Disneyland

Friday, January 11th, 2013
Hong Kong Disneyland

Today was great!  We got up early and headed to breakfast.  Yummy!  They had a great variety.  Cereal, fruit, cheese and crackers, several types of Asian noodles and dim sum treats, traditional eggs and bacon, as well as waffles and assorted pastries and breads.  We enjoyed it!  Parker ate a lot and that's saying something because usually he's not a big breakfast eater first thing in the morning.

The shuttle bus picked us up at 10:00am and we got to the park around 10:15.  As we walked to the entrance, I just couldn't believe I was FINALLY going to see the inside of a Disney park with my own two eyes!  :o)

The park is very small compared to Disney World, so we decided we would take advantage of the small crowds and check out all the rides Parker was tall enough to ride first.  Then we could enjoy our time walking around and seeing the sights.  After walking down Main Street, we made our way to Tomorrowland.  We rode the Orbitron and the Autopia cars.  Both had wait times of 15 minutes! Score!  We then headed over to Fantasyland and Vuong wanted to take the short cut on the map, but there was no way I was skipping walking through Sleeping Beauty's castle!  We took a few pictures of the castle, and as embarrassing as it is to admit, I'm gonna tell you anyway that I actually teared up when we walked through.    It was so exciting!!!

We stayed in Fantasyland awhile riding Cinderella's carousel, the Flying Elephants, and the Teacups.  The longest time we waited was for the Flying Elephants and that was 30 minutes!  So nice!  It's A Small World was closed for renovations, so we were kind of bummed we didn't get to go there, but I know we'll have another chance to see it this summer when we go to Disney World.

We picked up the train in Fantasyland and rode it around the loop once and got off again in Fantasyland to cut through to Adventureland.  We rode the Jungle River Cruise which gave us the option to choose our language from three choices.  Two seconds into the ride, I had to ask Vuong if maybe we were on the wrong boat because the girl who narrated the ride barely spoke English.  We understood about 1% of what she said, but Parker enjoyed the sites along the ride.

By this time, we'd pretty much been on every ride that Parker could ride.  We decided to take a break for lunch and got some 'hot dogs' from a food cart near the river cruise ride.  I say 'hot dogs' loosely because although they were shaped like a hot dog, and somewhat tasted like a hot dog, they were the same color as flesh and that my folks, is just gross.  I slathered on a ton of ketchup and ate a good part of it, but felt some welcomed relief when Parker asked to eat just the hot dot so I could finish the bun.

I was having a great time, but I really felt like something was missing.  I had been hoping we'd see some characters and to this point, we'd seen Mickey and Sleeping Beauty from a distance. (Both had lines that were either an hour long or already closed.)  We took a stroll back over to Fantasyland so we could hopefully see a few characters in the Fantasy Gardens.  Jackpot!  We saw Mickey Mouse, Goofy, Pluto, and Winnie the Pooh.  We got in line to see Duffy the Disney Bear (?) but the line was long and by the time we got up to the front, he needed to take a 5 minute break, so we left.  We walked back over the castle as there were a few places near and around there that designated at places to see characters.

We met Belle (my personal favorite), Sleeping Beauty, Tangled (Parker's favorite), Cinderella, and Snow White.  I was totally psyched!  It was so awesome! They were all so sweet and I'm going to tell you, they were all enchanted with Parker.  They asked him all kinds of questions and just raved at how sweet and smart he was.  Things, we of course, already know!  :o)  Parker really enjoyed it.  Every time he saw a character, he said, "I love Belle!" or whomever it was that he saw.  So precious.  My heart was just smiling, not only from my own experience, but because he was the PERFECT age to go.  It really was a special day for him!  (And he keeps asking at least once or twice a day if we can please go back again!)  LOVE!

We had so much fun and by 7:00pm, Parker was passed out cold on his daddy's shoulder.  He slept through the fireworks and the shuttle ride back to the hotel.  I can't tell if he's having some jet lag or if he's just plain old tuckered out.  He's been waking up around 4am for the day.  He'll take a nap (reluctantly), but had a really hard time waking up afterwards.  I'm hoping we can turn this corner soon because I don't think I'M suffering from jet lag, but I AM suffering from a kid who is getting up WAY too early, which in turn wakes ME up!

We're heading to Nanchang tomorrow morning.  We're hoping to get a bit settled in before MaryClarie Day on Monday!

I'll post again soon!
Steph

Planes, Trains, and Automobiles

Hi Friends!
We are FINALLY (and I do mean that with a lot of emphasis!!) in Hong Kong!  We left our house at 5:00am on Wednesday, and after a 6+ hour plane ride to Seattle, a 10+ hour flight to Tokyo, and another 6+ hour flight to Hong Kong, our plane got in at 11:25pm on Thursday night.  Man, it was pure torture!  I tried to not think about how it had been over 24 hours since my last shower!  Ugh!
Parker did pretty good on all the flights.  The first one was the worst because he kept asking when were going to land, when were going to be home, and telling me that he was so hungry.  Oh, and we did have bathroom drama one hour into the flight and I'm going to tell you, I was really worried because we'd only brought 2 pull ups!  Forturnately, all was well and we made it the remainder of the day.  
We are going to Hong Kong Disneyland today.  It will be a first for both Parker and I.  In fact, I almost cried when we got our tickets today.  I can't believe I'm finally going!  (I'm tired, I'm sorry!)
I hope to be able to post some pictures and stories from our day later tonight.  We have several VPN's downloaded so we can blog while in China and I hope they work!  (Hong Kong doesn't have the internet blocked so we won't know if they work until we get to China!)  Friends who have been to China rececntly say the VPN's are hit or miss.  Keep your fingers crossed!
More later!
Steph