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Old 15 Aug 22, 11:26 PM  
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#21
liz-paul
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Join Date: Sep 15
Location: Northern Ireland
Day 8 - Disneyland.

As you may know if you read my pre trip my sister in law works for Disney and she, my brother and their baby met us at Disneyland today for the day. She signed 2 of us in for free and I had already paid for the other 2 tickets. They met us around 10:45 which is much later than we would have gone into the park if we were on our own but they had to drive down and get sorted with their baby etc. We had a nice wander down main street, through the castle and into star wars land. We went on smugglers run which said a 45 min queue, it was more like an hour. This ride seemed like a lot of hard work to be honest 🤷🏻 edit to add OH and I were pilots as no one else wanted to be and I was absolutely rubbish and it wasn't especially enjoyable as I was just trying to figure out what was going on! The 2 boys were gunners and enjoyed that and a couple from the single/pairs rider lane were engineers. I would have much rathered been an engineer and another time I would suggest that the 4 of us do single/double rider.

After we went for lunch in alien pizza planet (I got a gf slice of pepperoni). Not sure how much this cost as sister in law paid and used her employee discount (we went back the next night for a single slice for DS13 and it was $9.15/£7.59). While we were finishing lunch we were by the entrance to space mountain which said 35 mins so me and the 2 boys went on. It broke down when we were almost at the end which meant we got to see it all lit up by the lights which was interesting. We got to ride again because it broke down part way through which was good. We enjoyed this ride a lot.

After space mountain we shopped in star wars land and on main Street for a while (sister in law used her discount) and then we headed to California adventure (DS16 went back to the hotel). We walked round cars land and went to web slingers cos it had a 40 min wait, this was actually an hour. I was not impressed with this ride at all and wished I'd waited with brother and SIL! DS13 also thought it was rubbish! After, we watched a band briefly and we got ice creams and margaritas (be warned they will only let you buy 2 margaritas so take a friend with you!). Ice creams from Ghirardelli's were very good but eyewateringly expensive 🙈 edit Ghiardelli's was $22.09/£18.26 for a single scoop with sauce and a double scoop with sauce! It was really good but that is a lot of money! I think the margaritas were $14 each bu not sure as my brother paid.

Then my family had to had back home so me, OH and DS went back to the hotel for a while (this was probably about 6:30 and I think we went back into the park about 8:30). While we were resting up at the hotel I kept an eye on the app and it looked like the lines were shorter during that time.

Will finish this later when I have another chance!

some photos now added






Edited at 08:04 PM.
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Old 16 Aug 22, 04:00 AM  
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liz-paul
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Join Date: Sep 15
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Day 8 - part 2.

We headed in to California adventure around 8:30. We looked around cars land which is very cool all light up at night.





Some people wanted food so we mobile ordered at Pym's test kitchen. I had a gf Pym ini sandwich which was nice. We also got 2 chicken burger meals and a vegan meatballs and pasta. It cost around $64, we all drank iced water.



Side note: we went to the cozy cones earlier in the day and queued at 2 different cones to be told at the front that we had to move order. This was fine but they could do with a sign telling you that 🙄 Just to be clear, we queued at 2 cones simultaneously in 2 groups, not that we're so daft we didn't listen the first time and went to another 🤣

We rode radiator springs after, queue was around 45 mins. This was an excellent ride and we all enjoyed it!

By the time we were finished it was 10pm and all the rides and shops etc in California adventure were closed. DS16 went back to the room, OH went for a walk around in Disneyland and watched some of the electrical parade, DS13 and I rode jungle cruise, big thunder (twice) and buzz lightyears, which were all immediate walk ons. By now it was 11:30 and I was exhausted 😥 so we went back to the hotel and sleep!

Sorry for the lack of photos I'm too tired to add many currently!

We had a great day, it was really nice taking it slow and spending some time with my family. As most of you know the theming in Disney is amazing and we had a great time just enjoying some of that without too many rides.

I walked about 22000 steps today😱


Edited at 07:37 PM.
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Old 17 Aug 22, 02:19 AM  
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liz-paul
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Join Date: Sep 15
Location: Northern Ireland
Day 9 - Disneyland again!

