Yes, another meal suggestion. The River Belle Terrace is a great place to eat lunch or an early dinner. They have sandwiches and salads and the sandwiches are made with real meat, not the pressed lunch meats. Here is the menu.
Once you choose your lunch, you can get a side salad (fruit, macaroni, potato, bean, etc.) and then put what ever condiments and fixin's you want.
This is the Mississippi Turkey Breast Sandwich.
This is the Tennessee BBQ Pork Sandwich
And the River Belle's Roast New York Sandwich.
It's pretty good and makes for a quick lunch. Plus you can sit out on the patio and people watch or listen to the different musical groups that play in and around the New Orlean's Square area.
That's right folks! Contrary to popular folklore, this gold dot under the back side of Sleeping Beauty's Castle does not represent the very center of Disneyland. There are a lot of stories regarding this and various debates, but it appears that this little gold dot is merely a spot for surveyors. It does line up directly down the center line of Main Street and up to the Train Station, but unfortunately is not the very center of Disneyland.
This aerial photo shows Disneyland back in the 1950's with the central hub as the center as noted by the intersecting red lines. The blue line at the back is approximately where the golden spike is located, making it obvious that the spike is not the center, but rather on the central line allowing surveyors to estimate elevation and such. photo from smd4
With the addition of Toon Town, the center has moved farther North, but the spike still isn't the center. And since it was there before Toon Town, it can't be surmised that it was placed there to represent the very center of Disneyland.
This becomes a heated topic for some, which I find rather entertaining! If you would like to read a few of these discussions, here are a few sites that discuss this little golden spot.
June 18, 1959 the Matterhorn Bobsled ride was opened in Disneyland Park.
Walt Disney returned from Switzerland where they were filming "Third Man on the Mountain," a 1959 Disney film based on James Ramsey Ullman's novel, Banner in the Sky, and set about getting a 1/100th scale model of Switzerland's famous Matterhorn mountain built in the middle of Disneyland.
When Disneyland opened in 1955, the Skyway ride from Fantasyland to Tomorrowland was held up in the middle by a large, tall structure. Walt thought the Matterhorn would be a wonderful way to conceal the unsightly "pole." So the W.E.B Imagineers and a construction company set about building the enormous mountain so that it would not only cover the pole, but also allow for a roller coaster to run throught the mountain.
When it was finished, The Matterhorn Bobsleds ride was the first ever tubular steel track roller coaster in the world.
The Matterhorn Mountain has changed many times over the years due to rennovations and improvements, but since 1959 it has remained an icon of the Disneyland skyline.
In the springtime.
In the summertime.
There are two of these impressions. This one at the front of the mountain as you approach it from the central plaza, and
And this one that is out in front of the queue. the sign below each one says:
Cast of footprint discovered by Matterhorn Expedition South Slope May 27, 1978
Sometimes climbers can be seen on the side of the slopes, including Minnie, Mickey, Goofy and Pluto. I have found this to be fairly rare.
Several of the rennovations have included filling in large holes in the mountain that were there for the Skyway.
The ride itself is supposed to mimic bobsled rides, and the steel tubular track really makes you feel as if you are in a bobsled sliding down an icy track.
In the 1994/1995 rennovations, the mountain got a new resident - the Abomidable Snowman!
Here are a few things you may not have noticed when you were on the ride:
See the tiny black hidden Mickey on this decorative plaque? This is in the right queue.
As you pass this icy vignette, you might have noticed the abandoned gear in the botton right corner from the Wells Expedition. This is a tribute to former Walt Disney Co. President, Frank Wells. He was apprently a mountain climber and died in a helicopter crash in 1994. During the 1995 rennovations when they took out the skyway, this tribute was added.
This one you won't notice, but there is a small basketball hoop and key within the mountain for the mountain climbers to use on their breaks. A few people other than cast members have also gotten to play here:
This is a picture of former LA Laker Vlade Divac and an LA DJ playing some on-on-one.
If you've never gotten a chance to ride The Matterhorn Bobsleds, here is a little virtual ride for you.
Disneyland turned 54 yesterday!! I sure wish I could have been there to commemorate the day, but maybe next years when it turns 55.
"To all who come to this happy place; welcome. Disneyland is your land. Here age relives fond memories of the past...and here youth may savor the challenge and promise of the future. Disneyland is dedicated to the ideals, the dreams and the hard facts that have created America...with the hope that it will be a source of joy and inspiration to all the world.”
Here are a few glimpses of that wonderful day 54 years ago.
The Sleeping Beauty Castle Walk Through has been a Disneyland fixture since 1957, two years before the movie was actually released. Walt Disney asked Eyvind Earle and Ken Anderson to head up the project. Later the two would work on the movie as well. They made a series of dioramas using some special effects such as forced perspective, mirrors and multi-layering to make each scene spectacular. Apparently once the walk-though opened, there had to be some changes. After the movie came out, it was clear that the walk-through varied significantly, but it remained relatively the same until 1977 when the first rennovation took place.
The 1977 renovation took the Earle-Anderson dioramas out and replaced them with scenes incorporating dolls and miniature scenery. Sadly, the dolls and scenery weren't very representative the the movie either. Many of the scenes can be seen at Yesterland.com
After Sept. 11, 2001, the castle was closed due to security issues. As the 50th Anniversary of Sleeping Beauty approached, imagineers thought that reopening the Castle Walk-through would be a wonderful and nostalgic way to commemorate it. When they got in to take a look at the castle, years of neglect and the additions of snow machines, fireworks machines, et cetera, had taken up a great deal of much needed space. As demolition got underway, a delightful surprised emerged -- many of the original Earle-Anderson dioramas were still in place!
This gave imagineers a great place to start. They were able to combine some of the wonderful old diorama ideas, with new special effects as well as to add new scenes so that the walk-though actually told the story of Sleeping Beauty as depicted in the movie.
Below are some of the scenes and the manuscripts that help move the story along as you walk through. Be warned - it is still a very tight corridor and if you get a lot of guests in at the same time it can become crowded around some of the dioramas that have animated effects.
The entrance is to the left as you cross the drawbridge and walk unde the castle, just before you get to the new Bibiddi Bobiddi Boutique.
Some of the photos are a bit blurry as there are moving parts and a flash wouldn't have worked.
The last manuscript has her dress turning from blue to pink and back.
One addition to the Castle Walk-through is the wheel-chair access. If a guest is unable to climb the many stairs within Sleeping Beauty's Castle, a virtual tour can be seen in a small room off to the right as you pass under the castle from the drawbridge.
I really liked that they hearkened back to the original feel of the Walk-through, and yet were able to incorporate the scenes and characters from the movie to make it more authentic. Excellent job to Imagineer Tony Baxter and crew! You can read more about the rennovation here.
For those of you too far away to get to see this in person any time soon, you can take a virtual tour through this youtube video:
