The trip when Grandma stole somebody's scooter (3/9-3/12/2019)

VandVsmama

DIS Veteran
Joined
Mar 28, 2011
Hi everyone!

A link to my PTR is available here for your reading enjoyment! We just returned yesterday evening from an eventful trip to DL. We are DL veterans, but this was our first and likely last time taking Grandma (my MIL) with us.

When did we go? Sat 3/9 - Tues 3/12/2019

Where did we stay? Park Vue Inn

So what did we think of the hotel?
We've stayed at a few different places over the past few years...DLH, BW Stovall's, BW Pavilions, Hojo's, and now Park Vue Inn. DH gave Park Vue Inn a big thumbs up. Why?
  • proximity to the park. It's right next door to BWPPI, so you can see the crosswalk on Harbor Blvd from the hotel. Not having to walk all the way down to Hojo's was great.
  • free parking
  • free hot breakfast every day - eggs daily. They switched it up between sausage and bacon every other day. One day there would be breakfast potatoes & the next day biscuits & gravy. Make your own waffles every day (3 waffle irons available). Plus the standard bagels, bread, cereal, fruit, yogurt, hard boiled eggs. This saved us $$ every day on breakfast.
  • room was clean
The beds were comfortable, but a little squeaky. Walls were a bit thin, but we used a white noise app on my phone so that drowned out ambient noise from outside and we slept like logs.

Who went on this trip?
me (Mom)
DH (Dad)
ODD (12)
YDD (10)
Grandma (73)

Grandma had her own separate room. Thank goodness for that. She's a snorer and none of us would have slept well if it hadn't been for a separate room. Grandma also rented a scooter through Deckert's. The scooter was at the hotel waiting for her when we checked in.

Is Park Vue Inn pet friendly?
I inquired about this for a friend of mine, whose kids are very allergic to cats & dogs. The answer is no...this hotel does not allow pets with the exception of service animals. But you can call them ahead of time to request a deep cleaning of your room if anyone in your group is prone to animal allergies.

What was the reason for this trip?
It was a bucket list thing for Grandma. She'd always wanted to eat at the Blue Bayou, but when DH & his sister were kids, they couldn't afford to.
 
We had a fair bit of drama in the couple of days leading up to our departure because Grandma didn't tell us until almost the last minute that she lost her ID. As a result, she wouldn't be able to check into the hotel (as confirmed by a phone call to the hotel). However, it got sorted out because the hotel linked our reservation with hers & the hotel did a $1 authorization on DH's credit card...DH showed HIS id and MIL then paid for her hotel with cash.

Grandma doesn't travel very often. She also doesn't drive anymore because she can't see well enough to drive safely. Apparently, this resulted in her misplacing her ID because she thinks that since she doesn't drive, she doesn't need to carry any sort of identification with her in her wallet. o_O If you're reading this and thinking, "What?!" then yes, that's what DH & I thought, too.

I'm pretty certain that Grandma's days of traveling are probably soon over. This was definitely a different sort of trip than we usually take to DL. As you'll soon see later on in this trip report, there were times when we all took turns herding Grandma in the right direction. And yes, you read that title correctly. She DID, in fact, take somebody else's scooter. More on that later.

Park Vue Inn parking lot:
A word to the wise...the parking spaces can be a little tight. So just be careful getting out of your vehicle if you're driving there with a large truck or SUV!

Saturday 3/9/2019 - Departure Day!
I was targeting to leave our house at 7:30 am. We ended up getting on the road at 8:15 am. We were travelling from the Phoenix area. Stopped at 11 am in Quartzsite for a bathroom break, then at 11:30 am in Blythe for gas (on the AZ side for the cheaper gas!) and then had lunch on the CA side of Blythe. We got to the Park Vue Inn around 3:30 pm. Hit bumper to bumper traffic on the 91 freeway through Riverside. That was a little crazy...traffic jam on a weekend!
 
So how close was the hotel? This close! This is right at the front of the hotel. Our room was about 2/3 of the way to the back of the property.
hotel 1.JPG

This is standing on the 2nd floor right near the breakfast room looking toward the crosswalk on Harbor Blvd. From the hotel to the security screening area was <5 min walk!
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And here's from the breakfast room looking to the back of the hotel property. The brown building on the left is BWPPI (Best Western Park Place Inn).
hotel 3.JPG

** Edited to add **
The Park Vue Inn's parking lot is VERY well lit at night. I had absolutely no problems walking back by myself with ODD late one night.
 


