Old Friends and Baking Sun

Day 27:

Waking up so close to Phoenix, we had a schedule to keep, meeting Jenny's friend from her childhood for lunch.  So we woke up pretty early and drove off to Jenny's home when she used to live in Glendale, AZ.  I punched in the address to Jenny's old home on my cell phone and the computerized lady in the phone told us where to go.

Buckeye is in the outskirts of the Phoenix area and Glendale is probably its largest suburb, making our drive into Glendale a short trip, especially compared with much of the driving days we'd made on our trip.  When we passed Sahuaro Ranch, Jenny had met her bearings with her old neighborhood and began showing us the library, places she'd ridden her bike, Desert Palms Elementary School and her old home.  Many of the places she remembered had changed in the past twenty years, but a surprising number of places were much the same as she remembered them from her childhood.

Desert Palms Elementary has been completely rebuilt since Jenny attended in the 1980's

After getting the complete tour from her old home, we drove into Sahuaro Ranch, where they were getting ready for a Wild West Day.  We parked and got out for a short time, giving the kids an opportunity to play at a unique playground before it got too hot in the day.  They played the National Anthem from the side of the park where they were celebrating Wild West Day, and I made the kids stop playing and stand at attention till the music was completed.  

The unique playground at Sahuaro Ranch challenged our children's fitness and imaginations.

Before we left, we walked past the orange trees to look at the peacocks that walk freely around the park.  It just coincided with the check point, where they were letting people in to the Wild West Days.  We got to watch as a man in full cowboy costume checked his gun with a man dressed as a sheriff and the young teenage boy with him before being allowed into the park.  Checking his gun consisted of verifying it wasn't loaded.  The boy gave each of my kids a sticker before we remounted our vehicle.

Kimberly decides the best way to get down the slide at Sahuara Ranch.

We still had a little extra time before meeting Jenny's friend, so we went back through the tour past Jenny's home, this time with the video camera. 

Then, I programmed the GPS to send me to the Arrowhead section of town, where we were meeting her friend at Arriba's.  We parked at the outskirts of the mall parking lot and walked across the street to the restaurant.  After a short wait, Jenny's friend Mel arrived with her family.  Our family clicked with their family very easily.  We all had a great time and enjoyed great Mexican food and at the end, Melissa and Steve picked up the bill, which we weren't expecting.

The Snethens with Jenny's friend and family outside the Snethen motor-home.

After leaving Arriba's and saying goodbye to Jenny's friend and her family, we drove out to Metro Center Mall.  As it turned out, Jenny didn't really recognize anything there, but they did have a really good playground on the first floor which entertained Daniel, Kimberly and Ben while Jenny took the oldest and youngest to look at clothes.

Kimberly, standing inside an alien robot at the Metro Center playground.

Leaving the Metro Center Mall, we drove on to Tucson, where we were fortunate to find a Burger King with a lit outdoor playland.  By this time, the sun was beginning to set and playing outside had resumed the appeal that it may have lost under the intense, afternoon sun.

Daniel slides down the rocket ship at the Metro Center Mall in Arizona.

By the time we left Tucson, it was completely dark and we decided to drive on, driving toward the waning gibbous moon as it rose with an amber hue over a mountain in front of us.  It was truly a beautiful sight!!  We kept going past the New Mexico border and on to Deming.  It would have been about a normal day's drive if we had started earlier in the day, but, arriving after midnight, I plugged us in and didn't even attach the hoses, knowing we probably wouldn't be there long enough to really need them.

Wildlife count to date:  2 moose, 21 bears, 7 rabbits, 9 deer, 16 squirrels an elk, a kitten and a coyote.

Into the Desert

Day 26:

The next day, we readied the motor home to be back on the road.  Having a week-long rest from driving, we pulled out of the parking lot and drove to the rental dealer, where we waited for about thirty minutes for him to show up, after calling the two numbers on the door.  Finally getting that accomplished, we were able to get on the road, taking the 91 up through Riverside to the I-10, where we began across the desert.

The kids watched movies in the cabin while we crossed the desert.

Our first stop was at Joshua Tree National Park, after a large ascent along the highway.  The engine was burning hot and it needed a break, but the road to Joshua Tree was closed due to dust storms in the area.  So we continued on.

Unusual foliage in the desert.

At the next exit, we found the General Patton Museum and decided to go after getting gas at the Chevron station.  I swiped my card and it did not work, so I went inside and asked the attendant to charge me for $40.  

Before I'd finished filling up with gas, the fraud department of Alaska USA was on the line asking if all my recent charges were valid.  The one I couldn't recall was the $126 charge to Chevron.  After talking to them for almost half an hour, I found what the charge came from.  When you swipe your card at the pump, most gas stations run a one dollar transaction, just to make sure you're not overdrawn on your account before you pump.  I'm fine with that.   Apparently, in March 2011, Chevron decided to change it from a one dollar charge to a $126 charge, more than it will let you pay at the pump for either a debit or credit transaction.  I decided not to shop at Chevron again.

Moving on, we crossed into Arizona and aside from the engine running hot and the cabin being hot, it was a relatively uneventful day.  Jenny wanted to show us Glendale, where she grew up as a kid, but we decided to save that for tomorrow, stopping in Buckeye, a western-most outskirt of the Phoenix area.

Jonathan, outside the pizza-joint in Buckeye, Arizona.

We checked into an RV park just minutes before they were about to close the office, stopped by a pizza-joint and let the kids swim in the pool until it closed at 10pm.

Downtown Disney

Day 25:

While waiting for the girls to get up, the boys played with newly acquired toys from Disneyland, a lightsaber and a tron disc, in the space between our sites.

