Oh My Aching Tentacles! A First Timer's TR (Finished! 02/08!)

Chapter Five: From Dawn Til Dusk

I was awake at goodness only knows when on our last day. It was probably just before or just after six in the morning. Jey wasn't that far behind me, even though she really doesn't remember waking up or anything. Her mum was dead to the world, and she had told us the morning prior not to wake her up if she was still asleep so we left as quietly as possible and headed on over to Disneyland.

We got there just before seven, so we had to wait just a few minutes before they began to let people in. Once they did we headed directly to Space Mountain, rode it, and decided we weren't going to do anything else until we ate so we headed back to Starbucks to grab a baked good. Since we hadn't done any character stalking and our favorite thing to do is get pictures of characters in their natural habitat we decided to do that instead of riding any rides. Honestly, it was definitely one of the most fun things we had done all week.

We stopped to snap this picture of the two of us:


Then we headed towards Princess Fantasy Faire. We grabbed some Fast Passes for the second Frozen show at the Royal Theatre and headed in to Fantasy Faire. We wanted pictures of just the princesses but since they wanted to rush us through they wanted us posing. We made a compromise - I was the one who would take pictures with them (mostly) and then Jey would snap a picture of them by themselves.
(okay I guess that first picture was from after dinner the night before but whatever)







(Tangent: god I hate my arms. I need to stop posing like that it's just such a default.)

When we left it was basically abandoned in the Fantasy Faire section so we took some pictures:






We slipped through to New Orleans Square and stopped for a minute at Rancho del Zocalo and just sat down at one of the outer tables since they weren't open yet. We pulled up the Disneyland app just to try and get an idea of where some of the others characters might be and made a comment about how much we wanted to see Tiana (she and Aurora are my two favorite princesses). Guess who came walking around the corner as we said it?



My girl!













After we gave up on trying to snap pictures of Tiana we decided to head over to the fountain since we knew that Aurora would end up over there at some point.





It was really, really hard to get a picture of this dang well. The second I had my camera focused on it three teenage girls came running over to make some sort of lip synch Vine. That they redid like four times. Have a blast, do what you want, I don't care, but if you see someone about to take a picture of something just wait the five seconds it'd take for me to take the picture, please. I waited five minutes until they were gone then took my pictures:



A few minutes after and Aurora came up with her retinue of little girls. We stood back and took some pictures. It's a lovely spot for pictures of Aurora but dang is it hard to find a place to enjoy and not be in the background of another family's picture! I tried my hardest and the handler was nice and not at all rude nor did he try to shoo us away (Tiana's handler kept yelling at us - "if you don't have a family member in line then KEEP WALKING!" - though we had been standing where we were before Tiana had actually showed up.)







We moved on once it got a little crowded with groups trying to get out of Fantasyland not realizing that there was a M&G going on, after having a quick conversation with a nice family who just wanted to make sure the line wasn't closed and what we thought was the best way for them to get around without accidentally cutting someone or getting in someone's picture. Once they were safely in line we scooted away. Jey needed to use a restroom and her mum had just called to tell us she was getting a cup of coffee but was ready to meet us. So we used the entrance to Pixie Hollow as a good meeting point.

I really loved the sign for Pixie Hollow. It makes me miss Pixie Hollow in WDW something fierce; I loved meeting the fairies.



I was the point person for everyone to meet up but suddenly a wild Bert and Mary appeared behind me so I kind of scooted back a bit to take some pictures - my hair's red enough that it was easy for Jey and her mum to both find me.







And just as well all got together these two walked by:


So you can guess what we decided to do. Yup. Stalk.















Back together we had a bit of time to kill before our FP, so we told Jey's mum about them and started to head back in that direction, just kind of chatting about our game plan.

Woefully behind, obviously.

Your pictures are getting me super pumped up for our trip!!

Love your report with all the pictures. We are going in June and staying at the Fairfield Marriot too. Did you use the pull out bed (or chair) for sleeping? Just wondering if it is comfy? There are 5 of us. Me, DH and 3 girls 9, 15, 17. How was the pool area? I don't suspect we will be in our room that much but to only sleep and freshen up.

xlsm said:

Woefully behind, obviously.

