The date for Disneyland was set as May 24, the Friday immediately prior to Memorial Day. Then, I found the best website ever - www.touringplans.com. I LOVE this site. I'm not sure how I found it, but once I did, it made me so happy. It is a site where you can plan out a schedule in Disneyland and/or Disney World. Yes, there was a membership fee, but it was totally worth it. Without a membership, you can get information regarding expected crowd levels and expected wait times at each attraction throughout any selected day. With a membership, you can also select which attractions you want to visit, what date you will be in the park, and your start and end times and the site will come up with an optimized schedule for you. You can then play around with the schedule and tweak it here and there. Needless to say, I LOVE this site.
So, months ago, when I first was investigating this, the crowd levels for both Disneyland and Disney California Adventure was expected to be about 3 or 4 out of 10 and the expected open times was something like 9 AM to 10 PM. Then, about 6 weeks ago, as I was making somewhat last minute arrangements, I checked again, and the information had totally changed. Crowd levels: 10 out of 10. Open times: 6 AM to 6 AM. And some special events were listed: Monsterous Summer and Grad Night. What the what?!?!? So I go look up details on the Disney site. Yup, they had decided that the day I was coming was going to be a 24-hour park day. I learned later that this is only the 2nd time they've done that. They did it last year for Leap Day and they decided to do it again as a big kick off to summer event. Plus, they were doing their annual grad night so high school graduates would get a certain portion of the park to themselves about 10 PM-3 AM, kind of a sober night out or something like that. Well, I was committed to that date, didn't have much wiggle room either way in my schedule, so I reworked my personalized touring plans on touringplans.com and based on the information they gave me, in order to get everything done that I wanted to, I would indeed have to start my day at the 6 AM opening time. Yikes.
So yesterday (I'm writing this post a day late, as I was too tired at the end of the day yesterday to write it), I got myself out of bed at 5 AM, showered, and drove over to Disneyland - I got to the park entrance by 5:45. The lines were already crazy long. Basically the lines to both Disneyland and Disney California Adventure were long enough that they met in the middle where there was a big stage set up. There were news cameras everywhere and just before they opened the parks, they shot off fireworks.
Then on the way in, there was a band playing right there and all the cast members were lined up along Main Street giving out high fives.
There was definitely an air of celebration. Oh, by the way, I never had ANY intention of making it 24 hours - not even close. My plan was to make it to about 10 PM.
The touringplans.com website has associated iPhone and iPad apps where you can load your personalized plan, check off items as you go and re-optimize on the fly. The plan includes when to get FastPasses and when to use them. What it doesn't take into account is the Single Rider Lines though (which are sometimes great, and sometimes not helpful at all). So armed with my personalized plan, I set off into Disneyland. The first couple hours, there were essentially no lines - I was checking items off quite quickly:
Peter Pan's Flight - ok, but pretty boring
Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters - ok, was starting to get into it
Space Mountain - oh my goodness, this is just as scary as I remember from when I was 10 at Disney World
Matterhorn Bobsleds - I was able to use the single rider line to skip a good portion of the line. Ride was fun
it's a small world - long and slow, but fun to see the engineering that went into it years ago
Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage - pretty slow, and sleep was threatening to take over
Star Tours: The Adventures Continue - I had a FastPass for this, but it didn't do me any good cause the line was still super short. Loved this.
Jungle Cruise - super cheesy.
Haunted Mansion - cool engineering, but not what an adult would call "scary". Oh, and it broke down for a bit in the middle of the ride and we had to just sit there and wait.
Pirates of the Caribbean - I don't actually remember much of this, I guess the animatronics were pretty cool
I then tried to use my FastPass at Indiana Jones Adventure, but it was down. I was nearing the end of the list of things to do in Disneyland (at 9:15 already), so I had to kill some time. I took a ride on the Columbia Steamboat, listened to a band, and finally got some clam chowder for "lunch". I made my way back to Indiana Jones hoping that it would be back up again, and it was. My FastPass paid off here, and I jumped a good portion of the line. I still waited a while and ended up in a car with four 12-year-old boys and 7 high school graduates. Joy. We boarded our car and took off. It was good, but not as great as it had been made out to me. But as we pulled into the unloading area, the operator said, "Do you all want to go again? You didn't get the full experience, your car malfunctioned." So we all said "sure!" They unloaded us, put us on a different car and we went through again. So glad we did. This time, the car rocked from side to side and forward and backward. So much more fun. Even with the young-ens.
On the way out, I went to The Disneyland Story presenting Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln. I wish I could tell you about this, but I'm pretty sure I slept through the whole thing.
About an hour ahead of schedule, at 11:30, I headed over to Disney California Adventure. I had to re-optimize my schedule many times throughout the day as things changed. Although I hit very few lines for the first 5 hours in Disneyland, DCA in the afternoon was much more crowded.
