Pammer ~ June 1-4, 2013 ~ Anaheim Del Sol Inn

Pammer — Sat, 15 Jun 2013 03:01:22 GMT

Travel dates: June 1-4, 2013
Travel method: Plane
Resort: Anaheim Del Sol Inn (Off-site)
Accommodations: Standard
Ages Represented in Group: Adult to Toddler
Disney Resort Experience Represented in Group: Veteran to Veteran-in-Training
Comments: I need my Disneyland fix!
Cast of characters:

Pam, 52: trip planner/writer and self-proclaimed Disney Queen
James, 53: Pams husband
Patty, 30-something: Niece's sister-in-law and fellow Disney Princess
Tavo, 16months: Patty's little Prince

The Planning

I always plan my year out way in advance to figure out the best schedule for my Disney trips; it helps me to get lower room rates while still getting my fix in! I was saving my vacation time up for a trip to Walt Disney World in February/March 2013 for the Royal Family 5K and therefore, I didnt plan our usual trip to the Disneyland Resort in late January for James birthday like I usually do. We were last there over Labor Day 2012 and I knew I would want a fix before the summer crowds (and our pass block-out dates) arrived so I put my planning hat on and started playing with dates.

Our Annual Passes expire May 1st and then there are a bunch of Grad Nites that we needed to avoid (mostly Wednesdays, Thursdays, and Fridays), plus I know James isnt as keen to make these trips too close together; therefore, I ended up choosing June 1-4, where we could fly down on a Saturday when our passes are blocked out and then hit the parks Sunday, Monday, & Tuesday before flying home that evening.

Lodging: In late October I made reservations at our usual spot: the Anaheim Del Sol Inn on Harbor Blvd. (a 5-minute walk from the parks; total for 3 nights = $271).

Transportation: We had a credit from rebooking our Disneyland flights last fall that was expiring in mid-June so when Southwest Airlines had a great fare sale ($49!) in early February I booked our flights & applied the credits. Our flight from Sacramento to Orange County cost $69.80 for us both after applying the credit and purchasing the Early-Bird option & I purchased the return flight using points (cost = $25, including the EB option).

I also made reservations with SuperShuttle for travel to/from the motel ($32 round-trip after the Entertainment Card group discount was applied).

Tickets: Our SoCal Annual Passes were expiring on May 1st, so I renewed them via mail ($658) in April.

Priority Seating: With such a short trip this time, I didnt make any reservations and well probably just wing it with counter-service and off-site places.

Disney Visa Rewards Card: I had accumulated a $95.83 rewards balance on my Disney Visa Rewards Card (DVRC) since I had last redeemed rewards for our trip to Walt Disney World in February/March so I transferred the money ~ whoo-hoo!

The Itinerary

The pre-planning was done, and we were ready to go! Here was our planned schedule:

June 1: Fly down in the early afternoon; check-in to the Del Sol Inn; World of Disney
June 2: Disneyland/DCA
June 3: Disneyland/DCA
June 4: Check-out of the Del Sol Inn; Disneyland/DCA; fly home in the evening

Friday, May 31, 2013

Actual: I had originally planned to work from home today but there was a Director from Edinburgh visiting our office and wanted to meet with me, so I went in for about 4 hours. I then stopped at Subway on my way home to pick up sandwiches for the trip tomorrow (2 foot-long veggies for James and one foot-long turkey & cheese for me; total = $16.50, which I paid for with a gift card).

I was home about an hour and then I drove down to Modesto (about a 75min drive) to meet my nephews wife
Sarah at Johns Incredible Pizza for a late lunch coupled with visiting and playing their games (she mentioned how nice it was to be there without kids or spouses!). Sarah lives in Merced (less than an hour south of Modesto) and this is a nice central place for us to meet up every so often. We also both had scratch-off postcards to use here so we had an ulterior motive (I ended up with a free buffet and Sarah received $5 off of her lunch today). We sat in the Theater room, where they were playing Pocahontas on the TV monitors (yay Disney Channel!).

Sarah had also given me a ticket on my birthday back in December to see Lets Go to the Movies with John Williams & Walt Disney with the Modesto Symphony Orchestra, so that was the actual purpose of our outing today. We had talked about it last year and then I hadnt heard any more about it until she gave me the ticket for my birthday in December! We both love music and it was a wonderful concert; our only real complaint was that about a quarter of the music, although very pretty, wasnt very well known and also wasnt either John Williams OR Disney! Also, they only played Colors of the Wind and Pirates of the Caribbean in addition to a very short Disney medley, and it would have been nice to hear more Disney!

