Trip to Annaheim and San Diego, California

Donavan had a conference in Annaheim, California last week. We just couldn't pass up the opportunity to go with him. Isaac and I are Donavan's American Express--he "can't leave home without us." The three of us headed out a few days before Easter and spent 3 days over Easter weekend at Disneyland.

Isaac's favorite part of Disney was the characters. He loved Mickey's Toontown where we could walk through Mickey and Minnie's houses. We also saw Chip and Tales treehouse and Pluto's dog house. The character breakfast we chose was excellent. It was in the Storyteller's Cafe housed in the Grand Califorian Hotel. It was laid back, not overly busy (probably b/c it cost an arm and a leg), and characters came up to our table for an individual visit. Isaac wanted to share his breakfast with each character. Dale actually took the grapes Isaac offered. We saw Little John, Chip and Dale, gorilla from Tarzan and several others. When we were leaving we came across a racoon (not sure what the character was from), but Isaac wanted nothing to do with it. In fact, he said "coons live outside." It was really funny that he embraced all of the other characters--even some he didn't recognize, but would have nothing to do with the racoon. Q

The hardest part of Disney for Isaac were the lines. Of course he didn't understand waiting in lines--who does? But he was a trooper. Our tickets allowed us to enter the park 1 hour early on one day. It was great b/c our bodies were still on east coast time so we were up and ready to go by 5:30 a.m. and hit the park by 6:30 to get in line for the 7 a.m. early opening. It was a really good time to be in the park. There was no wait time for rides. Isaac loved Dumbo, the Elephant ride and turning the wheels on the teacups in Alice in Wonderland.

Donavan was able to enjoy all of the "big kid" rides at the park. As a single rider he was able to jump to the head of the line. It was really cool because at times when the wait times were over an hour he was in and out of the ride in 15 minutes.

On Tuesday, Isaac and I went to San Diego to meet up with Mimi and Poppi Powell. Poppi presented at a conference in SD so we were thrilled to be able to spend a couple of days with them while Donavan was conferencing. In SD we went to Sea World. We watched the Shamu show, visited the penquins, flamingos, and turtles. Isaac's favorite part was the Seasame Street playground. The Elmo--flying fish ride was pretty cool. Mom and I enjoyed going a couple of times. They had a large area with soft blocks that Isaac really enjoyed. He was more interested in the play areas than the animals--I think Disney wiped him out of waiting in lines and crowds, etc.. he enjoyed being "free" to roam.

Before heading back to Annaheim to meet up with Donavan we headed to the beach for a morning at Coronado. It was a beautiful morning and Isaac loved playing in the sand. The water was pretty cold, but he and Mimi got wet up to their knees.

This was Isaac's first "long" plane ride and he did surprisingly well. All of our other plane trips have been from Atlanta to Indiana or Michigan which are less than 2 hours. The trip to Orange County was just shy of 5 hours. We took a lot of diversions and it helped that each seat had individual televisions screens. The flight was not full so we were able to spread out in the plane. Isaac is a really good traveler.