Yay, excited to hear how it all went down!!
 
Saturday 3/9 continued...

The weather was definitely chilly on Saturday afternoon! We all bundled up with jackets & scarves...the kids took turns with my gloves...and we took off from the Park Vue Inn to DCA! The security screening area that afternoon (~ 3:30-3:45 pm-ish) was slow. There was a line about half way down that bus depot area. It took about 10-15 min to get through it. I thought, "Oh boy, is this how it's going to be every day?"

Getting Grandma through security was a bit of a challenge. As I mentioned before, she's not well traveled, so she's not used to how things go with this sort of thing. In addition, she brought the most enormous bag as her purse that afternoon into the parks. Seriously, it was huge. A toddler easily could have fit in there (seriously, I'm not exaggerating). She opted to not put the bag in the scooter basket because she was worried about the bag falling out (yes, it was that large). So she had it on the scooter near her feet...except then she'd have her feet dangling in mid air on each side of the scooter.

I'll just pause for a moment while you all get that mental image in your heads. It was quite a sight to behold.

That didn't go so well because her feet bonked into several people as she was scooter'ing to the security screening area. So she decided to loop the handles of the biggest purse ever such that it was physically attached to the scooter...that way, if it fell off the foot platform, she wouldn't lose the purse. Well, if that had happened, then the whole scooter would probably have fallen over, but thankfully that didn't happen!

So we got up to a security screening table. Kids, DH, & I went through just fine. We knew the drill. Open up each bag, unzip all of the zippered compartments. We told Grandma about it beforehand, but she forgot all of that. She couldn't walk through the metal detector because she has a pacemaker. Metal detector + pacemaker = pacemaker gets shut off = trip to hospital for Grandma. So no metal detector. No metal detector wand either. So they had to pat her down. She had to take off her big ski jacket (it's really DH's). She had a hard time following directions... part of the challenge was Grandma is very hard of hearing and refuses to get a hearing aid. So you have to yell at her. She'll be looking at you and you think that what you've said has registered with her, but it really hasn't.

...that will come up later! Like all the times that Grandma went another direction at full scooter speed like she was in a race and we had to literally run after her to get her to stop and go the right direction.

So Grandma was cleared by security. But wait! We can't go yet to DCA. Grandma had to zip up her jacket. It was pretty chilly...it was mostly the wind that made it feel colder than it really was. But Grandma didn't have her reading glasses with her. So she kept trying to zip up the ski jacket but it wasn't working because she couldn't see what she was doing. DH finally had to step in and do it for her. Honestly, the whole entire trip felt like we had a 3rd child that we had to manage and it took all 4 of us sometimes to wrangle Grandma in. I'm used to zipping up little kids' jackets...like when they were 2-6 years old. But 73 year old Grandma...that was a new experience. It was exhausting. Overall, we had a nice time on the trip, but never again are we going to take Grandma with us. She's very high maintenance. This was a bucket list trip for Grandma.

One and done. I'm not doing a multigenerational trip to a Disney park again, that's for sure!

I decided that we'd eat dinner at Flo's V-8 Café because I figured that Grandma would enjoy it (she did). This is what Carsland looked like when we arrived...
Sat 1.JPG

The crowds don't look too bad, do they? Well, Luigi's was shut down at one point that afternoon/evening and when it was running, it was a 30-45 min wait. Mater's was a 30 min wait as well. And RSR? 2-3 hours. So we didn't actually go on any rides in Carsland on Saturday. But the atmosphere there is great.

This is one of the jukeboxes at the counter where you pick up your food...
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I love all of the fun details that this land has, like this...
Sat 3.JPG


What did we have for dinner?
I love talking about food! Here's what we had....
  • ODD had Flo's Famous Fried Chicken. That kid loves mashed potatoes and gravy, so she ate the mashed potatoes first!
  • I had Ramone's Low & Slow Club. I thought this was really tasty. I gave YDD my fries.
  • YDD had the chicken fenders. She gave me her fruit.
  • Each kid got a chocolate milk shake. YDD hates the 'road gravel,' so if you have a kid that doesn't like that stuff, you can ask them to leave it off.
  • DH & Grandma each had a Cobb de Ville salad
Because of the chilly weather, eating inside was very popular, so there was nowhere to sit indoors. We ate outside. Grandma really enjoyed all of Carsland.

