Mom, You Know We're in Hell, Right? A Feb Disneyland/LA TR. Updated 8/7 x 4 The End!

i don't even think i can do the paper fastpass run anymore. WDW has spoiled me with all the technology!
I do love the photo's with the PP they came out awesome but nothing beats the ride pictures! they are excellent!!! sorry the food wasn't as stellar as it should be. then again i am not a fan of RFC just think they are OK.
 
I am really hoping I can get to DL in 2018. Its been so long since I have used legacy FP that I barely remember how to do it. Reading DL TR's lately like yours is helping me though.

California Screamin' looks like a ton of fun!

I'd be one of those people who wants to go on the moving cars on the fun wheel too. No movement is a little boring ;)

I do hope you get there, it's a must do for a Disney fan! I learned most of what I knew for the trip reading DL TRs. There's just not a whole lot of info out there for DL.

The coaster was a lot of fun, we loved it!

We'll get to the whole moving cars on the Fun Wheel later.


We like Primeval Whirl much better than Goofy's Fly School. When we were there, we were amazed that it always had such a long line, but it was summer. We don't usually ever have to get a fp for Screamin'. I like that ride, so it is good that the wait is never that long. If it does get longer, we use single rider line.

I like Primeval Whirl too. We really had a low crowd day, the only rides with long lines was Radiator Springs Racers, TSM and Soarin'.

We ended up riding Little Mermaid two or three times in a row one day because it was so hot, LOL!! When we were there last June, two of our days were freezing in the morning and the other three days were some of the hottest days of the year. It was crazy.

California Adventure was my favorite of the two parks by far. California Screamin' was our favorite ride, but unfortunately we only did it once! When I was there, it was when they'd taken away the option for multiday photopass, so if you wanted it you had to buy it day by day. I think it was $39 each day, so we only bought it for our first Disneyland day and our first CA day.

Our first morning at CA, the park was empty outside of the FP area for Cars (I also did the rush in and stop in front of Carthay Circle with a few hundred of my closest friends thing!), and my kids rode Goofy's Sky School once with me and twice by themselves...they loved it, and I did like it more than Primeval Whirl. I think it's slightly less rough??

We did the stationary side of Mickey's Fun Wheel, and it was cool to see the view, but it was annoying that it constantly stopped and started to fill cars. I wanted to ride it once around at least without stopping, but nope. That was disappointing, but I really did love the view!!

Can't wait to see how you liked Radiator Springs!!

The weather on this day was perfect. Not too hot, cool at night but sweatshirts worked. Unfortunately we got some rain on subsequent days.

Huh, they must have added back the multi-day PP because I was able to buy it a few weeks before our trip.

It was pretty empty in Paradise Pier that morning except for the TSM line. Funny but I thought Goofy's was rougher than Primeval Whirl.

Spoiler for future post but believe me if you had been on one of the swinging cars you would not have wanted to go around more than once!


Hi! I am another WDW vet heading to DL for the first time. It has to be weird not having magic bands and hoofing it old school for fastpasses, right? Thank you for doing this report! I always enjoy your reports :) 70 days!!

Yes it was a little weird! But it didn't take me too long to figure it out, just like riding a bike. I'm so glad you are enjoying the report. If you have any questions feel free to ask. I'm definitely not an expert but I can try to answer!

Wow, that looks like a cool park...like Boardwalk resort come to life! Yeah, I would not have liked the Goofy ride, either. I HATE Primeval Whirl!!! The only time I ever rode it, though, there were FOUR of us squeezed in. One of my friends that rode is large, and I kid you not...my bottom was not even on the seat. I was wedged, mid air, between her and the side of the ride vehicle. Then add in all the twists, spins, and jerks...HATE!!! And that is the only ride at WDW that I say that about.

DCA kind of felt like a cross between the Boardwalk area and Hollywood Studios.

Funny thing is I like Primeval Whirl but really didn't like the Goofy one. Funny story about your only ride!


I'm glad the breakfast was at least edible; definitely saves you a little money!

Glad you found the FP machine line easily, I know you were worried about that!