We dragged ourselves out of bed this morning (OH and DS16 had breakfast at the hotel, but DS13 was too sleepy and I wasn't hungry). We headed for downtown Disney for around 10am as we were meeting my SIL again so that she could sign 3 of us in again. We met about 10:45 and went into California Adventure. We went to gaurdians of the galaxy first (OH opted out and went for a walk). Halfway through the the queue I remembered I was going to buy genie plus so I did (after adding all the tickets to my account) and booked a lightning lane for grizzly river rapids. We rode guardians - very very scary for me and DS13 but DS16 liked it! Met up with OH for our grizzly LL but DS16 was hungry so we stopped for a snack at smokejumpers, we shared a GF cheeseburger and fries (very nice) and all had more iced water. This was $15.61/£12.96.

Onto grizzly which was fun - 2 of us got soaked and 2 didn't! Booked a LL for soarin but it wasn't for about 2 hours time. Wandered over to Pixar pier area, bought a hotdog (I think this was $13.45/£11.16 for a hotdog with potato chips and a sprite) for DS13 and DS16 and I went on the Ferris wheel. We did the swinging ones - very scary! 🙈

After that it was time for more snacks 🙄 2 slushies, a cookie, a marshmallow and a Mickey head rice crispy treat and $32 later and we found a seat to eat these! My Mickey head was delicious (I didn't ask if it was gluten free, i just googled and the answer said they are as they no longer had malt in them. I am only gluten intolerant not coeliac so please ask if you're buying one!). The boys weren't that keen on the slushies, DS13's one had boba type balls in it and he didnt like them. OH went off his own at this point and ended up going back to Ralph Brennan's jazz kitchen for a late lunch, a beer and a long sit down! He was given a free beignet by his waitress...



After our snacks we went to our soarin LL and enjoyed that. And then back to the hotel for some more rest and showers for those of us with an interest in hygiene...

Back into the park (Disneyland this time) to meet my SIL for the final time, did a little bit more shopping on main Street (I'll update with photos soon), DS13 joined us at this point as he stayed at the hotel for a while on his own and then over to big thunder mountain railroad for our lightning lane (I didn't go on, stayed to chat with SIL and arranged that we would visit them the next day on our way to Santa Barbara which made me very happy as I thought I'd seen the last of my brother and niece the day before 🥰 ). Said goodbye to SIL and then we had a good look round star wars land which was very cool. Saw some people's droids that they had just built and they are awesome - much better value for money than the luxury build your own light saber.







Time for food, mobile ordered at the hungry bear as it was close. One cheeseburger, one gf vegan burger and DS13 had 2 toddler meals of Mac and cheese and a portion of fries 🤣🙈 This came to $42.62/£35.37.

After this DS16 went off to look at star wars land on his own and then back to the hotel as he was tired again!

The rest of us went on the train round the park which was a blessed sit down! I think we might have gone back to the hotel then as well for a lie down... We were all completely wrecked by now!

About 9pm I said if I don't go back in now then I won't! We went back to Disneyland park (minus DS16 who gave up and stayed in bed!), Hopped on the train for one stop and hot footed it to rise of the resistance which said 40 min wait. By the time we got there it said 65 min and we were too tired so didn't bother (spoiler alert we never managed to get on it 😭 ).

We went on its a small world and DS13 was staggered by the inappropriateness of it! And he's not wrong!

We had a while until our LL on space mountain at 10:30 so we passed the time with another slice of pizza from alien pizza planet for DS13 and a trip on the monorail. Again, another blessed relief to sit down 🤣

Space mountain at 10:30 - this time OH came on and we escaped any breakdowns! We followed this with a walk on buzz lightyear and a LL for Star tours and then a slow limp back to the hotel at about 11:30. Completely and utterly exhausted!

Over 25000 steps today - no wonder my feet hurt 😥😱

Edited at 08:12 PM.
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Old 17 Aug 22, 07:41 AM  
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Mortimer Mouse
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Join Date: May 10

Mortimer Mouse's Reviews
Hotel Reviews: 1
Restaurant Reviews: 6
I'm exhausted just reading your Disney days, but really enjoying reading along with your trip.
' for those of us with an interest in hygiene...' lol
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Old 17 Aug 22, 04:00 PM  
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#25
liz-paul
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Join Date: Sep 15
Location: Northern Ireland
Bonus post - my thoughts on disneyland the good, the bad and the ugly.