Shortly after we entered DCA, I used Max Pass to get us Soarin' FPs for later that evening. RSR FPs were all gone, as were Toy Story FPs. I was going to have us all go on Ariel's, but even that ride was 30 min and I'm sorry, but I'm not going to wait 30 min to go on Ariel's. I love that ride, but not 30 min! Instead, we headed over to Hollywood Land and saw Turtle Talk. Kids & DH are bored with that attraction, but I told everybody, "Too bad! Grandma hasn't seen anything here and almost everything has too long of a wait and Grandma will like this." I was right. Grandma loved it and she didn't even have to get out of the scooter.

We then tried to go to Animation Academy, but there were so many people waiting for it that we'd have to wait through 2 iterations of that attraction before we could get in. Ok, what about Monsters, Inc? Nope...that ride was 30+ min wait. Forget it! Honestly, DCA on Saturday was very frustrating. I did not enjoy it hardly at all. Neither did DH or the kids. The Food & Wine crowds were pretty heavy.
 
Oh man, those are some long waits! I'm sorry you didn't get to do that much attraction-wise! And going through security with little kids can be one of the more stressful parts of a trip, to say nothing of high-maintenance seniors, haha! But I'm looking forward to hearing what Grandma thought of Soarin! And I was complaining about our last trip where we waited 20 minutes for Ariel...
 


I saw on that stroller post about your mil stealing a scooter and I knew your trip would be bananas :banana::rotfl: I'm sure you guys had tons of memorable moments you'll remember for a while.

And I hope your DL days weren't as busy as your time in ca adventures! It sounds like an annoyingly large amount of people.
 
Really glad to hear that you all survived your trip and that MIL got to cross DLR off her bucket list. (You should get a solo trip as a reward for this one!) Your title made me think that this trip will be one you'll be chuckling about for years to come -- after you recover, of course!
MIL reminds me of my FIL -- who needs a hearing aid badly, but refuses to get one so that he can just ignore life by not hearing what he doesn't want to and by playing dumb the rest of the time (huh? what? I dunno...). Pretty convenient for getting away with doing whatever you want! Needless to say, so far I have managed to ignore his hints that he would like an all expenses paid trip to Disneyland... lol.
 
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I have lots of photos to post, but they're on the other computer right now, so I'm going to include a couple of text-only posts for now until I can use the other computer later today.

Some quick fun highlights of the trip:

  • Grandma being totally amazed at how empty Disneyland was on Sunday morning. Yes, Grandma, THIS is why we get up early on a Disney trip! :-)
  • Grandma being thrilled over her lunch at the Blue Bayou.
  • Grandma meeting the Mad Hatter in Fantasyland on Sunday morning. We took some pictures with him. He was hilarious.
  • Grandma really liking Soarin'.
Some "lessons learned"
  • If your elderly relative has such poor eyesight that she can no longer drive a motor vehicle, then she's too blind to drive a scooter. She ran into each of us more than once. Bumped into other park guests with the scooter. Ran over ODD's foot. Almost ran over another kid's foot. Almost went off the curb at the hotel & almost toppled over the entire scooter with her in it.
  • Do your elderly relative a favor and turn the speed down from rabbit to turtle. You'll be doing everyone else a favor, too.
  • Grandma's hearing is worse than it was several months ago. Many times we'd tell her something, she'd look at us, acknowledge us (she's say "Ok") and then head off in a totally different direction than we just said. We learned that we basically had to shout at Grandma the entire time. So yes, we were "THAT family!" LOL!!!
  • Multitasking is not Grandma's forte these days. While driving the scooter, she could only handle looking at the ground directly in front of the scooter and didn't pay attention to anything else. That's why she hit so many people. It was embarrassing and horrible and I never want to repeat that experience again.
  • If your elderly relative can't see well enough to drive, she also can't see well enough to do any sort of decent parking job of the scooter. There will be times when she will literally park it hanging out into a walkway & totally block everyone's way. We coped with this by DH & I taking turns parking the scooter for her. Seriously, her parking skills were pretty bad.
  • If you see a scooter that looks like the one you rented and it's labelled as being from the company you rented it from, do yourself a favor and check the scooter number to make sure that it actually is yours. Because the same make & model scooter from the same rental company uses pretty much all the same key.
This is how Grandma ended up stealing somebody else's scooter on Sunday after lunch at the Blue Bayou. So here's what happened:

