Secret Mission to the Mouse - A He Said, She Said DL Trip Report - Days One to Three

[Buttercup Roberts]

Hiya folks!

Because we only go around once on this little ball of rock, there's just no time to waste doing all those things you always wanted to do, right?

So how about a secret mission to true romance, a drive down the Pacific Coast Highway in a convertible, and a surprise trip to Disneyland and DCA? I didn't say no and neither should you!

 

[Buttercup Roberts]

PRETRIP

Buttercup:
My boyfriend Marcus is a really romantic guy, and had the bright idea to take me on a secret vacation / long weekend where he'd call me in real time and tell me what I needed to know to come meet him somewhere in the country.

Of course he had to tell me what kinds of clothes to pack, so I got a general idea of the latitude we'd be visiting (no snow but no shorts either), and some other weather hints (no rain in the forecast, which actually turned out to NOT be true, lol).

He gave me a couple more hints, like “you’ll see me at Midnight CST” so I could set up my Magical Countdown Clock on my ‘puter desktop, and “I have to switch planes and will get in 6 hours before you do”.

I of course spent the two weeks up to the trip madly searching Travelocity.com, Expedia.com, Orbitz.com, Southwest.com, and every other airline’s website in search of flights to somewhere that fit the climate clues and also the times. But to no avail!

Definitely not Orlando, you’d NEVER have to switch planes to get there. Probably not Las Vegas, no flight times matched up. Where the heck?

I know, we’re going to a Motel 6 off the I-10 just west of El Paso! The running joke became “So, what’s the weather forecast look like, now, for El Paso?”

I made plans to put in a full, honest day’s work on Friday and then go straight to the airport. It was kind of nerve wracking packing without knowing where I was going, but I figured you can’t go wrong with jeans and sneakers and layers.

Thursday I finished packing very late that night, and got the apartment set up for me to be gone for five days, and hit the hay around 1:30 a.m.

Marcus:
I don't quite remember where the idea originated. Perhaps it was during one of our daily phone conversations, or late night sessions on AOL Instant Messenger, since Princess Buttercup and I live 1,500 miles apart. The idea was that it would be extremely cool if I could plan a trip, but not reveal any of the details to Buttercup until they unfolded. Well, it was close to Valentine's day, and Buttercup and I had not been together since January, so it was time to make the idea grow into an actual trip. Not just any trip, but a surprise trip.

The first challenge was to select a destination. It had to be somewhere warm, with something to do. It had to be close enough that we could go for four days without using up too much time traveling, and it could not require a passport since it would not be possible for me to get one for Buttercup without her knowledge. Buttercup and myself are both Disney fanatics. In fact, we met at Walt Disney World, and our first date was at Walt Disney World. We even fell in love at Walt Disney World. So Orlando was definitely on the list of possible destinations. Alas, on short notice, no reasonably priced flights were available. Besides, Walt Disney World would have been too obvious. Honolulu was too far, and Las Vegas is not a good weekend destination due to the fact that the hotel prices triple on Friday and Saturday nights there. I would have liked to take her to see one of the Cirque du Soleil shows there, especially "O" at the Bellagio, but for this trip that was not in the cards - no pun intended.

That left one destination standing out in my mind. California, and no trip to California would be complete for two Disney fans in love, than Disneyland. I checked on flights to California for the prescribed set of dates. There were some available at a reasonable price. I work for Uncle Sam, and have every other Friday off, so I would be able to use Friday as a travel day, but Buttercup had to work. I could not book her a flight which would leave before about 7pm. No flights to Los Angeles matched those criteria, and she could not leave work a couple hours early. Only one option remained, short of flying her out the following day. A reasonably priced flight on Southwest to Oakland matched. Could we make it from Oakland to Disneyland, driving, in a reasonable amount of time? A quick glance at Expedia's driving directions said it was 400 miles. No problem. The next issue was my flight. Could I get to Oakland for a reasonable price? A quick panic - No flights on Southwest matched up. I checked other airlines. America West had one that would get me there for $85 plus tax, with a
stop in Phoenix. Booked! Then I booked her flight, then two flights back to our hometowns out of LAX on Southwest. A plan was coming together! All that was left were hotels, which were quickly taken care of with my Holiday Inn Priority Club membership, and the rental car. We were going to be on the road for a while. I wanted something nice, not a Kia Rio. On Hertz.com I booked us a Ford Mustang. It was a plan. Now could I just keep it a secret for two weeks? We'd see.

I told Buttercup the next day, that the secret trip was all set. She immediately became curious, and pried me for all kinds of clues. I gave her a few, but remained cagey. She kept thinking she had it figured out. A couple times, I even thought she had it figured out. But then she'd tell me what her current guess was, and the secret held. She did figure out that we were going west, and that I would be flying America West and stopping in Phoenix. She knew that because I said
that I'd be flying on a 757 and an Airbus. Normally if it ain't Boeing, I ain't going, but I'd bite the bullet this one time.

Our Magical Countdown Clocks on our computers counted down in synch, and finally it was time to go. My flight was set to leave at 10am on Friday. I live about 80 miles from the airport, so I tried to bum a stay off of my buddy who lives about 30 miles from it, to no avail. He was working late, and I couldn't get a hold of him. So I got a hotel room across town from the airport. I don't do well with
mornings. After IM'ing with Buttercup until 2am Eastern via my laptop and Holiday Inn's high-speed connection, I finally got to bed for 5 hours of sleep.

 

[Buttercup Roberts]

DAY ONE

Marcus:
The alarm clock went off at 7:45 and I leapt out of bed and was on the road by 8 to the airport. Well, traffic jammed going into the city and I had to take the Beltway. I finally pulled into the parking garage at the airport by about 8:45, and took the bus to the terminal. I was running a little late, but no problem, right? I had printed my boarding passes for my e-tickets the night before and had Buttercup's confirmation numbers tucked neatly into my briefcase.

I breezed through security and to the gate, to see that the cowling on the right side Rolls Royce RB.211 engine on the 757 was open, and technicians were working on the plane. The departure time was now listed as 11:30, instead of 10. I went up to the desk and asked the girl there if this would adversely affect my flight connection in Phoenix. She conversed with another agent at the counter, and they determined that I would not make Phoenix in time. They made a couple of phone calls, and asked if I'd like them to put me on a United flight which would get into Oakland an hour later than my scheduled flight. I said, "That would be great!" Unfortunately, I had to go all the way back to America West's ticket counter to get the tickets. I thanked them and did, still feeling that there was plenty of time to spare.

Once I got to the America West ticket counter, my hopes began to dim. There were people everywhere, and it was chaos. I stood there for about 10 minutes, waiting in the First Class line behind two groups of people who never moved and an agent at the counter who just kept scratching his head. Finally a woman behind the counter asked if I was Marcus, and when I said yes, she gave me the tickets and told me to hurry up or I'd miss the plane. I did not realize that they were not boarding passes, so I proceeded straight to security, and they would
not let me in. I ran back to the ticket counter and after another 5 minute wait, jumped in to ask her what was wrong. She then told me I had to go to the United counter to get boarding passes. So I did, which only took about another 10 minutes then headed back to security. Apparently I reminded the woman at security of her ex-husband, since she decided with 15 minutes until my plane was to start boarding that I appeared to be a security risk, circling the SSSS on my boarding pass and making me go to the Up-Your-Butt-With-A-Microscope line instead of the normal security check. I love Nazi America.

Anyways, I finally got through security and to the gate just as the plane, another 757, started boarding. I was happy that I actually got a window seat on this flight, since on the America West flight, no window seats remained when I made my reservation. I got into my seat for the flight to Denver, and after a characteristically smoky ignition of the twin Rolls RB.211's, we were off.

It was close to 2pm Central at Buttercup's workplace when I stepped off the jetway in Denver. I was waiting until the last minute to reveal the secret to her. I had two hours to kill before taking the next leg of the journey aboard a United 737 to Oakland. I ate lunch from a Domino's at the food court, then continued on to my gate. The plane was there already. I didn't want to call Buttercup yet, but I could hardly contain myself, so I called a couple friends of mine to kill some time. Finally I could wait no longer. I called Buttercup's cell phone. I said, "Your mission, if you choose to accept it, will require you to proceed to the Southwest Airlines counter at the airport, in time for a 7:20 departure. Your confirmation number is:" Then we talked for a while until they called for boarding on my flight.

They loudly said where the plane was to be headed, but I kept talking and hoped that Buttercup didn't hear the destination. She could have at that point looked it up on the computer, but she said she'd wait until she got to the airport.

