Halloween time in Disneyland

Yes, I know it's January, but I'm needing a bit of a Disney-fix, if you will.  So I decided to write up about my visit to Disneyland back in October of 2010. My sister was doing the DCP at the time, so we met up with her after her Disney U class and got into the park for a halfday of sightseeing in Disney's California Adventure. We picked up tickets for that nights Mickey's Halloween Party (not to be confused with Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party, which only takes place in WDW. As far as I can tell, there isn't much difference.  I've never been to the WDW party, but at DL we had the dance party with the green soldiers and there were like three parades).  These special nights are the only time that adults are allowed in the park while in costume.  Children under 10 may be in costume any day, but not so for adults. The park closes at 6:30 for regular ticket holders.  Mickey's HP ticket holders can show up in costume starting around 3pm, and you receive a special wristband. The park is open til midnight for the special ticket holders, and the park really feels empty. 

Upon entering Disneyland, the first thing you notice (besides the decorations) is that the music has changed to the soundtrack of "Nightmare Before Christmas!"  It was great to hear this, and to walk through the park singing along.  Even my parent's, who have never seen the movie before, enjoyed the music.  If you go during the month of October, make sure to go at night because Disney reverts back to it's regular music during the day.

Mainstreet is amazing! There are special spotlights that project ghosts on the ground and up to the buildings.

As you can see, despite what I said earlier that the park feels empty, there are definitely people who are in the park with you. :)  However we only had a five minute wait for Space Mountain: Ghost Galaxy. 

The castle was constantly changing colors throughout the night.  This is one of the better photo's that I have.  Just on the other side of the castle was where the candy stations started.  Upon entering we were given small bags, and there were quite a few candy stations throughout the park.  It took some work to find them, but once we did, we filled up our bags pretty quickly. 

This is the back of the train station as we were making our way out of the park at the end of the night.  The spiderwebs were amazing!! We went back the next day for a full day in Disneyland.

 

One of the best things about Halloween time is that they bring out all the Disney villains and have an official photo stage set up basically in front of It's a Small World.  They have three villains out at a time for about 45 minutes to an hour.  I saw Ratcliffe, The Queen of Hearts, Cruella, The Evil Queen from Snow White, The Evil Stepmother and stepsisters, the cat from Pinnochio (I think?). I only had photo's with the first three, and this was my favorite photo.   They also had Captain Jack Sparrow out by the pirate ship in Liberty Square that night, as well as Jack Skellington and Sally by the train station, also in Liberty Square, and we found them during the day.

 

And the ending photo, the Pumpkin King!  I love this photo, I think it's framed great!  The entire Haunted Mansion is completely done over in the style of Nightmare Before Christmas.  The Disney Imagineers have truly outdone themselves  Even the pictures in the elevator have been changed! If I ever join youtube, I'll post the video I took.

25 days to go!

Side note....

I literally just spent an hour coding in that stupid box of Other CP Blogs. <shakes fist> I hate you html coding!!!! But gosh doesn't it look pretty!!! :D

One month!!

Eeeee!! I have one month til I start my job! I can't believe how close it is, especially since I started this process back in the middle of August, five months ago!!! It's quite intimidating to think how different my life will be in a month.  I have had the same job for four and a half years, with the same people. But I'm looking forward to the adventure that awaits me.

So when I last wrote, I mentioned that I had to talk to my Fin. Aid ppl as well as Admissions, and boy am I glad I did!  I mainly went to Admissions to ask if I could get credit for any of the Disney courses.  I had previously gone to Academic Counseling, and sadly spent the whole time explaining the DCP to my counselor rather than find any answers to my questions, so I didn't have much hope for Admissions. Sure enough, Admissions couldn't answer my questions either, but did ask if I had been to see Work Study (WS).  Huh?  So I troop over to see them and low and behold!! They knew EXACTLY what I was talking about!!! In fact, there is (well, was) currently a student doing the Fall 2010 program!  Yay! Finally some answers.  In talking with the WS counselor, she told me that I could get 8 units of WS through my school, which means I wouldn't need to take any online classes in order to hold off any Financial Aid re-payments.  (Which turned out to be great, as she also advised me that the classes I had chosen were going to be A LOT of work).  In the end, I just signed up for 6 units of WS, which means nothing besides the fact that I saved like $50.  :)  I have to have a set supervisor in WDW that is willing to communicate with my counselor back here in CA, and I have to set goals which I'm not really clear on just yet (....take a picture of an engagement?) but I have another meeting with her before I leave, so we'll knock those questions out. :)  SO! Check out your work study department if you're looking to stay enrolled without having to worry to much about grades!

I've started packing already, and I have to say that you need to be careful not to overpack! First off, no matter when your program is, the weather is going to change.  For me, it's really cold in Florida right now, so I'm packing warm clothes, and taking a few sets for the warmer weather.  I am leaving a box of items I want my parents to ship out to me later, when I have an address.  (I think I talked earlier about driving, but ultimately decided to fly out and am in the process of looking at prices to ship out my car.  I love my car, but it has some....issues.  Like the fact that it totally runs out of oil after 2,000 miles... ultimatley it just seemed safer to ship it out, rather than drive it out the 3k+ miles.)  Since I'm flying, I'm watching what I'm packing.  My goal is one check-in bag, and one carry-on.  If you're flying, always pack an extra change of clothes in your carry-on, just in case something happens to your checked bag.  Also, the one thing that several people have said is that they brought too many business style clothes, and not enough "normal" clothes.  On the other side of that, some people have said they brought too many clothes period, as they spend most of their time in costume, lol!

Hmm... this post ended up a bit longer than I planned, so rather than post a group of past pics, I leave you with this shot I took of the Eiffel Tower.  Which is okay, since I bet you're not reading this blog to learn about my past adventures. ;)