We had a lovely morning going on rides mostly in Fantasyland and Tomorrowland on Sunday morning. I made a reservation for lunch at 11:40 for Grandma & DH at the Blue Bayou. We couldn't afford for the 4 of us to eat there with Grandma. Just too expensive and it wasn't in the budget. Grandma did not offer to pay. But that's a side issue...furthermore, not once did she even offer to chip in for gas money. Nor did she even spend $5-$6 to get either of my kids an ice cream cone or a Mickey ice cream bar. Never bought my kids a fun souvenir or even a trading pin (they collect pins). ODD has a Pandora bracelet and saved up some $$ to buy herself a new bead for her bracelet. Grandma was right there watching her pick out the bead and all that....MY grandmother would have swooped in and said, "Oh put your money away, I'm getting this for you." Nope...not ODD's Grandma. Bought herself some souvenirs, though. It's very frustrating. My kids think that Grandma is kind of clueless and self absorbed. Nothing we can do about that, though. I think the 4 of us deserve a gold medal for wrangling Death On Wheels Scooter Stealing Grandma through Disneyland for 3 days. :rotfl2:

The sense of entitlement is strong with this one. There are multiple reasons why we have not done this trip with her before...the primary reason being that she expected us to pay her way and, well, that just didn't work for us. Grandma considers anything over $10 to be expensive. Well, I sure would like an all expenses paid trip to Disneyland, too. And I'd like a pony. And I'd like to win the lottery. But that isn't happening. Grandma does not have a good handle most of the time on how one's behavior & choices sometimes impact others around her.

Ok, so back to the Scooter Stealing Snafu....

Grandma & DH got seated for lunch. Kids and I went to go eat lunch at the French Market, which is one of my favorite places to eat in Disneyland. YDD had the pulled pork..she loves it there. ODD & I each had a beef stew bread bowl. The beef stew was really tasty. We got our food around 11:50 am on Sunday. At that time, there were a ton of open tables at the French Market and hardly anybody inside ordering food. By the time we were done eating, though, all of the tables were full. So we hit the sweet spot there!

After lunch, I got the kids an ice cream from Gibson Girl on Main Street for dessert. After we were done having ice cream, I got a text message from DH saying that they were done, so we headed over to New Orleans Square to meet up with them. DH & Grandma were browsing in the dress shop next to the Blue Bayou. Once out of the dress shop, DH said, "Mom stole somebody's scooter." Here is what happened:

  1. *I* parked Grandma's scooter in front of the dress shop, facing inwards toward the dress shop. In her basket was 1 water bottle and a Disneyland park map.
  2. When they were done with lunch & exited the Blue Bayou, there was another scooter parked right next to Grandma's. From the same company (Deckert's). Only that one was facing outwards from the dress shop and did NOT have a water bottle or park map in the basket.
  3. Grandma didn't pay attention & didn't think and just sat on the scooter that was parked in a totally different direction, plugged in the key, and took off.
  4. DH said, "But MOM! Did you notice that your water bottle was gone?" She said, "Well yes, but I thought somebody just stole it."
  5. DH said, "But MOM! The scooter was pointed totally the other direction! And the scooter number was different!"
  6. Grandma said, "Oh, it was? HAHAHA! Oh well!"
  7. Deckerts called DH on his cell phone and asked him to check the # on the scooter Grandma was riding on and what do you know, but it was the wrong scooter. The woman whose scooter Grandma stole was beside herself, distraught, totally in tears, thought her whole trip was ruined, thought they'd have to pay for replacing the stolen scooter. Seriously, my MIL totally ruined this other woman's day and all MIL had to say about it was "Hahaha! Oh these things happen sometimes.' No, Grandma, they don't.
DH was really mad at his mom. My kids & I were horrified at Grandma's reaction and blowing it off like it was not a big deal. I mean, just put yourself in that poor woman's shoes and imagine how upset you'd be. At least Grandma did apologize to the woman once she handed over the stolen goods.

So for the rest of the trip, every time we'd get back to Grandma's scooter, DH would shout at her (because you couldn't talk to her in a normal volume otherwise she wouldn't hear you), "MOM! WHAT'S THE # ON THE SCOOTER? IS IT 3114? IF IT'S NOT 3114, THEN IT'S NOT YOUR SCOOTER!"