I got another window seat on the 737. United was saving fuel and did not have the airplane's auxiliary power unit running, and it was about 90 degrees in the plane on the ramp on this nice sunny Denver day. Mercifully, they connected a diesel powered air genny to the plane, and soon the two GE/Snecma CFM-56 engines came online with their familiar growl that seemed to emanate from deep within the aluminum bowels of the aircraft. A quick taxi to the active runway and the engines roared to 100 percent N1, and we were airborne. It was a beautiful day for flying as we climbed through 24,000 feet over the Rockies. The snow-capped mountain peaks unrolled for hundreds of miles in each direction, with the popular ski areas plainly visible. Onward we soared at 31,000 feet over Utah and Nevada and the next set of snow capped peaks of the Sierras. It got cloudy as we began our descent and headed toward the Pacific. Finally we began to drop below the cloud deck, and the white peaks and brown earthtones of the high desert had been replaced by the lush green California hills. We approached to the north over the San Francisco Bay and touched down.

I disembarked into the crowded, old terminal at Oakland to be greeted by dim flickering fluorescent lights nothing like the ones at Denver's sparkling terminal. A short walk through the labyrinthine walkways and I was outside in the warm California afternoon air, waiting for the bus to the rental car area. I checked the time. By now, Buttercup would be at the airport waiting to board her flight. I called her. She was surprised that I picked Oakland as our destination. She had previously lived in Berkeley so I wondered what she thought I had up my sleeve. She was like, "Life is such a surprise with you, I never know what you have planned next." We chatted until I got to the Hertz Rental Car pickup, which was an obnoxiously long drive on city streets from the terminal. She told me that her flight was running an hour late. I said I'd call her back after I picked up the car, then we signed off.

I stepped into the rental car office to pick up the Mustang. The woman behind the counter asked if I'd like a convertible Mustang with the NeverLost navigation system for the same price. Of course I agreed! I'd wanted at Mustang, but had no idea I was going to get a convertible. When I reminded her that I would be returning the car to LA and not Oakland, she called her manager and asked if that was ok. Then she said that I had to take the hardtop Mustang because they wanted to keep the convertible in Oakland. But as she started to book me the hardtop on the computer, a note came up saying that it could not go to LA, so she ended up having to give me the convertible after all. What a pity!

I drove out of the parking lot and went to the Holiday Inn Express and checked in. I was getting hungry by now, but I called Buttercup again and sat in the car hooked to my cellphone car charger and talked to her for a while. Finally the hunger got the best of me and I decided to drive around to try to find a place to eat. I was still talking to Buttercup, and she said it was a bad city so I should be careful. I continued talking to her until it was time for her to board her plane. I told her I'd see her in 5 hours then intensified my unsuccessful search for food. There was simply nothing to eat in this city, at least nothing in an area where I would not be afraid of being shot if I stepped out of the car. A quick time in a parking lot spent playing with the NeverLost navigation system revealed it to be useless for anything other than finding my way back to the nearest Hertz Rental Return area, so I returned to the hotel with the idea of ordering a pizza. I called several pizza delivery places. At the nearest one, they would not answer the phone. The next closest one put me on eternal hold, then another one said they did not deliver to where I was staying. So much for that idea. I fired up my laptop and its mapping program, hooked up my GPS, and headed back out in the Mustang, onto interstate 880. I was going to have to go to the next town to get food. Finally I found a Jack in the Box in San Leandro and took care of my hunger problem.

Back to the hotel, I hooked my computer back to the ethernet port and tracked Buttercup's flight as it crossed Tonopah, Nevada and began its descent over California. When it was nearly ready to touch down, I got back in the Mustang and headed back to the terminal building a short mile and half away. I parked, found out what gate her flight was due to deplane at, and waited as close to the security checkpoint as the TSA Nazis would allow.

Buttercup:
After not a lot of sleep, I dragged my tired body out of bed and got myself on the road to work, albeit a little late! These IM sessions with Marcus until 1 a.m. on work nights have just got to stop.

Ooo the anticipation all day today! One of my teammates at work called in and said she was really, really glad she had appointments out of the office all day today, because she could tell I was insufferably giddy. Marcus had said he’d call when he switched planes, but I wasn’t sure when that would be. Starting at 11 a.m., CST, I kept my cell on and in my pocket at all times.

Finally in the mid-afternoon, ring ring! I love seeing Marcus’ name on my cell’s display panel. Every time he calls me, my heart does a little ba-da-bump, but today was over top with the Secret Mission and all. It was time to find out where we were going, and I dutifully wrote down Marcus’ instructions on a sticky note at my desk: 7:20 p.m., Southwest, Confirmation number, don’t let the enemy know our plans. Hey, that doesn’t tell me where we’re going!

Should I log onto Southwest.com and look it up? Nah, I decided to keep the suspense going, and when I wavered a bit, a couple hours later, my co-workers made me stay strong and urged me not to peek.

10 minutes before quittin’ time I went out to my car and got out my travel duds for the evening, my favorite jeans and clogs and a more comfortable shirt, and came back into the building and changed in the bathroom. Then it was sayonara to the real world, and off into the exciting realm of intrigue and romance!

The 45 minutes it took to drive the seven miles to the airport through the horrid rush hour traffic was eased by listening to my favorite new cd “Supreme Beings of Leisure” at a very, very high volume, while I chewed Marcus’ and my favorite Bubble Yum Original Flavor bubble gum, blowing big bubbles that popped all over my face, and speeding in and out and around slow poke drivers, and feeling generally like a big overgrown teenager high on life. Ahh, love.

I parked in my favorite very-close-to-the-elevators-to-the-walkway-to-the-terminal spot on the top deck of the parking garage, and could hardly keep myself from running down to the Southwest self-check-in machines. I was really early for my flight, but I was racing anyways. Where was I going? Where? Oh WHERE?

I punched in the confirmation number after inserting a credit card to verify my identity (gotta love Southwest), and got back the magic info: Oakland.

Oakland??? Oakland?! Hmm. Well, OK. San Francisco is all right. There’s a great science museum there that Marcus would enjoy, and I’d like to see again – the Exploreum. There’s the Golden Gate Bridge, and Chinatown. There’s some old stomping grounds on Telegraph Ave. in Berkeley, that I could revisit (lived there for about 5 months back in 1987). But I know my Marcus, and it was just… kind of not what I’d think he’d pick. Oakland, really?

Then I looked at my itinerary, and saw that on our last day, the following Tuesday, I was due to fly out of Oakland back home at 8 a.m. or something like that. 8 a.m.!!!!! That means an entire day that I was off work, not being spent with the love of my life, but traveling! Hmph! Had Marcus lost his mind?

But hey, he planned this, he was paying for it, who was I to complain. I was getting to see him, and honestly I miss him so much that the Motel 6 in El Paso with an Interstate View Room would have been heaven.

I noticed there was a flight to Oakland leaving an hour and something earlier than mine, also via Southwest, and wondered for a moment if I should try and change flights, since I was there in plenty of time. Southwest is so dominant at our airport now, they have half of the gates, and the security seems to go far more quickly than on the other side that has the rest of the airlines. But I thought, no, I can’t get in touch with Marcus (in the air), I better not fool with his plans.

I tromped around the concourse, trying to decide on something to eat and something to read to pass the time. I settled on the current issue of the Economist, because sometimes it’s fun to read all the articles the Brits write bashing the Bush administration, and a very very spicy hot dog from a hot dog cart, with extra ketchup.

I got through a few jabs at Bush’s inaugural address, an article on the Iraq election, and my dog, when Marcus called. Hey baby, uh, what the **** are we going to do in Oakland? LOL He’s like “Oh, we’ll see, we can talk about it when you get here, I have some ideas but if there’s something you’d like to do we can do that, too.” OK Captain Vague.

My flight got announced as being an hour late!! Plane trouble, they had to send us a new plane. Dang it. That adds an hour to our Magical Countdown. Marcus said I should have totally switched flights. Next time, I will, if a similar situation arises.

So he kept me company for quite a while on the phone. We’ve got synchronized caller to caller plans, with unlimited minutes, which is a wonderful thing to have when you’re madly in love with someone who lives seven states away as the 737 (or a crow) flies.

We talked about politics, hot dogs, airplanes, travel, hmm, who knows what else. Poor Marcus couldn’t find anywhere to eat, and I kept urging him to please not drive aimlessly around Oakland. I told him a story about when my friend Patrick and I got “mugged” outside a grocery store, there, way back when (two teens came up and threatened us and then wanted to know if we had drugs, and when we said no, but Patrick tried to give them $5, they laughed and ran off). My love finally found a burger in some suburb down the Interstate.

