Day 4 – June 12, 2012– Part 6
After I got off the monorail from the TL station, it was already past 9:30am since I was in the monorail heading back to the TL station. So it was time to head on out of the park and head on over to DCA that morning. The clouds started to clear up finally that morning and it looks nice with a few clouds in the sky.
When I left the station, TL started to pick up with more and more guests that morning. I went past Pixie Hollow and the Matterhorn towards the Hub since I wanted to get out of the park so I can head on over to DCA.
Now I was back at the Hub and as always in the morning, more and more people started to enter the park. Every time in the morning around 9:30am at DL, the crowds start to come in so it was time to high tail it out of DL and over to DCA.
At least it wasn't where the park was so full where I couldn't even walk an inch out of the park.
It was already past 9:35am that morning.
Now there were more crowds around Main Street Town Square.
The Hub looks very nice with all those flowers.
Meeting Goofy right by the fire house was really long that morning.
Now I was at the esplanadeand I was heading on over to DCA. It didn't look that bad that morning while there were few people heading on over to DCA while most of the people were heading on over to DL.
I did get a picture of the stage out at the esplanade and it was highly likely for the DCA grand re-opening on Friday the 15th.
Now heading on in towards DCA turnstiles. This will be the last time to head through the side entrance to DCA. It has been less than a year since the side entrance on the back side of Soarin was used since the former land Sunshine Plaza is now BVS with the Golden Gate bridge as the entrance to DCA. This will be the last time in a very long time when we go on the back side of Soarin as the entrance to DCA.
The side building was the Guest Relations for DCA.
When I got inside DCA, I head on over to GRR for a WoC Showpass (you would call them showpass than FP Matt). It was semi busy that morning but it wasn't that bad at all. I got to GRR and the showpass I got was of course blue for the 9pm time. There were a lot of people heading on over to PP like always every morning. But when I first entered DCA at Condor Flats there were quite a number of people heading on over towards BVS so I decided to head in that direction instead of going through PP.
Over at Condor Flats, the rope drop right by the Pilot's Taste-In restaurant was past it so it was inside BVS. This was the first time to see the rope drop by Condor Flats at BVS. So I head in that direction to see the rope drop in that area.
When I was over at BVS, the rope drop was right in between the Carthay Circle Theater and the information center. I knew that this was going to be the rope drop area for DCA in order to head on over to CL.
Also around BVS, the front of the Carthay Circle Theater is getting ready for media day and the opening day on Friday the 15th. You can see the stage and containers around the fountain.
The other rope drop was heading on over to Hollywood Land right by the Disney Junior Live on Stage! building.
After looking around, I decided it was time to head on out of the park and go back to the hotel. It was early that day and we didn't need to leave Anaheim around 11am, but I wanted to get a head start on out of SoCal and back to NorCal. So I head on out of the park just before DCA opened at 10am.
Now this was the last time I will be going through the back side of Soarin during the construction of DCA. It might be a long time until I go on the back side of Soarin to enter or exit DCA. There were a lot of people entering DCA that morning while I was exiting.
I was out at the esplanade just before 10am which DCA opened and I head on back to BWAI to meet up with my DA and pack out things.
It was around 10:10am when I got back to the room and we started to pack all of our stuff in our car. We didn't leave the hotel around 11am since I wanted to get a little break until we left that afternoon and back to NorCal.
When it was 11am, we got in our car and I drove out of Anaheim which I usually do every time. The day was nice with more and more people heading on in the park so it was a good time to leave and go back to Sacramento.
On the way up towards I-5, we did got stuck in LA traffic for awhile, but we got out of SoCal in just 2 hours which is 30 minutes longer then we usually get out. I thought if we left SoCal around 11am there wouldn't be too many people on the highway. But there were way more people on I-5 going north than I expected. Maybe it was a weekday where people are working that day and there were more people on the road than on a Sunday going back home which we usually do.
My DA took over part way when we were up in the grapevine where we stopped at our regular Carl's Jr. restaurant up on the hills.
She drove most of the way until we got to Livingston where we check on my grandmother. We stayed for awhile and have dinner until it was time for us to head on back to Sacramento. It was about 1 1/2 hour drive from Livingston to Sacramento. So I drove the rest of the way back home after she drove for about 3 hours straight. I did offer to switch, but she was fine.
We left Livingston around 8pm since we stayed in Livingston to watch the NBA Finals between the Thunder and Heat for Game 1. The Thunder won the game which made us happy, but in the end the Heat won the NBA championship which I am not happy about.
It was around 10pm when we got home, since it took another 30 minutes to get home since there was road construction at night. But overall we got home safely and that concludes our Cars Land and Buena Vista Street Sneak peek trip.
This is one of our best trips that we have ever been to the DLR. Not only were we there for the preview of Cars Land and Buena Vista Street before the public, but also for my DA birthday meals which we don't usually eat at two sit down restaurants in one day. This is one that we will never forget in a long time.
We got to go on all the rides at CL during the preview which we rode Radiator Springs Racers 5 times (2 on Saturday and 3 on Sunday), Luigi's Flying Tires twice and one time on Mater's Junkyard Jamboree. RSR surpassed our expectations when we rode it the first time. It is way better then Test Track at EPCOT. The only thing about both TT and RSR is that TT is faster than RSR. But everything else for RSR is better than TT. LFT was something that I wanted to ride ever since I saw vintage clips of the Flying Saucers at DL in the 60s. It was not as bumpy as I thought when we saw clips of Disney testing it out. MJJ is just like Francis' Ladybug Boogie where the ride vehicles goes on another track but it does swing you left and right a lot where you can easily hurt your other rider if you are a big person. So you have to hold on the bar so you don't crush them.
