"Open Mouse"

At least that's what Disney calls the "Open House" for the (soon to open) "Art of Animation" Resort.

It is awesome! This place will be a hit for young and old alike. Today was an "Open Mouse" for Cast Members only. I'm going to let the photos say it all....

The above stitched photo is just the entrance and sign in building.

Check in.

Once you've checked in, bought a trinket in the "Ink and Paint Shop"...

...relaxed and had a lunch...

...and played in the "Pixel Play Arcade"...

You can head to your suite in one of the four themed resorts.

Two are finished and set to open this month. We toured the "Finding Nemo" and "Cars" resorts. The "Lion Kind" and "little Mermaid" resorts will open later this summer.

In typical Disney fashion, this resort "hides" the best yet to come. You need to pass through the Check in at the front desk and walk out the other side of the building and enter the "Finding Nemo" courtyard.

This will give you an idea of the "scope" of this courtyard...

The "dry" kid's play area. The areas where you can be active are covered with a super soft cork type surface.

The entrance to the second "Finding Nemo" building.

One end of the huge pool.

The "jelly fish" are showers. Adjacent to the pool is the largest "non-pool" wet area. (Numerous surface water jets for guests to walk over, jump around, etc.)

The "show" is literally on the exterior surface of the resort walls facing inward of this seven building resort.

Now for the "Family Suite."

Below is a "Murphy" bed that folds down onto a table.

Every bit of every room in each of the themed resorts are decorated to the hilt with "Finding Nemo" artifacts, including the dressers, shower curtains, etc. (You can buy the shower curtains in the "Ink and Paint Shop."

Just around the corner you walk smack-dab into the desert town of "Radiator Springs" of "Cars."

You enter trough an open chain link fence and you're walking on Rt. 66.

Cars are set out for the kids to climb on and play in this outside "dream world."

If you've seen "Cars" you'll enjoy standing next to all your favorite four-wheel "personalities!"

All of them are "life size" and on a soft pad so guests can climb on them and take your pictures with them.

Here's a look around the town....

"Luigi's Resort"

"Tow Mater's" Resort.

Remember the "Cozy Cone" Motel?

These are like "cabanas" around the pool.

The "Wagon Wheel Motel" is still under construction.

Here is one of "Cars" Family Suites.

The couch is rolled and pleated leather. The chair is made of "seat-belts" and is very comfortable. You'll notice that the drawers and all dressers look like "tool boxes."

Check out the night light on the table... a road cone... as are all the lights on the walls in the halls.

The bath... "Carwash!"

The shower curtains are great. (Sorry I didn't get a photo of one. But, you can get one in the store!)

Our self-guided tour took us back to the "Ink and Paint Shop." We showed the Cast Member behind the cash register our "completed guide map (we had to have it stamped in nine locations) to receive our "Open Mouse" 2012 pin. And, as you might guess, in typical Disney fashion, the nine hand stamps were letters.

Can you guess what they spelled? ....................."ANIMATION!"

The Disney "Imagineers" certainly worked their "magic" with "Art of Animation."

Just walking around and taking in all the color and art wok, never mind the "giant" sized "movie stars," will bring a smile to your face and make you feel like a kid again.

Our "Art of Animation" Resort map says it all...

"Get drawn into Disney's Art of Animation Resort! With 1,120 suites inspired by "Finding Nemo," "Cars," and "The Lion King." and 864 rooms inspired by "The Little Mermaid," you'll fee like you're staying in the middle of a Disney story with all of your favorite characters.

Open Mouse 2012

 We hope you enjoyed the "tour."

"Listen People"

By now you know where we went!

We forgot all about the remaining "Flower Power" shows at EPCOT. We just wanted to see the fireworks and get a "Sweet Pretzel" in Norway. (Although, I don't really know which one was our first choice.)

That really didn't matter, the show was great.

It's nice to be back but Pat's got me doing some chores we've put off until all of you left! Things like washing windows, and a sundry of other household chores!

