March 23, 2012

This month is Spring Break across the country and a lot of people headed west (or south from Canada) to spend their vacation at Disney.  So the RV park in Ahaheim is really busy, and Randy and I have been working full time instead of just part time.  So much for the best-laid plans.  In spite of all this unexpected work, we have been able to do a couple of fun things.

The Pirate Dinner Adventure is a local dinner show that lets some hospitality workers (like us!) see the show for free.  The idea is that if we see the show, it increases the likelyhood that we will suggest it to our guests.  The merchants in Skagway, Alaska do something similar, and it’s a good idea here, too.  

Before the show waiters served free appetizers to the guests.  When it was showtime, everyone went into the theater that wraps around the center stage.  The show is a loose story line about pirates under an ancient curse, and they bring children from the audience into the act, which is fun.

I thought the best part was the gypsy girl’s aerial fabric acrobatics - she was really good.  For dinner they served mediocre BBQ pork and excellent roasted chicken.

Well, a free Pirate’s Dinner Adventure is nice, but a free Disney adventure is EXCELLENT!  We were blessed with a couple of free one-day tickets, so we high-tailed it to Disney last Friday.  It’s been a long time since we were here (1985?), and of course a lot has changed.  For one thing, they partially solved their expansion problem by converting the old parking lot into the California Adventure.  It's not possible to see all of Disneyland in one day, much less all of Disneyland and California Adventure, so we just hit the highlights.  And the lines were really long; twice, after we'd already stood in line for 30 minutes, they announced that due to technical difficulties, the wait would be even longer.  But what the heck, we weren't on a schedule, so at California Adventure we went on the California Screamin' roller coaster (I screamed a lot), the Twilight Tower of Terror (it's better in Disney World), and the Soaring Over California ride (easy-going and fun).  Then we walked over to Disneyland and went on Space Mountain (it's still scary), saw Great Moments with President Lincoln, and watched the afternoon parade.  I like the statue of Walt Disney and Mickey Mouse together at the end of Main Street - it's kind of sweet.

At the end of the day we went back to California Adventure for the evening finale, World of Color.  It's a great display of dancing fountains set to music, with images of famous Disney cartoon movies projected on the fountains.  The show is put on in the lake in front of the huge Mickey Mouse ferris wheel, and it's a great way to end the day.  They recommend you get a Fast-Pass to get into the roped-off viewing area, but the display is so big that I don't think it's really necessary.

We had a great time at Disney - just what we were hoping for.

Now that our Disney adventure is over, it's time to finally address the issue of our living room carpet.  It is, in my opinion, the ugliest carpet in existence, so just ripping it out made the RV look better.  But little Julienne seems to think we need something besides particle board on the floor, so we are looking at options at Home Depot and Lowe's.

March 13, 2012

This weekend we attended another performance of the Wizard of Oz at the Riverside Children’s Theater because there are two casts and we wanted to see them both.  It’s a long and complex play for children to perform, and they all did such a wonderful job!   And I learned a piece of Oz movie trivia: originally a “Jitterbug” song and dance was filmed.  The bugs made Dorothy and her friends dance until they were exhausted, leaving them easy prey for the flying monkeys.  Then the whole bug scene was deleted, but a reference to it was accidentally left - when the witch sends the monkeys to capture the group, she says that she has sent “a little insect to take the fight out of them”.  Travel is so educational!  Trivia aside, I am so proud of Teresa and the whole Children’s Theater.  This particular Theater has a rule that everyone who tries out will be in the play, so nobody feels left out.  It’s a great experience for the kids.   

The Southern California weather just gets better and better - it’s often in the mid-80s during the day now.  We got the gear shifter on my bike fixed (replaced, actually - it wouldn’t shift gears at all) and the next day we biked to the nearby Gardenwalk shopping center.  We didn’t find what we were looking for there, so we biked to Downtown Disney and went to the Rainforest Cafe for lunch.  It’s fun to bike around the Disney complex and I’m looking forward to more bike rides.

The same day we drove to Newport Beach.  It’s a really nice area; it’s not like every car there is a Mercedes - there were a few Jaguars and Maseratis mixed in, too.  We were there to go shoe shopping, but we also checked out the local RV park.  It’s got a good view of the bay but the sites aren’t quite as big as the ones in the Anaheim park.

One thing I need to work on is my blog.  The local internet service almost never lets me upload pictures.  We could restart the hot-spot on our phone, but before we do that I see if there is another way to make this work.

March 10, 2012

There is a grocery store about a half mile away from our RV park, so we are adding exercise to our daily routine by walking there.  It’s named El Super,  all of their signs are in Spanish, and they sell things like pickled cactus.  

But they also have regular groceries so we get a few things there.  And anyway to avoid driving is welcome;  regular gas in California is now $4.37 a gallon - unbelievable!  And diesel, of course, is even higher, which is another good reason to stay parked.