Also during the preview on Saturday, I got to see Alison (franandaj), Fran and Arline right at Ramone's House of Body Art. It was nice to talk to them for a short time at the preview. I also got to read her TR which was great. Here is a link to her post during their preview. [post=45144333]PTR-F&W 2012 & Cheating on Mickey w/Harry!...Carsland Preview! [/post]
The rides that we usually do all the time (DLRR, monorail, BLAB and MFW) we got done on all four days. Most of the rides during the whole trip did look quite busy before the summertime at the DLR. The wait times were about average and the longest wait for a ride to get on was RSR during the preview. But overall we didn’t wait too long for any of the rides. We could have done more rides during that trip in the morning, but I always like to walk around the park while it is quiet and get some pics while DL is empty. It will be very interesting to go through DCA at 8am then DL in the morning.
We got to try some different food at the Cozy Cone Motel which was great but the only thing I didn't like about it too much was waiting in that long line just to get popcorn. Even though we didn't try everything at the Cozy Cone, I really like the sweet and spicy popcorn. The pretzel bites were good, but the one that I really wanted to try was the churro bites at Cozy Cone 1. But that might be a possibility during my next month trip. The one thing that also was disappointing is that we didn't eat at Flo's V8 Cafe. We were hoping to eat at Flo's V8 but when the restaurant was full and I wanted to use my time wisely at other parts of CL, we just couldn't fit it in our time. But this is another must do thing for me when I go next month.
Buena Vista Street was amazing with all the details of each one. Even though the Red Car Trolley wasn’t running that day during the preview, we still got a chance to go inside and see what it is like. Riding the Red Car Trolley is one of the must do things for my trip next month. We got to go inside the Elias & Company store which is the biggest store at DCA. The store was well themed and had a lot of choices to buy merchandise. Not only around DCA, Elias & Company also sold some CL merchandise. But most of the merchandise that we wanted was at Ramone’s House of Body Art. There were some great shops that we could easily stay in there for a long time.
We got to eat at two sit down restaurants during our trip at the ESPN Zone (twice) and Storyteller’s Café. Those two restaurants we mostly eat all the time at the DLR. She was kind of surprise to hear that we are eating at the ESPN Zone during her birthday. The main thing is that we got in so we can watch the Stanley Cup Finals where the LA Kings won that night. I wanted to eat at the Carthay Circle Restaurant during the preview, but it was closed that day unless you buy the $500 ticket in order to eat at the restaurant. My DA didn’t think it was worth paying another $900 or $850 for dinner tickets. But after hearing what you get in it, she still thinks even today that it was way too much money.
I must have took over 1500 pics of CL & BVS alone on this trip since I wanted to get every little detail of CL and BVS. Good thing that it was during a preview so there wasn't that many people. This was the most pictures I have ever taken on any trip and it was way more than the WDW trip last year. I had to switch the lens every time I got the closer shots as well as the longer shots. The ones that were great were the sign details of Cars Land which are my favorite pics.
Also with all those pics that trip, I got to try the firework trail setting for the fireworks. I want to thank PrincessInOz the most for helping setting up the settings for my DSLR when I took the pictures of the firework trails those nights. Some of them were good for the first time while some of them could have used some work. But I will try to do more firework trail pictures on my upcoming trip.
So PiO, you need to remind me if you read this of what setting I should try when I take the pictures of the fireworks. Last time I set shutter speed at 4 to 6 seconds while the aperture was at f/9.0. This time I will try to set it up at 2 seconds and the aperture at 11.0 to 16.0
As always when I go to the Disney parks, we got to see Magical fireworks twice on Saturday and Monday. I also got to do Fantasmic! which I haven’t done for quite some time which is always fun to watch. The only shows that we didn’t get to see were WoC and MMY. I was disappointed that the 11:15pm private of viewing of WoC during our preview on Sunday night was canceled and moved towards the 10:15pm 2nd show of WoC. There was no way we were going to see WoC at 10:15pm while we could use that time to enjoy CL & BVS during the preview. I was also considering watching MMY after the Magical on Saturday, but I was tired that night after driving to LA, the preview at DCA and waiting for Magical that night. I was not happy that I didn’t get to see it, but that will be another show that I will see that night.
This concludes our Sneak Peek at Cars Land and Buena Vista Street on June 9th to 12th, 2012. Now I am about to work on my next post trip report will be next month with my DB and his GF. The dates will be August 13th to 15th, 2012. We will be staying at BWAI. I was hoping to get BWPPI, but the prices were just way too high. When my DB planned the dates, it was after Destination D weekend which also made me sad that I wanted to go to Destination D. I really wanted to go to Destination D since seeing the last few Destination D's at DL and WDW the last few years. I know that Alison (franandaj) is going that weekend and hope to see her there. But these were the only times that my DB and his GF available that day. The main reason for the trip is for my DB and his GF where they want to see Cars Land. They are really looking forward to the trip that I will be working on our plans for this trip. We have one reservation at Wine Country Trattoria on Tuesday at 6:30pm. We won’t be doing the WoC dining since we know that I can get the blue FPs for the 9pm show. So we are cutting it close for dining and WoC. They also want to see Radiator Springs light up at night around 8pm so everything will be close.
I’m going to start on my PTR and I could always use some ideas for my trip next month. The title for the upcoming TR was though up by PrincessInOz which is called
I'm Racing Back to Cars Land with 'Bro and his Girl' in Tow Thank you for reading along DISers.