Showing posts with label california. Show all posts
Showing posts with label california. Show all posts

Saturday, 27 February 2016

Disneyland 60th Haul


Click here to view my newest video showing all my souvenirs from my trip to Disneyland during the 60th anniversary celebrations.

Sunday, 1 November 2015

Rachel's West Coast Adventure

It's been nearly 2 months since I got home from my trip and I still haven't done a single blog post or video about it. It's been a super busy time at home with work and study and trying to find time for a social life that I've not had the time to sit and do it until now!
So here is my first post which is a link to my video montage of the holiday, I will be reviewing the Disneyland portion of my holiday in a separate blog post, along with our attempt at another 24 hour challenge and I will probably do a post about my other travels too :)

 To view the video click here! (I still can't work out how to embed a video without it messing up my home page on my blog :[, if you know how please help! haha)

Monday, 3 August 2015

Disneyland Trip!!

So with less than a month to go until my trip to Disneyland, I thought I would share with you my Disneyland to do list :)
  • Watch Soundsational


I love Soundsational, I still love it more than Festival of Fantasy, although that could be because I haven't seen it since seeing FOF... so I'm excited to live up to my memories of it.
  • Watch World of Color



Again I love World of Color, and I'm really excited to see what they have done with the show for the Diamond Celebration :)
  • Watch Paint the Night


I'm so excited to see this new parade, it looks so colourful and fun :D
  • Watch Disneyland Forever


Fireworks are my favourite thing about the Disney parks, and a combination between them and projections sounds great, I'm also excited to see it from different points around the park to see how the experience varies.
  • Ride the Matterhorn
Last time I went to Disneyland they were refurbishing Matterhorn so I never got to ride it, so it is a definite must do this time.
  • Watch Aladdin


I love this mini musical, it's so well put together and as I still haven't got around to seeing the actual broadway production (fingers crossed it will make it's way to the West End soon) so this is a pretty good substitute.
  • Ride Big Thunder Mountain
Again this is another ride that was down for refurbishment on my last visit, I want to see how it differs from the versions at WDW and DLP.
  • Go on Soarin'


With the new HD show and the area around being re-themed I'm excited to see all the changes.
  • Ride Radiator Springs Racers


I love this ride, the theming of it is amazing and even though it's slower than it's Epcot counterpart, I think it's much better.
  • Visit Trader Sams
Last time I visited Disneyland I was only 20, so I wasn't old enough to go and experience the cocktails but this time I am and I'm excited to try them :)
  • Character breakfast at Storytellers Cafe
I love a good character breakfast, and from what I can tell this place will offer some rare characters to meet.
  • Walk in Walt's Footsteps
This is by far the thing I'm most excited for, visiting the apartment where Walt stayed during the construction of Disneyland will probably bring a few tears to my eye.

 Oh and of course we will be doing a 24 hour challenge when we're out there with a mix of old challenges with new challenges for Disneyland :)

 Is there anything else you think I need to do when I visit? Any hints or tips for navigating the parks?

Sunday, 29 March 2015

Disneyland Diamond Celebration Merchandise

So this week the Disney Parks blog gave us our first look at some of the merchandise that will be available throughout the celebration. Click here to view the post and video!
Here's what I spotted that I loved while watching the video...

Minnie Ears! I love my pair of sparkly Minnie ears, so I'm super excited to buy there special diamond edition ears, I love the blue bow! Now my big decision is, do I take my original sparkly ears with me too?

To be honest I'm not a huge fan of all this jewellery, however I do really like the little Mickey hat necklace, and depending on the price tag, I may well purchase this for myself :)

Pandora! Last time I visited a Disney Park in America was August, so before they released the Pandora's so I was already excited to get my hands on them, and now with added 60th anniversary charms I'm even more excited, that diamond Mickey hat will look great next to the Sleeping Beauty castle charm on my Pandora.


Autograph books! My old autograph book is full, and although I bought a new one when I visited Disneyland Paris in December, it's not my favourite, it's an odd size, doesn't have the elastic band for my pen, and is really thin. So I'm excited to buy myself a new autograph book and these one's look great :)

What merchandise are you looking forward to seeing/getting?

Friday, 20 February 2015

Goodbye Luigi's Flying Tires





This week we waved goodbye to Luigi's Flying Tires after opening less than 3 years ago.
For me this doesn't come as much of a shock, the ride itself was slow and very difficult to get the hang of.
For those of you who don't know, the ride is a bit like bumper cars, however you use your body weight to direct the vehicles around, I found them very difficult to control and by the time you started to get the hang of it, the ride finished.
I also went on this ride while wearing 
a skirt, oblivious to the air blowing up from the ground, as I assumed this would be off while loading the ride, I was wrong, and resulted in having to walk with my skirt held down and tucked between my legs in order to maintain my modesty!













