I returned to get Monica and found I had been unintentionally clever - I had all the money so she had been unable to buy anything. I was glad to see she was still wearing the hat she bought earlier too. Before going to Big Thunder Mountain, she realized that her head was still too cold even with a cap on. Then she found a furry children's baseball cap with ear flaps. There was no mirror, so she put it on and asked me how she looked... Well, um, with a fuzzy head with ear flaps I thought she looked like a puppy, but I told her "Oh, that looks great!" She looked at me suspiciously - "Are you sure?" "Oh yeah, it really looks good," I assured her. "Come on, let's go to Big Thunder Mountain." Maybe she forgot to check a mirror now, but bounding along happily, we now went to the center of the park to check out Sleeping Beauty's castle.
I never realized the different parks have different princesses for their castles. Sleeping Beauty's castle is unique in that it has a dark cave underneath with a really cool audio-animatronic dragon. The entrance is around the side outside the castle. Smoke comes from its nostrils and little details like the claws moving or the sides expanding when it breathes were not forgotten. Inside the castle it feels a little empty - maybe because there are no rooms or furniture?? Did she sleep in the gift shop?
In AdventureLand we tried the Indiana Jones roller coaster. Again, I felt lucky but a little disappointed as we zipped past lots of interesting Jonesque scenes. However, as the line was only 5 minutes we weren't going to spend an hour admiring the archaeological dig or the ziggurats. The ride itself was fun, but it boxed your ears like crazy. Remember when all you had was a lap belt on roller coasters?
Pirates of the Caribbean also had a short line, although the park had become noticeably more crowded. It was a wonderful, charming ride as we rode through scenes of pirates drinking, fighting, pillaging, burning, and raping. The burning building lighting looked really realistic and I couldn't help wondering how I could get that look for my Halloween decorations. As we left the ride Monica exclaimed "Pirates are awful, horrible people! Why do people romanticize them? Who would want to be a pirate?" Um, well maybe people like to think about getting lots of treasure - gold and jewels and stuff. That just doesn't happen in the ride with the law-abiding barrista.
We just had time for one ride before the princess parade so we went on Small World. Contrary to my previous SM experiences, this one packed all the countries in a *short* ride. The result was we were going "Look Egypt! Canada! England! What's that? I don't know!" the whole time. We got off beaming, surprised that we liked it. Rather than an endless zombifying song, it was a whirlwind world tour. In fact, this was the only ride we took twice. A quick romp through Alice's labyrinth afterwards and the trauma of Pirates was gone and we were ready for princesses.
As we took up position for the princess parade, the sky began to darken. Soon the parade began and soon after the rain came. The rain didn't change a thing! The dancers and marchers just kept going like there was no rain at all. Then suddenly the parade halted. The dancers continued to dance in place and the princesses continued to wave, but the floats didn't move. Hmmm. This is a bit of a mystery. Then, the Disneyland tow truck drove up the side of the parade! It passed us and kept going while the music and dancers continued performing in place in the rain. Soon the parade continued and the last of the floats and dancers passed us as the rain came to an end. Great timing Mother Nature.
The other dancing we saw was in the Lion King show. As a park show it was very good (thank you Internet). But at one hour in length it really could be called Lion King Cliff Notes. When we came out we noticed the lights in the park had started to come up and the crowds had started to disappear. I always like the look of amusement parks at night, but I guess the kiddies need to go to bed. Well, this gave us a chance to get on a few more rides than we might have expected.
Buzz Lightyear was a surprisingly fun ride combining a ride with a shooting gallery. At the end you got your score as well as the chance to buy your picture. Here I was looking forward to being able to email the picture home free, like at the other parks, but no! That wasn't an option here. The picture was really cute with us squinting down our gunsights, but at 15 Euro? The other cute surprise was the Peter Pan ride. This was just a "Why not?" ride at the end of the night and I think Monica summed it up with the comment "That was just darling!" Did she remember the family's last name was Darling? A really cute ride where all the action happens below you as you fly over it (the cars hang from a cable).
We finished the night eating french fries and having hot chocolate (with a ton of whipped cream) in an American pub decorated with baseball memorabilia. The wholesome old-time image of America evoked there doesn't really match up with the actual old America, but then again the castle doesn't really match up with real old castles, or the pirate ship with real old pirate ships. But, we wished they did.
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