We'll be back into our work routine next week and Pat will finish up at DisneyQuest. She put in for a transfer six months ago and she got a call while we were in CA. She's transferring to Food and Beverage in............

ESPN Wide World of Sports.

We're both very excited.

The only thing is she is required to provide "full availability," and the summer season is particularly busy. We'll need to head north in August for our Doctors appointments. I won't mind picking up some shifts at EWWS in addition to (staying cool) in the big green building in DownTown Disney!

As some of you already know, we've heard from Pete and Joan who had an awesome trip to the FL Keys. Traveling sans their camper is a plus for them to "scoot" about on their way back home. I hear they'll be taking the train down in the fall. That should be a fun trip for them. We're glad to hear from Steve and that he's back on his bike again. Hey Steve, "no fair" staying in shape for our bike rides this fall!

Oh Jack, your truck and trailer are still there!

Darlene and Buzz, your golf cart got a whole lot of rave reviews going up and down our street and into the woods and through the streams and over some stumps! Oh don't worry it's repairable. The Tech said he can put the steering wheel on another cart!

Remember, June 5, 2012, the Venus transit of the sun!

Photo from Sky and Telescope. 

Fred Espenak combined 17 exposures taken at 20-minute intervals to create this sequence from the transit of Venus in June 2004.

I watched part of this transit in 2004 through two arc welding lenses. Obviously, the image was much smaller but easily identifiable. I watched as Venus moved slowly and steadily to the lower right and off the of the sun's limb. There's something special about witnessing events happening hundreds of thousands of miles away (even light years) with your own eyes.

On Tuesday June 5th North America gets to see Venus transit the Sun late afternoon to sunset.

(For your safety, never look at the sun without a proper solar filter.)

The following site is an in depth article on SAFE ways to look at the sun.

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/highlights/Safely-View-the-Upcoming-Eclipse-and-Transit-150863835.html 

For ways to see this event that no one currently alive will see again, here are a few sites to help you.

These site will help the novice and/or the serious astronomer find their way around the night sky the next time you're out camping and happen to "look up" while enjoying the evening.  

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/ A Great resource

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/search?searchKeywords=venus+transit Everything about "transits"

http://www.skyandtelescope.com/observing/home/Transit-of-Venus-February-2012-134332798.html

A specific site for the June 5, 2012 transit

http://spaceweather.com/ A site for all things happening above us.

http://www.astronomy.com/ Another great resource

Here is the ultimate site to see the transit: http://www.ccssc.org/transit2012.html

FYI all of you "smart phone" users, "Stellarium" is a FREE downloadable planetarium program. Once loaded onto your phone, go out at night, begin the program and point your phone at any section of the sky. It will tell you all of the objects that are in the viewing screen. You will need to "play" with the functions of the program a little but, in no time you'll learn to see what planets are visible, star names and constellations and more. As you move your phone around the celestial dome you'll be surprised to see what you've been missing for all these years by not taking the time to "look up" the next time your outside enjoying the evening air!

Now, you have your assignment. There will be a test on June 6!

I'll leave you with this.....

Now you know it's made of Coco-Cola cartons....

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

.

...and this is what it looks like......

.

.

.

.

.

Cool huh?

Part 3 - "Disneyland and the Flight Home"

Graduation day was a blur. Sunday was a day for fun. Ashley was the first of four in her apartment to be packed and signed out early Sunday morning. So what are we going to do? We're going to Disneyland!
Just thirty miles south Anaheim awaited. One thing you've got to get used to real fast in CA is their highway signage..... it's most frustrating! Even the exit numbers may or may not be in order!
As all of you know, Disneyland is literally "sandwiched" by all the other businesses that sprung up around it.
Disneyland's parking is at a premium... so they built up. The five story enormous parking facility is impressive in itself. A long escalator stair ride placed us right at the shuttle trams. And they are quite cool looking...

I never did manage to get a really good picture of these stylish buggies. They run on CNG (Compressed Natural Gas). They don't produce any smoke, soot or smell and are very quiet.

