Allons-y! UPDATED 6/18: This is the end...

[OhioStateBuckeye]

We drove through Balboa park on the way out to the hotel:







All these building were gorgeous and I wish we'd had time to walk around and go in a few museums.

It took us a mercifully short time to find our hotel, Paradise Point Resort and Spa.

We got checked in and stopped at the souvenir/convenience store to grab some firewood for the fire pit later that night.

We got a bit lost trying to find our room. The hotel was just a bunch of little bungalows and had what seemed like a hundred small streets. We finally found our room and got our stuff unpacked and settled in. (pictures will follow, we were too tired and worn out to take too many this night)

Brian had got us a late reservation for the Fish Market restaurant and then we were going to go to the Prohibition Bar. Well...we both fell asleep. And didn't wake up until around 9 pm. So there went those plans. We ended up just ordering Papa John's Pizza and then took it out to the beach to eat and have a fire pit.

This was our view:







Then a little cat came wondering up to us. I think he was attracted by the pizza, and I named him Birthday Cat, since he showed up about 3 minutes within midnight. Brian thought he might have rabies?? I think he just wanted a piece of pepperoni. He hung out with us for the rest of the night.



And then I turned 30. On the beach, with a fire going, with Brian and a couple Papa John's pizzas and birthday cat.



The end.


Ok, not really.

We still have 2 more days everyone!!

And one more whole day at Disney!!!

Stories not over yet

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

The plan for my birthday morning was to sleep in (FINALLY!!) and the stay at the hotel until it was time for check out (11:30).

Of course, I think I woke up around 9 anyway, I wasn't too happy cause I really needed rest, but I was up and on vacation so what are you gonna do.

We had some leftover pizza for breakfast/lunch and took some time getting ready and re-organizing our luggage. We wanted to get all the camping supplies packed away so we could leave those bags in the car from now on.

Then I took a ton of pictures of the room:







Brian liked the complimentary coffee, and it was named after our cat: Toulouse! Either that or he has a little side business and he makes coffee.






This was our view, we didn't have a beach side bungalow, I have a feeling those were much more expensive than ours.





I really liked the lamp:



And the floor





We said our goodbyes to the room and decided to take a walk around the resort since we really didn't have anywhere to be.

Brian really liked the resort, I think I had a few reservations about it. It just almost seemed too nice to me. I don't really have very sophisticated tastes, and it just kind of had a weird vibe to me. I dunno, I'm strange.



I am willing to bet a lot of money that ducks appear more than any other animal/bird in DIS boards trip reports.







We went for a walk on our little beach and found a few nice sea shells.











Our fire pit in the daytime:





I think these were Birthday Cat's tracks:





Then we headed back to the car and headed out.

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

We saw a lot of people with remote controlled sail boats, which I thought was very awesome.









We were headed to:



We had read online that Old Town had a special Saturday market, so we were going to check that out and see if we could find a gift for my dad for watching the pets for us.



I'm not really sure what special market was supposed to be going on. we didn't see anything that looked out of the ordinary, it seemed like just the regular shops were open. We had fun walking around and looking at all the old buildings.

















These donkeys were supposed to be available for petting...but they were in no mood and were staying in the backs of their fences.


















It was an usually hot day, in the mid 80s. Looking for presents was hot and thirsty work, so we stopped at a little general store. I got a root beer and Brian got some sort of iced green tea.

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

We finally found the perfect present: a wine bottle inside a cow leg. I am not really joking and I wish I had a picture. It sounds super odd, but my dad really loved it.

With gift in hand we left Old Towne







My favorite San Diego bridge from last trip is in the background of this picture, though unfortunately we didn't get to drive on it this trip.





Next on the list of birthday shenanigans was a trip down south to look at Los Americanos outlets. I heard on the DIS that they had a good Disney Parks outlet and I wanted to check it out.

I've never been to Mexico before, so this was as close as I've ever been.






