Tag Archives: California Adventure

Disney Views and Food (or Rides Were A Low-Priority)

Posted on April 9, 2019 | Comments Off on Disney Views and Food (or Rides Were A Low-Priority)

The Food and Wine Festival at Disneyland is happening right now. This has been an annual event that I’ve been able to check out for the past few years. While I don’t drink, I always love seeing the fun and unique food offerings and it makes a really fun day at Disneyland. And with the food pass you can get, it actually makes things not too expensive. So of course I had to check it out again this year.

I went with my friend Dani last week, and it was the perfect spring day. We’ve been having warmer weather, but it wasn’t too hot and we had a gorgeous blue sky with all the flowers in bloom!

The main reason we went to Disney was for the Food and Wine Festival, so we immediately went over to California Adventure to get a food pass and start looking at what each booth had to offer. The food pass allows you to get 8 items and we figured that we would be splitting pretty much everything. There were a few things we each wanted that the other didn’t, but it all balanced out.

There were a few repeat things from the past few years and several new things. We tried our best to vary things up and I think we got a good mix.

My favorite things were the asparagus Caesar (which was a repeat from the past, but they added chicken this year), the pepperoni egg rolls, the corn nuggets with bacon, and the garlic mac and cheese (which was another repeat).

Dani got the ghost pepper mac and cheese (I don’t eat spicy food) and she said it was good and tasted like a spicy version of the garlic mac and cheese we split.

Not everything was a winner for us. The two things we got that we didn’t love were the fried artichoke hearts and the parmesan salt and vinegar wings. The artichoke hearts were a repeat thing but they were just soggy and didn’t have a ton of flavor. The chicken wings were fine, but we couldn’t really taste parmesan or salt and vinegar. They were good wings, but we were expecting something different.

There was also a new thing this year with how you could order food. Instead of having to go to every booth to order what is there, you could order anything at any booth and just bring your receipt to the correct booth to pick up the food. We didn’t try this until we were using our last food pass tabs and we ordered a bunch of different things at one booth. It worked out fine for most things, but we did discover the downfall to doing this.

We ordered the beef tenderloin slider at a booth other than the one that serves it. When we went over to the booth to pick it up, we were told they were sold out and that they wouldn’t have any more for about 30 minutes. We had the option to wait or we could get anything else from any other booth. We didn’t really want to wait 30 minutes for something that we’ve had before, so we decided to go through the options and see what we wanted to get instead.

Since everything we got had been savory, we decided to get something sweet. They had a popsicle duo that had lime and strawberry at a booth. Dani took the lime one and I took the strawberry one. They were good, but nothing special. I probably wouldn’t have picked it normally, but we just wanted something easy and it was a good choice to end the time at the Food and Wine Festival with.

While we were on the California Adventure side, the only ride we did was Toy Story Mania. We didn’t want to do any of the fast rides since we were eating so much food, but we also didn’t want to spend time on rides we could do whenever when the food offerings aren’t always there.

We headed over to the Disneyland side thinking we’d do a few more rides, but when we got there the first thing we noticed was how nice it was with the flowers and trees in bloom. The castle is being worked on so it’s covered by a mural, but that didn’t take away from how pretty it was.

We did Pirates of the Caribbean and then we were going to go over to Fantasyland to do the Storybook Canal Boats. And as we were walking, we saw yet another gorgeous Disney view.

By the time we got to the boats, the sun was down and I was hoping the little houses would all be lit up. But they didn’t have as many lights as I seemed to remember. It wasn’t bad, just different from what I thought we’d be seeing.

We did a lot of walking around and wandering through different parts of Disneyland. It wasn’t empty, but it wasn’t as crowded as we thought it might be. We had a few other rides we wanted to do, but we weren’t having good luck and it seemed like the few things we thought about doing happened to be down when we were over there.

And even though we had a day full of food, of course there is always still room for Dole Whips. I had the orange/raspberry one which I think is my favorite combination.

After the Dole Whips, we started to head out of the park because the fireworks were starting. We didn’t want to be stuck in the crowds exiting the park when they finished, and we managed to be just at the gates as the crowd started heading that way. We still hung out in Downtown Disney doing some shopping, but we didn’t stay too late since we both had early mornings the next day.

Considering that the main point of this Disney day was to check out the Food and Wine Festival, I would say it was a success! It would have been nice to do a few more rides, but since we can do those any other day we are there I was ok with missing out on a few things we wanted to do. I’d love to go back to try a few more things at the different food booths, but I’m not sure if I’ll be able to make it back before it ends. But if I can’t, then I know I’ll just be back to check it out next year!

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A Family Disney Day (or Rain, Cold, And More Rides Than We Expected)

Posted on February 26, 2019 | Comments Off on A Family Disney Day (or Rain, Cold, And More Rides Than We Expected)

Back at Thanksgiving, my cousin mentioned to me that her daughter was going to be performing with her dance group at Disneyland in February. I wrote down the dates that they would be in town and said that I’d love to meet up with them while they were here. They ended up getting flights that landed at LAX instead of Orange County, so when they flew in I was able to meet up with my cousin and her daughter for dinner that night. And we made plans to meet up at Disneyland the next day.

My cousin told me that the performance was going to be at 2:30, so I took some time off of work so I could make it for that. Between traffic and the parking lot taking time to get through, I was terrified that I would miss the performance. But by some miracle, I was able to get into the park and join my cousin to watch her daughter perform. I made it there only a minute or two before she went on, and I felt so lucky that I didn’t miss it.

