Tag Archives: MYWTM

Space Mountain!

2 Comments Posted by on March 27, 2011

And now we get to my favorite ride in all of Disneyland–Space Mountain! Space Mountain is one of four Mountains at Disneyland, each corresponding to a thrill ride. Space Mountain is an indoor rollercoaster (as is Big Thunder Mountain and Matterhorn Mountain, while Splash Mountain is a log ride). The cool thing about being inside is that it’s dark so you can’t see the tracks.

According to Standard Research Methodology, Space Mountain opened in 1977. One of my earliest memories of Space Mountain was when I was little but finally tall enough to ride it (I was a very small child), I was really chicken, but I wanted to ride it, so my mom kept saying, “are you sure? are you sure?” and I was like “yeah yeah yeah, I’m totally sure.” So we waited for hours (it seemed, it was probably about an hour) and then at the very last second–very last second meaning sitting in the car–I freaked out and started bawling and refused to go on it. My mother had to stay behind with me and she was livid that we had wasted all that time standing in line for me to chicken out. LIVID.

Ah, the joy of Disney magic.

Anyway, somewhere along the way I found the guts to ride it and it quickly became my favorite. This visit I was with my mom’s group for “Mom’s Night Out” (see Mothers in the Mouseland). We were all keen to go on Space Mountain, since it’s a difficult ride to go on with toddlers (difficult = impossible unless you have someone to ride switch with). Well, not all of us. One of us was pregnant, so SM was out for her. Still, this was that last picture of the whole group before we parted ways.

Look familiar? Thanks for reading!

Space Mountain was completely shut down in 2003, and they dug all the way into the ground to rebuild it. I was hoping they’d put in a new track, maybe something with a loop, but they ended up with the exact same track. That’s kind of the only disappointing thing about Space Mountain, once you learn the track. You bank to the right a LOT.

In the 80’s and 90’s, Space Mountain had this moving walkway that went right to the roof of the mountain. It was all futuristic and cool and stuff, but totally useless because it backed up the queue and they always had it turned off. After the re-do, you walk around the side and schlep yourself up to the roof. You can get some cool pictures up there

Oooooo, it's all glowy and stuff!

One baffling thing about the re-do is that it gets unbelievably hot up there on the roof while you’re waiting. You’d think they would take the opportunity to put in misters, or even just cover the whole thing, but no. In July, you bake.

After a thoroughly uninteresting queue in which you zig zag a number of times, you finally reach the actual mountain building. They let you through in groups, presumably so you don’t back up inside.

What ride are we waiting for again? Oh that's right--Space Mountain

Once inside the building, you descend. So yeah, you climb up to the roof to wait, and then descend to board. There’s not really space at the base of the building for a line, so there ya go.

Hi Kelli!

Inside, there are various monitors with loops talking about the ride and how if you’re pregnant or you don’t like high-speed adventures or shooting into space or whatever, this isn’t the ride for you. Which kind of bites because by the time you’ve made it to the building, you’ve already invested a huge amount of time in line. The inside looks a lot like this:

Boring

Kristin attempted to entertain us with some ballet and yoga moves.

I almost killed myself trying to imitate her. It was bad.

Again with my awesome photography skills.

Back in the olden days, there were darkened windows in the queue where you could actually look into the ride and see space shuttles go shooting by. There was also a viewing area from the Peoplemover. Both of those things let in a lot of light, so originally Space Mountain wasn’t completely dark.

It is now.

Which is pretty awesome.

In lieu of the windows, they installed the above-mentioned monitors. They try to give you a clue as to what your riding experience will be like, but trust me, it’s nothing like this.

Are they shooting lasers or something?

You finally open onto the space port area and get a nice aerial view before you board.

You're almost there--hang on!

After being seated, you move to the launch tube. This is all futuristic and there are black lights, so when you insist that everyone in your group turn around and smile so you can take a picture, their teeth glow.

It's like a freaky Crest commercial

You approach Mission Control, and then off you go.

We haven't actually started yet. Monica needs to get out more.

In the launch tube, the lights start flashing and spinning until you get to the inside of the coaster where it’s completely dark.

