A Jedi is never late, nor is she early, she arrives precisely when she means to. Or opening day at Disneyland’s Galaxy’s Edge

angai379

Mouseketeer
Joined
Oct 19, 2014
Hello everyone! Let me introduce myself. I’m Erika, a nerd with a particular love of Star Wars, theme parks, and Disney. I mostly go to the parks alone. It’s difficult to find trip partner’s at my stage of life, but traveling solo has its own perks. Thankfully I am an introvert so I don’t mind traveling solo too much. I do have times where I turn to point out that super minute detail in Galaxy’s Edge, only to have that random person in line I forgot to befriend before tugging on their sleeve look at me strangely. Ah those moments are so special.
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I adore Star Wars, Disney, and as you can see by my title Lord of the rings. I was lucky enough to plan a trip to the opening of Galaxy’s Edge in Disneyland and Disney World. I was encouraged to write a blog about my adventures to Disney. Mostly because my friends are tired of their eyes glazing over after I get to the part about how hard it is to get a California Brunch reservation. I wanted to start the blogging journey here at the Dis, because I’ve received invaluable info here and if my ramblings help someone a little I’ll be satisfied. I realize this trip report is extremely late, but quarantine seems like a good time to remember what the wind feels like on my face as I speed walk down main street.

Disney World is my home park and the one I’m most familiar with. I have been to Shanghai and Tokyo as well. On top of visiting Disneyland for the first time I was visiting for the opening of their newest land. Timing and planning was everything. I’m not a hardcore spreadsheet Type A planner. I’m a secret small notebook Type A planner. I broke out a new one for this trip and scribbled down any tidbit I heard about Galaxy’s Edge. Should I have been just as obsessive, I mean interested in Disneyland proper? Yes, yes I should have. I freely admit that I missed some of Disneyland's charm in chasing after my Star Wars adventure. I also admit I’ve been back to Disneyland after the initial trip. I didn’t request the trip. Pinky promise. I was in the area (an hour away) from Disneyland on a business trip. My boss turned to me the night before at dinner and said “Why don’t we go to Disney tomorrow?” Did my eye start twitching at the lack of time to plan? Yes. Did I happily go anyway? Also yes.

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Bear with me I’m going to tell you how this trip came about and all the super fun planning I did to get there. I’m not being sarcastic. I enjoy planning a Disney trip. Any trip really. I get this euphoric slightly crazed look on my face when I pull out my secret notebook and write down my latest bit of knowledge. In the initial stages of planning I heard that Disney would be holding a shareholders call. The buzz at the time was that we would be getting opening days for Disneyland. I set my alarm for the proper time and waited, and waited, and waited a little more. I was at work during the shareholders meeting so I had to listen with headphones. Not a problem for me as I listen to podcasts when I’m not in meetings or on calls. I was only half listening until those magical words were spoken. Iger gave me opening dates May 31st at Disneyland and suprise suprise August 29th at Disney World.

I had all that I needed; I immediately hung up and called the Disney World reservations line. What possessed me to call instead of jumping online I’ll never know. I’m a millennial and an introvert, online reservations are my bread and butter. Fastest mouse clicking skills win. I’m comfortable with that world. Soon the delightfully perky 😅 automated system picked up and started asking me the usual litany of questions. I got a live cast member and in a sing-song voice I told her I bet she knew why I was calling. She said no, why? Sadness. 😭 I gave her the opening dates for Galaxy’s Edge at Disneyworld and she said she hadn't heard anything yet. Double sadness. 😭😭 I was slightly panicking thinking I’d heard wrong or the past 30 minutes were a dream. The next words out of my mouth were facepalm worthy. I said ok I guess I’ll call back. Why??? What would possess me to say those words. Thankfully one of us was using our brain and the wonderful guardian angel on the other end of the line persuaded me to book anyway just in case. I gave her August 28th to September 3rd for the Port Orleans French Quarter. While we were finalizing my reservation she told me to hold on, because her supervisor was updating everyone. When she came back to me she was laughing so hard. She confirmed I already knew the contents of the update. It was official; dates were rolling out to the call center CM’s. The type A planner in me was doing flips Simone Biles would be proud of. She was kind enough to send me an email with her contact information in case I wanted to make any other changes. I think she knew what holding in a long queue would do to my poor nerves. We were done, I had my hotel reservations to go see my new home. Star Wars Galaxy’s Edge.


