YayforMickey
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Jan 24, 2011
Here's some info that might be helpful from the trip I just took with my daughter.
I attempted to get an Uber from LGB to the Tropicana on Wednesday night at almost 11pm, but the nearest one was a forty minute wait, and we were very tired. I would have paid about half the cost I ended up paying for a taxi ($57 after tax and tip). Going back to the airport yesterday, I got an Uber, and it was $30 after tax and tip.
We knew it was going to be cold in the mornings and evenings on our trip, so we were prepared with warm clothing. We used a locker on Thursday so we could stop carrying jackets around during the warm hours. Overall, lockers are kind of a pain with park hopping, so on Friday and Saturday we just carried or wore our jackets.
On Thursday (8:00 Magic Morning), we were third and fourth on Peter Pan by going by the Matterhorn. After Peter Pan, we rode Toad, Pinnochio, Carrousel, Tea Cups, Star Tours, and Buzz (scores were messed up) during the hour, and we used our 9:00 Space Mountain fastpass at 8:55. On Friday morning 9:00 rope drop, we were at the front, but the crowds were larger, and we would not have been able to keep up with the many sprinters to Peter Pan, so we were glad that Alice was our planned first ride, and once again, we were third and fourth in line. We usually do half of Fantasyland one morning with MM and the other half on a day with no MM, and that seems to be the most efficient way that we've found to do all of Fantasyland with almost no waits (except the wait for the rope to drop, of course).
We were excited to see the front castle scrim on Thursday morning, and then the back Maleficent scrim on Friday morning. We never saw the pathway next to the castle open during our trip.
We didn't have many ride closures during this trip. We did get one multi experience fastpass on Friday when Indiana Jones was down, but it was back up not long after. The only other closure worked very well in our favor. It was Saturday evening, and we had a fastpass for Buzz Lightyear that became a multi experience because Buzz was down. I then had access to a new fastpass, so I refreshed a few times until an immediate Buzz fastpass appeared. I grabbed that, and within fifteen minutes, I had another multi fastpass. So we got use them on Space Mountain (my daughter's favorite ride) to end our trip, and that was fun.
The ugly WOC platform was above water on Thursday, but on Saturday, it was under water, and the area looked so much better. It's exciting that WOC is finally coming back.
Thursday overall was very low crowds. Friday was busier, and Saturday was really crowded (especially at DCA). On Thursday afternoon/evening, we enjoyed using three of the six tabs from our sip n savor pass at the Lunar New Year booths at DCA. The food was good, and we didn't have to wait in any lines at the booths. I decided to save the other three tabs to use on Saturday when we'd be at DCA again. That was my big mistake of the trip. I had not accounted for the fact that locals flood DCA festivals on Saturdays. The only huge lines or giant masses of people that we encountered during the trip were at the Lunar New Year area of DCA starting at around noon on Saturday. That morning at about 11:45 am, we were at Paradise Garden, and we decided to grab a bahn mi and a mango mousse with our tabs. The lines were non-existant. That left one tab for later. We rode Goofy's Sky School and the swings, and then started to walk toward the booths. The lines and crowds had materialized out of nowhere. We couldn't find a place to use our tab that wouldn't make us late for our Soarin' fastpass. So, we went to ride Soarin', and then walked back to the booths. The lines were overwhelming, and we couldn't easily walk around. I was determined to use that last tab, and we ended up waiting almost an HOUR in line back at Paradise Garden (where the lines were deceptively shorter) for tasteless and cold orange tempeh. I wish I could go back and tell myself to leave after Soarin'. It was not worth it to use that dumb tab! Haha. We were so worn out from that experience that we decided to go back to our hotel for a rest. The number of people coming in at that time (2:00) was incredible. I was concerned that we would get stuck in a long security line when we returned at 4:00, but the people had disappeared, and we went right through. Disneyland was definitely busy, but not terrible like DCA was.
Mobile ordering worked well for us throughout the trip. At Red Rose Tavern I made a mobile order, and the food was ready when we walked in. I asked the woman at the counter if they still had the cherry rose dessert because I hadn't seen it available on mobile ordering. She said they had one or two more, but the lines were pretty long. She told me that if I quickly made another mobile order for the grey stuff (which is the same price), she would just replace it with the rose for me. I took my food to the table, made the mobile order, and then walked back to the counter, where she already had the rose for me. I thanked her a lot for that.
We loved the Tropical Hideaway, and the loaded dole whip is great. In fact, we enjoyed all of the food there, and my daughter can be picky sometimes. Our favorite seasonal treat of the trip was the Valentine churro by Haunted Mansion. We went back to get another one later in the trip because it was so good.
