Theme Park Review- Disneyland

So of course out of the three park days in California, the Disneyland trip was the best. Even though it isn't set in the wonderful Walt Disney World Resort in Orlando, FL, the Disneyland Resort is definitely the second best place to go for overall experience.

It was my second time to the park and Jack's first. The most obvious (and substantial) difference between the Magic Kingdom and Disneyland is size. Everything in the California version is smaller. Sleeping Beauty's Castle is probably a third of the size of Cinderella's. It's pathetic as far as castles go. You literally cannot see it from anywhere in the park other than Fantasyland and Main Street. Just to its right, the Matterhorn Mountain towers over it.

Everything from Space Mountain, Tom Sawyer's Island, the Railroad Station, and even the buildings on Main Street USA are much smaller in stature. As far as a ride-by-ride comparison, Disneyland is right on par, if not slightly above Magic Kingdom. The atmosphere doesn't compare though, and therefore is still behind all four of the Orlando parks.

Indiana Jones Adventure was the highlight of the park. To me it is a much better Dinosaur. The theming and story is obviously better and on my second time through it seemed faster and with more movements than it's Animal Kingdom counterpart.

The big draw of Magic Kingdom is the triple mountain medley. Of the three, Thunder Mountain is the one that is almost exactly the same in both parks. Disney World definitely gets the edge for Splash Mountain, but Space Mountain was re-done and is fantastic at Disneyland. It's got music pumping in your ears, is darker and seemed faster than the Florida version.

While the theming at Disney's California Adventure is nothing to write home about, it's still a fantastic park. It has a bunch of big guns, including Soarin' and Tower of Terror, but what won the voting of all four parks of the week was the Aladdin Show. This Broadway style musical was worth the price of admission all on its own. The quality of acting and singing was fantastic, but it was the pop-culture comedy that put it over the top. When I saw the same show three years ago they were using Britney Spears and Facebook jokes. This time around it was Twilight and Hannah Montana. It's an ever-changing show.

We ended the night with the highly touted new night time spectacular, World of Color. Quick review: It's no Wishes. Longer review: A spectacle of water and color, it tried really hard but didn't succeed. They put video and picture on the water that shot up from the ground, but they were very difficult to see. Fantasmic works a lot better because they just use a sheet of water instead of spraying all over the place. Also the soundtrack left a lot to be desired. Unlike Wishes, World of Color didn't flow together well. They just went from Disney Classic to Disney Classic, and leaving out some (Monsters Inc., Lion King) was a travesty.

Theme Park Review- Universal Hollywood

First on the park slate in California was Universal Studios Hollywood. It wasn't in our original plans, but once we found out there was a new attraction opening on Thursday, July 1, they made up our minds for us.

The park as a whole is very similar to its Orlando brother. It's missing the Rip, Ride, Rocket coaster and the Men in Black shooting ride, but it stole Jurassic Park from Orlando's IOA and has its own mega-attraction in the Studio Tour. Yes you heard that right; the Studio Tour was what everyone was there to see!

To give a bit of reference to this, we should all remember that MGM's backlot tour is pretty much the last thing I would go on in the park. Never-the-less we followed the crowd heading for the Studio Tour as soon as the park opened. Oh sure it may have had a lot to do with the fact that the brand new King Kong 360/3D had its grand opening that day and was a part of the Studio Tour, but either way it was strange to see people sprinting to the Studio Tour.

On this 45 minute tour through the Universal working backlot, there was plenty exciting to see. All of the sets used for multiple movies and tv shows were interesting, as was the anticipation of seeing a celebrity walking through the area. But what everyone was there for was Kong...

In the middle of the tour, the tram takes a turn into a darkened cave representing Skull Island of King Kong fame. Once inside the attraction is like nothing else out there today. It was from the Simpsons/Soarin' but instead of a big screen right in front of your face, there were two hemispheric screens on both sides of you. So the 3D action was going on all around you and it was fantastic.

The only problems with Kong 360/3D was that 1) it was way too short and 2) it was inside of the Tour which left no room for a story line or a good theme in the queue.

Theme Park Review- Magic Mountain

I am, as most know, a huge theme park guy. Most of my experience is with the Orlando parks, but I have also experienced both Busch Gardens as well as Six Flags' Great Adventure and New England parks. I did Disneyland just over three years ago, and on my trip out to California last week, I went on a couple more theme park expeditions. Jack and I did Disney, Universal and Six Flags' Magic Mountain while in the wonderful dry heat of southern California.

Magic Mountain was the third park in the rotation, and thankfully it was only 32 dollars for an online ticket, because it was definitely not up to par with anything I've experienced. Maybe it was because we had gone to Disney the day before, but Magic Mountain felt like the oldest, dirtiest, most run down park I have ever been to.

It started right as we walked out of the parking lot and boarded the tram to the entrance...the tram that felt like it was going to break every chug along the way. Once we got to the entrance, it got better. It was where we passed through the metal detectors. Definitely a catch-22 type moment. I felt completely unsafe that I was in a theme park that needed metal detectors to keep out guns and knives, but then again those same detectors should have kept that stuff out so there should be nothing to worry about. Moral of the story is that I was very scared while waiting to get into the park.

Once in things brightened up as there was ample room to walk through the park and we head right for Magic Mountain's biggest draw, X2. The only coaster in the park that had more than a ten minute wait on this Tuesday, X2 was unlike anything I had been on before. It's a coaster in which you sit on the side of the track, rotating forward and backward in your seat while the car goes along an equally scary track. Take a look...

In the end it's ability to scare me was greater than it's level of enjoyment. That's why it wasn't as good as Tatsu. Tatsu is the world's tallest and fastest flying coaster. I thought Superman at Great Adventure was good. This thing put it to shame. No feeling on a coaster can top the lying down loop feeling of Tatsu.

Other highlights from the park were Riddler's Revenge (a standing up coaster), Goliath (from the Apollo's Chariot family, but not nearly as good) and Ninja (a Big Bad Wolf type swinging coaster through the trees).

The low-light of the whole experience was how absolutely run-down and un-themed this whole place was. I couldn't stop commenting on how awful the queue lines were, as we walked through chain link fence areas with signs of High Voltage. The absolute worst was while riding the Scream coaster. As you made your way up the first hill, you realized this coaster was built on an actual part of the parking lot. Obviously they used to have more guests and had a bigger parking lot. This coaster was built on an extra lot and they didn't even bother getting rid of the white parking space lines. Just complete lack of effort.

Magic Mountain had a few awesome coasters, and some types I had never been on before, so it was definitely worth the trip (especially for 32 bucks). Having said that, I will never make another trip to this park. Even though its rides were at the same level, if not a bit better than Great Adventure, its upkeep was way worse and I was afraid for my life at times. I don't recommend a trip to Valencia, CA for this park, unless you feel the need to check out X2.