My plane was boarding now, and man was it full! The now-one-hour-and-fifteen-minutes-behind-schedule flight crew wanted to go HOME, and so did all the people boarding. I never saw a plane load up and everyone sit down, and the cabin doors get shut so fast. I said bye bye to my baby and settled in for a long *** trek across half the country.

I was fortunate enough to be seated next to Muffy and Biff, a couple in their forties who were so immaculately groomed and so entirely humorless that I wondered if they would be able to stand being inches away from me for four hours and forty minutes, but they seemed to be able to tolerate me and my attempts to be friendly to them, and Biff even gave me a pen to do the sky magazine crossword.

What’s up with crosswords these days? They’re way too easy. They’re written for like a 6th grade reading level. Oh well, I did it anyways, because what else are you going to do on a plane.

I made Muffy and Biff get up and down a couple times, and I traded them my oreos for their peanuts, which Marcus loves, and finally I got my jacket out of my suitcase from the overhead bin, and threw it over my head and tried to take a nap. It was getting on towards midnight my time, and I was getting really, really sleepy. Since the ground below me might as well have been the ocean, being evidently totally unihabited desert without a city in sight, ever, there was nothing to look at so I did manage to sleep for maybe 45 minutes.

After a lifetime aloft, it seemed, we touched down and I slammed off the plane and down the concourse (hey, how come at my aiport we have shops selling cheap tee shirts and here they have shops selling laptop accessories), looking for my man.

On the other side of SEA of Hispanic travelers waiting to board night flights to South America, there he was, in a little walled-off waiting area. Goodness, he looks better than I remember every time I get to see him again. Photos are nice, the phone calls are great, the marathon IM sessions are the cap to every day, but there’s nothing like giving someone you love a kiss and a snuggle.

Marcus has broken me out of my habit of checking bags, I’m trying to travel light with one overhead case now, like he does, so we can get out of the airports quicker. So we got to go straight to the parking lot, and ouila, a convertible for our trip is waiting there! Cool! I’ve actually never driven a convertible, or ridden in one for any length of time. A very nice touch. That’s my man, always kicking it up a notch.

I swear, with this secret mission, and just everything else he’s brought into my world since we got together, sometimes I feel like I’m wilderness backpacking through my own life. I love it.

We made it to the Holiday Inn Express in about two seconds, it was right next to the air field. Ran upstairs, took a shower, went to bed.

And that’s all that’s fit to print.

 

[Buttercup Roberts]

DAY TWO

Marcus:
You join us at the Holiday Inn Express near Oakland Airport.

Buttercup:
For those of you who are wondering, this was a very nice hotel and a very nice room! Way nicer than the Holiday Inn we stayed at near DL. The Captain and I stayed in a Holiday Inn Express room on the other side of the country, a month before, for one night, and based on that stay and this, I’d say HI Express is my new favorite chain.

The rooms are very deluxe, with real looking furniture, a nice desk, high speed internet access, a refrigerator and a microwave, a sink, a great tv system with streaming cd’s to listen to (I would almost hang out in the room to catch up on some 80’s favorites I haven’t heard in years!), and a decent coffee maker. The only thing that sucks is the teeny tiny bathtub and shower. It’s too hard to fit two people in there.

Marcus:
We leisurely wake up around 10am Pacific Time and remain cuddled for a while. With the 11am checkout time bearing down on us like a freight train, around 10:30, Buttercup yawns and stretches, and says to me, "Ok, it's 10:30. You can tell me what we're going to do today now." I say, "Well, my idea for today is to take a drive down the Pacific Coast Highway." She immediately is excited, saying that that was something she always wanted to do, and can't believe that I actually picked that without even knowing that she wanted to do it.

Actually it doesn't surprise me that I picked something that she always wanted to do. Buttercup and I think alike lots of the time. In fact our second choice of what to do today would also have been the same - a visit to Muir Woods.

But the PCH it's going to be! So then Buttercup asks me, "How far down the coast does that go?" I reply, "I'm not sure, but I think it goes all the way to L.A." She says, "But we're not going that far." Then I reply "Oh, yes we are." By now, Buttercup can hardly contain herself. She says "We're going to L.A.??? We're going to Disneyland? Are we going to DISNEYLAND???!!!" With a gleam in my eyes, I simply give a big nod yes. Buttercup then starts bouncing up and down and says, "Well, hurry up, let's go, let's GO!" and practically drags me out of bed.

Buttercup:
Hey ladies, how about that man of mine? I actually hit him with a pillow and yelled “GET OUT” when he told me about driving down the PCH. I’ve always wanted to do that! I planned like a whole dream trip, that I just knew I’d never get to go on, and was resigned to leaving as a faraway fantasy, forever, that included a drive all the way up Route 1. And now he had made it come true! I couldn’t believe he didn’t Google old posts to see me talking about it, but he didn’t. He’s right that we think so much alike, it’s freaky. If you put us in a room with 100 objects, and asked us to pick our favorites, we’d end up with about 85% of the same choices, I’m convinced.

So I thought that was all there was to it, I mean, that’s enough, right? And then he pops the Disneyland thing on me! My itinerary from Southworst said I was leaving from Oakland at a ridiculously early time in the morning, if you remember from Day One. I had been really bummed out about that. Well, now it turns out if I’d looked closer, the date was some time in March for that return flight. I had been so bummed when I saw the time I was leaving, I never looked closer, I just stuffed it in my backpack and tried to forget about it, and focus on the good stuff! LOL

So now Marcus told me he was just going to cancel that flight and bank the funds (gotta love Southwest), and had other tickets for us out of L.A. as late as possible on Tuesday, that I hadn’t seen yet.

I picked up the pillow and whacked him again for the Disneyland revelation. You know I said “GET OUT!” before it ever showed up on that Seinfeld show? Marcus says I remind him of Elaine a little bit. Well, maybe so, but I didn’t hurt him, hitting him with the pillow twice, or knock him off the bed or anything.

Marcus asked me if I still wanted to do some of the Berkeley/San Francisco things I’d named before, and I was like, hell no, what are you waiting for, let’s hit the road! But I was amazed, again, to find that both of us for a second choice of what to do in the area would have been the Muir Woods. We both have a kind of spiritual connection to forests.

Marcus:
We get out of the room, I think in time for the 11am checkout time and bound outside into the balmy, sunny air and hop in the Mustang. Buttercup wants to put the top down, but I think that it'll be too chilly at highway speed, plus I can't figure out how to get it to go down anyways, so we decide to leave it up and hope for a warmer day in L.A. when we can ride around in SoCal with the top down. I get my laptop booted up with the GPS program running and plot a course to Monterey where we'll pick up the Pacific Coast Highway.

Buttercup:
It was disappointingly cold this whole trip. I kept saying, isn’t this supposed to be Southern California? We are going to have to buy that car someday, so I can drive it with the top down to my heart’s content. I loved it. Well, *I* am going to have to buy that car, because I’m not sure I want to share.

Marcus:
Buttercup is hungry shortly after we get on Interstate 880 South, and I could go for breakfast. We see an IHOP sign up ahead, so I "hop" off the freeway. I love pancakes with some kind of syrup other than maple on them. The sign leads us into a huge shopping center still half under construction. After an eternity of driving around in the parking lot, there's no IHOP in sight. It must not have been built yet, and the joke was on us. There's a Denny's just on the other side of the highway, so we end up going there. It always seems that Buttercup and I end up at Denny's during our trips. I hope that isn't a trend that continues.

We get seated without a lot of fuss, but after 15 minutes no one has waited on us yet. Buttercup is hungry enough now that she's starting to get impatient, and she says if nobody waits on us soon, we're leaving. Finally she spies a waitress and snaps her fingers to get her attention. The waitress, who isn't assigned to our table, comes over and apologizes and offers to get us our drinks, which we order. Then as soon as she leaves, our waitress comes over and asks if she can get our drinks. Buttercup tells her, "Oh, no, somebody already got our drink order, but...." Just as Buttercup tries to tell her that we'd like to order our food now, the waitress disappears again, as if by some kind of malevolent magic. Feeling like it'll be another half hour before our food order gets taken now, I start to get ticked off, which Buttercup notices immediately. I say, "You should have never told her we already got our drinks, now it'll be forever before we get our food order taken." I was feeling that our precious hours of daylight, to be spent viewing the spectacular scenery along the Pacific Coast Highway will be wasted sitting inside this sordid restaurant. But happily I'm incorrect about that, as the original waitress who took our drink orders returns and takes our food order, and ends up taking care of our table the rest of the time we're there.