I noticed on Thursday and Friday that almost everyone we talked to was there for their first time. I'm a little surprised that so many people come for a big once-in-a-lifetime trip in February. There was some slight disappointment about the castle, but most people seemed to go with the flow and move on to other fun things. There were some people in Critter Country who seemed to genuinely think they could get on Splash Mountain even though there was no water running on it, which was pretty funny. I saw a proposal in front of the heart backdrop in Town Square. So, improvisation is possible.
Toon Town was a little disappointing. More people are showing up for the opening time (or at least they did on Friday), and there were no characters to escort us in. People ran like crazy to Mickey's house, so it took more time than usual to meet him, and the line for Minnie was huge when we came out. We usually go in there after Mickey with very little wait, but this time we skipped it. We didn't mind because we were going to meet her later anyway at Plaza Inn breakfast. Even Gadget's Go Coaster and Roger Rabbit had waits when we normally walk on. We didn't see Goofy walking around like we usually do. Maybe it was just a random off day. My daughter didn't really notice these things, and I didn't comment on them. She had fun. I just thought I'd mention them here.
Speaking of Plaza Inn, we decided to get a 7:10 Saturday reservation. We had never been there before. We aren't really character breakfast people, but I was there with only my youngest daughter for her birthday, and she loves the characters. It was nice to walk right up to the character breakfast gate at 7:00 and go inside without waiting. We chose Saturday because we had already used our MM on our first day when we were fresh, and the time we spent eating didn't waste any park time since we were only there during the Saturday MM hour. I just checked my photos, and we got to meet ten characters. Because we got there at opening, they were around us the whole time. They'd keep coming back to us and giving us a lot of attention. My daughter loved it. We met Minnie, Dale, Pooh, Rafiki, Hook, Max, Tigger, Eeyore, Fairy Godmother, and Susie (mouse from Cinderella). While we were eating, rain started to pour. I'm talking serious rain. On Thursday and Friday we had seen hardly a cloud, but now there was torrential rain. We luckily had ponchos and an umbrella, but we were still nervous to go out because it was such heavy rain, and the puddles were crazy. No one wanted to leave their breakfast. It got to be close to 8:00, and I noticed the CMs hovering around waiting for people to leave. I could tell that there was stress about the lack of tables for new arrivals (especially since it would have been impossible to seat anyone outside). We decided to get our ponchos on, and they were quick to grab our plates and silverware while were getting ready to leave. They probably had the table totally cleared and ready for someone else before we had left the room! We were lucky that the rain wasn't heavy anymore, and we stayed dry by carefully avoiding puddles. It was nice to see the park so empty for awhile, but the skies cleared quickly, and people appeared with the sun. We didn't see anymore rain until we were getting in our Uber yesterday morning to head to the airport.
My daughter got a birthday button, and she received many birthday wishes. We even got some extra magic twice because of it. Once she was trading pins with a CM at the entrance of Monsters Inc, and when she saw that we were going to walk into the queue (which said 25 minutes) after the trade, she told my daughter that she had a birthday gift for her. She handed her an orange slip of paper and told us to go in through the exit and give it to the CM inside. We thanked her, went in, and they let us on the ride within a minute or two. That was fun. The other magic happened when we ran up to the Mark Twain right as the CM was closing the gate. He decided to open it again for us because it was her birthday.
We had a great time with photopass, but most of them were at DCA. First of all, at Disneyland, the only ride photos are for Space Mountain and Splash, and Splash is under refurbishment. The only places we could find photopass photographers in Disneyland were in Mickey's house (I'm guessing they were in Minnie's house, too), in Town Square, and at the hub. We got one at the heart backdrop (which luckily doesn't get lines like the pumpkin or Christmas tree) and one at the partners statue. In DCA, we got Guardians, Incredicoaster, and RSR, but we also got tons more all over the park. There were photographers just standing around everywhere, and I took advantage. I even got some fun ones in Carsland in some out-of-the-way spots in front of Route 66 signs (on the side of the curio shop). Photopass is so important on a trip with just a parent and child, and I really appreciated all the fabulous photos I got. Oh, and all of our photos (photopass and ride photos) appeared very quickly on the app. Some instantly, and the rest within an hour.
We thought Mickey's Mix Magic was pretty fun, and it was very easy to find a spot on Main Street on Friday night twenty minutes before it started. It was a one and done for us, though. No nostalgia or tender feelings with this show. We were glad that we didn't want to see it again on Saturday because the crowds waiting to see it were much larger. Same thing with Soundsational on Saturday, which we also saw easily on Friday.
We tried to get Ghirardelli frees samples three times during the trip, and there were never any. My daughter loves to do that, so I finally caved and bought her a square (it was $.86).
Overall, we had a wonderful and magical trip. It was the first time we had a birthday button, and that was a fantastic experience. Sorry this is such a novel. I just wanted to mention all the things I would have wanted to know before a trip. Thanks to everyone for the good info before we left.
