OCTOBER 1 - DISNEY'S 50th

(Getting caught up bit by bit here …)

One item on my LA to-do list since I got here early this year was to go back to Disneyland.

It's not just because Disneyland is one of the top 10 tourist destinations locally, but because Disneyland has a family connection going back to the '60s. Some of my strongest childhood memories involve our family long vacations when, back in LA (Dad's "point of origin" for Aramco vacation policy purposes - they would pay your way back only that far), we would always hit Disneyland as far back as I can remember. It was an expected part of every long vacation. (I think Mom and Dad feared the scene that would ensue if they should fail to take us!) So, I am a long-time Disneyland aficionado - over 40 years now.

Anyway, one reason I particularly wanted to see Disneyland sometime this year was because it is also the 50th anniversary of the park's opening (1955). The park has been spiffed up, old rides renovated, and a super-duper pooper fireworks show has been added.

Anyway, the perfect chance came up the first Saturday of October. A group from a church I have visited off and on in Long Beach was planning a Disney day out, and several church members who are Disneyland employees volunteered to get a bunch of us in FOR FREE. (Can you say "opportunity knocks"?)

We met 9am at a bakery/restaurant in the new Disneyland Downtown (I had never heard of it), a free public-access area of the Anaheim complex with shops and restaurants. There were about 4 Disneyland people (and one or two employee friends drafted for the occasion) who could each sponsor 5 guests, so we got a bunch of us in.

The trip was as well-scripted and planned as any package tour I have been on. I knew we were in good hands when Glenn, the group leader, showed up with a list with cell phone numbers and made sure every single person on it was there or contacted them before we walked past the turnstyles. (The cell phone is a wonderful invention, I am coming to believe more and more.) The lines are famously long, but this "insider" crew knew all the strategies, and got us "fast passes" on many of the most popular rides. It's a special ticket you reserve when you get to the park that assigns a time to you, and you … walk right onto the ride. It felt somewhat first class/steerage class to breeze past the endless lines of shorts-clad families with whining kids, bypassing all hoi polloi to plop our buts into the car for Space Mountain.

All that togetherness was wearing on me a bit by dinnertime - and the constant noise. We adults dragged in for dinner in Tomorrowland amid the blare of a pop band's sound system in the background, still frenetic kids with their dragging parents, and the rustle of trays and silverware - it brought back (not so fond) memories of lunchtime in my high school cafeteria! After we ate, I begged off of the last ride to get a little time to myself and visit a few old family special haunts - Toad's Wild Ride among them. And I desperately needed to get away from the noise and (as much as possible) the people, people, people.

The coup de grace was the evening's fireworks display - perhaps the best I have ever seen. (I've seen a bigger display for 4th of July celebrations on the Mall in DC, but this was the most varied and technically awe-inspiring.) They had set fireworks launchers on all sides, so you felt in the middle of a Roman candle Stonehenge. And being Disneyland, it had to accompany everything with a musical score, a potpourri of Disney songs and styles.

A long day for an old fart in his '40s, but the perfect Disneyland trip!