Trip report with photos for 11/14-11/20

[XTinabell]

This is my first attempt at a trip report as well as my first attempt to
attach some photos. So let's see if it works:

Okay it works!!! YAY! So anyway - My DH and I went on our first trip together. This was his first time to Disneyland and my third. So let's begin and hopefully I don't make this thread too big that I get in trouble:
My DH and I left snowy Canada exactly two weeks ago for our adventure in DLR. Of course our flight was delayed and we didn't arrive to LAX until after 2 sometime. Then we just missed our express shuttle to DLR and because we prepaid we had to wait for that specific shuttle to return. Twenty minutes later we were finally on our way to DLR, unfortunately it was bumper to bumper traffic nearly the whole way to Anaheim. Finally around 4 we arrived to our hotel Howard Johnson. Checking in was easy and our room was nice and cozy. We had a crappy view but it didn't matter because we were so happy just to be out of the snow! My DH and I were starving because we hadn't eaten all day(we were up by 6 in the morning because according the airports website our flight WASN'T delayed)so we decided to check out Mimi's cafe. It was FABULOUS! DH got the chicken cordon blue.

I got the fish and chips. It looks greasy but it wasn't.

We both fell in love with Mimi and decided we would have breakfast there as well. Then it was off to the park FINALLY! This was my DH's first trip to DL so we were both quite hyper. This first evening in DL was rather uneventful as we only got a couple of hours in the park because it closed at 8 and we didn't get there until after 5. The park was practically empty and Disneyland was all lit up with the christmas decorations and it truely was beautiful. Our first ride was Pirates of the Caribbean, we were actually headed to Indiana Jones but the lineup for Pirates was 5 minutes but actually we just walked straight onto the ride. I had a slight embarrasment on this ride because after we told the CM we were a party of two he lined us up behind another couple. The gates opened and the couple climbed in, well there was room for us too so I followed the couple and was standing over the yellow line waiting for them to move over.When they didn't move I realized I would just take the next boat, but I didn't move back behind the yellow line. I stood where I was and began to daydream, then I heard a CM saying you can take the next boat. I realized he was talking to me so I looked at him and he repeated what he said, but I didn't move because it didn't occur to me that I needed to be behind the yellow line so they could close the gates. So I nodded to him so he would stop staring then he repeated it again and then it occured to me that obviously I was in the way of something so I stepped back and then I saw the yellow line and I knew what happened. Fortunately the CM didn't yell at me or anything and nobody else seemed to notice so it wasn't that embarrassing.This ride was cool, I hadn't seen the new pirates stuff and I was very impressed with the improvements. My DH was also thrilled on this ride and wanted to do it again. I told him we would later but we never did do it again because he realized that there are better faster rides. The next ride we did was Indiana Jones and this was another one that we just walked onto, and there was nothing new with that ride. It was terrific as always and my DH of course thought the boulder was going to hit us and talked about that for ten minutes after we were off the ride! We then decided to take some pictures and go shopping and my DH was like a kid in the stores on main street. He played with all the toys while I bought some keychains he ended up buying a pirates sword. Didn't take pictures of this sorry. Then we decided to watch the fireworks. Because the park was practically empty we sat down about ten minutes prior to the show beginning and got seats right in the middle right in front of the ropes. The fireworks were breathtaking and I almost cried mostly because I had only gotten three hours of sleep the night prior and was overly tired, but nevertheless the fireworks were great.

 

[XTinabell]

We woke up surprisingly early this day,considering we had been living off of three hours of sleep the day before, and we headed for the park. We got
there before 9 I think. The gates weren't open and the sun was so hot and the lineups were long so we weren't able to stand in the shade. Neither of us minded though because we were still just thrilled to be out of the snow.

This was the first time I had ever been there for the gate opening. They did a count down and even I joined in! Then we went through the gates and decided to head straight for Riverbelle Terrace for breakfast(we had forgotten about Mimi's)and were seated right away and in the shade! This was great experience the food was good and the waiter was really nice. The chef(I assume it was the chef because he was wearing a chef hat)came around to all the tables to make sure everyone was happy.