Love the PP pics on the pier!

I enjoyed California Screamin more than I thought I would as well!

Sounds like a good morning so far, can't wait to hear more!

Yep, breakfast was definitely worth the cost! We paid about $18 extra each over the other hotel we were looking at.

I was definitely worried about finding that line but your answers really helped me out!

More coming right up.


We rode Little Mermaid back to back because of that same reason. It was hot! The ride is air conditioned and we had time before our fast passes and there is usually never a wait.

We went to DL after the introduction of the $39 daily rate. I was really worried about that, but 2 weeks before we went, they introduced the weekly pass for $79. I was very happy to see that. Otherwise, we were planning on doing 2 of our park days tracking down photopass photographers.

We rode the swinging side and that was one of my biggest ride mistakes of my life. The next year, my son rode the stationary side with my youngest daughter. That is when he realized he is afraid of heights. He hated that. So, we no longer ride it. I think it would be better if they at least did one full circle without stopping.

We had great weather on this day but unfortunately it rained on the other days.

I'm glad they had the weekly rate because we used the photographers for all three days.

Yep, definitely a ride mistake for me too! I'm not sure I could have handled a full circle but I'll talk about that later.


You're killing me with anticipation on this Wheel of Fun ride!!

I love that your first ride at DL was an exact same as WDW attraction :)

Interesting that your good neighbor hotel ends up putting you closer to the parks! and I must admit, a free breakfast (whether it's the best you have ever eaten or not!) is always an excellent deal!

With the odd way to get your pics from PP and ride photos and the good ole paper FPs, it sounds like DL is really like going back in time :) Can't wait for more!

Unfortunately it will be several updates yet before we get back to Paradise Pier so you will have to wait a bit longer.

I thought it was funny we ended up on Little Mermaid when my whole focus was rides that weren't the same as WDW.

The free breakfast was worth it and while the Best Western was really just a chain and not very "Disney" it sure beat paying double the cost at one of the onsite hotels.

It is like being at WDW 5 - 6 years ago! The PP on the App was a bit of a pain as you'll see in the next update.
 
You did dodge a bullet! My hubby convinced me to do the swinging car and we both regretted it. It took him most of the day to recover. The two churros he ate right before didn't help him either. I love your pictures, they make me feel like I'm there again.

Oh the day's young yet! I only dodged the bullet for a little bit there. Glad you are enjoying the TR!

We did the swinging car because our daughters begged to do that one. My husband did not do to great on it and at one point we had to pull out our ziplock bag of sunscreen to give to him as a possible barf bag. Fortunately he didn't need it, but it took a while for his stomach to recover. I didn't get sick but I am not a fan of dropping so I was a little freaked out when the car slides down.

We all loved California Screamin. In fact this was the first "big" roller coaster my youngest daughter ever rode. I can't wait to see what you thought of Cars Land. That was one of our favorites of our DL trip.

I do know they used to have barf bags on the ride but they aren't there anymore.

California Screamin' was a lot of fun.


i don't even think i can do the paper fastpass run anymore. WDW has spoiled me with all the technology!
I do love the photo's with the PP they came out awesome but nothing beats the ride pictures! they are excellent!!! sorry the food wasn't as stellar as it should be. then again i am not a fan of RFC just think they are OK.

That's definitely true but I didn't mind running for FP.

We did get some great FP pictures.

I've eaten at RFC in both Nashville and at AK and liked them both. Definitely did not like this meal though.


Can't wait to hear how much you loved Carsland!

Coming right up!
 


Exploring Carsland Part 1

It wasn’t long before we were getting our first look at Carsland.






As we were walking along the street checking out everything, Lightning McQueen drove by on the way to his meet and greet.



He was switching places with Mater.





I took one more picture of Flo’s V8 Café where we would be eating lunch in a bit and then we headed to use our Radiator Springs Racers FP.



We rounded the corner only to discover that the ride was down. No problem, I knew that our paper FP would be good for the rest of the day since the ride was down during our window. Instead we turned around and got in line for Luigi’s Rollickin’ Roadsters. The line took you through Luigi’s tire shop.











