This week has completely flown by and not in a good way! Last week I went to California....Disneyland to be exact to run in the Disneyland Half Marathon! This is one of my all time favorite races, not only was it my first runDisney race last year but it also takes place in Disneyland and it just doesn't get much better then that!
I am going to recap the race in three parts so bare with me on this haha! First being the expo, next the 10k and finally the half with my final thoughts between this year and last year. If you want to read my reviews from last year here is part 1, part 2, part 3 oh and don't forget part 4! That should hold you over while I get these next three up!
Ok where do I start......We left Boston on Friday morning, our flight ended up being delayed an hour which I was not happy about but was so excited to get there that I didn't let it bring me down! We landed in LA around 11:30 and headed straight for Disneyland! While we were in the cab I realized that I hadn't signed my Mom and I up for the virtual que to get our Minnie shoes so did that quickly! This was something I might have been stressing about just a bit since at Princess it was very challenging to get the shoes! The que filled up in about 5 seconds. I was on right at 6am during Princess and it filled up minutes later. This time 6am PST I was mid flight so just hoped for the best. After I signed us up I received our text messages that we should report to the new balance booth at 2pm! I was pumped, perfect time since that was around the time we were going to be at the expo and they still had our size in Minnie's!
We got to our hotel, Paradise Pier and checked in. We stayed at the Disneyland Hotel last year and I think I would say I prefer that one over Paradise Pier but was full when I ended up finally booking a room. All the hotels are very close to the park and downtown Disney and are all great hotels, but I think I just liked the location a bit better at the Disneyland hotel. More on that in a bit! Once we started checking in the rooms somehow got all messed up and they ended up sending us to a room that was still dirty. It was a bit of a hassle checking in, I guess the problem was that rooms kept coming up in the system as clean and they were actually dirty. We ended up having to wait about an hour for our room, which was fine since my Mom's room was ready we were able store our luggage in there and headed to the expo. We were told we would get a call when our room was ready but that we didn't have to hurry back.
As soon as we headed to the expo I got the phone call our room was all set but we decided to go back after we were finished there. We went down and got our numbers and park tickets first. That was smooth sailing. Last year we went the first day and it was completely insane! People everywhere, lines super long. I will never do that again! We had the boys come with us to get our park tickets to make sure they didn't need to see their ID's and then they left us to go to ESPN for some food or beer (ha-ha!). My mom and I had certain things we wanted to get so we had somewhat of a plan of attack. We grabbed our numbers checked out the Dooneys to make sure we didn't want one of those. Went upstairs grabbed our race shirts (thank god they were in women's sizes this year) then we headed over to the runDisney booth. I wanted to get a few Dumbo things a key chain, sweaty band and a magnet for my car. I really wanted the sweaty band and was nervous I wouldn't get one since they sold out super fast at Princess but luckily they had maybe five left when I got there! I grabbed that and the other things I wanted and went to check out. My Mom also got some half marathon stuff, we were out of there in no time. No lines no waiting! Next we headed over to the Raw Threads booth and grabbed a few shirts and stickers. That booth was very busy but I also ended up getting everything I had wanted there! I was really making out at the expo. I also scored one of their 19.3 stickers which I was happy about because I am always afraid to put the runDisney magnets on my car as everyone says they get stolen, so a magnet for the fridge, sticker for the car! Enough with the rambling......Next we grabbed our lasting commemorative cards and it was about time to go to the New Balance booth!!!
Once arriving at the New Balance booth we had to wait in line to show our text message saying what time to come back. Once you got through that part you got a sticker that said "I survived the NB Virtual Que" you then waited in another line for a NB employee to meet with you and grab your size shoe and start the fitting process. This whole waiting in line process took about 15 minutes there were a lot of people so it seemed like it would take forever but it was fast. We were then in trying on our Minnie's! The NB guy that helped us was from Boston how weird! My Mom and I both have Cindy's and really wanted to get the Minnie's so we were glad we were able to snag some! Once we got our shoes we went to check out and they were having a deal on water bottles ones that matched the color of the Disney shoes for $5 each. We both grabbed one which ended up saving us a TON of money in the park buying waters because all the food stands will fill your water bottle for you! I spent a small fortune on water last year so this was awesome!
Once arriving at the New Balance booth we had to wait in line to show our text message saying what time to come back. Once you got through that part you got a sticker that said "I survived the NB Virtual Que" you then waited in another line for a NB employee to meet with you and grab your size shoe and start the fitting process. This whole waiting in line process took about 15 minutes there were a lot of people so it seemed like it would take forever but it was fast. We were then in trying on our Minnie's! The NB guy that helped us was from Boston how weird! My Mom and I both have Cindy's and really wanted to get the Minnie's so we were glad we were able to snag some! Once we got our shoes we went to check out and they were having a deal on water bottles ones that matched the color of the Disney shoes for $5 each. We both grabbed one which ended up saving us a TON of money in the park buying waters because all the food stands will fill your water bottle for you! I spent a small fortune on water last year so this was awesome!
Once we were done with the NB booth we were out of there. We didn't go through the entire expo just hit the booths that we knew we wanted things at. Plus the boys were waiting and we still wanted to get to the park that day. We spent about an hour in total getting everything and waiting in any lines we had to. All in all it was a very successful expo. It went much smoother then last year it wasn't so crazy and I didn't feel over whelmed. I am glad I had a plan of attack that way I didn't waist time moseying around and buying things I didn't need.
After the expo we went and found the guys and headed back to the hotel to get everything squared away with our room. The cast members were great once we checked in and everything was all set and they even gave us some fast passes to use on any ride we wanted! This was a really nice bonus and made up for all the confusion we had gone through in the beginning.
Tomorrow Part 2 the 10k will be up so stay tuned!!!
QOTD: Do you make a plan when going to the expo or do you just like to take your time and walk around or does it depend on the race?!?!?
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