Same as before, we took the big boys to school, stopped at Coffee Bean and Tea Leaf and Chik-Fil-A and hit the freeway to Anaheim. But not like last time, there were lines at the parking structure. Uh-oh.
It wasn't horrible. It wasn't Saturday bad. It wasn't Saturday in July bad. It wasn't Week Between Christmas and New Years When Everyone's in Town for the Rose Parade and all the Locals' Relatives Are In Town and Everyone Else Who Figured That NO ONE Would Want To Go To Disneyland Right After Christmas Descends Upon Disneyland Bad. But it wasn't "Empty like it was a few weeks ago." Fortunately, once again, we parked outside the parking structure in the Pinocchio lot. There were lines at the tram and they were removing trams from the route. That's as good of an excuse as any for me to get in a little extra exercise and we walked from the parking lot to the Esplanade.
We passed through the bag check fairly quickly and being the wonderful mother that I am, we went straight into Disney's California Adventure and right up to the most direct route to Toy Story Mania. The road was "blocked" for rope drop because it was not quite 10 am, so we waited. CS was intently studying his map and I was pointing to Toy Story Mania reminding him that we were going there first. Except that, he did not want to.
Yes, you read correctly. "No, I don't want to do dat." What? That's all you have been talking about. I showed him the picture on the guide - do you want to go on this? "No." I asked a few different ways, a few different times. He would not tell me what he DID want to ride but he did not want to ride Toy Story Mania. The wonderful mother in me switched to the selfish mom in me and said "Would you like to go on the flying ride?" and I pointed to Soarin' Over California on the map.
I love Soarin'. I realize that it is a bit of sacrilege that my favorite ride is not in Disneyland proper but rather is part of the bastard step-child that replaced a perfectly fine parking lot, but I do. I do not even mind sitting in the second or third row and seeing everyone else's feet hanging above my head. I love the breeze. I love the scents of evergreen and orange trees. I love all of the scenes from Lake Tahoe to Yosemite, the American River to the ocean, Napa to Anza Borrego, military air craft carriers to military aircraft. I love it. And, fortunately, so does my little buddy. He kept grabbing my arm and giggling and pointing out things he saw on the screen. And you know, little kids' legs don't hang down off the seat so I wonder if that helps them feel more secure in the seats than I feel.
After that, Captain Stubborn redeemed my sacrilege: He was done with DCA. Done. Been There, Done That. Time to go to the REAL park, Mom. Ok, he didn't say that. But I asked if he wanted to go to Monsters, Inc and he said no. He stared intently at the map and I asked over and over is there anything else you want to do here? And finally I said, "Do you want to go over to Disneyland?" and he said "YES!"
When we left DCA we stopped for some pictures in front of the CALIFORNIA letters. CS is the only one of my children whose first initial is one of those letters. A friend told me that some people can spell their entire names with those letters so they take pictures in front of every letter in their names. The problem with early morning pictures is that the sun backlights the photo. If I waited until later in the day, then he would be squinting in the photos. I would love to be there on an overcast name to eliminate this problem all together, but the letters will be going away forever in the DCA refurb later this year, so I took some pictures today just in case we never make it back on an overcast morning before the letters are gone:
By 10:30 when we finished, the lines into Disneyland were much longer than I ever like, but they were not unbearable.
Now, I have to stop briefly to describe the Treasure thing. CS remembered that on our previous Monday with Mommy visit, he collected "Treasures" and last night and this morning, he repeatedly told me that he had to collect treasures. His first Treasure was his DCA Map. At the Disneyland gate, he grabbed his Disneyland Map. As I put away our passes, he quickly had his map spread open on his lap to plot his plan. He saw the Autopia roads but I was hoping we might get on a different ride or two, today. I offered the Fast Train but he pointed to the Fantasyland train and so off we went to Casey Jr.
The people in front of us in line talked funny and being cute and perky as I am, I could not let it go. (Well, that and they asked me how to find the water ride below the train and I showed them how to get to the Storybook Canal Ride entrance, so I figured they owed me some conversation.) They were definitely native English speakers and at this time of year, summer vacationers come from the Southern Hemisphere, so it was fairly safe to ask "Are you from Australia?" They smiled and said "The other one" and I said "OH! New Zealand! How nice. Which island?" And so I found out that they are from 1 hour east of Rotarua and they're going to Colorado to go skiing tomorrow where it should be much colder than it is in Anaheim right now. They never get snow where they live. They asked me about the typical weather at Disneyland and where I live. I told them that I would answer their questions but they had to be in Fahrenheit and feet. We only had to wait for one train so our conversation was short.
