Our Return to Disneyland and Southern California PTR 7/3-11

[GBRforWDW]

After lunch, we looked at doing a couple more kids rides while in the area. They have a little helicopter lift ride and a firetruck race. We decided to go to the firetruck race, which was a bad idea, for me anyway due to some stomach and reflux issues.



The ride puts your family in a firetruck or police car and you race 3 other groups to a fire scene, put out a fire and race back. It's a rapid pumping motion that makes the vehicle move, so definitely not good. I survived though I guess. Haha.



Up next, we headed into the adventurers club, which is located near the firetruck race. According to the app, the adventurers club is a journey through the Amazon Rainforest, Ancient Egypt and icy cold arctic.



Essentially, you're walking through LEGO sculptures of representations from each of those time periods. The polar bear above really moves, which makes it even better!



After that, we just followed the path around the park. Once you get so far into the park, you're kinda stuck as there's not an easy way back to the front other than finding a Path through Miniland, but even that is not always easy.



So, we used the Reserve n Ride to get on Skipper School, Splash Battle and LEGO city Deep Sea Adventure. I clicked into reserve n ride while we finished one attraction and by the time we got to the new attraction, it was time to ride.



After Deep Sea Adventure, I finally spotted the Granny's Apple Fries stand, so of course I had to order some. My daughter only wanted an apple which was harder to buy than you might think. Lol.



She eventually got it, but I think she should have gotten the apple fries because they were so good. Basically, they cut the apple into sticks that look like fries, then fry em up and coat them in cinnamon and sugar and serve them with whipped cream. Delightful!

Next, we came across the Once Upon a Brick storytime. This is an improv telling of a fairytale story where the kids determine what happens next. Then after the show is a Lego character meet n greet along with the story tellers.





Also in the area is the kids only ride, the Royal Joust, where they ride a Lego horse around a track. I think my daughter thought it was time to be a cowboy



Then when she finished her ride, I swung back to the Dragon roller coaster. This ride is part indoor story and part outdoor roller coaster ride. It was fun, but slightly intense due to all the turns, but Overall, a pretty good ride.



At this point, my daughter was getting into one of her moody behaviors again, so we decided it best to go take a break from the park, and spend some time in the hotel room. Speaking of the hotel and room, I added my first 360 blog post from the trip and it contains about a dozen 360 pictures in and around the hotel. Check it out and comment your thoughts at the end, please!

http://the360ofdisney.com/2022/07/13/legoland-hotel-360-review/

One again, thanks for reading along! Happy Friday everyone!

 

[GBRforWDW]

Also, I have my first 360° pov ride through video uploaded to YouTube and should be available to watch at 7am Central Time, I believe.

This will be easier to watch from the YouTube app

 

[GBRforWDW]

After a short break, I headed back to the park solo to record a 360 walkthrough video of the park. I also recorded Live, which is still posted above, but I really like how the 360 video turned out. I just uploaded that to YouTube, which you can check out here:

When I was done recording, I hit up the Lego Technic Rollercoaster utilizing the Reserve n Ride feature. I think I had a 3 or 4 minute return time after submitting the request. This coaster is a bit different in that it is a single ride vehicle with 4 total seats, 2 front and 2 back. It has a couple of big hills to get you going fast, then it whips back and forth on switchbacks for a bit. Overall though, it's a fun little coaster.

After that I did some looking around. I was going to go to a show, but was 2 minutes late, so I went to the Big Shop instead , which is just a huge store full of LEGO sets to buy.

The family finally caught back up to me and we went to the Ferrari build & race. In this, you can see a Lifesize Ferrari built from LEGOs. Unfortunately, just before this, I had taken my 360 gear back to the hotel room. I really wanted to get a 360 pic of the inside of the car. But here's the outside:




Then we rode the Bionicle Blaster, which is basically the Tea Cups.



When it was time to eat, we first looked at a pizza and pasta buffet, but decided it might be too much cost wise and food wise really. Cost was nearly 25/adult.



We settled on Knights Smokehouse BBQ. You go through here buffet style, but are charged based on selections, so not really a buffet restaurant. They have many of the main meats and traditional sides as well as drinks and desserts. The meat was really good, we had brisket and pulled pork, but I wasn't as hungry as I thought so I didn't eat much.

At this time, we were ready to go find a spot to watch the fireworks. We figured Miniland would be the best place for us. As we were walking through Miniland, I finally found the Sofi Stadium LEGO replica! I missed it the first time I walked through. It is so big, I had to take 3 pictures of it!







