The New Orleans Square station and the greater area really take on new life at night. The air is thick with mystery and romance. The quiet tapping of Walt’s speech carries softly from the station. The trickling flow of a brightly lit fountain muffles excited, nervous banter from the queue of the Haunted Mansion. We spent quite a while here one Saturday evening not long ago, near the Haunted Mansion FastPass area, and it remained predominantly vacant. It was strange to watch the train come and go with the transition of but a few souls.
Good Morning Disneyland
This shot is the very last shot I took from our twenty-four hour Disney extravaganza and in many ways it is my favorite from the day. This scene is always what I think of first when I think of Disneyland. I love the Main Street Depot and the ever changing Mickey Mouse flowers. It’s the first thing you see past the turnstiles as you eagerly wait to enter and the last thing you look back on as you leave. As we walked through the tunnel, past the attraction posters and out into this grand entrance area, the early morning light seemed to make a point of highlighting Mickey. It makes sense, after all, Walt wanted us to remember that it was all started by a mouse. Even the sun seems to take note of such important things. But for me, more important than any of this, this image is the moment in which I remembered, very tangibly, how special this place is and how blessed I am to visit. To have taken part in such a wonderful event put on by dedicated hard working people is almost indescribable. Twenty-four hours culminated in so much more than exhaustion. This is the place, this magic kingdom, where we make memories and have special moments.
Waiting for the Disneyland Limited
I thought this was a wonderful moment at Disneyland as an engineer waited for the Disneyland Limited to pull into the station at New Orleans Square. It also seemed fitting to me to use this picture to help build anticipation for our Disneyland Railroad project. If you’re as impressionable as I’m hoping you are, you now have a deep desire and a need to watch our film on Saturday and share it with all your family and friends. If you don’t have that feeling yet, that’s okay. We still have a couple of days to work on you and clever plans are in the works.
Fill’er Up
There’s something really exciting about the Disneyland Railroad. It’s hard to put a finger on just one thing, however, because there are so many things that make it what it is. You have the friendly wave from the engineers as they drive the train from station to station. The shout of “All aboard!” from the conductors. The grand circle tour of Walt’s original Magic Kingdom. The feeling of adventure as you pass through trees and tunnels. The nostalgia and wonder of being transported by locomotives around a century old. It’s amazing to think that these quiet, steady steel horses were once the cutting edge of getting places. We are working on a special Disneyland Railroad project and have really fallen in love and gained a new appreciation for this attraction and the people who maintain it. Seen in this picture is an engineer filling up the water tank at the New Orleans Square Station.
Inside the Lilly Belle
I was recently a passenger in the Lilly Belle for the very first time. It’s the beautiful red car you sometimes see at the end of a train with “Disneyland Railroad” on it in gold across the top. If you go to the Main Street Station early, you can ask to ride in it too! It’s one of the most magical experiences I’ve had at Disneyland. It’s named, of course, after Lillian Disney, Walt’s wife and is rich with history.
Steam Engine No. 5
From a child, I have loved tunnels. There was just something extraordinary about them. Traveling into the mysterious unknown gives you such a sense of freedom and I think that really fed the wonder and curiosity of childhood for me. This shot is one I have wanted to get for a long time, a train in the New Orleans Station at night, lighting the tunnel behind the Haunted Mansion. I sat at the station for a while on the night that I took this just enjoying the trains come and go, listening to the voice come through the speaker, “The Disneyland Limited now approaching…” The Disneyland Railroad is still one of my favorite parts of Disneyland. I love seeing it when I approach the entrance, walking under it through that magical tunnel to Main Street U.S.A., and riding it for a grand circle tour of Walt Disney’s Original Magic Kingdom.