And every single time, Grandma would squawk, "EEEEHHHH?!" Like the squawking sound that Rosita at the Tropical Hideaway makes. That's Grandma's way of saying "I'm sorry, I can't hear you, could you repeat that?"

If at this point, you're thinking that this sounds an awful lot like a Chevy Chase Vacation movie, then YOU'RE RIGHT!!!! :rotfl:
 
What we've also learned about our immediate family on this trip is that when we visit Disneyland with other people (whether it's with friends or other family members), everyone in our group has a better time if we are able to have a little bit of down time from each other. For example:

A year ago, we went with my sister. At some point on both days there with her, we split up from her. She went to go do something on her own and we went off to do our own thing for a little while.

A year before that (so 2 years ago), we went with some friends. Each day, we split up for awhile from the friends...they did their own thing and we did our own thing and we all met up later refreshed and ready to go some more.

What was different, though, with this trip was that Grandma pretty much needed an escort with her at all times. She has always had an incredibly bad sense of direction. For example, she lived in this one city for 25 years. Knew it like the back of her hand. And regularly would get lost all of the time. This was when she was in her 40s and 50s, so it's not like there were concerns about dementia or anything like that for her back then. There's no way that Grandma would have been able to manage on her own at Disneyland. And she definitely would have gotten lost.

So yes, Grandma needed a handler/babysitter. She wouldn't speak up when she was hungry. We had to ask. She wouldn't speak up if she had to use the bathroom. We had to ask her. I'm used to this, though, because whenever we pass by a bathroom at Disneyland, I just automatically ask my family if anybody needs to use the facilities.

And they all know that we are not getting out of line at a ride to go to the bathroom. So if there's any remote chance that you might need a bathroom when we're waiting to get on Haunted Mansion, you better go use the toilet now. LOL.

There were rides that Grandma couldn't go on because she has high blood pressure and a pacemaker. So she was fine with sitting those out. She didn't go on RSR, Star Tours, BTMRR, or Splash Mountain with us. She was happy to sit on her scooter (not the stolen one) and people watch. People watching at Disneyland is fascinating and a whole lot of fun.

Up next...more pics from Saturday evening after dinner!
 
Ok, so back to our regularly scheduled programming!

After seeing the wait time for Ariel's being so long and missing out on Animation Academy and THEN seeing the line for Monsters, Inc being so long, I looked on the Disneyland app and saw this...
Sat 5.JPG

Hm...ok...Tiki Room has a 10 min wait and the Jungle Cruise is 15 min. YDD loves LOVES LOVES the Jungle Cruise so we always go on it at least once on every trip. I asked everybody what they thought of going to the Tiki Room & the Jungle Cruise. Everybody gave it a big thumbs up, so we hopped on over to DL. And Grandma helped other park guests play frogger with her scooter along the way. :rotfl2:

We had FP for later that evening for Soarin', so I basically needed some time filler attractions for us to go on while we waited. First, we went on Jungle Cruise. Thankfully, Grandma didn't have to go up or down any stairs in the queue. They let us in the handicapped entrance.
Sat 6.JPG

But before going on Jungle Cruise, we did the dance of watching Grandma try to park the scooter. Followed by DH yelling at Grandma to get off the scooter so he could park it for her. Yelling, of course, because she couldn't hear him and kept squawking "EEEHH?!" :rotfl:

Everybody enjoyed Jungle Cruise. We went next to the Tiki Room and only had to wait 5 min before going inside to see that. DH & ODD each got Dole Whips. Grandma saw the Dole Whips and then decided that she wanted one, so she sent DH off to get her one, too. That was a recurring theme throughout the rest of the trip. "Oh, that's a good idea. I want to get one, too. Can you get me one?"

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Sat 9.JPG

I really like how the Tiki Room exits now. It goes through the entrance/exit to the Tropical Hideaway. I really like the Tropical Hideaway and LOVE the animatronic bird Rosita. The jokes she tells are really lame and really funny! You can get Dole Whips at the Tropical Hideaway, too. And you can get pineapple Dole Whip mixed in with a couple of other flavors also.
Sat 10.JPG
 
6 years ago when we went on our 1st family trip to Disneyland, thanks to somebody on DIS Boards, I'd read about the Shrunken Ned machine in Adventureland. He gives out prescription cards for about $0.50. Or maybe it's $0.75? Anyway, we hadn't been back to see Shrunken Ned since that first trip 6 years ago, so I inquired with at the Adventureland Bazaar shop. It turns out that Shrunken Ned is now located in the eating area for Bengal Barbeque. The kids each got a prescription card...he talks to you...it's hilarious. MIL then thought it was pretty funny & wanted a prescription card. And then started fishing around in her coin purse to find 2 quarters. Only she left her reading glasses back at the hotel. So she couldn't see. And she took forever trying to find 2 quarters.

