We are home in the US now … yay! Our trip back was mostly uneventful, but very long. We left Tokyo on Tuesday at 4 pm and arrived 9.5 hours later at 9:30 am (traveling back in time …) in LA. Seth and Logan slept a lot of the flight (and only screamed some) and Logan even got the only extra seat in the plane. But Andrew fell asleep like the last ten minutes, so getting him through passport control/customs/security and onto our next flight was a NIGHTMARE. No, we can not carry 3 boys without any strollers through all of that. Anyways, we are hope and now in jet lag Act 2. Everyone else is napping. I guess I should be, too. Oh, well.
Back to Disneyland on Monday. We thought Monday would be less crowded. HA! We have since looked and Katsu saw it was a Chiba prefecture holiday (the “state” that Disneyland is in), so that explains the hordes of children who we thought should have been in school. I thought we were running quite late until I realized that the kids had changed the clock on me! So, we made it to Disneyland before it opened again and stood in line whiel I slathered the kids in sunscreen and all the Japanese looked at me completely baffled.
The park was PACKED. Seriously, I was grumpy and claustrophobic most of the day. And it still doesn’t hold a candle to when we went when Andrew was a baby during the New Years holiday and rode a grand total of 2 rides. So, we didn’t want to make the same mistake of waiting forever in line for a FastPass, so we skipped Star Tours. Hopefully, someday Andrew will forgive us, but until then he reminds us continuously about how he didn’t get to do anything he wanted in Japan and that was the only thing he wanted to do.
Instead, Katsu got us fast passes for the Pooh ride, since that usually has at least an hour wait and I took the kids on Dumbo. Andrew decided he didn’t want to go and Katsu showed up before we had to get on and took him on Snow White instead (probably too scary for the little boys anyways). The boys loved Dumbo and we took some pictures afterwards.
Then, we did the teacups and It’s a Small World. Actually, I could be totally getting the order confused, but we did something like that. I enjoyed the tea cups as I was with Logan and he did almost no spinning of the tea cup. Andrew and Seth, on the other hand, spinned Katsu dizzy dizzy dizzy. Poor guy. Logan LOVED It’s a small world – really the first ride he enjoyed much and the other boys really liked it, too. Though waiting in line for 30 minutes to see it was a bit much for the boys because it was very sunny and very humid (though not too hot, actually).
Somewhere in here we went to Adventureland and went on Pirates. Logan got pretty scared and Andrew was obsessed with counting all the pirates, but it was nice and cool and not crowded. By the time, we got, the line on Jungle Cruise just kept multiplying, so we decided to skip it. We did the Swiss Family Treehouse, but then had a bathroom emergency, so we had to run there.
Sometime, Logan fell asleep and so Katsu and the boys went through Haunted Mansion with fast passes (a very popular ride in Japan which still baffles me), while I sat with him. Then, the boys and I went and explored some of the houses in Toon Town for a bit. Logan woke up just then and so we all went with our fast passes to do Winnie the Pooh’s ride. This ride is probably one of the very best in Disneyland. The ride is beautiful – waiting in line, you walk through pages of the book and then you ride in little carts. They don’t run on a track, and each one goes a little different – it’s very interesting. You follow the story of Pooh, one part you can actually smell the honey. I am really enjoying the incorporation of smell on rides, now. Logan was a bit scared during the Heffalump dream scene, but he seemed to really enjoy this ride, too. The boys all liked it (though I am usually in the car with Logan so I know how he likes it better).
We also did the Pinocchio ride, somewhere in here.
We went back to Adventureland and did the Tiki room. We were hoping it would be air conditioned, but no. And the story, which incorporated Stitch, was just kind of boring. It was almost parade time, so we thought we could get into a restaurant without a wait – it was 3 pm after all. No such luck, so we bought some ice cream and headed over to Tom Sawyer Island. The kids were having fun running around and exploring, but I was getting super hot and worn out since I had been basically holding Logan 24/7 since he wanted nothing to do with Dad. So, after a while, we took the ferry back and decided to just deal with it and wait for a restaurant. We ate at the Crystal Palace and were much happier afterwards.
We headed over to Toon Town and the boys took turns riding the roller coaster with us (Logan was too small to go) and then we went to see a new 3D show with Mickey and music. I actually enjoyed it a lot, but by this time we were just all getting so tired.
Finally, we watched the Electric Lights parade because Katsu said it was always his favorite part when he was a kid. I was a little skeptical that it was going to worth staying up for, but it was really really beautiful. I especially liked the newer floats. My favorite was probably the Genie as he lighted up in all kinds of different colors and patterns. Really amazing. Then, we walked to the train station and took a city bus back to the hotel. A very tiring day.
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