I attempted to get an Uber from LGB to the Tropicana on Wednesday night at almost 11pm, but the nearest one was a forty minute wait, and we were very tired. I would have paid about half the cost I ended up paying for a taxi ($57 after tax and tip). Going back to the airport yesterday, I got an Uber, and it was $30 after tax and tip.
We knew it was going to be cold in the mornings and evenings on our trip, so we were prepared with warm clothing. We used a locker on Thursday so we could stop carrying jackets around during the warm hours. Overall, lockers are kind of a pain with park hopping, so on Friday and Saturday we just carried or wore our jackets.
On Thursday (8:00 Magic Morning), we were third and fourth on Peter Pan by going by the Matterhorn. After Peter Pan, we rode Toad, Pinnochio, Carrousel, Tea Cups, Star Tours, and Buzz (scores were messed up) during the hour, and we used our 9:00 Space Mountain fastpass at 8:55. On Friday morning 9:00 rope drop, we were at the front, but the crowds were larger, and we would not have been able to keep up with the many sprinters to Peter Pan, so we were glad that Alice was our planned first ride, and once again, we were third and fourth in line. We usually do half of Fantasyland one morning with MM and the other half on a day with no MM, and that seems to be the most efficient way that we've found to do all of Fantasyland with almost no waits (except the wait for the rope to drop, of course).
We were excited to see the front castle scrim on Thursday morning, and then the back Maleficent scrim on Friday morning. We never saw the pathway next to the castle open during our trip.
We didn't have many ride closures during this trip. We did get one multi experience fastpass on Friday when Indiana Jones was down, but it was back up not long after. The only other closure worked very well in our favor. It was Saturday evening, and we had a fastpass for Buzz Lightyear that became a multi experience because Buzz was down. I then had access to a new fastpass, so I refreshed a few times until an immediate Buzz fastpass appeared. I grabbed that, and within fifteen minutes, I had another multi fastpass. So we got use them on Space Mountain (my daughter's favorite ride) to end our trip, and that was fun.
The ugly WOC platform was above water on Thursday, but on Saturday, it was under water, and the area looked so much better. It's exciting that WOC is finally coming back.
Thursday overall was very low crowds. Friday was busier, and Saturday was really crowded (especially at DCA). On Thursday afternoon/evening, we enjoyed using three of the six tabs from our sip n savor pass at the Lunar New Year booths at DCA. The food was good, and we didn't have to wait in any lines at the booths. I decided to save the other three tabs to use on Saturday when we'd be at DCA again. That was my big mistake of the trip. I had not accounted for the fact that locals flood DCA festivals on Saturdays. The only huge lines or giant masses of people that we encountered during the trip were at the Lunar New Year area of DCA starting at around noon on Saturday. That morning at about 11:45 am, we were at Paradise Garden, and we decided to grab a bahn mi and a mango mousse with our tabs. The lines were non-existant. That left one tab for later. We rode Goofy's Sky School and the swings, and then started to walk toward the booths. The lines and crowds had materialized out of nowhere. We couldn't find a place to use our tab that wouldn't make us late for our Soarin' fastpass. So, we went to ride Soarin', and then walked back to the booths. The lines were overwhelming, and we couldn't easily walk around. I was determined to use that last tab, and we ended up waiting almost an HOUR in line back at Paradise Garden (where the lines were deceptively shorter) for tasteless and cold orange tempeh. I wish I could go back and tell myself to leave after Soarin'. It was not worth it to use that dumb tab! Haha. We were so worn out from that experience that we decided to go back to our hotel for a rest. The number of people coming in at that time (2:00) was incredible. I was concerned that we would get stuck in a long security line when we returned at 4:00, but the people had disappeared, and we went right through. Disneyland was definitely busy, but not terrible like DCA was.
Mobile ordering worked well for us throughout the trip. At Red Rose Tavern I made a mobile order, and the food was ready when we walked in. I asked the woman at the counter if they still had the cherry rose dessert because I hadn't seen it available on mobile ordering. She said they had one or two more, but the lines were pretty long. She told me that if I quickly made another mobile order for the grey stuff (which is the same price), she would just replace it with the rose for me. I took my food to the table, made the mobile order, and then walked back to the counter, where she already had the rose for me. I thanked her a lot for that.
We loved the Tropical Hideaway, and the loaded dole whip is great. In fact, we enjoyed all of the food there, and my daughter can be picky sometimes. Our favorite seasonal treat of the trip was the Valentine churro by Haunted Mansion. We went back to get another one later in the trip because it was so good.
