Showing posts with label Disneyland. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Disneyland. Show all posts

Monday, October 26, 2015

Disneyland: Mickey's Halloween Party 2015

Date of Visit: October 25, 2015

After being disappointed by Halloween at Magic Kingdom last year, we decided to take advantage of currently having Premier Passes (and use the last of this year's DVC points) and do another Disneyland trip this year specifically to enjoy Halloween time at Disneyland. I was a little worried that the only reason we preferred the Disneyland Halloween party was because it was less crowded and had not been sold out like all parties were this year. However, it turned out to not feel as chaotic as Mickey's Not So Scary Halloween Party last year even though it was more crowded than last Mickey's Halloween Party experience in 2011.

We got in line to enter Disneyland for the party around 2:30pm. The lines weren't very long and they started letting us in early, so we had our wristbands, treat bags, and were actually in line for Buzz Lightyear by 2:50 p.m. To kill time until the pre-party in Mickey's Toontown started at 5pm, we did the full circle tour on the Disneyland Railroad (really missing not having 'it's a small world' to kill time this trip) and Buzz Lightyear again.


At 5pm we went into Mickey's Toontown for the pre-party, which featured three treat trails and some photo ops. Mik enjoyed that two treat trails went through attractions we haven't done in years (Minnie's House, Mickey's House, and Donald's Boat).


The first trail we did was Minnie and Mickey's houses. The entrance for this one queues over the trolley tracks some, but we got in it before it got long enough for that to be an issue. Mik especially enjoyed being able to go through Mickey and Minnie's houses without having to do the character thing, which is why we never do them.


The Donald's Boat trail was the only one with a truly accessible queue as it didn't go over the trolley tracks. It does end where there's no cutout on the curb, but as long as there isn't people parking strollers where they're not supposed to like we experienced it's easy to follow the sidewalk to the cut out.


I'd say that I wish we skipped the trail over by Roger Rabbit's, but then it was the only one in Toontown with my favorite Werther's candy. The accessibility of the queue is absolutely horrible though because it has switchbacks around the trolley tracks where the tracks are crossing each other making it very difficult to avoid getting stuck in the tracks, which we did for a second at one point. I really don't get why they have it set up that way because not only are there a lot of wheelchair and scooter users at these events, but the treat trails are lines that strollers can actually go through so more than half the groups have some sort of wheeled vehicle.


After hitting each trail in Toontown, we decided to head over to Critter Country because Mik had been wanting to try the pulled pork dog and it seemed a good place to start the party at 6pm. We got there right as they were opening the treat stations there and hit one before getting dinner, which was perfect timing as we got our food before the Hungry Bear started to get quite busy.


Once fed, he was ready for hit the treat trails. We started in Critter Country and worked our way back towards Main Street hitting the trail in New Orleans Square and the one along the Rivers of America. The one along the Rivers of America was particularly enjoyable because the water is "spookily" light up and has fog.


Walking down Main Street after dark was fun as they had projections on the buildings and Halloween music playing.


On Main Street we got our Annual Passholder treat, which was a drawstring bag with a Disneyland 60 logo and a brownie pop.


Next we did the treat trail that goes behind the buildings on Main Street towards Tomorrowland. This was our favorite trail because the walls have a lot of attraction posters on them.

In Tomorrowland, we were going to start with the Space Mountain trail, but the line was all the way back up the ramp to the ride entrance. Thus, we decided to do the one near Autopia and check back later. The Autopia one is rather long with you hitting one station and then taking the long ramp up to the Monorail platform before hitting the other stations, but it was also one of the best in that the line moved steadily because of that long gap between the stations.

Next we headed to Fantasyland. The line for the one by the Matterhorn was very long and barely moving, so we skipped it and went to the one that goes through Pixie Hollow, which was another area that was fun to go through without the character aspect.


We then took a break to enjoy the seasonal projections on Sleeping Beauty's Castle and visit the Dwarfs Fountain.


Next we did the trail at the Fantasyland Theatre. At this point, Mik was getting tired and worried about getting out of the park before the parade. Thus, we decided to head out via Tomorrowland checking to see if the lines had gotten shorter at the ones we had skipped earlier.


The Matterhorn one was even longer than before, so we again skipped it. The Space Mountain one we would've done even if it was long because we knew it had the Werther's, but it was actually much shorter than it had been earlier.


On the way out of the park we stopped to take some pictures of the decorations on Main Street and hit one last trail in the square on Main Street.


Overall we really enjoyed Mickey's Halloween Party. Mik particularly enjoyed the experiences of the different treat trails, especially when they went through areas we don't typically go. While it was crowded, the trails definitely got shorter other than the Matterhorn one as it got closer to parade time. Also, even when the lines went past the Trail Entrance signs it always was easy to find the end, which is the main problem that made us hate the Magic Kingdom party last year.


Mik said it just seemed better laid out and organized. Plus, the giant Mickey Pumpkin on Main Street is just totally a necessity. Also, since I had visited Disneyland Paris last week the daytime decoration game seemed much weaker here and I really did need to see the nighttime lights on Main Street to be impressed with Halloween at Disneyland again.


We also really liked that it seemed much easier to collect the snack/healthy options this time including some stations being just apples and carrots. Of course, we still also got a lot of candy, but Mik is happy to have some snacks for the plane trip home tomorrow.


Destination Info:
Mickey's Halloween Party at Disneyland
1313 South Harbor Boulevard
Anaheim, CA 92802

Friday, October 23, 2015

Disney's PCH Grill Beach Side Bonfire Dinner Buffet


 Date of Visit: October 21, 2015

With so many different things we love and always new things to try at the various quick service places around the parks, we very rarely do any table service restaurants at the Disney parks. We also usually end up grabbing dinner at the hotel (or making in our room when at DVC resort), though, because Mik tends to prefer to just do the parks in the morning/early afternoon. Since this hotel doesn't have a quick service option, we decided it was a good time to splurge and do a more table service dinner for once.


