PTR: Disneyland and a Little Bit of DCA

[DATman]

So, this is my first PTR. Bear with me a little bit.

 

I'd do a write up of everything we did, but that would take up way too much space, so I'll go straight to the pictures.

 

In the car to DL:

 

 

This is Shar

 

 

This is Andrea

 

DL:

 

 

So, we got to the park an hour early. That was pretty fun, especially watching all of the hotel guests get in early.

 

 

Me

 

 

Half of the line to get in. We were in the other half. Once the lines moved, it took about 5 minutes to get in. I split from my friends to go get fastpasses for Splash Mountain.

 

 

People were already riding at around 8:30... Anyway, I wandered a little bit, and did a general look at some of the refurbs in the area:

 

 

The Mark Twain is back up and running! It looks SO much better.

 

 

Pirates Lair!

 

 

We didn't go, but it really looked like a much needed improvement. I really like the tree house that sticks out over the top of the Fantasmic building. I bet it gives great views of this side of the park.

 

 

Hmmn.... There don't seem to be that many people here today.

 

 

OH CRAP! That's where everyone went. This is the last stretch of the line. The rest wrapped around by the Matterhorn and up by the old meet and greet area by It's a Small World. We waited about 2 hours for the ride. Thankfully, cast members were allowing a person from each group to go get food and stuff to pass time.

 

 

The girls played cards while I grabbed some churros. We must have played 50 rounds of poker.

 

 

Anyway, Finding Nemo!

 

 

The lagoon looks amazing now!

 

 

The seagulls were great too! The audio was perfect. They said it just enough to be funny, but nowhere near enough to be annoying. They would babble for about 10 seconds, then they would stop for about 2 minutes. It was perfect.

 

 

Hey look! It's Nemo!!!

 

 

Oh my! It's water!

 

So, as for the ride, I absolutely loved it! It was adorable and very well done. The sets were beautiful, and the lagoon looked stunning below the surface. It was a long ride, but it didn't feel that way. It felt like the perfect length. The projections were really well done as well. My only complaint is the Angler fish, and that's only because the Florida one sounds so much better. As for line length, I would say 2 hours should be the limit people set for themselves. If not less. The ride is great, but you will feel ripped off if you wait longer than 2 hours. Really, you will. But that doesn't mean the ride is bad, it's just not worth an extremely long wait (much like any other dark ride).

 

 

What'd you think of the ride, Shar?

 

It was cute!

 

Moving on:

 

 

We did a lot of wandering (we stayed from 8 AM to 11 PM, so we had a lot of time. The crowds were about medium at both parks), so we tried finding all the little things that people who are there for the rides miss. This lady was sitting farther into New Orleans. She was so nice!

 

 

Obligatory Club 33 shots.

 

 

 

This was the cave that collapsed a while back and was finally brought back to life. It looks so great now! Especially at night, when they use lighting to make it look as if the tunnel stretches on for a really long way.

 

 

Big Thunder was running really well today.

 

The Epic Hat Adventure:

 

So, we spent a while inside the Mad Hatter, looking at all the ridiculous hats people actually spend money on!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

This is the most unflattering picture of Andrea I have. It's absolutely amazing!

 

 

So, after spending some more time riding things, we headed over to DCA. On the way, we caught the 5 minute version of the parade (it's what happens when you see the entire parade as you walk in the opposite direction of its route).

 

 

 

Onward to DCA!

 

 

Oh...

 

So, we headed over to CA Screamin, which was running really well today. We also hit Orange Stinger and the Sunglasses dinosaur. Midway Mania is coming along, but, seeing as Westcoaster.net has some great updates on the ride, I didn't snap any pictures.

 

 

We did Mediocre Tower, and it is really growing on me. For what it's worth, it is a great ride. It also has a really great drop sequence.

 

 

Continuing with our tradition of doing random things that people normally skip, we spent some time in the Animation building.

 

 

Being Broadway geeks, the Beast's library was the highlight.

 

 

 

I also surprised myself with this shot of the ceiling in Ursula's Grotto:

 

 

So, then we headed back to Disneyland. We decided to skip the fireworks for a ride on the Matterhorn. The left side broke down before we got in line, but it opened up just as we reached the point where the line splits into the two stations. We were on the 2nd train out, and the fireworks were blasting all around us while we were riding. It was AMAZING! After that, we rode BTM and called it a night. We did a lot more than I wrote about, but I just wanted to share the best stuff.

 

Also, I happened to acquire my own little mascot. Introducing Jack Ball!

 

 

 

He has a strange attraction to people's heads.

 

 

 

He also adores Pixar.

 

 

With that, I'll end this with a picture of the castle.

 

 

It may be small, but it sure looks great!

[cprocks22]

OMG I want a Jack Ball!

Awesome Photo TR, great pictures. I miss Disneyland/DCA, I missed a lot when I was there (TOT opened a week after I left and I missed Space Mountain because it was down for rehab).

BTW-Pan's Labyrinth is awesome!

[America Sings Freak]

Wonderful Photo TR! I can not believe the hats I see people buying at Disneyland and each new hat they come out with is even crazier than the last.

[socalMAN123]

^ I wouldn't be surprised if you owned all of them Benji. Anywho, great photo TR! I really enjoyed it, please make more! However, try and rotate your pictures if you can, it's much more comfortable to view the pictures. Great job!

---Brent

[DATman]

^Fixed!

 

Thanks for the nice comments! I appreciate it.

[dino]

fun TR. I never get tired of Disney ones. Planning on going next week and I'm hoping the crowds won't be too bad (but i won't bet on it). Oh, and Jack Ball rocks!

[arrowfanman]

Great PTR man! I've never seen a "Jack Ball" before! Pretty awesome, if you ask me!

 

Thanks for posting!

 

-Jahan

[DATman]

Thanks for the nice comments.

 

I forgot to mention that the Dreams campaign is utterly absent from the park apart from the advertisements. I saw no one recieve a dream, though I did see someone with the golden fastpasses, but that was all. They even removed the posters from the Tram stop (the one with the castle submerged in fog) and replaced it with ones that blended much better (hedge characters that look almost real until you get close).