some of the public spaces in the Grand Californian, but as I'm sure you've noticed, tonight was about taking in the sights, sounds, and smells of Downtown Disney and basically just getting our bearings for the days to come.

Our last stop for the evening was, of course, World of Disney. We looked at many things in this store, but ultimately we bought only one - an autograph book. One of Joel's must-dos on this trip was to see as many characters as possible, and I wanted to make sure he got photos and autographs to go with them as a special keepsake of his character greetings. The CM at the World of Disney counter was delightful. She asked us many questions and fished out several buttons for us. Joel got his first visit and graduation buttons, and I got a button making me an honorary citizen of Disneyland. I did notice later in the trip that I wasn't the only honorary citizen of Disneyland, but I didn't let that dampen my enthusiasm.

We meandered through the courtyard dividing Disneyland and California Adventure, back out to Harbor Blvd, and up to our room to enjoy our beignets and settle in for the night. It was a big day, a good day, and we would get a good night's sleep. Goodnight, all.