We spent the day at Disneyland yesterday with a group of friends, "doing nothing". We've spent time on other occasions barnstorming rides and seeing all the big entertainment, which of course we love, but one particular friend (S) hasn't spent as much time at the resort as the rest of us, and there were a lot of little things she hadn't seen/didn't know about, and which we hadn't done in ages, so we picked a day to do things that aren't the big-ticket items.
After breakfast at Carnation, we went to Toontown and explored everyone's house. Mickey's house has all kinds of little notes and stuff to read. We skipped meeting Mickey since there was a huge line. We didn't get to go through Minnie's house cause there was a long line, but we visited her back yard and saw the little tea setup, and another friend and I are of the belief that her wishing well was moved. We went through Goofy's house and Donald's boat, and the little play area for kids. The husband and I haven't been in there since it first opened. We did notice that in addition to the decorative items in the garden, they had real plants too, including eggplant and kohlrabi (which a friend helped to identify thanks to FB). We even climbed up Chip and Dale's treehouse. We looked at the funny signs on the buildings (planning commission is our favorite) and played with the various interactive items by the Roger Rabbit attraction. S was instructed to open the doors to the electricity company and was shocked at the outcome!
We walked through Sleeping Beauty Castle to see the diaramas, and we went to Snow White's wishing well.
We then went to DCA and did most of the things in the Animation Building. We sat in the lobby to watch a full loop of the film clips, then we went in to look at the Toy Story Zoetrope, then we went to see Turtle Talk with Crush (and S even got to ask Crush a question and have a conversation with him) and then we went through the Sorcerer's workshop.
We then headed over to the Disneyland Hotel, and we went to the Frontier tower to look at the model of Big Thunder Railroad that we'd seen a little while ago. Then we headed to the main tower and went to the second floor, above Steakhouse 55, as we'd also previously noticed that there is gorgeous concept artwork for the park on the walls. We looked at the giant display case opposite the main ballroom to look at the collection of old Disney merchandise (I know MouseAdventure teams are very familiar with that display case), and the map at the entrance to the hotel from valet parking. The map has some moving elements that are fun to watch.
We then went to see "Guardians of the Galaxy" at the AMC Theatres. S hadn't seen the movie yet, and most of the rest of us had only seen a preview showing of the film. We visited the Lego Store next door, and not surprisingly, all of the sets from "Guardians" were sold out. We then had a nice quiet dinner back in Disneyland.
We had a great time with our "do nothing" day, and it was especially fun to show all these things to someone who'd never seen them before. But mostly, we enjoyed each other's company, laughing, talking and just spending time together. We'd scheduled the day some time ago, but it happened to be on a day when I most needed it.
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