Those are the 3 views from left to right that I could get. Unfortunately, I'm not sure what the buttons in the second picture do, we were in a hurry to find a seat. We eventually found a seat along a landscaping wall mostly facing the direction I thought the fireworks would be. Unfortunately for us, they were more to the left of us than I thought. We were still able to mostly see, just more head turning than we wanted. I recorded the finale just for fun.

The 4th of July is the only day Legoland California shoots off fireworks, so that's why I chose LL first instead of doing Disneyland on the 4th. They also had a few other things going on with their celebration. Some can be seen in the walkthrough video, like games on the lawn near Miniland, Uncle Sam and statue of liberty meet and greets, DJs, dance party, fun hats, scavenger hunt and a few other things.

We had an overall great time at Legoland. I would definitely be interested in going back someday. Would love to see a couple other room designs in the hotel as well.

Thanks for reading along, I'll be back soon with our Tuesday report!

 

[GBRforWDW]

Day 3

Tuesday July 5th

This is our first travel day. We all slept in a bit as we had breakfast reserved for 9:30 and I figured we'd have enough time after to finish packing for our 11am checkout time, though we did get some stuff done before going to eat.

Breakfast items were about the same as the previous day. The biscuits and gravy is really good as are the eggs and potatoes. They also had pancakes, waffles, muffins, cereal and many other options to choose from.

After breakfast, we headed back to the room, packed and lugged our own luggage down the hall. Definitely would have been easier with a cart, but lots of people were checking out and we needed to be on our way. The wife and kid hung out in the lobby while I went to grab the car. I also used this time to grab my 360 shots from in front of the hotel. I think I linked to that already.

We then drove down to San Diego as we had a kayak adventure planned at La Jolla beach. We booked with Bike and Kayak tours because they had a 3 person kayak that we thought might be helpful for the kid. Unfortunately for us, it didn't work out so well. She ended up wrapping her arms around my wife's neck as we were just getting into the ocean. My wife did not want to do that for 2 hours so she let the guide know we wanted to bail. He helped us get back to shore after just helping us get out past the waves.

After checking our gear back in at the rental place, we grabbed some pizza at the pizza by the slice place next door, which was really good. Then we headed to the car and drove to a different beach spot about 5 minutes away called the children's pool. It's kind of a walled off area where the waves coming in are small, so easier to get out and play. We had fun for a couple hours here.

From here, we had about a 30 minute drive to our next stay, an air bnb in La Mesa. We found a cute little 1 bedroom guest house that someone built in their backyard. It was very clean and the guest house was fenced off for privacy. The house was also at the end of a culdesac, so it was a really quiet place to stay. We were also just minutes from a main road with grocery stores, restaurants, etc, so everything we needed was easy to get to.

Kind of a weird day, I didn't get any regular pix, so I'll have to post some 360 pictures soon.

I have been posting more 360 ride videos and shorts from Legoland to my YouTube. channel. Heres my video of the Safari Trek:

That's about all the excitement I have for this day. Wednesday will be a lot more exciting, I promise! Lol

 

[GBRforWDW]

For anyone interested, I wrote a blog post on all the exciting things available for kids at the Legoland California theme park:

http://the360ofdisney.com/2022/07/22/legoland-california-is-childs-play/

I've also added a few more 360° ride videos on my YouTube channel as well as some fun edited videos. I have a few more yet to add, but it's been a ton of fun reliving the excitement of Legoland California!

https://youtube.com/c/The360ofDisney

I was trying to get most of my Legoland content added to YouTube before moving on to the next part of our journey and Day 4, but I'll probably start on that post this weekend.

Thanks again for following along, hope everyone is staying cool in the summer heat!

 

[GBRforWDW]

Today, I wrote up a blog post detailing how the Reserve n Ride system works at Legoland California, their version of skipping the line:

https://the360ofdisney.com/2022/07/26/legoland-californias-reserve-n-ride-review/

We saved a ton of time, but also paid a crazy amount. Was still fun for a first trip to Legoland!

 

[GBRforWDW]

Day 4

Wednesday July 6th

On Wednesday, we woke up and drove about as far south as we could go without leaving the country. Our Destination: Sesame Place theme park in Chula Vista, which is located just a couple miles north of the border.

We arrived at the park around 1030, the park opened at 10am. I was really hoping to get there at rope drop, just to see if crowds build up at all before opening, etc.

Upon arriving at the park, we decided to roam around the buildings near the main entrance for awhile. They have several of the buildings from the show, so it's fun to explore.

After a bit, we hopped on the carrousel followed by Super Grover's Boxcar Derby rollercoaster. It's a small kid friendly coaster that is over in less than a minute.