And yes I know some of the pictures are crooked. It’s hard to walk and take pictures at the same time. Once we exited the building we could see the actual ride.





We waited only about 10 minutes before we were loaded into our cars.



Mom picked out our car because she liked the luggage on the back.





The only way to describe this ride is to say that our cars danced. The ride is trackless and each car moved in its own direction to the music. It was really fun and there was a few times were we were sure we were going to crash into another car. All the cars synced up at the end and there was some mild spinning but nothing that bothered me. We ended up at a completely different spot at the end of the ride from where we started. We all loved the ride and I would definitely ride it again in the future.

We headed back to the Radiator Springs Racers and it was open again so we used our FP. The FP line was pretty long and we waited a good 15 minutes but there was so much to see we didn’t mind.






That’s all the pictures I took at that time but I know I took more later. And as for the ride, we all loved it! Well I think I was definitely more enamored than the others because they were not as familiar with the Cars movies as I am. It’s basically Test Track with a Cars layover. The indoor part was all about the Cars and then at the end you race outdoors against another car. We lost but it was so much fun! I really wish we could have ridden it more than once because there are two different indoor scenes and I wanted to see both. I guess that’s just another reason to go back!



We were starving by the time we got done with RRR so we headed into Flo’s V8 Café. I had told everyone earlier that I had a surprise for them that night and that we needed to eat a bigger lunch and just get a snack around dinner time. Flo’s was both Jocelyn’s and my number one pick for the trip so we were excited. There was a small line so I took some pictures.



Continued in Next Post
 
Exploring Carsland Part 2

Love the tail lights on the lights.






We found a booth indoors with a view of RRR. John got the Roast Beef & Cheddar sandwich.



Jocelyn got the Turkey Dip.



Mom got the Spit-fired Rotisserie Quarter Chicken.



I got the same as Mom but I asked to sub out the veggies for mac and cheese.



I also was the only one in our party that got dessert. I had been looking forward to the pies they had here forever. The one I got was called Flo’s Signature Chocolate Mud Pie-O-Rama.



And our view out the window (along with part of Mom’s head).



I’m not sure if we were early or late eating but we were literally the only ones in the room.



And as for the food, this was the best Counter Service we had all trip and definitely one of the best meals overall. My chicken was delicious as was the mashed potatoes. But oh man, that mac and cheese! I could have eaten a whole gallon of that, it was so good. Everyone else loved their meals too. The pie was delicious. It was super rich and I wasn’t able to finish it all. The others didn’t mind though and they finished it up for me. There was a CM assigned to the room and he came over and cleared our dishes and also asked if he could get us anything. He was actually a bit over attentive but then we were his only customers.

After lunch we checked out the line for Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree but it was kind of long so we decided to come back later. Instead we headed towards the path that lead to A Bug’s Land. This is when we ran into the best Photopass photographer. She took a lot of time with us and led us to several different areas and did a magic shot.
















The PP Photographer could not get her scanner to read the barcode on my phone so she ended up giving me a card that I loaded into the app later that night. The card also had a barcode but once again my phone would not read it so I just entered the number manually.

As we headed out towards A Bug’s Land, we had to stand aside to let Red and Lighting pass.










We really enjoyed visiting Carsland, the details are just amazing! I planned on stopping back later that night to ride Mater’s ride and also see the neon all lit up.

Up Next: Bugs, Donald and Some Monsters
 
Carsland looks so awesome! It's one of the biggest reasons I want to go to DL. The theming is just incredible.

Your meal at Flo's looks great. That view of the ride and "mountain range" is also really cool.

Great photopass photos!
 


Cars Land totally blew me away. Isn't it cool seeing Lightning and McQueen just driving around?

Luigi's looks like such a fun ride! It was under construction when we were there.

I'm glad you enjoyed Radiator Springs Racers! It's definitely very similar to Test Track, but I like this one more :)

What a great view from Flo's!

Great PP pictures, including the magic shot!
 
So, while the Funwheel is above and beyond my favorite park icon next to the castles, I have never been on it and it actually kind of terrifies me lol.

