Happy Monday from Los Angeles. I can’t believe I’ve already been here over a week! It’s been really great to spend a ton of time with my BFF David who I’m staying with and I’ve been able to catch up with a bunch of other friends who live in the LA area. Between seeing friends, Disneyland and work I’ve been keeping pretty busy out here.
Even though I’m working remotely while I’m here it’s been such a treat to have a break from my home routine. It’s felt like a well deserved vacation after a super stressful winter of studying.
Disneyland
When I knew I was going to be staying in LA for two weeks, I also knew David and I had to do a multi-day Disneyland trip. We’re both HUGE Disneyland fans and have gone every single time I’ve been here to visit. The first few times I came to LA we did an epic 3-day stay so we could ride every ride at both Disneyland and California Adventure… multiple times The past few times we’ve just done super speedy 1-day trips to Disneyland which means we don’t get to do everything and it feels kind of rushed with both parks.
So, this time around we did another epic 3-day Disneyland vacation and stayed on-site at the Disneyland Hotel. The whole Disneyland complex isn’t very big, so staying on-site is super convenient because you can walk through Downtown Disney to the parks.
One of the coolest things that happened to us is got to skip the line on both Space Mountain (now called Hyperspace Mountain) and Star Tours… and this all happened in a 1 hour span.
On Space Mountain the person in front of us took a while to get out of the seat. The gate closed and the car moved away before I could get on the ride… and David was already buckled in, ready to go. The super nice ride attendant let us go on again without waiting in line since we got separated the first time.
After our double Space Mountain experience we stopped to get some snacks at this stand in Tomorrowland that sells fresh Pineapple. So good. We ended up chatting with a cast member and he asked if we wanted to go on Star Tours and skip the line. Uh yes! We then got “Honorary Citizens of Disney Pins” as well.
Wearing my pin and holding a loaf of sour dough bread. There’s a delicious sour dough bread factory in California Adventure as an homage to San Francisco. We decided to buy a loaf so we had something to snack on throughout the day. It also was delicious as toast the next morning.
The not so cool part of Disney? I got stuck on Pirates of the Caribbean for over 20 minutes. David wanted to meet some of the Star Wars characters so we divided and conquered, and of course I got stuck on the ride all by myself. Hearing Yo-Ho-Yo-Ho for 20 minutes straight was… interesting.
Disneyland is currently celebrating it’s 60th Anniversary so there were a number of fun special things at the park in honor of this anniversary. David and I were kind of obsessed with the new Paint the Night Parade. It felt totally reminiscent of the classic Main Street Electric Parade.
I’m always SO impressed with how accommodating Disney is regarding food allergies. At home I’m not paranoid about accidentally eating something with dairy in it, I’m lactose intolerant so it’s not going to kill me. While I’m traveling, though, I’m super cautious about it. Disney is not the time and place to test out how much dairy I can handle.
Every Disney restaurant has an allergy menu that lets you know which items your can eat. They’ll also send out a chef if needed to walk you through your best options. I know my dairy issues aren’t severe, but can only imagine what a big sigh of relief it is to someone with far more life threatening allergies.
I’ve always been curious about how much walking you actually do in Disneyland. It’s a ton of standing around and walking from one side of the park to the other. According to my phone we walked roughly 13 miles each day, which is kind of insane when you think about it. I don’t know if that’s 100% accurate, but did I have my GPS going in Disney World a few years back and it also tracked over 10 miles of walking. No wonder I’m exhausted at the end of the day at Disney.
And last but not least? We got to see one of the feral cats of Disneyland while waiting in line for Thunder Mountain. Apparently it’s not super common to see them.
Question: Any other Disneyland/ Disney World fanatics out there? What’s the coolest thing that’s ever happened to you at Disney?
You know I’m a total Disney Princess 🙂 Funnily enough, I’ve only been to Land once when I was very young, we’re World people (13 times so far and really due for another- #sorryimnotsorry). I feel for you with getting stuck on the ride. When I was little, I would freak if a ride even paused for a few minutes. I still get jittery but no tears anymore. My dad, sister, and I once got stuck on the Jurassic Park ride at Universal. It ended up breaking and we had to be evacuated. Half an hour of the raptor cage “crashing” down on us was headache-inducing. Thank goodness they then turned it off. Coolest Disney experience, hmmm… when I was younger and my sister was too small for many rides, we learned about the parent switch which is when you wait on line and go on the ride with one parent (other parent stays with too small child) and then you get to get right back on with your other parent- so much fun & lets you do all the rides with both of your parents!
Before my friend moved here I had only been to Disneyland twice– Disney World is the obvious choice from New York.
It’s really sad that I kind of wanted to get evacuated to see the inner workings of the ride…