While we were waiting for my cousin’s daughter to come out after the performance, it started to rain. I had seen that there was a chance of rain in the forecast, but it was saying just sprinkles and only for a brief time. This rain was a pretty heavy storm and we found an umbrella by the entrance of a ride that we could wait under. We still got a bit wet, but it saved us from being completely soaked.

To avoid the rain, we went over to the Animation Building so we could do the Animation Academy and see Turtle Talk. A lot of people had the same idea as us and it was so crowded inside there. But the space was big enough that we were able to get into both things without too much hassle.

When we were done, we went back outside and the rain was finally done. It was really cold, but we were able to dry off a bit when we were inside so that helped. I can’t imagine how bad it would have been if we were drenched and it was that cold out.

Then it was time for us to go on some rides. We started with Guardians of the Galaxy, which my cousin and her daughter went on earlier as well. Fortunately, they like all the big and crazy rides so they were happy to ride on it again with me.

After that, my cousin and her daughter had a ride time for Toy Story Mania with their MaxPass, but I didn’t have a time. But that worked out perfectly because we noticed there wasn’t a big line at the Lamplight Lounge and I was able to wait for a table for us for dinner while they rode the ride! By the time they came back, our table was just about ready. We were seated outside downstairs and it was a bit cold. They did have heat lamps which helped.

After dinner it was time for what we thought would be our last 2 rides of the night. We went on The Little Mermaid and Radiator Springs Racers.

After those rides, California Adventure was going to be closing soon and we were all getting a bit tired. But I mentioned to my cousin that it might be a good time to do Space Mountain together since we rarely get to be at Disneyland together. We decided to head over to the Disneyland side to ride that and when we were done we noticed that the Jungle Cruise was pretty much a walk-on. I love Jungle Cruise at night so of course we had to do that. And when we were getting off that ride, Indiana Jones opened up after being closed for a while and that was a walk-on as well. Again, we had to take advantage of that and we got another unexpected ride in.

I ended up being at Disneyland for about 8 hours and we did 6 rides (plus 2 show type things and dinner). I wasn’t planning on being there that long or that late, but I was having so much fun. I rarely get to see my cousin outside of Thanksgiving and we always have fun together. And of course, I always love being at Disneyland and getting to have fun there. By the time I got home, it was about 3 hours later than I thought I’d be home and I knew it would affect me the next day, but it was totally worth it.

I would have loved to have gone back to Disneyland the next day to hang out with my cousin and her daughter more and I actually debated doing that. But I knew it wouldn’t be the best thing for me to do and my cousin mentioned that they had dinner plans that night so I wouldn’t have been able to spend too much time with them.

I think we totally took advantage of the time we had there. We ended up doing so much more than we thought we’d do and we had the best time. The last time I was at Disneyland with my cousin was when her daughter was a baby, but I’m hoping that we can do this again much sooner than how long it had been before.

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2 Restaurants and 2 Rides (or A Very Low-Key Disney Afternoon)

Posted on January 25, 2019 | Comments Off on 2 Restaurants and 2 Rides (or A Very Low-Key Disney Afternoon)

I haven’t been able to have a full Disney day in a while, but I’ve been doing a bunch of random Disney afternoons after work lately. It does only give us a few hours at the parks, but usually we only have a few rides we really want to go on so it’s not a big deal. One of the biggest advantages of having an annual pass is that I can go for an hour or two and be ok with it. I never feel rushed to have to get things done because I know I can go back another time.

I was able to do one of those Disney afternoons this week with my friend Dani. We didn’t really have an agenda of rides we wanted to go on, we just wanted to have a few hours of Disney fun. We didn’t realize before arriving there that the parks were closing relatively early that day, so we only had about 4 hours from the time we arrived until they closed. But since we didn’t have a plan of things to do, that was fine with us. We both just enjoy being at Disneyland and it was such a nice evening that it just made everything feel magical.

We were both a bit wishy-washy about what we wanted to do first, but we knew we wanted to get some food. We thought about a few different places we would like to go to, and we decided we should check out the Lamplight Lounge. Normally, there is a big line to eat there, but the parks were unusually empty so we decided to take a chance. There was a small line when we got there, and we figured it would be fine to wait it out. Only a few minutes later a woman got our information to have us put on the list and told us that our table would be ready in about 10 minutes. We went out to wander in one of the stores and before we could take more than a few steps away I got a text that our table was ready!

We were seated at the bar which had a really nice view of Pixar Pier and the sun setting.

This restaurant is known for their lobster nachos and I had never had them before (the nachos were also offered when this restaurant had a different name for the past few years but I never made it there). So we knew that we were going to be getting those and they didn’t disappoint us!

We also got dinner to go with the nachos. I got the ratatouille and even though I was already a bit full from the nachos I couldn’t stop eating it because it was so good!

Dani had the spinach salad which was also good, and there were so many things that were on the menu that we wanted to try. I know we lucked out by the lack of line there, but I think we are going to try to plan a day when we can make a reservation there so we can try more of the entrees and get the nachos again!

After eating and doing some shopping, we did our first ride of the day: Radiator Springs Racers. I feel like I haven’t been on it for a while, and my favorite time to ride it is at nighttime. It was just as fun as always even if the car we were in didn’t win.

