Single Rider Passes, Code Red and “Randy Marsh”

• Author: Mike
• Filed under: Randomness, Travel
• Date: Friday, April 27, 2007

Greetings from Palm Desert.

Despite my plans of having a Jack Black inspired tasty nap, I got a second wind and headed down to the Disneyland report, passing other hotels and shops in the process (Quiznos, nice). The walk would of been no more then ten minutes, and after picking myself up a two-day park hopper pass, I headed straight into Disney’s California Adventure.

Right before going to the parks, I checked out RideMax and created an lists of rides I wanted to check out. The software allows you to list what rides you want to ride, then connects to their servers with the latest information on wait times at the parks. As a result, I waited no more then 15 minutes in any line in the park, yet every time I got in line their seemed to be a rush of people ready to ride.

The first ride I checked out was The Twilight Zone’s Hollywood Hotel: Tower of Terror. The ride is themed to an episode of the show where the “world-famous” Hollywood Hotel was struck by lighting, causing hotel guests to disappear into thin air. You are then lead to the freight elevator, strapped in and lead through a cool video sequence including going through the door into the twilight zone. Then boom - you are launched to the top floor and freefall back down, only to be launched a dozen or so more times. The ride is a bit tamer then your standard launched freefall (hey it is Disney after all), but the theming makes up for it. Thumbs in the middle.

From there I headed over to Sorin’ Over California where I found out something extremely interesting. I got to the front of the line, and as usual am asked how many people are in my party. I stick up a finger and he asks me why I haven’t got a single rider pass. Turns out that select rides in the park allow for single riders, allowing for people riding by themselves to skip the lines and go all the way to the front. You still have to wait for rides to have a seat for single riders, but otherwise it’s perfect for a person like me. Thanks to this, lines for rides later at the day which were 30 minutes or longer became 5 minute waits.

Onto the ride - it’s straight up awesome and has the best use of technology I have ever seen. The ride is pretty simple, you are on a hang glider and go on a tour looking at the various beautiful parts of the state. Now where as most parks would have this as a IMAX film, Disney take it one step further with the use of hydraulic seats. You are lifted into the air causing the IMAX screen to be above, in front, and below you all at the same time. Then, the seats tilt and move up and down depending on the on screen action. As a last minute bonus, scents are sprayed at you depending on the vision, from a water smell to a desert smell and more, and to think I haven’t even went into what you actually view yet! I am not doing this ride justice, it is on that you have to ride yourself to experience how good it is.

At this stage I was pretty hungry, and headed over to Taste Pilot’s Grill, the burger bar near the ride. They have a unique ordering system, you select what you are after from the touch screens, pay and take your reciept to the counter where you pick up your meal. Also rather then having a long menu full of burgers, they have three to choose from and it’s up to you to dress the burger with items from their burger bar. I picked up the standard cheeseburger, along with a serve of onion rings and a water (about $12). I ended up getting my burger with the lot (extra pickles and jalapenos), and for a fast food burger it was okay - big but average. Onion rings were huge and tasty, but limited in quantity. Water is water, what do you take me for.

I decided it was time to hit Grizzly River Run, the rapids ride but it was temporarily closed, so I took a risk on my full stomach and headed down to the Paradise Pier section of the park, full of thrill rides. First it was a ride on the Orange Stinger, a simple wave swinger that was fun. Next was the Maliboomer, a launched freefall identical to the one at Knott’s or Movie World, except for the fact that their were three of them. At that stage I decided it was time for a ride on California Screamin’

While waiting in line I overheard a conversation between a group of people behind me about Coachella. I butted in and we ended up having a chat about music and the festival. Now the ride - first of all props to Disney for having packs attached to the seats to stick your gear in, my hat and glasses fitted perfectly. As far as rollercoasters go, it’s good but not great, even for Disney standards (I’d rank Matterhorn higher, but I haven’t rode it yet this trip). The launch doesn’t pack any punch compared to Superman Escape, and their isn’t much intensity in the loop. Currently they are having a “Rockin’ The Parks” promotion where the rides are themed to Red Hot Chili Peppers song, but Around The World doesn’t really work that well to the ride.

