A So-Cal Summer Road Trip, 1965.....

Hidee Ho, dolls! I found some travel brochures the other day from my Great-Grandmother. She was always on the go to some exotic location or another (Israel, Spain, Japan, Mexico....) even into the '80s when I was little. And she always kept postcards, brochures, and other paper memorabelia of her trips.
Here she is with one of her tour groups (fourth place on the right side of the table with the silver horn rims on) in Monterrey, Mexico at a restaurant called 'Santa Rosa' in the early 1960s.



The things I want to show you today, though, are of a trip she took in 1965 and are a little closer to home than she usually stayed, if the other side of the country can be considered close, that is.

She and some friends took a trip up the coast of Southern California that summer and I think it must've been just grand to have gone along for that road trip....

Apparently, they stopped off at the Pottery Shack in Laguna Beach. This is a postcard she'd kept:



Apparently, it's changed hands since then, but it's still there. It's now a little grouping of shops called The Old Pottery Place. The weird 'greeter' is still greeting too, by the way.

Then they made a stop in the 'Happiest Place on Earth', Disneyland.
1965 was the park's tencennial, having opened in 1955.



I don't think I want a piece of that cake....not after those darn candles have been stompping all over it!
Here's the brochure that my Great-Granny kept with the year's logo and a map of the park on the inside. I just love the blues and golds!:





Here's some more images of the park in the '60s...back when good old Uncle Walt was around and Disney was fabulous:








Having lived in the South as a kid, MY first Disney experience was with DisneyWORLD (I didn't get around to DisneyLAND until a bit later). I had two favourite rides. One of them, Mr Toad's Wild Ride, was in existence already at Disneyland when my Great-Grandmother visited three decades earlier ( I wonder if she went on it?)...



The other of my two faves was always the Haunted Mansion...there's just something about all those 'Grim, grinning ghosts'!! It wasn't open in '65, although the outside was complete by 1963. The inside mechanics would take another six years to finish. Here is is on it's opening day, 9 August, 1969.





My favourite Disney park show as a kid was always The Enchanted Tiki Room. In fact, I can still sing the 'Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki Tiki Room' song word for word. That's how many times my poor parents had to sit through it with me!! As I've mentioned before, I've been obsessed with birds since I was a baby!
Here's the Tiki Room today, for anyone who has never experienced it's sheer jollyness:



I'm sure that my Great-Grandmother visited it. It's right up her alley! Here it is around the time of her trip:





Wonder if she stayed at the Disneyland Hotel??









Here is a little fashion spread that was done in Disneyland in 1961:







From Disneyland, they traveled north to the fabulous Knott's Berry Farm in Buena Park.
These are all from a menu booklet my great-grandmother kept:



















Here are some more pics of Knott's (America's First Theme Park) in the the '60s:

















Kind of reminds me of Dollywood!...or Silver Dollar City, if you were around pre Dolly!

All this makes me want to go on a road trip...only I'd need a DeLorean because NO WAY could it be as cool a road trip today as it must have been in '65!!