Day 10 - Sunday June, 21 - L.A. Live Steamers and Bob Gurr!!!
It was a bummer to only have 1.5 days in Yosemite, but no worries as we were heading for one my most anticipated anticipated activities of the whole trip… Seeing Walt’s Barn in Griffith Park, riding the trains, and meeting Bob Gurr!
As I mentioned earlier, we’re the only die hard Disney fan’s on Stephanie’s side of the family, so the idea of getting up super early to see more Walt stuff didn’t appeal to the rest of the family. So we bid them all farewell the night before and agreed to meet up at the Candy Cane Inn in Anaheim later in the day.
Our goal was to get on the road at 5:00 AM. (We wanted to arrive in LA around 1:00 or 2:00 and didn’t want to risk being late due to traffic or any accidents.) So that meant we had to get up around 4:15 AM to load the car and get on the road. Wow, you could really see the stars!!!!
As we approached our departure, I grabbed a couple photos of the dark sky. And then sure enough, we were off right at 5am.
It was surreal driving on the winding roads through the Valley when it was still somewhat dark and lonesome. Such a contrast to the super crowded traffic the day before.
A little while later, we had made it to tunnel view. I’ve never tried HDR photography before, but since it was fairly dark still (the sun was just below the horizon), I decided to give it a try. The following photo was a combination of 6 or 7 individual photos with some under exposed and some overexposed. In the end, the photo looks like it was taken in the daylight, but it was still sort of dark. Not the the quality that I had hoped for, but it still turned out pretty well, I think.
Overall, the drive to LA was fairly uneventful and boring. Which was a welcome change after the last few busy days!!! As we approached LA, we needed gas and figured that we might as well stop for lunch. We Yelped a bit and saw that an In-N-Out was just off the highway, so we pulled off. Except for, no dice, it was closed for refurbishment. Bummer! We went ahead and got gas across the street and while I was doing that, Stephanie Yelped for other options that were nearby. There was a place called “Teriyaki Madness” down the road that had great reviews. Why not?!?!? Everyone was game, so we headed that way. It was in some sort of funky shopping complex with a fake trolley outside. Cool, I guess...
It was just before 11am, and they had recently opened. I think we were the first customers and they were happy to greet us. Oh, and I forgot, it was Fathers Day. They offered us 20% off our meal to help celebrate. Cool! We mostly all ordered versions of teriyaki chicken.
I had spicy teriyaki chicken and yakisoba. It was yummy!!!
Stephanie and Princess both had regular teriyaki and rice.
Buddy went with just the chicken and rice
And Pickle went with brown rice and shrimp tempura.
All in all, it was a delicious meal. Especially for being counter service. Maybe a little better than a Sansai and definitely much better than anything you’d get in the mall like Sarku.
We relaxed in the shade for a while and then headed to Griffith Park.
Another hour or so, and we had arrived!!!
We decided to ride a train with the L.A. Live Steamers first. (And you know, Walt Disney, was a founding member of this club.) I think it was about $3 per person, not bad. This was probably my favorite small scale train ride ever. We have a good one here in St. Louis, and I mentioned the awesome one that we rode out to Royal Gorge in Colorado. This was cooler than those because it had a lot of turns, tunnels, straights, trestles, etc. with lots of cool scenery too.
It took about 20 minutes to get through the line. This place is popular!
And a few minutes later, it was our turn to get on.
The whole ride was about 10 to 15 minutes long. It sure was a lot of fun! Here’s a video with a couple minutes of the highlights.
Next up, was to head over to Walt’s Barn. So, yeah, the barn is only open once a month, we timed this Sunday over a year in advance. LOL!!! But we didn’t know then, that they’d be having the opening event for their new “Trains of
Disneyland” exhibit. Or that Bob Gurr would be there for a meet and greet. We found that out a couple months earlier before we left. I really got excited then. I mean Bob Gurr?!?!? Mr. Monorail himself?!?!? The guy who designed the Autopia cars, and the Matterhorn Bobsleds?!?!? And the Haunted Mansion Doom Buggies?!?!? And countless other Disneyland ride vehicles. Wow, what an opportunity!
Anyway, we headed over to the barn area and it was PACKED! They had quite the turnout for the opening of the new trains exhibit. But we made good time driving from Yosemite, and it was a lovely day, and we had plenty of time, so we didn’t care.
Even though it was packed, it was full of kindred spirits. Pretty much everyone there were true Walt Disney fans. (Not just people taking their kids to a theme park.) Our kind of people!!! There was plenty of good energy and positive vibes all around!!!
Only a couple people were lined up to meet Bob, so we headed over there first. (Most were in line to tour the barn.)
Remember the pin and post card that we picked up in Marceline?
We were excited to share them with Bob and he graciously accepted. He said that he didn’t have anything from Marceline and thought they were pretty cool. He even let Pickle apply the pin to his shirt.
He ended up having an L.A. barn pin on his right shirt collar and a Marceline barn pin on his left shirt collar. He wore the pin the rest of the day, so that was pretty cool!
I made a quick video of the interaction...
We also asked him to sign the stamps that the kids had cancelled at Walt Disney Post Office in Marceline.
And then Buddy asked him to sign some monorail track from his play set. As Buddy walked up with them, Bob said, “Hey, I know what those are!”
We had him sign two. One for Eli, and one for a fellow monorail fan!
I didn’t ask for anything to be signed, I preferred a photo with the Disney Legend himself!
We chatted with Bob for several minutes. He was super friendly, warm and open. Such a right on guy!
Here’s a better photo of our autographs. You can't buy vacation souvenirs this cool!!!! (At least that's what I hope the kids say when they look at these when they are all grown up.)
Next up, we decided to get in line to go inside Walt's Barn and tour the train exhibit...