The next day, everyone slept in, except for Daniel who had fallen asleep in the stroller before we left the park.  I had tried to get him on Star Tours at the end of the day, but he just wanted to sleep.  After we finally did wake up, we ate breakfast in the picnic table next to our home, before driving to Downtown Disney, basically to see what was there.  Our biggest agenda was to make sure that Kimberly got a proper birthday meal, since we kind of skipped that while we were in the park.

Kimberly arrives at Downtown Disney.

At Downtown Disney, we get three hours of free parking, plus an additional two hours if we got our ticket stamped at a restaurant or at the AMC movie theater.  It took us a little while to acquaint ourselves with the area.  We wanted to see Disney stores and they were mostly generic name-brand stores, like Fossil and Lego.  The restaurants were all themed, but none of them specifically Disney.  The only one we recognized was the Rainforest Cafe, right at the entrance.  Then, we started seeing some places a little more Disney themed.  

Ben, at the Lego store in Downtown Disney.

There was one place called D-Street, where I was tempted to buy some StarWars art work that was kind of expensive.  They also had these creepy four-inch-tall characters with mouse ears.  The appeal to these characters was that had them in all different themes and they only sell them at Disney parks, making them collector's items.  You didn't know what character you were going to get until you opened the box.  They were essentially like trading cards.  I thought about getting one in the StarWars theme for $11.95--a  whole box was over $300, but you were guaranteed to get a rare figure--but I decided against it in the end.

The Snethens walk through Downtown Disney

 

One thing we were looking for was a recording of a bunch of old Disney music, from Snow White or Sleeping Beauty or even The Little Mermaid or Beauty and the Beast.  We were frustrated at Disney 365 because they only had one CD and it was just the pop-Disney music from today, but they suggested the World of Disney, which was just down the way.  When we got there, all they had was more of the same.  They did have a complete soundtrack to the Lion King, but that wasn't really what we were looking for, either.

However, the World of Disney store, which was the last store before the park entrances, was the largest store by far.  Divided into four sections, we could have spent our parking allotment in any of the sections of the store.  In the first section, it started with toys and post cards, magnets and things, but ended up with all kinds of knick knacks and some useful things, too.  This was the section of the store where the DVD's and CD's were located.  The second section was devoted to artwork.  On one side of the store, hung paintings and the other side had dishes with every media of Disney art imaginable in between.  In the last two sections hung mostly apparel, first for kids, then for grownups.

Kimberly, at the Rainforest Cafe.

 

Once we'd left the World of Disney store, we decided we needed to eat lunch.  But on the way back to the Rainforest Cafe, we stopped at a vendor who made the names out of Disney characters.  A sign hung on the kiosk with Kimberly's name and she loved it.  Rebekah also wanted one.  Why did we have to pick names that were so long?  In the end, we decided to get all four of them done, since we'd already gotten Ben's name in StarWars characters at Legoland.  The man told us the signs would be ready at 4pm.

Kimberly and the Volcano

Stopping at the Rainforest Cafe, we were directed past the fish to the upstairs where we were finally seated.  We all ordered too much food and fortunately had boxes brought in the end, rather than eating it all.  Then, we ordered the Volcano, which was essentially three brownies piled up with a mountain of ice cream, enough for everyone to get some and no one to feel he'd been shorted.  Getting my parking ticket stamped on the way out of the store, we decided to wait until 4pm.  (Our five hours would expire at 4:27.)

Daniel learned a lot about the bird outside the Rainforest Cafe.

Leaving the cafe, Jenny walked back to the vendor to wait for the names, stopping back into the World of Disney store to see if they had a shirt she liked.  The kids and I watched a bird demonstration before walking back toward the vendor who had sold us the names.  Another vendor stopped me along the way, seeing Kimberly's hair.  "Can I draw her, just for fun?" she said.

"No, thank-you," I replied and walked on.  We didn't get much farther down the street when I realized it was actually a good opportunity, since we weren't sure how much longer Kimberly's hair would last.  "How much does it cost?" I asked.  She quoted me a price and it seemed reasonable, so we sat Kimberly down and the artist, named Millie, drew a perfect representation of Kimberly while we waited for those names to get done.

Kimberly being drawn by Millie in Downtown Disney.

 

In the end, it was after four and the names weren't finished.  So we decided to come back and get them later in the night and we walked back to the car and find a nice beach to spend the sunset.  We drove to Huntington Beach, but on the way, clouds started to roll in.  By the time we got there, it was 100% overcast and a cold  breeze came in from the ocean.  I decided to see if we could find a place to park, just for fun.  Maybe we could see some waves.  The kids really wanted to make a sandcastle.  At the State Beach, parking was $15, which seemed a little high, but the thing that detracted us from stopping the most was the yellow gate shut across the roadway to the parking lot.  It was closed.

So we turned around and drove back to the RV park, where I dropped off Jenny, taking the kids back to Downtown Disney where we finally got the names we had ordered.  Downtown Disney was a lot different at night, with musicians along the street and crowds of people filling in every square inch, making it difficult to maneuver  the stroller among so many people.  Retrieving the names from the vendor, we left the street for good and returned home in time to go swimming in the pool and watch the fireworks from Disneyland on our last night in LA.

Returning to the RV park, our kids watched fireworks from Disneyland from the pool.

Disneyland and a Birthday

Day 24:

Today was Kimberly's birthday and we went to Disneyland. 

Enough said.

The Snethen Seven stop for a picture at Cinderella's Castle in Disneyland

Kimberly's first ride on her birthday was on board a baby elephant with big ears.

The Snethens crowd into a teacup.

We rode in caterpillars...

...and flying pirate ships.

We helped defeat Zurg...

...and Daniel met his Fairy Godmother by the wishing well

while Kimberly got her hair done at the Bibbity Bobbity Bootique.  She is now Pop Princess Kimberly.