Then I was attacked by flying birds that were swooping by my head and sat on the railing by my breakfast to watch me eat.All the other people that didn't have breakfast were lining up on mainstreet to wait for the other rope drop. This was neat for us to see without actually being in that mob of people in the really hot sun.

We finished up eating and did some more shopping. We headed to space mountain which was new for both of us and I was really scared. The lineup was 5 minutes and that ride was so amazing and kinda scary the first time you see it. We bought our picture off that ride because we were right in the front and my DH looked terrified and I looked like I was at a picnic! You would have expected it to be the other way(me terrified and him bored)but the truth was that I was squeezing my lap belt so tight it just looks like my arms are folded neatly in my lap. Anyway that ride was fun so we did it again(sorry I don't have that pic to show you). For the next few hours nothing really happened we just went on splash mountain several times and took pictures of different things.

We had blue bayou reservations for that night and we forgot about them until it was almost time to go. So we went to check in but they said we couldn't check in for another ten minutes so we decided to run over to California adventure park to go on Soarin over California because we had fast passes for that line. While we were waiting to go on this ride we met another couple who had never been on the ride and were scared of it. So I told them that it was a mild ride, really good and they'd love it. Well we got on the ride and then I was terrified! It was alot higher up than I remembered but it was still really good. Then we raced back to Disneyland and checked in at Blue Bayou. We were told we'd have to wait about half an hour for a waterside table but we only waited about 5. This was an amazing experience! Our waiter was also from Canada so that was weird and neat to talk to him about his move to California. I ordered the Tesoro Island Chicken and my man had Cajun Spiced Salmon. He had the gumbo with his and I had the cajun inspired wedge salad. This meal was AMAZING! We were so full but it was soooo good we stuffed ourselves until it hurt. Then we both wanted dessert but he wanted the cookie boat and I wanted the creme brulee. We decided to share the creme brulee. I was diasappointed but my man was in heaven and ate almost all three by himself. The waiter told us to keep our menus as a memento and the treasure chest that came with the creme brulee. That was by far the best experience of our trip. I don't really remember what we did after dinner. I believe the park was closing and I remember going on splash mountain and asking if we could ride again but they said they were closed. So I think we just left and went in the hot tub at our hotel.

Thursday we were at Universal Studios so I'll jump ahead to Friday:
Friday we slept in a little bit and then went to Mimi's for breakfast. I had bacon and eggs and my DH had oatmeal. I do have pictures of this meal but I think I've posted enough food pictures and I'm making myself hungry. I'll post meal pictures in the food thread. So anyways Friday was a really good day for seeing characters. They were all over the place! When we arrived at the park I went straight to madhatter to see if I could find a donald duck hat for my grandpa because his name is Donald I never did find a hat but as we were leaving a car full of characters pulled up. They were all getting out to go "rest" behind the CM only door. We kept our distance because we figured they must be hot and just wanted to get out of their costumes. However they were all good and hugged and shook hands and waved at everyone on their way by.

Friday was full of excitement I guess because it was the weekend. There was a marching band on mainstreet just about every hour! We decided to go to Fantasyland because we hadn't been there yet. We made it just in time to see the sword in the stone ceremony. It was very cute. They brought up a big man who of course couldn't pull the sword out then they brought up a little boy who of course could. Then they crowned him and said that since it took so long to find him his duties as King were now over. It was very cute.

After this we did some more shopping and then it was time to check in for our Holiday Tour. This tour was great! Our guide was very good and very friendly. We were given an assignment to say Happy Holidays to the other Holiday Tour group, when we saw them, before they said it to us. We started our tour on main street and there was alot going on. First we stopped at the bakery for some free treats. Then after we had our treats my DH and I stepped out of the bakery to make more room for everyone else. Well Minnie mouse was outside now and she was going to dance. So we started taking pictures and I was video taping her. I turned around after a couple of minutes and our tour group was gone!

