California Christmas December 2017 - Day 6

Day 6 Notes –

• -          DCA - Monsters inc, Soarin, donut - We tried to start the day by going to Disneyland, but the lines were crazy and we found that California Adventure opened early and we hadn't used our Magic Morning yet so we went in to DCA early.  It is so nice to go into these 2 parks early.  The lines are non-existent.  We went to Monsters Inc first.  It was literally a walk on.  There was no one in line.  We were the only people going on the ride.  It was great.  We went and rode Soarin' after that and there was some line.  It took about 30 minutes, but that was shorter than during the day.  After Soarin', Lisa had seen specialty donuts on a blog that she wanted to find.  We found it at the smoothie stop.  This was the BEST donut I have ever had.  It was a Yule Log cronut.  I had always wanted to try a cronut because I love croissants, and this was a cronut, with praline filling and dark chocolate icing.  It was amazing!
• -          DL - After the donut, we headed across to Disneyland because the Magic Morning was over and we planned on spending the last day in Disneyland.  There were still quite a few things to see there that we hadn't done before.  We were also able to get a FastPass for Space Mountain before the park opened since we were able to go into DCA early.  That was a cool perk.
• -          Space Mountain - Since Ellie had done most of the other big rides that she was able to do this trip, she wanted to try Space Mountain.  I tried to explain it to her to prep and she was ready to go.  We took off and she was a little quiet.  The Disneyland Space Mountain is really dark so she was really quiet.  She was very calm and quiet the entire ride.  At the end, I asked her how it was and she said, "that was too much".  She said she liked it, but it was too much.  It was cute.  No meltdown, no crying, just "too much".
• -          Tinker Bell - After Space Mountain, we walked by Pixie Hollow and stopped in to see Tinker Bell.  It was a really cute area.  Kind of like Honey I Shrunk the Kids at MGM Studios.  Tinker Bell was really good with Ellie too.  She took her hand and walked around showing her stuff.
• -          Alice - We walked by Alice and saw the Mad Hatter walking around.  We tried to find Alice walking around, but couldn't find her.  She wasn't out that day.  We decided to ride Alice one more time.  It is such a cute ride and Ellie loves it.
• -          Haunted Mansion - we got a FastPass to ride Haunted Mansion one more time.  I loved this ride.  I had to do it one more time.  It was great.
• -          Train - I wanted to ride the train and we decided to hop on in New Orleans Square.  We left the stroller and just rode the train all the way around.  It was fun and there is a lot to see on the train. 
• -          Corn dogs - Lisa really wanted corn dogs for lunch so we stopped at the Little Red Wagon for lunch. It was delicious as usual.
• -          Mickey and the magical map - Another item on my list was to see Mickey and the Magical Map show.  We got there a little early so I went to the concession stand to get a drink.  They had a really good frozen lemonade drink.  It was a really cute show with some of the newer characters.  We all enjoyed it and it was nice to sit down for a little while.
• -          Looked for Alice and Aurora, rode Alice - We decided to look for Aurora and/or Alice.  We found the spot where Aurora would be, but she never showed up.  Lisa went to ask if she would be there, but found she would not be there.  Lisa did run into Peter Pan and Captain Hook in the Christmas store while asking about Aurora.  She said it was really funny.
• -          Princesses - Since we couldn't find the characters walking around the park, we decided to go to Fantasy Faire to see the princesses.  Ellie was so excited.  She didn't realize where we were until we went in to see the Princesses and she loved it.  She got to see Snow White, Ariel and Cinderella.  We was most excited to see Snow White.  She really liked seeing Cinderella too.  When she saw Ariel she said, "I already saw you".  It was kind of finny.  She was really cute and more comfortable with the Princesses than last year.
• -      Tiki room with Dole Whips - We decided to finally get a Dole Whip in the park.  We waited a little while, but not too long.  The Tiki room was starting and they let us take the Dole Whip in with us so we went it to watch.  I liked it better than the Florida version.  Everything worked and it wasn't 1000 degrees inside.  We all enjoyed it.  It isn't Lisa's favorite, but it was nice to sit down and relax a little.
• -          Monorail to Downtown Disney - Another item on my list was the Monorail.  We got on and rode to Downtown Disney.  It was fun, different from the Florida version.  Much smaller and faster.  Cool to see the resort area from a different view.  
• -          Shopping - We did some shopping in the Downtown Disney area and walked back to the park.  We had left the stroller in Tomorrowland so we walked back to Main Street and Lisa and Ellie head to dinner at Blue Bayou and I went to get the stroller.  It was a little extra to walk, but it was better that I went by myself.
• -          Blue Bayou - We had planned on doing the Fantasmic dining package to eat at Blue Bayou and get reserved seating for Fantasmic.  We met our friends there for dinner.  They were nice enough to put two tables together for us even though they told us they couldn't when we made the reservation.  Dinner was delicious.  We enjoyed it.  The atmosphere was cool, the food was good and the company was great.  The kids even did a good job eating.  The desserts were really cute, themed to Fantasmic.
• -          Fantasmic and Fireworks - After dinner we went to our seats for Fantasmic.  They gave us seat cushions to sit on which ended up be a good thing.  Our seating area was on cobblestone front center.  Great spot, but not super comfortable without the cushion.  We waited a little while, but it was a good thing we got there early because the area filled in by show start.  The show was great.  We loved it.  It was a mixture of fireworks, characters and World of Color screens with a giant dragon.  It was really cool.  I think I still like the regular World of Color the best, but this is a close second.  Ellie was really cute.  She sat on my lap during the show and was watching it.  She got a little scared when the villains came out so she closed her eyes.  The thing was, she fell asleep when she closed her eyes and her head fell back on me.  I didn't wake her, but out of the blue she woke up when the princesses showed up and then with the riverboat came out she was super excited.  She got to see Aurora and Alice on boat.  She kept saying, "I saw them.  We didn't think we would see them, but we did!!".  It was really cute.  After Fantasmic, we stayed in our spots and watched the fireworks.  They showed the images from the castle on the water screens so we could see the same show with the fireworks.  It was good, but not great.  Always fun to see fireworks though.  After the fireworks, they did the gingerbread "snow" on the Rivers of America.  It was a nice ending.
• -      Didn't want to leave - After the show, we got Ellie setup in the stroller and we headed to Tomorrowland.  We wanted to get the light saber churros.  They were fun and delicious.  After that, Ellie fell asleep and we walked through the park, stalling and looking at everything.  We didn't want to leave.  We made it to Main Street and I wanted to walk in to see Mr Lincoln.  We didn't watch the show, but we did see the exhibit about Walt and the beginning of Disneyland.  It was a fitting ending to our trip because we got to see the bench that Walt was sitting on while watching his daughters ride the Griffith Park Merry-Go-Round.  They had the actual bench in the exhibit.  It was really cool to see and brought the trip full circle.