After that, it was time to meet some characters! Elmo and Cookie Monster we're greeting friends in an indoor location. Then we met Abby along the main street area. After that, it was storytime with Big Bird!



One of big bird's friends reads a book while he sits in his nest and kids gather around. Afterwards, he hosts a meet n greet. Here's an article I wrote about all the entertainment options at Sesame Place San Diego.

http://the360ofdisney.com/2022/07/28/entertainment-at-sesame-place-san-diego/

After the storytime, it was time for lunch, but rather than eating real food, we settled on Dippin' Dots



That about covers our morning, we're having fun so far! I'll be back with how the afternoon went. Thanks again for following along!

 

[GBRforWDW]

After our snacks, we hit up the rest of the rides in Sesame Place, going from Elmo's Rockin' Rockets to Abby's Fairy Flight, then Cookie Monsters Cookie Climb, then Ernie's Rub-a-Dub Sub, and finally Abby's Fairy Flight!

Each of the rides were basically walk-on, just having to wait for the ride before us to finish up to get on. That includes the rides we did earlier in the day.

Sesame Place is a Certified Autism Center themepark, the Philadelphia location being the first theme park to achieve the certification. As such, they have sensory levels on the ride signs located near the ride entrance to every ride or aquatic offering. Might be hard to read on the picture, but the sensory information is located in the blue area at the bottom of the sign.



At 2pm, it was time for the parade. Not too many people were lined up yet when we headed over. We asked a worker where the best place was to watch, and I think they were pointing us to where Elmo's float would stop, but then we noticed a couple shady areas closer to the starting spot of the parade, so we went there instead.

My daughter had a lot of fun seeing all the characters coming out onto the street to sing and dance. I was rewatching the parade video and noticed her waving for a good minute, plus getting a couple high fives in.





After the parade, we decided it was time to take on some water experiences. We didn't really find designated changing rooms, so we just changed into our swim gear in the restrooms. They also have lockers you can rent for the day, to help store valuables while swimming.

We ended up only doing a few of the water activities. We started at Big Birds Beach, dubbed the biggest bird bath ever! It's a 500,000 gallon wave pool with an inclined entrance that takes the water level from 0 inches all the way to about 6 feet at the deepest. My daughter really loved playing in this so we stayed awhile.

We then headed over to Big Bird's Rambling River, the Sesame Street version of a lazy river. We floated around that a couple times, enjoying the afternoon sun. On the inside area of the river, they also have an Elmo themed sand castle with kid friendly water slides, which my daughter decided to spend the rest of her time in the park doing, as well as a bigger play structure area to climb, run around, slides, and just play In the water. That also has one of those giant buckets that fills with water and dumps over on people.

Other than that, they also have several other big water slides as well as the Cookie Monster Mixer, which is a giant funnel that you ride an intertube into. They all looked fun, but we just ran out of time. I thought they stayed open til 7, but it was actually 5, I think the difference between weekend and weekday times. Oh well, I don't think we could have talked my daughter into doing any of those rides, but I would have liked to try to get her to go down Oscar's raft ride, that looked fun.

Prior to heading out, we decided to grab a snack for the road. Some of the food places were closed, but one spot with fresh baked goods, so we got a brownie and cookies. My daughter ate the entire brownie on the way to the car.

Overall, we had a lot of fun at Sesame Place San Diego. Everything is designed for smaller kids, but can be enjoyed by all. They do offer a lot of upsell items that weren't necessary. we definitely didn't need a skip the line pass, especially having gone on a weekday, but probably even the weekend visitors wouldn't need. They also sell parade and show reserved seating that weren't necessary either. One thing you may enjoy is a private cabana, if you need a bit of privacy or may need a place to escape to if the kids need a break, though they're not exactly cheap. .

Thats about all from our quick trip to Sesame Place San Diego. Thanks again for reading along!

 

[GBRforWDW]

I ended up writing a couple blog posts with helpful tips for first time visitors to Sesame Place San Diego, not that anyone really needs them because it's so easy to get around, but here they are:

Tips:
http://the360ofdisney.com/2022/08/09/sesame-place-san-diego-first-time-tips/

Ride Rankings:
http://the360ofdisney.com/2022/08/08/sesame-place-san-diego-ride-rankings/

Thursday, July 7th

On Thursday, we checked out of the air bnb and traveled up to Anaheim. On the way, we stopped in San Clemente and had lunch on the beach. Saw this Navy ship in the distance:



There was a seagull hanging around the beach. My daughter nicknamed him the lifeguard. She was really hoping he was watching over everyone!



Neat little house right beside the ocean with Dana Point in the background. We had gone to Dana last year to do a whale/dolphin watching boat ride.



