Alinasan
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Oct 3, 2010
Hello Everyone! Thanks to everyone on these boards for all the helpful advice, because I know it helped so much with making our trip even better! I'm sorry I don't have pictures as I do not know how to load them up.
Hotel: We ended up in the Hyatt Place at the Convention Center, which we chose mainly because it was new, had bunk beds in a divided room /sort-of 2 room set-up, the price, and the room safe.
What we liked: The room was spacious, new and had a good bed and TV. We didn't watch much TV, but it was nice to have the option of putting on Disney Channel for the kids one morning while we sorted our things. The breakfast was a mix of hot and cold things, like sausage, eggs and a pancake or waffle thing, they even had a breakfast muffin sandwich one day. They always had fresh fruit and yogurt, which I liked as my daughter is very picky about meat. The best thing though were the "to go" cups of Seattle's Best brand coffee, complete with coffee sleeves. Hotel staff were friendly and attentive. The maids took the extra effort to arrange the kids toys in fun poses when making the beds. So that was nice!
What we didn't like: The walk wound up feeling a bit too long, because of traffic lights it usually took 15 to 20. We did use the ART system, but it is not convenient to wake up a sleeping toddler to get on the bus. We also passed several other potential hotels that I'd considered and felt like I should have stuck with those! The walls also seemed a bit thin, with water pipes and occasional conversation noise from other guests when in our room.
Overall I probably would pick a different spot next time, especially with all the new hotel choices that are opening in the next couple of years.
Day 1: California Adventure
We arrived mid-day May 30 and after settling into our hotel, we walked over to CA thinking we'd just sort of grab dinner at Flo's V8, and see some atmosphere. It was probably our best day there anyway. We somehow wound up seeing Olaf with a 5 minute wait, and then walked into the next showing of the Frozen Sing-Along, and then another 10 minutes or so to see Elsa and Anna. The waits in general were not long, so we rode the Monster Inc, with no wait, then the Tractor ride with less than 10, and we enjoyed the food and atmosphere of Flo's. The Fast Passes for Radiator were of course long gone so we went back to the hotel. We didn't really notice Grad Night to the point if I had not been looking for people from it, that I would have noticed it.
Day 2: Disneyland (bonus DCA)
We definitely missed Rope drop but the crowds were light enough that we had no wait to get in around 9, and very little wait to do most of the Fantasy land rides, like Small World and the Story Canal. We rode the Casey Jr. train because my son loves trains, even though it did sort of repeat the scenery of the canal boat but my daughter wanted to ride that again to look at the miniatures anyway. We then did some Tomorrow land things, Buzz and Star tours. From there, we crossed over to Splash Mountain and while I rode Winnie the Pooh a lot with DS (2) (less than 5 minute wait), DH and DD tried to use our Rider Swap on Splash Mountain but it broke down. DH and DD (7) had to walk down from the ride and they gave each of them a fast pass to any ride (even ones that do not have them, so they said) in EITHER park that were electronically on our tickets. Well, already my DH had said we needed to leave before he got on Splash Mountain and though we knew it was late we felt like we had to use that pass. But where!? I tried to talk my DD into picking Matterhorn, but she felt too scared and she said she wanted Splash Mountain or Winnie the Pooh (which felt like a waste of the pass!). Then I suggested Radiator Springs--so we zipped over to DCA as we had Park Hoppers. They rode with a less than 5 minute wait, and then she and I went (as we Rider Swapped) and our wait was maybe 10 as a bunch of FP must have arrived in between. We all loved the ride, but now it was VERY late, and we wound up watching the fireworks waiting for the ART bus.
Day 3: Disneyland.
