California, Here We Come! DLR, Hollywood, and San Diego *OCTOBER 15-23, 2011*

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

I like having a little time to myself like you did while you were waiting for Rapunzel. Its nice not to have to keep an eye on everyone and really be able be able to relax and look around.

You got a lot of characters we never met before. Ariel, Cinderella, the Fairy Godmother. Rapunzels line was always way to long for us when we were at MK.

I'm sorry to hear they didn't have water sprayers at Donald's boat for Ava. I know its heartbreaking to see them so disappointed.

I don't want your day to end there! I can't wait to find out what happens next.

I know I was just waiting in line, but it really was relaxing. Knowing it was our last day it was nice just to have some time to reflect on our time at DLR.

We only planned on taking the time to see Rapunzel on this trip and any other characters were a bonus. We were fortunate that we just happened to see Ariel and Cinderella on the side paths. Something that was different at DLR vs. WDW was that you would sometimes just come across a character and they didn't have handlers with them. Ava was pretty excited to see the Fairy Godmother. I think it might have more to do with bragging to Erin about it later!

Ava was so cute running as fast as her little legs would take her to find those sprayers. She was bummed, but I am glad that her ride on the coaster made things better.

Our day is far from over and I don't think it could have ended any better!

 

[tessieg]

Still enjoying the report and waiting to hear about the rest of your trip!!!

 

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

Still enjoying the report and waiting to hear about the rest of your trip!!!

Thanks for hanging in there! I have been out of town for the last week, so I need to get going again. Hopefully I will be able to get an update in soon.

 

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

At about 2:00 we made our way over to California Adventure. We had something very important on our agenda. The ride that Grandma Sandy had been dreading for months had become one of her favorites. We needed a FP for Tower of Terror!

While waiting for our window to open on our FP we decided to separate for a while. Erin and Stu really wanted to do the Animation Class and Ava really wanted to see the Disney Jr show. Sandy decided that she wanted to see the show with Ava. We made our way to the line-up and it was huge! Thankfully there was space for everyone.

After the opening of the show, Handy Manny was featured.

Bubbles started falling from the ceiling and Ava thought that was fantastic.

Next up was Jake and the Neverland Pirates.

To wrap up the show they brought out the cake to celebrate Minnie's birthday.

The show got a definite from Ava. I think Sandy really enjoyed it because she had such a great time watching Ava.

We met up with Stu and Erin just outside of the animation class. It sounds like they really enjoyed themselves. They drew Winnie the Pooh during their session and neither one of them was super excited about it, but they still had fun.

We all made our way over to Tower of Terror for the last time. Sandy giggled like a school girl and I was just so happy to see her enjoying herself so much.

For dinner we decided to head to the Pacific Wharf. We had enjoyed the bread bowl and cinnamon roll that we had gotten there for breakfast, so we decided it would be worth a try for dinner. We ended up getting the corn chowder, clam chowder and another cinnamon roll! It was very yummy and I would definitely go back again.

We really wanted our last ride of the trip to be Toy Story Mania, but the wait time was 40 minutes. We still wanted to head back to Disneyland for some shopping, so we decided to pass on Toy Story and we chose to ride the Little Mermaid ride instead. It was a sweet ride to end our time at California Adventure and it was even better since we didn't have to wait.

On our way out of California Adventure the girls were trading pins with CMs like crazy. They both had a blast with this and I would highly recommend doing it. They were having a great time visiting with the CMs. One of them pointed out to Erin that she was only missing a Mickey pin from set that she had been trading for. This sparked her interest even more-she wanted to find that pin! We checked every CM on the way out, but we didn't find it. We decided it was time to make our way back to Disneyland and see if we could find the Mickey pin there.

Up next: A very magical 90 minutes

 

[WDWJonasGirl]

I loved the update!! Your Disney Jr. pictures came out perfect.

 

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

I loved the update!! Your Disney Jr. pictures came out perfect.

Thanks! I am glad that you enjoyed the update! I was happy that a few of the shots turned out because Ava just loved the show so much.

 

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

It was about 6:30 when we made our way back through the gates of Disneyland. Erin was really on a mission to find that Mickey pin and she also hadn't forgotten about the Lady plush that she had wanted earlier in the day. I told Sandy and Stu that we would meet them in the Emporium, but the girls wanted to do a little more looking for that Mickey pin.