Once we arrived in Anaheim, we didn't have much to do, so we went straight to the hotel to see about checking in early. Fortunately they had a room, so we were able to get in and get a bit of rest. My daughter spotted Mickey from inside the car before we even went inside:

We were staying at the Cambria again this year. I don't think they were a good neighbor hotel last year when we stayed, but they were able to get that added on. They also got rid of their valet service, so the underground parking was now self service.

After awhile, we walked over to downtown Disney, it's about a mile from the hotel, so about a 20 minute walk. We had dinner at Black Tap Craft Burgers, a quick service, but really more like casual table service, burger and shake restaurant. You order at the counter, but they bring the food to your table and everything is made fresh. They had really good burgers, but the shakes looked insanely awesome. We didn't get one, but saw several pass by and they looked like works of art . I'd definitely recommend if you don't want or can't get a table service reservation for Downtown Disney.

After dinner, we did some walking around, then headed to Salt n Straw for ice cream dessert, which I was excited to try, hearing great reviews. My wife and daughter both got a vegan type of Mint chip while I spotted the foraged berry slab pie.



This was pretty awesome, such a delicious combination. I almost missed my daughter complaining about being itchy on her face. After a bit, I noticed she was breaking out on her face from the ice cream. Apparently she may really be allergic to coconut, which is what they use in the vegan ice cream.

We found a security guard to see if they knew any place with medicine. I knew we were really close to CVS and Walgreens, but they thought the store in the Grand California Hotel might have benadryl. Fortunately, they did, so we were able to hang out in the lobby while the medicine did its job.



Fortunately, she cleared up after a short time and we were able to relax the rest of the evening as we wandered around, though we were basically ready to head back to the hotel at that point. The next day was Disneyland after all, so we needed our sleep!

I'll be back with more from that day soon!

 

[AJA55]

Oh heck, allergic reactions can be scary. I have become sensitive to various foods. Adding a new one every few years.

Glad to know she is OK.

 

[GBRforWDW]

Oh heck, allergic reactions can be scary. I have become sensitive to various foods. Adding a new one every few years.

Glad to know she is OK.

Thanks, yeah, not sure what's going on with her, but she had another one this week . Can't take her anywhere! Fortunately benadryl keeps doing the trick. May need to take it wherever we go

 

[AJA55]

Thanks, yeah, not sure what's going on with her, but she had another one this week . Can't take her anywhere! Fortunately benadryl keeps doing the trick. May need to take it wherever we go

Yes ! ! ! Carry Benadryl. I do. It has come in handy on a few occasions.

I don't know if this will happen but...I can now tell about 70% of the time if I am going to have anything a reaction.

 

[GBRforWDW]

Hi again, sorry I'm so slow getting this trip report updated, I've been slowly uploading my ride and park videos to YouTube and finally got all my morning rope drop stuff added.

Friday July 8th

I've added a blog post here that's has all my morning rope drop and ride videos, so I'll just post a few fun ones here.

On the day I was there, I had posted a link to my live video, which was just a regular video going into the park, it wasn't very crowded when I got to my rope drop location. Well, by the time they dropped the rope, things were crazy!

My morning was doing a solo rope drop. The fam wanted to sleep in, but I was up at 6, so I got ready and left the hotel at 6:30. I walked, which as I might have mentioned in the last post, it's about a mile from hotel to park. I arrived around 6:45 - 6:50. The path wasn't too bad yet, was up by bus sign 2, which the line started at bus sign 1, so not bad. Heres my good morning from Disneyland post again with 360 pictures along the way:

http://the360ofdisney.com/2022/07/08/good-morning-from-disneyland/

Security opened at 715, then ticket takers opened at 7:30. I was third in line and was able to get pre-scanned, which just means I was able to start walking into the park as soon as they finished the welcome! That was fun, a bit of a mad rush, and I wanted to go across the front of the train station, so had a little bit of crazy going through.

I walked around the town square area, down main street and past all the rope drop locations before finding a spot at the Adventureland rope, as you can tell in the video and picture above!

Here's a fun ride edit I did with the Haunted Mansion Stretching room:

After rope drop, I walked right onto Indiana Jones, had a few minute wait at Pirates of the Caribbean, nearly walked into Haunted Mansion, maybe a couple minutes wait outside, then headed over to Big Thunder Mountain Railroad.

This was the best ride video of the morning as it was outdoors. The 360 camera is definitely better in regular light than lowlight. I tried messing with manual settings, but couldn't get it right. Hard to do on the fly.