Buttercup:
We’ve renamed Denny’s “Dennyeven Think About Stopping Here”. And the nonexistent IHOP was just cruel.

Marcus:
Finally we get back on the road, and take 880 south to California 101 toward the coast. We stop at a K-mart in Salinas to pick up some sodas and other supplies, and I also stop at a gas station to get a cigarette lighter which we'll need to light up the "girl candles" as Buttercup likes to call them - they're scented and matching, unlike the "guy candles" I brought on our last weekend together.

The "guy candles" even featured a candleholder I made myself in shop class years ago - but I digress. Anyways, at least now we'll be able to light the candles for a more romantic atmosphere in the room once we get to Anaheim.

Buttercup:
Marcus’ boy candles were a hoot. My girl candles were from Pier One.

Marcus:
A short run down California Route 68 takes us to Seaside and Monterey. The view is beautiful already, and we're not even on the PCH yet. Buttercup can't stop commenting on how awesome the scenery is.

As soon as we get onto the PCH, the rocky shoreline of the Pacific comes majestically into view. We pull off into a parking area to get out and take pictures of each other standing on the gateway of the Pacific Ocean. The warm weather we had farther inland has yielded to a chill seabreeze and clouds, but the sights are still stunning. We continue on our way, making several more stops to take pictures. Around Big Sur, the sun begins to burn through the clouds and the verdant greens of the hillsides bloom into all their splendid color. We stop at another wide spot in the road, and Buttercup asks another couple there to take our picture together standing at the edge of the mountain slope.

Buttercup:
This area is very very beautiful, but also very isolated. And cold! And cloudy. Surprisingly, we never saw a single sea lion. I did see the tops of the giant kelp forests that make up the heart of this unique ecosystem.

Marcus:
I'm having a great time, until now. Then, it happens. My cellphone beeps to indicate that I have a message waiting. What was that noise? "Oh my God, who the hell would be calling me now", I wonder. I try to call in to retrieve my voice messages, but the freak signal that delivered the voicemail beep to my phone must have been the only inch of cell service anywhere along the whole Highway.

Buttercup has been itching to drive ever since she's seen the convertible, so she takes over the driving at this point, and I spend the next hour looking at my cellphone for any hint of a signal so I can retrieve my message. We pass the rest of Big Sur and San Simeon, but I don't see much of them because I'm obsessing about the phone call. It could be something totally innocuous, but then again Buttercup is usually the only person who calls me on this line, so maybe it's some kind of emergency and here I am with no cellphone service. A road sign finally shows up indicating that there's a town 8 miles ahead, and Buttercup is trying to reassure me that we can call from a payphone to get my message. Buttercup jockeys the Mustang through a twisty section of the highway that appears on my GPS screen as a madman's scrawl on a piece of paper, and we see some of the areas where the road has recently been repaired following the infamous mudslides that happened a couple months prior to our arrival.

Unfortunately, when we make it to the promised town, all it is is one forlorn, weatherbeaten looking store next to the side of the road, and it has no phone. But someone there does tell us that there's a phone in a camping area another 10 miles down the road. We continue, and finally, mercifully, in a small picnic area near the side of the road, there is a payphone. Buttercup pulls off the road, and has to help me dial it since I can't figure out how to use a calling card. I can hardly hear anything on the phone except a loud 60hz buzz, but I can make out my buddy Dave's voice on the other end of the line, just calling to say "Hey, buddy, how ya doing? Call me later!" Whew, at least I know it's not my mom trying to get a hold of me because of a death in the family or something. I walk back toward Buttercup and the car with this relieved grin on my face, and tell her, "Oh, it was just Dave calling to shoot the bull." I can't tell if she's going to kiss
me or kick my butt for all the worrying and being miserable I did for the last 50 miles. Finally, I can be happily on my way and enjoy myself again. Buttercup tells me at a later time that the sun was setting as I was trying to get the message. I had really wanted to see the sunset along the PCH, but ended up missing it.

Buttercup:
I think this is where I picked up a rock and considered throwing it at Marcus’ head. Note to self, warn nature boy ahead of time if there will be no cell service somewhere we travel.

Marcus:
Well, at least that is over with, but now it's dark, and we have definitely had more than enough of the Pacific Coast Highway. We still have a long way to go to get to L.A., and by my best guess I'm calculating an 11:30 arrival time. We're happy to reach an outpost of civilization again at Cambria, where we head east on California 46 to rendezvous with I-5 to speed up the remainder of the journey to L.A. This road is another deserted highway through the middle of nowhere, and now Buttercup and I are starting to get hungry. Then my phone rings again, with Dave on the line. Even though I had told him I was coming to California, he's wowed that I'm actually here with Buttercup, because he seems to have forgotten that I was going this week. He's obviously had a few Budweisers by the time he called. He asks if I'm here with my HDCS (honey dolly chickie sweetie) to which I reply, "yes, do you want to say hi to her?" and I hand the phone to Buttercup.

Dave can talk anyone's ear off, and he talks to Buttercup for a few minutes
then she says goodbye to him and hands me the phone back. We're to Paso Robles now, and Buttercup is seriously looking for a place to eat. She turns off the highway but there's absoposilutely nothing to eat anywhere here. This seems to be a recurring theme this trip. She gets back on the highway, and I can tell she's getting aggravated, because she firewalls the throttle on the Mustang and accelerates up to 80 mph. I'm absolutely no help at this point, with Dave yakking in my ear on the phone. Finally I get a word in edgewise and tell him that I have to get going. I think he's jealous now that I'm with Buttercup that he doesn't get to talk to me as much as he used to.

Well, if we can't eat right now, we're definitely going to have to make stop for a bathroom break. We find a creepy looking rest area alongside the road and stop. I quickly do my business and wait back at the car for Buttercup. She comes out and heads for the driver's door, then I ask her, "Can I drive now?" She gets this "I've been had" look on her face, and sheepishly says yes and gives me the keys. We are on California 41 now, traversing the most desolate stretch of land I've ever seen. We still have the six bags of peanuts from Southwest that Buttercup bartered for on the plane, so I give her some to take the edge off her hunger. A quick look at the GPS screen indicates that we're still close to an hour away from I-5. The time goes by faster than I expect, and soon I can see a cone of orange sodium vapor light in the sky off in the distance. I say to Buttercup, "Look, light pollution! We must be getting close to I-5!!!" She says, "YAAAAAAY, Light Pollution!!!" We both laugh. You can see that we're really getting creeped out by being so far out in the wilderness. Well, in a few more miles we reach I-5, but civilization? Hell, no. We go from a desolate stretch of 2 lane road to a desolate stretch of 4 lane road. At least now it doesn't seem as creepy to me, at least until I look down at the fuel gauge on the Ford and see that it's getting below the quarter mark. Buttercup is navigating with the GPS now, and she says there's an exit coming up, Lost Hills. I say, "Oh, wow. LOST HILLS. THAT sounds real freakin' populated!" We both laugh again, but my laugh is just a little bit nervous as I can visualize the rapidly decreasing quantity of rotgut 80 octane in our gas tank.

Buttercup:
Yes, light pollution, yaay!

Marcus:
Soon the oasis that is Lost Hills fills the windscreen, though, and thankfully enough, it has several gas stations and fast food restaurants. In fact, that's all the town is - a few gas stations and fast food restaurants. I pull up to the pumps at a truckstop and Buttercup goes into some sandwich place, I think it might have been an Arby's. She soon gets done eating and is ready to go, but I still have to get something to eat. I decide on a Carl's Jr. across the street. Buttercup asks me if she would like me to drive, and I tell her that I would rather drive, then we get back into the car. I get a sense that Buttercup is angry, so I ask her, "Are you mad?" She replies, "No, About what?" I say, "The driving thing." If she really wants to drive that badly, I'd be willing to relinquish the port seat to her, begrudgingly as it may be. I'm going to need some retraining, because I am totally not used to riding in a vehicle as a passenger, and Buttercup is the only person I've ever been with who actually looks forward to stints behind the wheel. But she tells me that she's not mad about the driving situation, it was the fact that the whole time she was eating, a bunch of creepy looking dudes were leering at her. Now that she mentions it, I do see a lot of shady looking characters in this town, and I can't wait to get the hell out of here. A quick drive through the Carl's Jr. drive thru (no way in hell I'm getting out of the car now especially if it means her waiting outside in the car for me) and we're back on I-5 getting closer to L.A. by 110 feet every second.