We found out our Disney World ID, were not in the system and Pat and I needed our Maingate Pass to enter. We were handed a "re-ad" ticket so we could pass between Disneyland and California Adventure. However, we still needed to have our hand stamped in order to re-enter the parks. Interestingly, when re-entering Disneyland, we still needed to show our IDs!

Anyway, being Sunday both parks were slammed! Pat and I didn't really care to go on many of the attractions we basically wanted to "walk-about" the parks to enjoy being in Disneyland for our first time.

For us, Disneyland was part of growing up. I followed the original Mickey Mouse Club and could only dream of ever seeing Disneyland. In fact it wasn't until 1984 that we finally got to visit the Magic Kingdom in Disney World! We didn't return until we retired in 2005. The rest is "history!"

With the lines at the Disneyland turnstiles backed up we headed to the California Adventure.

I have to admit, Disney does an outstanding job "hiding" the business growth outside its berm. Fake walls, earth and trees focus your mind on the property and allow you to enjoy "the dream."

Walking around (even both parks) you sense how compact the parks are. California Adventure is nearing the completion of a large reconstruction you see the "Disney Fence" enclosing quite a lot of the Adventure. They'll be adding "Car Land" sometime this summer.

I had visions of riding some of these fascinating rides but once I got up close and personal with them I thought otherwise.

Mickey Mouse's Fun Wheel had me intrigued. Take a good look at the ovals that each car rides. You get a Ferris wheel with a "twist!"

You guessed it! First stop, Toy Story Mania!

Ashley said the line moves quickly. It did until we got in line! It wasn't that bad, but just after we got in line,the crowd caught up with us.

Luckily, we had our FastPass for Soarin'.

Ashley connected with several of her friends and we had no problem letting her hit the rides with them. We set out to explore for ourselves.

Pat and I headed out to checkout Downtown Disney. As you can imagine, all three of these parks in Disneyland can fit into one Disney World park. Actually, that turned out to be a good thing, we didn't have to walk very much!

Finally, it was time to visit Disneyland,

The minute we entered the gate, we couldn't help but notice everything is much smaller. The train, the train station and Main Street seem to be "compressed."

And, you certainly don't expect to see this on Main Street...

Cinderella's Castle was a real surprise... it's tiny!

... a walk through was an eyeopener.

This photo is from the rear wall to the front wall in the castle tunnel.

Several of the attractions have no cover...

We reconnected with Ashley and waited in line for Pirates of the Caribbean.

Which by the way, I think, is better than Disney World's.

By this time the crowds made it almost impossible to want to stand in line for an attraction.

We walked around and waited for the show Ashley wanted us to see, "World of Color."

Here's a sampling of Disneyland...

I never did get a really good photo of the Monorail. They looked so different than those at Disney World. The photo in the center of the above photo is the Monorail.

We headed back to California Adventure for "World of Color."

We got there early on Ashley's recommendation so we would have good viewing.

While waiting, many of the attractions along the water's edge shut-down early.

While waiting we were treated to a unique light show on Mickey Mouse's Fun Wheel...

The Entire wheel is outlined in LED lights that lit up in patterns or movement and kept us entertained for the entire time we waited for the show.

Sorry to say, I knew my camera would not do the show justice. Suffice it to say, the "World of Color" was worth the entire day!

The show lasts nearly thirty minutes and the pulsing water, video and music gave us chills.

It was awesome!

Now it was time to head home.

Ashley stayed with us at the hotel Sunday night. Both our flights were Monday. Ours at 8:00am and Ashley's was noon.

We dropped Ashley and her luggage off, then the car and headed for check-in.

We had one stop over on the flight out and back. Our flights went of without a hitch. Ashley's was another story. We heard she got home many hours later than she was scheduled to be home.

Now "seasoned fliers," Pat and I even enjoyed looking out the window of the plane...

Somewhere over the Panhandle of Florida!

.... and VERY close to getting out of this thing!