As I was in line for this, the fam was on their way, so I headed to the hub to wait for them to arrive. So that was basically my rope drop in a nutshell.

I was able to ride 4 rides by 9:30. Crowds were really picking up by that 4th ride, Big Thunder had a posted wait of 30 minutes but I was off within 15 minutes.

I'll come back with a morning part 2 post soon!

Thanks again for following along!

 

[GBRforWDW]

I've added a fun new video tonight! It's a (virtual) stroll through Adventureland at #DisneylandPark!

Check out this amazing 4k 360° video as I enter Adventureland from the Main Street hub and walk through Disneyland.

I even include quick links to take a ride at any of the rides along the way!

https://t.co/FCx7M4KjMS

 

[GBRforWDW]

Friday July 8
Part 2

The family arrived around 930 and we headed back to Fantasyland. I was hoping to ride several rides back here, but after Snow White, (posted wait 20 minutes, actual wait about 20 minutes)

and Pinocchio, (posted wait 20 minutes, actual wait about 20 minutes)

as well as a Churro snack, my daughter was ready for her favorite ride, it's a small world!

So we rode that, (posted wait 10 minutes, actual wait about 5 minutes) I was asked to hold the wait time lanyard!

Then we spotted some characters at the Promenade just outside of it's a small world.


We also saw hook and Wendy, Alice and the mad hatter, and Mary Poppins and Bert all just walking around.

I rode the Matterhorn Bobsleds using Single Rider line, which took about 15 minutes to get on.

Then we headed back to the Fantasyland Theater to watch the Lion King stage show, but it was cancelled for the day, unfortunately, so instead we headed to the Royal Theater to watch a Rapunzel story reenactment

Then we headed to Main St For the character cavalcade at 1:15. We also had a lunch reservation at the plaza inn at 1:20 for the main street electrical parade dining package. They have a preset meal for the dining package of fried chicken veggies cornbread salad and cheesecake dessert. For the most part, it was really good. The chicken especially was amazing. At lunch, they give you this lanyard to wear during the parade to let the CMs know you belong there.






After lunch, there was another cavalcade coming through so we stayed and watched, but it was the same one! .

I finally convinced my family we needed to ride jungle cruise, as it was something we had never done before. It had a posted wait of 15 minutes, but really took closer to 25.

Then we visited the Tiki Room, another first for the family.

At this point, they were wanting to head back to the hotel to get rest before the evening entertainment, so they took off while I stayed for Star Wars! I'll post more about that in the next update though.

Thanks again for following along!

 

[GBRforWDW]

Oh my, I haven't been back for a bit, sorry

When the family left the park, it was time for some Galactic travels. I started by heading to Star Tours. They had a 35 minute posted wait time, but only took about 25 minutes to get through. This was my first time on Star Tours as well. I thought it was a fun little journey, would definitely do again.

Then I went to the Flag Retreat ceremony on Main Street. Very cool ceremony honoring the military veterans. If you haven't seen it, check it out below:

The next couple hours were spent in Galaxies Edge. I had a 440 reservation at Ogas, but didn't get there until almost 5 due to the flag retreat ceremony. I was seated at the bar due to being so late, but I didn't mind. I was right in front of DJ Rex, so I just set my camera on the bar counter and hit record.

Then I headed over to the single rider line for Millennium Falcon, so I was in and out in about 15 minutes. Got the engineer role again, lol. That's probably all I will ever get to do unless I go with a group.

I was ready for the Ride of the Resistance Lightning Lane, but it wasn't ready for me. The ride was down. So, I walked Galaxy's Edge with the camera. Love the walking videos with this thing, they're so cool.

By the time I was done, Rise was back open. I ended up having a very minimal wait even tho a large crowd was waiting for the ride to reopen. I did my video in 2 parts cause I wasn't sure I could get it all in 1 30 minute clip (a limitation of the camera), but it would have been fine. Here's the queue video. A link to the full ride is at the end:

After Galaxies Edge, I rode splash mountain, probably for the last time, at least in Disneyland.

From the ride video, I got this awesome snapshot on the big drop:

https://www.google.com/maps/@33.812...ipNDmQEpbLH_6SBmarl_TIFW0PANppaKaTJL5aqZ!2e10

First 360 pics on Google maps while on the drop!

I then did a walkthrough of Adventureland/Frontierland before waiting for the crew to return to the parks:

https://youtu.be/F2VzX4A_qSw

thry took longer than expected. I could have done a walkthrough for Fantasyland/Tomorrowland, but I didn't and ended up missing out on that one unfortunately.

Anyway, I'll be back with the conclusion of our Disneyland day soon. Thanks again for following along!