We did not get an early start after the late night, and wound up getting to the parks around 10. Lines were already longer, which I expected since the annual pass block-outs were over. We started with Matterhorn which had a 25 minute wait, while DH took DS on Dumbo and the Carousel. We had some trouble with Cell reception there near Dumbo and it took some time to meet up again, but we did and ran into the Evil Queen which was fun. Then we did Pixie Hollow and met Tink and Rosetta, about a 40 minute wait. We hit the Tikki Room and enjoyed a dole whip while we watched and then ate at the BBQ across from Indiana Jones. My DD 7 refused to ride Indy after riding with DH, so I used the Rider Swap and went back on by myself. I enjoyed it, but since I was holding onto 3 fast passes for the ride, having assumed we'd want to ride it more than once (the wait was short when we got there), I handed those off to others to share the magic. After that DD and DH rode Thunder Mountain RailRoad but it broke before we could swap, so I went to get Fastpasses for Haunted Mansion, while my family rode the Colombia which they enjoyed. I missed the boat so didn't get to ride with them! We liked the Haunted Mansion and did Pirates with a 30 minute wait (about as long a wait as we can handle with the 2 year old). Then we went over to Toontown, and let the kids run around the Goofy House and Donald Boat which they loved (and we loved letting them cut loose for a bit). We tried to ride Roger Rabbit, but it broken down and we had dinner reservations for Blue Bayou at 6:10 that we wanted to make for Fantasmic Reserved seating so we had to leave. We got to the BB a little early, around 5:45 and they said it would be 30 to 45 minutes to wait for a table near the Water, so I figured that wouldn't throw us off too much. So I said yes, but of course trying to keep 2 kids "near" the limited range of the BB for that long was tricky. Just as we couldn't stand waiting any more, our table was ready and it was right by the water and was pretty fun to watch the boats go sailing by. The food was generally good, especially the cornbread, but the Strawberry-Rhubarb Galette, tasted a bit like a stale danish. We liked the "mint juleps" and they were good about boxing up the extras which we fed to our kids while waiting for Fantasmic.
Fantasmic! The show's seating was really a nice spot, even though CMs did seem confused about where/when to line up. We asked one who sent us off to the side, who sent us back to the other one, and when we came back again, they'd let people in already. The sign said BB and RB, so I think they don't distinguish at all between those groups, as it was not roped off into a separate area at all. We were just too tired to try to do something else, around 8 and risk getting stuck, so we were definitely trying to line up early, but we managed to be the 2nd row back and it was a nice spot. The BB people gave us an extra cushion for our DS even though he didn't buy the dinner package which was sweet but he just sat on Daddy's lap (so he got the extra cushion). We loved the show, and it was exciting that the kids had ridden the Colombia earlier when it entered the show. We stayed in our spots for the fireworks which while not straight on looking at the Castle was really fun since they had projections on the screen, and did some other things to make it feel magical.
While waiting for the show, I kept my kids entertained with those light-up bracelets you get at the Dollar store, which was a great tip I'd read on these boards.
Day 4 DCA
DD and DH just didn't want to rush around that morning, so DS and I went earlier to see the Disney Jr. show at 10:30. We really enjoyed that, and we emerged and found DD and DH waiting with fastpasses for Radiator Springs 5:45 return after picking the tickets around 11 am. I managed to get over after 11:30 to get a 7:10 return, which we used with Rider Swap by having my DH ride by himself one time. We went over to Toy Story Mania with a half-hour wait, ran into Woody and Buzz character greets, and decided to skip the Wheel as it wasn't working. We rushed back to the other side of the park to get in line for the Aladdin show and ended up on the upper Balcony.
The view is ok, but you can see the trap doors, so I think I liked sitting in the Orchestra more for that reason. I like how they updated the script since the last time I saw it, with jokes to keep the popular culture nods recent.
After that, we enjoyed the fanciest frozen lemonades at Schmoozies across from the Animation Studio. I wanted to take the kids to Turtle Talk, but DH said they really need to run around, so I suggested the Adventure Trail area, which was amazing for the kids. On our way, we stopped at the Starbucks for DH (and me too!), and did a little shopping. We found two very cute pins for the 60th Anniversary in the store around the corner, sure they have it lots of places, one with Minnie and the Castle and another with Tink. The Tink one was really neat as it has a little card you pull so the castle changes from black and white to fireworks. They LOVED that part, and we went back at night after the Racer fastpasses and they didn't want to leave at all.
