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Published: July 15th 2008
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12/07/2008
If you want to see middle America go to Disneyland.
It's where the myth that was created and those who believe come together in the place 'where dreams comes true' according to the late merchandising genius and creator of Disneyland, Walt Disney.
Even without our sleep-deprivation on the bus-trip out to the park, when one older American woman leaned over on the bus and declared to Pops “Honey, I think we should go see the ocean” it was all a bit surreal. We wondered if the woman would make it to Santa Monica beach or settle for the ocean themed ride at the park?
We were around the 550,000,000th visitor's to Disney as we walked through the gates and started to queue. The Americans have a gift for organization that rivals the Germans. We found out you could pre-book a ride every 2 hours and skip 1 hour queues. After a circuit of the entire park on the railway we got going on a memorable day ahead.
The Jungle Boat cruise is where we encountered two creatures peculiar to LA and Disneyland.
Animatronic Animals and far, far more entertaining; the struggling actor guiding you on a
tropical jungle river ride. Our Jack Osborne lookalike guide/driver (pretended to drive the boat but every ride is effectively on rails) was the best host of the day. Maybe he'll succeed like Steve Martin or Justin Timberlake who both got started working at the park.
All the jungle river ride was missing was dengue fever, it even had robotic piranhas! Very cool.
When I was a child it was with great excitement but eventual boredom that I would be taken to Fantasyland in Hastings, New Zealand by my parents. Now closed, Fantasyland took the core attributes of Disneyland and promptly lowered your expectations for the next visit.
Our next ride was Indiana Jones, this blew my pre conceived notion of Disney being tired and hokey out of the water. Disney has teamed-up with George Lucas to produce a superb ride.
This ride had the longest queue in the park.
If you're looking for historical accuracy, forget it. Corporations don't like the messy truth and Frontier Land's fake Indian on horseback obviously was in rude health and had not suffered from smallpox. Thunder Mountain railroad was one of the rides I remember from the Disney show that aired on
Bull Elephant
From the Jungle Boat Cruise Sunday mornings, in real life the ride is great. It's like a Looney Tunes ride without Wiley Coyote.
I mentioned Walt Disney was a merchandising genius, literally every ride ends with being herded through the gift area. Pity the poor parents with children, they don't stand a chance. There are some clever toys, Disneyland even has a Lego Shop in the shopping annex over the motorway. You can get to it using the monorail. Disney's monorail was the first ever and it's 2.5 miles of track would have paid for itself by now I imagine.
If making money is the goal then the sheer detail and care they've put into the park has helped them get there. Every ride has staff wearing unique, themed garb. Disney's resident Jack Sparrow (the AM weekend shift) wore a costume better than a Halloween rental but not quite as elaborate as on film.. No worries, all the children love it, Indiana Jones was especially popular.
Buzz Lightyear reminded me of Jeremy Clarkson for some unfathomable reason.
One ride in particular was a big disappointment (after a 60 minute queue talking to an irate Los Angeleno who was just coping with queue)
Natives
From the Jungle Boat Cruise and a wee bit of a revelation of sorts.
The Finding Nemo submarine ride consisted of a mock Aussie accented narration (A Gringo captain we were told with his trusty Hispanic 'second mate') and an 'ocean' with the occasional holographic fish, mercifully however there was no gauntlet of merchandising to run at the end.
We made it out just it time to catch the 10.25 fireworks display; EVERYTHING runs like clockwork.
Every night they shoot-off half a million bucks of fireworks synchronised with maximum musical schmaltz which had Michelle cooing appreciatively and me trying to get a good shot.
I convinced Michelle to do the Space Mountain roller coaster ride one more time. For both of us this was the most exciting, terrifying and enjoyable ride. It's mostly pitch black, shooting through the universe whilst being wrenched around corners and down dips you had no idea were there.
Then we headed for the gate. It was Midnight, we had walked in at 9am.
One day was enough, but we were happy enough to have done it all.
There are simply too many rides to tell you about, here's a brief summary off the top of our conjoined
Elephant God
From the Jungle Boat Cruise heads....
Space Mountain - Awesome
Jungle Boat Cruise - The Guide was funny, he made a great ride better
Indian Jones - Awesome too
Pirates of the Caribbean - Cool and long
Thunder Mountain - Neat, little roller coaster
Finding Nemo - Rubbish, don't bother. But if you haven't seen the ocean I suppose you could be fooled.
Log Flume - Fun, musical animals and I sat in the front and got soaked.
Haunted House - Pretty
Mark Twain Paddle Steamer - Gentle way to relax streaming around the lagoon
Autopia - Rainbows end has a shorter queue, go there for motor carts.
Final observation. When Disney opened the park many Californians picked oranges in Anaheim,
now most work at Disney serving fries and keeping the toilets (Restrooms in America) clean.
It seems real life and Fantasy live together at Disneyland.
Go, just go..... there are many things to see and do.
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