We had a wonderful trip but it’s time to head home. Ari is on his way back to Cleveland, ready to start his next semester. Greg and I are starting our drive home. Considering the LA wildfires, we checked road conditions before setting out. In the San Fernando Valley, we passed the Hurst fire, one of the smaller fires in the area. We saw smoke and flames from I-5.

We were lucky that our itinerary was not impacted by the fires, but our hearts go out to everyone affected. Two weeks ago, we arrived in Malibu shortly after the Malibu fire was contained. We saw the charring on the hills. The impact was huge and we had no idea there would soon be more destruction.

The Pacific Palisades fire is very close to the Malibu fire. The campground where we stayed in Malibu is only a couple miles from the Pacific Palisades fire. We passed that area at least twice daily when we were in Malibu.

We then moved to Pasadena, which is now threatened by the Eaton fire. Mayra told us that her sister had to evacuate because of the Eaton fire. We are very concerned for her family.

On our way up I-5 we saw a fire truck from Kirkland, WA heading south towards the LA fires. It was one of many fire trucks that we saw on their way to help.

We spent the past three days in Anaheim at Disneyland. It was so much fun. Ari rode Star Wars Rise of the Resistance 9 times, and it broke down twice while he was partway through! We gathered Coaxium from Millenium Falcon Smugglers Run more times than we can count. Most of our photos were taken in Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge, even though we spent most of our time in other parts of the park.

After seeing Ari’s hat, Chewy was very disappointed in Ari for his allegiance to the dark side

Poster Ari saw on the exit after Rise of the Resistance broke down

I have always been fascinated by the Blue Bayou restaurant, which is located inside the Pirates of the Caribbean ride. We managed to get a reservation.

But my favorite thing that I ate during the trip was at Pym’s Test Kitchen in Avengers Campus. If you‘re not familiar with Marvel, Dr. Pym is a scientist who discovers a way to make things shrink or expand. So everything in the Pym’s Test Kitchen restaurant is comically large or small. The dish is the ChocoSmash bar: a huge candy bar which was plenty big enough for the three of us to share. The restaurant was a lot of fun.

This week we all walked over 10 miles per day. I think we will appreciate the relative rest from the drive home.