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Welcome to my blog. I write mostly about travel and in particular my love of Disney, with a few tidbits such as musings about movies or theater thrown in for good measure. I have stories dating all the way back to 1997 so be sure to explore! I don't post regularly, so if you want updates be sure to join and follow this blog (links below). Feel free to share, and if you want you can also click the Facebook or Twitter links below. You can also follow me on twitter. And be sure to comment letting me know what you think!

Friday, June 8, 2012

Southern California - 2002 - Downtown Disney



            Having fun (and spending money) at Downtown Disney

This is a re-print of an original post to the ThompsonFamilyWeb site about a trip we took to Southern California in July 2002. It is mostly unaltered from my original post.

Intro
Angels Baseball game
Old Towne Orange
Disneyland
California Adventure
Downtown Disney
Harbor Blvd Hotels


One of the surprisingly nice aspects of staying right at Disneyland is being able to walk right over to Downtown Disney. It's a very fun outdoor shopping, eating and entertainment mall done in the best Disney fashion. The girls especially enjoyed Build-A-Bear Workshop. We had gone to another one of these stores in Newport Beach last year and spent a fortune. This time we told the kids that they could each get an animal or clothes for one of their other animals - but not both. Charlotte decided to get a horse but Nat wanted to go to the Disney Store. Well, after Charlotte finished her horse, Nat changed her mind and got a stuffed dog.


Andie and I both really enjoyed shopping at Downtown Disney. Among our favorites were Starbilia (but just for browsing - nothing there either of us would likely be interested in buying), Something Silver (Andie wears exclusively silver - except for her engagement and wedding rings) and Island Charters. In particular, at Island Charters I bought a really cool (and expensive) Hawaiian shirt with a pineapple design on the back which reads "Monkey Bar". At Andie's insistence I also got a T-shirt with hula girl designs forming a ring around it.


There is live entertainment at DD nearly all the time. We enjoyed several including Japanese drummers and Irish dancers.


If you've read any of my previous reports from Disneyland and WDW, you know that we are not big fans of Disney park restaurants. Well, DD restaurants do not seem to have this problem. We at Arriba Y Arriba, Catal and Catal's UVA bar. All three were excellent. We also had breakfast at La Brea Bakery and were a little disappointed, but all in all I would say that the dining experience at DD is among the best you can have while at a Disney resort.

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