It was kind of weird to wrap my mind around the fact that this was Tijuana and a different country, even though it was like less than a mile away.




It took forever to find a parking spot because it was super busy. We finally found one and set out for the Disney outlet. I won't keep anyone in suspense, I was super disappointed by this outlet. There were very few items that I thought were from the actual park, it just looked like a regular Disney store. There were barely any vinylmations, the only set I would have wanted was the Cinderella set and they were still pretty pricey. So I left with nothing Brian wanted to look at a few stores but he didn't find anything he wanted either and we ended up walking around a ton. My feet were hurting by this point, I was hungry and tired of eating leftover pizza and I was upset I couldn't find anything at the outlet I wanted.

We made it back to the car and I was pretty disgruntled. My birthday special day was not turning out to be the way I imagined. I had another piece of pizza (we brought the box in the car with us) and of course spilled the garlic sauce everywhere. So another high point of the day.

We had two more stops before we headed back to Anaheim and I was hopeful that the day could be turned around.

Since I enjoyed the first REI we stopped at so much we had found another to stop at. All the winter items were on clearance so Brian searched for a coat. I ended up getting yet another coat so it wasn't a complete loss.

After that brief stop we made our way to La Jolla. I wanted to see seals since I'd never seen any before and the internet told me that La Jolla was my best chance.

I was super sick of driving at this point so I was really hoping this would be a fun stop. La Jolla actually turned out to be a pretty ritzy little seaside town.

My luck must have been getting better because we actually found a really great free parking spot right next to the cliffs.











I thought this sign looked like the Finding Nemo queue in WDW so I liked it:





I was super delighted by the seals.









Some people around us thought these seals out swimming were dolphins. Then they pointed out how lucky it was to see dolphins.





There is a baby!!

We climbed down pretty close to the seals, but still kept our distance. I didn't want a birthday seal attack, after all.

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

This was the view across the water. Geez, those houses must cost a fortune, it is such a nice view. Doesn't smell great...but still a nice view.













This pretty much explains the awful smell. All that white stuff? Bird poop. I read an article after we got home that residents are strongly complaining of the smell, but the area is protected so people are reluctant to go in and clean it up and disturb the birds.













The sun was starting to set so we climbed back up. I wanted to touch the Pacific Ocean, and there was a small beach right beside the cliffs so my dream could come true.









I was wearing flip flops so I just walked up to the edge of the waves and let the next wave crash over my feet. It was freezing. And now my feet were all sandy and wet. Dreams never really live up to reality, do they? But at least I'd touch the Pacific Ocean, so mission accomplished.



Lots of people brought their dogs to the beach and this adorable husky reminded my of my husky, Sirius. I regret never having seen him as a puppy (we got him from the shelter when he was almost 1). I am quite sure he was the cutest puppy ever.



Everything reminds me of Disney. This little life guard shack thing reminded me again of the Finding Nemo queue in WDW.





We went back to the car and left to head back to Anaheim.

On the way we saw this condemned looking little building and wondered why someone didn't buy it, it is right by the little beach and the cliffs and would make a perfect bar.



Apparently everyone in the town were driving around their expensive cars to show them off, we saw plenty. Also saw a pretty funny ferrari that was doing this weird 6 point turn. Pretty sure the driver had no idea how to drive it.

 

[PHXscuba]

La Jolla is pretty but we kept getting lost when we went. Parking can be atrocious too, so it's a birthday miracle you were able to find a spot!

Yep, the Pacific is always cold, even in the summer. It's still weird to me when I go to Florida or someplace and the ocean is in the 80s. Cool, but weird.

I love the bridge to Coronado. I drove it by myself a couple times when I was in SD with DH on a business trip at the Hotel Del. I was equal parts exhilarated and terrified -- not of the bridge but of taking a wrong turn coming off of it, especially on the mainland side.

Tijuana sucks, but at least you can say you went to another country!

