Second Star to the Right and Straight on ‘til the 2017 Pixie Dust Challenge*COMPLETE

[disneydaydreamer33]

Fun half marathon recap! So nice you guys had good weather! I feel like May can be pretty unpredictable with either very cool rainy days, or total scorchers- sounds like you guys had weather that was just about right for running! I love looking at neighborhoods during races too! It's so fun, and I'm sure the owner of that spanish colonial house was very flattered by your compliment! You got some really great racing pics too! Those medals sure are pretty!!

That brunch looks pretty amazing! That's pretty cool you guys got to try a "rare" menu.

 

[AuntieBean]

I think Sunday Brunch had magical power because it was my favorite meal too! And I didn't even have the "I just ran!" hungries

 

[roxymama]

Well now I have to add another thing to my "things to do next time" list because eating on a balcony at DTD sounds just lovely

 

[ZellyB]

Yum!! What a perfect meal to celebrate your race AND Mother's Day!!

I was so glad this meal lived up to the reviews I'd read online. Delicious!

Brunch sounds (and looks delicious). I love all the Patio dinning you did. I am a big fan of eating outside and really taking in the atmosphere!!

That was really the best this weekend. The weather was just perfect for outdoor eating and I love that atmosphere too.

I like Matterhorn, but it is rough for sure, I feel like I could just fall out so easily, it's painfully fun I suppose.
Great Half & recap! You guys get such great photos! I so loved the palm trees too when I ran Disneyland half in 2015, so pretty!

Painfully fun sounds like a good description of that ride. I want to have palm trees in my backyard. Not happening, but I want it!

Fun half marathon recap! So nice you guys had good weather! I feel like May can be pretty unpredictable with either very cool rainy days, or total scorchers- sounds like you guys had weather that was just about right for running! I love looking at neighborhoods during races too! It's so fun, and I'm sure the owner of that spanish colonial house was very flattered by your compliment! You got some really great racing pics too! Those medals sure are pretty!!

That brunch looks pretty amazing! That's pretty cool you guys got to try a "rare" menu.

I think I remember reading that last year it was pretty cool and rainy for Tink weekend, so I felt like we got super lucky for this trip. Every day was perfection from a weather standpoint.

I hope that owner was flattered instead of frightened. LOL

I think Sunday Brunch had magical power because it was my favorite meal too! And I didn't even have the "I just ran!" hungries

Yes! The magical powers of Sunday Brunch in Disneyland are REAL!!

Well now I have to add another thing to my "things to do next time" list because eating on a balcony at DTD sounds just lovely

Seriously awesome. Add it to the LIST!

 

[ZellyB]

Turns out “Charm” CAN get old

​

With our delicious brunch behind us, it was time to head into the parks for some final park enjoyment and, of course, some medal photo ops! We opted not to wear our medals (they just bug me too much) and instead I carried them in our bag and pulled them out for pictures. We first headed to DCA because I wanted to get some pictures on the Wheel of Death with our medals, but the parks were SLAMMED. I think the wait for Mickey’s Wheel was close to an hour and I just didn’t have that in me. So, we decided we’d head over to DL instead. On the way out, we saw Mickey meeting at the front of DCA in his cute outfit and headed over to join the line. Sadly, a CM was there to tell us they had cut off the line.

*Spoiler alert* this would become a theme for the day.

Once inside Magic Kingdom, we saw Goofy meeting at the front and were going to get a shot with him, but again saw a CM at the back of the line turning folks away. Aw, man. But, on we went and finally got ourselves a photo op! The photographer was really great and took a few different shots for us.

Hey, Tink!

Even though we had little Digital Tink and a shot with her during the race, I also wanted to get a picture with her with our medals. I’d checked meeting times, and we knew we had a couple of hours until her next scheduled meet, so we decided to wander around a bit. I wanted some kind of fun medal shot as well. Decided I’d do this one, but now sort of wish I’d also done one with the castle in the background. We just never got around to doing it though. Oh well.

Love all our bling!

