[Trip Report] One Day, Four Trips to Hyperspace

[sheriffwoody]

EDITED 07.07.17 - Photobucket has updated their policies so my photos aren't displaying. I'll try to switch them all over to Flickr eventually!

A couple of weeks ago, my mom and I went to visit family in the LA and Vegas areas for a week. On our first full day in California, I got to go to Disneyland with my cousin. Her dad (my mom's first cousin) and his wife work there, so we used a couple of their passes.

I hadn't thought about doing a trip report until I realized how many pictures I had! Hopefully this will be helpful to someone down the road Or maybe it will at least be entertaining.

I was intent on being there from opening to close, but we had to wait until the younger cousins were dropped off at school before we could go. We ended up getting to the park at 9:30. Bag check took forever, which was frustrating since we had no bags. There was no "no bags" line here.



First on the agenda was to get our fastpass for Radiator Springs. We got it and it wasn't going to be until after 3pm. We had plenty of time to roam around until then, so we headed into Cars Land. I haven't been to these parks in 7 years, so a LOT has changed in California Adventure. I just watched Cars for the first time recently just so I would know what stuff was. The movie was fine, but they did an excellent job on the land! Loved it.





We decided to ride the Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters. My cousin hadn't done them yet either. I wish we hadn't wasted time in line for this, but I guess it's good we did them, so we know for next time. They were just a little boring, though it looked cool over there!

That's all we did in CA for the time being. I was ready to see Disneyland! We could also get our next fastpass around 11:30, so we wanted to be close to Space Mountain when that time hit.


Here I am!


It's a little shocking to see Sleeping Beauty castle after getting used to Cinderella Castle. They're both beautiful though!


Loved these flowers near the beginning of Main Street.




First up was Pirates! I forgot how dang good it is here. I was sending my husband snaps, making him jealous since it's his favorite

Next we headed to MY favorite




I'm not a hatbox ghost fangirl, but it was cool seeing something that is only there for the celebration (I assume). I have never seen him before, and may never again! This picture was a miracle. I knew he was coming, but he still snuck up on me, and trying to get that shot in the dark ain't easy (no flash, promise).

On our way over to Tomorrowland, we stopped by Tarzan's Treehouse. I had to do it for my friend from work. He's a huge Tarzan fan and laments how little of him is represented in the parks (merch/entertainment/attractions).




It was finally time to go get our Hyperspace Mountain fastpass! We headed over there and enjoyed the sights along the way



Next Up: Lunch!

 

[jrogue]

Oh, you and your amazing photography skills and photographs!!! lol Excited to read more! And, of course, love the pictures!!!

 

[Californian Elitist]

You've got some serious photography skills.

 

[ScarletBegonias]

I'm in!! Loved seeing your pics on Instagram! Can't wait to read more about it. The castle in DL looks a little underwhelming compared to Cinderella's castle. Is it "bigger" when you are there?

 

[Phroobar]

Those were really good pictures! Don't tell me you did that with your cell phone. Glad you had a great time.

 

[sheriffwoody]

Oh, you and your amazing photography skills and photographs!!! lol Excited to read more! And, of course, love the pictures!!!

STAAAHHHHP You're too sweet! I was trying so hard not to get on my cousin's nerves taking too many pictures. She lives there, so she doesn't get why I want to just take a shot of every little thing.

You've got some serious photography skills.

Thanks so much! I try

I'm in!! Loved seeing your pics on Instagram! Can't wait to read more about it. The castle in DL looks a little underwhelming compared to Cinderella's castle. Is it "bigger" when you are there?

It really isn't...it's totally the same effect in person as in the picture. It's much more impressive when you're right up close to it, but it's still super teensy. Still lovely though

Those were really good pictures! Don't tell me you did that with your cell phone. Glad you had a great time.

Thank you!! Most of them are with a Fujifilm XT-1 with a 35mm lens. All the selfies were with my phone and a few other shots, but yeah, mostly the real camera

 

[sheriffwoody]

We made our way over to Tomorrowland to get our fastpass for Space Mountain, which ended up being for around 5:30 I think. At this point I was getting really hungry because I think all I'd had was a cinnamon roll at home. My cousin wanted to go to this burger place in Tomorrowland, so we went there. I wanted to get her lunch as part of her graduation gift, so I figured I better let her pick the place.

I got the First Order burger from Galactic Grill and it came on a black bun . I thought about asking for a regular bun, but I figured "what the heck" I'll try it! It didn't taste weird, but it sure did look funky.



It was fine. That sauce was great, but the burger itself was meh. I never like quick service burgers, so I didn't expect to be wowed. I usually wouldn't choose a burger place at all.

