It was my first Disney visit of the year, but it wouldn’t be my last. Nonetheless, like any of my visits to any Disney theme park, it was a unique, fun, and awesome experience. It came on Sunday, February 12, 2012, following another very fun and exhausting day in the Los Angeles area. I had stayed at David’s house the night before and we were up bright and early and ready to begin our day at the butt crack of dawn. We left the house in Burbank around 7:45am and met Jimmy at Knott’s Berry Farm, where we would have breakfast at Mrs. Knotts Chicken Dinner Restaurant. I had the Mrs. Knott’s Chicken Hash to kickstart the day. In a bold and dramatic move, I spilled my entire glass of water across the table.
Breakfast at Mrs. Knotts with David and Jimmy
I think this would turn out to be the largest group of us ever to spend the day together at Disneyland, but it made me feel good to have so many friends gather together during my visit. It started out with my friend Stacey (whom we had spent a Disney day with once before – back in 2009) meeting us near the entrance at around 10:30. David got the three of us in for free with his Silver Pass.
We started out at the California Adventure Park, mostly for the purpose of riding the new dark ride The Little Mermaid: Ariel’s Undersea Adventure, which had opened last June. It’s Disney World counterpart will not open until later in 2012, so we will miss it during our next visit there. Located at Paradise Pier, it was pretty standard Fantasyland fare, featuring scenes from the film as viewed from our OmniMover. Just the day before, I had met Pat Carroll, who provided the voice for the character Ursula.
Stacey joined me on my first ride-thru of the new Little Mermaid ride
Ariel and Prince Eric and some happy fishes
The disgusting Ursula. But it was neato that I had just met her voice the day before.
Jimmy and David come out of their shell
Hottie
It was around 11am as we quickly roamed around Paradise Pier, checking out the Goofy’s Sky School (but not riding it), and then boarding the Golden Zephyr ride, a simple circular rocket ride designed in the style of 1940’s Buck Rogers. The coolest thing about riding this ride, was that the operator was a guy named Raul Moreno, with whom I had occasionally corresponded, but never met. He had found me through this website and was intrigued with my writings about Hollywood ’80 – since he himself had attended that legendary Sons of the Desert convention.
Finally meeting Raul as he determined our fate on the Golden Zephyr
A visit to California Adventure wouldn’t be complete without seeing Muppet Vision 3-D. In fact, a trip to California the state wouldn’t be quite complete without it. The movie never gets old and will be forever quotable, especially with David. I started to panic a bit after the movie when I realized that I didn’t have any cell phone reception. We made some calls with David’s phone to find the status of the other batch of peoples who would be meeting us.
Ready to enter a personal favorite: Muppet Vision 3eeee-Deeee!
Stacey and me in 3-D
A trio of Incredibles
We departed the park a bit after noon and it wasn’t long before we were meeting up with Rick and Patty Greene and Denise Kress. Rick brought along some CD-Rs for me, which I had Stacey hold in her purse. Naturally I forgot to get them and she ended up mailing them to me. But I digress. Next stop: Disneyland.
Our group expands: Rick, Patty, Stacey, me, Denise, Jimmy, and David outside the train station at Disneyland
Upon entry, the new group was hungry so we proceeded promptly to the Jolly Holiday Bakery Cafe on Main Street. The lines here resembled a ride queue, but eventually I was able to order my Hot Angus Roast Beef sandwich and a cup of Practically Perfect Punch. While we ate, the rest of my friends showed up and completed the group. My high school friend Wendy Luckenbill, whom I had seen this past Thanksgiving, found time between writing press releases for the Oprah network about Whitney Houston’s death, to meet up with us. I split my roast beef with her.
Wendy and Stacey hadn’t seen each other since their days at Ankeney Junior High some 25 years ago. Wendy also had a friend locally named Jim who was visiting Disneyland that day with his daughters, so he joined up with us as well. Finally, Bob came ambling along at around 1:30 and completed our massive group.
Bob joins our crew at the Jolly Holiday
Finally, after the food and greetings, we moved on to our first Disneyland ride: Pirates of the Caribbean. Besides being the foggiest I’ve ever seen the pirates, the only other thing unique about this particular ride-thru (besides a wait time of about 30 minutes) was the fact that somehow we managed to all get soaked on the first hill of the boat ride. Never before in my life had this ride made me or anyone else so wet, even though Bob denied that it had anything to do with him riding in the front of the boat. We’re just not sure.
The Ankeney girls sure stay pretty
The traditional photo of Carl and the pirates
Rick and Patti as we end our ride, still wet
Rides don’t get much more fun than The Haunted Mansion, and we hit that one next. Again, there was about a 30-minute wait. Part of our group got separated, so Stacey, Wendy, Jim, Rick, and Patty rode it separately from the others. We got in line first, but somehow the others finished before us. Hmmm.
