Monday, part 1 (our DCA day)
I had set my alarm for 5:45 a.m., knowing it would take as awhile to get four women through one shower and bathroom. Even with everyone moving at a motivated pace, we still didn't walk out of the Paradise Pier Hotel until about 6:50, and I knew the walk through the GCH, bag check, and the gate would take more than 10 minutes. Happily, not
much more, and we were in California Adventure around 7:05.
Looking from the DCA gates back at Disneyland across the esplanade
We had already pre-decided together to hit Radiator Springs before the line got to its usual hour-plus wait. We had missed the first wave of people to the ride but still knew our eventual 25-minute wait was as short as it would ever be. It's got such a nicely themed line that I don't mind meandering it every once in a while.
We all guessed what color car we would get and I was right, it was bright red!! We went through Ramon's, and we won! I won't subject you to all of my bad photos of ride photos, but you can see that they were loading the ride at enough of a clip to not bother with single riders that early.
Best car of our trip so far!!
Picture time!!
We skipped over to Paradise Pier and into the shortest line I have ever seen for Toy Story Midway Mania -- maybe 10 minutes long. Before we knew it, we were on the ride and hurling darts, rings, balls, etc. I am very bad at that ride. My friend beat me, and the girls both obliterated us. (The only shooter ride I have ever been good at was the Men In Black ride at Universal Orlando. I beat DH twice in a row!) Then we rode Screamin' with a very short wait too.
No one had really eaten breakfast in our hurry to get ready -- I had some OJ we brought to get my blood sugar up -- and we started to get hungry. My friend wanted a churro for breakfast, which sounded awesome to all of us. But all of the carts were still closed. After some asking around, we found out that most of them wouldn't open until 10:30 or 11:00.
#churrofail That would have practically been lunch by then!!
We knew we could get something at the Starbucks on Buena Vista Street, so we headed back to the front of the park, by way of collecting a Soarin' FP. We got pastries and parfaits from Starbucks without much wait. It felt good to sit for a bit and I kept reminding myself to pace myself!
The other three got a locker for our quickly-discarded sweatshirts while I snapped a few character photos near the front of the park. I love the unique BVS characters and costumes!
We all wanted Mouse ear headbands so we hit up Elias and Co. My friend and I got the 60th-anniversay ones with the blue bedazzled foam bow. DD got the sparkly Minnie ones, and her friend got the more plush version.
I texted DH this photo that morning and told him we were already having a much better day
Since we were near Hollywood Land, we thought we'd get an Olaf FP and maybe go ride Tower of Terror. The girls had voted on meeting Olaf vs. Anna and Elsa, especially if the lines were long and required FPs. It took me a bit of looking to find where Olaf was at, tucked into a little corner and out of sight of the main walkway. I asked a CM how we got a FP and was told no more FP to meet Olaf. She pointed to the line, which looked maybe 10-plus minutes long. Sold!
We got in line and made it to the front just before Olaf had to take a break "to pack on more snow." The girls thought he was adorable waddling away backstage. He was really much cuter in person than some of the pictures I had seen.
My friend had given the girls the matching "Never Grow Up" Peter Pan T-shirts the night before and they got lots of attention that day wearing the shirts, coordinating Minnie ears, and birthday buttons. They got asked several times if they were sisters despite the fact that both look totally like their mamas, not each other!
Well, this is a good spot to take a break, so I will leave you with some cliffhangers:
Did we ever get churros?
Did we use up all of our character-meeting luck on Olaf?
What "malfunction" delayed something that afternoon?
PHXscuba
p.s. Thanks for reading!!