Trip to Cali!!!! Day 1

We started our family vacation today by flying in to LAX. The kids did really good on the plane and I think they enjoyed it. After landing and picking up the car, we headed for the beach. I LOVE driving along highway 1, but after hitting a little bit of traffic I was ready to turn around and just make for our hotel. I am so glad we didn't!

I have never been one that loves the sandy beaches where people surf and lay out, so I looked online for a different kind of beach. We went up by Malibu to a beach called El Matador Beach. To get down to the beach we had a bit of a hike. I LOVED it! It was beautiful and a little bit exciting to come down the steep hill with the kids. They had fun hiking too.



When we got to the beach, it was rocky and had lots of shells. We were one of about 5 groups of people there, and it was really nice. There were tide pools with lots of anemones.




The highlight of the beach trip for Doug and I was the sea caves we found. They were beautiful and so different from anything I had seen before. Doug and the kids had fun exploring them and I had fun taking pictures.










After the beach we drove to our hotel. I love our Cali hotel. It isn't necessarily the nicest place, but it is clean, quiet, with a fridge and microwave, continental breakfast, and we are literally right across the street from the entrance to the park. They even left a gift basket in the room, with a personalized note! Talk about quality customer service!

We walked to Downtown Disney to eat at the Rain Forest Cafe, but changed our minds when the wait was 45 minutes. We walked back to IHOP next to our hotel and ate there where the kids ate for free! I ordered the Chicken Fried Steak, and I could probably eat it for the next two days it was so huge! Maybe tomorrow for dinner.

After that we went up to the deck of our hotel and watched the fireworks. Now it's time for bed. Tomorrow will be a crazy busy day. Plans for the day are to start out at California Adventure with Soaring over California (for Doug and Matt), then the merry go round and Ferris wheel for Paige. Matt is also looking forward to riding Tower of Terror tomorrow. We'll see if that happens! Doug and I will definitely be prepared with some meclizine tomorrow.

I love Disney. Everything is so magical!!!

Paige's favorite part of the day today (in her own words) "The anemones, and they close up when you touch them. And I like running in the waves."

Matt's favorite part of today: "The sea caves and that's all I liked." (But we know he loved finding sea shells, too.)