This starts spinning and stuff and it's kind of nauseating, actually

When you get to the actual track, the music goes all “Ahhhhhhhhh!!!!!” and then you get a countdown from 10. At 1, you shoot through the entire track, completely gravity-fed. It’s really awesome. There’s also this cool soundtrack that just kicks it up a notch.

At the end of the ride, you get your picture taken. I always try to think of something clever to do, but tend to fall short. However, this time I attempted to take a picture of my own. This is the part where you get your picture taken:

Flashy streamy lights and stuff

When you get off, you can buy your picture for $14.95 for a 5×7. Or you can go all ghetto and take a picture of your picture, like I did.

You're actually supposed to buy this

So there I am, taking a picture of the part where they take a picture of you. I mistakenly thought that the camera was off to the left a bit, so my camera is pointed off to the left, but I later realized that the camera is directly overhead and it’s just the flash that comes from the left.

This is a picture of me taking a picture of the camera taking a picture of me

That is so postmodern, my head exploded.

Tomorrowland , ,

It’s Snack Time–Popcorn and Churros!

23 Comments Posted by on March 10, 2011

Disneyland makes more money on food than anything else. Or at least that’s what someone told me once, but I would totally believe it. I’m not going to eat at all of the restaurants for this blog (unless you want to open up a donation fund for me to eat everywhere), but I am addicted to Disneyland snacks. Well, two really–their popcorn and churros.

Popcorn and Churros are sold from carts conveniently labeled “Popcorn” and “Churros.” Your very first introduction to Disneyland snacks are the popcorn and churro carts on Main Street. After that you will find them scattered throughout the park.

Now, all popcorn is made of corn, fat, and salt, so it shouldn’t be any big surprise that Disneyland popcorn is also made from corn, fat, and salt. However, Disneyland has perfected this snack treat without even making you add your own artificial butter flavoring (which I love, but would be messy at Disneyland). The Disneyland popcorn carts have a large receptacle for popcorn:

You will be shocked to hear that this is where the popcorn comes from

And then the second area is the cash register hidden by a cute little miniature popcorn turner thingy. Well, it would be cute if it didn’t have a clown. Clowns freak me out. Fortunately, these little clowns are trapped behind glass cranking away at their popcorn thingies in perpetuity.

Push, little slave clown--PUSH!

The popcorn cart by the Matterhorn has a little Abominable Snowman instead of a clown. Now THAT is cute.

This past trip to the park, I decided to get a churro to show you all. Churros are awesome. First I had to find a churro cart. Fortunately my friend Kelli knew exactly where one was–this was on the way to Small World.

Hi Kelli!!

The various popcorn and churro carts are subtley decorated to blend in with their location. This churro cart, being near Small World, had very Small World-like styling

It's a churro after all, it's a churro after all...

I should probably take a moment to mention that the churro and popcorn carts all have a little annexed cooler with beverages available at the low low price of a million dollars a bottle (or whatever). Here’s a good tip from Shelby–bring your own water bottle.

ANYway, the churros at Disneyland (I was horrified to find that they were different at the Mouse-in-Law) are frozen, and then they stack them up on one of those heater conveyer belts, like when you were in college eating dorm food and they had the toaster death trap that you put your piece of bread on and then waited a bit and hoped it came out on the bottom in some sort of edible condition? Like that. Except there’s no risk with Disneyland churros, since the little piece of heating machinery is pretty much made precisely to heat up frozen Disneyland churros.

So the toaster thingy heats it up, and the outside of the churro gets this nice crisp that can only come from fried foods that aren’t good for you. Once it comes out of the heater, the cast member drops it into a bin of cinnamon sugar and rolls it around. If you’re me, you ask them to give it a second roll before they hand it to you.

Pour some sugar on me

The thing that horrified me at the Mouse-in-Law was that their churros are not heated fresh before your eyes, and they’re not hand-dipped in the cinnamony-sugary goodness. They’re pre-heated and pre-dipped. I was so disappointed I almost cried. Theo ate it though. He’s not as picky as I am.

