Hello from Abroad!

Hi all! Photos to follow when we get home. For now, we just have time for updating with text.

So, for those of you who don't know we're spending the week at Disneyland in California. Yup, that's it... just a laid back trip with rides, shows and food. There's also lots of walking... lots of walking.

To date, we've done all major rides at least once. Some we've done more than once:

- Space Mountain: 2
- Splash Mountain: 2
- Star Tours: 3
- Pirates of the Carribean: 4
- Indiana Jones and the Temple of the Forbidden Eye: 10

We still have a couple of days to go, so we expect that number to go up. There are also a few rides I want to do a lot more, but I have to go without Natalie. These include: Malib00mer, California Screaming, Mulholland Madness and the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror.

The Tower of Terror has been a ride I've always wanted to go on since we missed doing it in Orlando many years ago. Last time the family was at Disneyland, they were just finishing it at California Adventure. This time, it's been open for a while. There's still a lot of interest in going on it, but it doesn't look like there are so many people that it will be a huge line (it's off season now).

Anyway, on our second day, Natalie and I went into California Adventure as soon as the gates opened. We'd just eaten breafast so we'd both agreed that we wouldn't do any "heavy" rides right away. But, while we're waiting to for the part of the park to open that has the Muppet Show (in 3D!) we ended up becoming a part of a crowd. When the barrier went down the crowd was directed toward the end of that section of the park, so we followed everyone. We soon figured out that they were all going straight to the Tower of Terror. A quick decision later and we were following everyone into the ride.

For anyone who hasn't been, it's a really cool ride with a lot of details put into creating an abandoned hotel. We are finally ushered into our "elevator" and strapped in.

That's when the screaming started.

Only seconds later and our elevator is plunged into darkness and we are rocketing skywards and freefalling (three times). It's pretty tense, but it doesn't take long for Natalie to start screaming with the rest of the group and me to start laughing.

Yeah, that was a good time. Natalie won't be doing it again with me.

We have two more days of this action. It'll continue to be laid back with breaks for the pool, shopping and naps. Yup, this is the life.

Still, we're looking forward to watch Battlestar Galactica on Saturday. Tony, fire up the TV -- we have two episodes to watch. (Plus, I need to catch up on Intelligence.)