We arrived at Newark at 4:45 AM EST, Checked in for our 6:30 AM EST flight. We landed at Memphis at 9:20 AM CT (ahead of schedule) waited for on tarmac for 10 minutes for our terminal to be clear. The captain thought he was a comedian – Made a joke that Elvis was at our gate giving a press conference. We then went to our next flight waited for 10 more minutes and boarded our last leg from Memphis to LAX. We had landed 40 minutes early and we figured that our car would not be there yet but when we got to baggage he was there. I was asked if I was an actor by some scientologist guy and I said I didn’t want to buy his books or make a donation…. We were driven to the Renaissance Hotel. Upon arrival we were greeted by our Adventure guides, Mike & Dean.
After choosing lunch for the following day at the Jim Henson Studios, I chose to have a salad, Mike chose to have a cheeseburger. Our room was not ready yet so we decided to take a walk over to In and Out burger. We both got cheese burgers and fries. After lunch we decided that since we had a while before dinner that we would walk around Hollywood. We walked down Hollywood Blvd. They were premiering Cats and Dogs tonight so Gamins Chinese Theater. We would have to wait till tomorrow to see that. We walked all the way from the start of the walk of fame and turned around to get the stars on the other side of the street. We had found Walt Disney’s star and I just had to get a picture of me with it. By this time we got a call that our room was ready so we. Strolled back to the hotel to pick up our room keys. We got our keys and met several of our fellow adventures in the Lobby (Pete and Walter, Kristen, Nicole, Jeff and Stacy). We chatted a while finally putting faces to names of people we chatted with on the boards. It felt like we were meeting old friends. After a while we headed up to see our room. We still had a lot of time before dinner and we decided to see the rest of the Hollywood walk of fame. Mike was on a quest to find Audrey Heparn’s star for a friend at work.
We had seen all of the start (except for the ones in front of the Chinese Theater). It was lots of Walking. Along the way we found a second hand store and found they had 2 Disney pins(Pirate of the Caribbean from Hong Kong pins for $9 each) Mike asked if I wanted them and the shopping begun… The gentleman behind the counter sold them to us for $9 for both so we already got a discount. It was getting close to dinner time so we went to the room. I showered and changed got gifts for the other adventurers and went down to meet everyone. Before dinner we had taken our first picture with the ABD paddle in front of the Twist sculpture. I had handed out all of the Journals I had made for everyone( More about My Journal on the way home later) and Pete handed out Swag form the DisUnplugged Podcast. We were given Visors that said ABD 2.0. They were very nice. We walked up to dinner and had started our game show. The contestants were John , me , Pam, and Wayne. When Pam walked over she asked me to let her win. I felt bad so I kept my hand away from the buzzer and only answered the hard questions like What was the fastest attraction at Disneyland( I’m not going to tell you the answer here) and everyone was surprised that I knew that. But hey I don’t call myself DisneyRob for nothing. John had won the gameshow and won a nice Photo album. The rest of us won a Vinylmation Mickeys. They must have sealed it with steel carbonate because it was so hard to open it. Mine was a crockodile. I past it around the table for all to see. We chatted and got to know everyone( We all knew that we would be a great group and knew we would make lifelong friends). We all served a chicken dinner… was not terrible but was not the greatest meal during the trip. After desert mike and I headed back up to our room we were exhausted (we hadn’t slepted the night before before because we were so excited) . as soon as our head hit the pillow we were both out…..
Stay tuned for our second Night and as soon as I go through pictures I’ll post them!
DisneyRob
After choosing lunch for the following day at the Jim Henson Studios, I chose to have a salad, Mike chose to have a cheeseburger. Our room was not ready yet so we decided to take a walk over to In and Out burger. We both got cheese burgers and fries. After lunch we decided that since we had a while before dinner that we would walk around Hollywood. We walked down Hollywood Blvd. They were premiering Cats and Dogs tonight so Gamins Chinese Theater. We would have to wait till tomorrow to see that. We walked all the way from the start of the walk of fame and turned around to get the stars on the other side of the street. We had found Walt Disney’s star and I just had to get a picture of me with it. By this time we got a call that our room was ready so we. Strolled back to the hotel to pick up our room keys. We got our keys and met several of our fellow adventures in the Lobby (Pete and Walter, Kristen, Nicole, Jeff and Stacy). We chatted a while finally putting faces to names of people we chatted with on the boards. It felt like we were meeting old friends. After a while we headed up to see our room. We still had a lot of time before dinner and we decided to see the rest of the Hollywood walk of fame. Mike was on a quest to find Audrey Heparn’s star for a friend at work.
We had seen all of the start (except for the ones in front of the Chinese Theater). It was lots of Walking. Along the way we found a second hand store and found they had 2 Disney pins(Pirate of the Caribbean from Hong Kong pins for $9 each) Mike asked if I wanted them and the shopping begun… The gentleman behind the counter sold them to us for $9 for both so we already got a discount. It was getting close to dinner time so we went to the room. I showered and changed got gifts for the other adventurers and went down to meet everyone. Before dinner we had taken our first picture with the ABD paddle in front of the Twist sculpture. I had handed out all of the Journals I had made for everyone( More about My Journal on the way home later) and Pete handed out Swag form the DisUnplugged Podcast. We were given Visors that said ABD 2.0. They were very nice. We walked up to dinner and had started our game show. The contestants were John , me , Pam, and Wayne. When Pam walked over she asked me to let her win. I felt bad so I kept my hand away from the buzzer and only answered the hard questions like What was the fastest attraction at Disneyland( I’m not going to tell you the answer here) and everyone was surprised that I knew that. But hey I don’t call myself DisneyRob for nothing. John had won the gameshow and won a nice Photo album. The rest of us won a Vinylmation Mickeys. They must have sealed it with steel carbonate because it was so hard to open it. Mine was a crockodile. I past it around the table for all to see. We chatted and got to know everyone( We all knew that we would be a great group and knew we would make lifelong friends). We all served a chicken dinner… was not terrible but was not the greatest meal during the trip. After desert mike and I headed back up to our room we were exhausted (we hadn’t slepted the night before before because we were so excited) . as soon as our head hit the pillow we were both out…..
Stay tuned for our second Night and as soon as I go through pictures I’ll post them!
DisneyRob
Awesome retelling of the first night, Rob! Jeff wishes he got to go to In-n-Out Burger! Thanks for helping us relive the trip! We can hardly wait for the next installment!
Ummm, never! I asked if they could put it on a plane to Rochester (friends there offered to get it there for me), but they said I could either pick it up at JFK or have it shipped via FedEx at my expense. Heavy sigh. I recited my FedEx account number from memory. 
We probably have some extra paper souvenirs too...let us know what you're still missing...
Oh Kristin! I hope they get your print back to you! I can't believe we all had such difficulties getting out of LAX (aka the Gateway to Hell! thanks, Lisa)!