On our way to the Racers from our first stop at the Adventure Trail, we passed by Ariel and as it had been all our trip, a 5 minute wait was too hard to pass up so we hopped on that. Then we did the Racers. At night trying to leave the Adventure Trail we saw a swarm of traffic crossing after WOC, so again we did Ariel.
Day 5 Disney/DCA
We were all completely exhausted now! We had a late night flight, so as we had 5 day tickets, we decided we'd "just" do Space Mountain and Nemo. DH completed packing us up, and we got to the park around 9 and got fastpasses for Space Mountain (around 11), and hopped in Nemo's line which was 10 minutes or so. After Nemo we had some time before Space, so we decided to do ToonTown and Roger Rabbit. We found the line started around where we'd been when the ride broke down before, so we finally did that ride (was NOT worth the half-hour plus change wait!). The kids just enjoyed running around Toontown, so we let them do that, and meet Minnie and Mickey. They enjoyed playing with the stuff in the houses more than the pictures. We were just about ready to head back to Space Mountain, when my DD got separated from us. She was there one minute, and we turned around to put DS in his stroller (where he did not want to go!) and when we stood up she was gone. We were panicking, wondering where she went but the CM's were wonderful. I thought she'd run into a line for the Gadget Coaster which I told her was too long for us to do right then, and so I went in the exit to ask if they could see her along the line. They didn't, so they called Security and in 20 minutes they had her located (all the way in Tomorrowland near Space Mountain, she said she thought we'd started off without her and was trying to find us). They didn't take her up to the Lost kids area at the Town Hall, but waited with her there as we were on our way there. After we all calmed down a bit, we decided to use our fastpasses for Space and rider swap and then get lunch back in DCA so the kids could run around the Adventure Trail. Before we knew it, it was time to get back and collect our things and head to the airport (SNA).
Hotel: We ended up in the Hyatt Place at the Convention Center, which we chose mainly because it was new, had bunk beds in a divided room /sort-of 2 room set-up, the price, and the room safe.
What we liked: The room was spacious, new and had a good bed and TV. We didn't watch much TV, but it was nice to have the option of putting on Disney Channel for the kids one morning while we sorted our things. The breakfast was a mix of hot and cold things, like sausage, eggs and a pancake or waffle thing, they even had a breakfast muffin sandwich one day. They always had fresh fruit and yogurt, which I liked as my daughter is very picky about meat. The best thing though were the "to go" cups of Seattle's Best brand coffee, complete with coffee sleeves. Hotel staff were friendly and attentive. The maids took the extra effort to arrange the kids toys in fun poses when making the beds. So that was nice!
What we didn't like: The walk wound up feeling a bit too long, because of traffic lights it usually took 15 to 20. We did use the ART system, but it is not convenient to wake up a sleeping toddler to get on the bus. We also passed several other potential hotels that I'd considered and felt like I should have stuck with those! The walls also seemed a bit thin, with water pipes and occasional conversation noise from other guests when in our room.
Overall I probably would pick a different spot next time, especially with all the new hotel choices that are opening in the next couple of years.
Day 1: California Adventure
We arrived mid-day May 30 and after settling into our hotel, we walked over to CA thinking we'd just sort of grab dinner at Flo's V8, and see some atmosphere. It was probably our best day there anyway. We somehow wound up seeing Olaf with a 5 minute wait, and then walked into the next showing of the Frozen Sing-Along, and then another 10 minutes or so to see Elsa and Anna. The waits in general were not long, so we rode the Monster Inc, with no wait, then the Tractor ride with less than 10, and we enjoyed the food and atmosphere of Flo's. The Fast Passes for Radiator were of course long gone so we went back to the hotel. We didn't really notice Grad Night to the point if I had not been looking for people from it, that I would have noticed it.