Ok, so there is no denying that Disney does theming excellently. You can have an amazing time walking around the parks and never do a single ride. They are very cool, clean and just a great place to be, as long as you don't mind crowds!

The rides are also good, with something for everyone I'd say but the queues were often long. We queued for an hour in the heat a few times and ignored rides completely or only did them once because of long queues.

The food and drink offerings are pretty good with a fair amount of variety but my god it is expensive! I will update with my spends when I'm back home properly in case anyone interested.

Genie +: I'm still on the fence with this. It did allow us to do some more rides on the second day but most things we wanted to do didn't have availability until quite a bit later on so we had long gaps between our LLs. I'm sure there are ways to optimise it but to be honest we didn't want to have to, I felt like it should be making our day easier, not harder. It is also a kick in the teeth to have to pay another $80 for a family of four for each day that you want it. We didn't do any of the individual lightning lanes and to be completely honest I think the charges for those are absolutely obscene! I think they vary at different times but rise of the resistance was always $20 and radiator springs was always $15 while we were there. Just my opinion but that's a lot of extra money for a family after the gate price. The photopass that came with it also wasn't great value as we ended up with hardly any photos, there didn't seem to be many on rides or photographers around the park.

Length of time: our two days was ideal for us on this trip as we have lots of other things we want to do and we sort of have a budget. But we could have filled 4 days quite happily if time wasn't an issue. There was lots in the park we didn't do, plenty for a return visit in the future if we're able to. If you're more of a Disney fanatic than us and/or its your primary reason to visit California you can definitely fill more than 2 days.

This might sound very negative but we really did have a fantastic time! I think my criticisms really come from the costs of things which on occasions did just seem a bit much. We saved a lot because of my SIL but we still spent a fortune!

Best western plus park place inn:

This hotel really couldn't be closer, it was so easy to go back and forth from the room to the hotel and the kids were able to go back and forth on their own when they wanted to. This was worth a lot to us. I picked this place partly because of the proximity but also because we could get a room with 2 beds and a pullout bed which is essential for us. Although I'm glad we were only sharing a room for 3 nights on this trip as it felt very cramped!

The pool was absolutely tiny and we never used it. Free breakfast was pretty good with hot food: eggs, potatoes, ham, waffles. Cold food: cereal, pastries, yogurts, fruit and coffee and fruit juices etc. Some items would have been easy to 'grab and go' if you wanted to. They had gf bread you could ask for and one of the cereals was gf.

It cost £672 for 3 nights.

Edited at 09:03 PM.
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Old 17 Aug 22, 04:01 PM  
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#26
liz-paul
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Join Date: Sep 15
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Originally Posted by Mortimer Mouse View Post
I'm exhausted just reading your Disney days, but really enjoying reading along with your trip.
' for those of us with an interest in hygiene...' lol
We were exhausted but it was worth it! 😁
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Old 18 Aug 22, 06:40 AM  
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liz-paul
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Join Date: Sep 15
Location: Northern Ireland
Day 10 - academy museum of motion pictures, more family time and moving to Santa Barbara.

Our original plan for today had been to take the coastal road up to Santa Barbara and stop in Malibu on the way. However, we got the chance to go back to my brother's house in the afternoon so we took it! This left us with 3 hours to fill between checking out of the hotel in Anaheim and arriving at my brothers in Glendale (about an hour's drive) when they could finish work for a while. We ended up driving to the academy museum of motion pictures as we hadn't managed to do that earlier in the trip. If we had planned this slightly better we would have decided that the day before and left about an hour earlier. As it was we left at 11am, it took an hour to get there (slightly longer when you take into consideration the parking and getting in etc), we had just over an hour there and then we had to head over to my brother's. The museum is pretty cool if you have an interest in movies but it is quite dry in a way. I would have liked 2 hours, the kids and OH were more than happy with an hour. Tickets were $25 for adults and free for kids up to 17. Parking in LACMA which is next door was a huge $20! There is a fantastic view from the roof:







Edited to add: this is the only place we've been to so far where we had to prove vaccination status (they accepted the NI vaccine app for OH and I, and photos of the boys vaccine cards) and we had to wear masks in here, they provided masks if you didn't have them.

