What could make for a better second anniversary trip than a Friday at Disneyland, followed by a couple of days exploring California’s REAL urban frontier?
Left San Francisco this morning. Drove a lot. Landed in the middle of a nasty traffic jam on the Santa Ana Freeway. Fled to a Best Buy in Cerritos to buy a huge memory stick for the new digital camera. Finally made our way to the lovely Howard Johnsons in Anaheim and secured a room on the top floor with a view of the Matterhorn…
Up early. Must spend entire day at Disneyland. Went on the Hanuted Mansion (twice) and also did Mr. Toad’s Wild Ride, Pirates of the Carribean, Autopia, the Tiki Room, the Matterhorn, the log ride, the teacups, the train, and more. Visited all three of the smoking areas…
I was a little pissed to see that the Swiss family Robinson Treehouse is now Tarzan’s Treehouse, and has been stripped of anything particularly interesting. It was also a bit disappointing that Space Mountain, Thunder Mountain, and the Monorail, and Small World were all closed, but we coped…
Disneyland is so much smaller and more compact than Disney World. I liked it. I also liked the unnatural fog generated by all the water in the light show. It helped keep down the ash which was falling from all the fires surrounding us…
Dinner at the Blue Bayou, which is right in the middle of Pirates of the Carribean. the atmosphere was nice. The food didn’t do much for me, but Mark liked his…
I now own a miniature Haunted Mansion…
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Brushed the ash off the car and toured Orange County and parts of LA. I was, of course, looking for miscellaneous old supermarkets and shopping centers to photograph for the other site. We also made a pilgrimage to the site of the very first Taco Bell in Downey (and then drove down the street to eat at arch competitor Del Taco). Stopped by another Best Buy in Lakewood for more necessities and then made our way to our Saturday night accomodations at 3rd and Vermont in LA…
The motel was old and dumpy, with some very strange plumbing quirks, but it was clean and not terribly scary, so we survived it (after some initial apprehension)…
We took the 110 to Pasadena. Mark had never travelled California’s oldest freeway, and I thought it was time. Popped in a record store, realized it was too late for dinner at Clifton’s, and made our way into the Valley in search of interesting sights. And food. The sights lasted a little too long before producing food, but finally we were fed and happy…
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Anniversary day. Had breakfast at the Best Western Coffee Shop in Hollywood. We went there looking for the exact site of a Sandra Bernhard joke, but were pleased to find that it was also dirt cheap and uncrowded. We liked…
Afterward, off to Amoeba and a stop by the Formosa Cafe (from LA Confidential), and then back to the valley for some daytime pictures. Soon, we were on our way home, with a lovely cloud of smoke to our left as we approached the Grapevine…