I really wish we could have ridden it more than once because there are two different indoor scenes and I wanted to see both. I guess that’s just another reason to go back!

I feel the same! We only got to go once and I cannot wait to go again to hopefully do it more than once or at the very least get the other side!

Flo’s was both Jocelyn’s and my number one pick for the trip so we were excited

This was our pick in DCA as well. Glad you enjoyed your meal! The turkey sandwich looks tasty (as does that pie!)

I’m not sure if we were early or late eating but we were literally the only ones in the room.

That happened to us too! It was early (we sat down outside before lunch officially started to be served) but we were outside and there was still literally nobody there!
 

Huh, they must have added back the multi-day PP because I was able to buy it a few weeks before our trip.






Yes, it came back a few weeks after we returned from our trip, lol!! It was one of those, "it figures!" moments. I'm glad they brought it back, because the pay-per-day thing was not awesome!

I loved Cars Land so much! The food at Flo's looks great. We did a quick lunch at the Cozy Cones, but never managed to get to Flo's. I was kind of sad about that. We didn't do the Rolickin' Roadsters because the line was always really long, but we had fun with Mater's ride. I like that RR has the trackless tech, it reminds me of videos I've seen of Mystic Manor in Tokyo.

Love your photopass pictures and jealous Red was out driving around!
 
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Oh, my gosh, I'm crying at how amazing Carsland is!!! Jimmy LOVES the Cars movies and can't wait til the new one comes out in June. We have quite the collection of the Disney Store die cast cars, too. He would absolutely love to be walking around there. I am SO not looking forward to the long flight to get there, but I have to get this kid to Disneyland to see it!

Your lunches looked DELISH. I love the mural on the wall where you guys were sitting. How cute are Flo and the girls!?

The PP pics you got here are definitely great--love that magic shot!

It's so cool how the different vehicles come driving by to do their meet and greets. Do they make any sounds or talk or anything? I always liked that you could meet Mater and McQueen at DHS but that annoying engine revving and horn honking I could've done without. I always wished they'd just include dialogue, "Kachow!"
 
oh my.. Cars land is one of the biggest reasons we want to go to DL!! the ride is adorable and loos like so much FUN! So glad you were able to make up the bad food with Flo's every ones food looks fresh and DELISH!
Adore the Photo's you all are adorable!!
I never heard of the dancing cars before! SO CUTE!!
 
I love Carsland!! It's become one of my favorite spots in California Adventure. Looks like you guys had a lot of fun.

I agree, your meals at Flo's looked delicious .

Love all the pics!!
 
Cars land is the best :) We haven't tried Flo's yet but may have to during our next trip.
 
Great trip report on CA. I really enjoyed DL, but have really only been there once for a true vacation. We stayed at grand Californian and had a great room that over looked the park! I kept calling it my once in a lifetime trip, but would sure love to go back. It is so weird that there are so many hotels so close, and really closer than the onsite ones. Looking forward to more, thanks for taking the time to share your trip!
 
Carsland looks so awesome! It's one of the biggest reasons I want to go to DL. The theming is just incredible.

Your meal at Flo's looks great. That view of the ride and "mountain range" is also really cool.

Great photopass photos!

It is awesome! I hope you make it out there to visit.

Can't beat both a great meal and a great view.

Thanks, I do love those photos.


Cars Land totally blew me away. Isn't it cool seeing Lightning and McQueen just driving around?

Luigi's looks like such a fun ride! It was under construction when we were there.

I'm glad you enjoyed Radiator Springs Racers! It's definitely very similar to Test Track, but I like this one more :)

What a great view from Flo's!

Great PP pictures, including the magic shot!

Carsland was amazing, that's for sure!

Bummer you missed Luigi's, it was a lot of fun.

I'm pretty sure I like RSR better than TT but I think I need to ride RSR a few more times just to be sure. ::yes::

I was so glad we found that PP photographer. She really took her time with us.


So, while the Funwheel is above and beyond my favorite park icon next to the castles, I have never been on it and it actually kind of terrifies me lol.