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I'm still playing around with post length. I have warned you I'm a long winded writer. I'm happy to go longer or shorter and I'm open to feedback. I also know I just described getting reservations for WDW. I promise the rest of the story on how my DL reservations came together in my next post. Stay tuned!
 
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I have not lost my mind. I know I just described getting reservations for Disney World and the title of this trip report promises a look at Disneyland.Well I did not originally plan on going to the opening of Galaxy’s Edge at Disneyland. The same day I made my reservations for the World D23 was hosting an advanced screening of Captain Marvel. I was able to secure tickets and talk my mother into coming downtown with me. Surrounded by even more Disney. The wheels in my head began to turn. We were lined up outside the theater and waiting for the doors to open. I pulled out my phone and started doing a little “research”. That research turned into attempting to book a hotel room at Paradise Pier. Of course since it’s hours after the official announcement hotel reservations on property were hard to come by. What was available was out of my price range at the time. So I gave up my dream of attending Disneyland’s GE opening for all of 24-72 hours. I say 24-72 hours, because it sounds more dramatic. In reality I waged a precise campaign of checking for availability at regular intervals. Finally I saw a price I could live with at Paradise Pier. It’s the furthest onsite hotel, but it got me a guaranteed reservation to Galaxy’s Edge. I was originally booked Thursday to Sunday 5/30-6/1. I realized that I could get another GE reservation if I split my hotel stay. I called to edit my reservation and dropped the last night from my package. I called again the next day to pick up the Sunday as a room only for the same price as the other nights in my package. By this time I figured out why I was choosing to call instead of book online. Disneyland was unchartered territory for me and being able to explain what I was trying to do was comforting for me. I was very explicit about why I was changing my package. If any CM had told me this was a bad idea or in violation of terms and conditions I would have stopped immediately. The CM I spoke to just told me good idea. I also made it through the reservation system gauntlet to pick up a general reservation when those opened. I had 3 reservations total for opening weekend at Disneyland’s Galaxy Edge.

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Observations: Captain Marvel was so much fun!

Tips: Try signing up for D23 even if you don’t choose the gold membership level. We were invited to the cocktail hour after the movie and the people we shared a table with didn’t have gold level membership. They ended up inviting everyone to the cocktail hour. So we received all the goodies together. You never know when Disney will decide to be a little more generous and spread some pixie dust. I will also admit that I signed up for D23 for any additional details they’d give me on Galaxy’s Edge. Perhaps even a private tour forD23 members. Wishful thinking I know, but I’ll explore any avenue that will get me more time in Galaxy’s Edge.



The day before my flight was scheduled to leave my luck started to run out. I planned to arrive Thursday 5/30 to get the lay of the land and to try out some experiences that can’t be found at my home park. That plan was scrapped once Southwest sent me a text letting me know my flight was canceled. Thus in the middle of Kohl’s while trying on additional Disney shirts I didn’t need to buy I was informed that I needed to find a new flight. 😢. We all know that little shelf/bench thing in the fitting room isn’t actually made to hold people, but yep you guessed it. I plunked myself down there anyway and desperately tried to find another flight. My original search turned up absolutely nothing. There were no flights for the same day let alone anything near a time I wanted. I gave up, paid for my shirts and dress. (Shhh, I know I was only supposed to get shirts) and left for home. I decided to finalize my packing first before attempting to find another flight. The 2 P’s. Packing and planning brighten my day. As you can see below I’m also an unrepentant and incurable over packer. I know people that swear by carry-on only. They look at my suitcase and weep. I don’t mind the weight of the suitcase and I like having a different outfit to change into after hitting the parks. It’s part of how I get refreshed for night time touring.