I noticed on Thursday and Friday that almost everyone we talked to was there for their first time. I'm a little surprised that so many people come for a big once-in-a-lifetime trip in February. There was some slight disappointment about the castle, but most people seemed to go with the flow and move on to other fun things. There were some people in Critter Country who seemed to genuinely think they could get on Splash Mountain even though there was no water running on it, which was pretty funny. I saw a proposal in front of the heart backdrop in Town Square. So, improvisation is possible.
Toon Town was a little disappointing. More people are showing up for the opening time (or at least they did on Friday), and there were no characters to escort us in. People ran like crazy to Mickey's house, so it took more time than usual to meet him, and the line for Minnie was huge when we came out. We usually go in there after Mickey with very little wait, but this time we skipped it. We didn't mind because we were going to meet her later anyway at Plaza Inn breakfast. Even Gadget's Go Coaster and Roger Rabbit had waits when we normally walk on. We didn't see Goofy walking around like we usually do. Maybe it was just a random off day. My daughter didn't really notice these things, and I didn't comment on them. She had fun. I just thought I'd mention them here.
Speaking of Plaza Inn, we decided to get a 7:10 Saturday reservation. We had never been there before. We aren't really character breakfast people, but I was there with only my youngest daughter for her birthday, and she loves the characters. It was nice to walk right up to the character breakfast gate at 7:00 and go inside without waiting. We chose Saturday because we had already used our MM on our first day when we were fresh, and the time we spent eating didn't waste any park time since we were only there during the Saturday MM hour. I just checked my photos, and we got to meet ten characters. Because we got there at opening, they were around us the whole time. They'd keep coming back to us and giving us a lot of attention. My daughter loved it. We met Minnie, Dale, Pooh, Rafiki, Hook, Max, Tigger, Eeyore, Fairy Godmother, and Susie (mouse from Cinderella). While we were eating, rain started to pour. I'm talking serious rain. On Thursday and Friday we had seen hardly a cloud, but now there was torrential rain. We luckily had ponchos and an umbrella, but we were still nervous to go out because it was such heavy rain, and the puddles were crazy. No one wanted to leave their breakfast. It got to be close to 8:00, and I noticed the CMs hovering around waiting for people to leave. I could tell that there was stress about the lack of tables for new arrivals (especially since it would have been impossible to seat anyone outside). We decided to get our ponchos on, and they were quick to grab our plates and silverware while were getting ready to leave. They probably had the table totally cleared and ready for someone else before we had left the room! We were lucky that the rain wasn't heavy anymore, and we stayed dry by carefully avoiding puddles. It was nice to see the park so empty for awhile, but the skies cleared quickly, and people appeared with the sun. We didn't see anymore rain until we were getting in our Uber yesterday morning to head to the airport.
My daughter got a birthday button, and she received many birthday wishes. We even got some extra magic twice because of it. Once she was trading pins with a CM at the entrance of Monsters Inc, and when she saw that we were going to walk into the queue (which said 25 minutes) after the trade, she told my daughter that she had a birthday gift for her. She handed her an orange slip of paper and told us to go in through the exit and give it to the CM inside. We thanked her, went in, and they let us on the ride within a minute or two. That was fun. The other magic happened when we ran up to the Mark Twain right as the CM was closing the gate. He decided to open it again for us because it was her birthday.
We had a great time with photopass, but most of them were at DCA. First of all, at Disneyland, the only ride photos are for Space Mountain and Splash, and Splash is under refurbishment. The only places we could find photopass photographers in Disneyland were in Mickey's house (I'm guessing they were in Minnie's house, too), in Town Square, and at the hub. We got one at the heart backdrop (which luckily doesn't get lines like the pumpkin or Christmas tree) and one at the partners statue. In DCA, we got Guardians, Incredicoaster, and RSR, but we also got tons more all over the park. There were photographers just standing around everywhere, and I took advantage. I even got some fun ones in Carsland in some out-of-the-way spots in front of Route 66 signs (on the side of the curio shop). Photopass is so important on a trip with just a parent and child, and I really appreciated all the fabulous photos I got. Oh, and all of our photos (photopass and ride photos) appeared very quickly on the app. Some instantly, and the rest within an hour.
We thought Mickey's Mix Magic was pretty fun, and it was very easy to find a spot on Main Street on Friday night twenty minutes before it started. It was a one and done for us, though. No nostalgia or tender feelings with this show. We were glad that we didn't want to see it again on Saturday because the crowds waiting to see it were much larger. Same thing with Soundsational on Saturday, which we also saw easily on Friday.
We tried to get Ghirardelli frees samples three times during the trip, and there were never any. My daughter loves to do that, so I finally caved and bought her a square (it was $.86).
Overall, we had a wonderful and magical trip. It was the first time we had a birthday button, and that was a fantastic experience. Sorry this is such a novel. I just wanted to mention all the things I would have wanted to know before a trip. Thanks to everyone for the good info before we left.
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Glad your daughter got to have a special day 
