Saturday, December 30, 2017

The Happiest Place on Earth

If you have to celebrate a milestone birthday, in my case 65, it might as well be at the Happiest Place on Earth, right?

Our first stop was at City Hall, where we got our celebration pins.

After spending the first afternoon and evening in Disneyland, we headed over to Downtown Disney, to the ESPN Zone. It was Monday night, so we watched Monday Night Football for a while.
We splurged on this dessert.
We took the Monorail back into the park, and for the first time ever, we sat in the very front of the Monorail, along with the conductor.
The castle is spectacular at night, even more so during the holidays.
The next day was another beautiful day.
It was an early admission day for us, so what better way to begin the day than coffee with the castle in the background.


The castle is even gorgeous in the daytime.
Mark has a hard time handling rollercoasters and merry-go-rounds--it messes with his equilibrium. But he does have a favorite "ride," the one commonly known as the "park bench." And his favorite bench at Disneyland is the one with the porch, on Main Street.
While there, he started chatting with the man sitting next to him. It turns out this man has been coming to Disneyland for years, and now that he is retired, he averages four or five times a week. He is part of a "club" and he shared one of the club buttons with Mark.

We went over to California Adventure for the afternoon. We started with lunch. It was like my fortune cookie was chosen especially for me. Hope it knows what it is talking about!
Cars Land is one of my very favorites.
There is a new show in the Hyperion Theater--Frozen. We enjoyed it so much that we attended it twice. My favorite part was when Anna did one of those "quick change" costume changes. In a blink of an eye, she went from this
to this. It was quite amazing.


Nighttime lights at California Adventure.

As we often do, we went to the lobby of the Grand Californian Hotel. The lobby is gorgeous. Someone was playing the grand piano and we watched two bakers make and decorate the gingerbread house. They said it takes a week to complete.
We looked for, and found, quite a few of the "hidden Mickeys."

The next day we did not have early admission. So we ended up in line with the thousands of others. With the current terrorist activity that seems to keep occurring, this was the first time I had ever felt vulnerable at Disneyland. Waiting...and waiting...to go through security made me feel a bit unsafe. Definitely not a feeling I was expecting at the Happiest Place on Earth.
 We spent the day back and forth between California Adventure and Disneyland. Another beautiful and fun day.

I haven't ever wanted to go on this ride, but it was sure fun to watch all the people get drenched.

This would have been our Christmas card picture this year. If we had actually sent Christmas cards...
My favorite ride at Disneyland is Big Thunder Mountain. It's fun no matter when you ride it.
 But I especially like it at night.
And then all too soon, our time was over.



Until next time, Disneyland. You never fail to make me happy.

4 comments:

05 08
Robby said... #

Disney at birthday/holidays? Sounds like you must have had twice as much fun. I've been to Disney World just before Thanksgiving as all the decorations go up. Fun to watch the transformation and they do such a lovely job. Hope your happy feeling lasts all year!

OPQuilt said... #

Sounds like a great way to celebrate the Big One, and I'm not talking earthquakes. I love the little adventures that you and Mark go on, and thanks for sharing it with us!

Kathleen said... #

Happy birthday! I love the front porch sittin'.

SarahZ said... #

Happy Birthday, Cindy!!!