A bit of a different start to our summer vacation this year. I was in San Diego for a conference so the plan was for me to travel from there to Anaheim and meet the family in Disneyland. I could have taken a flight which would have meant a taxi to the airport, waiting for the plane, the flight and then a taxi from LAX. It probably would have taken 5 or 6 hours. Instead there was an Amtrak train that left from about three blocks from my hotel and ended up just a 5 minute cab ride away from Disneyland. I left San Diego at 6:01a and was in the park by 8:45a, all for $40 dollars USD and they even offered free snacks and coffee as it was a business class ticket. I highly recommend.
When I got to our hotel I attempted to check in however our room wasn't quite ready yet. We're in Disneyland for Kerry's 50th birthday and are staying in the Grand Californian. It's not cheap but we're making up for the cost by spending our last night in the airport. Our flight leaves early in the morning and the park closes at midnight so by the time we get done at the park and get to our hotel we'd have to leave in a couple of hours anyways. I checked my bags with the front desk and got my electronic ticket and then headed to the park. The rest of the family was scheduled to arrive after lunch and there was plenty of time for a few rides.
Going to Disneyland as a single rider is quite advantageous. There are several rides that have specific single-rider lines and even when they don't, they often call out asking if there are any single riders to help fill in a row. Within just a few hours I managed to do six rides including Indian Jones and the Millennium Falcon. I joined a nice family of 5 on the Falcon and acted as their engineer. It seemed like a successful run. After this, the conference and the early morning caught up to me and I headed back to the hotel to see if my room was ready. It wasn't so I had quick nap in the lobby until the family arrived.
The family was later than anticipated and didn't arrive until about 3:00p. Their flight had been over fueled so they were assigned another plane. All things considered though they were lucky it was only a slight delay. This was the day of the Crowed Strike bug that shut down millions of computers around the world and grounded thousands of flights. We're hoping things get resolved before the next leg of our trip. Our room was ready and we brought our things up. Carter was excited to get his own Bambi bed.
The plan for the evening was to go out for dinner with Kerry's brother's family who had already been here for a few days. Unfortunately only Corey and Ryan were able to make it because Kristen wasn't feeling well. We went to the Naples restaurant and which was of course Italian. It was nice that it was only about 100m from the lobby of our hotel. We usually stay in hotels that are about a 15 minute walk which isn't a big deal except when you've already been walking for hours. It's nice to be able to pop up to the room if we forget something or in this case book a restaurant that's at the front door.
At this point it was finally time for the rest of the family to head into the park. We have park hoppers so by this time we could start at any park and since California Adventure was close we started there. Ryan really wanted to do Grizzly River which is usually a bad idea this late in the day because it's guaranteed to get you wet. Callie and Kerry bought ponchos but the rest of us took the risk. We were pretty lucky and it was still warn so we didn't have to back to the room to dry. We also got the highlight of Carter's trip so far with a selfie with Big Al, one of the bears from the Country Bear Jamboree.
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