Trip Report Loco goes west! A DLR trip 4 years in the making!

Now that the clothes are washed, the lawn mowed, and I’ve made my return to work(booooo!) it’s time for me to start another TR before I forget more details that I didn’t take note of!

Who: Myself and Mrs. Loco, A. I call her A because I’m too lazy to type her entire name.
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Where: Uhhhhh, Disneyland, with a few stops throughout Orange County.

When : September 14-19.

Why : Because we wanted to. It was also a celebration of both of our September birthdays.

Enough with the details though, you’re here to see pictures and to read my thoughts on Walt’s Disneyland right? Let’s get started!

Day one, travel day.

We originally had this trip planned for September of 2018. Unfortunately A’s father was nearing the end of his battle with cancer, and we decided we didn’t want to be out of town at that time. Our next trip to CA was planned for June of 2020, but we all know why we didn’t get to go on that trip. Needless to say, we were nervous some large life-altering event would happen before we were able to go on our trip. Thankfully this didn’t happen. Third time really is the charm I guess!
Sweating Flowers In The Dirt GIF by Paul McCartney


Our flight out of Dallas was at 10:30 am. We live a few hours from love field. I decided to stay at a hotel not far from the airport the night before, rather than getting up early and trying to fight through morning rush hour traffic to get to the airport. This turned out to be a wise idea. Even from our hotel it took 45 minutes with traffic to get to our parking spot!

Travel day selfie!
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Thankfully things weren’t nearly as hectic inside the airport and we made it through security and to our gate with plenty of time for some Whataburger breakfast!

Our steed for the trip out.
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Southwest sent us a dozen drink coupons about a month before our trip. It was a fun flight!
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Living Music Video GIF by Dierks Bentley


The flight itself was smooth and in three hours we were in sunny Southern California. Long Beach to be exact! This was a great little airport! Much closer to Anaheim than LAX, and much more affordable than John Wayne!
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Baggage claim was located outside(literally) the terminal. Our flight’s bags began unloading almost immediately, which is a nice change from Orlando or love field!
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The Uber pickup area is steps away from baggage claim, and soon we were on our way to Anaheim. This day was added on after our initial booking, so I ended up having a different hotel called the Cortona Inn and Suites. Unfortunately they were having some sort of plumbing issue and weren’t able to get us our room. Instead they comped us a night at the much nicer Hyatt next door!
Fuck Yeah Yes GIF


Up next : a super early dinner, and a short walk around downtown.
 

Bullseye1967

Is that who I am?
Premium Member
Travel day continued.

Some palm trees for my friend @Darstarr
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I took this picture to remember how much gas cost, I didn’t notice the billboard until later! Snoop would approve!
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Snoop Dogg Yes GIF


We had a bit of an issue getting our room at the Hyatt. The girl working the front desk had never done a room credit from another hotel, so we had to wait for the manager to show up and show her how. This took about 45 minutes, but luckily our room was ready once they figured things out.

We relaxed in our very spacious(sorry I forgot room pictures) room for a bit before deciding to go out in search of food. We ended up at the pizza press at Anaheim hotel.

This was my pizza. It was quite tasty
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A’s pizza. Also tasty, but not as much.


We were already feeling the effects of the time difference after our late lunch(or is it early dinner?). We pressed on toward Downtown Disney.
Were they mowing the lawn? Someone got grass all over your pizza! :hilarious: Great to see another TR from you!
 

Loco_driver

Well-Known Member
Original Poster

Loco_driver

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Day two continued.

More from HM holiday. I actually liked the longer hallway/opening scene being before the boarding area. It feels less chaotic after the stretching room.
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The attic scene.
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Snake thingy is prominent in the attic.
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Hatbox ghost! He’s very hard to photograph!
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The graveyard scene was very impressive.
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I know this one is named Jack(and zero)!
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Singing jack-o-lantern busts!
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Oogie Boogie gives you a present instead of hitchhiking ghosts.
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Despite not having any real knowledge of the film, I was able to follow the story perfectly on the attraction. I really wish WDW would do something like this for the holidays!
 

fractal

Well-Known Member
Day two continued.

More from HM holiday. I actually liked the longer hallway/opening scene being before the boarding area. It feels less chaotic after the stretching room.
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The attic scene.
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Snake thingy is prominent in the attic.
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Hatbox ghost! He’s very hard to photograph!
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The graveyard scene was very impressive.
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I know this one is named Jack(and zero)!
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Singing jack-o-lantern busts!
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Oogie Boogie gives you a present instead of hitchhiking ghosts.
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Despite not having any real knowledge of the film, I was able to follow the story perfectly on the attraction. I really wish WDW would do something like this for the holidays!