I wanted to head back to see if Grizzly River Run was operating yet, but decided to grab myself a nice cold iced lemonade with cherry syrup (outstanding value at $4). Grizzly River Run was running, and I headed to the front of the line with my singer rider pass. Now the ride is great, in fact it surprised me at how extreme it was for a Disney ride. Most rapids rides suggest that you may get wet - but trust me when I say that if you ride this you are going to get wet. Obviously I know this - since I was the guy wearing the white/transparent t-shirt. I considered a re-ride but decided that I was running low on time and headed out of the park, going straight to Disneyland.

At Disneyland most people were heading home after a long day at the park - bonus for someone like me. I went straight to Tommorowland and Buzz Lightyear’s Astro Blasters. It’s a cool little dark ride where the aim is to take part in the action then rather view it, thanks to the guns on your ship. The basic story is that Evil Emperor Zurg is trying to steal batteries to stop those three eyed aliens, and we have to go in and stop him by shooting our blasters are selected flashing objects. The cars have two guns which you can pick up and move and a spin joystick, causing the ride to be different each time you ride it. A scoreboard also shows up for each player, so you can find out how well you actually went. Another great use of technology by Disney, plus having a scoreboard means you want to re-ride again to improve your score each time.

I headed down to Matterhorn to see if I could catch a ride, but the twenty-five minute wait plus the lack of a singer rider line meant that I was gonna give it a miss. I was exhausted at this stage and ready for bed once again. I struggled back to my room and made a few phone calls before getting a taxi at around six for the hockey.

The Honda Center (which has a sucky name - please they primarily use it for hockey just call it the Honda Pond as Arrowhead did when they sponsored the place) was only a ten minute cab ride from my hotel but is located in a deserted part of Anaheim next to Angel’s Stadium, the home of the Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim (which has an even suckier name then the Honda Center) which reminded me somewhat of the old drive to Waverly Part when it still existed. On the way to the arena we passed a strip club which proudly advertised that they opened earlier for Angels games - I guess a few people want to hit a home run of their own.

Walking to the arena I saw a fair amount of fans - most decked out in the new Ducks away jerseys and jeans. I sort of was surprised, after all I thought I was fine wearing a t-shirt and shorts. I grabbed my ticket from the will call window (thanks for nothing Ticketmaster) and headed up to my seat on level two. Here is where it gets interesting. See I paid for a seat on level two, simply cause I wanted to be high up but close to the action. But these seats were in the club section. So I get up here and show my ticket to guy on the section, who leads me to my seat and explains that if I want any food or drink to just grab him and he will make the order and bring it to my seat. Oh ship it! Each seat also came with a Let’s Go Ducks towel to wave when the team scored a goal - I guess Sheedy must of coached an NHL team one summer in his spare time.

A couple of things I noticed at the game. First of all it’s a bad idea to only wear a t-shirt and shorts to a game played on ice - they turn up the air conditioning really high which meant I was shivering five minutes into the game. Second thing is that the fans love to eat and drink plenty at games - pre-game, during both intermissions and then post-game too. It retrospect it makes the pie I have before the footy look like something a kid would eat (to be fair, the kid to my left had a slice of pizza, nachos and a pretzel during the game).

The last thing I noticed was how incredibly one-eyed (see stupid) the supporters are, and as a person who has sat near supporters going at war during some intense Carlton games it didn’t even get close to these. It all started off like this, there were a group of one-eyed Ducks fans sitting behind me. In front of me was a Vancouver fan who stood up and applauded a penalty against the Ducks (and for the record, he looked like an absolute wanker).