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When I took a break from packing I decided to try the blunt force trauma method in finding a new flight. This involved me going to Southwest’s site and hitting refresh over and over again until a flight with even close times popped up. I went from landing at 9:10 AM (plenty of time to explore) to landing at 11:45 AM. While it might not seem like a big difference I was foolish enough to book my flight to LAX instead of SNA. I would now be fighting rush hour traffic to make it to Disneyland. I can hear you all weeping in commiseration from here. Every night before a trip I do my best to go to bed on time if not early. Every single time the clock sits there and laughs at me. I’m mostly packed, I have this trip planned to within an nnth, and my bed is comfortable. Why does sleep desert me every single time I’m getting ready to go to Disney? I’m excited yes, but once my eyes actually close I’m down for the count and I don’t wake up in the middle of the night.
 
Observations: My flight was canceled around that time that Southwest was having capacity problems due to the grounding of Boeing 787’s. Better safe than sorry yes, but scrambling to find a new flight in less than 24 hours was not a fun experience. It also put me behind in my schedule. Lack of sleep the night before and a later arrival has me rethinking the length of my trips and going to a park on arrival day.
Tips: Packing cubes. That is all. If you have the room in your suitcase and you’re traveling with multiple people each person can have their own color to work with. It makes finding your clothes in the morning a little bit easier. It’s also a fun activity for kids to decorate their packing cubes with Disney stickers. An extra step you can add to a trip countdown calendar.


The morning of my trip still dawned bright and early even though I wasn’t making it into LAX at the same time. I have absolutely fabulous parents that refuse to let me take an uber to the airport no matter what time my flight leaves. I have also inherited my early bird tendencies from them so they’re awake to take me to the airport at ridiculous times anyway. I do have TSA pre-check and I fly out of a mildly busy airport so I wasn’t expecting any major delays. I like to arrive around an hour and a half before boarding. Plenty of time to go through security, refill a water bottle, and pick a cushy seat to while away the short amount of time left before boarding.

Flying will always be another love of mine. From take off to landing; I love the entire experience. My mouth hangs open when someone closes their window shade. I usually have a window seat. My friends and I always debate about the merits of an aisle seat vs the window seat. They tell me statistically you have a better chance of surviving if you have an aisle seat. My rebuttal is usually I’d rather see it coming from the window seat unbuckle quickly and move. I’ve always told them if you see me running. Drop everything and follow me. How do you not want to see the world pass you by from 30,000 feet in the air? On the other hand sleep is wonderful and I can understand the need to have a darker cabin to sleep better. I can and do sleep on planes just not for very long. If I notice my seat mates really really need a little TLC I will close the window shade. There’s always a next flight for me.

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The flight itself was uneventful and I arrived at LAX on time. I grabbed my luggage and made my way to the uber pick up lanes. I always have the only slightly irrational fear that my luggage will not show up on the conveyor belt. Especially if I bring a generic black one and forget to make it stand out in some way. To that end I always try to pack a 2nd outfit in my carryon. If I’m stuck somewhere at least I’ll have clean clothes to change into before tackling the problem of being stuck. It definitely changes my attitude for the better. Something I discovered while stuck in an airport overnight in Tokyo on a different Disney journey. The uber from LAX to Paradise Pier was long and uneventful, but I had a pretty great driver. We discussed starting over in life and why putting sugar in tea is a different form of blasphemy in Japan. In the end we both agreed that it was an excellent night to get Korean BBQ for dinner. Just to give you a taste of how far our conversation topics ranged. Arriving at Paradise Pier the differences between WDW and DL began to present themselves. Check-in was smooth and the cast member helping me did an excellent job of explaining everything. I’m just not used to needing anyone to explain the intricacies of Disney to me. At WDW I blow right past the check in desk to my room as soon as I have a room number confirmed via text. She even made sure I knew about reservations to Galaxy’s Edge. I did mention that I was able to book 3 reservations to clear up any misunderstandings. If I was only allowed one reservation I would have been disappointed, but I would get over it and give up the other two in enough time for someone else to use them. My fears were unfounded and she reassured me everything would be fine as long as I had the corresponding QR codes and valid ID. She also gave me a first visit button to wear that I never quite worked up the courage to wear. In time it will find its way to a shadow box to commemorate the event, but it never touched my clothes. I run from that level of attention 9 times out of 10, and I’m sure I would soon forget I was wearing it. As soon as a CM said congratulations on your first visit I would have begun an interrogation of the poor CM. “Speak! Who told you this was my first visit? How many other people know I’m here?” Completely forgetting that the info is practically stamped on my forehead in the form of a button.
 



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