Part IV: June-September 2013

Chapter 95
Goin’ Home

Previous Post | Next Post
Table of Contents

(Originally posted November 7, 2013)

June 1-2, 2013

Saturday night, Tracy and her mom, aunts, and cousins had a “girls night” to paint wine bottles and beer glasses at a place down in Denver. She made a nice Stupey Doodle wine bottle and these cool peacock beer glasses.

Tracy was on her way back from Denver pretty late in the evening, but we really wanted to go to Dairy Queen before the trip was over. A little backstory: we have several Dairy Queens here in SoCal, but Tracy’s favorite thing to get there is a chocolate cone dipped in the cherry sauce that makes a hard shell. We tried going to/calling the 5 closest DQs to us one night earlier this month, and none of them had cherry dip. We had started to be afraid that it didn’t exist in CA. Now, we knew that the DQ in Colorado had cherry (because that’s where she had gotten it for years) and tonight was our last chance to get it for dessert before going back.

I was with my mom for dinner, and as she drove me back, I asked if we could quickly stop at Dairy Queen. We arrived at the restaurant right as it was about to close and I secured the ice cream, getting it to-go. When Tracy returned from painting glasses in Denver, she had her cone waiting for her.

The funniest part about this whole mission is that right after we got back to CA, we happened to try one last Dairy Queen in Irvine, and they had cherry dip. So now we can get it whenever Tracy has the craving.

When Sunday arrived, we were amazed how quickly our trip had gone even though we had been in CO for about 10 days. Of course, we had to do another photo shoot with Stewy before leaving.

As we got ready to drive to the airport, Stupey Doodle jumped into the passenger seat. She wanted to come with us (which would be fine by us!)

We drove the rental car to the airport and got all ready for our flight. We were actually bringing Steve’s WDW Monorail Play Set home with us because he said we could borrow it to put up around our Christmas tree this year. I think we must be the only people to ever fly TO Disneyland carrying on a Monorail Play Set…

For some reason, the terminal at the airport was an absolute madhouse. The geniuses who assigned the gates had decided to put five flights that all left at exactly the same time right next to one another in one of the most cramped sections of the airport, so the crowds resembled Disneyland on one of its worst days.

We were truly excited when we could board the plane and get out of the mob. We would be flying home with Carl the coyote on the tail of our plane (the animals are the one thing we still love about Frontier).

Sitting in our seats on the plane, we realized that while we had really enjoyed our time in CO, we were excited to be going back to CA. We missed our apartment and “our” cats and, especially, our Disneyland. Even though we hadn’t lived here for too long, it had started to feel like home.

June 3-7, 2013

We got back from Colorado late Sunday night and Tracy had to go to work Monday morning, but that didn’t stop us from heading to Disneyland on Monday evening. It truly felt like it had been AGES (yes, I know we are absurdly spoiled), and we were SO EXCITED to return to the parks.

After parking at Mickey and Friends, we rode the tram and went into Disneyland as Soundsational was heading down Main Street. Now, we are usually pretty annoyed by the parade because it ALWAYS seems to be running right when we are trying to navigate the route. Today, however, we were actually excited to walk past the characters, the dancers, and the floats. It felt almost like a “welcome home” parade after we had been away from the parks for several days, and it reminded us just how special it feels to walk into Disneyland.

In our absence, the busy summer season had officially started, but the crowds didn’t feel too bad this evening. We walked to Tomorrowland for our first ride—Star Tours. We were welcomed back to the galaxy with a solid combination of Tattooine and the Death Star, and we were both just in such good moods being back in the Disney bubble.

By the time our ride finished, the parade was done, so we walked over toward New Orleans Square. On the way, we took pictures of all the beautiful new flowers in the hub.

Tracy still really wanted to find the Haunted Mansion music box, but it was still sold out from the cart. We asked the cast member, and she had no idea when (or if) it would be coming back into stock. Since we were there anyway, we rode the Haunted Mansion next.

We were ready for a snack after the ride, and it only seemed fitting to get a Mickey pretzel on our day of celebrating all things Disney. We got one at Bengal Barbeque, and it was as delicious as always.

Heading across New Orleans Square, we decided to ride Pirates. The standby line wasn’t bad at all, so we just went through that. For some reason, when we got to the front of the queue, the cast member loading the boat made us sit four-across with another family. I have NO IDEA why, considering the line was only about 5 minutes, but those boats are NOT designed for you to have to share a row with strangers. Sitting four-across with members of your group is one thing, but being shoved in next to randoms for no reason is another entirely. We were not pleased.

To make matters worse, the people we were sitting next to were FLASH PICTURE TAKERS. And not just a few pictures. We’re talking every 10 feet another flash picture. At one point, I loudly said “no flash photography” hoping they would get the hint, but they didn’t speak English, so they didn’t understand what I was saying…

It was awful. Flash photography totally ruins that ride, and it hurts your eyes when it flashes in the dark. We have never been so excited to get off an attraction at Disneyland as we were by the time we reached the dock. The Disneyland Cats composed a tweet at that moment that I think sums up how we were all feeling:

If we cats had our way, every human who insists on taking flash pictures on dark rides would be sent straight to Disney jail.

Still a little mad at the terrible people from Pirates, we made our way to the exit. We arrived back at Mickey and Friends and had no clue what level we were parked on. Luckily, our first guess turned out to be right, but I imagine people must often have to wander for a long time searching for lost cars in the garage.

On Thursday, we headed over again and got to Mickey and Friends at about 7:30. We were parked on Level 3, and we laughed as we noticed for the first time just how excited the sign looked proclaiming “You’re on Mickey’s Level!!!!”

The crowds looked pretty heavy this evening—it was another Grad Nite—but we avoided them and headed straight back to New Orleans Square once we entered Disneyland. Still on our mission to see if the Haunted Mansion music box had arrived, we found ourselves disappointed yet again.

Everything was so crowded in this area, so we walked further back into Critter Country and rode Winnie the Pooh. For the first time ever, our ride vehicle didn’t bounce like the rest of them do. It was almost a little jarring with its lack of motion…

Once we were off the ride, we headed to Pooh’s Corner and decided to branch out a bit with our snack choice. We got a Peanut Butter Chocolate Chip Cookie to try because it looked delicious.

Now, these cookies are HUGE, and they are really good! I love peanut butter cookies. And anything with chocolate in it. So I was quite satisfied. Tracy too.

We booked it over to Fantasyland to see if we could get on a few rides before they started shutting down for the fireworks. In the end, I think we only got on Pinocchio before the dark rides all started closing. We rode the Carrousel next because it was one of the few things that doesn’t close.

Of course, being in Fantasyland, it was only natural for us to go ride “it’s a small world” next.

We LOVE this sea serpent guy because he’s always doing our half-smile pose.

We got stuck in the White Room for an inordinate amount of time at the end of this ride. I don’t really know what was going on, but when we got to the unload area, the ride appeared to be closed, so something must have been malfunctioning…

Previous Post | Next Post
Table of Contents