Holidays in Disneyland

[hellow]

We spent Dec 21-26 at Disneyland this year and had an awesome time. We stayed at the GC in a room with 2 beds and a daybed. I have three kids, but we seemed to fit quite well, and the hotel lobby was decorated beautifully! We often spent an hour or so in the lobby next to the huge Christmas tree, or by the fireplace. Santa and carolers visited often, and we really felt relaxed during our stay.

Now for the good, the bad and the ugly:

Good: Best was the Holiday tour we took. It was $49 per person, but we felt it was well worth the money considering the time we were visiting. We learned a lot of fun trivia on our tour, and were given instant access to the train, Haunted Mansion Holiday and Its a Small World decorated for the holidays. At the end of the tour, we got reserved chairs to sit on for the Holiday Parade, and enjoyed hot chocolate and cookies. They also gave each person a special pin, and we tried some holiday fudge in one of the candy shops on our tour. VERY FUN!

We loved the Snow White and Aladdin shows. We watched Aladdin twice: once on the mezzanine section and once in the orchestra section and got to see it in a different light each time. Each section has its own special attributes. Even with the crowds, we made sure we entered Disneyland right at the opening and were able to ride on everything we wanted to in a short amount of time. We purposely decided not to go into Disneyland on Christmas, and enjoyed DCA with somewhat heavy crowds (but not unbearable). For all the days (even Christmas Eve) Fast Pass worked great. It's hard to imagine how we used to manage without it!

We had the character breakfast at the GC (Storytellers), which we really had fun with. I really liked the food--especially the Mickey Waffles. Characters were Kenai, Koda, Meeko, Chip, Dale and the Forest Ranger who was hilarious. (My kids are teenagers, and they still had fun) We had one PS for each of the days we were there, and that was a blessing.

The Bad: Our least favorite meal was the Ariel's Grotto in DCA. The chicken pot pie wasn't to my liking, and the salad seemed old and wilted. That was our first meal of the trip, and luckily all the other meals (Blue Bayou, Plaza Inn, ESPN Zone, Storytellers and Rainforest) were much better.

The Ugly: The drive home. We luckily missed the wind storms on the Grapevine, but got to battle road closures due to snow on the Siskiyous. It is MUCH cheaper for the five of us to drive, but that time of year always brings "surprises".

I'm happy to answer any questions.

Helen

 

[JKJK]

Hi Helen,
We were on vacation from the 11-26. We spent 5 days at DLR but stayed with family in Anaheim. We left at 4:45 a.m. on the 26th and heard there was trouble in the Syskious and so we took the coast. What a LONG day. We drove for 25 hours to get back home and boy were we glad to be home. What did you guys do?

Kerry

 

[hellow]

My sister lives in the Bay Area, so we stayed with her on the 26th. But when we tried to make it over the pass on the 27th, they were threatening to close the pass again (they were escorting people at that point) and we decided to not risk it and stayed another night in Redding. (Kind of a budget buster, but the thought of spending the night in the car on the side of the road on the mountain with three fighting kids was too scary.)

We woke up real early on the 28th and the snow had cleared by then, so we were able to get home that morning.

Hope you enjoyed your trip! Aren't you glad you weren't there for the rain (and now the snow--I just heard the grapevine is closed due to snow)? I think we got out in the nick of time!