Truncated Disneyland

I was 4 or 5 yrs old when our family went to Disneyland. We stayed with Uncle Dave and Auntie Annette who lived close to the theme park. I remember feeling the excitement when I saw the ticket booth person hand my Dad a thick book of Disney Tickets for each of us (in that day you bought a book that had tickets for each ride I guess).

That was the infamous Disney trip where I got the measles. So I remember laying in the Mickey Mouse bed at the Disneyland infirmary. And I also remember being thrust into cold baths at Uncle Dave/Auntie Annette's house to get my fever down (I think I was pretty unhappy about it, but then they put a really cool Fisher Price Houseboat in the tub for me to play with and I got over it - so I imagine that the water was probably just lukewarm and not filled with ice as I remember it!) But most of all, I remember the ANXIETY I felt for not getting to go to Disney the 2nd day - the feeling of missing out.

But I really didn't miss as much as I feared, because I do have memories of many rides which I must have got to go on the first day, before they realized I was sick...because I remember the thrill of climbing up and through the Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse. I remember feeling sick (or was it getting sick?) on the spinning Tea Cups. I remember being truly amazed at how a ghost managed to join me in my seat in the haunted house ride. And I REALLY remember losing my little white Gilligan's hat when it blew off and into the water when the Pirates of the Caribbean ride swooshed down one of its slides (Did my hat get retrieved? I don't remember...). I remember LOVING the Jungle Cruise ride - the animals are real in my memory! And I'm pretty sure I got a Mickey Mouse ears hat with my name embroidered on it (although I don't still have it so you would have to ask my Mum if that was a memory or just a longing...)

But I was most certainly perplexed and concerned that I wouldn't get to use the rest of the tickets in my book!!!! Mum called the park (or at least pretended to) and she told me that if I save my book with unused tickets, they would honour them the next time we came...of course we didn't go again until I was 14, and I'm sure that the price of the park had at least doubled by then. I vaguely remember asking Mum (when I was 14) if she still had the ticket book so I could get to use them this time, but she said they were gone, and I was a little annoyed by that. But in reality, Mum was hoarding them in my Forties File for memorabilia sake (or was it because she had just told her little 5 year old that they would be good the next time in order to calm her sadness?)