Day Two - LA (Disneyland)
To think, LA was still only a week ago - after Las Vegas and far to few hours sleep it feels like a lot longer than that.
Disneyland and California Adventure Park both exceeded our expectations. The 3 of us not being interested in massively branded things, we gave a quick cursory glance at the shops, but certain high pricetags and tortured asian kids in sweatshops makes it all pretty easy to by-pass.
But the rides, oh yeah - the rides! I was always one of those kids who hated rollercoasters, and I still certainly have my limits... but we had a wild time. Starting with the slow and easy Jungle tour, we then knocked it up a notch - and I'm sure I'm forgetting some and the order isn't right but... Indiana Jones ride (bloody awesome!) all underground and bumpy, some crazy Wild West Train thingo (my favourite) with fast and rapid turns, the famous Matterhorn in comparison was a let down, Space Mountain (again, awesome!) - whizzing through darkness with just spots of space-esque lights, Haunted Mansion was really good, we did this ultra lame arsed "future car" ride which was "highly recommended" on the map - but the Chevron sponsors must have paid big time for that because if your over 8 y/o it was shitful. Shane slept the whole time he drove his "future car".
There must have been more but I don't recall right now, we left alone all the other kiddie rides and anything to do with a certain mouse (which I'm glad to say we got some photos of me kicking in the head - take that evil mind controlling mouse!).
Then over to California Adventure Park, which we'd been told was heaps better and more grown-up on the rides than Disneyland. But we walked in, and there was a third of the people and didn't look like anything was around. Grabbed a quick lunch (classic Chili Dog, can tick that off the list now) and gradually walked around to the first ride we found, Twilight Zone Hotel of Terror (or something equally cliched) .... Mason chickened out but Shane and I got in line, and we start noticing there's more people, some drinking wine (Disneyland was totally dry, WTF?!?! how else do you put up with so many screaming kids?) ... this ride took over 40 minutes to get through, longer than any earlier in the day - but damn it was crazy - one of those straight up and down rides, but set around a Twilight Zone "crazy hotel" theme and in a huge Hollywood Tower building... got a classic picture of us at the top as it dropped down. Thinking that was it, we kept meandering around and go into A Bugs Life ride with a "4D" film - we couldn't see anything else around, lots of stuff still being built and this was full of kids - but it was awesome! Extroadinarily good 3D (stuff actually pops right out at you like you want to grab it, unlike the spate of 3D cinema movies which are crap - but that's a totally different rant) and the damn seats sprayed water over us, proded us in the arse and suprised the crap out of us... super!
Still thinking that's all this place was, we kept walking and found a Wine Bar - shared a lovely Pinot Gris and walked around the corner to find a massive/classic Boardwalk/docks style of fun park with massive roller coaster, twisted ferris wheel, shop and heaps more. Shane and I hit that roller coaster ASAP and it was killer, moves along around to the watery side, stops for a few seconds then propels you forward to a massive climb - then crazy turns, ups and downs and a full loop ... it was ace. We then did the Ferris Wheel, which had most of the carriages on a big circular twist thingo so the whole carriage massively rocks as the ferris wheel rotates (had a few "standard" carriages), best part was that it freaked the hell out of a family we shared a carriage with - couldn't stop laughing! After that there was some chair-spinny-sky thing and then a pretty lame "Golden Zephyr" (which was Silver - WTF?!?), got some hilarious snaps of us pretending it was wild and scary. Further walking around found a huge line for a white water rafting type of ride, again didn't look to thrilling but had some fantastic moments. Thinking that was the end of it we continued moving around and then found "Soaring" - nothing to scary but it was basically a massive IMAX screen where the seats lifted you up and shifted you up/down as you "flew" over all this landscape... very impressive. So that finally got all the rides out of the way, and it was heading to wine/dinner time - found a restaurant that offered a 3 course meal plus a "front area" pass for the big water & light show, we weren't quite hungry yet so went next door for another drink, then went back to the restaurant for the meal-deal and they stopped filling seats because it was an hour before the show - but the ripped off look on our faces still got us the free good spot passes. So we went around the corner and got some cheap japanesse - score!!!
With no expectations for this light show, thinking it was just some kiddy thingo... we went along because we had the passes... and WOW - what a phenominal production it was, at least 30 minutes of water jets choreographed to Disney music with wild coloured lights and projections onto these sprayed walls of water of the classic Disney films. Level of production was incredible... I'd never seen anything like it in Australia... and as I would soon find out, this became a familiar theme in doing things I had minimal expectation for to begin with.
A crazy cab ride back to the hotel, who took us in the complete wrong direction, shut off the meter for 15 minutes because of it... and offered to drive us to Las Vegas for $600... we got back to base with a large bottle of wine. The previous night we ended walking around the area, we were in the non-tourist area of Anaheim and one thing was really striking so far about the States - poverty. The vast majority of locals are doing it hard, and sometimes your haggling with them like it's a third world country... the areas which must have been shining examples 20-30 years ago are now run down poverty striken never having upgraded infrastructure. In the morning (and me with a nasty hangover, Mason chose some cheap wine there!) we got Mickey's bus at 6:30 in the morning to get back to the airport and we saw the massive amounts of long distance commuting traffic... I don't know how people could live with these 90 minute commutes in hot, slow and heavy traffic - sure some people do this in Melbourne too, but they usually have nice houses and modern cars to go with it, apparently a large amount of modern cars stopped being on the main highways over the past couple years. Definitely seemed like desperate times for the US of A.
We got through security with minimal hassle and hours of waiting for the late plane with a 1 hour flight to Vegas. Turns out the cabbie would have been quite a bit faster, and relatively on par for price. Go figure :) It was now Thursday afternoon and 3 men were now in Vegas for 5 nights... oh boy oh boy...