So I just got out 2 extra quarters and put them in the machine for her. At this point, 2 other people were patiently waiting their turn for Grandma to figure out how to put 2 quarters into the Shrunken Ned machine. :rotfl2: A fun time was had by all!
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After that, we went on Pirates of the Caribbean (having gotten a wheelchair return time just before getting on Jungle Cruise). Everybody loved it like we always do.
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After Pirates, it was time to head back to DCA to go on Soarin'. We stopped to get DH a corn dog from the Little Red Wagon. Grandma tried some and said, "Oh that's a good idea. I should get one. How do I do that?" o_O DH pointed over to the Little Red Wagon and said, "Mom, you go up there to the person standing at that cash register and order. Then you get the corn dog from the red wagon right there. It's just like any other restaurant."

Grandma changed her mind and just ate more of DH's corn dog instead. Good times! :rotfl:
Sat 12.JPG

So we got back over to DCA and headed over to Soarin'. MIL thought there were a lot of people in DCA that evening...she expected it to be not crowded like she remembered DL being when she was a kid. Um, ok? o_O But she really liked the theme'ing in the Grizzly Peak area. I pointed out a lot of the decorative elements to her...how the signs were shaped like national park signs, the big billboard as you walk toward GRR, stuff like that. She had to stop the Deathmobile (scooter) in order to look at it all because she couldn't look at the ground and her surroundings all at the same time. :joker:
Sat 14.JPG

YDD doesn't really like Soarin' because of the heights, but she sucked it up for Grandma's benefit. ODD wasn't thrilled with it either. MIL thought it was great and wanted to go on it again. You'll have to wait until tomorrow. Sorry! At this point, DH was pretty much done because he'd done most of the driving earlier that day. I promised the kids an ice cream from Ghiradelli in Pacific Wharf. So even though it was chilly outside, the kids, Grandma, and I went over there. Kids each got a scoop of ice cream. I got a brownie sundae, but couldn't finish it. Grandma again decided halfway through us eating our ice cream that it was a good idea, so she went to get some for herself. We also learned that Grandma eats really really REAAAAAALLLLLY slowly. Combined with a cold breeze that evening and ice cream and that makes for 2 chilly children. :sad2: Definitely not the best idea I had so far on that trip! LOL!
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After that, we were all pretty much done for the day. Didn't get to go on nearly as many rides as the kids and I had hoped. But the next day was Sunday and I'd read reports on the DIS that Sunday mornings at DL were pretty darn great if you're a rope-dropper like we are, so things looked promising for the next day.

On our way out, Mickey & Minnie were in the red car trolley saying hello to people and I snapped this quick picture of Minnie Mouse in her flapper outfit.
Sat 16.JPG

Then a short 5 min walk to the Park Vue Inn and we got to our room! Made sure that Grandma didn't biff it off the curb like she almost did earlier that day. DH was fast asleep when the kids & I got to our room.
 
Sunday 3/10/2019:
Park hours for DL were 8 am - 11 pm and DCA was open until 10 pm. On Sunday before we took a break, we went on:

Dumbo
Pinocchio
Mr Toad
Snow White
Alice in Wonderland
Mad Tea Party
Star Tours
Buzz Lightyear
Roger Rabbit
It's A Small World
Storybook Land Canal Boats
Haunted Mansion
Peter Pan
Indiana Jones
Davey Crockett Explorer Canoes

I think it was about 2:00 pm by the time we left the park.

We started at rope drop! We all met at the breakfast room at the Park Vue Inn to fuel up. The kids were thrilled with the make-your-own waffles. DH & Grandma were happy with the sausage and eggs and other various options. It was very nice & convenient to be able to eat right there pretty quickly and not have to devote time to sitting in a restaurant for breakfast. Plus, it was easier on the budget, too! The plan was to leave at 7:15 am. We didn't leave until 7:25 and got to security check at 7:30 am. There were NONE of the huge long security lines from the previous afternoon. EVERY single security screening table was open. I mean, the ENTIRE row was open. NO line, NO wait.

