Today was Alan's day of indulgence, so he'll be blogging today with Sarah's comments in red.
We started our last morning in Anaheim with our free breakfast again. They had pancakes on offer today. Yum! After checking out of our hotel, we hit the road north to Los Angeles in search of our next destination. I had taken special care to check the route online and as a result we had no problems finding our way here. After about an hour driving we arrived at Marina del Rey and found our hotel. We knew we wouldn't be able to check in this early, so had already planned to go to Six Flags Magic Mountain amusement park for the day. The sky looked menacing but we decided to risk it anyway, as it had to be either today or tomorrow that we went there. Another hour heading north and we arrived at the park without any sign of a wrong turn along the way. Those who followed our blog back in 2007 may remember that we had all sorts of problems finding Magic Mountain after Sarah's directions landed us about 48 miles off course. <sigh> It was your directions. I had the correct directions printed out but you choose to ignore them and me, but you believed the Police Officer when he told you that you had gone the wrong way.
Anyway we pulled into the parking lot which once again was only maybe 10% full and walked to the entrance. I have to mention that it was almost midday, but we were absolutely freezing. I hoped that rain holds off for a few more hours. For those who don't know, Magic Mountain is a thrill junkies playground, containing some of the most extreme rollercoasters on the planet. The following are the rides I went on....
X2 - A massive floorless coaster which sends you down the first drop backwards.
Viper - A steel coaster with 7 loops.
Tatsu - The world's tallest, fastest and longest flying coaster. You spend the entrie ride on your stomach as though you're flying.
Terminator Salvation - A brand new wooden coaster.
Riddlers Revenge - The world's tallest and fastest stand-up coaster.
Batman The Ride - An intense speed looping coaster with nothing but air beneath your feet.
Scream - Very high floorless coaster with 7 loops.
Colossus - The big old wooden coaster built back when the park opened in 1971.
Goliath - Monster coaster with a 255 foot first drop into a 120 foot underground tunnel, reaching a speed of 138kmh.
Needless to say that Sarah did not join me on any of these rides.
Deja Vu and Ninja were closed today but luckily I rode both of those last time so that was ok that I didn't do them this time around. There are also 4 water rides at Magic Mountain, 2 of which were operating today, but it was far too cold to even contemplate getting wet today. Something else that we didn't get to do last time was go up in the observation tower. It doesn't seem all that high from the ground but once you get up there 38 storeys in the air, you sure get a fantastic view. And no, that does not count as a ride that Sarah went on. Yes it does. I queued up, got in, went up and then went down again. That's a ride.
All afternoon we were watching the clouds get darker and darker and by the time I had ridden the last coaster it was just starting to drizzle. We made our way back toward the exit and just had time to stop off for a photo and to buy a magnet. After spending some quality time with Bugs and Daffy. We were lucky enough to exit just as the people mover was coming around to take us back to the carpark. Bye bye Magic Mountain. I had a fun day. And I love the fact that there was no waiting time for almost all the rides.
Alan managed to buy some pretty funny one liner t-shirts for $5 and a funny jumper. I hope he can fit all of this stuff in his suitcase.
5 minutes into our trip down the freeway back to our new hotel and the rain came pouring down. We got out just in time. We checked into our hotel. Our room has a nice view out over the beach and the marina. It's far too cold to be out on our balcony tonight enjoying it though.
For anyone who has ever watched the tv show Big Bang Theory, you will know that Penny works at The Cheesecake Factory and the boys eat there once a week. Given that there is a Cheesecake Factory right next door to our hotel, we thought we should really give it a try. On tv it is portrayed as a cheap burger/cheesecake joint. It is anything but that. The decor is really nice, the staff are lovely and the food is amazing. The menu was 11 pages long, featuring all sorts of different foods. We both had a combination shrimp scampi/steak diane with mashed potato. Although I did choose it first and then Sarah copied me as usual. I pointed out the combinations first and THEN he decided he would have what I was having. We could go there every night for a year and still not try everything. Well worthwhile. The servings were so big that we had no room left for any of their dozens of different cheesecakes, although they're open for another hour and three quarters yet so we may walk the 30 seconds from our room back there if we get hungry later. It's about 8 degrees out there. I doubt it. However, we do have fudge that we bought at Magic Mountain to eat.
Tomorrow will be a free day, doing whatever touristy type things we feel like doing around Los Angeles.
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