CS was insistent that we would NOT sit in the PINK cage, but he passed the orange cage, too and he declined the back seat of the caboose, so we sat in the front facing caboose seat. (Do you see his treasures?)
Here's your cuteness overload story of the day: When anyone asks CS what he rode today he says he rode "The train with the colored coaches."
Everybody now: Awwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwwww.
How precious and adorable is THAT?
Before Casey Jr, he'd asked to go on the "Horsies" next, and so we went to King Arthur Carrousel. Again we waited one ride and while I might have been able to get Jingles the special horse, CS's favorite color is green so we promptly found the right green horsie for his taste.
And then CS saw the mirrors on the top of the Carrousel and thought it was really fun to make faces in them. I accepted the chilling challenge of taking a picture of his face in the mirror, without a glare from the flash blocking his face. I finally did it!
Captain Stubborn remembered very well that they give out more free treasure at Autopia - and he's allowed to drive there - so he asked to go to Autopia next. Oh that was not a fun experience. The sign said it was a 10 minute wait, so I figured, sounds good to me.
At the first major stopping point (keep in mind, the Fast Pass line was closed so there was no option to "come back later with a shorter wait,) we stopped. And we waited. And we moved up a few feet. And we waited some more. And more. And More. And after awhile of very little movement and me thinking "I am NOT doing this every time we come to Disneyland like this," I could see that the sign had changed and now said 30 minutes. That's just not right.
Eventually, we started moving but somewhere CS lost his DCA Treasure and tried to run BACK in the line to find it. Fortunately, he found it quickly but then he lost it again almost as quickly as he had found it. This time, I pulled one out of my purse and he did not realize that it was not the actual map he had lost so he took it and rejoined the line.
Today we had a blue car and there were no young out of control drivers around to bump into our car. Yeah!!
When we came off of Autopia, CS announced that it was time for lunch, which was very convenient because, indeed, we had little time left so if he wanted his Magic Straw Treasure, it was time for lunch.
Remembering that Coke Corner had 32-ounce Diet Coke last time, we headed there again. Today I was not hungry and being a good little Weight Watcher, I decided that if I am not hungry, I will not force myself to eat food I do not want nor need. Fortunately, the purchase of CS's children's meal qualified me for the steeply discounted Annual Passholder price on the soda, plus we received a 15% discount on our entire bill with my Premium AP.
Remember that trip to Chik-Fil-A? CS had eaten two perfect Chick-N-Minis on our walk in from the car but he only wanted two. That third Chick-N-Mini which I had saved in the carton was the perfect accompaniment with my Diet Coke. CS was very happy with his Hot Dog Kid Meal.
When he spilled fruit cup juice, he immediately wanted a napkin to clean the spill (this happened a few times, hence the picture taking.)
I did attempt to do the responsible Mother thing. After lunch, we walked to the Partners Statue in front of Sleeping Beauty Castle. I asked the Cast Member photographer stationed there if she could please take our picture, and she did. I was prepared to display it here no matter how many chins I had.
However.
It is quite possibly the worst picture of me that anyone has ever taken in my entire almost 40-years of life. I am squinting and I look like a shar pei. It's really scary bad. So you will not see it here ever. Maybe next time I'll get a less horrific picture.
We took the tram back to the parking lot and after the first freeway interchange on our drive home, CS was fast asleep.
I won't turn this blog into nothing but "PerkyMommy's Trips To Disneyland With Captain Stubborn" but I had pictures so I figured I'd tell my story this time.
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2 comments:
OK, I need more background. I take it CS has never actually gone on Toy Story Mania. The older kids have, right? So is he working up the nerve to go on it? I'm trying to figure out if I've not heard the entire story or if I'm just not remembering it.
He's been on it once before. We talked about going on it leading up to that visit but when we got there and stood in line, he said no.
I don't know if he thought it was too hard last time or what.
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