Then we headed over to the Disneyland side where we rode the train for the loop around the park. I really just love the train and it’s a nice relaxing ride. I wish that there were more lights around so we could see all the scenery, but it’s still nice having the little bits we could see. Plus, I love the diorama between Tomorrowland and Main Street.

Once we did our loop on the train, there was about 30 minutes before the park closed. And we had one more stop that we wanted to make: Dole Whips!

We went to the Tropical Hideaway again for their Dole Whip options. Dani got an orange/raspberry swirl on top of pineapple juice and I got a pineapple/orange swirl. It was a bit cold outside, but Dole Whips are so good that it was worth getting extra cold eating them!

By the time we were done with our desserts, the parks were technically closed. But the stores are open after closing so we did a lap through the stores to see if there was anything we liked. Then we went to World Of Disney in Downtown Disney to see what they had there. I’m pretty picky when it comes to Disney attire. I like cute and fun Disney shirts, but I don’t like them to be super obviously Disney. The shirt I was wearing that day was one I found online that said “Gaston’s Tavern” (from Beauty and the Beast). But Disney is getting better at creating fun shirts and I found one that I had to get for a future Disney day.

I love that it’s a Disney themed shirt but not everyone will know that it’s a Disney shirt unless they are familiar with the Haunted Mansion. I will totally be wearing it soon when I’m back in the parks!

My pass is due to be renewed in a few weeks, and even though the prices were raised I will be renewing it again. I get so much joy out of going to the parks and I know I couldn’t do these short and relaxing Disney afternoons if I had to pay every time I went to the park. I know that I probably shouldn’t spend the money on my pass, but with the payment plan option I think I will be able to figure out a way to afford it without it being too bad. And I think that if I couldn’t go to the parks as often as I go, I would end up spending the money somewhere else (or by getting one day tickets to the parks), so it’s worth the splurge.

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Another After Work Disney Adventure (or Holiday Time And Random Fun)

Posted on December 21, 2018 | Comments Off on Another After Work Disney Adventure (or Holiday Time And Random Fun)

I haven’t been going to Disneyland as often as I used to. I still am getting my money’s worth on my pass and I still love to go, but I just haven’t been there as much as I would like to. I used to go by myself all the time, but now I just don’t feel like doing that. I miss having my friends with me if I’m there alone, but maybe I’ll work on doing that from time to time in the future.

But since my pass is about to be blacked out for the holidays, I wanted to make it one more time before the end of the year. And my friend Dani was able to join me after work earlier this week so we decided to do another afternoon and evening in the parks. Fortunately, the weather did not predict rain like the last time we were there, so we knew we’d be able to do a few more rides. But we also mainly wanted to go to the parks to see the decorations and have some fun so we weren’t too focused on getting a lot of rides done.

The drive down to Disneyland was a bit longer than normal due to traffic, but we got there with plenty of time left in the day to have some fun. We knew that in California Adventure they were doing the Festival of Holidays, so we decided to see the offerings and decide if we wanted to do one of the food passes. As soon as we got into California Adventure, I was just so happy to see all the holiday decorations and how festive the park looked!

We weren’t too excited by the food options at the different stands, so we just got 2 things on their own instead of getting the food pass. We got a turkey tamale and bagel chip nachos (the nachos were much better) but I didn’t get a photo of them. We needed to get some real food for dinner so we went to the sourdough place to get bread bowls (I had broccoli cheddar soup and again forgot to take a photo).

After food, it was time for a few rides in California Adventure. I had to go on the Incredicoaster since I couldn’t go on it the last time I was there. While it is the same ride as before, they added some theming and a new soundtrack. And I really liked how the updated version looked especially with it all lit up at night!

And we also rode the Guardians ride since that one is really one of my favorites. I still have one version of the ride to do and this time it was another repeat song. But one day I’ll get that last song!

We were in the California Adventure side for a few hours and even though we didn’t ride that many rides, we just enjoyed walking around the park. We both thought it would be much more crowded, and while there were a lot of people, it wasn’t that bad. There were areas where things got a busy, but in general it nice to not feel packed between everyone. And since we weren’t squished, we could take time to appreciate how pretty things looked.

Then we headed over to the Disneyland side. And just like California Adventure it was decorated so nicely for the holidays.

We knew we wanted to ride the Haunted Mansion to see it decorated for the holidays, but we had to make a quick stop first. We knew that there was going to be a new quick service restaurant opening near the Tiki Room, but we didn’t know if it would be open when we were there. But it turns out that they were starting to do a soft opening that day so we had to check it out!

It’s called the Tropical Hideaway and they have some really amazing offerings. They had 3 different types of bao buns and some other savory options. But what Dani and I were most excited for were the Dole Whip flavors!

They have the regular pineapple one as well as orange and raspberry. You can do one flavor or swirl 2 of them and there may be new flavors coming in the future. I hate pineapple yet I love Dole Whips, but I was so excited to try new flavors! I got an orange and raspberry swirl and Dani got the pineapple and raspberry swirl.

It was so good! I loved the orange and it tasted like a creamsicle! And the combination of orange and raspberry was perfect! Dani also got some of the bao buns and I tried a little bit of one and they were really good too. I know this is totally going to be one of our new favorite snack places to get something savory and something sweet. I can’t wait to go back another time so we can try more of the savory foods!

After riding the Haunted Mansion, we were feeling ready to head home. We were in the parks for over 5 hours and we did a ton of walking! But it helped me get my Disney fix in now so I don’t miss it too much while my pass isn’t good.