We started to run to try to find them, well fortunately they hadn't gone far and we found them within seconds. We continued on with our tour, it was really hard to hear the guide because there was sooo much going on. She took us to New Orleans and told us some trivia that I couldn't hear because there was a marching band practicing.

Then we went to the Haunted Mansion and bypassed a very large lineup and got a few dirty looks from people that were waiting Our guide and one of the other guests took one seat and were the first to go, the rest of us got on a little bit later as this ride was quite full. Well the ride got stopped about three times while we were on it. When we finally got off our guide was nowhere to be found and we were missing three people from our tour! Well our guide got off the ride before the ride began to stop so she was off for awhile and was looking around for this guy and his little daughter who didn't want to go on the ride. It turned out the guy and his little girl got stuck behind that marching band we had heard practicing and our guide went to rescue them. So eventually we were all reunited and we headed to the train to go on Small World. When we got off the train we got free hotchocolate in a collectors mug and a gingerbreadman cookie that was quite yummy. We watched a few princesses for awhile by Fantasy Faire while we ate. Then we were off again. After small world it was time for the parade. This was really cool because we were seated inside the ropes right where the parade begins. We were so close we were practically in the parade. It was a great experience. A man sitting next to me spilt hot chocolate on my shoe and was horrified. I really didn't care because it's just a shoe but he felt so bad, I thought that was cute. Anyway here are some pictures from the parade.

 

[XTinabell]

Friday evening we had riverside seating reservations for Fantasmic. We had no idea what we were supposed to do so we went to city hall. The guy there was very helpful although he said we only needed to check in about ten minutes prior to the show. We decided to try to find where to check in and since the first showing hadn't started yet we didn't think we'd be able to check in we just wanted to figure out where to go. So we found this roped off area and asked a yellow jacket CM where to go, he sent us toward haunted mansion where we found another yellow jacket CM. We told her we were just trying to figure out where to go to sign in when we come back for the second show. She took our names and checked us in and we weren't even the first ones to check in! Anyway I made a post about our fantasmic experience earlier and I'm too tired to repeat it but basically Fantasmic was great but we think the riverside seating is overpriced. So after that we decided to hit splash mountain again and do more shopping.

SATURDAY

Saturday we were going to do early entry but we were so tired we just splept in, but later that night we met a guy in our hot tub that said he did early entry and they were very disappointed because there was nothing to do unless you have little kids. So they wished they had slept in. So anyway, when we did finally get to the park it was very busy. Mainstreet seemed to be the only place that was a little less occupied. The first thing we did was try to find the Alice in Wonderland penny stamper. We found it near the ice cream shop I think. After we had Alice and the queen our penny collection was quite full. This is a picture of a "few" of the pennies we got, not even close to all of them.

Then when we left we saw Alice herself, the Queen of hearts, wendy peter pan, the mad hatter and the cat I forget his name setting up to play musical chairs. We stayed to watch and take pictures. I was fascinated with Wendy. The girl that played her was incredible, not only did she look exactly like wendy IMO but her voice and manner was exactly like Wendy. The other characters were good too but not nearly as good as Wendy. They asked anyone that was a kid to come up and play and soon they had too many kids but they handled it well. The first one out was a little boy who ran to his mom and cried in her shirt when he was the "un-winner" and Wendy went to him to make him feel better but he didn't come out from his mom's shirt. So everyone cheered and applauded for him. Then whenever the characters were out they would blame peter pan. The cat said he tripped him and I can't remember what Alice said but it was similar. Anyway it was fun.