PHXscuba

 

[caffingdu]

yes, those California waters are unusually cold given the latitude. The current flows down from Alaska, which makes for cool water. It always takes a couple minutes to get used to the temperature, but eventually the body adapts haha.

I believe the California current is referred to as "God's natural air conditioner" or something like that. Usually keeps temperatures nice and moderately cool on the coast. But sometimes I wish it was a nicer temperature for swimming...

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

La Jolla is pretty but we kept getting lost when we went. Parking can be atrocious too, so it's a birthday miracle you were able to find a spot!

Yep, the Pacific is always cold, even in the summer. It's still weird to me when I go to Florida or someplace and the ocean is in the 80s. Cool, but weird.

I love the bridge to Coronado. I drove it by myself a couple times when I was in SD with DH on a business trip at the Hotel Del. I was equal parts exhilarated and terrified -- not of the bridge but of taking a wrong turn coming off of it, especially on the mainland side.

Tijuana sucks, but at least you can say you went to another country!

PHXscuba

Taking a wrong turn from the bridge is not what scared me. Rather I kept picturing the car going out of control and plunging over the side.

I am pretty sure the Atlantic was cold the last time I touched it too, it was up in some New England country.

yes, those California waters are unusually cold given the latitude. The current flows down from Alaska, which makes for cool water. It always takes a couple minutes to get used to the temperature, but eventually the body adapts haha.

I believe the California current is referred to as "God's natural air conditioner" or something like that. Usually keeps temperatures nice and moderately cool on the coast. But sometimes I wish it was a nicer temperature for swimming...

Yeah, a few seconds from one wave was more than enough for me. There was someone who was swimming but she was wearing a wet suit.

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

The drive back to Anaheim was pretty uneventful, except for the fact that I was sick of driving and it was getting late.

We eventually made it back, and I felt like we were coming home.


We checked into our final hotel of the trip:



We got an upgrade to a slightly bigger room. There were no real available parking spots, so the front desk person told me to just make our own spot. Good thing we rented one of the smallest cars available. We made our spot then checked out our room.



We got a towel elephant on each bed!!















The room was very nice. The only problem we had was with parking that first night, and there was a bit of construction noise in the morning because they are building a new addition to the hotel in the back.

We relaxed for a little while then got dressed up and were ready to celebrate the rest of my birthday.

First we headed to the Napa Rose! We were not really thinking of eating there, but we hadn't had dinner yet and it'd been for the most part a dissapointing day for me, so we thought we could sit at the bar and have a pre Trader Sam's drink and get some food.

I have no pictures of this event, the bar was pretty full and I felt kind of silly trying to take pictures in the dimly lit space.

The bartenders were all super friendly and provided excellent service.

We each ordered a drink and then got (description off all ears):

Seven Sparkling Sins - An Array of Tantalizations Featuring Spicy Beef & Cashew Roll, Curried Crab Taco, Seared Ahi Nacho, Shrimp in Cucumber Wrap with Lemon Dill Creme, Citrus Cured Salmon with a Buckwheat Blini, Grape Leaves Stuffed with Pheasant and Lemon Broiled Scallop

Brian really enjoyed it, and even my severely underdeveloped taste buds could tell that the food combinations had been excellently prepared. What can I say, I think Texas Roadhouse is fine dining. But I still really liked it.

After about an hour at the Napa Rose bar we arrived at our final destination of the night, my beloved Trader Sam's.





There were no seats at the bar but we found an empty table. We got our first drink of the night, the uh-oa!!



I was a little sad that they were out of souvenir cups, but the drink still went down the same way

I liked all the decorations on the walls.



I don't think you can see, but there were lots of postcards and letters, and one was from Short Round to Indy (IJ and the Temple of Doom).



I love the windows and how you can see the volcano erupt whenever anyone orders a Krakatoa.



Which is what we ordered next:



Then we got an appetizer, not sure why since we were stuffed from Napa Rose.

