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Friday, December 6, 2013

Disney Day 2: California Adventure

On Monday morning, the 25th, we all woke up fairly early to get ready for our first day at the parks! The boys had breakfast in bed, muffins that I had brought, and Paul and I grabbed Starbucks on the way out of the hotel! We grabbed a cab and made it over to the gates!
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A couple of pics in front of our hotel while waiting for the cab! We stayed at the Hilton Anaheim, and loved it!


California Adventure was our first park!

My crew!

***TIP***
Before I go any further, lets talk a minute about Cars Land, in particular Radiator Springs Racer, the main attraction in Cars Land! This ride is the hot ride and wait times can be well over two hours! And that's just not going to happen! So, it is a MUST that you get a Fast Pass for it! However, Fast Passes for this ride "sell out" for the whole day in about the first hour  when the gates open! No lie!! So let that be the VERY first thing you do when the park opens! 
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So now onto our day! As soon as the gates opened, we followed the crowd straight to the Fast Pass line for Radiator Springs Racers! Once we got that and knew we were good, we found ourselves in "A Bugs Land"!


Our very first ride, Flik"s Flyers! We all got to ride together! 

We did the three other small rides and then hit that land's only show, "It's Tough to be a Bug"! This show is a 3D show about bugs and it totally freaked both boys out!! It actually was a bit scary, ha!

**TIP** 
Bugs Land is actually a great place to hit right when the park opens. It's small and we walked right onto every ride and no one was in line for the show! We got through this land in about 30 minutes! This land is definitely for small kids only, and when we walked through later in the day, the lines were long!

After we finished up Bugs Land, we went to the highly anticipated Cars Land!! Our fast pass for Radiator Springs wasn't until a little later but we were right there and Lane was dying to go! 
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Must take Photo opt right as you enter Cars Land!

I swear entering Cars Land is just like stepping into the movie. I mean every last detail is theme related. Disney outdid themselves with it! It was AWESOME!

First up in Cars Land was Mater's Junkyard Jamboree! Super cute ride!



After the ride we headed to the Cozy Cone Motel to grab a little snack! 

It was seriously precious!! Everything was cones!

Right as we got there, Mater was there!! Lane freaked and we got in line quick to say hi!

We grabbed mini Churros and they were yummy!

More scenery!



It was finally time to ride THE ride at California Adventure! Fast passes take you to the front of the line and we also grabbed a Stroller Swap, allowing Paul and I both a chance to ride it without having to wait in line! Disney thinks of everything! I didn't even think to take my camera with me (which I learned later to do), but this was the cutest ride ever!! Definitely my favorite!!

After the ride we grabbed Lane some Cars Mickey Ears! A must at Disney right!?! Levi didn't seem to interested in the wearing the ears, and even though I wanted him to have some, we decided to save that money and spend it on something he would actually use!

Then it was time for our last ride...Luigi's Flying Tires. Although cute, I give this ride a C...it was hard to work and didn't do much. The parents definitely had to do it all.


It was time to leave Cars Land! This was some signs as you left! You also HAVE to see Cars Land at night...which we did on Day 3, so pics of that in a later post!

On our way we made a quick stop to get our Fast Passes for the World of Color night show, and ran into Minnie Mouse!

Next stop was Hollywood Land...and our first character sightings!! Mr. and Mrs. Incredible was out and Fro-zone! With it being our first ones, Levi was a little hesitant with them!


This was definitely the place to see characters! We spotted Sulley and as much as Levi likes Monsters U, he wanted nothing to do with saying hi to him!

Then we saw Jake!!! It was SO precious to watch Levi meet him! And he wasn't scared at all with him!! Funny huh!?



Levi spotted Sophia from afar, and we didn't wait in line to see her, but I snapped a pic!

We caught a drive by singing show!

We had grabbed a Fast Pass for Tower of Terror before doing all the character sightings! I remembered this ride from going as a kid and loved it! Lane was a little nervous but was determined to do it! So daddy hung back with Levi while we went to ride it!
This was right as we got one!

And this was the pic of us on the ride!
**TIP**
I quickly learned that people took their cameras on rides so that they could just take a picture of the screen after the ride! So smart! But a little grainy! Much better than paying $20 bucks for a 5x7, and you get pics of each ride!!
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Lane was so small you could barely see him!

At this point it was getting close to time for the Pixar Play Parade! People get spots for these parades about an hour in advance. We were already in that area and didn't want to leave. So I grabbed a bench and Paul took the boys to ride Mike and Sulley to the Rescue! Then it was parade time! This was an adorable parade, a must see for anyone with young ones! All your favorite Pixar Pals were there!









After the parade, it got dark and cooler and it was time to head over to Paradise Pier! But not before grabbing another snack, Mickey Ice Cream Sandwiches!!



We rode a couple of rides in this part, and then Levi crashed in his stroller! We were supposed to catch the 9:00 night World of Color show, but then Lane crashed and neither one would wake up! We tried and tried, but I think the previous day of traveling and Downtown Disney did them in! So Paul and I grabbed dinner and then we decided to go ahead and leave to let the boys get some sleep! I couldn't believe we were leaving the park before 9, but you just have to be a little flexible with kiddos!  We did see the night show on Wednesday!
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This was them while Paul and I ate!



Look at this beautiful tree! I loved being there when it was decorated for the holidays!!

With the exception of the two water rides, we did everything but about six things. We got to those on our last day! California Adventures was so much fun! I *may* have enjoyed it more than Disneyland park! It was a great first day, the boys did GREAT, and we all had so much fun!!


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