I'm a big fan of spike Lee so I enjoyed the exhibit about him:



We then spent an lovely afternoon with my family 🥰

My sister in law had bought us these incredibly cute Nuimos from Disneyland the day before as a surprise (we had been looking at them the day before but I had resisted! DS13 and I find it hard to resist anything cute!). There are huge range of outfits and accessories to buy.



We left Glendale about 5pm which is obviously not the ideal time to be trying to get anywhere in LA! But that's what fit with my family so we went with it! We had to get fuel first and then we hit the road. This cost $78.51/£65.39 to completely fill the tank on our Kia Sportage.

Nearly in Santa Barbara:


We took the direct route rather than the scenic as it was getting late and we arrived at the hotel shortly after 7. We lugged our mountains of luggage in, settled in and then got some dinner in the cafe/restaurant that is onsite (it's a separate business). The food was nice, I had pork tacos, OH had salmon, mash and veg, DS13 had pasta and tomato sauce and DS16 had surprise surprise, a burger! We got parmesan fries to share as well. We shared a bottle of white wine. It was $140 Inc tip.

Back to the room for an early night for me!

Edited at 08:17 PM.
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Old 18 Aug 22, 06:54 AM  
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liz-paul
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Join Date: Sep 15
Location: Northern Ireland
Bonus post: Disney merch!

I would never normally buy this much stuff in a theme park but my sister in law bought everything with her 50% discount (this was a short term discount, it's usually less).

All prices are the original prices less tax.

Oversized sweat shirt back $75.


And front.


Sweatshirt $44.99



Sweatshirt $44.99



Backpack $39.99



Gorgeous little grogu who can sit on your shoulder $24.99



Notebook $24.99



Magnet $9.99 and Minnie ears tree decoration $19.99



Insulated wine cups (they have Mickey heads all over them), one for me and one for a friend $24.99 each



Water bottle $22.99



Loungefly backpack $75



I also bought two tee shirts but I've worn them and they're in the laundry bag!

DS13 also built a light saber for $29.99.

As I said before, a lot more stuff than normal but, you know 😁🤷🏻

Edited at 07:45 PM.
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Old 18 Aug 22, 09:13 AM  
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Princess Ariel
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Originally Posted by liz-paul View Post
Bonus post: Disney merch!

I would never normally buy this much stuff in a theme park but my sister bought everything with her 50% discount (this was short term discount, it's usually less).

All prices are the original prices less tax.

Oversized sweat shirt back $75.


And front.


Sweatshirt $44.99



Sweatshirt $44.99



Backpack $39.99



Gorgeous little grogu who can sit on your shoulder $24.99



Notebook $24.99



Magnet $9.99 and Minnie ears tree decoration $19.99



Insulated wine cups (they have Mickey heads all over them), one for me and one for a friend $24.99 each



Water bottle $22.99



Loungefly backpack $75



I also bought two tee shirts but I've worn them and they're in the laundry bag!

DS13 also built a light saber for $29.99.

As I said before, a lot more stuff than normal but, you know 😁🤷🏻
I’ve got that tree decoration, I love it!
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Old 18 Aug 22, 08:00 PM  
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liz-paul
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Join Date: Sep 15
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Day 11 - Santa Barbara

This may come as a surprise based on our previous day's, but we had a slow, lazy start this morning 😂 and then we drove down towards downtown Santa Barbara to find some parking. We struggled to find any so parked in a spot that was limited to 90 mins and got out for a quick explore. Less than 2 minutes of walking and we found 2 car parks near the beach that were $2 an hour, not sure how we missed them 🤦🏻


We walked to Stearns wharf and down to the end enjoying the view, the huge birds (maybe some type of pelican? It turns out that these are Californian brown pelicans. They legit look like pterodactyls), The rays (as in the fish creatures not rays of sun! I wasn't impressed that a couple of guys were in the water catching them for photographs and then throwing them back in) under the water, looking in the shops and checking out the restaurants.