We had both had quite a bit to drink by this time, but I saw they had a new souvenir cup that I just had to have (I am still missing the uh-oa cup and the trader sam's barrel, I got the tiki cup last time):



So we got one of those and, to his detriment later, Brian drank most of it.





I liked the totem polls and the guys' eyes moved. I don't think Trader Sam's is as much fun sitting at the tables as it is to sit at the bar. I missed the interaction with the bartenders and our waiter was pretty busy.

We were pretty much done after the Zombie drink, so we stumbled out and back to the Ramada. We had a pretty early morning, so we went right to bed.

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

I won't lie, this was a rough morning. The park opened at 8 and I wanted to be there and in line by 7:30 so that we could be sure to get on Peter Pan. Brian was not feeling well from the night before, and I was also pretty tired and worn out.

We managed to drag ourselves out of bed and got ready.



We stopped by at the Ramada's free breakfast and grabbed a couple items.



We were let inside the parks once we arrived. It was AP early entry, so we hung out at the rope by the castle.











Figment and Maverick were chilling in the backpack.





The flowers looked extra bright and cheerful this morning. And I had a lot of time to kill.







Then a Disney Duck came out to entertain us.



It wasn't Donald, but I like to think Donald is in charge of all the Disney Ducks.

Then the rope was dropped right at 8 and we were off!

First destination:





We ended up having about a 15 minute wait since all the AP holders were in front of us, but it wasn't that bad considering that wait jumps up to around an hour real quick.

I love this ride so I try to take as many pictures as humanly possible:











I actually had never seen Disney's Peter Pan. I grew up on the Mary Martin Peter Pan and I loved Hook and all the other interpretations. Just recently I watched Disney's version. Ya know, it is amazing that even though Peter is a young kid, he is still kind of a womanizer.

I think the Disney version is pretty decent, but it is just the overall theme and story that I am in love with. Especially the whole flying over London part.

Then we went on Alice in Wonderland, it was a walk on.









I'd also never seen Disney's Alice in Wonderland. I saw that around the same time as Peter Pan, and I must say, didn't really enjoy Alice in Wonderland. No real concrete reason, just not my cup of tea (pun intended).

Next we walked onto Snow White (I wish WDW had kept their version, it is a bit longer and I miss it).

We still had a bit of time until we needed to head for the park entrance for the 9:30 Walk in Walt's footsteps tour, so we...

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

...went on the Finding Nemo subs! We were able to walk right onto the sub that was loading.





The Argonaut looks like a fine ship.

We submerged...



And came face to face with a hideous underwater creature!



Saw what looked like an old, sunken FP machine...



Hello fellow undersea explorer



This dum dum musta forgot he couldn't swim (Night at the Museum reference)



Is this oyster available for Pick a Pearl?



I like to fondly think of these guys as the dumpster divers of the sea:



And if you ever wondered what the inside of the sub looks like:



We had a little bit of time before the tour, so we went on Snow White again.





Disney doesn't even have to ask for people to throw money at it:









This is how we were feeling:





It was time to check in for our tour. Conveniently for us, Danny was waiting to give us a ride down Main Street.







We made it in time (thanks Danny!) and checked in for the tour. We had a couple minutes to wait while the rest of our group formed up.

Next up: Walk in Walt's footsteps!!

 

[PHXscuba]

Wow! You got a lot done in just an hour and a half. When I make myself wake up early I always groan, but then I see how much I accomplish and I am "happy" too!

Looking forward to hearing about the tour!

PHXscuba

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

We got checked in and received our name tags:



I called our guide Mary, because she reminded me of Mary Poppins:



Those outfits they have them wear make them come off as super prim and proper.

Our group had about 10 people and we started off near the firehouse and were told some
Walt history.



