So on Friday, after I’d made a pass through DCA, I went back to Disneyland so I could use my Star Tours Fastpass.

The Disneyland Band was performing in Town Square when I arrived, and I listened to the rest of their set. At the end they announced they would be performing in front of the castle at 11:30.

After my jaunt through a galaxy far, far, away (note to self: protocol droids are not very good pilots), I went to the castle. There were a number of people lined up already, with several cast members making sure we stayed behind the gold line. The band came up Main Street and then went through Snow White’s Grotto so that they came towards us through the castle and across the bridge.

They were joined by a number of characters, including Mickey in his own band leader costume. Alice and the Mad Hatter came out later for the “Unbirthday” song. Eventually Mickey led the band back down Main Street.

I’d done what I wanted to do at Disneyland for the day, so I went back to DCA again. The line for The Little Mermaid was up to 20 minutes, though that’s not too bad. It was lunch time, so I went to try out something new at the Paradise Pier restaurants again. I was happy to see that there were a lot more people enjoying lunch there than when I was there two weeks earlier.

But I was very unhappy with Paradise Garden Grill – they again did not have the baklava. The cast member at the register told me they don’t get it until later in the day. That’s just unacceptable. If it’s on your all-day menu, it should be available ALL DAY! It’s not like Paradise Garden Grill has that extensive a menu to begin with, and the baklava is the only dessert item on it.

I went to Boardwalk Pizza & Pasta – I wasn’t really that hungry since I’d had the breakfast burrito from Taste Pilot’s Grill just a few hours before. I got a piece of the BBQ Chicken Flatbread. It was not bad – I prefer a thicker chewy crust to a thin crispy crust, though. The BBQ sauce was a little too sweet by itself, but worked well with the overall flavors.

One interesting thing about the new Paradise Pier restaurants – they both scanned my Annual Pass correctly as a Premier pass. But when I used it at Taste Pilot’s Grill and at Greetings from California they had to manually enter the discount code. I wouldn’t have thought that newer registers would make a difference with that – seems like it should be an upgrade to the underlying computer system.

Here’s a few photos of Cars Land.

The part of the Cadillac Range visible above the Pacific Wharf looks to be fairly complete and colored.

There’s starting to be some more structures visible inside.

Here you can see part of the building for Mater’s Junkyard Jamboree.

There’s not really any changes in Blue Sky Cellar, except to the one case on the wall that is updated approximately monthly. Right now there’s an aerial photo (which, considering the subject matter, is also an Ariel photo) showing the park in April of this year.

There’s been a wine display case sitting next to the projection screen for a while, but I’d never looked inside it before. There are several bottles of “Imagi-noir” and “Zin-fun-del”, as well as a bottle of “WED Wine” and a bottle from the Lasseter Family Winery.

Blue Sky Cellar is scheduled for another update this fall. I was told by the cast member there that it would focus on the Buena Vista Street area of the park rather than Cars Land.

I took a quick trip through Flik’s Fun Fair. Francis’ Lady Bug Boogie is undergoing refurbishment – they have even removed the cars from the attraction! The Disneyland calendar does not show a date for its return.

I guess I should talk a little about the weather and the crowds. It was a beautiful summer day – sunny but not too warm. The parks were pretty busy – about what you would expect on a summer day, and, especially on Friday, the park gets busier as it gets towards late afternoon and evening when the Deluxe and Premium AP holders show up for the evening activities (Southern California passes are blocked out for another couple of weeks).

And that was my day at the parks.

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