Still wet outside the Haunted Mansion, Rick’s favorite ride
Wendy’s press release hits her Blackberry and it is a proud moment
Sons in a teacup
The next request came from Bob, whom I reminded of his disdain for the theme song and refusal to partake in riding it’s a small world. But times have changed and Bob has mellowed, so we endured the 45-minute wait for another magical boat ride. In fact, with the ten of us present, we filled an entire boat – and I have the picture to prove it. Stacey was having trouble getting her camera phone to take any good pictures, so I obliged to snap several for her and send them on to her later.
it’s a small world with these big fellas
A boatful of rockers
One of the pics I snapped for Stacey
Another classic pose as I find yet another Mickey model
At this point Rick, Patty, Rob, and Denise broke off from the group to go over to California Adventure so that Denise could see the new Little Mermaid ride and Bob could play on the Midway Mania. The six of us remaining hit Big Thunder Mountain Railroad utilizing a FastPass that we had gotten earlier in the day. I knew that Big Thunder Mountain at Disney World was going to be closed during our next visit, so I wanted to make sure we got to ride it here.
Jim and Wendy ready to experience the thrills of Big Thunder Mountain
Stacey and I are plenty a’scared aboard the runaway train
No words can express David and Jimmy’s feelings about the ride. Note the peacemonger behind them.
Wendy had agreed to meet another friend for drinks at the Disneyland Hotel, so she and Jim departed from us at this point. It was cool that she was able to hang out with us and promised to see me at Thanksgiving. Next up was another ride that I wanted to make sure that I saw: Star Tours: The Adventures Continue. This had opened during late Spring at both parks last year. Obviously, it was a completely re-made version of Star Tours, using more of the characters from Star Wars, and most importantly, utilizing the Real 3-D process. I thought they did an outstanding job and it really looked and felt like we were looking out the window of a real spacecraft careening through a galaxy far, far away. The only drawback was the line that was nearly 90 minutes long.
More 3-D fun in the new and improved Star Tours
Princess Leia has nothing on this chick
We had time for just one more ride, and naturally we chose Space Mountain. Jimmy sat this one out, as he wasn’t feeling well. I know I say it every time, but the version here blows away the one in Florida so badly that I dread the irritation I’ll feel when I next ride it at Disney World. We got off the ride at about 7:20 and then departed the park.
Space Mountain thrills. David needs consoled.
Our ride!
Dinner reservations for the evening were at 8pm at Napa Rose. Rick & Patty, Bob, and Denise met up with us again at the restaurant located in the Grand Floridian. It’s tough to believe that this pricey, fancy-shmancy restaurant had been featured on Diners, Drive-Ins, and Dives – but it had. However it had been featured on a special episode entitled Guy’s Disney Holiday, where they featured holiday treats around the park, culminating with dinner at Napa Rose. Naturally the holiday offerings from the show weren’t featured on the menu, so I opted for the filet mignon. Much to my chagrin, the cheese sticks contained broccoli, which put a damper on the entire meal. Broccoli ruins everything in the world – even Rick’s back. However, we did have a fun time socializing and telling some Sons stories from throughout the years.
DD&D #33: Napa Rose in Anaheim, California
The gang’s all here for dinner at Napa Rose
Jimmy and Bob discuss the 2014 Sons convention. If all goes well it will be back in Hollywood 34 years after the first one.
Bob on the tram as we depart the park. The kook behind him hijacks the photo.
We all said our goodbyes and left Disneyland around 10pm. Jimmy took me back to his place and we turned in almost right away. The flight wasn’t all that early on Monday morning, but little did I know what a harrowing day I’d be in for.
The first sign of trouble came when my boarding passes wouldn’t print at Jimmy’s house. Upon arrival at the airport, I found out why. My tickets had been cancelled by the morons at American during the debacle back in Dayton. This called for a Burger King breakfast and a stern warning to the airline: I wasn’t happy. I was able to get re-booked for the first leg of the flight, but not the second one going from Chicago to Dayton. They put me on priority standby. However, since the flight that was supposed to leave at 9:30am, left about two hours late, I got to Chicago at the time that my original flight was supposed to leave at 5pm.
So there I sat, eating McDonalds and reading Amber Benson’s book Among the Ghosts, for nearly five hours. The next flight to Dayton was supposed to leave at 10:00pm, but even it left 45 minutes late as we sat on the runway while the plane was de-iced.
Eventually I made it back to good old Dayton, USA, losing another hour, stumbled to my conveniently located car and drove home, arriving at about 1:15am. Needless to say, I was a tad bit late to work the next day. But soon the bad flight memories would subside, and I’d be left with the many good ones that came out of this trip.
Return to February 2012…
News Flash to Me: I think Bob is a Christian. For some reason I had always wrongly assumed that he was an Eckankarist. But one of the photos above reveals a small white cross hanging around his neck, next to his shades.
So I stand corrected: Bob may not have attended Camp Woodland Alters, but neither is he a devotee of Eckankarism as I had always believed.
Peter
March 7th, 2012
Yeah!Finally get a picture with you!Good thing you came by when you did since in a hour we went down for high winds and never came back up.See you when Cars Land opens!
Raul Moreno
March 8th, 2012
Ravel, when my group splintered off and came over to California Adventure, we went to see if you were still on duty, but you had gone. However, I did get my warm carmamel corn at the popcorn stand next to the ferris wheel, the best fresh caramel corn I’ve ever tasted. Hopefully I’ll get to see you later this year. Cars Land June 15th!!!
Rick Greene
March 8th, 2012
Such a fun day!
Wendy
March 8th, 2012