We figured the Matterhorn line wasn't going to get any shorter, so we hopped in. This gave our food time to settle since the line was about 45 minutes long. We got to watch the Mad Hatter and Alice a little while we waited! That was pretty cool. I also love seeing the bobsleds go by as you're in line. We were lucky it hadn't been super hot that day, but the sun did start to wear on me a little.





I LOVE THAT RIDE! It still jostles the heck out of you, but I love it. The abominable snowman still scares me as an almost 30 year old . My cousin was laughing at me screaming when we went past him! You can't tell me that huge thing with those loud sounds isn't scary!

One thing I was wanting to do was ride all the little Fantasyland rides that Magic Kingdom doesn't have (except Peter Pan), so we headed over to that area. They are all pretty basic, but I wanted to see them anyway. We were in line for Snow White's Scary Adventures, but it broke down so we left. We jumped in Pinocchio's Daring Journey and rode that. All of these rides seem to end so abruptly.



At this point we decided the waits for a lot of stuff we wanted to do were too long, so we'd go on back over to CA and do the rest of the Disneyland rides later. Had to snag another shot of the blinged up castle



Next up: More California Adventure! Will I like Radiator Springs Racers?

 

[ForeverAnna]

Good report.

FYI for your next trip. DLs and DCAs fast pass systems are completely independent of each other. You could have gotten your RSR fast pass and immediately gone over to DL and picked up Htperspace Mountain fast passes.

 

[BrianV]

Good report.

FYI for your next trip. DLs and DCAs fast pass systems are completely independent of each other. You could have gotten your RSR fast pass and immediately gone over to DL and picked up Htperspace Mountain fast passes.

Good to know!!!

 

[sheriffwoody]

Good report.

FYI for your next trip. DLs and DCAs fast pass systems are completely independent of each other. You could have gotten your RSR fast pass and immediately gone over to DL and picked up Htperspace Mountain fast passes.

Well dang Thanks for the tip! My cousin, who lives there and who has two CM parents, didn't even realize you could get another fastpass while you hadn't used one. I guess she doesn't use them often!

 

[sheriffwoody]

We walked back over to CA pretty quickly, and there was no line to get in (woo!). The wait for California Screamin' wasn't bad, so we walked back there. I didn't grow up going to fairs or being around amusement parks, so I find this kind of stuff incredibly charming. Later in our trip, I went to Santa Monica Pier and love it there as well!





Before we got in line, we got a fastpass for it, figuring it would be time to use it when we got out. We were close! We only had to wait about 10 minutes to go on again. I needed that time to get my equilibrium back. Clearly I'm getting old! For our second ride, there was a little girl behind us that was LOSING HER S***. I have never seen a child scream so much in my life. Thankfully, the CMs kind of nudged the parents to not make her ride. The mom ended up going up the elevator with her and the dad rode with the other kid. I heard him say the little girl had freaked out for every single ride, including kiddie rides. Not sure why they thought she'd be ok with a huge roller coaster? I hope that got to use rider swap for some stuff!



We had a few minutes before our fastpass window, so we watched a Mater meet and greet and just looked around Cars Land.



It's time! We still waited a while even with a fastpass, but it was fine. I enjoyed the misters they had in the area. I was so excited to ride this!




I loved this ride! It was really fun, and the theming is just perfectly done. I wish I could have rode it again! It's just great light-hearted fun.

I wanted to get something at Flo's so we popped in for a milkshake.



YUMMMM. It was just your standard chocolate milkshake, but when you're tired and hot, it is like 100% better than normal.

We decided we'd skip the rest of California Adventure since there weren't any more "must-do" items for me there. We stopped by Starbucks for my cousin to grab some iced tea and holy cow did that take forever! I had time to watch an entire show outside and then sit around for 10 more minutes. I wish I'd shopped some instead of just sitting there, but alas...

Next: Back to Disneyland and a LOT of Space

 

[sheriffwoody]

We're back!

I tried to get my cousin to take a picture with my good camera, but the focusing is a little tough for someone not used to shooting with a dslr so I just got her to take one with my phone

Earlier in the day, we had tried to get a fastpass for Indiana Jones, but it was down. When we went back over there the return time was up to like 10pm, and we didn't feel like doing that, so we just waited in line. It was an hour wait, but somehow it didn't bother me. I usually don't want to wait more than like 30 minutes, but I knew this was a better option, and I HAD TO ride this. It's definitely in my top 5 rides, possibly 2nd...it's just hard to decide. It's kills me that the WDW version is Dinosaur, because I hate that ride. You can tell I was bored in line for Indiana Jones. I took so many pictures of those snakes





That last one clearly shows my boredom. Also, we saw a mouse while we were in line. And I'm not talking about Mickey...
After our huge adventure with Indy, we walked back over to Fantasyland.