I feel the same! We only got to go once and I cannot wait to go again to hopefully do it more than once or at the very least get the other side!

This was our pick in DCA as well. Glad you enjoyed your meal! The turkey sandwich looks tasty (as does that pie!)

That happened to us too! It was early (we sat down outside before lunch officially started to be served) but we were outside and there was still literally nobody there!

I'll get to our Fun Wheel ride in a few more updates but I will say that I will never ride the swinging side again!

I'm tentatively thinking about dragging Jim out there in 2019 or 2020 and I will try to ride the Racers a few times. I know Jim will love them because he loves Cars and Test Track at Epcot.

We really enjoyed our meal and it was nice to have a quiet place to eat and rest for a bit.


Yes, it came back a few weeks after we returned from our trip, lol!! It was one of those, "it figures!" moments. I'm glad they brought it back, because the pay-per-day thing was not awesome!

I loved Cars Land so much! The food at Flo's looks great. We did a quick lunch at the Cozy Cones, but never managed to get to Flo's. I was kind of sad about that. We didn't do the Rolickin' Roadsters because the line was always really long, but we had fun with Mater's ride. I like that RR has the trackless tech, it reminds me of videos I've seen of Mystic Manor in Tokyo.

I'm glad there was a week option. I'm not sure I would have done a day by day option.

We did check out the Cozy Cones later that night but didn't eat anything from there


Love your photopass pictures and jealous Red was out driving around!

It was really cool to see the cars driving around.

Oh, my gosh, I'm crying at how amazing Carsland is!!! Jimmy LOVES the Cars movies and can't wait til the new one comes out in June. We have quite the collection of the Disney Store die cast cars, too. He would absolutely love to be walking around there. I am SO not looking forward to the long flight to get there, but I have to get this kid to Disneyland to see it!

Your lunches looked DELISH. I love the mural on the wall where you guys were sitting. How cute are Flo and the girls!?

The PP pics you got here are definitely great--love that magic shot!

It's so cool how the different vehicles come driving by to do their meet and greets. Do they make any sounds or talk or anything? I always liked that you could meet Mater and McQueen at DHS but that annoying engine revving and horn honking I could've done without. I always wished they'd just include dialogue, "Kachow!"

If he loves Cars that much you really should take him there! It was just like stepping into the movie.

Lunch was awesome, definitely one of the best meals of the trip.

The Cars did talk and make comments as the drove by. We didn't do any meets with them so I don't know how interactive they were.


oh my.. Cars land is one of the biggest reasons we want to go to DL!! the ride is adorable and loos like so much FUN! So glad you were able to make up the bad food with Flo's every ones food looks fresh and DELISH!
Adore the Photo's you all are adorable!!
I never heard of the dancing cars before! SO CUTE!!

Everything about Carsland was just awesome. I'm so glad we finally made it out there.

The dancing cars ride is fairly new. There was another ride there that they replaced but I can't remember what it was like.


I love Carsland!! It's become one of my favorite spots in California Adventure. Looks like you guys had a lot of fun.

I agree, your meals at Flo's looked delicious .

Love all the pics!!

We did have a lot of fun in Carsland and really enjoyed our lunch.

Cars land is the best :) We haven't tried Flo's yet but may have to during our next trip.

Flo's was definitely one of our top meals during the trip!

Great trip report on CA. I really enjoyed DL, but have really only been there once for a true vacation. We stayed at grand Californian and had a great room that over looked the park! I kept calling it my once in a lifetime trip, but would sure love to go back. It is so weird that there are so many hotels so close, and really closer than the onsite ones. Looking forward to more, thanks for taking the time to share your trip!

Thanks, glad you are enjoying the trip. This was supposed to be a once and done for us. I can't speak for the others but I'm pretty sure I will go back again someday.
 
Bugs, Donald and Some Monsters Part 1

When I last left off, we were taking the back path between Carsland and A Bug’s Land.






We could see the Tower of Terror but it was all covered up for the transition to a Guardians of the Galaxy ride.