After this we decided to go to California Adventure park since we hadn't really done that yet. We went straight for the Aladdin musical and saw Sulley on the way. We didn't really have time to stop for a picture with him so we just took a picture of him posing with people we didn't know. Then we got mezzanine seating and we were the first in line for that but even though we were first once they opened the doors a ton of people nearly knocked me over to pass us. Even with that bit of rudeness we were seated in the front row a little to left because people that barged in front of us took front center. But we didn't really care, we still had great seats and the show was fabulous. My DH took pictures throughout the show which really irritated me because he would rest his camera on the railing and I was scared it would fall off. But also because we were in the front row other people saw him taking pictures(you're allowed as long as the flash is turned off)and it promped other people to take pictures, FLASH pictures. But that only happened once then I elbowed him to put away the camera. After the show my DH told me that was his favorite performance at Disneyland so far. He liked it better than Fantasmic. We then went to the building that has all the drawings and stuff and looked around for awhile. Then we left and almost got stuck in the Block Party Bash parade but we made it through and decided to go to Disneyland and do Space Mountain again. Well in disneyland they were setting up for the holiday parade. So people were crowding the walkways and places were roped off. We were being told to stay to the right, well people were stopping where they weren't supposed to to try and watch the parade. Finally we made it around them and were getting through and I turned around to make sure my man was right behind me. Of course he wasn't he was being cut off by other people. So I stepped out of the way to wait for him but this lady behind me yells at me as she passes me "WHAT ARE YOU STOPPING FOR?" and then storms off before I could reply. I was so mad because trailing behind her was her daughter and I thought lady, what would you do if your daughter was trapped behind people, you would stop to wait wouldn't you? So then I was grumpy for about ten minutes but got over quickly. After a lot of dancing around people and getting stopped by ropes we finally made it to tomorrow land. Well the lineup for Space mountain was 50 min! We thought for sure it would be empty because of the parade, well we were wrong. So we decided to train to splash mountain and Indiana Jones. We had fast passes for Indiana which was fortunate because the line up was over an hour. After Indiana we went back to splash mountain where I got yelled at AGAIN! We were in line and a CM asked if there was a party of two so we raised our hands and he told us to come foward. The lady in front of me must not have heard because she didn't move. So I tapped her on the shoulder and said excuse me. She snaps "Don't push there are kids up here", since I hadn't even moved I just waited for her to step to the side and then we made it up to the front. I was a little irritated because I hadn't even attempted to move past the woman let alone push her, but my DH said to let it go because she was allowed to ruin her holidays but I shouldn't let her ruin mine. So then we went on the ride and had lots of fun. And ate churros later and then went home. Oh I also got a mickeyshaped pretzel.

SUNDAY - our last day

Sunday was busy because there was so much left to do that we hadn't done yet. We were going to have Mimi's breakfast again but there was a 40 minute wait and we were so hungry. So believe it or not we had five dollar corn dogs at Disneyland. They were very good actually. While we were eating, Mary Poppins and what's his name came out of the CM's only door and walked by.

We then went to Innoventions and saw the robot guy I forget his name and my DH will kill me but he's not here to tell me. Oh yeah it was Asimo. So we saw him, I was too chicken to do the aging thing. It was nice in Innoventions because it was sooooo cold and Sunday was super hot. I think they said it was 90. Don't remember for sure though. Anyway we went to thundermountain after this because I had never done it before as it has always been down for refurbs when I've been there. The lineup was hot but short and the ride was actually a lot of fun. After that we walked by the ranch and a dad and his daughter were in front of us and he pointed to the ground and said to her look at that. Well she jumped about four feet in the air and screamed at the top of her lungs so of course we look too. And its a praying mantis.

Soon the praying mantis created a crowd so we decided to move on. We had New Orleans reservations so we ate there. While I was eating I saw Jack Sparrow walk by the window and I was sad because I couldn't get to him. After we finished eating we saw Jack again!

As you can see he had quite the crowd so we didn't wait to get our pictures with him. We then went to the Fantasy Faire so I could my princesses. Unfortunately the lineup was horrific so we took pictures over the fence.