Checking in on other options for character meets, I saw that Peter Pan would be appearing shortly near the Matterhorn, so we decided to stake out that area to wait for him. We noticed some other runners lingering in the area and figured they’d had the same idea as us. About 10 minutes after the appointed time, we saw Peter skipping our way. He had a few kiddos following him, but we noticed, no CM or photographer. Hmmm. Well, we figured they’d be along in a bit, so we wandered over by where he was talking with the kids. Within a few minutes a crowd of kids had gathered and Peter began playing hide and seek with them. So cute!! Before long, Captain Hook joined the group as well, and Peter got all the kids gathered in a circle for his “Lost Boy, Lost Boy, Pirate” version of Duck, Duck, Goose. He even got Hook to join in!

We started visiting with the other runners waiting and they told us a CM had said that he normally plays for awhile with the kids and then settles in for photos, so we just stood and watched. We all remarked on how charming this was and that you’d never see this at WDW.

I was holding my medals in my hand waiting for a photo opportunity when Peter ran up behind me to talk to me about my medals. One of the other women standing there grabbed a shot and then texted it to me! Love this.

Still time for Tink’s meet and greet was coming up in about 20 minutes, so we decided to walk over to see how that line was starting to look. As we approached, we realized the line was already pretty long and as we walked even further, we saw the dreaded CM at the back of the line. We asked him if the line was already cut off and he replied, “Yes. It’s crazy, she isn’t even scheduled to be out here yet.”

So, at that moment, Chris and I decided that the Tink pic we’d gotten during the race was good enough.

We headed back to see what was happening with Peter and evntually, he kicked off a following the leader game and all the kids headed off to follow Peter and Hook. We figured this was the moment for him to head to his PhotoPass spot. Turns out? Not so much. After traipsing after him for another 5-10 minutes, we called it quits. The other runners did too and one of them said, “You know I do really like the spontenaeity of these interactions, but there comes a time where the structure and predictability of photo ops at WDW are nice.” Chris and I were in total agreement at that point. At least I got my candid shot though.

We decided to go get a shot we KNEW we could get, so it was off to ToonTown to meet up with the main Mouse.

The wait was posted at 30 minutes and it took right about that amount of time, but we did at least finally get to actually get a picture.

Mickey liked playing with the spinner.

I showed him the marathon medal and the coast to coast medal and told him we loved him so much that we had to run races on both coasts!

Next up: We put this trip (and ourselves) to bed!

 

[ZellyB]

Maybe one day we’ll actually see World of Color!

​

Deciding that maybe we’d gotten enough medal pictures for the day, we wanted to get at least another ride in on Chris’ favorite, Haunted Mansion. We made our way through a VERY crowded park and found the line for HM to be an hour long. Sigh. But, there were FP available just a short time later, so we grabbed a couple and decided we’d see what the Pooh line was looking like.

Turns out it was a very manageable 20 minutes, so in we went. I do love this ride and we are big Pooh and friends fans, so it was enjoyable as ever.

After we finished, we had about 15 minutes until the start of our HM FP window and we saw that Tigger and Eeyore were meeting nearby. YAY!!!...

You guessed it. Line was cut off. Seriously, what the heck? Just not our day.

We settled in on a wall in the shade to rest our feet and people watch and then headed over to ride Haunted Mansion one last time. So happy in our Doom Buggy.

After picking up our hitch hiking ghosts, it was getting late in the afternoon and we had one final ADR to attend. So, back across to DCA we headed. We picked up a WoC fastpass for later (I forgot to mention that when we’d gone to DCA right after our brunch we’d been surprised to see there were still Radiator Springs Racer FP available, so we grabbed one for shortly before WoC. YAY!!).

We went to check in for our ADR at Carthay Circle. We went to the reservation desk and they directed us to the lounge to wait. A gin and tonic was just perfect while we waited.

While there, we spotted @Ariel484 waiting as well. I’m pretty sure by this point she had decided we were stalking her. About 10 or 15 minutes later though, a hostess approached us and headed us upstairs for dinner.