Buttercup:
The weirdest thing I saw, though, was this very tall, like linebacker tall, young 20-something girl with incredibly flat broad giant shoulders. She was wearing the kind of outfit you’d wear on a date to go clubbing, and was sitting by herself in front of two meals, in the Arby’s. She just sat and kicked her leg and looked around, for about five minutes. She’s not unattractive, but she’s got a kind of circles under the eyes just generally unhealthy look to her, like she’s seen her share of hangovers. Then this wealthy looking guy in his late 40’s, I’d guess, comes and sits down across from her, and says “You can start eating.” So she does. OK… I figure it’s a sign we’re getting closer to L.A., land of weirdness. I mean, he was definitely not her father.

Marcus:
It's not long until we reach the Grapevine Pass and the road begins steadily gaining in elevation, and the altitude indicator on the GPS keeps climbing steadily. We reach the pinnacle at around 5,000 feet as we head through the pass. Another 280 feet higher, and who knows what might have happened. The lights of greater Los Angeles come into view through the pass as we begin our descent, and soon we see the Magic Mountain Park go by on the right, then we're into the city.

Things are going smoothly except for one point in Burbank where I see a whole sea of brake lights in front of me. Everybody knows I'm the most impatient person in the world when it comes to traffic - just ask Buttercup what I plan on getting put on the personalized license plate for my Monte Carlo. Anyways, there is an exit ramp right there and I jump off the freeway onto the city streets, much to Buttercup's chagrin. Hey, she's got the GPS, we can find or way back onto I-5, but she is still having flashbacks of being mugged in Oakland years ago I think. The traffic jam was nothing major, so we go a few blocks and see a little bit of downtown Burbank then get back on I-5. The rest of the drive to Anaheim is uneventful, and we pull into the parking lot of the Holiday Inn near the entrance to Disneyland just at 11:30 as planned. Check in goes smoothly. The lobby of the hotel looks like a super cheap knockoff on Wilderness Lodge theming, including a wooden Mickey statue.

Buttercup:
Climbing over the Pass was really fun. I kept calling out the elevation the GPS was giving us, and couldn’t believe how fast we were climbing! Coming down the other side, the view into the L.A. basin was just beautiful, and we descended so rapidly my ears actually popped.

If you like extreme coasters, Magic Mountain looks like the place to be! They had some real monsters in there. I told Marcus I was surprised he never wants to go ride extreme roller coasters, but he says after doing aerobatics in planes, they are like a big yawn in comparison. He prefers the theming at Disney’s parks, with a few little thrills.

I could not BELIEVE Marcus got off the freeway and just started driving around surface streets without knowing where he was. I was like, oh my god, you have no idea what this neighborhood is like? Have you ever seen “Grand Canyon?” No, of course he hadn’t. I am going to make him watch that movie!!

The Holiday Inn we stayed at was a bit of a let down after the HI Express, but the bed was comfortable. We never could get the room temperature right, though that wasn’t helped by the weird weather in Anaheim during our stay. More on the hotel in future days.

Marcus:
We park the car and head off to our nest on the fifth floor without delay, and light up the "girl candles." And that, my friends, is all the news that's fit to print.

Buttercup:
Yup, I never kiss and tell.

 

[Buttercup Roberts]

DAY THREE

Buttercup:
Oh my goodness, can life get any better than what I have to wake up to this morning? True love and a day at Disneyland!

Marcus is big on sleeping late on weekends, and not into breakfast. I’ve been accustomed to hopping out of bed at 6 a.m. for months on end, until fairly recently, and I love breakfast. I especially love coffee. So I sneak out of bed and go down to the Holiday Inn’s café to eat.

Marcus:
She didn't really sneak. She said she wanted breakfast and I half opened one eye and mumbled, "Go without me."

Buttercup:
It really was good! They do their own version of the famous Tonga Toast, though they called it something else. It was really yummy! The bacon was excellent, too, which I think is a real test of a breakfast place, It was of the highest quality, thick cut, evenly cooked, crispy without being burned, and not greasy at all. The coffee was good, the oj was great, heck, it was just a really good breakfast, and I got out of there for under $12.

I poked around the lobby and gift shop a bit, picking up park schedules, finding out about the shuttle service over to the park. There was a machine to buy a round trip ticket for the shuttle, which when I asked they said came every 20 minutes. I asked the front desk guy on direction for walking over, and it didn’t sound far, so I said “I think we’ll just walk, so we can come and go as we please.” He motioned me closer and dug around in a drawer, and then handed me two free shuttle tickets. “It’s raining,” he said, “we don’t want you to get wet.”

The internet service in their “office” was really expensive, and the gift shop had an odd assortment of gifts. Disney souvenirs on the walls and in the middle of the aisles, but the case around the register was full of things like skull rings and lighters with tawdry or rude things on them. It was a combo Disney Store / Head Shop, evidently. I stuck to a razor (forgot mine) and some kind of silly candy.

Back at the old “nest”, Marcus was still sacked out solid. After a wee bit of coaxing, I got him up and out.

Marcus:
Buttercup came back and said she had good news and bad news. "First, the bad news. It's raining. Now, the good news. I have bus passes!" Well, I was so groggy I don't think I understood what she was talking about. Then I think I said "It doesn't rain in Southern California." But I don't remember much about the exchange. I can't remember if she did any other kind of coaxing to get me out of bed either.

Buttercup:
We waited for about five minutes for the shuttle, and then said, ah, screw it, as it wasn’t raining anymore, and just walked over. The landscaping Disney put in all around the area is very nice. There were my favorite L.A. Meditteraneanesque tall pointy trees, and hundreds and hundreds of thriving Birds of Paradise. Marcus said they were called something (he’s into gardening), what were they again, baby?

Marcus:
Strelitzia Reginae.

Buttercup:
We walked and walked, past very empty parking lots, acres of them, and along a long iron fence until we got to the monorail track, then turned to follow it towards where we assumed the front gate would be to the Magic Kingdom. This took us past the teeny tiny Downtown Disney (at least it looked that way from this approach), past a tram unloading area (I guess from the indoor parking garage that was next to our hotel), and finally to the ticket booths for the parks.

There was a line, but not a horrid one, to buy our passes. But the line for security was terrible. There’s no line for people without bags! And I had come without a lot of things I’d normally want during the day (camera, gum, my own water, etc.) just so I wouldn’t have a bag and could bypass bag check. They made us wait in line and then say “we don’t have bags”. Totally stupid!

The Main St. train station was all boarded off and the clock wasn’t even working.. no train this trip. Disneyland’s Magic Kingdom was totally down for rehab, for the upcoming 50th anniversary festivities. We didn’t mind too much, being well forewarned. I could handle, this one time, no Splash Mountain (not as good as WDW’s anyways), no Space Mountain (a little disappointing, but we’ll come back some day and see the new improved version, and we want to go to DL Paris and ride the really cool one more, anyways). Yes, those things being closed I could cope with.

But, *sob*, no original Tiki Room!!!!! Say it ain’t so! That’s IT!! Marcus owes me FIVE, count ‘em, FIVE visits to the Tiki Room now. Every time I want to go it’s closed at WDW (morning, night, Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party). Now I come all the way to CA and it’s closed here, too, and this is the good one! Boo. Hiss. I’m beside myself the whole trip.

Well, ok, I’m not, but Marcus still owes me five rides in the Tiki Room.

Marcus:
Foul! The deal was, I'd go to Tiki Room for every time I dragged Buttercup onto Space Mountain at WDW when we were there in December. She claims that she doesn't like to go on Space Mountain because "it's rickety." Anyways, I dragged her on twice so I owed her two Tiki Room visits. But she keeps adding one on when, through no fault of my own, the attraction is closed when we she tries to get me to pay up. This was never part of the original deal. But I'll go 5 times, then she'll owe me three rides on Space Mountain.

Buttercup:
But I digress… Back to us, standing around in the courtyard between the two parks, waiting to go inside. I haven’t had my mind shattered by the Tiki Room closure, yet, so I’m still in good psychic health.

It’s so neat how the entrances to the two theme parks, the Magic Kingdom and Disney’s California Adventure, are just a stroll away from one another. Beats the hell out of taking Disney busses all over WDW. Going from one park to the other takes 3 minutes, not 30 minutes or more! Very nice. I can’t imagine why they originally opened DCA without one day hopping tickets, it’s made for walking back and forth on a whim.