We moved down Main Street and continued to hear facts and interesting stories. One of my
favorite stories was on opening day of Disneyland, an orange grove farmer whose land touched Disneyland set up a ladder and charged people admission to climb over his ladder and into Disneyland.









Next up the wind blew us towards:



Peter Pan! I hadn't read about this ride ever being one that the tour backdoored you onto, so I was pretty pleased that we got to ride it twice today.



We got to go through the exit (how important we were!).

We enjoyed our second flight to Neverland and then headed through Frontierland to New Orleans Square.



Ah Walt, if my husband gifts me with a giant piece of petrified wood, I'd be one happy person.



And then it was time to set foot where not many get to set foot!! (If you don't count the people on the tour every single day, or all the multitudes of Club 33 members and their many guests). Club 33!!!





Even the exit sign was fancy!







Mary told us that she'd only been upstairs once, she was giving a VIP Tour and her family invited her to lunch with them.

It seemed so fast but soon we were on our way out to our next destination.



Disney has the best flowers.



Next we hopped on the train at the New Orleans station.



We disembarked at Toon Town Station and headed to IASW. We were going to ride that, but it was down so instead we had a short bathroom/snack break while Mary tried to find us a substitute ride.





We got an awesome snack!

Then we found out that our IASW substitute was none other than the famous Tiki Room!





It was fun to sing like the birdies sing, but our tour was nearing the end. We headed
back down Main Street.

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

Here our group split into 2, half went to Walt's Apartment and I was in the group that was having lunch first.







We got this sweet exclusive pin:





We got to hear some more interesting stories and have our picture taken:



The tour was amazing. I highly recommend it to anyone. You can get a discount with a Disney visa or an AP. And for the cost, you got backdoored into 2 rides, an exclusive pin, lunch from Jolly Holiday bakery which includes a bottled drink a sandwich and a dessert. You also get to see Club 33's lobby and Walt's Apartment, which are exclusive experiences.

We were ready to head over to DCA, but first I stopped by City Hall to get our Dessert party tickets and Brian ran to get IJ FPs.

 

[stacy~**]

You guys did a great job of getting stuff done that morning....especially after an evening at Trader Sams!

Your Walk in Walt's Footsteps review was SO helpful. I am really cringing over the cost (we do have the visa but there are 4 of us, ouch!) but I think we are going for it anyways. Our 30 days to book it is this week!! I hope we are able to get it.

Excited to hear about your F! dessert party, too. I don't think we are planning to do this but a wonderful review could change my mind!

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

You guys did a great job of getting stuff done that morning....especially after an evening at Trader Sams!

Your Walk in Walt's Footsteps review was SO helpful. I am really cringing over the cost (we do have the visa but there are 4 of us, ouch!) but I think we are going for it anyways. Our 30 days to book it is this week!! I hope we are able to get it.

Excited to hear about your F! dessert party, too. I don't think we are planning to do this but a wonderful review could change my mind!

If you need to know any more details about Walk in Walt's please PM me. Like I said, if you break the cost down it does seem a bit more manageable. The lunch is really very big and filling and would probably cost around $10 if purchased separate. The pin is actually pretty big, and I could see it costing on the higher end of pins, which would be what, $12? Plus the rides you get back doored onto, and the Club 33 lobby and Walt's apartment which I'm not aware of any other way to see. And really, one of the best parts was getting to hear all the little stories and history. The tour inspired me to come home and get several Walt Disney and Disneyland history books from the library.


I actually just finished up writing the entire rest of my trip report tonight so my F! dessert party review is forthcoming as well.

I wanted to get this report wrapped up because Brian and I just got back from an amazing trip to Arizona. I noticed that there are not a lot of California and the West trip reports, so I was going to do a quick write up on that trip. We did the Grand Canyon (including a mule ride!!), the Petrified Forest, the Painted Desert, Route 66, Sedona, and a lot of small stops like Montezuma's Castle.