Disneyland and California Adventure Park both exceeded our expectations. The 3 of us not being interested in massively branded things, we gave a quick cursory glance at the shops, but certain high pricetags and tortured asian kids in sweatshops makes it all pretty easy to by-pass.
But the rides, oh yeah - the rides! I was always one of those kids who hated rollercoasters, and I still certainly have my limits... but we had a wild time. Starting with the slow and easy Jungle tour, we then knocked it up a notch - and I'm sure I'm forgetting some and the order isn't right but... Indiana Jones ride (bloody awesome!) all underground and bumpy, some crazy Wild West Train thingo (my favourite) with fast and rapid turns, the famous Matterhorn in comparison was a let down, Space Mountain (again, awesome!) - whizzing through darkness with just spots of space-esque lights, Haunted Mansion was really good, we did this ultra lame arsed "future car" ride which was "highly recommended" on the map - but the Chevron sponsors must have paid big time for that because if your over 8 y/o it was shitful. Shane slept the whole time he drove his "future car".
There must have been more but I don't recall right now, we left alone all the other kiddie rides and anything to do with a certain mouse (which I'm glad to say we got some photos of me kicking in the head - take that evil mind controlling mouse!).
Then over to California Adventure Park, which we'd been told was heaps better and more grown-up on the rides than Disneyland. But we walked in, and there was a third of the people and didn't look like anything was around. Grabbed a quick lunch (classic Chili Dog, can tick that off the list now) and gradually walked around to the first ride we found, Twilight Zone Hotel of Terror (or something equally cliched) .... Mason chickened out but Shane and I got in line, and we start noticing there's more people, some drinking wine (Disneyland was totally dry, WTF?!?! how else do you put up with so many screaming kids?) ... this ride took over 40 minutes to get through, longer than any earlier in the day - but damn it was crazy - one of those straight up and down rides, but set around a Twilight Zone "crazy hotel" theme and in a huge Hollywood Tower building... got a classic picture of us at the top as it dropped down. Thinking that was it, we kept meandering around and go into A Bugs Life ride with a "4D" film - we couldn't see anything else around, lots of stuff still being built and this was full of kids - but it was awesome! Extroadinarily good 3D (stuff actually pops right out at you like you want to grab it, unlike the spate of 3D cinema movies which are crap - but that's a totally different rant) and the damn seats sprayed water over us, proded us in the arse and suprised the crap out of us... super!
Still thinking that's all this place was, we kept walking and found a Wine Bar - shared a lovely Pinot Gris and walked around the corner to find a massive/classic Boardwalk/docks style of fun park with massive roller coaster, twisted ferris wheel, shop and heaps more. Shane and I hit that roller coaster ASAP and it was killer, moves along around to the watery side, stops for a few seconds then propels you forward to a massive climb - then crazy turns, ups and downs and a full loop ... it was ace. We then did the Ferris Wheel, which had most of the carriages on a big circular twist thingo so the whole carriage massively rocks as the ferris wheel rotates (had a few "standard" carriages), best part was that it freaked the hell out of a family we shared a carriage with - couldn't stop laughing! After that there was some chair-spinny-sky thing and then a pretty lame "Golden Zephyr" (which was Silver - WTF?!?), got some hilarious snaps of us pretending it was wild and scary. Further walking around found a huge line for a white water rafting type of ride, again didn't look to thrilling but had some fantastic moments. Thinking that was the end of it we continued moving around and then found "Soaring" - nothing to scary but it was basically a massive IMAX screen where the seats lifted you up and shifted you up/down as you "flew" over all this landscape... very impressive. So that finally got all the rides out of the way, and it was heading to wine/dinner time - found a restaurant that offered a 3 course meal plus a "front area" pass for the big water & light show, we weren't quite hungry yet so went next door for another drink, then went back to the restaurant for the meal-deal and they stopped filling seats because it was an hour before the show - but the ripped off look on our faces still got us the free good spot passes. So we went around the corner and got some cheap japanesse - score!!!
With no expectations for this light show, thinking it was just some kiddy thingo... we went along because we had the passes... and WOW - what a phenominal production it was, at least 30 minutes of water jets choreographed to Disney music with wild coloured lights and projections onto these sprayed walls of water of the classic Disney films. Level of production was incredible... I'd never seen anything like it in Australia... and as I would soon find out, this became a familiar theme in doing things I had minimal expectation for to begin with.
A crazy cab ride back to the hotel, who took us in the complete wrong direction, shut off the meter for 15 minutes because of it... and offered to drive us to Las Vegas for $600... we got back to base with a large bottle of wine. The previous night we ended walking around the area, we were in the non-tourist area of Anaheim and one thing was really striking so far about the States - poverty. The vast majority of locals are doing it hard, and sometimes your haggling with them like it's a third world country... the areas which must have been shining examples 20-30 years ago are now run down poverty striken never having upgraded infrastructure. In the morning (and me with a nasty hangover, Mason chose some cheap wine there!) we got Mickey's bus at 6:30 in the morning to get back to the airport and we saw the massive amounts of long distance commuting traffic... I don't know how people could live with these 90 minute commutes in hot, slow and heavy traffic - sure some people do this in Melbourne too, but they usually have nice houses and modern cars to go with it, apparently a large amount of modern cars stopped being on the main highways over the past couple years. Definitely seemed like desperate times for the US of A.
We got through security with minimal hassle and hours of waiting for the late plane with a 1 hour flight to Vegas. Turns out the cabbie would have been quite a bit faster, and relatively on par for price. Go figure :) It was now Thursday afternoon and 3 men were now in Vegas for 5 nights... oh boy oh boy...