I know the pic is a little blurry, sorry about that, I moved as I snapped the picture so that's what happened.
Anyways, we went on some more rides in fantasyland then we did toontown at night right before they closed it and did some shopping and played with everything in Minnie's house and in Mickey's. Then we decided to do splash mountain as our very last ride. I was put in the front again, and having ridden in the front and gotten rather wet I was a little worried but decided not to think about it. Well my DH didn't have enough leg room so he wanted me to hold the video camera bag, I told him I couldn't because I was gonna get wet. We should have given it to the CM but didn't think about it. So he hung on to it for a little bit but kept whining so I took the bag. For the first portion of the ride I wasn't getting very wet so I was happy about that...until the second drop. Our log was full of big men, with the exception of me and one little girl so our log was quite heavy. The water came over the side in buckets and soaked my legs but I didn't care at least it wasn't the camera. Then it came time to the final drop. I rarely get wet on the final drop so I wasn't too concerned, nevertheless at the bottom I leaned over to cover my bag so it wouldn't get wet. BIG MISTAKE!!!!!!! Water dumped in the log, my end of the log pretty much went under water! My head went under for a second because I was leaning over and I couldn't breath and my god it was FREEZING! I was soooooo wet and so was my camera bag. My makeup was running and my hair was dripping and I was wet from head to toe! But my only concern was my camera. So when we got off everyone in our log laughed at me, including my hubby, lol and I checked our camera and thank god!!! It wasn't even a little bit wet. So there I was on our last night, last ride freezing cold. So of course we went for ice cream!
After ice cream I still wasn't a little bit dry so we decided to head back to the hotel an hour before the park closed. My trip was really good and I know I missed out a whole bunch of stuff on this report but hopefully you enjoyed reading about what I did remember to put in. And thanks to everyone who helped me plan this terrific event!

 

[Alex2kMommy]

WOW, fabulous report! I loved reading about your tour, since we didn't do one. And your photos are great, I really enjoyed those as well.

I also liked how you included 'little things', like the praying mantis, certainly not a bug I see every day! And even encounters with cranky people, there always seem to be some. So glad they didn't ruin your day, you had the perfect attitude!

 

[wendypooh22]

Sounds like you had a great trip! I really enjoyed reading your trip report. Your fireworks picture is just outstanding! I am counting the days until we get to go

Thanks for sharing!!

 

[XTinabell]

WOW, fabulous report! I loved reading about your tour, since we didn't do one. And your photos are great, I really enjoyed those as well.

I also liked how you included 'little things', like the praying mantis, certainly not a bug I see every day! And even encounters with cranky people, there always seem to be some. So glad they didn't ruin your day, you had the perfect attitude!

You're so sweet! Thank-you so much for the kind words. Yes the praying mantis was a new thing for us too, considering that we live in Canada we only have small normal bugs so it was kinda cool. It was also funny because all of the adults were saying what is that? then this little girl about 5 years old casually walks by and says in a matter of fact voice "oh it's a praying mantis"

 

[mystic_path]

OMG thanks so much for your trip report. Im like crying right now. You brought back so many memories of things I did on my trip as well, and now im so home sick for this place.

Im happy you had a fantastic time. Those corn dogs are amazing! I love them, and that Aladdin show is the ultimate.

 

[GailT]

Great job on that report, I wish I could do something like that each time I go to DW and now DL. The pictures were and added bonus for me to see, I am getting so close, today was the first day I woke up thinking 3 more weeks I'll be in DL

 

[Minniespal]

Enjoyed reading your report ~ Thanx for sharing.

 

[XTinabell]

OMG thanks so much for your trip report. Im like crying right now. You brought back so many memories of things I did on my trip as well, and now im so home sick for this place.

Im happy you had a fantastic time. Those corn dogs are amazing! I love them, and that Aladdin show is the ultimate.

I'm home sick for disneyland now too. I was reading other ppls reports and they are fun to read but my god I really miss that place. I wish Disneyland was in Canada...

 

[drag n' fly]

What a fantastic trip report. I always love to read Canadian trip reports especially ones from Calgary! We love DL too! However we are going to try WDW for the first time in a month and I am excited about that too! I am going to post a trip report also. I hope it is as enjoyable as yours was to read!

 

[Skroops]

Thanks for your trip report, I really enjoyed reading it, and I love all the pictures you put in it.
I'm going to remember what your DH said about that rude lady, "she can ruin her holiday, but not yours" what great advice.
Glad you had a great time! I can't wait to go!

 

[Disney owl]

thanks for sharing your great photos