OFFICIAL CHRISTMAS HOLIDAY SEASON & NEW YEAR'S 2017 THREAD

[tink89]

Bags are packed. Called DHL to request a high floor. In less than 24 hours we will be there. So ready for this vacation!!!

 

[katyringo]

Holy cow what a day. Our first flight was delayed on the runway due to freezing temps and problems with that so by the time we took off we already knew we weren’t making the lay over. But then all hell broke loose and my 5 year old went into full panick on the plane. He loves everything planes trains and automobiles so that took me really off guard and if you were on the flight from Omaha to SFO today I am so sorry. We landed and got him some Benadryl and that helped calm him down and he was fine on our resecheded connection. We finally made it to hojo 6 hours after we had originally planned. We skipped Medevil times and went to DTD... had a blast! That being said with Christmas and things my kid needs a good nights rest not being woken up early so unless he wakes up on his own we may not do MM tomorrow and save it for Friday.

Instantly when he freaked out i realized that while we still have plans and strategies we are going with the flow for a peaceful trip.

Oh and he weather is soooo good! It was -2 at home .. hehe

 

[mom2rtk]

Holy cow what a day. Our first flight was delayed on the runway due to freezing temps and problems with that so by the time we took off we already knew we weren’t making the lay over. But then all hell broke loose and my 5 year old went into full panick on the plane. He loves everything planes trains and automobiles so that took me really off guard and if you were on the flight from Omaha to SFO today I am so sorry. We landed and got him some Benadryl and that helped calm him down and he was fine on our resecheded connection. We finally made it to hojo 6 hours after we had originally planned. We skipped Medevil times and went to DTD... had a blast! That being said with Christmas and things my kid needs a good nights rest not being woken up early so unless he wakes up on his own we may not do MM tomorrow and save it for Friday.

Instantly when he freaked out i realized that while we still have plans and strategies we are going with the flow for a peaceful trip.

Oh and he weather is soooo good! It was -2 at home .. hehe

Oh no! What a rough start. Here's hoping things are grand and magical from here on out.

 

[bcwife76]

Well we are back home after a whirlwind Christmas trip to Disneyland and it was even more magical than we could have imagined!!!
-Maxpass was fantastic, worth every penny
-parks were busy but not capacity and we found the crowds VERY manageable
-it was cooler in the morning and evenings than we were expecting (eventhough we looked at the weather forecast before we left) but it was nice not to be sweating at 8am!
-LOVED Grand Californian, I don't think we will be staying anywhere else for future trips! We had a woods view and we thought the location was perfect, we were in a smaller building right by Napa Rose, Storytellers and the pool and it was SO close to the DCA entrance.
-EMH was fantastic, no waits at the turnstiles for our DCA entrance and it was so cool having the parks basically to ourselves for an hour (ok we got in at 7:10am so for 50 minutes haha)

Oh my gosh, it was just such a great trip! Happy New Year everyone!!!

 

[katyringo]

So we did end up making the 7 am magic morning today (Wednesday) thought I would report back as it’s not a normal magic morning day. They had tomorrow land and fantasy land open. We got through a special stroller gate but we were first in line for buzz, rode star tours with a 5 minute wait, booked a RSR fastpass for 830 return time, was able to fill another fastpass like 30 minutes later before we even used it and held fast passes RSR and guardians at the same time. We were using max pass. We then played in fantasy land and ride rides, we got awesome uncrowned castle pictures, bought a Christmas ornament and then headed to DCA where we rode RSR, guardians, soarin, goofy sky school, toy story midway mania, had a milk shake and flo’s, took pictures with buzz and lightening McQueen, watched the the viva navida performance .. all before noon. Then we had our character dinning at Ariel’s which was soo good and amazing and we got some great pictures of them interacting with my toddler daughter. We then took a hotel pool break. We came back to find Disneyland park at capacity- but our B.B. fantastic reservations got us in. We ate dinner at B.B.- again I thought it was soo good. We then checked out a few shops and rode Winnie the Pooh- everything else has super long waits. For fantastic we ended up being first in the BB. line on accident cause I was just standing in the general area of where I thought we were suppose to be lol. So we had great seats. Watched the show then fireworks. The magic was real for us today! I know the power was out in DL for a while and things over there went haywire. I literally loved every second of today!