Your pictures are getting me super pumped up for our trip!!

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That's okay because I'm woefully behind at updating it lol. I'm glad! I want to go back right now lol

CherylGonz said:

Love your report with all the pictures. We are going in June and staying at the Fairfield Marriot too. Did you use the pull out bed (or chair) for sleeping? Just wondering if it is comfy? There are 5 of us. Me, DH and 3 girls 9, 15, 17. How was the pool area? I don't suspect we will be in our room that much but to only sleep and freshen up.

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The pool was always hopping. We were right next to it but it was never loud in our room (except the night we went back early so we had the windows open to get some air). The room was pretty big (we had a corner room) and while nobody slept the night in the chair, Jey's mum did nap in it for a bit and said that it was comfy! The hotel in general was friendly and nice and very accommodating.

Part Two

So, a few months ago before I forgot about this TR, we were just meeting up with Jey's mum. We headed back into Princess Fantasy Faire. Jey's mum was going to head over to Rancho del Zocalo and wait for us to see the Frozen show at the Royal Theatre. We got back a little too early to get into the line for the next show so we ended up watching a certain princess interact with some kids:







So after some stalking of a certain Scottish Highland princess we went in with our FPs to the Royal Theatre. The biggest issue with FP here is that there are so many bench seats reserved for the handicapped (or there were in this particular viewing). I think, as the reserved cushion things move, they change per viewing but at the show we went to there were over half of the seats taken up. It made it very difficult for us to find a place for the two of us to sit together and they hadn't even let people without FPs in yet!

A CM was very strict about where people sat but she told us "if you have any complaints, come see me afterwards." We had no complaints once we found a place for the two of us to sit together but we were both really curious about what she meant by that. Especially because she had a blue tag so we knew she had a Legacy Award. We just were curious, hah.

But then the family in front of us sat down and we automatically forgot about her (so much so that I never took her name down because she was a seriously awesome cast member with the kids around us and I wanted to leave a comment for her up front and once I remembered I realized I hadn't taken her name down anywhere!). The family in front of us was a family of four: mum, dad, and two boys. The younger of the boys went to sit on the pads in front with the daughters of the people sitting next to us. It was cute to watch them before the show started. The older boy was deaf, so they had to sit there so that he was close enough to the interpreters.

Guys. These interpreters were the most amazing people. They were so sweet and they looked like they were having so much fun that it was hard to focus on the show! I have absolutely no proficiency in ASL and I was enraptured by them.

I did watch the show though. I adored it! It was like watching the Reduced Shakespeare Company, but with Disney. I didn't get many pictures because the father of the family with the little boy was so tall I had to hold my camera up and I didn't want to run it for the Japanese couple behind me but here are a few I managed to get:









After watching the show we slipped out and met up with Jey's mum at Rancho del Zocalo. It was around noontime so we went in to get something to eat. If you've ever read any of my WDW TRs you know my dislike of Mexican food. For a truncated explanation: when I was younger Mexican food made me violently ill and I've been very wary of Mexican food ever since. In the last few years I've figured out how to get very basic meals if we go to Mexican. Though I survive better with Puerto Rican food.

All that's to say that I was really, really worried walking into Rancho del Zocalo. But I saw that there were taco salads on the menu so I was good. I asked if I could get it without refried beans, as the texture's definitely not my thing (except at San Angel Inn at Epcot, tangent but oh, my god those things are so good!).

This is my "salad":


It was really good! I just put "salad" in quotation marks because it was more a bowl than a salad. Especially as, what I hadn't noticed was that the woman had given me extra rice when I asked for no refried beans. Which was perfectly fine! But man it made it filling!

We left and were going to just kind of meander around and just enjoy being in the parks for a bit. We saw Rapunzel was out where Merida was and, as she is one of Jey's favorites, we stopped to take some pictures:









We headed out and got ourselves some frozen lemonade as we headed back o go back on Small World. I snagged a picture of the Castle



And on the way to Small World we ran into the Evil Queen



She had a guy bow at her feet


We enjoyed our last ride on Small World then headed to the front of the park. Jey's mum had a bunch of stuff she needed to grab from the hotel and either return or exchange so she went to do that. I sat in front of Town Hall and just enjoyed the ambiance for a few minutes:



Then headed into the Moments with Mr. Lincoln theatre to look at some of the exhibits.



