The Most Beautiful Woman in the World and I picked up our friend, A, and her daughters, H and M, at about 5:00 Thursday morning. We drove to the Mouse House West, arriving at about 10:30 or so and parking in the parking structure that was erected when California Adventure was planned to encroach on the old parking lots west of Disneyland’s Main Entrance. We must have planned things just right, because the parks were not very crowded at all – in fact, on Thursday, we managed to ride Grizzly River Rapids several times in a row for a lack of line, and the girls enjoyed themselves on the Nature Challenge Trail in relative solitude.

TMBWitW, A and I just walked around enjoying the weather (around 80°, thanks for asking. Compared to 115° in the Valley of the Sun.) and I would go on the rides with the girls that their mother or my wife wouldn’t go on.

We hit the Tower of Terror first – the girls loved it, I got a kick out of the negative gees, and the ladies just watched from a distance. We got pretty decent seats in the Hyperion Theater, to watch Alladin, then we wandered over to Paradise Pier to find out why California Screamin’ wasn’t running – refurbish! What a bummer. I was really looking forward to riding that one.

We made up for the lack of a full loop by going on the Matterhorn, Space Mountain, Indiana Jones, and the Jungle Cruise the next day. OK, the Jungle Cruise isn’t a coaster, and IJ isn’t really one either, but the wisecracks from the one and the whiplash from the other were more than worth the price of admission. The rest of the day was spent on Pirates of the Caribbean, eating lunch at the Blue Bayou (try the Monte Cristo – first rate!), and watching Fantasmic.

Saturday was spent shopping in Downtown Disney. Much money. Much, much money. We ate lunch at the Whitewater Café, located behind the pool at the Disney Grand Californian hotel. From where we were sitting, we could see the bear at the entrance to the Grizzly River Rapids. We can’t afford to stay at this hotel, just eat there. Occasionally. We stayed at the Holiday Inn on Walnut, and our rooms overlooked the parking garage at Disneyland. If we could have figured out a way to walk over to the tram, we would have been set. As it turned out, we drove and parked every day.

We pulled out of Anaheim (after filling up at $2.85/gallon) about 3:30, and we pulled up at A’s house around 9:00. We are very happy with the mileage – the car still had over a quarter tank when we arrived at both ends.
Lots of pictures – I’ll try to post them over the next week or so.