Disney California Adventure.

Blogged with Flock

I spent the entire day today with my friend Mike C at Disney's California Adventure theme park (the 2nd theme park at the Disneyland Resort). The park is located in Anaheim which is about an hour or so away from where I live. You can see photos on my flickr account. It was a bit overcast and cooler than expected, but I had fun. Mike had an extra 2nd-day ticket from a previous visit earlier this month and I took advantage of the opportunity. The normal $56 single day 1-park admission is just a little too steep for me to just blow on a whim if you know what I mean. Call me cheap, but ...

The day began with us arriving shortly after the park opening at 10:00am. Somehow we got stuck at the furthest parking lot that was actually off property and a good 3-4 blocks away! There was some kind of cheerleading competition going on as well and there were hundreds of girls of various ages swarming everywhere - matching hair extensions, ribbons and bows galore! The first ride was the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror. I immediately got ill after the 3-4 drops in the ride. I also kept one comparing it (and the whole experience) to the original ride and the bigger park in Orlando, FL. IMHO, the Orlando experience is much bigger and better. Anyway, Mike probably heard it so much, he zoned it out. Bless his heart. ;-0 We also wanted to take advantage of their 'Fast Pass' system where you can get advanced placement in a special line when you came back to an attraction at a specified time. All you need is your original entrance ticket to use at a special 'Fast Pass' machine. By the time it came to use our 1st attraction pass, Mike lost his entrance ticket. This was only about 2 hours into the day!!! BLESS HIS HEART, INDEED! I was totally over the whole experience by then but I just kept on going. It was FREE after all, right?

The day continued on and we saw a 3-D Muppet Movie which was cute. We also saw some kind of film about the history of California that was dramatized with Whoopi Goldberg as some kind of ethereal host / character taking part in key point in the past (original indians, the gold rush, asian immigration, etc.). I walked away from it with a sense of, "Why did I sit through and watch this piece of California propoganda?" The whole think just came across as being just a bit too schmaltzy for me. After the movie there was an outdoor performance selected songs from HIGH SCHOOL MUSICAL 2. Halfway through that, we noticed that were the only 2 adult males watching the show WITHOUT little children in tow. LOL. I didn't care -- the dancers and singers were cute. Oh yeah -- we were standing behind Gelman (from the KELLY AND REGIS SHOW) in the crowd. It appeared he was with his family and kids and they had some kind of VIP escort shuffling them around. We silently stalked him on that side of the park for a little while.

The day, as a whole, was a nice break from the norm - I normally don't get Saturdays off. Too bad the weather wasn't nicer. We probably would have spent more time there. Maybe next time.