Just like the previous afternoon, Grandma had logistical challenges with her Purse Large Enough To Hold A Child In It, her Deathmobile scooter, and her clothing. :rotfl2: The kids, DH & I sailed right through security. And then we sat down and waited. And watched. And waited. And waited some more. Watched and waited while Grandma was fiddling with trying to once again zip up DH's ski jacket (she hadn't thought to brought layers and the 1 jacket she did bring wasn't warm enough because all she had on underneath it was a short-sleeved t-shirt). Eventually, DH got impatient and went over to zip up the jacket for her. It was both frustrating and comical to watch...the 2 of them bickering while everyone got to watch...Grandma saying, "No, I can do it myself." And DH saying, "No, you can't. You didn't bring your glasses like I told you to, so you can't see the stupid zipper. We want to go get in line and you're taking forever. Just be quiet and let me do it so we can get out of here."

That's when ODD turned to me with a smirk on her face and said, "Mama, we're THAT family, aren't we?" :rotfl:Yes, child, I think we are...on this trip we are, anyway!

Here's what the line looked like around 7:40-ish on Sunday morning:
sun 1.JPG

Grandma didn't understand the countdown. So I explained it to her. Then she shouted out, "EEEHHH?!" So I repeated it only I had to yell it the 2nd time around. Lots of knowing looks & smiles from other surrounding families. You know...that look of pity from somebody else and you know they're thinking, "Oh thank goodness my mom/MIL/grandmother/crazy relative isn't here." :rotfl2: Once they scanned all of our tickets, we went down Main Street and Grandma did a pretty good job of not making anybody play Frogger with her scooter.
sun 2.JPG

Thanks to @WonkaKid and all of his previous posts talking about how frequently the path to the left of the castle has been blocked off at rope drop lately, we went to the right hand rope drop instead. I figured that we didn't want to risk having to back track since Grandma doesn't follow directions very well, doesn't hear very well, and would literally get lost in a paper bag. :laughing: We were pretty close to the front of the pack!
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Despite having had all of these procedures explained at breakfast, Grandma unfortunately was confused and shouted (because she's apparently of the philosophy these days of "go big or go home"), "HOW COME WE'RE WAITING HERE? HOW COME THEY'RE NOT LETTING US IN? WHAT'S GOING ON?" More smiles & knowing looks from other park guests while ODD & YDD explained to Grandma what was going on. Followed by another "EEEHHH?! WHAT?!" :lmao:I saw a dad wearing a college sweatshirt from my alma mater, so I went up to him and gave him a high 5. :wave2: Then Grandma shouted, "DO YOU KNOW HIM? WHY DID YOU JUST GO TALK TO THAT MAN?!" Um, because we both went to the same college.

"BUT DO YOU KNOW HIM?"

No, Grandma, I don't know him.

"WHAT?!"

*sigh* I thought, "I give up. It doesn't matter what I say. I could say that the sky is pink and she would shout out 'EEEHH?!' and it won't matter. But we're at Disneyland and this place is amazing and there's hardly anybody here, so it's going to be a great morning one way or another.":laughing:
 
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OMG, I can feel my blood pressure rising with each new post, LOL

You are a saint! I love that you let grandma tag along so she could have her bucket list visit to Blue Bayou, but holy cow!!

I'm glad you all survived the trip, and oh what stories your daughters will have to remember for years and years to come!! I have a feeling there will be more than one holiday when one of them says, "Remember when we took grandma to DL?" followed by much giggling
 
Following along. Although I agree with the PP, the posts are making my blood pressure rise! I keep imagining your MIL in this funny cartoonish way on her scooter as you guys chase behind her. Bless you and your patience! You guys definitely deserve a treat after all of that. Can't wait to read more.
popcorn::
 
Once the rope dropped, pretty much everybody headed straight for Peter Pan. I knew that we'd be able to get a wheelchair return time for Peter Pan later, so we skipped it first thing and went on Dumbo instead. Skipping Peter Pan as our 1st ride, as it turns out, was a very wise choice because we learned that Grandma does not get on and off the scooter very quickly. Plus, there was the World's Largest Purse Ever that she had to wrangle as well. Plus attempt to park the Deathmobile, followed by DH or I re-parking said scooter.

