After I finished my race, we got back to the hotel, I cleaned up and we hit the park as quick as we could! Today was Disney’s California Adventure day! It was also Mother’s Day, so as soon as we got into the park, we saw this sign next to tables filled with carnations. Disney really just does everything right! I let Chloe help me pick the prettiest bright pink one and we were on our way. First stop…meeting Anna and Elsa, Chloe’s FAVORITE!
I was pretty excited about it as you can see. It took Chloe a few minutes to warm up to him though. He was the first character she met of the day after all.
Eventually Chloe did decide to give Olaf a high five and a kiss on the nose. It was so adorable and I’m bummed they didn’t get a good picture of either one! At least we got a great picture of her big happy smile when we told her to say cheese!
Next up we got to meet Anna and Elsa! I think Chloe was a little star struck because she got kind of shy as we went to meet them. Can you blame the girl? They are her favorite princesses after all.
We couldn’t get her to smile for a picture and she went into “I want my daddy” mode, but that’s okay. What was more important to me was the HUGE smile on her face and her constant jabbering about Anna and Elsa that made it all worth it to me. Even though she was shy in front of them, she was so happy to meet them.
After meeting Chloe’s favorite Disney characters, we were on our way to It’s a Bugs Land!
This area is meant specifically for the little ones. Usually I’d be headed to the best ride, but this morning was about Chloe and just having fun with her before she got tired and cranky. {Remember, girlfriend had been up since 5am for my race and it’s already about 10am at this point!} The first ride we did was Francis’ Ladybug Boogie which is a ladybug version of the teacups! Chloe thought it was hilarious while Mommy and Daddy were feeling a little woozy towards the end.
Next up was Flik’s Fliers which is similar to a flying swings type ride as you can see above. Chloe was so excited while we were standing in line. Luckily it was only about a 10 minute wait!
We were first on so we even got to pick our box of goodies to sit in. Chloe chose the raisins of course. She loves them, and this ride! She wanted to get back in line after we did it, but of course it double in size while we were waiting, so we opted to move on.
If you have little ones, this area is so perfect for them! They also have Hemlich’s Chew Chew Train, Tuck & Roll’s Drive ‘Em Buggies {you have to be 36″ tall for this one} and Princess Dot’s Splash Park! If we had been around the splash park later in the day, we definitely would have played there, but there was still a cool morning breeze.
We thought we’d check out the single ride line for Radiator Springs Racers, so Chloe and I stopped off at Flo’s V8 Cafe while JP took at look. The plan was for him to ride it if it wasn’t too long, but of course it was about 45 minutes which meant an hour and a half for both of us. To the Fast Pass station it was!
We grabbed some Fast Passes and went on our way around to the Boardwalk. We checked the Disneyland app on our phones {which is awesome by the way} and saw the California Screamin’ Roller Coaster had a short wait! When we got there, the guys manning the ride entrance helped us out even more and told us the fastest way for both of us to get to ride it! It only took 30 minutes for both of us and Chloe got a tiny, little 15 minute nap while JP rode. The transfer from carrier to stroller didn’t work like it had the day before.
For the next little bit of time, we actually just walked around taking everything in. I needed a caffeine pick me up since I had been up since 3:30am and run a half marathon, so I grabbed an iced coffee. We were kind of hoping Chloe would fall asleep plus we wanted to see the whole park, so why not take the time to walk and see it! We walked down the Boardwalk and along Paradise Pier and around Grizzly Peak. Did you know that the Grand Californian Hotel has an entrance directly into the park in Grizzly Peak? It was so awesome! Most of the rides in that area have height requirements, so we just walked through not wanted to deal with a long wait and rider swaps.
As we were walking, we spotted Judy Hops! Chloe wasn’t falling asleep, so we had to meet her. We love Zootopia. The best part is that they were about to close her line to give her a break, but they let us in! Just a heads up, Judy doesn’t sign autograph books because her signature in classified. She is a super cop/detective after all!
It was 100% worth getting in line as soon as they let you to see the show. My original thought was that Chloe would be completely exhausted and fall asleep during the hour long show. Nope. She was amazed, stayed quiet and paid attention for the whole show!
Throughout the show, anytime there was a scene change, Chloe would say “Anna? Anna?” because she wanted her to come back. It was adorable. Since she loved the show so much, we went back to see Anna and Elsa again. Maybe she would smile the second time around?
Once we met Anna and Elsa again, Chloe couldn’t stop talking about it which meant that it was completely worth going again! We had a little bit of time before our dinner reservation, so we walked over to Carsland to ride Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree. This ride has a 32″ height requirement that we weren’t sure if Chloe would meet, but she did! Our little bug is getting so big!
Chloe was super tired in line and ended up falling asleep in my arms. Finally right? It’s 7:00pm at this point and Chloe had been up for 14 hours with a 15 minute nap. We thought that she would wake up once we got on the ride but NOPE!
Y’all she slept straight through this ride. It swings you around in circles and is actually really fun, but I don’t know how on Earth she slept through it!
We had dinner reservations at Carathy Circle which is one of the fancy restaurants at California Adventure! It has a Golden-era of Hollywood vibe with beautiful decorations, hand crafted cocktails and a cozy vibe. And Chloe continued to sleep through it all.
Luckily we were sat at a half booth table, so we were able to lay Chloe down on the bench. She slept right through dinner which meant that we were able to enjoy a quiet dinner alone!
The food was amazing here. Seriously, so delicious. We started with the Carathy Signature Fried Biscuits. You have to get these. For my main course, I ordered the Sesame and ginger crusted salmon. It came with a miso-lime broth on a bed of coconut red rice.
We finished with dinner and had just enough time to use our Fast Passes for the Radiator Springs Racers. We had to take turns since little Chlo was still fast asleep. I rode it then put her in our carrier while JP was riding. As JP was riding, the announcements came on that park was closing. Somehow I managed to wake up at 3:30am and stay at the park until it closed at 10:00pm. We were all exhausted and ready to head back to the hotel for a good nights sleep! Pretty much the best Disney day we could have asked for!
In case you missed it, here are some other posts from our Disneyland trip!
Downtown Disney & Expo | Breakfast with Minnie | Disneyland Park | Tinkerbell Half Marathon