Day 2: Disneyland (bonus DCA)
We definitely missed Rope drop but the crowds were light enough that we had no wait to get in around 9, and very little wait to do most of the Fantasy land rides, like Small World and the Story Canal. We rode the Casey Jr. train because my son loves trains, even though it did sort of repeat the scenery of the canal boat but my daughter wanted to ride that again to look at the miniatures anyway. We then did some Tomorrow land things, Buzz and Star tours. From there, we crossed over to Splash Mountain and while I rode Winnie the Pooh a lot with DS (2) (less than 5 minute wait), DH and DD tried to use our Rider Swap on Splash Mountain but it broke down. DH and DD (7) had to walk down from the ride and they gave each of them a fast pass to any ride (even ones that do not have them, so they said) in EITHER park that were electronically on our tickets. Well, already my DH had said we needed to leave before he got on Splash Mountain and though we knew it was late we felt like we had to use that pass. But where!? I tried to talk my DD into picking Matterhorn, but she felt too scared and she said she wanted Splash Mountain or Winnie the Pooh (which felt like a waste of the pass!). Then I suggested Radiator Springs--so we zipped over to DCA as we had Park Hoppers. They rode with a less than 5 minute wait, and then she and I went (as we Rider Swapped) and our wait was maybe 10 as a bunch of FP must have arrived in between. We all loved the ride, but now it was VERY late, and we wound up watching the fireworks waiting for the ART bus.
Day 3: Disneyland.
We did not get an early start after the late night, and wound up getting to the parks around 10. Lines were already longer, which I expected since the annual pass block-outs were over. We started with Matterhorn which had a 25 minute wait, while DH took DS on Dumbo and the Carousel. We had some trouble with Cell reception there near Dumbo and it took some time to meet up again, but we did and ran into the Evil Queen which was fun. Then we did Pixie Hollow and met Tink and Rosetta, about a 40 minute wait. We hit the Tikki Room and enjoyed a dole whip while we watched and then ate at the BBQ across from Indiana Jones. My DD 7 refused to ride Indy after riding with DH, so I used the Rider Swap and went back on by myself. I enjoyed it, but since I was holding onto 3 fast passes for the ride, having assumed we'd want to ride it more than once (the wait was short when we got there), I handed those off to others to share the magic. After that DD and DH rode Thunder Mountain RailRoad but it broke before we could swap, so I went to get Fastpasses for Haunted Mansion, while my family rode the Colombia which they enjoyed. I missed the boat so didn't get to ride with them! We liked the Haunted Mansion and did Pirates with a 30 minute wait (about as long a wait as we can handle with the 2 year old). Then we went over to Toontown, and let the kids run around the Goofy House and Donald Boat which they loved (and we loved letting them cut loose for a bit). We tried to ride Roger Rabbit, but it broken down and we had dinner reservations for Blue Bayou at 6:10 that we wanted to make for Fantasmic Reserved seating so we had to leave. We got to the BB a little early, around 5:45 and they said it would be 30 to 45 minutes to wait for a table near the Water, so I figured that wouldn't throw us off too much. So I said yes, but of course trying to keep 2 kids "near" the limited range of the BB for that long was tricky. Just as we couldn't stand waiting any more, our table was ready and it was right by the water and was pretty fun to watch the boats go sailing by. The food was generally good, especially the cornbread, but the Strawberry-Rhubarb Galette, tasted a bit like a stale danish. We liked the "mint juleps" and they were good about boxing up the extras which we fed to our kids while waiting for Fantasmic.
