Why I Love Disneyland

1. It's located in California, and just a half hour from a beach. One of our better ideas: leave extremely early in the morning in order to get there and lay out at the beach for the rest of the day. Brilliant.

2. Hopper pass. It's unheard of in our family to go to Disneyland and not California Adventures. Those are always a package deal. How do you not go to both parks?

3. Being with someone whose experiencing Disneyland for the first time. Oh it's a blast and adds a different sense of enjoyment.

4. Theme rides. I know those little kid rides are meant for little kids enjoyment... but they're so classic and I love riding through the movies of Alice in Wonderland and Peter Pan. (side note: The Snow White ride, Pinocchio, and Mr. Toad's Wild ride are quite possible the freakiest little rides I've ever been on. No joke. How do little kids enjoy those?! I'm surprised kids don't come off those rides terrified and crying.)

5. Thrill rides. Some of these are theme rides also, but everyone loves a good thrill. Indiana Jones, Space Mountain, Hollywood Tower Hotel, California Screaming, The Ferris Wheel. (Ferris Wheel you may question? Oh, it is the most gut dropping ferris wheel I've ever been on.)

See how some of those carts can swing? (Hopefully you can see it in the picture.) Yes, they swing a lot. When I went on this ride when I was much younger, I cried my poor little eyes out. (And whoever was on it with me was standing up and making it swing even more). It was a horrible ride. Well, I'm much older now and I had Whitney with me, who I decided needed to experience almost every ride. We didn't think it would swing that much anyways since we weren't going to be forcing it like before. Oh no... it swung just as much and I was facing backwards. Imagine sitting in the cart and having it suddenly start moving backward and then swinging back so you are now looking downward. I relate this ride to the haunted forests at Halloween. It's a scary fun. While you're there you're thinking "this was the dumbest idea" but afterward, you're craving more and thinking, "that was the greatest idea." The ferris wheel has this intense scary fun feeling to it that drove me and Whitney back to ride it again the next day.

(Yes we are holding on to the back of our seats for dear life.)

6. The music. The music on the rides, in the shops, as your walking along the streets just as this wonderful childhood innocent goodness to it. And yes we bought the CD that has the songs from most of the rides and park areas of Disneyland and California Adventure.

7. Lastly, the atmosphere. It's like the music, innocent goodness. (Aside from the completely immodest clothing worn by many Disney-goers. You just ignore those people.) Other then that, it's great.