 

[PHXscuba]

Nice update! Doing that tour would be great. The only tour I have done at DLR is the Holiday tour, which was awesome and worth every penny.

Hope you enjoyed our AZ heat. It's wicked this week. My younger kids have swim lessons at 11:45 and I am so not looking forward to sitting out there. Why did I wear my black Mickey shirt today?

PHXscuba

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

Nice update! Doing that tour would be great. The only tour I have done at DLR is the Holiday tour, which was awesome and worth every penny.

Hope you enjoyed our AZ heat. It's wicked this week. My younger kids have swim lessons at 11:45 and I am so not looking forward to sitting out there. Why did I wear my black Mickey shirt today?

PHXscuba

Well, I think we got lucky with the weather. It was mid 70s at the Grand Canyon (up top, anyway) when we went and one of our guides said it was usually quite a bit hotter.

I was hoping you'd pop into my Arizona trip report once I start it so you can see if I represent your state well.

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

We were on our way to get FPs for Screamin when who should we see but my main duck! Donald!

Who was looking very dapper in his sailor outfit. Coincidentally, today is his birthday as well (well, it was when I wrote this). Happy Birthday Donald!





He was pleased to see my duck tales shirt even though he wasn't on it. Gotta give out some love for the family.

We then got our FPs and decided to check out the Blue Sky Cellar exhibit, which was for the Princess Fantasy Faire! Which ended up opening about a week after we got back. Talk about your sneak peaks.





We wanted to check another experience off our list, so we went to the Muppets Theater which happened to be playing a preview for the new Oz movie. The preview was the scene where the wizard leaves Kansas courtesy of the tornado and arrives in Oz and has his rapids adventure. You can all probably imagine where the wind and water effects figured in.





We both kind of decided that the movie was probably going to be bad but we saw it in theaters anyway. We were pretty much right. I know a lot of DISers really liked the movie, but I thought it was lacking in a lot.



Monster's Inc was down (that ride is down more than any other I have ever seen) so we headed over to Animation Academy. The next character up to be drawn was Jack Skellington. Once again, another movie DISers seem to love that I just never got into. So we passed on drawing him and our FP time was up for Soarin so we headed over.






I love those giant screens in the animation building.



Brian felt a little sick still from our birthday antics at Trader Sam's the night before, so we handed off our FPs to a couple who were just entering the 60+ minute line.



It was high time we got our little horse bud Maverick a friend, so we played...




And this time, it was my turn to win. It was a really tight decision between Ten Gallon and Chuckwagon (who looked like a real goofy fellow) but I chose Ten Gallon




We moseyed on over to Carsland to check out the single rider line for RSR.





The single rider line was 45 minutes so we decided to check back later. We explored Carsland a bit more.







We decided we had to have a Cozy Cone souvenir cup, so into line we went.





Next we jumped into Mater's meet and greet line. The CM told us he was leaving soon, but we decided to chance it.



We made it! But were a little disappointed when Mater didn't even talk to us

A last visit to the baby tractor was in order:



Our FPs for IJ were open, so we made our way back into DL.



We saw very Dapper Goofy on the way out:

 

[tayalltheway]

A few days ago, I found myself wondering if you had started updating this TR (having not checked in since it was just the PTR) and realized you were 40-some chapters in! I've been slowly starting to catch up ever since then and just finished Day 2.

I'm so glad that you liked Luigi's Flying Tires too! It's one of our favorite parts of Cars Land and I truly don't understand why it has such a bad rap. We always get moving so fast!

Also, couldn't agree with you more about stupid people taking flash pictures in dark rides. We had a similar experience on PotC the other day and I just wanted to get off the ride about 2 minutes in.

I liked reading your review of Blue Bayou. We're going there next week for our anniversary and hearing about your experience makes me excited.

Finally, I think the Splash lyrics are "Pretty good, sure as you're born." Still don't really know what that means either.

Looking forward to catching up some more, and then I'm sure I'll have more to comment on.