The parade was scheduled to run at 7 that evening, so the sides of Main Street were starting to fill up with people. There were several CMs lined up along Main Street directing people and getting ready for the parade. The girls ended up approaching a gentleman by the name of Dave. They asked to see his pins and soon realized that he didn't have the one they were looking for. He asked Erin which one she wanted and she explained it to him. He told her he knew which pin it was and he thought he had it in his office. He asked us if we had time to go with him and we said, "Why not?" He escorted us to City Hall and had us take a seat. He made his way back to his office and was gone for several minutes. When he returned you could tell he felt awful to report that he didn't have the Mickey pin. He said he wanted to make it up to the girls for waiting and he presented Erin with three pins and two for Ava! Even though he didn't have the Mickey pin, they were super excited for the pins that they did receive.

We made our way to the Emporium where I was sure we would find the Lady plush. We didn't find her with the other plush items that were similar, so we found a CM to see if she knew where there was one in the store. She stated that they had never made a Lady in this type of plush. At this point is was almost 7 and the park was closing at 8. I made a quick decision and told Stu that when Ava and Sandy were done in the Emporium to go ahead and make their way back to the hotel. Erin and I were going on a mission!

We knew that Lady had been in the shop just outside of It's A Small World, so that was where we were headed. The parade was going to start very soon and at this point there wasn't very many people on Main Street. We decided we would pretend we were the parade and marched our way down the street. We got the giggles so bad we could barely make our way. When we reached the area by the Matterhorn we thought we might not be able to make it through, but we got around just in the knick of time. We reached the shop and made our way to where Lady had been in the morning-to find just one remaining! All of it was worth it when I saw this face. She was in tears because she was one happy little girl.

Just as we were paying the music started and the parade began. We figured we weren't in any hurry, so why not stop and enjoy the parade just one more time. It seemed like a whole different parade seeing it in the dark versus during daylight earlier in the week. There was also a Princess and the Frog float that hadn't been in the parade when we saw it on Monday.

Tinkerbell looked so cute in her little jacket.

After the parade finished I asked Erin if it would be bad of us to take one last ride. She thought it was a great idea and chose to ride It's a Small World. We ended up in a boat by ourselves and just snuggled together while we talked about how much fun we were having on our trip. I felt sad that the rest of our group wasn't with us, but at the same time I was so happy to have this stolen moment with Erin.

We made our way to the front of the park and neither one of us was quite ready to go. Erin decided she needed one more picture of herself with Lady.

Goodbye my friends, you were a great host and hostess.

Up next: Sea World adventures

 

[WDWJonasGirl]

I'm so glad that you guys found Lady!! I love her but we have alot of stuffed animals.

 

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

I'm so glad that you guys found Lady!! I love her but we have alot of stuffed animals.

I was pretty happy that we were able to find Lady. There had been at least 6 of them that morning, but we got the last one on the shelf! We have a lot of stuffed animals too, but the girls think we can never have too many!

 

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

Unfortunately it was time for us to leave Disneyland behind. Thankfully we still had 3 days in San Diego to look forward to! We were up early as usual and were on our way by 7:30. We made a quick stop at McDonalds for some Egg McMuffins before we got on the freeway. I was pleasantly surprised at how smoothly the traffic flowed. Even with a stop at a rest stop along the way we arrived at the parking lot of Sea World at 9:15. We had to wait a little bit until they opened the lot at 9:25. We made our way to the front gate and we had a short wait.

We were let in the gate at about 9:45 and made our way towards the Wild Arctic exhibit. We weren't able to get to the exhibit, so we did a little exploring at the Sesame Street Playground. A worker came up and told us that it wasn't actually open yet, but we were able to get a couple of pictures.

I took a couple more pictures of my surroundings while we waited for the opening.

At ten they played the National Anthem and the chains leading to the Wild Arctic were dropped. We decided that we would spend our first hours touring exhibits. On the day that we were there the large shows were only showing one time and they would be in the afternoon.

Our first encounter in the Wild Arctic exhibit was the polar bears.

We were also able to see beluga whales.

There was also a walrus encounter. We had a lot of fun viewing these guys. One of them came right up to the window and eyed us for a bit. All of a sudden he reared up and splashed water at the window. It startled all of us and it almost seemed like he was laughing at us as he swam away.

It was a great way to start our day at Sea World!

 

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

Next on our agenda was to visit with the penguins. There was an area outside of the main penguin building that we really enjoyed that had Magellanic penguins. The water was just bubbling with these little guys.

After we had been watching for a while it was time for their feeding. The lady that fed them just sat right down and they would each come up to get their food. Each one them was tagged so she could mark down which ones had received their food. It was really fun to watch how the whole system worked.

Next we made our way to the turtle reef. This was probably my favorite exhibit because of all of the beautiful colors. It definitely made me think of Finding Nemo.

Ava wanted to get her picture taken with the turtle outside. Pretty much everyone that has seen this picture has wondered if that was a real turtle, but it wasn't!

