How I spent my summer vacation aka back in the USA

So how did you spend your summer?

Ours was jammed into a three week trip back to the States...

family goofballs

Visits in California included Disney, American Girl, Legoland, La Brea Tar Pits and the Page Museum, Hollywood and the Santa Monica Pier, and then stops at the Mission San Juan Capistrano, getting lost in the Rancho Santa Margarita hills....kids in hot tubs and visits with the OC family.

Visits in Oregon, including McMinnville and the Evergreen Air and Space Museum, a drive through Salem to see the State Capital and Willamette University, the Enchanted Forest in Turner (South Salem), OMSI in Portland, Thursday Music @ Kruegers Farm in Sauvie's Island, Fort Clatsop, Fort Stevens, and Seaside with a stop at Tillamook Creamery for Ice Cream. Kids running through sprinklers and enjoying summer evenings in the twilight.

Washington State visits included Mt. St. Helens (the long way) Fort Vancouver and ice cream in old town Vancouver.

Summer Fun!

Add in visits with family and friends, a family reunion in Oregon, too much food and wine and great conviviality. Great people great summer. No time to blog. But, come back to Singapore and this is what happened.

Kiera's broken arm.

She is recovering well but will be attending second grade with a new cast on her right arm. I am back on the road in Kuala Lumpur and will be back on Flickr, Twitter and blogging regularly now that things are slowly returning to normal.

I hope your summer is perhaps less eventful than ours :-)

Disney and Legoland and Los Angeles

A few pictures to keep you all entertained while the Vagabondkids are traveling around the PNW.




Highlights



Disneyland. It is still my favorite park. It is awesome. Couldn't see the World of Color this time, maybe next year. Watching the fireworks while riding Big Thunder Mountain was a great time.

Mission San Juan Capistrano. A whole post is coming on this.
Character Meals at Goofy's Kitchen and the Grand Californian Hotel.
Drives through the Hollywood Hills.
LaBrea Tar Pits

Lowlights
90% of Legoland
LA Traffic
Freezing Cold Temps.
Not Enough Time with our Southern California Family.

We are off today to the Evergreen Air and Space Museum in McMinnville with old friends. Can't wait1

Legoland California-Review

Legoland-not my cup of tea

Okay, I will admit that I am a Disney fan. I think Disney rocks. But with an 8 year old boy who was just itching to go to Legoland in California, we did a trek down to California’s Legoland. Okay, second confession, the kids did enjoy themselves. It was the adults that pretty much thought Legoland stunk.

First, it was the weather. Now, that is not like Legoland had any control over the freakishly cold weather, but it just didn’t help. Second, 12 bucks to park. Third, admission fees of nearly 400 for a family of 4. That was just to get into the park. Once in the park a number of the activities had “additional” payments required. In my opinion that really sunk the whole experience for me and we had passed purgatory and moved directly into the 7 levels of hell.

My specific pet peeves were, single loading rides. Nearly all of them. This created long lines of up to 60 minutes for a half a minute not really exciting ride. Additional charges for specific activities. The fact that I felt the whole park was just a giant store for Lego, and the to top it off, when you try to use your Lego VIP card… you are told that this is not a Lego store and the cards don’t work.

The kids (and I did too) enjoyed mini-land. But many of the lego structures looked worse for wear, needed “re-touching” and frankly a good old fashion cleaning. Next time, I will skip Legoland and just give the kids 200 bucks in a lego store.

Disneyland Pictures (circa 2008)

Just a few pictures from Disneyland and Disney California Adventure