An Up Day

I headed out solo early this morning to meet former flute student Amy for a 3 hour visit to Disneyland.

We were on a quest for Hidden Mickeys.

Our first assignment: locate the Hidden Mickey in the Alice in Wonderland ride.

We had been through this ride several times on a fruitless search for the pesky thing. I finally googled it and came up with this.

Once you know where to look, it is not hard to spot.

Can you find Mickey in this painting near the Mark Twain dock?

There he is on the lower deck, hanging out with the ladies:

This mouse-shaped lock is located in the exit of Pirates of the Caribbean.

We spotted several more "Mickeys" throughout the park, and had a thoroughly grand time in the process.

On our way out we spotted this:

The "Up" house was on the Esplanade.

Speaking of Up, after Amy and I said our good-byes, I went home to practice, then Bob and I headed to the theater to see the latest Pixar offering.

It was marvelous.

Bring your tissues...

What Exactly Will You Be Celebrating?

Disneyland has an excellent promotion going on in 2009 called "What Will You Celebrate?"

If you come to Disneyland on your birthday, you get in FREE.

THAT'S a good deal.

The celebrating doesn't stop there. You are encouraged to celebrate True Love, Triumphs, Reunions, and First Visits.

The resort is decorated with balloons and looks very cheerful.

The characters are there to celebrate with you (I'm not necessarily calling Disneyland Band Director Art Dragon a character):

I was more than a little taken aback, then, when one of the first displays I saw in a shop window on Main Street featured this:

What exactly is THIS guy celebrating?

Disneyland Dream Time Event

Tuesday found Bob and me at the Disneyland Resort. We were there to celebrate Bob's birthday.

We got a special treat right off the bat; this amazing parking place right next to the escalator:

The parks were decked out in their Halloween Time finery:

The birthday boy enjoyed lunch at his favorite eatery:

Although the park in general was not very crowded, there was a line to the Winnie the Pooh ride. I was all for bailing, but Bob quietly insisted that he wished to wait (he knows I really like the ride). As we exited our ride vehicles we were suddenly pounced upon by the Dream Squad. In a flash we were proud possessors of a Year of a Million Dreams "Dream Time Event" passes:

These passes allowed us to stay in Disneyland for an hour after everyone else left! We've never gotten anything from the Dream Team before, and were extremely tickled by this special birthday gift.

At 8pm as the park was closing to the rest of the guests, the 3,000 people with Dream Passes were escorted into a special area near Big Thunder Ranch. There we were entertained by Clark as the park was cleared of those not blessed with Dream Time passes:

Special guests Minne and Mickey were on hand to send us off into a now deserted park:

Although going on the rides was cool, the best part of the experience was the empty streets:

Here we are at the end of our day after riding the last Finding Nemo sub of the night:

What an amazing thing it was that the entire park stayed open just for us!

Thanks, Dream Team!


flickr photostream here!

Duck And Cover

Bob and I had a really lovely afternoon at Disneyland. You can see my flickr photo set here.

As we were leaving we got an added bonus:



Yes, that is an F-18 flying over the Mickey and Friends parking structure.


We are assuming that it was doing a fly over with full after burners before the Angels game just a few miles away.

It was LOUD.

We were prepared to Duck and Cover.



Just in case...

Beautiful Spring Day at Disneyland

Bob and I have been Disneyland Annual Passholders since we began dating almost 4 years ago.

We chose not to fool around before marriage, so we needed something that we could do together during our engagement.

Disneyland fit the bill.

We both still enjoy our trips to the park.

Unfortunately, I got sick the day after Christmas with a lingering malady that plagued me until right before my February recital.

Then Bob got shingles.

On Monday Bob came home from an early meeting and said, "Let's go to Disneyland!"

He didn't have to ask twice.

I quickly abandoned the laundry I was doing, donned a hat to cover my non-hairdo, gave the make-up the day off, and headed to the car with my honey.

It was Spring Break for someone or other so the park was a bit full.

We didn't care.

We came to enjoy the beautiful spring afternoon.

You think my (Muni Band) shirt is loud?

Check out our Muni Band colleagues Mark, Tim, and Kurt:

Now that's loud.

Kurt even gets to sing with Mary Poppins!

Bob and I soon made our way over to Rancho del Zocalo Restaurante.

It is tucked right next to Big Thunder Railroad and is seldom overrun with mouse-eared hordes.

