Nonetheless, its location couldn't have been much better, especially for all the families that were camped there, being able to catch a short shuttle bus trip to Disneyland. We were so close we could see the tip of The Matterhorn from the park, and we were treated with the fireworks displays at night.
It was fun watching the excitement of the kids as the families left their RV's, walking toward the shuttle stop; and then watching their return with Mickey Mouse caps and tee-shirts, kids still excited but parents walking much slower. Even though we could walk to Disneyland (and did on one of our morning walks), we opted to take the shuttle on the day we visited Disneyland.
It was surprising how many people were there given that it was a weekday, not spring break, not summer vacation. We didn't intend to ride any of the rides, and good thing given the length of the lines. We enjoyed walking through the different areas of the park, and were especially interested in getting to Mickey's Toontown.
Our stuffed travel companions accompanied us to Disneyland, of course. And we wanted to make sure they met Mickey and Goofy. The line to get to meet Mickey takes you through his house which is set up to make you feel like you're in the middle of one of his cartoons. Very cute and a nice distraction while waiting. Those of us that grew up with Mickey cartoons may enjoy it even more than today's kids. Goofy was out on the street, and we were able to get a nice group picture with him.
Traffic in the Los Angeles area is always heavy, and after just a couple of side-trips by car we decided that the least stressful way for us to see the major attractions was to take a bus tour. The one we chose included:
Venice Beach (lots of homeless folks and really seedy shops, but a few of the expected 'colorful' residents)
Santa Monica pier,
Rodeo Drive (SheM didn't see anything that she had to have, luckily--HeM, sigh of relief),
Grauman's Chinese Theater (we took lots of pictures of various foot/hand prints; we were surprised to see how small John Wayne's footprints were),
the Hollywood sign from Mulholland Drive,
and driving around Beverly Hills and Hollywood, with stories about various star's homes, performance locations, and scandals. All in all, the bus tour was just fine for our sightseeing.
Start rants:
Old rant: One thing that we have noticed about California is that the condition of the highways in the cities is truly awful--Los Angeles is the worst we've seen. There is a lot of repair work being done, all with signs saying "Your Tax Dollars at Work", but there is SO much that needs to be done. How we, as a nation, have let our infrastructure crumble is really appalling in our opinion.
New rant: This has happened while, a few miles further out in the burbs, new roads and malls are frenetically being constructed. This isn't new, of course, it's just that seeing it on such a massive scale is very sobering (and we've been deep in wine country here!). We really need to consider how wise it is to gobble up so much open space with so much 'new'; perhaps we should rather take a cue from Europe and make better use of the existing infrastructure. Save the open spaces for better uses such as nature and intelligent agriculture. ('Intelligent' doesn't HAVE to be vineyards, but we have been enjoying the wine--or did we already say that? Reference next blog posting.)
End rants.
We said good-bye to LA, and headed to the Paso Robles area--wine country!
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