I’ve been there three times – this place brings out the child in me and I can’t get enough. When I was growing up, I lived on a farm and the Auckland Easter Show was the only fair I ever went to and that was only once a year. Perhaps it was some sense of deprivation that makes me such a baby about theme parks still today.
I don’t do rollercoasters but I ride the Space Mountain one at Disneyland because it’s mostly in the dark and I don’t realize I am flying through the air. I do feel a little sick by the end though and need some recovery time. A trip in the nearby submarine is the perfect antidote. Calming and serene. The same can be said for the Jungle Ride but I wish the animals were real – that would be really cool. There’s hardly a part I don’t like – I even go on the kiddie’s roller coaster. Actually that’s about my measure of a rollercoaster.
I feel a day is about right for this park – you can do most everything at least once and I love that sense of completion. The queues can be long but they are constantly moving so you don’t mind them. At least I don’t – I’m just too darned excited to be there at all.
Now a few facts about Disneyland in case you wanted to know. According to Wikipedia, Walt Disney came up with the concept of Disneyland after visiting various amusement parks with his daughters in the 1930s and 1940s. He bought a 160-acre site near Anaheim in 1953. Construction began in 1954 and the park was unveiled during a special televised press event on July 17, 1955.
But back then it didn’t have the New Orleans Square which opened in 1966, or Critter Country (1972), or Mickey’s Toontown (1993) or Disney California Adventure Park which was built on the site of Disneyland’s original parking lot and opened in 2001.
To give you some idea of the numbers which go through, in 2010, 15.98 million people visited the park. That’s just crazy but I understand it.
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