We got our first look at Disney’s California Adventure. Didn’t look too exciting, but didn’t look awful, either, to me. I like the “Golden Gate Bridge” monorail track across the front. But why is it bright red? I was excited to be in any Disney theme park for the first time, with so many things I’d never seen or done before, no matter what the bad reviews have all said. But, of course we have to do the Magic Kingdom first.

After a pretty long wait at the turnstiles, we’re in! The train station tunnels are dinky compared to WDW’s, but the posters are better. I really want some of those posters, but smaller, please. I’ve been wishing Disney would make ‘em for years. I’d like every original attraction poster in about an 8 x 10 size, to frame and put up in a parade around the walls over my kitchen cabinets.

Main Street looks more like Main Street, here. There is still a semblance of the original idea of it as an attraction featuring the architecture and culture and wares of the turn of the century in small town, USA. I pointed out the Great Moments With Mr. Lincoln attraction, and Marcus said it’s going away soon. I’ve seen it, once, years ago, and that was enough.

Marcus:
I love the real gas lights here. Other than that, I like WDW's Main Street better.

Buttercup:
We hit the center of Main Street, and… hey, where’s the castle? Who put this squatty pink thing in its place? Marcus says it needs Viagra. It actually starts to grow on us as the trip progresses, but really it’s just kind of weird to be here and not WDW. Marcus keeps calling it “Bizarro Disney”, and we do have a kind of weird dreamlike feeling, where everything is not quite what it should be, wandering around.

Marcus:
I've had dreams where I'm at WDW and things are all in the wrong place, and I had the same feeling at Disneyland. Look at Big Thunder, where Haunted Mansion oughtta be! Disneyland was pretty and there were a lot of things that were better than at WDW like the food, but it really did make me homesick for WDW.

Buttercup:
So what to do first?? Which way to turn?? First we look to see if
there's a barbershop here so Marcus can get his hair cut. Last time
he was at WDW, he got blue hair gel and then they put a Mickey bib on
him and took out a huge pair of plastic scissors, and snapped a photo
of him, and for some reason he wanted to repeat the experience. He
ducked into the restroom and I asked two cast members standing by a
flower cart if there was a barbershop here, and they looked at me like
I had just asked something really really crazy. They shook their
heads, like, nooo, you insane woman, there's no barbershop in a theme
park.

We stopped in the hub for the mandatory shot of us with the partners
statue and the castle, and then took a couple more photos. Marcus had
to get one of a bronze Pluto statue. Pics of Pluto are becoming a
theme, specifically his nose... an inside joke from the first trip we
took together, last December, at WDW. You see, Disney is selling a
novelty "stress relief" massager in the Mouse Gears gift shop, and
well, we just found it extremely funny, because we are very silly
people. You can see a shot of it at http://www.hiddendickies.com.

Marcus:
Actually, that's www.hiddendickeys.com.

Buttercup:
It was an easy decision to hit Adventurland first. Of course, the way
to get there was all weird, with this being bizarro Disney, but we
managed to stay left and make our way into the wilds. The Tiki Room
was CLOSED. Not happy. I am not happy about that at all. Marcus, I
think just remembering the disappointment, you owe me an extra ride.
That makes six.

Marcus:
No, even if we accept that you add an additional visit every time the Tiki Room is closed, which I might add was never part of the original deal, that only makes five. If I do six, and quite frankly I don't know why anybody would want to sit through that show six times no matter how much they liked it, then you owe me four rides on Space Mountain.

Buttercup:
The theming in this Adventureland is better than the Magic Kingdom's
at Walt Disney World. The absence of that giant carnival eyesore Magic
Carpet ride they shoe-horned into WDW's Tiki Room courtyard is a
relief. DL's Adventureland is more immersive in many ways, making you
feel that you are really exploring along a street in another land. It
doesn't feel like you're in a commercial theme park; the story is
everywhere around you. The front of Jungle Cruise doesn't look like
a ride, it looks like a real place to book a jungle cruise. The
entrance to Indy looks like a jungle with an overgrown temple to
explore. The shops look like homes and a real marketplace. The street
is narrower and more lushly landscaped. The place crowds in around you
and you can never see what's around the corner, you have to go
explore and find out.

Marcus:
Actually, I like WDW's Adventureland much better, except for the Magic Carpet thing.

Buttercup:
We got fastpasses for Indy and went standby for Jungle Cruise. Marcus
got a shot of his favorite boat, Kissimmee Kate, at the dock. Our
guide was really deadpan and funny. I like this version of JC better
than WDW's, Marcus disagrees. He likes the temple at WDW I think,
which is missing here. I think the ride here at DL is paced faster,
and I like the jokes coming in a rapid-fire style. I love that the
waterway goes along the side of the Indy queue, integrating the two
attractions as part of one jungle.

Marcus:
Had to get a picture of Kissimmee Kate, to hang on the wall in my condo in Kissimmee.

Buttercup:
After we safely escaped the head hunters and charging hippos, I was
hungry, and we decided to eat at Pecos Bill's for old time's sake,
if they had a similar eatery here. I kind of started to fall in love
with Marcus at Pecos Bill's at WDW, last year. ;-) We asked a cm, and
no, you crazy tourists, there's no Pecos Bill's here. I've always
wanted to eat at the Blue Bayou, so I suggested we look at the menu,
and in the same building is of course Pirates, so we decided to ride
first and eat later.

I love this ride here at Disneyland, this original version is so
amazing. I think my favorite things that are unique to this version
are the fireflies in the swamp as you make your way past the Blue Bayou
restaurant, the wonderful huge winding cave after your first downhill
splash, the shadows of men sword fighting in front of flickering
torches up in the fort's left turret, the burning beams falling
around you towards the end, and finally the end of the story with the
pirates killing eachother or dying trying to carry out the treasure.

Marcus and I talked briefly about how to do those fireflies in a garden
of our own, some day. It's just a little light that blinks on
intermittently, at the end of a curved springy thin guage wire arm on a
little motor that gives it small tugs. I'm sure he could make the
same thing, as long as he didn't get carried away and decide it needs
a four stroke helicopter engine in it. Marcus thinks everything needs
a four stroke helicopter engine that runs on aviation fuel. That would
be a bit much for the delicate little fireflies.

Marcus:
Actually if we're talking helicopter engines, they'd need to be gas turbines and run on JP-8. Buttercup is getting confused because I did re-engine my leaf blower with a 4-stroke Honda string trimmer engine which I run on 100 octane aviation gasoline. But we digress.

Buttercup:
We walked up to the podium for Blue Bayou and took a look at the menu.
Good golly! Very ambitious menu for a park restaurant, and very
expensive. The word on the street is that it's definitely not worth
it. Marcus is a picky eater to the power of 10 and that made it
definitely not worth it. I asked the maitre d' cast member
something, I can't remember what now, and he sneered at us. Whatever
he said, it was said rudely. As we walked away, I whispered to Marcus,
"Now get out of here you damn tourists."

That was the sotto voce underscript of most of our interactions with
cm's here, this trip. Most, not all. I'd say about 35% of the
cm's we encountered were absolutely beaming and very kind and
enthusiastic. The other 65% barely tolerate the damn tourists and they
let it show.

Marcus:
Yeah, you'll never hear me complain if I meet one or two surly cast members in WDW again. I'll count my blessings that it's not the majority of CM's like in Disneyland.

Buttercup:
I remembered the food being good in New Orleans Square, so we made our
way around the twisty French Quarter mockup and checked out the eatery
at the end of the townhouse row. Fried chicken! Marcus eats that. I
dragged him in there. He liked it. I liked it. I would go back right
now, quick, check the flights on Southwest, anything for $89 each way?

Marcus:
Not only do I eat fried chicken, I love it, and was totally blown away that you could buy that in Disneyland, unlike the terrible mass produced burgers, pizza, and emu legs that are standard fare at WDW. Disneyland definitely gets an "A" in the food department.

Buttercup:
And I got soup in a bread bowl!! WDW did away with bread bowls, but
they're still here at Disneyland! Yaay bread bowls! I don't know
why I get excited about bread bowls. But this was particularly good as
it was REAL sourdough.

After a yummy, not too expensive and sneering-cm-free lunch, we went to
the Haunted Mansion. I love the queue inside the building! The
feeling of really being inside a house is so much better than at WDW.
I like the flow of the ride better, too, and the Madame Leota floating
is way better, and I like that the guys popping out of the attic are
saying "I do" instead of screaming, which adds to the story line.
The only thing that's better at WDW is the graveyard, right honey?

Marcus:
Yes, in WDW the ghosts in the graveyard are physical animatronics, indicating that after you fall from the window you're a ghost too hence they look like real objects to you. Here in Disneyland they still have their ghostly projected appearance.

