Disneyland!!

Oh what fun it is to be a kid. To run, jump, skip, smile, and laugh around every turn. And the absolute best place to be a kid would be Disneyland. This is the one place on Earth where every person who enters is allowed to smile and skip with excitement for just being there. A place where grown men and women can wear Mickey ears and nobody thinks anything of it. A place where every girl can believe she is a princess and every guy can be the hero. A place that exists just to make you happy. This wonderful place called Disneyland where I got to spend three glorious days.

I left on this magical trip last Thursday with one of my dear friends, Kendra. The thing about us traveling is that we have known each other long enough and gone on enough trips together that we know how each other operate. We know what we like and what we would rather skip. WE left Thursday morning on a plane after wondering around the airport for a good hour and a half. No, we did not do this because we were lost. We wondered around because we had time to kill and figured that we would kill it by getting to know the airport. I can now say that I have walked through every terminal in the Delta section of the SLC airport. Some of the sections more then once. We made it back to our plane just in time to board for our flight to LAX California.

Now the flight there is not terribly long, but you still have time to kill, therefore we did what all little kids would do...we colored Disney Princess pictures of course. The lady next to us thought we were a little weird, but we really didn't care and had loads of fun coloring.

Upon landing we quickly made our way to the restrooms and then to baggage claim to retrieve our luggage. From there we weren't sure where to head but found our way to our Super Shuttle Stop.

If you are one who is traveling without a car and still need to get to a hotel this works out really well. When we got to our hotel (we stayed at the Royal Crowne) our room was not quit ready so we went and laid by the pool. It was so nice just to sit and relax in 72* weather with our feet in the water for an hour or so.

We got our room around 4:30, put our bags in it and decided that there was no time like the present to go to Disneyland. So we ran down the stairs and hopped onto the shuttle bus and rode off to that magical kingdom. When arriving I think I was about as excited as any kid can get. I literally jumped off the shuttle and skipped to the park entrance. We got our bags quickly checked and then picked up our 3-day park hopper passes.

And then came the moment to go to the entrance gate and get our tickets scanned and walk through the turn counter to enter the park. I e\will have you know that I entered that park with a huge smile on my face. We had no plan or agenda, we just started walking and figured we would see where we ended up. I don't think we even looked at a map, we just went. We went under the tunnel and onto Main Street. Past all of the Disney shops and straight to Sleeping Beauty's Castle.

After our picture we didn't actually make it through the castle. We ended up venturing over to Frontier Land. We didn't really have a direction or a plan. We sort of just walked and ended up wherever we ended up. I think we were just so excited about being there that we didn't really care what we did. We just wanted to enjoy Disneyland and enjoy the moment. Our walking lead us into New Orleans Square, past the shops and Mark Twain's cabin. It lead us right to Pirates of the Caribbean. We decided that this would be our first ride of the trip and soon climbed aboard to plunge into the depths of pirate country. We made it through unscathed and then headed to the Haunted Mansion where we were greeted by ghosts galore. After finding our way out of the mansion we decided we were hungry and went in search of food. We ended up at this place.

It is located in New Orleans square and has wonderful food. We got the Steak Gumbo and an order of fritters. Both of which were amazingly delicious. We loved the fritters so much that we ended up getting an order of them the next two days as well. The rest of the evening we hung out in Frontier land and Adventure land. We went on Big Thunder Mountain, Indiana Jones, the Jungle Cruise, Space Mountain (we did cross over there at one point, but came right back after) and then we ended the night by watching Fastasmic.

Friday we started the day off with a wonderful breakfast from our hotel. Then we hoped on the Disney shuttle and headed back to the park. Upon entering we decided to head a different direction from the day before. Once again, we had no plan of action or agenda. We just started walking and figured we would do what we wanted as we came across it. We met Tinkerbell, rode the Matterhorn, went on Space mountain, played in a photo booth, bought fairytale art, went up through Sleeping Beauty's Castle, rode on the Peter Pan ride and Mr. Toad, went on the circus train, walked through Toon Town, had Bengal Barbecue for lunch, went on Indiana Jones and Big Thunder again, found fairytale shops, ate cookies at an awesome bakery, explored New Orleans Square, had Mexican for dinner, found Tiana'a cookbook, and anything else we cam across. Yes, we did end up crossing back and forth across the park a lot, but we had fun along the way and we got to experience things you don't usually do at Disneyland.