Can't pass the castle without a picture!


We had better luck with Snow White this time. You know those weird flailing things she does in the movie when she's running through the forest? The girl in front of us was doing that as we were going through that scene in the ride . I was dying! hahahaha




I think Mr. Toad's was the one that felt like such an abrupt ending. Did we ever come out of hell?! Am I still there?! It feels like it outside right now . I wanted to ride the Storybook Land Canal Boats next, but it was down. I never did get to do that one We stopped by the teacups instead!





I forgot how fun these are! I probably would have felt more sick if I hadn't been taking pictures. After our fun spinning, we headed to Tomorrowland. Our fastpass window was about to open, but the wait for Star Tours was pretty short. I want to say it was 20 minutes? We hopped in line, and got on pretty quickly.



Ok so storytime. We sat down and the ride started. After a second I realized the guy next to me appeared to be sleeping. I thought surely when it started tossing us around, he would jolt awake. He never did! His head just lolled there the entire time. I was so worried that he had died. I know that sounds SO morbid, but that's where my mind went! I was so relieved when he lifted his head at the end

Next up: More rides. How much can we do in one day?!

 

[sheriffwoody]

Ok NOW it was time for Hyperspace Mountain! I was anticipating this one pretty hard, so I went into this with high expectations. As we were walking up, I took this shot of the birds flying around. We waited a while for this ride too, even with a fastpass. I am still glad we didn't have to wait two hours!





It was everything I dreamed it would be! I've always preferred Disneyland's version of Space Mountain, but with the new overlay, it's just so awesome. The vehicles are so much more comfortable than the WDW version, and the track is super smooth.

So as we were pulling back in to unload, we just kept going. We stopped right past the people waiting to load and the CM asked if we wanted to go again. UM. YEAH?! I don't know why we got to go again, but we did! A little pixie dust, I suppose I was thrilled. My head was not. I needed a rest after two in a row.

I can't remember when, but at some point we had gotten a fastpass for Big Thunder (probably after we rode Indy), so we walked over there for that. It was fun as usual!




My cousin wasn't as into the ride selfies

After our wild ride in the wilderness, we decided to do Jungle Cruise. We hopped around a lot, but the park is small enough that it didn't feel like we wasted too much time.


Saw this balloon in line and really liked it. I can't bring myself to spend money on a balloon, but I think they're pretty awesome.



Our skipper was awesome! After the cruise, we were ready for some dinner. We saw Rancho del Zocalo with practically no one there, so we went in there. I got the Burrito Sonora with chicken. I tried to ask for no beans, but the guy acted like he didn't hear me. That was irritating, but I just shrugged it off and dealt with the beans. I'm fine with them on the plate, but I don't like them in the burrito. Despite that, it was pretty good. I barely ate half though. It was a lot of food!



We had pretty much decided not to try and watch the first parade because we had seen people camped out for it at 5pm. That is FOUR HOURS before the parade started. Yes. You read that right. People were sitting on the curb four flipping hours before the parade. Who does that?! That's four hours you could be doing so much stuff. To each his/her own, I guess. Since we gave up on the parade, we headed to Splash, which was the last thing I felt like we still needed to do.


We got the red card!


Guys. That face is real. That drop freaks me out every time! It feels like you're just going to lift right out!!!

Another story. Those girls in front of us actually asked us if we'd switch with them. I said no immediately because I didn't want to be in the front, but I probably sounded super rude. Oops! I didn't realize until the ride started that their friends (who must have asked not to be in the front of the boat) were behind us. I would have gladly switched with the back two! I felt bad that we messed up their picture, but then again the whole dab thing annoys me (I'm a curmudgeon) so I only felt like 2% bad. They were also pretty unruly during the whole ride. The girl in front was screaming every time the water sloshed, and the girl right in front of me asked me to hold her bag up off the floor... I did, but I felt like that was super weird. They also jumped up in their seats at the end of the drop, as if the water was going to kill them . Whatever, we had fun and had a good laugh about the picture.

Next up: Best Disney parade?

 

[sheriffwoody]

As we were walking toward Main Street, we were trying to decide if we'd find a spot to watch the Disneyland Forever fireworks. I think at this point the parade was over, and they had delayed the fireworks a little because of wind. There was a fire while I was there, but I think it was quite a bit farther inland. They are still super cautious from what I've heard.

When we got close to the hub, a man turned around and asked how many were in our party. I told him just two, and he handed me a fast pass that was good for up to six people at any attraction. We both thanked him enthusiastically, and he said "ah what the heck, here's another one! You didn't get these from me." ha. I have no idea where these came from, but I'm glad he shared! I'm assuming he was headed out for the night. My cousin and I looked at each other, grinned, and headed straight for Hyperspace Mountain!