We both loved the John Williams pieces for Harry Potter, Raiders, and E.T., plus the medleys from Chicago and Phantom of the Opera. It was also fun to see a few characters wandering around including Captain Jack Sparrow and several from Star Wars. In fact, we were both surprised to not see that music on the program, but it ended up being the encore (with a little encouragement by three Storm Troopers and Darth Vader himself!). :D

We said our goodbyes and I drove home, arriving around 11:45pm. I spent a little of time getting organized and was in bed around 12:30am (James followed about an hour later).

Saturday, June 1, 2013 (85^o)
Plan: Fly down in the early afternoon; check-in to the Del Sol Inn; World of Disney

Actual: I love planning these trips but sometimes things dont go as planned. In this case, James didnt get the rest he needed and told me at 7:15am that he didnt feel up to going on the trip (note: he had issues flying to & from Florida with little rest earlier this year and ended up having to take the train home to Sacramento, which took four days! Hes a bit cautious about flying now, which I think is beginning to manifest into anxiety issues but thats another story); this meant that I needed to cancel his flights, cancel & rebook SuperShuttle for one person, and cancel our diabetic cats boarding reservation, as well as repack the bigger suitcase into a slightly smaller one! I managed to do all that, plus get myself ready to go, in just a couple of hours.

I was thinking that I needed to leave around 10:30am and then realized around 9am that I really should be targeting a departure time of 9:30-10am since my flight was at noon. OOPS ~ oh well, we left at 9:40am (after I said good-bye to the cats) so everything was fine. I drove us to the airport with no traffic issues at all and James dropped me off at 10:15am. We said good-bye (he was going over to Frys Electronics on his way home ~ hmmm, he felt fine for that part ~ LOL!) and I went inside to check my bag in. There was a short line, but I was done in about 5-6mins (26.5#) and then I was through TSA fairly quickly as well. The only hitch was that I had forgotten to remove my Pulse pedometer before going through the screening so they had to pat my waist area down and run it (the pedometer, not my waist!) through the X-ray machine (I usually remember to remove it and place it in my backpack beforehand). This only took another couple of minutes and I was soon on my way.

I was done by 10:30am, so I filled my water bottle and sat down in the dining area to eat about half of my sandwich and play with my PamPhone (this was a smart phone I bought for myself on Black Friday last year that I only use on special occasions, such as theme park vacations! It only costs me $2 a day for the days that I use it; the rest of the time I use my Go-Phone which only costs me about $25 every 3 months).

About 11:10am I topped off the water bottle and headed down towards Gate B16. I sat down to wait about 15mins and then got in my space (A22). We boarded about 10mins later and I got the exit row (window seat), which gave me extra leg room. We pushed back on time at noon and were on our way! I had Coke Zero and honey-roasted peanuts as my snack and I updated my trip notes during the flight. I also spent some time thinking about what I wanted to do this afternoon since James wasnt with me (e.g. dinner?).

We landed about 1:20pm and I went to retrieve my checked bag. While waiting, I texted Sarah to see if she wanted to impulsively grab my great-nephew Chase and drive down to stay with me for a couple of days (great-niece Molly had her 8th grade trip on Monday so I knew she wouldnt be available)! Sarah replied back that she unfortunately couldnt (which I expected) because she had other commitments for the weekend ~ oh well!

I got my bag and trekked down to the Ground Transportation area to check- in with SuperShuttle. They called a van forward and we waited about 10-15mins for other passengers before leaving (the only other passengers on my van were a set of grandparents with their two young granddaughters who were staying at the Candy Cane Inn). The traffic was light and I was the first one dropped off.

I checked in at the Anaheim Del Sol Inn around 2:30pm (saying hello to T.J. and Loretta who were also working today) and told them that I would take a king bed instead of the 2 queen beds if they wanted to give me one, so they gave me Room #238 at the front of the resort. The only downside to this room is that it is slightly smaller than the other rooms, but that was fine since it was just me this trip.

They gave me my freshly-baked chocolate chip cookies and I hauled my bags up to the room. I quickly turned on the A/C and checked to make sure that everything appeared to be in order (e.g. refrigerator working, key for the safe, enough towels, etc.) before unpacking and changing into a skort.