But one of the best parts of our Disney outing was actually something that happened toward the beginning. We both love to look through the different stores to see what new merchandise is for sale. Disney has really been stepping up their game in getting fun and cute new things. I rarely buy things since I can’t afford them (especially now), but I love to look and dream of things I’d love to get.

In one of the first stores we went into, Dani grabbed me because she saw something amazing: Disney is selling really cute and soft leggings! In the store they had a castle pattern, Disney cat pattern, and Disney dog pattern. I feel in love with the dog leggings and was debating if I should just get them and figure out money later. They were so awesome and I was so sad when I had to be responsible and decide that I just couldn’t spend the money. But that’s when Dani said that she wanted to buy them for me for Hanukkah!

I was totally not expecting her to say that and I told her she didn’t have to, but she wanted to and I am so grateful that she did! As soon as I got home after being in the parks, I changed and put them on. They are so comfortable and the perfect lounging leggings!

I don’t know if I’d wear them out and about, but I really just wanted them for being in my house or for sleeping in. And these are seriously just so perfect! I still can’t believe that Dani got them for me and I have thanked her over and over for her generosity!

All in all, this was a really successful Disney adventure. We got to do a few rides, we got to each some food, we checked out a new restaurant, and we got new Disney swag! I couldn’t ask for anything more!

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A Stormy Night At Disneyland (or Trying To Have A Few Hours Of Fun)

Posted on October 16, 2018 | Comments Off on A Stormy Night At Disneyland (or Trying To Have A Few Hours Of Fun)

It’s been a long time since I had been to Disneyland. I usually go as soon as my pass is good again at the end of the summer, but I just didn’t make it there this time. And somehow September went by without be going too! I still love Disneyland and my pass is totally worth it, but since I go with friends so often now I don’t really want to go alone. And my friends and I just haven’t been able to coordinate schedules lately to have one of our fun days there.

I don’t usually go after work to the parks since it’s driving in rush hour traffic, but sometimes it’s worth it and I do that. And last week, my friend Dani asked me if I wanted to go with her on a shopping adventure to IKEA which happens to be on the way to Disneyland. So we did a shopping trip first and then made our way down to Anaheim for a couple of hours before the parks closed.

We got there around 6:30 and the Disneyland side was going to be closing at 7 for one of their Halloween parties. We weren’t going to buy tickets for that because we didn’t need to go for a special ticketed event and we were hoping we could do maybe one ride on the Disneyland side before they closed. We might have been able to do that, but we decided to not stress ourselves out too much and we went just to the California Adventure side.

Since it was a Friday after work and the Disneyland side was for the party only, it was pretty crowded when we got there. All the ride had multi-hour waits and we were a bit surprised by that. But since Dani and I both have passes we also knew that if we just looked at the Halloween decorations and had some dinner, it would still be worth it.

When we arrived, there were clouds in the sky but the forecast said it wasn’t going to rain until after midnight. But the clouds helped to make everything look nice and spooky!

And while we were admiring the decorations near the entrance, it started to rain. It started as a drizzle but quickly became a decent rainstorm. We checked the weather on our phones and saw that a storm cell was passing over us. We waited it out until it slowed a bit and then we decided to go get some dinner while we waited for the rain to stop. Some of the rides we wanted to go on can’t run when it’s raining so we knew we’d have to wait it out if we wanted to ride them.

After dinner, the rain had stopped but the lightning was still happening. We had to make a change to our plans for what we wanted to ride and we decided to just be casual and easy about things. We went to the Turtle Talk with Crush show which is a really cute show. The jokes were funny and it was nice to just have some silly fun. We then walked over to Cars Land to see all the Halloween lights and decorations.

Every minute or so, the lightning was making the sky glow and it looked so perfectly Halloween themed! I was trying to get a photo of it and Dani had the brilliant idea for me to take a video so I could take a screen shot when I happened to catch a lightning bolt. And her idea worked! I got this amazing photo of 2 bolts in the sky!

It’s so rare to have lightning in Southern California and everyone seemed to be watching it. The rain still hadn’t returned while we were watching the storm, but we had a feeling it would be back soon. So we headed over to the one ride that we were going to do: Toy Story Mania.

When we got in line, the rain was slowly starting up again. But while we were riding, it turned into a real downpour. We knew that we were going to be soaked and there was no avoiding it. I wasn’t properly prepared for the rain (I was wearing jeans and sweatshirt and didn’t have an umbrella) but I wasn’t going to buy a poncho that I wouldn’t use again. So we just went for it and walked back toward the entrance of the park to head back to the car.

While it was packed when we arrived, the rain made so many people leave. It was nice and empty and if we were better prepared for the rain and it wasn’t as late we probably would have stayed later. But it was fun being in an empty park again and I loved seeing the reflections of the lights on the buildings in the puddles on the ground.

We had to park in the overflow parking near the hotels so we knew we’d be walking through Downtown Disney to get back there. But there is an entrance into the Grand Californian Hotel from the park as well as one from Downtown Disney. So we went through that for a bit of a shortcut as well as a break from the rain. By the time we were walking through the hotel, our clothes were dripping wet and I felt like a drowned rat.

Walking from Downtown Disney to the car ended up being a bit fun. We were both drenched and we knew it couldn’t get that much worse so we tried to enjoy it. We were laughing about how we were able to wring the sleeves and hoods of our sweatshirts and it was like a waterfall coming off us. We were also grateful that we didn’t have to worry about doing a ton of stuff in the park to make our evening worth it. We did some window shopping, had dinner, went to a little show, and did a ride. Considering we were only there a few hours, we got a lot done.