We also made our way through the shark encounter. They warned us that the sharks were mating, so the males would be very aggressive. I will just post the PG rated picture!

The next area that we went to you could hear long before you got there. Those sea lions sure are cute, but they sure are loud! This little guy was quite the poser.

I decided that I really wanted to feed these guys. They had a stand right there that you could buy fish to feed them. I ended up getting 5 fish for $6. I don't have any pictures of the girls and I doing the feeding because Stu took video instead. They were warning you constantly to watch out for the birds because they will swoop in to steal the fish. Of course this happened to Erin, but I think it startled her more than anything. I was happy that they had a washing station right there!

At this point we decided we better get some lunch so we would be ready for our afternoon of shows. We ended up at the Calypso Smoke House and we got chicken and ribs for all of us to share. The portions were big and it didn't taste too bad either!

 

[tessieg]

Glad you've gotten to San Diego! I am having a hard time planning that part of our trip. Can't wait to see what all you did and where you stayed!

 

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

Glad you've gotten to San Diego! I am having a hard time planning that part of our trip. Can't wait to see what all you did and where you stayed!

It sure has taken me a while to get there, hasn't it? I also had a hard time planning our time in San Diego. There is just so many great things to see and do.

 

[WDWJonasGirl]

I'm enjoying it so far!! I went to Sea World when I was younger.

 

[Kathy Jetson]

Thats great Erin found her Lady plush. What a great memory for you and Erin pretending you were the parade and going on one final ride together AND had your very own boat!

Those shots of the walrus were very good.

Thats so cool how the penguins walked up to the cm to get thier food.

The sea turtle really does look real.

Aww to bad the bird stole Erin's fish.

Looking forward to hearing about the rest!

 

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

I'm enjoying it so far!! I went to Sea World when I was younger.

Thanks! This was our first time at any Sea World. The girls really enjoyed themselves.

Thats great Erin found her Lady plush. What a great memory for you and Erin pretending you were the parade and going on one final ride together AND had your very own boat!

Those shots of the walrus were very good.

Thats so cool how the penguins walked up to the cm to get thier food.

The sea turtle really does look real.

Aww to bad the bird stole Erin's fish.

Looking forward to hearing about the rest!

I was pretty relieved to see that Lady plush. I should have known better and bought it when we saw it earlier, but then we wouldn't have gotten our stolen moment!

That walrus was very cool. It really seemed like he was interacting with us.

Watching the feeding of the penguins was interesting. They all took their turns, but of course there had to be that one that hopped back in and pretended that he hadn't been fed eat. They were just like little kids!

 

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

The rest our day we ended up seeing several shows. Since it was a slow day, most of the show were only showing one time. If we weren't interested in seeing any of the shows we would have had the rest of the park to ourselves because it was that quiet.

After our lunch we made our way to the Pirates 4-D movie. We all enjoyed it, but there were several spots that Ava was frightened. She hides behind the seats in front of her at movies when something scares her and I remember her hiding at least four different times.

At 1:15 the only showing of Blue Horizons was taking place. We made our way into the stadium and selected the first row above the splash zone. It was pretty cool and overcast, so I had no desire to spend the rest of my day wet.

We found the show to be amazing. The dolphins were featured, but we were also treated to pilot whales, birds, and acrobats. There was so much going on that it was difficult to know where to look. The story is about a girl names Marina that dreams that she can swim in the ocean and fly in the sky.

Once she dives in she has a chance to swim with the dolphins.

Then the dolphins have a chance to show off for her.

The next segment features several different types of birds-human and otherwise.

We were also treated to the pilot whales. They were pretty amazing creatures to watch.

Continued in the next post

 

[LoveMyTwoPrincesses]

It was now time for the dolphins to show off some more!

For the grand finale this group of birds were released and made their way back as a group.

To wrap up the show the dolphins waved goodbye to everyone.

I really enjoyed the show because we got to experience so many different creatures. It was also nice to see the trainers in the water and interacting with the dolphins and pilot whales. Overall we all gave the show a big !

 

[WDWJonasGirl]

I loved it!! I haven't been to Sea World in years. Anyway, the girls would like Legoland if you go next time.

 

[tessieg]

what day of the week did you head to San DIego? We are supposed to leave for san diego on a Friday morning. Wasn't sure if we would be better off leaving mid morning to avoid traffic. We are going to the zoo that day and wanted to be there earlier but didnt want to sit in rush hour traffic all morning instead!
WOuld also love to know where you stayed in San DIego! Cannot figure out where to reserve there. We only have two days so want to be in a good location.
Love your report and thanks for any suggestions you have!
Tessie