8 December 2003

Today was our first day visiting Disneyland ... we bought a 4 days for the price of three type park-hopper pass, so we wouldn't feel like we'd have to rush through seeing everything and making purchases. It works out to be just under USD30.00 per person per day, and it's one of those passes that you can get through the hotel you're staying at, or at the tourist information office nearby ...

Our trek around the Disneyland Park was fairly haphazard in its path, and it began at what we thought might've been the most craptastic (Decay's word for the moment) ride of the lot ... welcome to the attraction known as ... Autopia! Erm... it involved cars, on tracks, going v e r y slowly... ahh well, the only way is up, after this, isn't it? We did arrive right on time for the gates to the original part of Disneyland, but then we had to wait within the Main Street USA part until they decided to open up the rest of the park ... sort of like they wanted to build up enough of a crowd before they let everyone loose... or something?

What else did we visit? In the order that we didn't visit in (because I can't remember), and commentary where appropriate...

Mickey's Toontown:

• Gadget's Go Coaster - It was... a bit wussy? for a roller coaster... But then again, it was part of Toontown, which just seemed a bit more little-kid-like... it lasted all of ... 15 seconds ... actually, 30, says Decay, but it took about 15 seconds to reach the top of the first drop point

• Indiana Jones Adventure - After a really quite long walk through a well-designed walk-through area, we finally get to the ride bit of the attraction. It was pretty good (:

• Haunted Mansion - This actually took on the 'Tim Burton's Nightmare Before Christmas' theme instead of the normal Haunted Mansion thing, and it was pretty kewl ... Decay liked the nightmare before christmas thing muchly (:
• Pirates of the Caribbean - the movie's better (:

• The Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh - Umm... yes?
• Splash Mountain - only Decay rode this one because I didn't feel like getting super-soaked ... What happened? Um... I missed taking a picture of a hummingbird, and Decay got whacked on the eye by a flying hat ... Not fun. He didn't hear any pre-ride warning about people needing to secure/take off any items that might be loose, so as to prevent injury ...

• Autopia - see above?
• Innoventions - This became the most craptastic ride, and upon walking in, we soon discovered the reason why the lines to this attraction were so ... short ... it was ... product placement city! we couldn't even get proper internet access in there - we read rantspace via the google cache, and we couldn't post or check email ... as an aside, we haven't actually been missing the lack of internet access ... it's something Decay and I consider as just being there...
• StarTours - the moving ride illusion thingies here leave the Melbourne Aquarium ride for dead ...

• Matterhorn Bobsleds - I liked this one - good fun (:

After this funness... we crossed over to California Disney, and did a few of the rides... the Maliboomer is a shoot some people up in the air in some seats that you've been buckled into securely, complete with wind shield ... it was good fun (: We also did Mulholland Madness, a permanent Mad Mouse kind of rollercoaster-ling (good), and Tuck and Roll's Drive'Em Buggles, which were the slowest Dodgem Cars known ... Jim Henson's Muppet Vision 3D ... very kewl, and so muppety, complete with polaroid 3D-Vision glasses ... they made mey eyes go a bit funny though ...

After all this fun-ness, we walked through some more of Downtown Disneyland, and then attempted to find non-fried food for some dinnery sustenance ... yeesh. We watched some fireworks, and then we had some food that wasn't fried (;

9 December 2003

Today, we decided to tackle some more of Disneyland California... the first attraction we saw was "Soarin' over California", which was also our first encounter with who we'll call "the Wooh Guy" ... this was one of those rides where you get strapped into a seat, which moves as the projected image in front of you changes ... it was pretty good for a first ride of the day ... the Wooh guy seemed to enjoy it lots too ... he waved at the people in the projected image, and Woohed lots ... especially at the swoopy dippy bits ... the roller coaster - California Screamin' - was the ride we went on lots ... left the Mulholland Madness ride for dead *grin* ... Although he was on the rollercoaster at around the same time we were, I didn't hear the Wooh guy going off, because there was much screaming coming from others on the rollercoaster at the same time...

We only spent the morning and part of the early afternoon at Disneyland California, and then went to Downtown Disneyland for a bit... then we decided that doing some laundry while there is a laundrette would be a good idea. We met a couple of mothers doing their families' laundry while the kids/husbands were doing the Disneyland thing, and we talked for a bit - small-talk type things like where are you from, how long are you staying, what did you like at Disneyland, except that I missed a bunch of this because I was taking the suitcase back to our room ... I did come back and then they found out that Decay and I are on our honeymoon, which started off another wave of conversation about where they spent their honeymoons (one of them spent their honeymoon at Disneyland also), and wishing us good luck on our new life ...

After all that domestic fun and happiness, we decided to attempt to take a bus to the local Mall ... we'd just missed a bus, and after waiting well past when the next one should've arrived, we gave up and took a taxi (about 12.00) instead ... the Block at Orange is the big shopping centre out here... it's about the size of the new Knox Ozone, with sort of the same mix of shops ... outdoor setting with restaurants and snackier/takeaway food outlets interspersed with clothing and accessories, a cinema complex, and a skate park ... we managed to get some Doc Martens sandals for both of us at a pretty good price, and a new cap and some pants for Decay ... And we managed to find some food that wasn't fried! Yay! Wolfgang Puck was our choice for the night ... strange mix of music in a room that was a bit loud because of the high ceiling that wasn't padded out with non-sound-reflectivey stuff, and lots of talking on all the tables ... We found out what rapini is, and discovered that it tasted pretty good - peppery and green...

It was a relatively early night, because we'd booked tickets to visit Universal Studios the next day ...

10 December 2003

Today began early - an 8:15am bus to collect all the people on the various tours offered by the company we booked with. For today, Decay was known as Mr Droidy - the hotel booking was made in my maiden name, so the tour booking was made under the same name since we were just putting the tickets on the room tab to be paid at the end... after our joking about that we'd switch surnames after we got married, it's happened inadvertently (:

The trip there was ... I don't know - I was asleep for most of it ... the whole waking up thing isn't my cup of tea at the moment... we arrived, and Universal Studios was all ... dead-like... we're having a dodgy hit rate on our first ride choices lately - the 'Back to the Future' ride was feeling a bit dated ...

What else did we see? the Waterworld attraction was better than the movie (not that it was that difficult), the souvenirs were ... mostly crap, and we have found out what happened to Pissweak World - it's turned into 'The Mummy Returns Chamber of Doom' ... What we found was the better stuff was the Universal Studios equivalent of Downtown Disney, known as Universal City. Hot Topic was where we found much Goth/Punk Hello Kitty stuff, and a cute black/tartan pleat skirt for the 'gothic lolita without the makeup' droidy thing ... Decay considered getting some boots with buckles and stuff, but then we worried about the weight and hassle of getting them through the airport...

Tomorrow? Not sure yet ... looks like we might catch a bus to Downtown LA and have a look-see about by ourselves... we pick up our hire car on Friday, so Decay will be wanting to practice driving on what feels like the wrong side of the road ... I don't really feel up to driving here at the moment, so it looks like I'll be in charge of finding a decent radio station to listen to on the way to Vegas ...