And then we stopped here:



We decided to just sit and wait for the parade since we knew we wanted to see it so we sat for an hour. It was weird that we were sitting and nobody else really was, since we're so used to WDW. So what we did was took turns getting some iced tea and a glass of water from the Marketplace. While we were sitting another woman came and sat next to us. We said we had one more person coming but she was more than welcome to sit with us on the rest of the curb and we got to talking. She was with her husband and his friends from Argentina and figured she'd save a spot for the parade in a central location so they could all meet up. She was very nice to talk to and we had a nice time just sitting around people-watching!

Part Three

We were reunited with Jey's mum just before the parade started. and here are the Parade photos:





























This man is my favorite part of this parade:




When Ariel saw my hair during the parade she pointed at me and yelled "you look like me!!!!" and began waving. It was kind of adorable.














After that we headed up to the train to take around around Disneyland and enjoy the view. I love taking pictures from the train station, no matter what the park!

Part Four

We had spent the entire day kind of teasing Jey's mum about how she wanted to eat at the Plaza since we had met up with her at the park that morning because she thought it looked cute. So once we got back to the Hub it was time for dinner (I truncated random wandering so now it sounds insanely like we just ate all day. I promise there was like at least 2 hours between each snack!

Anyway, we went to the Plaza. I got chicken so it took me a little longer to get my meal. It was weird too because there was a father yelling at his daughter with the same name as me (not something that happens often in little kids) so when Jey had to get my attention to tell me where she and her mother had found to sit so she had to wait for me. Oops!

It was kind of funny though. The poor guy ended up in front of me in line to pay and I glanced at him to make sure I didn't hit his tray with me and saw that he had a Massachusetts license. The only other girl in the parks I'd run into with my name and she's a little girl from my state!

Anyway, here's my yummy chicken:


It was really good though. We went to find a place to stand to wait for the fireworks but were having issues. Jey went to talk with some CMs while her mum and I waited. I took this picture:


We were told how to get into the Hub area where people were sitting and waiting for the fireworks since we weren't interested in watching the parade again. We sat down next to a man with his mother and niece. He's a regular but his niece was visiting from out of state to look at colleges. His mother was from Massachusetts as well so we were talking about the fireworks and the park and started playing Heads Up together. It was great spending a few hours talking with them.

The only problem I had was with the mother sitting in front of me. She had a young daughter (5 or younger) who kept crawling on top of me and grabbing my leg. Mum saw no issues with this, even when I asked politely (strangers touching me, kids or otherwise, just makes me really uncomfortable). Between Jey and the family we had become friends with helped me move away before we stood up for the fireworks at least.

Fireworks time. Both my cameras ended up dying so they're cellphone:


























Happy that we got to see the fireworks we said goodbye to our friends and then headed into Tomorrowland. We rode Star Tours one last time and headed out. We stopped to get some candy before we left. Well, Jey and her mum did - I got a Goofy's Glacier and it was yummy. Jey got a fancy Mickey bar.

We left Disneyland at about 11 and went back to the Fairfield to pack and shower.

Chapter Six: So Long

We had to get up for the very first bus back to the airport the next morning. I woke up around 4:30, got dressed, made sure I had all my stuff, then went down to the front desk to check out and double check the directions to the bus stop. By the time I was back in our room Jey and her mum were ready so we walked one hotel over to wait for the bus.

We were early for the bus but the concierge had told us to get their early just to be on the safe side. When we got onto the bus it was ourselves and one other family. We took the front of the bus and they took the back. We stopped at about four other hotels before driving to the airport. We all fell asleep on the ride to the airport. We had a much better time getting through the security line and everything which was soooooooo much nicer than Boston!!

We got to our terminal and got muffins and coffee and relaxed while we waited.

Our flight to North Carolina and then to Boston were both bumpy and horrible but we made it home!

I have to say, while it wasn't a long trip it was a great trip and I miss it immensely!

Thank you all for reading!!!

It is highly likely that I'm going to keep coming back to this report and ogling your photos for the next few months until it's time for our trip

I'm so glad you wrote this, it has me so excited!!