US trip - Day 1

It really is quite something just what you can fit into a single day - particularly when you cross time zones (try not to cross time zones - they can be very unforgiving). It's quite something else
just how much time can be spent queuing!

It began for us as 5am this morning - or was it yesterday morning - when every phone and ipod started beeping to wake us up from our Tullamarine motel. It was Sunday10 April in Melbourne.

And the lord said unto the intrepid travellers "let there be queues". And lo there were queues. We queued for the bus, we queued for our boarding passes, we queued at customs, and we queued to board the plane. Suzy was held up at security as she attempted to smuggle some illegal hair product through in hand luggage. She was then pulled aside when boarding for an allegedly random security check. Random my sweet buttocks. She's got shifty eyes or my name isn't Max Power.

Here's a funny thing. Whilst boarding, we heard call for a Mr Einstein, who was apparently running late for his plane. Not a name you hear too often, but I like to imagine he boarded the plane to much sarcastic calling of "Well done Einstein." or "Bit of trouble finding the plane Einstein?". Perhaps one of the better read passengers could weave a cutting reference around the relativity of time.

So, anyway, we boarded Hudson Fysh, the QANTAS A380, and made for the skies.Well, just the one sky actually. The one you see when you look up.

This was my first international flight, and at the risk of sounding very Dale Kerrigan, I'll fill you in on the movies I watched. Freakonomics, The Deer Hunter, The Fighter, Annie Hall. I also watched a bit of stand-up comedy from Arj Barker and Jimeoin, and listened to a bit of music. I must say I'm impressed with the breadth of music available. I was even able to find some Charles Mingus and Oscar Peterson.

I tried to sleep, and I managed a couple of short naps, but nothing substantial. I also availed myself of the free Scotch & Coke on a couple of occasions.

Connick, made no attempt to sleep, and interrupted me frequently with chat requests (I was across the aisle from the rest of the family). Jesamine and Rachel didn't sleep much either.

So we landed at LAX a little after 7am LA time and did some more queueing. We queued our way off the plane, queued our way through border security, queued at the carousel for our bags, and queued at customs to reassure that we wouldn't be bringing anything nasty into the USA. A highlight for some whilst queuing at border security was seeing Nathan from Packed to the Rafters - or at least the actor who plays him. When I say "a highlight for some", I mean for those who have the faintest idea who he is. I thought he looked a bit like Jamie Oliver.

Having made our way through the various stages of security, we queued for us bus, which carried us to Anaheim, and then queued for our room keys to check into the motel.

By the time we settled into our motel (Howard Johnsons) Suzy failed in the plan to stay awake and get our bodies onto LA time. I could easily have succumbed, but the kids and I decided to head over to Disneyland. We've got 6 day tickets, and if we didn't got today we wouldn't get another chance to use that sixth day.

We stopped at McDonalds for lunch on the way. And queued. I've been to some pretty average McDonalds stores on Australia, but never anything that comes close to the wait at Anaheim. There were three (I think) couples in front of me when I joined the queue, but it was over 20 minutes before I was served - and then had to wait off to the side to get our meals. I gathered some interesting distinctions from this experience.

1. Over here, they call hamburgers "sandwiches". You can have the "meal" or the "sandwich".
2. In Australia when you order a meal, you specify small large or medium, which dictates the size of the accompanying fries and drink. Here there is only one size - and it's big.
3. The menu items are numbered, so ordering is more like in the stereotypical Chinese restaurant. "Can I have a Big Mac" will draw a blank stare - until they realise that "oh, you'd like a number 1?" (tee hee)
4. I saw no evidence that the Happy Meal has any place in American Culture.
   
5. And perhaps strangest of all - you can not order a cheese burger. Item 2 on the menu is "two cheeseburgers" - and that's what you get.
   

And so we crossed the road into Disneyland. There's a lot to look at, but there is a pretty narrow band of years in which kids can get excited about Mickey's Toon Town - and probably narrower now that we have Movieworld in Queensland.

Rides, however, can serve all ages - and so ...

we queued. Until the last two rides the day, I don't belive there was a ride for which we queued less that 30 minutes. And when a ride lasts about 20 seconds, that can be a painful trade-off.

We started with Gadget's Go Coaster. We then rode the Matterhorn bobsleds (which had just broken down when we first queued for them an hour earlier), the teacups (because they spin), the Indiana Jones Adventure (the favourite so far), the Pirates of the Carribean, and the Big Thunder Mountain Railroad.

We then crossed over into California Adventure Park, specifically to ride the Tower of Terror - because Jesamine kept spotting it from a distance.

Connick hated the ride, as he kept repeating to me through clenched teeth and look of sheer terror throughout. But upon getting off decided it wasn't so bad after all. It's a poor trade-off though between queueing time and ride time.

We headed over to California Screamin', and the queue looked manageable, but Connick was not keen, and we were all so damned tired - so we decided to head back to the motel and see if Suzy had roused. Taking a wrong turning on the way out, we stumbled across the Grizzly River Rafting ride - which had no wait and offered a chance to rest our legs. That was enough encouragement so around we went, getting pretty wet in the process. With very few people still waiting to ride, we stayed on for a second round, and subsequently headed home thoroughly drenched.

Turns out Suzy has woken and tried to track us down - which was never going to work - but she did queue 45 minutes for the Ferris Wheel.

So, back to the motel, and we just headed out for a buffet tea. Now I know that you don't tip for fast food, and I know that you tip around 15% for table service, but we found ourselves out of our depth deciding how best to depart a buffet. Suzy tried questioning another customer, but it turns out he was recently landed from New Zealand, so not much help.

In the end we left $2 on the table and scarpered.

So there we have it. Day One. I've now been pretty much on the go for 34 hours, and it's time for bed. We've got a 5:30am wake-up call in the morning for our breakfast with Goofy.

I'm currently listening to the relentless and VERY load reports of fireworks over the road at Disneyland - but that's not going to wake the kids, who had well and truly crashed by 9pm LA time (2pm Melbourne time)

Good night.