I’ve always made it known that my focus when visiting Disneyland or Walt Disney World were the rides and attractions. Unless there is something truly “Disney” about a restaurant (like eating under the moonlight at the Blue Bayou Restaurant at Disneyland, or eating in a car at Sci-Fi Dine In at Disney Hollywood Studios), I’m pretty sure I can find good restaurants all over. Likewise, I can find luxury resorts with plenty of amenities in my home town. With that in mind, I find it surprising that, during my first visit with a digital camera in 1996, I visited the Disneyland Hotel.
Back then, there was only Disneyland, a parking lot, and the hotel. Perhaps I just wanted to get off at the monorail stop and explore. Perhaps I was doing the “here’s how to drink adult beverages at Disneyland” trick (though I see no photos from anything else, so I’ll assume I was just exploring and that the alcohol trick came later).
Somewhere inside the hotel there used to be this massive collage of Disney memorabilia:
My ancient 640×480 digital photo doesn’t do it justice. If I had encountered this today, I’d have taken tons of photos of the various items in this display case. I wonder if this display is still there somewhere?
I was also impressed to find that there was live street entertainment at the hotel:
The Bellhops would ride up on their golf cart and perform. I did not have a video camera with me during that trip, but I did find someone else’s brief video of the Bellhops from a few years earlier (1991) on YouTube:
A quick web search did not turn up much about this band. Anyone know more about them?
Moving on, I was impressed with the “lake” that existed between the three Disney Hotel towers! You could rent a paddle boat and ride around.
This area has been remodeled at least twice since I took this photo. During a recent visit with Werner of Yesterland.com, he pointed me to a collection of old Disneyland Hotel press photos from this era that showed more about this “lake.” In those years, before it was actually owned by Disney, it was quite an attraction on its own with entertainment and activities. If you go back early enough, there was even a large golf course next to the original tower!
But I digress.
I also snapped a picture of the pool area. By today’s standards, it doesn’t seem that impressive.
I’m not sure what caught my attention in this photo. Perhaps it was the lush landscaping behind the pools that blocked out the view of a contested city area. Perhaps it was the sandy beach where the volleyball court is.
I’ve wanted to stay at the Disneyland Hotel for a long time, but the pricing was outrageous to me back then… Today, we’d jump at a chance to stay there and pay 1990s prices.
Thanks for joining me on this quick look at some of my earliest digital photos from Disneyland. I figure we have about 150,000 more to get through, so check back again sometime.
Until then…