I don't think this ride will be missed and I'm excited to see what they will put in it's place.
What did you think of Luigi's? Will you miss it now it's gone?

Sunday, 1 February 2015

Disneyland 60th

So as you may know Disneyland's 60th Anniversary is just around the corner, and with that comes lots of new and exciting things that will be happening in the parks.
 The new merchandise artwork has been revealed, I love the progression through the years as well as the more simplistic designs. I especially love diamond Mickey and Minnie and really hope that the characters will get some special outfits for meet and greets throughout the celebration.

Pins
The first set of pins have also been revealed and are already available in the parks with each being released periodically between now and May.
The Walt Disney quotes are a lovely touch and reiterates that we are not only celebrating Disneyland but Walt himself.

Popcorn
These adorable commemorative popcorn buckets will be available from May 22nd, I think this will make a great souvenir and can't wait to buy one full of popcorn :)

Decorations
Of course with any celebration you can rely on Disney to decorate the parks and this will be no exception, the parks will be sparkling with the main decorations being around Sleeping Beauty's Castle and Carthay Circle.





















World of Color
I am so excited about this one, an updated version of World of Color called World of Color - Celebrate! The Wonderful World of Walt Disney :D I loved this show last time I saw it, and can't wait to see what's going to happen with it. I love that the show is going to focus on Walt Disney and will feature Mickey Mouse.

Paint the Night
This is definitely the thing I'm most excited for at the moment, this parade looks amazing, to be honest I'm not a massive fan of ELP at WDW, I think it's in need of an update and the music gets on my nerves after about 10 seconds. However this new nighttime parade brings a completely different feel and looks beautiful, if you haven't looked at the Hong Kong version then you really should.

Click here to watch

They are supposedly adding even more floats to the Disneyland version, including, of course, Anna and Elsa. I'm unsure as to whether the soundtrack will be the same, as in the interviews conducted after the 60th announcements it was mentioned that the music would 'make you cry' and I'm not sure about you guys, but the HK soundtrack hardly makes me want to weep. I'm also not sure what the deal will be with the paint brushes, at the HK version, the floats stop for about 2 minutes while guests get the chance to interact with the floats by 'painting' them. I've heard that this doesn't really work all that well and the stop makes the parade feel a bit disjointed, so I'm not sure if this will be carried over to the Disneyland version or not, I know they are talking a lot about interaction for the 60th, so maybe this feature will be improved. Who knows but I can't wait to find out!






Disneyland Forever
The new firework spectacular looks like it will bring something completely new to the park, boasting that you will be able to view this show from multiple locations around the park with the new projections (Think celebrate the magic but all around you) and new technologies. This show is sure to be an amazing sight and my trip to Disneyland can't come soon enough!

Other updates...
There's not much more to go off at the moment, we know that Soarin' and the surrounding area is being updated and the new HD version of Soarin' will be making it's debut at Disneyland in May this year.
Many other attractions are closing for refurbs over the coming months so that everything is in working order.

 Are you planning a trip to see the 60th? What other things would you like to see added for the 60th?

Saturday, 31 January 2015

Hello World!

Welcome to my new blog!
Isn't this exciting!
I've decided to start a new blog to basically share some Disney knowledge with you all, give you an insight into how I plan a trip to Disney and share some tips and tricks I've picked up along the way :)

So who am I...
My names Rachel and I'm from England.
I first visited a Disney park in 2013, I know that seems like not very long ago, so how can I possibly have any insight that most people don't already know.
I first visited a park when I started my International College Program with Disney. Now for those of you who don't know Disney run programs for students to come and work in the parks to gain experience in every aspect of life, there is the CP (College Program) for those studying at a college in America, then there's the ICP/CEP (Cultural exchange program) where students from all around the globe can come and work at Disney from a couple of months to a full year, there is also the CRP (Cultural representation program) for anyone who wants to go and spend a year working at Disney representing their culture in Epcot. If you want to know more about my time on the ICP then please head over to my tumblr or youtube where I kept a log of what I got up to, how to get involved and what's involved.
Anyway back to me, I worked in Walt Disney World in Florida for 3 months, and during that time I gained a lot of knowledge into the workings of the parks and how best to tackle them when visiting as a guest. Since then I have also visited Disneyland and Disneyland Paris, as well as going back to world in the summer of 2014 and going on a Disney Cruise.
So even though I haven't been visiting for long, I feel like I have a good 20 years experience of an average Disney visitor.
Now don't get me wrong, I'm not a fact machine, what I do know is how to maximise my time in the parks and I like to keep up to date with what's going on, so that is what I intend to share with you on this blog :)
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