Dumbo was awesome! We made it onto the 2nd run of Dumbo that day. Look at how totally empty Fantasyland was!
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Even Grandma was pretty amazed. She shouted, "THERE'S NOBODY HERE!"
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After Dumbo, we went to Pinocchio. Mr Toad wasn't open quite yet and neither was Snow White.
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Once off of Pinocchio, I asked everybody if they wanted to do the carousel. The family all said "No thanks!" so we skipped it and went straight on Mr Toad as a walk on since Mr Toad was now online and operational. DH & Grandma rode together on this one. ODD & YDD rode together and I went solo.
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After Mr Toad, everybody looked to me and said, "ok, what's next?" Snow White was just open so we went on that and walked onto that ride, too. Grandma got a kick out of how you can touch the golden apple and the evil queen comes out and cackles at you.
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So far, so good! 4 rides under our belts and we didn't have to wait at all for any of them!
 
After we got off of Snow White, the kids spotted Captain Hook, so we went up to say hello and took a picture with him (but YDD took the pic and it didn't turn out so well). A few min later, we saw Peter Pan with a couple of young children messing around with Captain Hook. Grandma really enjoyed watching that. She had no idea that characters just roam around DL like this. After that, we headed over to Alice in Wonderland. The posted wait said 15 min, but it was more like 5-10. I used the play Disney parks app on my phone to read off Disneyland trivia questions while we waited, so the wait went by pretty fast.
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Then it was time for one of the kids' favorite rides...Mad Tea Party. ODD & YDD rode w/DH because they think that I turn the tea cup too slowly. LOL! So Grandma and I rode together. Grandma really enjoyed this ride, too. She was pretty surprised how it had been about an hour at this point, we'd ridden I think 6 rides so far, and barely had to wait at all for any of them.
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We spotted the Mad Hatter off in the distance while waiting to get on Mad Tea Party, so after that ride, we went over to meet him. In the picture above, if you look at the white & blue tea cup on the left side of the photo, you can see the Clapping Man of Disneyland! His name is Peter. He goes to DL every morning for the first couple of hours. We have seen him on EVERY SINGLE TRIP! Seriously. He's awesome. He's in his 80's, I think. Has a special handshake that he does with all of the CMs. And does this special clap while he walks through the park. I recognized him as he was getting off the ride and shouted out, "HI PETER!" and started doing his clap. He waved at me. Saw him do the handshake with the Mad Tea Party CMs. IT WAS SO GREAT, YOU GUYS!

On prior trips, we've seen him in line in front of us at Autopia. We've seen him at Star Tours. We've seen him on the Jungle Cruise, on Indiana Jones, on BTMRR.

As we were going through our rides in Fantasyland, I used Max Pass to get us a Star Tours FP. So it was now time to head over to Tomorrowland for DH, the kids & I to ride Star Tours. Here's what the hub looked like around 9:00 am...
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We had a Star Tours FP for the 8:30-9:30 am hour...
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After Star Tours, I got us a FP for Buzz and we walked right on that. I then looked on the Disneyland app and it showed a 5 min wait for Autopia so YDD & I headed over there only to find out that it was 20 min wait, not 5. Sorry kiddo, we're not doing Autopia right now. We'll try for later. Need to get over to Toon Town to use the Roger Rabbit FP that I just snagged! On our way out of Tomorrowland, we saw a mama duck and all of her ducklings eating breakfast in 1 of the Tomorrowland planter beds...it was growing a bunch of lettuce. So adorable! All of the baby ducks were snacking on all of the lettuce growing right there.
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Here's what the Autopia end of Tomorrowland looked like around 9:30 am on Sunday...
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Not too bad, right? IT WAS SO EMPTY! Now it was 90 min after park opening and even the Finding Nemo submarines had a short wait of 20 minutes.

Ok, so then we headed over to Toon Town to use our Roger Rabbit FP...You can see from this screen shot that the app tells you at what time you can grab your next FP. I used a tip that I read about on the Disneyland Daily website...I would put in an alarm on my phone for that time. So in this case, I set an alarm to go off at 9:43 am. Then at 9:43 am, I went on the Disneyland app to figure out what our next FP would be for, and then I selected the FP for that ride. In this case, the next FP ride I picked after Roger Rabbit was It's A Small World. Although, honestly, the wait time was low...15 min, I think. We probably didn't need a FP. But it had a quick return time and we were already nearby in Toon Town, so I selected it anyway.
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