Buttercup:
Now it was time for our Indy passes, yaay! This queue is the best
queue, ever. Well, except for Kali River Rapids and the above
mentioned Haunted Mansion. We'll see what they do for Everest at the
Animal Kingdom, I have a feeling it's going to be awesome, too!
I enjoyed this ride a lot, though the story is weak. But the big
multi-level, multi-trackway main show room is just to die for. I have
to go back and ride again, because a girl behind us said the big rock
that rolls down at you wasn't working properly this time. Better
yet, PLEASE put this attraction into the Studios at WDW, where the old
Indy show is now. And don't skimp on the queue! And make the story
better. Hey, I can help... I'm a writer. Just call my agent,
we'll do lunch.

Marcus:
The queue was totally awesome, but the ride didn't impress me much. There was no storyline to it and it was simply a montage of scary scenes reminiscent of those in the movies, with large quantities of skulls and bugs, and huge snakes. I'll compare it with Dinosaur at Animal Kingdom, since it was the same ride technology, and I like Dinosaur much, much better. But I do agree that it would be a worthy addition to the Studios at WDW especially if they improved the storyline.

Buttercup:
After Marcus took a few pics of me walking out of the expedition's
camp in the jungle, we were done with Adventureland for today. I wish
we'd had time and energy to make it into Tarzan's treehouse, but we
skipped it today, wanting to hit other top must see things first, and
then you'll read tomorrow where I got a really awful migraine and had
to leave before we saw everything we wanted to.
I'm telling you, we just have to go back now.

We went over to the Big Thunder Mountain attraction, where the Haunted
Mansion *should* be. I really missed WDW's Liberty Square area,
here. That's one thing Orlando can chalk up over Anaheim. Mainly I
missed the liberty tree with its lanterns, and the wonderful façade of
the Haunted Mansion at WDW, with its howling wolf. I even missed the
Hall of Naps, oops I mean the Hall of Presidents.

Marcus:
I did miss seeing the Liberty Tree.

Buttercup:
But here was the "wildest ride in the wiiiiiilderness!" I got a
pic of some prickly cacti, and Marcus, and Marcus with prickly cactii,
and we picked up Fastpasses to come back in a bit. Then we noticed
they have canoes here on the River! We got so excited, I think we ran
to the nearest cm and said, where do we get on the canoes?? We had to
walk all the way back around to the far end of the River of the
Americas, past the Haunted Mansion again.

Marcus:
Actually I had seen the canoes on Disneyland's website before we left, and wanted to make it a point of taking a ride on them.

Buttercup:
After a good 15 minute wait, we were off on our own Davy Crockett
experience. The guy behind me kept hitting my paddle over and over
again until I was about ready to turn around to see what a complete
moron looks like. I mean, you watch the person in front of you and
match them, and if everyone does that, then it's smooth as glass.
Too hard for most people, evidently.

Marcus:
Buttercup was taking her girl scout canoe certification very seriously on this ride. The same thing was happening on my side of the canoe, that the dude behind me kept hitting my paddle. But I chalked it up to them being but unenlightened tourists lacking the proper training.

Buttercup:
This attraction seems to be the position of choice for young muscle-ey
gay cm's. They were all having a great time at their jobs, and made it
fun for everybody. I just wish the big pirate ship would not have been
in front of us. We could never really get going, we'd get too close
to its rear end, and have to stop for a bit.

Marcus:
I was actually liking looking at the pirate ship. Maybe it has something to do with my screen name.

Buttercup:
OK, got our exercise for today. We had a few more minutes to kill so
we went to Fantasyland and rode the carousel, where we got some
wonderful photos of eachother, and then Mr. Toad (I love going to hell,
it's hilarious), and Peter Pan. The Peter Pan ride here is so much
better!!!!!! Oh my God, the star room, why oh why didn't they do
that at WDW??

Marcus:
The star field was totally awesome, but I like the aerial view of London better at WDW. I think Walt should have made it a point to make WDW superior in every way.

Buttercup:
Now it was time for the BTMRR fastpasses, and we snuggled in for the
"wildest ride in the wiiiiiilderness!" There's some things I
like about DL's version better than WDW's and vice versa. It's a
great attraction at either park. I do like the projector effect of the
falling rocks at DL's, which is missing from WDW's. It adds a lot
to that part of the show.

My next must see here was Small World, and Marcus' was the
Matterhorn. Alas, the line for the Matterhorn was silly long, and they
don't have Fastpass. We did get onto Small World in about 12
minutes, and enjoyed the façade and the landscaping around it while we
waited. It was all white for some reason? I thought it was brightly
colored? It looked weird.

This attraction is so much fun, but I like WDW's better, just because
I'm used to it, I think. I do feel that the soundtrack here at DL is
better, with the song being sung in the language of the country
you're passing through, clearly. And obviously the façade of the
show building is a thousand times better than WDW's. Inside, we
snuggled up and sang and just chilled out together. The Hawaii room is
always my favorite, and I think Marcus likes the Mexico room the best.

Marcus:
I liked the Disneyland version of IASW much better than the WDW version. It didn't even really annoy me. Was the Mexico room the one with little characters floating under bunches of odd shaped balloons? If so, then I do like it the best.

Buttercup:
Leaving there, we looked to see if the Matterhorn queue was any better,
and it was actually worse. It was starting to get on towards late
afternoon, and if we were going to do anything at DCA we better get
over there. I talked to Marcus a bit about maybe going back to the
hotel because I was suddenly massively tired. I haven't been
sleeping much lately, and it was catching up with me, plus all the
walking today, I was getting pooped. But Marcus' favorite time of
day at the parks is late night, he's a total night owl anyways, and
after 15 minutes of sitting on a bench with my head on his shoulder
while he pouted at the thought of not getting to come back to the MK
tonight, I actually did feel a bit of a second wind and decided to give
it a try, for him.

Walking into DCA, it was starting to drizzle, so we bought DCA rain
ponchos. I have started a collection, and Marcus says he has one, too,
now. I always mean to bring my old ones from home, but I never
remember or if I do remember, I don't feel like carrying them around
in the parks when it's not raining, and don't bring them with me.
Now I have a yellow Mickey, a clear Mickey, and a DCA.
We had missed the last Aladdin show for today, so that was on
tomorrow's must do list. We decided to see Soarin' first, which
was wonderful! What a great ride concept. It could last a little
longer, and the smells don't really work for me, but it's a great
ride vehicle. I want to be in the front row in the final queue, next
time - that row is shuttled to the ride vehicle that goes the highest
up in the air, and you won't have a view of other guests' feet
above you.

I wanted to see the Grand Californian hotel, so we walked out of the
park and into it, and got treated to a mini version of the Wilderness
Lodge, basically. We sat by the fireplace and talked until a
storyteller showed up, and then we left for a short stroll outside
through an arbor, with some tender moments.

I don't think there's any reason to stay on property, here at DL.
And I never stay offsite at WDW, so it's not that I have a problem
with Disney's hotels. It's just here, it's somehow not immersive
and so what's the point? The Grand Californian is not a bad looking
resort, but it's not worth the money over a good hotel down the
street, here in Anaheim. The pool was certainly nothing to write home
about.

Went back into the park, and saw that Grizzly River Rapids was down for
rehab, to my disappointment. Gotta come back.

We went back across the hub, the way we'd come, to go see the
Animation attraction and Tower of Terror.

I love DCA's Hollywood street! It's way better than the Studios at
WDW. When they can put something in that works where Millionaire and
the ill fated limo ride used to be, they'll really have something
here. That limo ride attraction was evidently so bad, they just turned
it into a smoking area. LOLOLOL!!!! Anyways, rough starts and bumpy
roads the first few years, but the layout and the theming is in place,
and is very nicely done. The ToT is a great addition; it, along with
the Hyperion Theater and the Animation attraction, form a wonderful
trio of E Tickets for this "land". They could take a blow torch to the
cheap *** wild mouse Mulholland Madness thing, for all I'd care. It
doesn't belong here, or anywhere in Disney.

The Animation attraction was a serious high point for us, in so many
ways. I told Marcus don't even bother with WDW's, it's like a
pimple in comparison to this.

Marcus:
Oh my God, this was an awesome attraction. We sat and watched the
entire preshow twice.