The restaurant was really pretty with lots of dark wood and lovely frescos painted on the ceiling.

We were really getting tired, so I didn’t manage to get many pictures of food. I know Chris got a steak and I got lamb –

Service was REALLY slow, so the waiter gave us some free soup while we waited which I thought was very nice.

The food was good, but I wasn’t blown away or anything. But compared with some of our other meals, this was ranked quite a bit lower.

After finishing up, we wandered out and had a little time before our RSR FP. This area is even more awesome at night!

Little Mermaid was a walk-on and our feet were tired, so why not!!

Bubbles!!!

Then, it was time for RSR one last time. I was really happy we’d get to experience it at night.

Right when we got to this point…yeah, the loading point

The announcement came that the ride was down. UGH!!! Luckily it only took about 10 minutes to get it going and we were off!!

Such an awesome ride!!!

With the ride done, we still had 30 minutes or so before WoC and we both realized we didn’t have it in us to wait it out, so we headed out for the last time. On the way though, we did spot some fireworks at least.

Back at the hotel, we set our alarms for the next morning trip home and fell into an exhausted and very contented sleep!

Next up: Final thoughts

 

[ZellyB]

Let’s wrap this thing up with a pretty bow – and a bonus PUPPY!!!

​

We were up bright and early the next morning to head to LAX. I’d arrange for our car to pick us up a bit earlier since we’d gotten warning messages from Delta that they were changing terminals at LAX and there could be significant delays. We got there about 3 hours early and, no delays for us at least. We got checked in easily. We’d off loaded a few things from our checked bag into a soft-sided carry on I’d brought along, so we met the weight restriction easily. We had our medals of course and shirts as well as some shirts and hat we got for our kids and my own sourvenier. I always try to pick up a dated snow globe for our Disney trips and I really wanted a Disneyland one.

They live on a shelf in my office along with family photos, so I get to look at them frequently and think of how lucky I am!

We had plenty of time to grab some Starbucks and settle into the gate area to wait. We had an easy and uneventful flight home and then a few hours drive and happily arrived home to see our kiddos!!

Final thoughts on this trip – In case it wasn’t already obvious, this was one of the best trips we’ve had. The weather - perfection; the parks - a great experience; the food – delicious; the races – spectacular; the Dis meets – amazing. I could not have asked for more.

Would I do this race again? Yes, I would. But, given that we think we are going to cut back on Disney races, I don’t think it’s likely we’ll do THIS particular weekend again. We did love Disneyland and I definitely want to go back. I talked with my daughter about maybe doing the Disneyland half weekend next year if she wanted to train for a half marathon and she’s fully on board. I mentioned it Chris and he didn’t immediately try to kill me, so maybe it will happen.

Now the focus turns to Marathon Weekend and our training for Dopey. I’m excited to finally complete the Dopey challenge and am hopeful that we’ll do well. You can always join me on my training journal (link below) if you want to hear all the exciting details.

I Never Look Back, Darling

One last thing, the weekend after we got home, we picked up this little cutie.

This is Rosie our new (now 10 week old) Yorki Poo. She’s settling in nicely at home and doing a good job of harassing our yorkie, Teddy, as well as the grand dame of the family, Sandy, our 14 year old golden retriever.

Yes, we’re crazy.

Thanks for reading along everyone!!!

 

[Verstehen]

Oh my gosh, she's adorable! Thank you for the great report. I'm glad that you had such a good Disneyland and race experience!

 

[ZellyB]

Oh my gosh, she's adorable! Thank you for the great report. I'm glad that you had such a good Disneyland and race experience!

She's a sweetheart! Thank you for reading along!

 

[Sailormoon2]

Hurray for a fantastic end to a lovely trip!!
AND Hurray for PUPPY!! She is super cute! I certainly don't think you are crazy for having 3 dogs-we have 2 (large breed) and if it weren't for my DH I'd own an entire managerie. LOL!