Monsters, Inc. Mike & Sulley to the Rescue!: was slow and would probably have been more interesting had I seen the movie. Oh, and the parents and daughter behind me in line - I was ready to kill them. The father was antagonizing his daughter for fun and she was getting so upset. And she had no manners at all (I wonder why). It was a mess.
Animation Academy: This was fun! I got to draw Piglet.
It's Tough to Be a Bug!: A 3D show about bugs that is "interactive" - they shoot water at you, your seat pokes you, etc. Somewhat fun, somewhat annoying
Disney's Aladdin - A Musical Spectacular: hmmmmmm. For some reason, I expected better performances. From a production point of view, there were some cool things - the elephant walking through the audience was great, the flying carpet was cool (even though it was completely obvious that it was body doubles up there rather than the actual lead actors). And the singing was good. But the acting was lackluster, except for the Genie, but he was overkill, even for the Genie, with a TON of pop-culture references. Oh, and did I mention that I fell asleep a few times throughout again?
Toy Story Midway Mania!: LONG wait for this, and no FastPass or Single Rider line. When I finally got up to the front (half an hour in line), they were not being very efficient in loading the ride - there were a lot of empty seats. This was a game ride, similar to the Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters, but this one was 3D with lots of different targets throughout. It was pretty fun (except when it seemingly broke down for a while in the middle of the ride)
California Screamin': I had a FastPass for this, and it helped, but it looked like the Single Rider line would have been even more efficient. There were only 1 or 2 people in the Single Rider Line. And boy, was this one scary. Once you load and get out of the loading area, the car stops and then there is a countdown until the car is propelled forward incredibly quickly and then up a hill and down a steep decline. All the while I was repeating, "Ohmygod, ohmygod, ohmygod, ohmygod". I like loops and curves and whatnot, but declines are scary as hell.
Twilight Zone Tower of Terror: the line for this was quite long, so my FastPass really helped here. Once I finally got on the ride, I wasn't sure I was happy about it. They strap you in via a lap belt only - no shoulder restraint or anything. And then you go straight up and freefall down for a bit, back up and down and up and down. I think they randomize it so even if you ride it multiple times, you can't predict when you're going to drop. Scary, especially when you leave your seat at the top of each descent.
At this point, I was starving, and getting close to having everything on my list completed. So I stopped for some food over near Soarin' Over California.
My plan told me to get a Soarin' FastPass, but, like I said, I was ahead of schedule, so I decided to just go right for the Single Rider Line. Now, at this point, it seems like groups, especially groups of high schoolers, had discovered the Single Rider Line, so the Single Rider Line on Soarin' wasn't any faster than waiting in the regular line. The ride was pretty enjoyable once I finally got on though. It's basically an IMAX movie, where you're suspended in your seat with your legs dangling and the seats tilt to and fro.
Then it was up to Radiator Springs Racers. The FastPasses for this ride were completely out for the day at 11:30 when I first entered DCA, so that wasn't an option, so I went straight for the Single Rider Line, which was crazy long. I do think it saved me some time over the standard line, but not much. There were groups ahead of and behind me. Now these groups did get broken up into singles where they were needed, but it was still annoying since I was a true single and they weren't. I waited a long time for this (like 45 minutes or so), but the ride was really fun!
Exhausted, I had made it to about 5:30 PM, having been in the parks for almost 12 hours. Wine was necessary. I made my way over to one of the places where they served wine in order to rest and recharge. Had a glass of wine and some water and wondered if I was going to make it to the World of Color show at 9PM. The only other thing left on my list was The Bakery Tour, which isn't a ride at all, but really a tour of a Boudin Bakery where they make sourdough bread. I sat with my wine for a while and finally, around 6:30, decided that I wasn't going to make it, so I gave up my table and immediately after that found out that the parade was going to come right past there at 7PM. Oops. Oh well. Oh, while I was sitting there people watching, one of the people that I saw? Richard Simmons!
See him there on the left? His hair is thinning.
Anyway, I went through the Bakery Tour, considered going into the Ghiradelli shop, but my stomach was not at all interested in chocolate (crazy, right?), and decided to make my way to the exit. Oh, I forgot something earlier, when I was going from the Soaring over California to Radiator Springs Racers, I happened by a street performance by the Disney Newsies and Mickey. They sang Seize the Day, which made me really happy. Back the end of the day. I made my way back towards the park entrance. At one point, one of the cast members asked me if I was staying for the parade. I said no, I was calling it quits and she asked how long I'd been there. I told her I got there at 6AM, so at this point, I had been there about 13 hours. She gave me mad props.
Anyway, I did make it back to my car, got back to the condo where I was staying the night, and basically immediately collapsed into bed and slept for 12 hours. Long day, but good times all around. I didn't make it until the World of Color show and I do wish I had seen that, but I'm more glad that I got the sleep that I so desperately needed at that point.
Stay tuned - another post coming in imminently about today!
Best celebrity spot ever.
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