February 20, 2008

Wednesday, February 20, 2008 9:39:30 PM

Hope to write more about it later.  Disneyland was incredible.  Actually it was more California adventure that we went in but we had a lot of fun there.  I was amazed at the quality of the rides.  The day was rainy with a little wind.  I think that helped keep the lines down.  I have heard horror stories about Disneyland lines.  The longest line I saw was an hour.  The longest line I stood in was 25 minutes.  Well not counting the Aladin play we were in line for that for 40 minutes but it would have been possible to show up at the last minute and still get a balcony seat.  What an incredible play!  I haven’t ever seen a performance done to the level that one was.

Ty and I had a lot of fun on Splash Mountain.

I believe this picture was a wild mouse style roller coaster.  I am not extremly fond of these either.

Grizzly River Rapids.

Our stroller, or battle wagon as I called it was great for carrying lots of food and water.

The Bug's Life 4D show was great.  It was a first for the entire family ot see a show like that.

We road a tram to get from the parking lot to the main park.

Tyrell explained that he was "rain tanning".  I don't expect this will catch on in high numbers.

Monday we went swimming, and returned to the chocolate factory.  The free tour unsurprisingly wound up costing about $28 in the gift shop at the end.  I felt a bit of defiance as I bought US made truffles.  I am sure it was a bit of my moving on ritual as I make my separation from AMIS. 

Any recipe that calls for that much butter has to be capital 'G' Good!

Ty shows off a fancy strawberry.

There is a wonderful cactus garden next to the Ethel M Chocolate factory.

It was surprising how little driving we got done Monday.  We did take a short involuntary tour of east Las Vegas for a while but we were straightened out pretty soon.  We had a wonderful family home evening in Baker California under the largest thermometer in the world.  I was amazed at how undeveloped the largest thermometer in the world was.  The most convenient parking to the thermometer was in a Del Taco parking lot.  We played a game of steal the flag.  It won’t be much farther into Lexie’s pregnancy until the kids are able to out run her flat.  It won’t be too much longer in their development until they are giving me a real challenge.  Even Davey got into the steal the flag game he was very intent on getting to the flag (one of Natalyn’s shoes) and seemed very aware that someone was after him once he had it.

I was surprised how undeveloped the thermometer was.  I guess it isn't that bit an attraction afterall.

We played steal the flag for family home evening.

After driving a short way from Baker I decided I was too tired to drive much more.  We found a small gas station with a large parking lot that allowed people to park over night.  I was happy to find some free camping in as much as we had some catching up on the camping budget to do from Vegas.  I was shocked to see gas at over $4 a gallon.  I could understand though.  It was the kind of place that if a person needed gas they would pay what it would take to get the gas.  The place and others like it along I-15 on that stretch had 24 hour tire service.  We got the idea a lot of people lose tires on that stretch of highway.

Tuesday we stopped at the Calico ghost town.  It is a reconstruction of an old silver mining town.  We were very pleased with the stop.  I didn’t know anything about hard rock mining before the stop.  Something that perhaps caught my attention the most was that on the train tour the guide told us they had accessed the ore at the mouth of the Silver King mine to contain about 6 million dollars in silver however the cost to extract it would be about 10 million dollars.  It makes it clear why the mine is shut down now.  It also makes it clear what got miners so excited in the days of the mining boom towns.

We all had a lot of fun "gold" panning for iron pyrite.

This kids made crafts.

We were able to walk through one of the old mine shafts.

We were able to take a train ride.

 

The drive into Anaheim was a bit nerve wracking but otherwise uneventful.  It is really nice to be through that part of the trip.