Thursday, October 28, 2010

Trip Report - October 26, 2010

This trip report will be a little different for a couple of reasons. First my digital camera ate right thru its batteries and I’m too cheap to buy batteries at Disneyland so about half way thru my four hour visit I switched to my Droid cell phone and took a few more videos than I usually do.

The other reason this report is different? The park was so un-crowded and the lines were so short that I got the bit by the attraction bug and rode the Matterhorn 5 times in a row (in under 30 minutes!), Space Mountain 3 times in a row (within 20 minutes), Peterpan twice (in less than 15 minutes), Casey Jr. (no waiting) and more!

The park was the least crowed I’ve ever seen it. I think the odd hours are to blame. The park was open for normal guests from 8am to 6pm on Tuesday. The special Halloween party was held at night (at an extra cost of course). From 8am to noon the park was unusually empty – boy do I love those days! Did they add the light up sign or have I just not noticed it before?





Today’s photo's are a bit out of sequence, the sun wasn’t quite out yet at 8am so I cam back a couple hours later for these shots.








Once the clouds broke it was a beautiful day.







How many cast members does it take to do the job of one horse?





After my usual breakfast at the River Belle (I was starving so no food photo!) I took a walk around the Rivers of America.




The River was extra calm and nicely devoid of guests.




It’s a floating wedding cake!





I believe these are the same posters as seen in the photo on my Monday’s August 1955 post (link).







Let’s take a two minute walk thru a very sparsely populated New Orleans Square.







On my next visit I’m bringing a crowbar to pry off that “Pirate’s Lair” sign. (I wont take it, I'll toss it in the river!)





What knockers”…






Splash Mountain was open but didn’t have many takers?





I’ll be seeing the other side of this door in about a WEEK!!!!





Frontierland was packed, barely room to move around.





Let’s talk a little stroll into and thru Frontierland. Checkout the couple playing hide and seek and then getting busted by security “no running”…







Heading over to Tomorrowland I wanted to see if Space Mountain had much of a line, it had NO LINE…. NO WAITING….





I rode Space Mountain three times in row, would have gone for four but my brains were starting to spill out of my ears. Here’s a video of the queue line, once we get inside its pretty much totally dark (blame the Droid) but you do get a nice sampling of the sound track!







The Tomorrowland Cross is developing a rather large crack in the stucco, let’s hope they fix this and not use it as an excuse to remove it.





The mighty Matterhorn was exceptionally inviting for some reason.






This is sign would be correct, IF there was a line!





There’s the line….






I kept trying to get in the front and they kept putting me in the back, I guess I’m a “larger passenger”





Hmmm, this line is too long, I’m leaving!






I tried to get row 1 only to be told “row 3 or 4” from the CM on the other side of the tracks!





Red Button, upper right – I wonder what happens when you press it?






How about a ride on the Matterhorn? Please excuse the guys bald spot in front of me, he wouldn't get out of my way!







Three Fences (my corner of Disneyland) is doing well.





Fantasia Gardens (former Motor Boat Cruise) area was a complete ghost town.







These guys OWN Disneyland





This is one of my favorite parts of the park, lets hope they keep it this way or add something nice and tranquil.






A comparison in good show (below) and bad show (above).





The Skyway Chalet is still calling my name… There was NO ONE around, I mean NO ONE. I could have walked right up there, taken photos and walked down and probably not be noticed, I’m just a "Larger Passenger" Chicken!





Pretty flowers, they smelled nice too..





These flowers in front of Caser Jr. look fake to me. The bees seem to think they are real however…





“Disney Tangled” What a tangled web we weave….





I guess “Tangled” isn’t finished yet, but boy does it look weird – reminds me of the tree in Poltergeist.




The castle looks weird in the day time with the snow on the roof.





These are supposed to be pumpkins I guess…





These look nice, but um, well, they smell like a rotting corpse, sorry, but they do… Rich theme indeed…





This is the last photo of the day before my camera died.






Switching to video, you can see what’s left of the House of the Future. You can see the green concrete support part of the former attraction, but I’m not sure what part? I don’t think it’s the foundation, my guess would be that its part of the waterfalls.






I spent the rest of the time riding the train, the Mark Twain and walking around Main Street. It was one of my best “solo” visits ever. I highly recommend getting to the park during the week if you can.

Now its time to leave, take the tram ride with me, it’s just me you and the cast members.