 

[DLmama]

We leave one week from today!!!! The Christmas scavenger hunt surprise actually worked on DS9! I didn't think he'd get that excited since we go to Disneyland about once a year, except for a couple magical years we had APs. By the time he got to the final reveal, he was jumping up and down!

 

[katyringo]

Goodbye Disneyland! Tomorrow is legoland and then home. It was amazing in every single way. Planning paid of big time!

 

[donaldanddaisy]

Just finished three magical days and said goodbye ourselves. May come back and do more updates, but yes, very crowded. Really couldn't ride anything without a Fastpass of some kind. Max pass really essentially. Glad there were fireworks every nights. They also added a 3rd Fantasmoc show at 11:30 the past two nights. I didn't know they ever did that!

 

[Susie63]

Checking in from CCI. We spent two wonderful days in the parks last week. Everything was under a 30 minute wait. The WOC dessert party was fantastic and highly recommended. I drank so much yummy hot chocolate that I sloshed on the way out of the park. The next night we did RBT premium viewing. It was not the greatest view, but the food was good and having a seat was so nice at the end of the day. Yesterday was a different story. We spent the day in the DCA and it was very busy. We used fp and DAS. We rode all the headliners with long waits in between. Still fun but we knew this going in. There were lots of grumpy people though and gave the cm's a hard time. Who goes on a trip with out doing research? DH came down with a cold so we are chilling at the hotel, doing laundry and prepacking. Back into DCA tomorrow for NYE and DL on Monday. Hope everyone had a great holiday.

 

[katyringo]

We did legoland today and fly home in the morning. I’m so sad. Was my first ever Disney trip and I am absolutely in love. We are already planning when to come back.

 

[Kender]

There were lots of grumpy people though and gave the cm's a hard time. Who goes on a trip with out doing research?

I actually witnessed a guest saying "shut up" to a CM that was telling people to not stop in the walkway in front of the castle after fireworks . Not to mention people letting their children run rampant. I've been crashed into so many times this past week that I have more than a few bruises.

I'm still having fun because I knew what to expect crowd wise, but this feels like a lot more rude of a crowd than I'm used to even this time of year.

 

[katyringo]

We’ve had an amazing time and the CM have been amazing but we too deff saw some upset people.

 

[Ellek07]

We did legoland today and fly home in the morning. I’m so sad. Was my first ever Disney trip and I am absolutely in love. We are already planning when to come back.

DL is intoxicating that way. Our first DL trip was in March and we’re planning for next year!

 

[blue888]

We are back. Trip was wonderful. We ended up in Fantasy tower in our 3 bedroom suite and got our concierge request. We had a lovely pool view on the 9th floor. Everything was great. Concierge was awesome! We spent 5 days in the park, 1 day at Universal and spent an afternoon at the beach. Our last day we spent at the pool before flying out. I wouldn't do Universal again until my kids are older. Harry Potter land was cool, but the park was so packed and not nearly as organized as Disneyland. We ate at Storytellers and Goofy's Kitchen, both were great!

 

[Susie63]

Sitting in Animation Academy waiting to draw Oogie Boogie. Crowds have been great. Rode all the headliners multiple times today. Wait times are not bad. Whoever thought giving out noise makers would be a good idea at 6 o' clock is getting coal in their sock next year lol. Happy New Year's every one.

 

[Kender]

Sitting in Animation Academy waiting to draw Oogie Boogie. Crowds have been great. Rode all the headliners multiple times today. Wait times are not bad. Whoever thought giving out noise makers would be a good idea at 6 o' clock is getting coal in their sock next year lol. Happy New Year's every one.

Oh my gosh, look for the girl with the panda on her head, lol!

I'm in the same line!

 

[Kender]

Aside from a couple pockets of crowds, it was not nearly as bad as I've experienced in the past on NYE. Still crowded, but I never saw a single alert come out saying that entry was in any way restricted (same as I recall from last year although I know there's been some differing of memories regarding closures last year).

There was an interesting issue that I hadn't considered: MP on the app haf a hiccup and stopped displaying FPs as soon as midnight hit.