Anyway, then they wrap your delicious churro in a piece of paper and off you go! Delightfully crunchy on the outside, deliciously chewy in the middle, hot and sugary.  And if you’re with Theo, you will hear an endless litany of “bite? bite? bite? bite?” until you can physically prove that the churro is gone and there are no more bites to be had.

Oh yeah, come to mama

Seriously, if you ever visit Disneyland, you have to try a churro. I will buy you a churro at Disneyland. If I am not with you at Disneyland, I will Paypal you the money to buy a churro for yourself when you are there.

The churro cart cast member was very nice to me so I’m putting her picture here.

Thanks for the churro!

Happy snacking!

 

 

Stuff To Eat , , , , ,

In the Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki Room

4 Comments Posted by on March 2, 2011

Today was Theo’s first visit to the Tiki Room, officially known as the Enchanted Tiki Room–as opposed to, I suppose, the Tiki Room where the birds don’t sing words and the flowers don’t croon. Sounds like a sucky attraction to me. Good thing we have the Enchanted Tiki Room.

The Tiki Room is sponsored by Dole. The upside of this is that there’s this Dole booth and you can get pinapple spears (my favorite–long chunks of pineapple) and the infamous Pinapple Whip. I’m about to be blasphemous when I say that I’m just not bowled over by the Pineapple Whip. It’s like ice cream but it’s not ice cream–actually it’s a bit more like frozen yogurt. But you can get said Whip outside of the Tiki Room.

There is always a long line for the Dole products. Many people confuse the line for the Pineapple Whip as the line for the Tiki Room. Make no mistake–the Tiki Room does not have a line. If you are wanting to go inside the Tiki Room and you find yourself standing in line, you’re in the wrong place. The line is for Dole items.

If you’re in the mood for Pineapple whip and have 15 minutes or so to kill, and don’t want to wait in the regular line, you can get inside the Tiki room waiting area and there’s the other side of the Dole booth there where you can order what you want without waiting.

This is the other side of the Dole booth, in case you have an insatiable craving for Pineapple Whip and happen to be waiting for the Tiki Room

I will admit that due to some stress reasons (read: toddler meltdown) I did not actually get a picture of the outside of the Tiki Room. Oops. I’ll slip one in later, okay?

Upon entry, you actually sit in a courtyard waiting for your turn to go into the theater.

People wait in the Tiki Room courtyard

Theo (blue shirt, middle) is pretty much convinced that his mother has left him. What kind of mother does that???

The cute thing about the Tiki Room waiting area is that there are statues around that animate themselves periodically. They are supposed to represent gods or goddesses of one thing or another, though it’s not always clear what they’re talking about.

Pele, the goddess of fire and volcanoes. Also soccer.

Finally, the doors to the theater open. Apparently Walt envisioned this being a dinner theater show. He must have been on crack or something because seriously, you couldn’t fit more than 10-12 tables in this room.

When the doors open, step inside.

We got seated and Theo became immediately upset. He’s not a fan of the dark, and while the room itself wasn’t terribly dark, compared to the sun outside it was. Also, I dressed him in a long-sleeved shirt and it turned out to be kind of hot, so he wasn’t particularly thrilled with that either.

First of all, there’s a bit centerpiece of flowers and stuff.

Flowers and stuff

Then the birds wake up. There are four main birds, one for each branch of the audience, which is sort of a cross shape. Also, there’s no flash photography, so these pictures are going to be totally awesome.

The birds light up and speak. Photography is limited.

Once the individual birds do their comedy spiel, other birds jump in and they all sing their signature song. I think the Tiki Room song is probably the 3rd most recognizable song at Disneyland. Numbers 1 and 2 being Small World and It’s A Pirate’s Life For Me, respectively.

All the birds sing words...

The centerpiece in the middle (imagine that–a centerpiece in the middle!) turns into a fountain and lights up and white birds descend from the heavens above to sing a song.

Can't you just hear the choir of angels?

Theo was particularly fascinated by this part.

I'm 2 years old and these bird things are kind of tripping me out

"Let's all sing like the birdies sing--tweet, tweet tweet, tweet tweet"

The audience is invited to sing along. Some of us are more enthusiastic than others.