I called James to let him know that the eagle had landed and we chatted for a while. I checked The Weather Channel which showed the local temperature to be 80 degrees (that was a pretty WARM 80 degrees!) and debated whether to change into a tank top but ultimately decided that I didnt need it.

I headed over to Downtown Disney (DD) around 3:30pm and had no line at bag check. I was also very surprised to see short lines at the ticket kiosks, since Disney had just this morning announced a ticket price increase to go into effect the next day. Last year we were here the same weekend they upped their prices (significantly) and we waited an hour (at 6pm) to renew our Annual Passes! Not sure if there were fewer people this year because they had already renewed passes the month before ~ LOL! The SoCal passes were going up $30 so I was glad I had renewed them via mail already (the previous ones expired on May 1st).

I cut through World of Disney (WoD) to check out the merchandise and was thrilled to see a Darth Vader shirt for sale (he was riding the Carousel with his Storm Troopers, which was a scene from the Star Tours re-launch commercial a couple of years ago), so I planned to stop back by on my way out to purchase it.

I had a warm, but not too hot, walk over to the Rainforest Caf (RFC) where I looked at the clearance racks to see if there was anything I was interested in. They had a long-sleeved shirt that I thought I would buy for James if they still had it after I finished eating, and then I went over to the bar to buy a gift card. Im a member of the Landrys Select Club where you rack up reward points on food & gift card purchases; once you get to 250 points you get a $25 cash award! Since you only get a 10% discount on retail purchases, you can get points by buying a gift card first and then using it to purchase merchandise with the discount; you also can double-dip by buying a gift card and using it to pay for your meal ~ you get points for the card and then you get points for the value of your meal ~ a great deal!

I was at 126 points so I bought a gift card for $60 (if you buy them at the bar, the points get added to your account immediately; if you buy them in the retail store, they have to send a form in so I prefer purchasing them at the bar) and then showed my card at the elephant for priority seating. It was still early so I was directed straight upstairs and seated immediately. Nicole was my server and she arrived within a couple of minutes to take my drink order (Diet Coke). When she came back with the soda, I ordered the chicken tenders appetizer as my meal, which came with fries, ranch dressing, & BBQ sauce. I had never eaten them before, as I usually get the burger or the pepperoni pizza, but they were very good and hit the spot just right!

While I was waiting for the food to arrive, I worked on my trip notes & downloaded The Weather Channel app to my PamPhone. The food arrived quickly and was delicious! I ate all of the chicken tenders and about half of the fries before I was stuffed.

I paid the bill with the gift card ($19) and left around 4:50pm. I walked down to the Disneyland Hotel and looked through the shops and walked around the grounds, just enjoying the atmosphere. As I neared the Rose Garden, the Cast Members re-directed me as a wedding had just begun and the bride was arriving in Cinderellas coach! I could peek through this one section of bushes and admired the bridal party ~ it was quite lovely to see. I didnt have my camera with me and couldnt figure out how to use the phone camera at the time (silly me, I later saw that it was an app!) so I headed back into DD.

At the little stage between the RFC and the ESPN Zone, they were preparing to have the Swing Party and there was already a crowd of all ages gathering. This stage is so much smaller than the Bandstand inside the park so not sure how they will fit all of the musicians on it!

I went into the RFC and bought the shirt for James ($12.63 after the 10% Landrys discount) and noticed how much more busy they were than they had been an hour ago! DD was pretty busy as well, and I headed straight back to WoD. I had a coupon from when I renewed my AP by mail for 20% off a purchase of at least $50 so I spent quite some time checking out the entire store.

I ended up buying that DV t-shirt plus the Mine, Mine, Mine t-shirt in a very pretty blue (Ive been wanting to get that shirt for a couple of years now and I really liked this new color!), a couple of pins, and a bracelet ($66.31 after the 20% coupon discount). As I stepped away, I noticed the Glow in the Park ears that I also had been thinking about buying but they didnt have a price on them. I stepped back to the CM who had just rang up my previous purchase and asked how much they were ($25, with tax). I asked her if the 20% discount would have applied to them as well; she said yes and that she would give me the same discount even though it was technically a separate purchase, so I bought a pair ($20, with the 20% discount). I used Disney gift cards to pay for both purchases, forgetting that I should have used the DVRC balance first (since that card expires at the end of the year!) ~ oh well.

