Christmas Break 14: Tokyo Disneyland

Saturday, January 8th

School started up again on the 6th.  Besides attending the very boring opening ceremony, I did nothing all day except study Japanese at my desk and sorta plan for upcoming elementary lessons. There were some English classes on Friday, but the students were taking practice tests so I didn't need to go to class. Going to work was pretty pointless. I hated being there especially since Jonathan was leaving so soon. Oh well... at least we would get to spend a few more days together in Tokyo! We left for Tokyo on Friday night. Then on Saturday we went to Disneyland!

Yay! Disneyland! I was pretty excited about going to Disneyland. However, that morning when I checked some park info on the computer I found out that Space Mountain was closed that day. It was the ride I was looking forward to the most! The Haunted Mansion was also closed. Oh, and so were a couple kiddy rides. But, despite several attractions being closed, we still went.

As we walked towards the park's entrance, we saw Mt. Fuji!

The first ride we headed towards was Thunder Mountain, which is a roller coaster. When we arrived, the line was super long! I think the wait was about an hour and a half. Instead of waiting in line, we used our tickets to get a fast pass to go back later.

We looked around for a while and all the lines were ridiculously long. I waited in some long lines at Disney Sea, but I don't think I waited over an hour for anything. I was surprised by the lines because it was January! Though it was a really clear day and not super chilly so I guess I could understand why so many people were there.

After wandering around the park for a while, we eventually rode a ride. The first ride we rode was the teacup ride! :)

We were able to spin our teacup pretty fast!

Next we rode Star Tours, which is a Star Wars movie ride. The line was only about five minutes long! We were very surprised by the short line. It's not the most amazing ride, but it's still fun.

Around noon we were able to get another fast pass. So we got some fast pass tickets for Splash Mountain. Then we ate lunch.

Yay! Pineapple pizza! I also had an apple tea soda. Unfortunately, I spilled quite a bit of it. :( The apple tea soda was good, but it wasn't as amazing as it sounded, so it wasn't really too sad.

Later I saw some characters. Usually that's exciting, but... ugh...

I really really really hate the Country Bears! Who thought it was a good idea to make such STUPID looking characters?????

It didn't take very long for us to get hungry again so we got a snack.

Mickey waffles with chocolate sauce! :)

We rode It's a Small World even though it's kinda dumb. We knew it would be horrible, but we just wanted to do it. Plus, I had a book about it when I was little and I really liked the book, so I felt that I kind of needed to see the actual ride.

The line was really short (only about 10 minutes I think). Though waiting in line was one of my favorite parts because I got to watch the expressions of the people finishing the ride. I saw one man asleep. But, my favorite was the kid in the bottom left corner of this picture:

Hmmm... I wonder what he thought about the ride?

At that time, the ride still had a Christmas theme. So throughout the ride I got to hear both It's a Small World and Jingle Bells.

Overall, the ride is kinda annoying, kinda cute, and kinda creepy. It's a unique experience.

Next, we rode the teacups for the third time (haha, we liked it a lot and the line was short). The first two times we had tried to get a purple teacup, but hadn't gotten one. This time we got purple! Yeah, we were like little kids.

Next we headed over to Toon Town. On the way we saw a parade passing by.

In Toon Town we rode Gadget's Go Coaster. It's a kiddy roller coaster, but the line wasn't bad so we rode it. Plus, it's Rescue Rangers themed! I LOVED that show when I was a kid!

Then we went back towards the entrance of the park to look in some of the shops there. While we were there, a bunch of characters came out and I got my picture taken with Robin Hood! :)

Then we went into this "old-fashioned" arcade. A lot of the games were only ten yen. Though I don't think I'd want to pay any more for them because they weren't that great.

I won the bike race! You had the turn a wheel to make the bike move.

That was an old-fashioned claw machine. Well, I don't think it was really old. Or maybe it was? I don't know. Anyways, this one didn't try to cheat like the regular claw machines. The kid in front of us won a whole handful of these toys in one try. My boyfriend played and won this for me:

Haha, I'm sure it's not worth 100 yen like it cost and I could easily make it with some pom poms, felt, and glue, but it's cute. :)

That's soy sauce and butter popcorn. I'm not a huge popcorn fan, but I really wanted to try it. I liked it a lot!

Then we rode the teacups for the FOURTH time. This time it was different though because it was dark. Seeing the streaks of light as you spin around makes it feel faster than during the day.

The teacup vending machines were cute. :)

Then we rode Splash Mountain! I had been on it before at Disney World, but I didn't remember much about it. It was more fun than I remembered! There are many smaller drops before the big one, so it builds up suspense of when the big one will come. The final drop really isn't that huge, but it's scarier because of the suspense.

The race cars actually go pretty slowly... :P It was still fun though!

For dinner we had pizza again!

When we first sat down to eat pizza, the place was packed. It was almost empty by the time we left because it was time for the Electrical Parade! Yay!

I'm not really into the parades during the day, but I really like the Electrical Parade. Ooooohh! Shiny lights!!!!!

Towards the end of the video you can hear Minnie Mouse and Goofy. Minnie Mouse sounds normal, but Goofy sounds weird. 

After watching the parade for a while, we headed towards the castle to watch the fireworks. Unfortunately they were canceled due to inclement weather. Huh? There was a slight breeze... I guess that's enough to cancel them. :( The fireworks were also canceled when I went to Disney Sea and it wasn't windy then either.

So then we went to watch Captain EO because we had fast passes for it. It was a 3D movie starring Michael Jackson that opened in the 80s, but it was recently brought back. I was looking forward to the weirdness of it (Michael Jackson as a space captain? lol) but I wasn't expecting much else from a 3D movie made in the 80s. However, it was a lot of fun!

After that we rode the teacups one last time (fifth time!) and it was the most fun of all the times we rode it. The fourth time it had been dark but I had spent a lot of the time trying to get pictures, so I wasn't looking outside very much. This time I looked at my surroundings more so it felt really crazy!

Before leaving we looked in some more of the shops. Here are the souvenirs I got that day:

Those are folders. I really wanted things that were very Japanese, but still very Disney. This set of folders was perfect! I don't like Stitch, but I really like the Mickey-shaped food on that folder! That picture is a little too small to see the details, but you can click on it to see the full-size picture.

At some point we went back to the arcade and Jonathan played the claw machine game again and this time won three little animals!

It ended up being a really great day! It wasn't looking so great at first because several rides were closed and then there were really long lines. But we ended up not having to wait in any long lines (yay for fast passes!) and got to ride a lot of things. :)

I took a lot of pictures at Disneyland. You can see more here: DISNEYLAND PHOTOS