We went to Splash Mountain next, and were pretty much soaked by the first turn. It was a lot of fun,

If you know anything about me at all, you can probably assume that I was more than excited for our trip to Disneyland. San Diego was spectacular. But for a Disney fanatic like me, Disneyland was the heart of my trip.
The story starts, however, before we even left San Diego. A couple of days before we left, my mom had told us we d be leaving around 6 AM to drive from San Diego to the Best Western in Anaheim. But then, the following day, she said we d be leaving closer to 5 AM to get there at 6:30, check in, and go for the Magic Morning hour at 7. I was confused; weren t extra magic hours reserved for guests staying on property? My mom grinned. She d kept it a secret from us the whole time we were actually going to be staying in the Grand Californian Hotel, one of the Disneyland hotels.
We left the San Diego house at 5 AM and powered through exhaustion to drive the hour and a half to Anaheim. I was so excited that I didn t even care how tired I was; as soon as I saw the Anaheim Convention Center (where they were holding the D23 convention that weekend), I started discount hotel price bouncing in my seat.
We pulled under the expansive discount hotel price awning, had our car valet parked (we wanted discount hotel price it parked underground so we could leave our heavy suitcases inside), and went inside to check in. The hotel is absolutely breathtaking we all spent the first few minutes just looking around, unable to believe we d be staying discount hotel price somewhere so beautiful.
We couldn t access our room right away, but the hotel held our luggage for us so we could go get food (Disney Parks coffee yay!) and head to California Adventure for the early opening. Our hotel had an entrance directly into the Coronado discount hotel price Springs area of California Advenure.
We knew that, based on the popularity, Radiator Springs Racers, a new Cars Land attraction, would immediately fill up. So we booked it to Cars Land first. We were all absolutely amazed discount hotel price by Cars Land it looks exactly like the scenes discount hotel price from the movie!
Radiator Springs discount hotel price Racers is a really cool attraction. Guests climb into a car straight out of the movie to go through the scenic Radiator Springs, tip tractors with Mater, and get a fresh coat of paint or new tires before the big race. What was really fun was that the race is between your car and the car next to yours, so you re racing another group of guests! A randomly selected car wins every time; we didn t win our first race, but we were still completely impressed by the attraction.
After Radiator Springs, we could see the Hollywood Tower Hotel looming in the distance, and since it s one of our favorite Walt Disney World attractions, we knew we had to ride it. We took a detour through It s a Bugs Land, which had some of the most amazing theming I ve ever seen.
I came to a realization as we were walking through Bugs land. My family kept talking about the differences between Disneyland discount hotel price and Walt Disney World. I noticed, though, that we had changed the inflections. While we normally put the emphasis on the word Disney in Disney World and Disneyland, our comparisons were leading us to put the emphasis on World and Land instead. In fact, we re still emphasising the differences in the words, as well as the differences in the parks themselves.
I knew there would be some differences between the Tower of Terror in Disneyland and the one we ve ridden over 50 times in Walt Disney World, but I was unprepared for just how different they would be. For one, the attractions, while decorated the same, are set up pretty differently. The pre-show is the same, but the boiler room is very different. On our first ride through, the cast member gave us our own elevator which is when we decided to debut Flat Andy.
A bit of background: My cousin Ben came with us to Disneyland. His brother, Andy, could not, because of prior obligations. We knew Andy was upset, but we wanted him to know he wasn t forgotten. So my mom decided that we had to take Andy or, rather, a representation of Andy, with us to the parks. Flat Andy was created by cutting out an 8 10 photo of his face and mounting it on a popsicle stick. We didn t tell Andy; we just started discount hotel price taking discount hotel price pictures with Flat Andy , posting the pictures on Facebook, and tagging him.
So anyway, we got our own elevator. My mom pulled out Flat Andy, and he joined us for the most uncommon elevator ride. It was so different from Walt Disney World s tower that the first initial drop got me every time.
After our stay at the Hollywood discount hotel price Tower Hotel (we ended up going once more), we headed over to check out Paradise Pier and go on Toy Story Midway Mania. Midway is one of our favorite WDW attractions, but it always has a ridiculous wait. At California Adventure, though, we didn t see the wait time go above 45 minutes, discount hotel price and on our first trip through we only had to wait about ten minutes. Next, we decided to try something new California Screamin . I was thrilled discount hotel price that the narration is done by Neil Patrick Harris, and it was a great coaster, but the loop got me (I get pretty bad vertigo sometimes some rollercoasters discount hotel price bug me, others are fine). California Screamin was followed up by a trip around Mickey s Fun Wheel, which didn t help the vertigo much the swinging gondolas were pretty cool, though, and I got some really nice pictures once we got to the top.