Buttercup:
First, we were blown away by the beautiful lobby and its musical
montage on huge screens on every wall. The lighting and the colors in
here are wonderful! We sat down on a comfortable velvet bench and
cuddled and watched the whole thing through, about 15 minutes, maybe
20. We were singing along sometimes, and yes, shedding a few tears.
You know, against all odds, Marcus and I have found one another in this
life. We met through Disney, part of a fan group that meets to talk
about Disney, and after three years of a casual acquaintance that
started to build into a real friendship, suddenly we both looked up and
SAW eachother, this past December, and it was like the whole world just
moved under our feet to bring us together. All the clips here tonight
of true love and romance, the innocent fun of the comedy and music, the
sweetness of Disney, its wholesomeness and hope, it's everything I
wanted for myself but had given up ever having. But now here we are,
we've found eachother and finally it feels like we're going to be
o.k., and maybe the world isn't such a hard place after all. No
matter how crappy life can be, how many false starts you make or bad
situations you get into out of your own stupidity or just plain bad
luck, it really is true: even though your heart is grieving, if you
keep on believing, the dream that you wish will come true.

Marcus:
<sniffle> It's just like Buttercup said!

Buttercup:
OK OK put away the hankies, sheesh! I suddenly hear the voice of
Gilbert Godfried, doing his most nasal Iago... no wait, it's Marcus
doing a not shabby at all impression! We walked down a ramp to what I
didn't know... and into the most wonderful room full of pendant
lamps, all of exquisite handblown glass or handmade paper. Wow!! I
could go back and just look at those lamps for half an hour, it was
like an art exhibit on its own.

The next room was the best. The beasts' library, from Beauty and the
Beast! I was so totally amazed. I had no idea this was here, I'd
never read or heard about it before... that was one of the most magical
things about this trip, that since it was a secret mission and all, I
hadn't had a chance to read up on anything here, so there were some
wonderful surprises, like this attraction.

I said, look, it's the rose, on the mantle!! The beast's rose was
in its bell jar, and losing petals one by one. I stood and watched,
and then the WHOLE ROOM TRANSFORMED and the lighting changed and magic
ripped through the library and the rose was restored and I just stood
there with my jaw on the floor and tears came to my eyes and I think it
made my whole body tingle. OK Imagineers, you got me! Thank you so
much!

There were "books" all around the library to take a quiz to see
what character you are. I came out as Nala, honest and kind but apt to
get into scrapes, boy isn't that true, ha ha ha, and Marcus came out
as Tarzan!!!

Marcus:
Tarzan and Nala? That's a rather odd couple, don't you think?

Buttercup:
As if this part of the attraction wasn't amazing enough, the next
room was just as fabulous. There are these clever, so well-done booths
to dub your own voices into Disney movie clips. Marcus and I were
thrilled to see one of the choices was a song we'd *just* discovered
we both know and love, in the main hall's montage: "Bare
Necessities" from the Jungle Book!

Another couple who'd been doing a scene from Beauty and the Beast
stayed and watched while Marcus and I sang our hearts out, and we
pegged it so good, the couple applauded and gave us high 5's! Marcus
has a wonderful voice, and is a naturally gifted musician (played bass
for a great professional jazz group a few years back, and for musical
theater, and the bass clarinet, what else, baby?), on top of everything
else he can do, and I love hamming it up. We just have to go back here
and do all the scenes, some day.

So, if you can't tell, I think I liked this whole attraction. We
didn't do one whole side of it, so.. we have to go back. LOL

Marcus:
WHAT? I don't remember missing anything except the Princess character photo ops.

Buttercup:
We went to Tower of Terror next. I had decided a few years ago that I
didn't like this ride, it's too intense. But since I fell in love, I've decided to hell with it, life is short, and I'm going to start doing every last thing I used to be afraid of, and doing it as often as I can. The new me is going to ride Tower of Terror and upsidedown roller coasters and everything else, whenever and wherever. And you know what, with my love by my side, it was a blast! I'd go again right now.

Marcus:
I can't wait to get Buttercup on the REAL Tower of Terror at WDW. This one was much too short a ride for me and not as intense as the WDW version. I also can't wait to take her up for an aerobatic flight.

Buttercup:
It was closing time for DCA, and I really did have my second wind in
full gear. I didn't need to go back to the hotel, I was ready to
close down the MK. We walked back over and finally got onto the
Matterhorn, with a very short wait, and then got right back on for a
second ride. Marcus said if I want to be scared of anything at Disney,
it should be that ride. He thinks it's rickety.

Marcus:
You neglected to mention that I got a churro.

I liked the Matterhorn, especially the part where you splash into the water at the bottom. We rode it twice. I like the track you access from the left line better, because you get a better view of the room with all the crystals.

Buttercup:
We rode the monorail next, but the windows are heavily tinted and it
was hard to figure out where the heck we were or what we were looking
at, in the dark.

Marcus:
I wanted to ride it again during daylight hours. Alas, we never got a chance to. I think that hearing that foghorn sound coming from the monorail is very weird.

Buttercup:
Marcus took a break to make a phone call home to check on his mom, and
then we sat and talked for about 45 minutes, while we waited for
Fantasmic to start on the Rivers of the Americas. We got a great
viewing spot right at the rail. I guess there was nobody here tonight,
since it was a Sunday, and kind of chilly, and had been raining most of
the day, and it was February. We really didn't need to stake out a
spot so early, anyone could have walked right up and got a great view.
But it was nice to just rest and catch up with eachother while we
waited for the show.

Fantasmic is better here than at the Studios, but it still makes no
sense. And it's still a wow moment when all the characters come by
in their barges and on the ships. Above and beyond the WDW version,
here at DL, is the Columbia sailing ship with Peter Pan fighting
Captain Hook up in the rigging! Peter Pan was played by a woman, and
when I pointed that out to Marcus, he got a little too interested in
watching her. Hmpf. I'll get him back when I make him sit through
the Tarzan show at the Animal Kingdom in WDW, some day.

Marcus:
I enjoyed Fantasmic much more here than at the Studios, because I didn't have to wait for hours in the ugly amphitheater for it to start. The one thing I like better in the WDW version is that the pyrotechnic devices are larger there, but overall, the show is much more entertaining in the Rivers of America.

Buttercup:
We streamed out with the rest of the guests, and walked back to the
hotel. It was a really amazing day, we had so much fun and learned so
much about eachother. And that my dear readers, is all that is fit to
print for today.

Marcus:
Buttercup, you forgot one important thing! Fantasmic finished with 5 minutes left until park closing. We wanted one more ride on "The Wildest Ride in the Wiiiiiiiiiildernessss" so we started running towards where Big Thunder should be, just as Fantasmic finished. We were running towards Splash Mountain. But then we realized.... This is Bizarro Disney. Big Thunder is where Haunted Mansion should be! So we turned around and ran even faster, and made it on for the last train of the night. I always like Big Thunder better at night, and it was fun.

So then we meandered out of the park, wandering into a tram lane at one point and being yelled at by a CM, and made it back to our room. And THAT's all the news that's fit to print.

 

[Cinerama]

Thanks for the fun report! I liked the detailed comparisons between DL and DW. I'm hoping to visit DL soon...haven't been there since I lived in the LA area as a child. That animation place sounds really cool! Oh, I'm another one who really wishes they sold those ride posters in a 8x10 size...I say that everytime we leave MK! Looking forward to the rest!

 

[Sthronds]

I really enjoyed reading your posts, especially since it was about Disneyland which is very near and dear to my heart. I am born and raised in central CA and have been to D-Land around 25 times (Almost once a year since birth). It is this perfect little paradise in the middle of imperfect LA. To me, the smog even seems to stay away from the parks. Anyway, I am glad that you enjoyed some parts of the original! I will be taking my third trip to WDW in May so to me the Magic Kingdom is the bizzaro Disney. I try to go one direction and end up somewhere else. Thanks for the post, I really enjoyed reading it!

 

[kathymc]

bizarro disney - we felt the exact same way when we went for a day last fall. And splash - space and thunder mt + haunted mansion were all closed while we were there - and pirates kept breaking down!

We did enjoy Indy and were quite pleased with CA - is the animation stuff new or did we just completely miss that - it sounds cool

thanks for posting - cute report

 

[jns]

first DL report I read Thanks
lucky you sounds like a great trip

Most get my other half to read it might give him some ideas

 

[Goofymum]

Wow that was a great review!! That has to be the most romantic and fun trip report I've ever read! I feel like I've just read a great novel or something - I laughed, I cried LOL I've never been to DL before but it sounds like you guys had a wonderful time!! Thanks for sharing!!

 

[Buttercup Roberts]

Hey, the trip report's not over!

We're posting Day Four (it's up now), and then Marcus' responses later this week.

Day Five should soon follow.