I like the tostada salad:

It makes me smile:

The ride wait times were longer than we cared for, so we strolled over to California Adventure.

I wanted to see the new Pixar Parade (Bob sucked it up and agreed to watch it because he loves me).

It was actually adorable:

I love the Incredibles:

Aren't these guys the coolest?

The floats squirted water and blew bubbles:

To infinity and beyond!

After the parade we made our way back to our car (and hiked all the way to the top of the parking structure on the unmoving escalator!), content to ride the rides on another day.

Bob is out of town most of this week.

I miss him.

That's why we are so grateful for our beautiful spring afternoon at the Disneyland Resort!

Enchanted Afternoon

After our alarming early wake up on Wednesday, we weren't in any hurry to get out and about. Mid afternoon found us at the AMC theaters in Downtown Disney to take in "Enchanted" (yes, my husband is a prince!). We enjoyed the beautiful theater and entertaining film.

We stopped for a light dinner at Ralph Brennan's Jazz Kitchen, then hopped on the monorail for a quick trip to Disneyland. The previous evening, while the rain was coming down in torrents, we stood in line for "It's a Small World" figuring we would be dry during the 15 minute ride. Sadly, (or providentially in Bob's view) the ride completely failed in a way the cast members had never seen before and we were turned away (we just went on and found Nemo figuring that we couldn't get any wetter underwater).

Wednesday we returned to Small World and successfully rode it for probably the last time until it re-opens in October after a 9 month overhaul.

We considered viewing Fantasmic, but weren't really in the mood for crowds so we hopped into our car and made it back to our hotel in time to view the fireworks from our room once again.


We had a lovely night's sleep interrupted too early by a rogue phone call. It seems there are way too many kids staying at the hotel with way too much unsupervised time on their hands who choose to entertain themselves via the phone and alarm systems.

We are still chuckling over our many misadventures (wait until you hear about our dinner at Tortilla Jo's!), but are grateful for the hilarious memories we've taken away from our little getaway to Disneyland.

Fireworks

Bob and I just watched the Disneyland fireworks show from the comfort of our room. We've never done that before!

A Disney Rest

With Bob's wonderful mom Nellie safely home after her lovely week's stay with us, Bob and I are making our way to Disneyland for a bit of rest before joining my family in Atascadero for Christmas.

No, we can not afford to stay at the Grand Californian Hotel. We will be staying at a hotel nearby.

It's supposed to be rainy, so you will find us snuggled up in our suite watching HGTV (since we don't get it at home) after venturing out to the Magic Kingdom.

I'm not sure if I'll blog while we're gone, but I will (of course) take some pictures.

And hey, if you're going to be in the Disneyland neighborhood let us know. Maybe we can ride Indiana Jones together!

Ornamental Quest

As I unpacked our Christmas ornaments the other day I realized that we were lacking something. We've made a point of getting a dated ornament from Disneyland every year. This year...oops!

Fortunately we were able to hop in the car yesterday and make a brief but refreshing trip to the Magic Kingdom to do some ornament shopping.

Of course, most of the dated ornaments have been gone since October. We did, however, find a really attractive 2007 mirrored snowflake to hang on our tree.

We enjoyed a relaxed lunch at our favorite restaurant and then, without riding a single ride, jumped back in the car went on to the auto body shop to try to get the shoddy work on the interior dealt with. More on that later.

Meanwhile, I am grateful for the little piece of fun we had during our ornamental quest.

A Zippity Do Dah Day

My birthday is this Saturday.

Since Bob will be working in Rancho Mirage and I will be taking several APU flutists to the James Galway Master Class in Malibu, we spent the day at Disneyland yesterday to celebrate in advance.

We happened upon our friend Kurt conducting the Disneyland Band:

Muni Band colleagues Tim and Chris were also present:

Since I am known as Aunt Doda, the band played Zippity Do Dah in honor of my birthday.

That was cool!

It was a truly beautiful day. The skies were clear and the air was warm.

The castle has its new snow overlay (it is especially breath taking at night):

We had lunch at our favorite "casual dining" restaurant:

The canoes were in operation.

Who could pass up an opportunity like that?

I can't remember the last time I was in one of these:

About half way around, I wondered what I was doing in the canoe. That rowing is hard work!

We had a wonderful, laid back day strolling through the park and taking in the sights.

Now, refreshed and renewed, it's back to work!