The FPs still existed (I confirmed with an info kiosk that I still had all 4 FPs and he was able to give me the times for each so I could type a note for myself... I normally screenshot, but I guess I forgot to do so for those) and the system knew they were there, but the app wasn't displaying them.

Word seemed to spread fast to CMs at rides so they knew to tell people to scan their ticket rather than try to find the FP in their app.

The biggest issue I saw with this (beyond that it was holding up a few lines as people who were relying on their phone blocked the scan points trying to locate their "missing" FPs) was that no one could cancel a FP anymore. Ride lines were short and I had 4 FPs booked anyways, but it still was a feature that went away and meant there was zero chance of picking up a cancelled FP.

In other news: I finally got over 1 million points on Buzz! But the system didn't catch it so all I have is my "999,999" picture I grabbed on the ride vehicle. Don't even know what my real final score was. Still a great way to start the new year, though

 

[jeepnjudy]

Well we are back and I have been trying to play catch-up at work so no time to post...not to mention flu is running rampant here and everyone seems to be sick! Ugh! Anyhow, had a fantastic trip with no sick kids while there...Yeah! We did the WOC dessert party which was great and worth the money for a seat. And yes my family concurs, the gingerbread man was DELICIOUS! We also did the RBT premium seating and thought this was overpriced for what it is. It was nice to have an actual seat since the evenings were chilly and we did not have to sit on the ground but if the weather was nicer I would probably just do a standard dinner package at one of the other restaurants where you get the seat cushion to sit. This was likely a one and done experience for us. I cannot rave enough about MAX Pass. Even with the busy holiday, we still managed to pull at a minimum 10-15 passes per day after quickly figuring out how to use the system and it beat running around a busy park trying to pull a paper fast pass. We hardly waited in any standard lines. My favorite holiday treat was that Yule Log...absolutely YUMMY!! We did not go DL on Wednesday (27 DEC) as that was our tour Hollywood day and thank goodness as we heard they lost power for several hours due to a transformer issue and had lots of upset people. All was calm and running smoothly the rest of the week. NYE at DL was not nearly as bad as I thought it would be and of course was busier as it got closer to midnight but we still managed to party in front of the castle with all the other crazy folks to ring in the New Year. Hope everyone else had fun as well!!!

 

[Susie63]

Back to reality...sigh. I just wanted to give a little insight into our NYE experience at DCA. We got into the park at 9 and grabbed a locker to store our coats and blanket. The park was very manageable all day. We grabbed fp's for RSR but it was closed more than open between Christmas and NYE and I never did get to ride but DH and DD did SR. I made it a priority to try the Cove bar this trip and it was the best meal of my entire trip. The lobster nachos were amazing and the tri tip sliders were fabulous. We rode GOTG multiple times and it my new favorite ride. I think that the new design makes the ride way more fun. More of a thrill factor than a fear factor.
We loved the Frozen show despite a small delay mid performance. We also managed to draw 3 characters at Animation Academy. The biggest let down of my trip was the removal of the Zoetrope. I could watch that for hours.
We had reservations for CC WOC for a late dinner. The restaurant and service were impeccable. The food was unimpressive with the exception of the firecracker duck wings. The fried biscuits were bland. The entrees and desserts were nice but none of us were overly impressed. The WOC fp's were worth the price though.
I was able to sit on a bench and when no one else showed up, we were able to sit for WOC. After WOC we stayed on the bench for the fireworks. There was a great dj and it was fun to watch all the people dancing. The people were very welcoming when my DD joined in on the dancing. The WOC fountains remained on for the entire time at a low level and it made for a very party like atmosphere. The fireworks at midnight would have been disappointing on their own but the combination of the fireworks and fountains were awesome!
There were lots of NYE photo ops around the parks. I debated for a long time over which park we wanted to celebrate the New Year in and we were all happy we went with DCA.

 

[PirateRedhead]

We rode GOTG multiple times and it my new favorite ride....We had reservations for CC WOC for a late dinner. The restaurant and service were impeccable. The food was unimpressive with the exception of the firecracker duck wings.

I'm with you on both counts! But mostly I just wanted to pop in and thank you for managing this thread. I'm taking my family to Disneyland in December for our first Christmas season visit, and though that's many months away, I love to plan ahead. This thread has been so informative and just plain fun to follow. I'm glad you had a great trip.