Awoke at 9 on the day of theme park visit. Figured that we spent so much (much more than on the tickets) on the room, might as well make the most use of it. With a young kid, optimizing theme park visit wasn’t top priority, thus even when given an option for an earlier visit of 1hr before official opening as a guest of the hotel ( which was ridiculously early at 7am) we couldn’t be bothered. Wasn’t easy to get K out of bed and we tried to optimized the packing for the check out. I moved some of the smaller non essential items to the car first and have mommy and K go over to the club for breakfast on the second floor. There was a simple buffet spread and a couple of choices for food and a big TV that was showing Brave. We left at about 10am after breakfast, as I went back to the room to bring the luggage to the bell.
Walking to Disneyland was at least a 10min walk, through some car parks and through Downtown Disney District (a street with some shops including Starbucks and Sephora). There was a tram that could take visitors direct to the park but it was for Disneyland instead of California adventure park.
We bought tickets via Klook that was slightly cheaper than those offered online and chose one park visit instead of hopper. There weren’t much time anyway and we thought that Disneyland would be mostly the same as those closer to our part of the world (eg. Hong Kong). Our print outs were exchanged for tickets that were tagged to photos taken at the entrance. Then we entered the park.
Wanted a stroller as I wouldn’t be able to carry K thru out and was told that it would be outside the park next to the entrance of Disneyland. Didn’t expect re-entry to happen so soon and went out alone to queue for the stroller, rental at $15 the whole day. They had other accessibility options for rent too, like personal mobility vehicles.
Returned to find mommy and K at the shop. Walked to the Disney Jr dance party for our first show. The floor was almost full and we had to sit to the sides. Then the show began and some kids were already out at the front dancing with the performers. This interesting show brought together physical dances from the dancers, interaction with digital presentations on screen and physical presentations using bubbles and fake leaves, and characters coming from screen to on stage, something like a 4D show. Amusing to both kids and adults.
After the 30mins fun, we went to the Hyperion theatre to watch a rather professionally done Frozen musical. Again we were the last bunch of those people there and ended up at the top balcony, offering a birds eye view of the stage. It was pretty good with the visual effect and the singing, only thing was the characters were not the same dimensions as that in the animation.
Afternoon was spent having a quick lunch getting chicken box from Poultry Palace for 10ish, and walking around the Incredibles section to find the characters which we couldn’t see. Queued 50mins for midway mania which was pretty fun, where we were in seats that moved from screen to screen with guns to fire at the screens. Then we proceeded to Cars area to queue for an outdoor ride at Maters’ farm and snapped a photo with a talking Lightning. Sat down for some popcorn and ice cream before moving on.
K then fell asleep in his stroller, rejecting my offer to take the Ferris wheel or the other rides. We then walked to the Elena of Avalon show, a street song and dance show.
K woke up a little annoyed due to the lack of sleep but quickly recovered when he saw a Buzz lightyear bubble maker that mommy bought him. Instantly became his favorite toy, creating bubbles along the way as we strolled through the rest of the park going through Grizzly peak, an American theme area.
We returned to the Hollywood area to line up for a photo session with Spider-Man and K acquainted with some kids in the queue and played till we met Spidey.
Spider-Man was really into character, as the friendly neighborhood superhero and it was amusing when he talked about the bubbles coming from the Buzz in K’s hands. We took our photos professionally and with my iPhone and then proceeded to walk towards the exit.
Near the entrance, we saw lines queuing to take a photo with Mickey and Minnie. Walked a bit more to look for Goofy but couldn’t see him and eventually lined up for Minnie (K’s preference). The short line was about a 10mins wait but Minnie had to leave by 630pm and so we did a selfie instead (K was naughty and hit Minnie’s nose).
We got out of the park way before closing time and returned the stroller but re-entered the park to walk through Californian hotel via Grizzly peak as the distance felt a little shorter than the route we took to entrance in the afternoon through the Downtown Disney District. The hotel looked more grand than the one we stayed as we strolled through its lobby.
Retrieved the luggage from the bell after snapping a photo of the giant Xmas tree they replaced Goofy in the same position and we were on our way to dinner at Roscoe’s House of Chicken & Waffles, where we had chicken, waffles, corn bread and soup.
After dinner, we drove to our accommodation for the night, Homewood Suite Anaheim by Hilton. The suite was big and had the comforts of a hotel and a nice kitchen came with it. It was the best of worlds for families who wanted to prepare meals. The only small issue was that there wasn’t detergent nor an electric flask/kettle. Got my hot water from hot water flask at the dining area in which the reception on duty helped to replace and the cool water from the water cooler.
Night was a combination of bath time, washing up of utensils and then it off to bed after some time watching Disney Jr channel, the cartoon theme of the day.