On Saturday we started off much the same as Friday. We ate a fabulous breakfast at the hotel then headed off to the parks. This day we did have somewhat of a plan though because we knew that we wanted to visit California Adventures as well as Disneyland. Since that park doesn't open until 10 we went at played at Disney first. This day we kind of just did the things we really wanted to do. We went on the big rides first then walked our way through main street before heading across the way to California Adventures. Once there we went straight to California Screamin and then on to the Toy Story ride. Both of which our on the pier and are extremely fun. From there we headed over to Tower of Terror. Along the way we stopped to meet Chip & Dale and saw the bug show. After the tower we headed off to Soarin. From there we decided to leave the park and check out Downtown Disney. we only stayed here for a little bit because we really didn't want to go shopping. So we headed back to Disneyland and found some hidden Mickey's We had been doing this throughout the trip and decided to find some of the ones on Main Street. We went to the fire house, Steamboat Willie, and through the Abraham Lincoln building. We walked down Main street and looked under shop carts and searched the window display's. We even went on some rides to see if we could take a picture of the ones we had already found. We also went and meet Rapunzel from Tangled.

After that we headed back over to California Adventures because we had tickets to the World of Color show. We had some time before it started so we took a walk down Hollywood Blvd. There we wondered into a shop called Off the Page. This shop is Awesome! Well, it is if you like Disney artwork. This shop has all of the Disney artwork. They have prints on every wall and the ceiling. They also have an on site artist who sketches the characters for you. You can tell him the ones you want and he will draw them for you. We were quite excited about this. It turned out that the artist was not taking anymore requests that day but that during down time they always continue sketching. We were able to go through all of the sketches and found some that we really liked and ending up purchasing. The guy that was helping us with this then told us about the Sorcerers Workshop. He asked us if we had been to the Beast's Library. Kendra and I both just looked at him because we didn't even know that such a place existed. He then told us all about it and we knew that that would be our next stop. It is quite a cool place. You walk in and they have a whole section where they show you how the animation is created. It showed you how to draw Mickey and how to create a character. From there you walk down a stone hallway and enter into the Beasts Library. In here you can find out what Disney character you are most like. After the Library you enter into Ursala's grotto. We didn't spend a whole lot of time here because we still needed to go pick up our food and get to our seats for the water show.

With the tickets that we got food came with it. So we went and picked up our dinner and then went and found our seats. We choose to sit on the second level so that we could still see but weren't too close. We had our dinner and then waited for the show to start. Once it got dark the show started. And let me tell you, it is amazing what they can do with water and color. The show was fantastic. It was full of music, pictures, clips from movies, and all of the magic you would expect Disney to have in a show. It made me smile and just fill so happy and giddy to be there. In essence, you could say that it was magical. And just so you know...we still got wet even though we were on the second level. After the show we went and played in the Bugs Life land. They have some pretty entertaining rides that are quick and fun to ride. Once finished there we headed back to Disneyland to ride some rides and shop some shops. We went back to Fantasy Land and rode a bunch of the little rides again along with the Carousel. From there we took a walk down Main street and got Ice cream, pictures, and souvenirs as we headed out of the park. We rode the shuttle back to the hotel perfectly happy and content. We had been to Disneyland and we had truly enjoyed every moment of it.

On Sunday we stayed in bed a little later and moved a little slower as we got ready to go home. We found that it was pouring rain and then didn't fell so bad that we were going home. We still went down and ate our wonderful breakfast and then packed our bags and hoped on our shuttle back to the airport. This time we checked and then made our way through the California LAX security. And let me tell you, this is quite the feat. It is not easy to get into this airport. Once we made it through we just went and sat in our terminal. We had no desire to walk around this airport, we had already done enough walking in the last three days that we just wanted to sit. We ate lunch, boarded our flight, flew to SLC, got picked up and ended back at home. All in all it was a fantastic trip! One that I can't wait to do again. Good thing I am planning on going back in May.