This would all have been very enjoyable if it wasn't accompanied by the almost constant complaining from DS13 that he was hungry but didn't like any of the food in any of the restaurants we passed. 🙄😤 He probably would have been less hungry if had eaten some breakfast in the room, but he didn't like any of that food either 🙄 ahh the joys of family time! I saw some postcards and fridge magnets that I wanted but for some foolish reason decided I'd go back another time! Spoiler - I didn't!).

We left the wharf and headed up state street (OH went to move the car while we looked for a restaurant).



We stopped at Finney's and ordered 2 starters of coconut shrimp which were delicious.



These were marked with a 'gluten conscious' symbol and the waiter told me they were gluten conscious not gluten free. Check for yourself if you have any concerns.

I then had a Cobb salad, very nice but hardly any dressing so I asked for more. Oh had pork tacos and surprise surprise DS13 had pizza and DS16 had a burger 🙄😂 food was all good, they had a very big selection of beers but we didn't have any. Can't remember the price, will update later. Edit $113.70/£94.53.

After lunch we walked up one side of state Street for a while and back down the other looking in some of the shops as we did. The shops are a mix of big name brands and small independent shops that were selling a mix of trash and treasure!

We got more super expensive ice creams (will check what the place was called and the price later) and headed back to the car and the hotel. I drove the car - my first time on the other side of the road! I did ok but still haven't braved the freeways yet... OH had lots of helpful feedback for me 😐

Back at the hotel the kids just wanted to look at their phones and lie in bed. Adults decided to go to the pool, it was very busy so we decided to do some laundry instead and went back for the dirty clothes bag but when we got back to the laundry room a woman was standing guard over the machine and we couldn't use it. So we decided to get our detergent from the front desk and sit in the jacuzzi and wait for her load to finish but she was still standing guard and hadn't started her load when we got back so we got irrationally cheesed off and left! We then went to the beach and left the kids in the room (I drove again). The beach was glorious, really empty and absolutely stunning! The sea is freezing so I did what any normal person would do and only went in up to my knees. OH decided it wasn't cold and went swimming. He was still cold 2 hours later 🤨 I took pics of the beach on his phone so will update when I get them.

This hour or so on the beach was really lovely and we saw seals and lots of different birds.

After the beach we made a stop at Ralph's for some drinks and snacks. Back to the hotel, showers and out for dinner. So, our hotel isn't really close enough to state street/downtown to walk to all the restaurants and bars, especially if you've spent 2 days in Disneyland just beforehand have sore feet, legs, hips etc... So I said I wanted to drive (and I would drive and not drink, perfectly happy to do this) or go somewhere very local (which OH seemed to think there were some). OH decides we should both have a drink and therefore we'll go local. So we set off for a pizza place round the corner, when we get there it looked pretty basic and more like a takeaway. At this point there are many frayed tempers and DS13 is doing his standard I'm hungry and don't want to walk anywhere act 😤 so we walk to state street which is exactly what I didn't want to do! We stopped at the first restaurant we came to (Opal) and it was very good food. We had 2 pasta dishes, 1 fish dish, 1 pizza, 3 desserts, 1 cocktail, 1 beer and a glass of wine - it came to $222.73/£185.18 inc tip. It was about 1.1 miles from the hotel which wasn't too bad anyway but I still would have preferred to drive! I also realised we couldn't get an Uber back as I hadn't brought a handbag so we had no face masks 😷

We walked back to the hotel and parents had a drink and DS13 was forced to have a shower 🚿 a carbon monoxide alarm in one of the bedrooms started cheeping with a low battery. Luckily they sent someone up pretty quickly to replace it.

My thoughts on Santa Barbara:
It's really really lovely here and we could have enjoyed several days here. There are day trips to do from here (solvang, my brother recommended Ojai), you can do winery tours, the beach is lovely, you can do watersports and there are a ton of restaurants and bars. Our hotel is a bit far out to be ideal but we have a 2 bed apartment which is 2 bedrooms, and a huge living room with small kitchen. We really like having our space and that is currently more important to us than location. I'd definitely consider coming here again, possibly by train as the station is right in the middle of town and it might make a great stop if you were doing the Pacific coastal train route.

It is significantly cooler in Santa Barbara than LA with temps around the low to mid 20s during the day versus the mid to high 30s we had in LA/Anaheim.

I'll try and add more pics soon.

Edited at 08:37 PM.
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