When we got to the entrance, Disneyland Forever was starting. We watched the fireworks from there before going into the ride.



As we were waiting in the line for the first ride, my cousin spotted some school friends. She couldn't get their attention, but texted one of them to wait at the ride exit. When we got out, she went over to talk to them. You want to guess how many of them were there? 4!!! It was perfect, they joined us for our other fastpass, so we made use of the "up to six." So that was my 4th trip to hyperspace for the day. It was such an awesome treat!

As soon as we got off the ride, I told my cousin I wanted to book it to Main Street for the second parade. I assumed it would be crowded like the first one. I got out way ahead of her and her friends, but she eventually caught up and her friends had gone off to do something else. I felt a little bad for not being willing to hang back, but Paint the Night was the one nighttime thing I had chosen as most important. I was not going to miss it!

We got to Main Street and there were people sitting on the curb, but it wasn't packed like the first one. We stood behind a bench and had a perfect view! We waited about 20 minutes for it to start, then my jaw hit the ground and didn't come back up until it was over



The dancers were mesmerizing!




The Cars themed dancers were also really cool.














Sorry for the photo dump, but I couldn't help it . Paint the Night is AMAZZZZZINNNNNGGGGGG. I could go on and on about this parade, and I'm not kidding when I say my jaw was dropped the whole time. There was so much to look at, it was absolutely dazzling.

I have no nostalgic connection to MSEP at Magic Kingdom, so it would delight me to no end if they replaced that with Paint the Night. It is an objectively better parade. I know there are a lot of Electrical Parade fans here, and I'm sorry, but I hate that parade. I'll take my stoning with no regrets!

After the parade we made our way down Main Street. We had let my uncle know we would be leaving after the parade, so we were hoping he was waiting for us. My phone was about dead and my cousin can't use hers past 10pm. Luckily he was waiting for us as we exited Downtown Disney.


One last phone snap over my shoulder Don't know when I'll be back! It's always sad to leave.

One thing I am disappointed about is that I didn't find the set of attraction posters I wanted. They are 12x18 I think and come in a 12 pack. I have the WDW pack and wanted the Disneyland pack. I looked in Downtown Disney as we were leaving, but I didn't see them. I probably should have called ahead of time to find out where they were sold. I mentioned it to my aunt and uncle, but no one volunteered to find them for me soooooooo, I'll just have to do without

I ended up walking just over 20,000 steps that day according to my apple watch. My legs were certainly feeling it the next day! We had planned on hiking the next day, but I could tell as soon as I hit the couch that night it wasn't happening. We ended up hiking Sunday when I was fully recovered

I hope you all enjoyed the report! I am definitely no Disneyland expert, and all I really planned was getting a fast pass for Radiator Springs and Hyperspace Mountain. Everything else was just spontaneous, and it ended up being a perfect day.

 

[Californian Elitist]

That Splash on-ride photo is EVERYTHING. Hilarious.

I'm definitely one of those people who would sit on the curb/benches and waits for hours for a parade. I remember the first time I saw Paint the Night, my friend and I grabbed a spot at 4. Welcome to the DL fan habits. LOL.

Great report, thanks for taking the time to write it!

 

[sheriffwoody]

That Splash on-ride photo is EVERYTHING. Hilarious.

I'm definitely one of those people who would sit on the curb/benches and waits for hours for a parade. I remember the first time I saw Paint the Night, my friend and I grabbed a spot at 4. Welcome to the DL fan habits. LOL.

Great report, thanks for taking the time to write it!

AHHHH I cannot imagine. I would be bored to tears waiting. My phone would have died a LOT quicker . Maybe if I knew I'd be back again soon, I'd be willing to just chill for a while, but I just had the one day to do all the things. Thank heavens for nights with two parades!

Thanks for reading!

 

[Curious Constance]

Fun report and awesome pictures! Thanks for sharing!

 

[Doc Disney]

Thanks for sharing! I have been thinking a lot about DL lately and can't wait to go back. If only it wasn't across the entire country from me
Its funny when I went last year everyone told me I would hate it because its nothing like WDW but I really enjoyed it and loved the Walt nostalgia of it all!

 

[sheriffwoody]

Thanks for sharing! I have been thinking a lot about DL lately and can't wait to go back. If only it wasn't across the entire country from me
Its funny when I went last year everyone told me I would hate it because its nothing like WDW but I really enjoyed it and loved the Walt nostalgia of it all!

It's definitely different, but so great in its own ways! I loved your report. I probably should have read through yours again before I went to get a refresher! Hope you get to go back soon.

 

[ScarletBegonias]

Loved it! Thanks for posting. I know absolutely NOTHING about Disneyland, so I always love seeing the pictures and stuff. Paint the Night looks amazing!