CHILDREN'S FAIRYLAND

Children's Fairyland has been perched on the shore of Lake Merritt in Oakland since 1950. My grandmother took me there when I was 3 or 4 years old. We took Darrin around that age, also. Now, our third generation has entered the make believe world through the giant shoe of the "Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe".

The entrance to Fairyland. History says that the original cost of entering Fairyland was 10-15 cents. It is now $10 per person for ages 1 to 100. No adult is admitted without a child & no child is admitted without an adult.

The website describes Fairyland as a magical 10-acre outdoor park that features larger-than-life displays, rides & entertainment inspired by children's literature. Through the eyes of a 4 year old that is probably true. In truth Fairyland is in need of some upgrading. Honestly, I don't think much has changed since I was there as a child. But it still seems to delight young children.

This innocent looking slide is the devil in disguise. Back when I was there with my grandmother I climbed the stairs but refused to go down when I reached the top. The line was completely backed up with kids waiting for me to stop crying & go down. My grandmother had to climb up past the kids & bring me back down the steps. When we first took Charley back in February, it wasn't crowded but all the encouraging in the world couldn't entice her to try it. It was deja vu all over again as she stood at the top unable to muster the courage to go down.

I felt so badly that this miserable contraption had claimed yet another victim in our family BUT Darrin took her a few months later & she bravely gave it a try. This time she exclaimed, "One more time!" about ten more times as she went down it. In our defense, it is dark at the top & a very steep drop off into the curling  metal abyss. And I swear that damn thing was at least three times taller back when I was a kid!

The idea of Fairyland is a good one - a place for wholesome, family fun for small children. Darrin wants to take Charley as often as possible since the window for her enjoying it is likely only another few years at best.  The website proclaims that Walt Disney even got the idea for Disneyland from Fairyland. Disneyland didn't open until five years after Fairyland so maybe that is true.

Charley loves to climb on almost anything. If there is something she can climb up on, she will. The fun thing that you can't see in this photo is that her shirt had a picture of a giraffe on it.

This hill has several squares of cardboard strewn about encouraging kids of all ages to sit on them & slide down the hill. Charley insisted that Daddy & Gaga both do it with her. It was slow enough that Gaga creeped down the slope at about 1/4 mile per hour.

Charley has recently discovered the joys of being a model. I took almost 80 photos since every single thing we did she yelled, "Take my picture, Gaga!" Thank goodness for digital photography.

As I said, she's a climber. You probably weren't supposed to but Darrin helped her onto this giant mushroom.

Fairyland has the "oldest continuously operating puppet theater in the United States" according to its website. That is quite an accomplishment!

I took this close up while Charley was watching the Halloween puppet show.

At one point in the puppet show, a character commented that, "The zombie was gross." Charley loved it & repeated the line. That was when I snapped this shot.

Charley loves to imitate poses for the camera. She takes great care to look at every detail. Hmmm? Wonder where that comes from?

Another of her impersonations of a scene.

There is one area of Fairyland that has all of the characters from the Wizard of Oz with cutouts to put your face on the character. I had to take a photo of every one with her looking through it - she insisted.

Isn't this the cutest little Dorothy with her little dog, Toto?

A pretty cute tin man, too.

Thanks for indulging me with my Gaga moments of sharing something that I enjoyed, my son enjoyed & now my granddaughter enjoys. I wonder if Fairyland will still be around when Charley's kids are ready to explore it? I sure hope so.