I was grateful to be back in the car to be out of the rain, but I was still soaked. As soon as I got home I hung up the clothes I wore to try to dry them before putting them in the laundry. I didn’t think about it when I did it, but when I woke up the next morning there were puddles on my floor from all the water that dripped off.

Even though we had a short time in the park and we didn’t do a ton of stuff, I still was so happy to be back at Disneyland. I had missed the magical feeling of the parks and I was so glad to get it for a few hours. But I’m hoping that it won’t be that long again before I’m back!

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Having A Fantasmic Day (or A Relaxing Time At Disneyland)

Posted on June 20, 2018 | 3 comments

My annual pass for Disneyland is about to be blocked out for the summer. There is a slim chance I might do a quick trip after work next week to check out the new Pixar Pier offerings (those should be opening this weekend). But even if I go for that it will be a very quick outing and I will be doing only limited things. I wanted to get in one more Disney day before the summer and this past Monday was my best chance to do that.

I went with my friend Dani and we didn’t have a ton of things on our agenda which was nice. But we did have one big thing we wanted to get done. We wanted to see Fantasmic! The show reopened last year, but I hadn’t seen it since then. The last time I saw it was quite a while ago. And now you need a Fastpass for the viewing areas and they are usually gone by the time we get to the park. But there are some dining options that include Fastpasses so Dani and I set that up and went to the parks to enjoy some time before the show.

Since we didn’t have a big plan for what we wanted to do, we were pretty lazy with our day. We first went to the California Adventure side where the only ride we ended up doing was Guardians of the Galaxy: Mission Breakout. I finally got to hear a new song on the ride so there is only 1 song left that I haven’t heard yet. Dani and I didn’t plan a pose for the ride photo, but I think this ended up being perfect! I’m acting crazy and Dani is confused by me but enjoying it all.

After ride we got some food and wandered around the various stores. I have an ears headband that you can change the bow on and I wanted to get the bow that is themed for the movie “Up”. I got that and Dani got a new bow as well. And I just like to see what else they are selling because Disney really is getting some fun merchandise!

After that, we headed to the Disneyland side where we went on Pirates of the Caribbean. They recently changed the ride a bit and we wanted to see the new scenes. The big news has been about the auction scene which used to be an auction for brides. But it changed to be an auction for household goods and the redheaded character (which previously was supposed to be the hot bride for sale) is now a pirate.

There were also a few other fun changes in the ride that we enjoyed and got a kick out of seeing. After Pirates we walked over to Finding Nemo where we went to the alternative viewing area. This is a room where you can watch the ride on a screen instead of going down into the submarines. I personally prefer the viewing room because there is nice air conditioning and it’s not crowded. We also had an amazing cast member who starting the video for us that showed us a bunch of fun Disney secrets in the room. If you do the alternative viewing room for this ride, check out what’s inside the lockers!

Our last ride of the day was the Haunted Mansion. Dani hadn’t been on it without it being the holiday overlay for a long time so she really wanted to go on it. And it’s one of the classic rides I love so I was happy to go on it too. Then we headed over to the Hungry Bear restaurant for our food and Fantasmic Fastpasses.

The meal at Hungry Bear is a picnic dinner. We both got the BBQ chicken which was a nice piece of chicken along with a kale salad and a mixed grains salad. We had a pretty big lunch earlier so I only really ate the chicken, but it was good. I also tried the grains salad which was tasty but I was too full. This picnic also came with soda and I decided to splurge and have a soda. I never drink them and it was a bit too sugary for me, but it was a nice treat.

When we were done eating, we spent a bit of time just hanging out and relaxing at the seating area of the restaurant. There is a nice view of the Rivers of America and it was nice and peaceful. It had been a hot day and the park was pretty crowded so it was nice to have a bit of an escape.

Our Fastpasses said to be lined up between 8-9 for Fantasmic, but since the show was the main event for us that day we ended up getting into the line area closer to 7:30. We only had a few people ahead of us in line but there were also the people who had Fastpasses from eating at Blue Bayou that had priority over us. But it worked out really well for us because we were still able to sit right at the fence for the show!

It was pretty close to be center and I was happy there was nobody blocking my view (the fence was there, but it was easy to look through it). The only downside to being that close to the action was the mist from the show got us pretty wet. But considering how amazing the view looked it was worth it!

There are so many times that we view things through our phones or cameras looking for the perfect picture, so I really tried not to do that. I took very few photos during the show so I could enjoy what was happening in front of me. But I did get the pirate ship as it went right in front of us!

The show was great and I really loved it! This was the best view that I ever had for it and if I go with people again to watch it I will totally do the picnic Fastpass deal from the Hungry Bear.

After the show, there was an announcement that we could stay where we were to watch the new Pixar fireworks show. I knew that they did some projections in that area for the show, but I didn’t realize they used the mist screens again to show clips of various Pixar movies during the fireworks!

I’m sure the view is amazing when you are in front of the castle and the projections there are incredible, but I loved watching the fireworks from where we were so we didn’t have to stress about rushing quickly to another section of the park so we could see both evening shows.

After the fireworks, we started our journey toward the exit of the park. We usually don’t stay this long and the downside is everyone seemed to be leaving the park at the same time as us. It was a little crazy, but we didn’t want to hang out there much later since it was already getting late for us and we both had to work in the morning.