Fantasmic! The show's seating was really a nice spot, even though CMs did seem confused about where/when to line up. We asked one who sent us off to the side, who sent us back to the other one, and when we came back again, they'd let people in already. The sign said BB and RB, so I think they don't distinguish at all between those groups, as it was not roped off into a separate area at all. We were just too tired to try to do something else, around 8 and risk getting stuck, so we were definitely trying to line up early, but we managed to be the 2nd row back and it was a nice spot. The BB people gave us an extra cushion for our DS even though he didn't buy the dinner package which was sweet but he just sat on Daddy's lap (so he got the extra cushion). We loved the show, and it was exciting that the kids had ridden the Colombia earlier when it entered the show. We stayed in our spots for the fireworks which while not straight on looking at the Castle was really fun since they had projections on the screen, and did some other things to make it feel magical.
While waiting for the show, I kept my kids entertained with those light-up bracelets you get at the Dollar store, which was a great tip I'd read on these boards.
Day 4 DCA
DD and DH just didn't want to rush around that morning, so DS and I went earlier to see the Disney Jr. show at 10:30. We really enjoyed that, and we emerged and found DD and DH waiting with fastpasses for Radiator Springs 5:45 return after picking the tickets around 11 am. I managed to get over after 11:30 to get a 7:10 return, which we used with Rider Swap by having my DH ride by himself one time. We went over to Toy Story Mania with a half-hour wait, ran into Woody and Buzz character greets, and decided to skip the Wheel as it wasn't working. We rushed back to the other side of the park to get in line for the Aladdin show and ended up on the upper Balcony.
The view is ok, but you can see the trap doors, so I think I liked sitting in the Orchestra more for that reason. I like how they updated the script since the last time I saw it, with jokes to keep the popular culture nods recent.
After that, we enjoyed the fanciest frozen lemonades at Schmoozies across from the Animation Studio. I wanted to take the kids to Turtle Talk, but DH said they really need to run around, so I suggested the Adventure Trail area, which was amazing for the kids. On our way, we stopped at the Starbucks for DH (and me too!), and did a little shopping. We found two very cute pins for the 60th Anniversary in the store around the corner, sure they have it lots of places, one with Minnie and the Castle and another with Tink. The Tink one was really neat as it has a little card you pull so the castle changes from black and white to fireworks. They LOVED that part, and we went back at night after the Racer fastpasses and they didn't want to leave at all.
On our way to the Racers from our first stop at the Adventure Trail, we passed by Ariel and as it had been all our trip, a 5 minute wait was too hard to pass up so we hopped on that. Then we did the Racers. At night trying to leave the Adventure Trail we saw a swarm of traffic crossing after WOC, so again we did Ariel.
Day 5 Disney/DCA
We were all completely exhausted now! We had a late night flight, so as we had 5 day tickets, we decided we'd "just" do Space Mountain and Nemo. DH completed packing us up, and we got to the park around 9 and got fastpasses for Space Mountain (around 11), and hopped in Nemo's line which was 10 minutes or so. After Nemo we had some time before Space, so we decided to do ToonTown and Roger Rabbit. We found the line started around where we'd been when the ride broke down before, so we finally did that ride (was NOT worth the half-hour plus change wait!). The kids just enjoyed running around Toontown, so we let them do that, and meet Minnie and Mickey. They enjoyed playing with the stuff in the houses more than the pictures. We were just about ready to head back to Space Mountain, when my DD got separated from us. She was there one minute, and we turned around to put DS in his stroller (where he did not want to go!) and when we stood up she was gone. We were panicking, wondering where she went but the CM's were wonderful. I thought she'd run into a line for the Gadget Coaster which I told her was too long for us to do right then, and so I went in the exit to ask if they could see her along the line. They didn't, so they called Security and in 20 minutes they had her located (all the way in Tomorrowland near Space Mountain, she said she thought we'd started off without her and was trying to find us). They didn't take her up to the Lost kids area at the Town Hall, but waited with her there as we were on our way there. After we all calmed down a bit, we decided to use our fastpasses for Space and rider swap and then get lunch back in DCA so the kids could run around the Adventure Trail. Before we knew it, it was time to get back and collect our things and head to the airport (SNA).