At one point, it starts to “rain” outside and there’s thunder and lightning, and for some reason this naturally leads into the columns in the room bursting out into song.

Their eyes move too. It's a little bit creepy.

Also, at some point, the flowers sing. Or should I say croon? These are kind of like a hyped-up wedding centerpiece on crack. If wedding centerpieces were animatronic or something. These flowers actually remind me of Little Shop of Horrors (bop she-bop), so I always feel a bit uneasy wondering if they are going to eat me.

These guys whistle

The Tiki Room show takes aobut 10-13 minutes and is quite cute. It’s air-conditioned, so if you’re looking for a place to rest your feet and also hear singing flowers at the same time, the Tiki Room is the perfect attraction for you.

Self-portrait!

Adventureland , ,

More About Character Pictures at the Mouse-In-Law

4 Comments Posted by on February 25, 2011

Character pictures are awesome. I have long loved them. They can be tough to get at times, like this time at Disneyland, but the characters are so great. And right off the bat, one big difference we noticed between Disneyland and the Mouse-In-Law is that at WDW, the characters are everywhere and are always out. At Disneyland, probably because it’s smaller, the characters generally appear and disappear on a schedule I am too lazy to figure out. At the Mouse-In-Law, you can’t swing a cat without hitting a character. Which was pretty cool.

Not that you should be swinging at cat at any theme park. Disney does have a kennel for that.

One thing I particularly love about the Disney characters is how good they are with scared children. I mean, I kinda get where the kids are coming from, meeting a mute giant anthropomorphic animal-type thing with an oversized head in an exaggerated expression of joy. When you’re like 2 feet tall, I get it. And there certainly are kids who burst out in tears at the approach of a character, which can be almost as frustrating as getting that ever-elusive Santa picture.

But the characters are great at approaching in a non-threatening way. I’ve got some wonderful pictures of Theo’s first meeting with Mickey last year along those lines. If the kids don’t want a hug or to get close, the character will offer a high-five, or sometimes just hold out their hand for the kid to touch or look at or sniff if the kid happens to be a dog. We had a fantastic experience with Donald Duck along those lines that I will show you in just a second.

First I want to say that pictures at Epcot were perfect because Mickey and friends were in a single room and there was an inside line with tv’s showing cartoons. Awesome. This was where we took our character pictures.

So for Donald, we sent Theo on his own and he was kind of freaked out. Upon approaching Donald, Theo decided that clearly the next logical move would be to give Donald a hug,  give Donald a high five, get near Donald in any way,   sit down on the ground somewhat near Donald. Rather than going over to Theo and looming over him like some kind of freakishly large oddly-attired duck, Donald simply sat down on the ground too.

Have a seat on the ground? Don't mind if I do!

Theo was a fan, and thus willing to entertain the idea of the giant-thing-on-tv-that-just-came-to-life-OMG-is-it-a-zombie? sitting near him.

The ground's pretty comfortable, isn't it?

And then we got a simply darling picture.

Donald is my friend! And he likes to sit on the ground just like me!

We then coaxed Theo into actually making contact with Donald and giving him a high-five. Actually, Theo learned from his swimming teacher that a “high-five” is a two-step procedure with an open-handed slap following by a fist bump accompanied by a “BOOYAH!” He is now very confused when he gives someone a high-five and then sticks out his fist and they don’t pound it. He’s not quite sure why most people aren’t familiar with proper high-five technique.

Theo is trying to give Donald a fist bump. Donald continues with the "slap me five" completely unawares

Following the positive Donald experience, Theo was ready for the Ultimate Cute with Minnie.

MINNIEEEEEEEE!!!!!

Prior to both Minnie and Donald, we attempted to take the family picture thing. The lighting was a little odd with Pluto here.

It's technicolor Pluto

And there’s also the unfortunate timing shots. Despite what it looks like, I can assure you that Kevin is not stoned in this picture.

Say Nope to Dope and Ugh to Drugs!

Once again, we didn’t have an autograph book, so I’ll have to do that here at home.

Characters, Mouse-In-Law , ,

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