If I don’t make it back to the parks before my pass isn’t good for the summer, this was a pretty great last day for a while. While we didn’t do a ton of rides, we both had a great day. Sometimes it’s nice being able to take advantage of just relaxing and being lazy at Disneyland. We had fun people watching and just enjoying a day out in a place that makes us and so many other people so happy.

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Enjoying More Food and Wine Festival (or Enjoying A Hot Day At Disneyland)

Posted on April 12, 2018 | 1 comment

The last time I was at Disneyland, it was during the beginning of the Food and Wine Festival. I got the pass to be able to try different foods at the festival cheaper than they would be on their own because I figured I’d be going at least another time or two before the festival ended. But I forgot about spring break and how long that would block my pass from being good. So since the festival was ending this week my friends and I knew we needed to get to Disneyland. It had been pretty typical spring weather recently, but of course the day we planned on going it ended up being almost as hot as it gets in the summer. But that wasn’t going to stop us from having fun!

I had a few tickets left on my food pass and Dani and Michelle got a pass to split between the two of them. It ended up working pretty great for us each to get to try a few things. When we got to the park, we started with getting some lunch. I had the pork roast which had coleslaw on it and it was really flavorful!

And because it was so hot out, I also got the orange vanilla float. I haven’t had soda in several years so it felt a bit weird having soda in this. But it wasn’t really like drinking soda (more like an ice cream shake). It really was the perfect thing to have to try to feel more comfortable in the heat.

Later in the day I also had the tacos that I had the last time but totally forgot to take photos of it! It was still as good as the last time I had it.

Because of the heat, we had a pretty lazy day. When we got to the park, we had our food first and then started to do some rides. While we were at the California Adventure side we did Toy Story Mania, The Little Mermaid, Soarin’ Around The World, and Guardians of the Galaxy: Mission Breakout.

But we took our time getting from one ride to another. When we were going between The Little Mermaid and Soarin’, we walked through the path behind Grizzly River Run which we usually don’t do. It’s such a nice area back there and we really enjoyed spending a few minutes by the waterfall because the mist from it was cooling us down.

We also took advantage of the Photopass photographers. We found one by the Hyperion Theater that didn’t really have a line so we decided to go for it. The photographer was really fun and was helping us get some cute photos. And she also set it up so we could have a magical photo (where they add things into the photo to make it special) and I think our magical photo with the balloons was my favorite out of all the ones we got.

When we headed over to the Disneyland side, we took our time getting over to our first ride which was Space Mountain.

The ride didn’t break down so we didn’t get to be on it with the lights on, but I am hoping for that to happen now every time I’m on it since it was so cool when it happened! After that ride we were all starting to feel a bit tired so we ended our day at Disneyland with a quick ride on Buzz Lightyear’s Astro Blasters.

I would have loved to have stayed later, but I think the heat really took it out of me. Even though I knew it was going to be a hot day, it really got to me and I probably should have prepared better. I also ended up being sunburnt even though I had sunscreen on and wore a hat. But the tiredness and sunburn was totally worth it because I always have a pretty amazing day when I’m at Disneyland.

It’s getting closer to when our passes are blacked out for the summer so I’m hoping my friends and I make it once or twice before we can’t go for a while. But being at the parks in the heat reminded me of why I don’t mind my pass not being good for the summer. While there are ways to cool down, it does get uncomfortable for me being that warm and I always have a risk of getting sunburned. But maybe for the next time that I’m there it will be a bit cooler so I can enjoy the last few times in the park before I can’t go back until August.

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An Easy Disney Day (or Another Eat All The Foods Adventure)

Posted on March 8, 2018 | 2 comments

I was at Disneyland pretty recently and didn’t really have plans for when I’d be back. But I knew I wanted to be back soon because the Food and Wine Festival was starting up again. So when I was randomly texting with my friend Michelle, I mentioned how we needed to go to have all the delicious foods again. And it turns out that we were both free on Monday (sadly our other Disney buddy Dani was not), so we made plans to have a fun day at the park.

We had our usual mid-day start and got to Disneyland around noon. And there wasn’t a line at the parking garage so we took that as a good sign. We ended up walking over to the park instead of taking the tram, but as soon as we were in California Adventure we immediately headed to a store to get our Sip and Savor Pass for the Food and Wine Festival.

The pass is a pretty great deal since it’s $45 and you get 8 food items for it. Most of the food is between $5-8, so you get your money’s worth. You can’t use it for alcohol, but since I’m not really drinking it’s not a big deal for me.

It was a really gorgeous day out and we were enjoying walking through the park to get to the food booths. And we noticed a PhotoPass photographer by the waterfall from the water ride and we decided to stop to get a photo. Since Michelle’s pass includes PhotoPass photos, we take advantage of these more often. We were both feeling a bit silly so we went with a silly pose.

When we got to the food booths, there were a few things we wanted to share and some things we each wanted. So we settled on us each getting one thing we wanted for ourselves and then 2 things we were going to share. We shared the caesar asparagus and grilled artichoke hearts. And I got the beef slider for myself and Michelle got the poke salad.

Everything was so delicious! I have had the slider before and I thought it was better this time than it was before. But I think my favorite thing we got was the asparagus. It was so good and not that heavy considering it was with a heavier dressing. I might start making caesar salads now with asparagus instead of lettuce occasionally!