We only did a walkthrough of A Bug’s Land since all of the rides are for smaller children. I may have ridden one or two if I had been by myself but the others didn’t care too. I did take some pictures as we walked through.





There were bumper cars.



And a ride that reminded me of the Tea Cups.



And another kind of like Dumbo.



We stopped and used the restrooms which were housed in a tissue box.



There were a couple of splash areas for the kids. I only got a photo of one of the areas.



There was also a train ride but this was the only picture I got. It’s kind of hard to see the track there.



Mom and John wanted ice cream so we stopped at a cart in A Bug’s Land. Mom got a Mickey Ice Cream Bar and John got a Mickey Ice Cream Sandwich. Jocelyn and I were still way too full from lunch to have anything. Unfortunately the cart they bought the ice cream from must have been on super deep freeze mode because their ice cream was hard as a rock. They had a bit of a hard time eating them.

We exited out of A Bug’s Land through the main entrance.




As we exited, we saw Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree on our left and stopped to watch for a minute. The ride looked fun and we decided to make sure and come back to ride it later.





At that point, I did a FP run and got us passes for Soarin’. Even though it’s almost the same version as WDW, John and Jocelyn had not seen the new version and Mom and I couldn’t wait to have them experience it. We loved the new show when we saw it in December. I took zero notes for this trip so I don’t remember the exact FP time but I think it was from 2:30 – 3:30 or something similar.

After I made it back to them, we turned right and headed into Hollywood Land. For some reason the name of this food stand cracked me up.




Walking down the street into Hollywood Land reminded me strongly of Hollywood Studios at WDW.





We headed inside the Disney Animation Building to check it out. My pictures don’t do justice to how huge these screens were. They changed and displayed scenes from different movies.



I really wanted to do the Animation Academy and luckily there was a class starting very soon. The others were a bit hesitant but I talked them into giving it a try.





They don’t have desks like at the old version at WDW. Instead you have a clip board that rests on your lap as you draw.



Continued in Next Post
 
Bugs, Donald and Some Monsters Part 2

I spotted Remy on the desk in the front and zoomed in for a picture.




The class at DL has a set schedule so I knew we would be drawing Donald Duck. I was pretty happy with my drawing. If only I had started down a little further on the page. I almost didn’t have room for his hat.



And here’s the finished results with all of our drawings. The other three did seem to enjoy the class.



There wasn’t anything else we wanted to do in the Animation building so we headed out and towards the Monster’s Inc. ride.





There was about a ten minute wait and I took a few line photos. Funny thing, my brother thought this was a real restaurant in the parks and asked if we were going to eat there.









And my pictures from the ride itself which was basically a ride through of the Monster’s Inc. movie.















Roz is at the very end and she interacts with the people in the cars.



John and Jocelyn were in the front row and she said “Young lady in the front row, you better keep an eye on that young man next to you. He looks like trouble”. We all laughed pretty hard at that one. Over all it was a cute ride and I loved riding something so different from anything at WDW.

We continued walking through Hollywood Land and visited a few stores but we didn’t do any other attractions. Really the only other things were the Disney Junior show and the Frozen show. I did kind of want to see the Frozen show but it was a really long show and I figured we just wouldn’t have time for it.

As we were walking, we saw some super hero meet and greets. The lines were very long and I didn’t really have any desire to meet any of them. I was able to take a few creeper photos of Spiderman though.





More photos from that area.





We exited out of Hollywood Land and spent some time in the shops on Buena Vista Street. I saw a few things I was thinking about buying but I knew Mom and I would be coming back later that week and I could get them then. We also stopped back and picked up our sweatshirts from the locker because it has started to get cool again.

Both Jocelyn and I really wanted to see the Red Car Trolley News Boys show and there was one starting soon. It was going to be cutting it close to make our FP for Soarin’ but I knew there was a grace period on the FPs so we stopped to watch the show.

Up Next: Red Car Trolley News Boys Show
 
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I didn't do any of the Bugs Land rides either, but it's so nice just walking through that area!

Glad you got to do the animation class, your drawing came out great!

Loved the Monsters Inc ride; you got some nice pics on it!
 

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