Disneyland -- the magic kingdom. The place of fake reality
and real fantasy.
Those are pictures out the window of the submarine ride, if
you hadn't guessed.
As you can see, we arrived at Disneyland for our "Magic Morning" at
7:30am. You get a Magic Morning when you buy a ticket package
and it allows you to enter the park two hours before it
regularly opens. Not everything is running but the big
attractions are all open so you can get in shorter lines
then the people who come later.
Here is the Matterhorn as seen from a car in Autopia.
My the time we made it to Toon Town, the crowds
had started to build.
Toon town is fun but is generally very crowded because the
little kids and their families mass here.
There was space, though, from a hug from Tim's favorite
character.
(Can you tell whether it's Chip or Dale?)
For my kids (5 and 7 years), their favorite thing in Toon
Town is Mickey's House. You wander through Mickey's house
until you come to the barn where they are "filming" one
of Mickey's movie classics. Small groups are ushered into
a room with Mickey for something like a private audience
with The Mouse himself. It's really neat to have such
an intimate meeting with Mickey in the large and
crowded park. Here is a hug for John from The Mouse.
Next door (keeping everything proper) is Minnie's house.
The adventurers in the family
headed for Tom Sawyer's island
. If I win the lottery, I'm going to build an island like
this in my back yard.
A ride on the paddle wheel
took us by the updated "back island" displays.
If you haven't been to Disneyland for a few decades you
would notice very little changed. But there are a few
"updates".
Two of my favorites are the settler's cabin that still
burns but it isn't an Indian attack any more. It's now
a careless settler who started his own fire and is tragically
threatening a bald eagle's nest that's next to the cabin.
The Indians are no longer warriors hiding in the
trees, but are villagers with their own culture.
The three days at Disneyland ended on Friday before Memorial
Day weekend. The park got fuller and fuller.
In keeping with the holiday, we caught the Lincoln exhibit.
I found it notable that there were 3 plus hour lines for the
roller coasters and amusements but there was no waiting
to see Abraham Lincoln tell us how, if America has any
enemy to fear, it is the complacency of American's themselves.