I'd love to see this version of HM! btw, I think you would really enjoy the movie.
 

Loco_driver

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Day two continued.

There is definitely more of an emphasis on atmospheric entertainment here. We often were greeted with groups like this or Dapper Dans.
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We walked along the rivers of America to our next attraction.
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Imagineers used Bryce Canyon as inspiration for this version of BTMRR rather than Monument Valley, which is the inspiration for WDW and Tokyo. It definitely has a different feel with more plant life and water features.
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Lift hill selfie. The working water fall on the first lift and the third lift hill dynamite scene were neat. I still prefer the actual coaster at WDW. This one didn’t feel as wild and out of control.
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We continued into Galaxy’s Edge where we encountered a Wookiee! He was friendly though!
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Another strange encounter was finding Rise of the Resistance to be 1) Operating and 2) showing only a 40 minute wait. We decided to try our luck and joined the queue.

The 40 minute posted wait turned out to be closer to 60. Still worth it for this attraction though.
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This room still amazes me!
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We had a slight delay in our interrogation room, but did make it to our escape pods! The only effect I noticed not working were the cannons, which seem to be disabled on both coasts. Overall a great time as always!
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Time for IT issue number two. We had booked a LL for smugglers run while queuing for rise. Unfortunately my app kept kicking me out and making me log back in. This time however, it decided to just not let me log in at all. A quick trip to the nearest blue umbrella was in order. They informed me this can happen when your phone keeps constant jumping back in forth from Wi-Fi to cell signal while logged in to the app. It took about ten minutes but we finally got it resolved. I suspect my horrible cell coverage(thanks AT&T) had more to do with this than Disney.

We were on and off smugglers run so fast that I didn’t have time to take any pictures. We got pilots and managed to capture two whatchamacallits.

We left galaxy’s edge satisfied with our experience. This guy was out doing a little recruiting for the first order.
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Loco_driver

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Day two continued.

The park had been open for a few hours now and crowds were picking up. I’d made a LL reservation for space mountain but still had time to kill before that window opened. Tucked away in the back of the park with no wait was this beauty.
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We walked straight to the loading dock
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It was great to be able to experience the original attraction. The facade and areas around it are beautiful.
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We were blown away by how impressive this attraction is. Everything was in perfect working order, and the Disney characters they added fit in seamlessly!
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Our favorite hippo!
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After our happy cruise it was time for our Space LL, but apparently the ride was down because we had another multiple experience pass in our accounts. Leaving us with three slots for LLs now. Things were getting interesting. Since we were already in Tomorrowland I booked a LL for buzz that began immediately.
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This sign sums up how I was feeling by this time.
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The on ride photo won’t let me lie about the scores.
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We were both really hungry by now. All of the restaurants were full and didn’t have any mobile order windows for at least another 30 minutes. We settled on alien pizza planet since it was available immediately, and I’m a sucker for Disney QS pizza.
High Five Jimmy Fallon GIF by Saturday Night Live


A kids meal for both of us was plenty. @Tuvalu do you keep purse carrots? 😂
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LeighM

Well-Known Member
Well welcome to the party friend!


The flying doesn’t bother me nearly as much as the stress of dealing with the airport. We are lucky to have pretty similar distance flights to both coasts though!

My claustrophobia is really bad on airplanes. I used to be okay-ish on JetBlue when they had 2x2 seats but when they changed to 3x3 I really started to medicate with pills LOL. Which turned out to be like tic tacs and not do anything. However, this last trip I had less issues on the return trip which was in the evening after it was already dark and not many people were sitting at the back of the plane. That was the nicest flying experience I've ever had 🤣
 

Loco_driver

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Day two continued.

Our next LL was in a different park. We headed for the exit, stopping for some castle pics on the way.
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Hard to get a selfie with such a tiny castle.
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There was a PPP nearby to help us out.
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Time to get to our second new park of the day! Several others had the same idea.
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Stopping for pics with dear old Uncle Walt.
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Not pictured : a ride on Monsters Inc.
Bernie Sanders Ok GIF by Saturday Night Live


Pixar pier makes for good photos.
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Pixar swinging wheel of doom.
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Our next ride up was incredicoaster. We both give it two thumbs up, despite the look on my face!
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season 6 GIF
 

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