After our lunch, we did a quick ride on the Little Mermaid ride since it was right there and then we headed over to Radiator Springs Racers. That’s one of my favorite rides but we hadn’t been on it for a while. So it was nice to get to go on it again!

We then went over to the Animation Academy to do some drawing and this time we were taught how to draw Zero from “Nightmare Before Christmas”. It ended up being the best character I’ve drawn so far and I think that both Michelle and I had drawings that looked pretty good.

Then it was time for our favorite ride at California Adventure: the Guardians of the Galaxy: Mission Breakout ride! We are still hoping to get a song on the ride that we haven’t had yet, but this time we weren’t lucky enough for that. But I’ve been experiencing something on that ride for a while that we finally have a photo of. I had my seatbelt on the ride on pretty tight (my friends can verify this). But somehow, when the ride drops I fly so high up! Michelle jokes that she can see me floating toward the ceiling each time. And in this photo, you finally see it. I know it looks like I’m standing up (especially when you compare me to the other people seated in the back row), but I swear I’m not. I’m just floating up while the ride drops.

Even though we had a lot of food to try earlier, since the food isn’t huge portions we were feeling ready for a little dinner and we each got the tacos which they have had in the past. Again, they seemed better this year and I love that this is considered theme park food!

We also saw a PhotoPass photographer by the big backdrop and decided to do more photos. We got some fun ones, but I think this one is my favorite because it makes me think of a buddy cop movie poster!

After that, we headed over to the Disneyland side where we did a lap on the train. I love the train and it gave us a chance to look at some of the Star Wars land construction. When we finished our ride, we headed toward Space Mountain and saw that there was a pretty nice sunset.

We then had our ride of Space Mountain which went off without any emergency stops. We were kind of hoping it would happen again because it was so amazing to see the ride with the lights on, but we also know that we were just lucky to get to experience that once. Unfortunately you can’t really see us that well in our ride photo, but it’s still a funny one. We are just so used to being in the front of the ride car.

The parks were starting to get a bit more crowded with the after-work crowd, but we were able to do quick rides on Buzz Lightyear and the Haunted Mansion before we were both feeling ready to head back to the car to go back home. We were at Disneyland for about 7 hours and considering we wanted it to be a lazy day we accomplished a lot!

The Food and Wine Festival is going on for another 5 weeks and I know I’ll be back for it at least once more. I’ve got 5 more things I can get with my Sip and Savor pass so I want to make sure that I try some other new things!

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Celebrating Villaintine’s Day (or Getting Something Checked Off My Disney Bucket List)

Posted on February 13, 2018 | 3 comments

This past Sunday at Disneyland was Villain’s Day. It was an unofficial Disney event but it was being shared online as a fun day to dress up as a villain and go around Disneyland. Even though I normally only go on Monday’s I couldn’t turn down a chance to have a fun themed day at the parks!

I really wanted to dress in a cute new villain themed shirt I got, but it wasn’t fitting correctly and I didn’t want to be super uncomfortable all day. I ended up wearing a Gaston’s Tavern shirt (which is a bit villain themed) with some Belle themed ears and figured that being comfortable was more important than being themed correctly for the day. I went with my friend Michelle and we were meeting some of her friends in the park that day. She was dressed in lots of cute Maleficent stuff so I figured she could represent for the theme for us both.

When we go to the parks and met up with the others, we noticed that there really weren’t that many people dressed for the theme. There are so many themed days like Dapper Day or Tiki Day, so it’s probably tough to get a new themed day started. We did see some cute outfits, but they were few and far between. But again, all of us decided to just have a fun day in the parks and enjoy the costumes we did see.

Our first stop was over at the Lunar New Year area of California Adventure. We hadn’t gone to the Annual Passholder section before so we stopped by there to first make a wish for the new year.

And we stopped by the photo spot to get a cute photo of us all in our villain attire.

We then went over to our one ride we did in California Adventure: Guardians Of The Galaxy. It’s seriously amazing every time I ride it. I was hoping that we’d have a new song on the ride because I want to hear them all, but we got one that we had heard already. But that doesn’t ruin the ride or anything. It was still as great as it always is!

Since all of us in the group are passholders, we were being a bit lazy with our day. After that ride, we decided to head over to the Disneyland side. As soon as we got over there we noticed Tiana right by the gates and there wasn’t any line to take photos. It’s pretty rare to see a character out without a photo line, so we took advantage of that.

After our quick photo we headed over to our first ride on the Disneyland side: Space Mountain. This is another favorite ride and something I pretty much go on every time I’m there. We got on the ride and everything seemed pretty normal at first. We headed up the hill and just as soon as we started the drop I noticed a weird voice coming from the center of the ride. Every time we got close to the middle of the ride we noticed a voice talking. It was so odd and we couldn’t figure out what was happening.

Then all of a sudden we came to a stop on the tracks before the end of the ride! If you are a Disney geek like me, you know that you love when a ride breaks down. Sometimes you get to be evacuated and get to see the behind the scenes area of the park. And it seems like one of the most coveted ride breakdowns is to get stuck on Space Mountain and have the lights come on. I had never experienced it and it was for sure something on my Disney bucket list.

We were stuck for a few minutes in the dark (but everyone was getting out their phones to use the flashlights to see everything around and then the lights came on!

As soon as the lights came on we all started cheering. Fortunately everyone in our ride car was just so excited to get to see the ride with the lights on and wanted to photograph everything around us.