I was getting pretty tired so I headed back to the room, first stopping at the outdoor Guest Relations window to the left of the DCA entrance for some nice new Guidemaps and Times Guides (mine always get folded in my fanny pack). I wanted to buy some water at the little mart at the Anaheim Desert Inn but they were temporarily closed at 6:15pm (to reopen at 6:45pm) so I continued on to my room.

I enjoyed the A/C and called my mother to check on her (shes nearly 86 & I try to call her a couple of times per week). Around 7pm I went back to the mart, purchased two 1-liter bottles of water ($7), and went back to the room again. I ate my cookies while watching The Big Bang Theory reruns on TBS and updating my trip notes. I showered and was in bed around 9:30pm, listening to the firework booms!

Steps: 10,832

I'm going to break the rest of the trip out so I can include photos, so to be continued... :D

TulaBelle & Sparky's California Adventure May 18- 24, 2013

TulaBelle — Sun, 09 Jun 2013 18:52:12 GMT

Hey Y'all!
I am finally making time to put down my trip report. I wanted to get to it sooner, but life keeps getting in the way :p.
WHO:
Tulabelle - trip reporter, planner, and Disneyphile, nearing the end of my 40's
Sparky - TulaBelle's hubby, model train collector, getting the Disney bug after almost 22 years married to me! Can reach out and almost touch 50.
PRE- TRP STUFF:
This trip just kind of happened. I had been looking to maybe take a trip to DLand in the fall, I didn't think I could manage to take the time off from work during the busy spring season. Two things happened, first my hubby's boss said "it's now or never", and second a good friend and co worker of mine said "go, I got this." Still, I didn't think I could find something affordable in less than 5 weeks out, but I did, thanks Cheaptickets! Airfare, hotel, car rental and travel insurance (I NEVER travel without insurance) came to just under $1600. Now all I had to get was park passes, in hindsight I should have bought them through the company Mousesavers suggested, arez. It would have cost me a little less and netted me a Magic Morning early entry. Lesson learned! We stayed at America's Best Inn on W. Ball Road, it's an older hotel, small, clean, and safe. Clean and safe were really all we needed. We don't spend a lot of time in the room anyway.
THE PLAN:
I splurged on a subscrption to Touringplans.com to help me plan out the Disney part of the trip. I looked at every thing they could tell me, read as much info here on MP that I could find on planning for park storming and came up with what I thought was a solid plan. It fell apart almost immediately.

REALITY:
We landed at John Wayne Airport Saturday about midmorning (almost 10:00) and after some initial confusion about the car rental area found our way to Avis and our car. I had printed out directions to our hotel (and a few other places - remember that) so we were on our way. Excited? You bet! The room wasn't ready yet since we arrived before check in time, I requested a room on the second floor and the man couldn't have been nicer. We left to go eat at Downtown Disney, we always enjoy the craziness of the Rainforest Cafe, we like the food too. We walked around a bit, that's when I hit the jackpot. Little Miss Matched was having a sale buy three get one free! With the AAA discount it came to $25 for 4 sets of miss matched Disney socks. We also bought a few pins from the pin place and just enjoyed the California sunshine. Eventually we left to go to Target to get a few provisions for the room (room had a dorm size fridge and microwave). We got our top floor room - yay, it's more quiet. Even though the place is small I wasn't disturbed by other guests moving around or in the parking lot, and it was at full capacity most of the week. Okay so I mentioned I had directions to some other places, I have mentioned before that my hubby is a train fanatic (he collects Lionel trains pre & post WWII era). I had directions to a couple of hobby shops not far from the hotel so we took off to explore. It didn't take long for the argument to start. I was reading the directions, he was not listening -anyone seen the video "It's not about the nail" ? Like that. So we were driving around and around this business park when we finally figured out the train place had closed it's doors, some other business was in it's space. After that he needed a beer, but we drove around some more, getting a feel for the real town not just the tourist part of Annaheim. Eventually he got his beer.
Sorry folks life is getting the way again, or more specifically death. I have to go into work to make a funeral spray. The folks are coming in early tomorrow to pick it up, I don't want to have to rush through it in the morning. I'll write more as soon as I can. Hope everyone enjoys their Sunday.

MousePad - Trip Reports from California

Pammer ~ June 1-4, 2013 ~ Anaheim Del Sol Inn

TulaBelle & Sparky's California Adventure May 18- 24, 2013