After that, we had lunch at Boardwalk Pizza/Pasta, and then headed on some smaller attractions, like Ariel s Undersea Adventure. Then we went over to the front of the park, and as we were searching for the Monster s Inc. dark ride, we found a shop called discount hotel price Off the Page that connected with the Animation Academy. My cousin Ben is an artist, so this area was definitely his happy place. We learned discount hotel price to draw Tigger, saw how Pixar uses Zoetropes (sp?) to animate their characters, and traveled discount hotel price through replicas of the Evil Queen s castle, the Beast s library, and Ursula discount hotel price s grotto.
Then, after a brief ride through Monstropolis and a flight over California on Soarin , we decided it was time to go to Disneyland. I for one was ready for some comfort I was still feeling pretty weak from my encounter with Paradise Pier and I was hoping the buildings on Main Street USA would offer some familiarity and good vibes.
I was absolutely right. As soon as I saw the train station, I immediately started to perk up (it could have been the Vitamin Water my mom forced on me, too, but I like to think it was the Disney magic).
Walking on to Main Street was surreal. It felt like home, the same way the entrance to the Magic Kingdom does. But there was one big difference; when you turn the corner near the Emporium in Walt Disney World, Cinderella Castle towers in front of you. Sleeping Beauty Castle, while spectacular in its own way, does not really tower the same way.
Next, we headed to Pirates of the Caribbean. My mom had been checking wait times on her phone, and Pirates queue is almost never over 20 minutes. There are so many differences between DLR s Pirates and WDW s Pirates. For one, DLR s is much longer. It starts in the Bayou which got us excited for our dinner reservation at the Blue Bayou the following discount hotel price evening and then goes through scenes, like a shipwreck, that WDW s Pirates is missing. (I said throughout the trip that I refused to play favorites to me, no attraction is better or worse at either Disney park, it s just different. I enjoyed Pirates in Disneyland just as much as I do in Disney World.)
After Pirates, we crossed New Orleans Square to the Haunted Mansion. It was closed (only briefly), so we went to Splash Mountain for Fastpasses, then headed to Tomorrowland to brave the queue for Space Mountain. Space Mountain is another attraction with many differences; the most notable differences are the double seating and the soundtrack. We had a blast. That first ride was definitely worth the wait.
We still had some time before our Splash Fastpasses, so we decided to see if Haunted Mansion had reopened (it was). One of the most interesting things for me was the stretch room DLR handles discount hotel price theirs differently than WDW (but I m not giving away more than that).
We went to Splash Mountain next, and were pretty much soaked by the first turn. It was a lot of fun, but we were starting to get chilly as the sun went down, so after visiting the Hundred Acre Wood, we headed back to the hotel to change into dry clothes and go to dinner at Downtown Disney.
Our room was ready, so we opened the door and found four Mickey graduation discount hotel price caps, and an envelope for each of us containing a Just Graduated button and a signed photo of Mickey. When booking our hotel, my mom had told the cast member that we had all graduated recently, and the CM made sure our graduations were celebrated. It was such a sweet gesture and really added to the Disney magic that was already winding its way through our minds.
In Walt Disney World, Downtown Disney discount hotel price is separate from the parks; in Disneyland, Downtown Disney is right there, outside the parks. (The front of our hotel was attached to Downtown Disney, the back was attached to California Adventure. It s all in the same area.) We went to House of Blues for dinner (a Downtown Disney must for us), and then shopped for a while before heading back to the hotel it had been quite a long day!
On day 2, we woke up early again (though, not as early) and headed back to California Adventure for another early entrance. We hit Midway Mania first so Ben and TJ could test their skills (and try out some of the tips they d learned from the internet). Then the boys went on California Screamin , but since I didn t want a repeat of the previous day, mom, Kylie, and I went on Ariel s Undersea Adventure.
After that, the park was opening so we decided to try and get Radiator Springs Racers discount hotel price Fastpasses, but the Fastpass line was already really long. Instead, everyone went on Luigi s Flying Tires (basically human air hockey), while I finished my coffee discount hotel price and took pictures. We also decided to do Muppetvision 3D, which was pretty much exactly the same as at WDW, but entertaining and relaxing nonetheless.
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