Disneyland Day 2

We spent most of Thursday May 17th at Disney’s California Adventure Park.  It’s amazing how much they’ve added since I was last there.  We couldn’t go on a lot of the rides with the girls, but the rides they could go on, were a huge hit – especially The Little Mermaid ride.  There was almost no line for that ride when we first got to the park, so we rode it 3 times in a row!

I loved watching Ashilene thoroughly enjoy this ride.  It was so cute to see her point or wave at all the characters and say things like, “Hi Scuttle!” or “Bye Ariel!”  Absolutely precious.

We had a chance to catch the Phineas & Ferb Dance Party.  Ashilene didn’t want to go in the middle to dance with the other kids, but she had fun clapping along from Daddy’s shoulders.  Ashilene had never seen Phineas & Ferb before we saw them at Disneyland, but now she wants to watch them all the time on Netflix.  I don’t know why, but when she wants to watch Phineas & Ferb, it sounds like she’s saying that she wants to watch the “Relax Show”?  She loves talking about how she got to see them at Disneyland.

We enjoyed our Preferred Seating at the Aladdin production, which was very well done.  The cast was very talented and the special effects were fabulous.  I loved watching Ashilene & Kaylana walk hand in hand around the theatre after the show.

The girls had  a lot of fun on the Monsters Inc. Ride before we headed over to a Bug’s Land, which is in honor of the Disney movie, A Bug’s Life.

We weren’t terribly fond of the “It’s Tough to be a Bug!” Show.  It was a little scary with all the special effects and 3D glasses making it look like the bugs were coming right at you.  Towards the end of the show, they announce that the humans need to wait while the bugs exit first and all of the sudden it felt like there really were bugs crawling under my bum!!!!  I literally jumped out of my seat and screamed!  But the rest of Bug’s Land was a lot of fun.  We went on Heimlich’s Chew Chew Train, which was a little train that takes you through all the food that Heimlich has taken a bite out of.  All the food is made to look humongous, so it’s like you’re looking at it from a bug’s perspective.  When we went through the animal cookie box, it actually smelled like animal crackers!   Flik’s Flyers was a cute ride, where you go up and around in hot air balloons made out of leaves.  Ashilene loved Tuck and Roll’s Drive Em Buggies because she got to drive the bumper car.

My favorite ride in Bug’s Land was Francis’ Ladybug Boogie.  With Ashilene’s less than positive reaction to the Teacup Ride in Fantasyland, I wasn’t expecting her to like this ride too much, but she ended up loving it so much that she went on it an extra time with Uncle Rigo.  I love her look of pure joy in this picture.

Disneyland has a lot of super tasty, although crazy expensive food to eat.  We couldn’t resist the smell of freshly made sourdough bread at Boudin’s Bakery.  I indulged in a yummy chinese chicken salad served in a sourdough bread bowl.  Later Ashilene and I split a Fanta float at Paradise Pier.  Mmmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

 

You’ll note the Buzz Lightyear toy in Ashilene’s hand above.  Her favorite ride (other than the Little Mermaid ride) ended up being Toy Story Mania.  It actually was a really cool ride that takes you through the wonderful world of Toy Story, but you get to stop and play 5 games along the way with these little shooters that you have in your car.  You are competing against the other four players in your car as you have opportunities to play carnival type target games.  Ashilene didn’t really hit any of the targets, but she still had an absolute blast and couldn’t stop talking about the Toy Story ride.  At the end of the ride, you exit through the Toy Story Store and Ashilene absolutely fell in love with this Buzz Lightyear doll.  She actually found a lot of Buzz Lightyear toys that she wanted to get, but when forced to choose only one, she picked the doll.  The antennas by his head spin around and light up when you push his legs together.  The cashier was surprised that a little girl would choose a Buzz Lightyear toy over Jessie the Cowgirl or some other “girly” toy.  The line for Toy Story Mania was the longest we had to wait in all three days (45 minutes).  They really need to get a Fast Pass for that ride.  Rojohn, Rigo and Riesel got Fast Passes for the Hollywood Tower of Terror before we got in line for Toy Story Mania and by the time we got out of the ride, it was time for them to use their Tower of Terror passes.  I had absolutely no desire to go on that ride, so I volunteered to stay with the girls (who were looking pretty sleepy) while they went on Tower of Terror.  Ashilene didn’t end up sleeping for very long, but she had a fun time singing Disney songs while Kaylana slept.  Isn’t she a cutie?

After Rojohn, Rigo and Riesel returned from Tower of Terror, I took Ashilene on King Triton’s Carousel.  This is what she looks like when we tell her to say “Cheese.”

Next we went over to the Hollywood Pictures Backlot and got to watch Turtle Talk with Crush from Finding Nemo.  It was a really cool interactive presentation where the animated Crush asks the audience questions and answers their questions as well.  Crush ended up asking me a question about swimming after he named me “Malibu Merilee”.  I thought it was particularly fun that he named me “Malibu Merilee” because years ago when I went to Disneyland, they were having a Beach themed parade and I remember the toy that I picked to bring home as my souvenir from Disneyland was a Malibu Barbie.

After Turtle Talk with Crush, we decided to try and take Ashilene on The Little Mermaid ride one more time before the California Adventure Park closed, but Rigo and Riesel had more things they wanted to check out in the Hollywood Pictures Backlot, so we split up for the rest of the evening.  After riding on The Little Mermaid ride, we decided to head back over to Disneyland, which is open later than the California Adventure Park.

Unfortunately it ended up being super crowded with teenagers.  We found out that they were having “Grad Night” on the Thursday and Friday night that we were there.  The only ride that didn’t have a super long line, was King Arthur’s Carousel, so Ashilene got to ride on her horses again and Rojohn got to try to pull the Sword out of the Stone.  We took a picture in front of the lit up Small World ride (or as Ashilene calls it – the Cuckoo Clock ride) and headed back to the hotel.  It was another long, but incredibly fabulous day at Disneyland.