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.
 

ajrwdwgirl

Premium Member
It was fun and interesting!
I'll get a trip report started soon.
While we were in Hawaii Gary got a call from the outlaws, inlaws (his brother and sister in law) informing us that they were going to be landing on our doorstep for a visit the day after we got back! o_O
(they're still here now)!

Maybe you should have extended your stay in Hawaii when you got that call! ;):)
 

Loco_driver

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Day three continued.

Pooh had a relatively short line, so we headed there next. While waiting we saw a Blonde woman and her kids getting on the ride with a VIP tour guide. I asked A if she recognized the woman. “I do, but I can’t put a name to the face” she says. I contemplate getting a quick picture but by the time I get my phone back out it’s too late. I know this woman is famous because I too recognize her face, but I have park brain and can’t seem to put a name to it. Later that evening as she’s scrolling through instagram A immediately realizes that the woman we saw was none other than Disney legend Kristen Bell! She had just posted pics from her day at Disneyland.

Anyways we boarded our hunny pot and visited the hundred acre woods.
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It was Friday night and the park was packed. On to another short wait.
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Apparently it was 7:15 when we boarded.
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The addition of characters was met with much resistance by the locals, but they turned out to be well integrated.
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Wait, are we at Epcot?
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My people!
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Our journey took exactly 15 minutes.
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We ventured over to Tomorrowland. I guess we’ll never know the true score of our game.
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Star Tours was a walk on so that was next. I wish I’d had my phone out because after years and years of riding this attraction, I was finally the rebel spy!

You’ll have to forgive the lack of night time pictures. I seem to have somehow lost quite a few pictures. There are pictures I distinctly remember taking that are nowhere to be found.

Remember how I mentioned that we’d had no break this day and that I couldn’t quite tour as hard as I once did? This is where it finally caught up to me. We had one more LL for Indy which we used. Our plan was to watch either fantasmic or the fireworks after. My feet were dead tired though, and I was really running out of gas. I asked A if it was ok if we just went back to the hotel a little early. “I was afraid to ask because I thought you wanted to stay” was her response. We worked our way to the park exit to call it a night after over 12 hours in the parks.

We were treated to some fireworks from the toy story lot to end the night.
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Loco_driver

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Day four. September 17, 2022.

This day would be a non-park day. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t a full day though! We were up fairly early and caught and Uber over to Newport Beach. First stop was for breakfast.
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We decided to go whale watching this morning.
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It was a beautiful morning on the harbor.
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Despite my intense searching. We did not spot any whales.
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We did come across a few pods of friendly dolphins. There were several calves swimming with their mothers .
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Of course we saw California Sea Lions.
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It was a nice morning to be out on the water and we enjoyed the relatively calm seas.
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We checked out some of the murals on the way down to the beach.
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Not pictured is homeless guy having a very intense conversation with himself right behind me.
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Loco_driver

Well-Known Member
Original Poster
Day four continued.

We headed across the peninsula to Balboa pier.
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It was our first time at the Pacific Ocean!
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About to get wiped out by a wave?
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It’s so cold!
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There was a surf contest going on this morning. These guys were practicing before their round.
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They were really good and had some sweet moves! Turns out this contest was part of an Olympic qualifying event that was taking place. Pretty cool!
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We enjoyed listening to the waves and dipping our toes in the water for a few hours before lunch.
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Lunch by the beach. What’s going on in that painting?!
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Oh there was food too! Shrimp tacos for A.
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Fish tacos for me. We of course shared.
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