Of course we wished that we had gotten stuck much higher up in the ride so we could have seen everything. But beggars can’t be choosers and we were just so excited to get this little bit of behind the scenes of the magic. And we could see a couple of fun things like the other cars higher up on the ride that were also stuck.

I’m not sure exactly how long we were stuck because honestly we were having a great time just checking out everything around us. And when it was time for the ride to start again the brakes were released on our car and the cast members had to push our car to start going again. So we finished the ride pretty slowly because we were only going down with gravity from that last section. Michelle was smart and took a video of this since it was such a special thing to get to do.

You don’t see it in the video, but when we got back to the station everyone waiting in line was cheering for us! It was pretty funny. We were given the chance to ride again since our ride was disrupted and of course we did that. And when we were done with the ride we went to look at our ride photo.

But we also learned that when we were slowly getting back to the ride station the photos were working and we got some funny ones from that ride too!

I’m sure I sound really silly, but I feel so lucky that I got stuck on Space Mountain and got to ride with the lights on. It’s something I’ve always wanted to do and it’s not something you can control when you could do it.

After the excitement on Space Mountain, we did a quick ride on Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters and then Star Tours before heading back to the car. It was getting a bit more crowded in the parks in the evening and we were all feeling a bit tired. But we still had been in the parks for about 5 1/2 hours which is a pretty decent time.

I just renewed my Disneyland pass (fortunately before the price increase!), so I’ve got another year of Disney fun ahead for me! And hopefully I’ll have some more fun random adventures and maybe I’ll be lucky and I’ll be able to accomplish a few more things from my Disney bucket list! Most of the things left are things that won’t be easy (like getting to walk off certain rides or getting to dine at Club 33), but you never know what is possible!

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Finally Back At Disneyland (or Enjoying An Average Day At The Parks)

Posted on January 31, 2018 | Comments Off on Finally Back At Disneyland (or Enjoying An Average Day At The Parks)

I finally made it back to Disneyland this week! It had been a while since I was there because of the holiday blackout and then being busy on my days off. I really had missed being at Disneyland and I was so happy to be back there! The only odd thing was that it was pretty hot that day (it would have been hot even if it was in the summer), but we didn’t let that bring us down.

We got to the parks a bit later than we normally would, so we headed straight to California Adventure to get some lunch first. They are celebrating the Lunar New Year right now in that park and have some fun and new food offerings. I got the sticky rice with pork and a sugar cane shrimp skewer. They were both pretty good and the perfect lunch before going on some rides!

After enjoying our lunch, we headed over to Guardians of the Galaxy to ride it. This is still one of my favorite rides and we always have a great time on it. While we didn’t plan on how to pose for our photos, I think we still got a pretty funny one!

Since it was hot out, we decided to go into some air conditioning next. We went to the Animation Academy to do some drawing where it listed the character we were drawing as “artist choice”. It ended up being Dante from “Coco” which I haven’t seen yet. So we were all a bit confused on what the finished product would look like until we were done. Mine looks a bit weird, but I think all of our photos look enough like the character.

We thought about if there were any other rides we wanted to go on at California Adventure, but we decided to head over to the Disneyland side for the rest of our day. And our first stop was Space Mountain where we tried to recreate our poses from the Guardian ride for this photo.

Then we headed toward Fantasyland to check out the Mickey and the Magical Map show. I had never seen this show completely through so I was excited to check it out. It was really cute and the performers were really good. We all had grabbed some snacks before the show and enjoyed a break in the shade while watching the show.

Last year, my friend Michelle and I had a year-long battle on Buzz Lightyear’s Astro Blasters. We kept track of our scores whenever we rode it together over the entire year. This year the battle is going to be Michelle, Dani, and me and we are not going to just do the total score for the year (I only won last year because I had one really amazing game), but instead the average for the entire year. I’m glad we made that decision because on the first game Michelle and I both had laser guns that didn’t seem to work and Dani had the best game! It was so good that she ended up in 4th place for the entire day at Disneyland!

By this time, it had gotten dark and we have all discovered how much better it is to ride the Jungle Cruise at nighttime. It’s still silly, but it looks more interesting in the dark than it does when it’s light out. And the skipper we had this time had some pretty funny jokes that we hadn’t heard before. I love that they are getting more creative with the jokes and I hear new material more often.

Even though we were all a bit tired (and it still felt warm outside), we weren’t quite ready to end our Disney day. We went over to Indiana Jones to ride that because it had been a while since we had been on it and we ended our day with some Dole Whips and watching the show in the Enchanted Tiki Room.

While there was nothing too exceptional about this Disney day (except Dani and her crazy high score on Buzz Lightyear), it was still an amazing day. I just love getting to spend time with my friends at Disneyland and I love that we don’t have to make it into an event each time we are there. We can relax, take our time, and ride or not ride whatever we want. There is no stress to make it a special day and I realize how privileged I am to have that. I know that not everyone can have an average day at Disneyland and I love that that’s exactly what I had this week.

My pass is up for renewal in 2 weeks and I’ll be renewing it again for sure. It is not a cheap thing, but it’s so worth it to me. I would want to go to the parks as often as I do if I didn’t have a pass, and that would be so expensive. I easily get my money’s worth with my pass and it saves me so much money. I’ve been trying to budget for it all year and I think I should be fine with getting it. But if not, I will figure out a way to make it affordable for me.

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