 

[ZellyB]

Hurray for a fantastic end to a lovely trip!!
AND Hurray for PUPPY!! She is super cute! I certainly don't think you are crazy for having 3 dogs-we have 2 (large breed) and if it weren't for my DH I'd own an entire managerie. LOL!

Thanks for reading along! And our little puppy is great. I'm with you and would likely have even more pets if I could.

 

[JulieODC]

Thanks for a great TR! It was fun reliving the weekend through your pictures!

And I see myself 2 people behind you in the half corral!!! This one! Right behind th girl with glasses!

!

So glad you guys had such a great weekend - running and park hopping! Congratulations!!

Excited to follow your Dopey journey too!

 

[disneydaydreamer33]

Such a wonderful TR- thanks for sharing! I'm glad you had such a good experience at Disneyland, and running the Disneyland half with your daughter- sounds amazing!

Your puppy is sure an adorable little thing! How is puppy training going? That is such a fun (but intense and tiring) time!

 

[ZellyB]

Thanks for a great TR! It was fun reliving the weekend through your pictures!

And I see myself 2 people behind you in the half corral!!! This one! Right behind th girl with glasses!



So glad you guys had such a great weekend - running and park hopping! Congratulations!!

Excited to follow your Dopey journey too!

Fun! Wish we would have known that was you!! Thank for reading along.

Such a wonderful TR- thanks for sharing! I'm glad you had such a good experience at Disneyland, and running the Disneyland half with your daughter- sounds amazing!

Your puppy is sure an adorable little thing! How is puppy training going? That is such a fun (but intense and tiring) time!

Thanks for reading. I'm really excited at the idea of running with my daughter. I hope we can make that happen.

Intense but tiring is a very apt description. Training is hit and miss. She's a smart little dog, so I think we'll get there eventually.

 

[SarahDisney]

That Peter Pan playing with the kids thing is super cute ... but I definitely agree, sometimes you really just want to be able to get there, chat a little, take a picture, and go. Waiting for the games to end takes way too much time. I'm glad you got your candid shot with him, though!
Your Mickey Mouse picture looks great! I love that he played with the spinner!

I've actually only done RSR at night. I've never managed to get there during the day. It really is something special. I'm glad you guys got a chance to do it

I'm glad to hear that you guys had such a perfect trip! I hope you get to go back for the DL Half next year - I'm sure it would be a lot of fun to run with your daughter!

Thanks for sharing your trip with us - I really enjoyed reading all about it and seeing your pictures!!

(Also ... how have I never read your training journal? I'm off to read all 40-something pages of that now...)

 

[girliea]

Great TR Zelly! Enjoyed every minute of it!
Thanks so much for taking time to write it and share....now going to catch up on your training report!

 

[Ariel484]

Loved your TR!!

OMG...You changed your avatar!

3 dogs, I am so jealous!

 

[rteetz]

Fell behind because I was in WDW! (Guess I need to start my own TR).

Congrats on another half! Looks like it was a fun time. I really love that coast to coast medal.

As always I love reading your trip reports.

 

[ZellyB]

Great TR Zelly! Enjoyed every minute of it!
Thanks so much for taking time to write it and share....now going to catch up on your training report!

Thank you for reading along!!

Loved your TR!!

OMG...You changed your avatar!

3 dogs, I am so jealous!

LOL New avatar's are the best. I would seriously have like 10 dogs if Chris would let me.

Fell behind because I was in WDW! (Guess I need to start my own TR).

Congrats on another half! Looks like it was a fun time. I really love that coast to coast medal.

As always I love reading your trip reports.

Yes! We need a trip report!! All the Tink ones are done and I need a new fix. Did you check out Pandora while you were there? I want to hear all about it. Was this for the Dis meet trip?

The coast to coast medal is awesome. You need to get one of them.

Thank you for reading along.

 

[rteetz]

Yes! We need a trip report!! All the Tink ones are done and I need a new fix. Did you check out Pandora while you were there? I want to hear all about it. Was this for the Dis meet trip?

I will start it in the next day or two. Yes I got to Pandora and yes it was for the DIS meet up.