So the group of one-eyed Anaheim fans, led by their leader (who I will dub Randy Marsh) proceeded to bag the shit out of this guy for the game. It didn’t help that the Ducks won 5-1, but they yelled out anything, even abusing the guy sitting next to him (who was an Anaheim fan), and abusing the Canucks supporter because he was.. ORDERING A BEER! Yeah, you read that right, he was giving him shit over ordering a beer. Just so damn stupid. On a side note, their was also a women who sounded a lot like Alyssa Jones, but I didn’t ask her if she ever if she was supporting the visitors who make coffee the morning after.

At intermission I went for a walk to the toilet, and then decided to grab myself a drink. The conversation between the attendant and myself was amusing but doesn’t carry to text that well. I asked for a Mountain Dew. He asked me to repeat my order. I asked again. He apologized then asked what I was after. I told him a third time, and he said he didn’t understand. At this stage two other attendants had stopped and wanted to hear what I was saying. With a broad fake American accent, I asked for a mountain dew and he finally understood, laughing in the process. I guess they don’t get many Australian’s at hockey games.

As for the game itself, it was everything I expected it to be. As previous stated the Ducks won 5-1 to win game 1 in the best of seven semi-final series, with Andy McDonald scoring a hat-trick (I only wish I had a hat to throw, but this didn’t stop fans from throwing their towels onto the ice, a scenario which lasted at least five minutes and delayed the game in the process). The break made all the difference for Anaheim, who had five days of rest after beating the Wild four games to one in their quarter final series compared to Vancouver who went to all seven games. The Canucks looked extremely tired after the first break and never looked like recovering for the entire game.

Hockey is a sport which looks good on tv, but is even better live in person. The pre-match hype generated by the effective use of video screens and the arena’s sound system will never be matched in the AFL, but if the clubs were smart they’d start looking at this for an example on how to get the crowd ready for the main event. The video screen was scarce on replays however, which was annoying when questionable penalities were called and I wanted to see how the call came about. All in all, a great night out. I capped it by grabbing a few souvenirs from the shop downstairs to take home.

On my way out of the arena I was met with some difficulty in grabbing a taxi. There were a lot of fans like me and no real ordered path, some people were grabbing their mobiles and ringing, and others decided to walk back to their hotels. I didn’t really want to walk back at 9:30 at night, so I decided to do an Amazing Race type job, I waved down the next taxi that pulled over along with about twenty others, but unlike those people I opened the door, told the driver where I was headed and made a run for it. Rude? Maybe, but I just wanted to get home.

After getting to the room and putting stuff away, I realized that I needed to get some money for taxi fairs Thursday and figured it was an excuse to get some dinner too (I didn’t grab any food at the arena). I headed to the nearest hotel with an open shop and an ATM and grabbed some money. At the same time I had a look around, and grabbed myself a packet of Sun Chips (they are really good), a bottle of water and something I will rave on about until the end of time. I like the odd Mountain Dew, as far as soft drinks go it’s on par with Coke. So when I saw Mountain Dew Code Red, I decided to grab a bottle. Let me just say.. this stuff is nectar from the gods. Really, it’s just cherry flavoured Mountain Dew, but the stuff is delicious and I can’t get enough. I’ve had at least a liter of it today.

Quiznos was closed by the time I got to it, so I had to resort to a chicken burger from McDonald’s which was suprisingly better then any burger I had from the place locally. After that I was absolutely stuffed and decided to head to bed - I can’t remember any day where I have had a second and third wind before.

When I started writing this entry Leno was on, and he starts late over here (11:35). Now as I finish up, Carson has just started (the third tier talk show after Conan), and he comes on at 1:35 and yet people still watch apparently. Hey on the upside, at least it isn’t Poker After Dark. So far today I’ve got into Palm Desert, had a walk around the place and kicked back - but that is a whole ‘nother entry to look forward to. The reason I am here - Coachella 2007 begins tommorow, and with the adventure continuing in leaps and bounds I bid you the reader, good-night.