Mik tried the fish tacos, mac and cheese, fried chicken, deviled eggs, and shrimp alfredo pasta. He enjoyed everything, but his favorite was the fried chicken.


For dessert, he had to have the pumpkin cheesecake, which he said was the same or similar to the one he enjoyed at the French Market the day before. He also tried the vanilla bean dessert filled ice cream cone. His favorite thing, though, was dipping the house-made marshmallows (strawberry and plain) in the warm chocolate sauce from the S'more Bar.


While it is much pricier than what we tend to spend on a single meal at Disney, it was an enjoyable experience and it was worth doing. Mik particularly enjoyed that he could have just a little of a lot of different things. He also liked that it was one of the few buffet opportunities that did not include characters, which he's not a fan of. Only thing we didn't like was the carpet was very thick making it take a lot of effort to roll him through the seating area, which is why I only took him to see the buffet options once and on the way out he noticed he missed some things he would've gotten if it was easier to take him back to look.

Destination Info:
Disney's PCH Grill
Paradise Pier Hotel
1313 South Harbor Boulevard
Anaheim, CA 92802

Thursday, October 22, 2015

Disneyland: Paint the Night Parade


 Date of Visit: October 21, 2015

We kept putting off see the Paint the Night parade the last two trips because we knew we still had another trip. This being our last Disneyland trip until probably the next D23 Expo, I insisted that we make sure to watch the parade this time. I know Mik usually doesn't like parades, but I remember him really enjoying when the  Electrical Parade was at California Adventure. Thus, I wouldn't let him talk me into seeing it by myself.

We knew we'd be in the parks at night the day we're doing the Halloween Party, but we wanted to enjoy the Halloween stuff instead, so we picked one of the few nights there wasn't a party during our stay. It also meant getting to see the parade at 7pm, which is much more appealing than the 8:45pm or later times to us.

We headed over to Disneyland from our hotel (Paradise Pier this time) around 5pm thinking we could leisurely get some dinner and/or snacks before staking out a spot. That wasn't exactly the case as already much of the front row spots were claimed. Of course, I knew people had been staking out spots really early for this parade, which is why we skipped it the last two trips, but the park was much less crowded than those trips and I didn't think getting a spot on Main Street would be as much of a problem this time.


Mik's main reason he was resistant to even see the parade was having to get a spot hours early. Thus, I agreed that we would still get the Pumpkin Twist he wanted before finding a spot. After that was successfully acquired barely before they closed, we did manage to get a good front spot right next to the reserved area on the square facing The Mad Hatter.


There is also a wheelchair seating area on the corner right where the parade route ends, but the area was still being used as a character greeting area and didn't get set up until about 30 minutes before the parade. We have used that spot for parades before and it is a good view if you get in the front, but it ended up being even more crowded than where we were and it would've been harder to end up with a front row spot there than what we did.



Overall we both really enjoyed the parade. Despite being reluctant to see it, Mik really did love it at least visually. The only thing he didn't like was that the spot we picked ended up being right under a speaker, so the sound bothered him more than usual. He still agreed it was a great spot otherwise, especially considering our options were limited. He especially liked that it ended up seeming easier to get out of the park after the parade than normal, although that did require us to roll off the curb rather than backtracking to a ramp.

Destination Info:
Disneyland
Paint the Night Parade
1313 South Harbor Boulevard
Anaheim, CA 92802

Monday, May 25, 2015

Hyatt Place Anaheim Resort/Convention Center

Date of Visit: May 16-24, 2015

When we lived in AZ we used to always use Mom's Hyatt points and stay at the Hyatt Regency Orange Country. Now that we have to fly we've tried out the Hilton and a Best Western since those are close enough to walk to the parks from. Last D23 Expo the Hilton worked awesome, but we wiped out Mom's points there and they seem to take longer to earn enough for stays compared to Hyatt, which is why she focuses on earning Hyatt points. Thus, we were very excited to see that Hyatt now had one at the convention center when looking at options for the D23 Expo this summer. Being able to use Hyatt points for the hotel also made it feasible to add a May trip this year and make even more use of our Premier annual passes.


I messed up on dates when booking the hotel, so I ended up with three separate reservations including two different ADA room types and one night that didn't let me choose an ADA room. Totally my fault in that I accidentally booked the dates I was originally planning the trip, but had actually ended up with an extra day on both ends in order to use mom's airline miles for the trip (yes, I even had finished booking that before the hotel). Thus, I was totally okay with our first night being in a non-ADA room as long as we were then moved to what I reserved the rest of the trip. However, the guy at check in talked with his manager and found an ADA room that we could use the whole stay if we just waited a few hours for it to be ready.


We ended up with a tub instead of roll-in shower as I mainly booked, but it had a shower seat and it was better than having to change rooms. Really just the extra space for wheelchair and grab bar is why we need the ADA rooms, although when possible the roll-in showers are convenient.


We ended up in what they called a King specialty room. I have no idea what that means, but we're assuming that is about it having bunk beds in the area with the corner sofa bed. Not having to pull out the sofa and still have two beds (well, actually three, but we only used two) was very convenient.



We have long loved Hyatt Places for not only the cheaper point cost, but it being like two rooms with the sitting area and the bed/beds area. This one worked out even better than the others we've stayed at because it really is two rooms with sliding doors that close between the two areas. This might also be a specialty room feature.

Another nice feature is that the blinds are controlled with a remote, which is something I've always wanted for home and now Mik understands why I think it'd be awesome. Of course, he also enjoyed that we each had a TV and it was DirecTV so he knew the channel numbers for his sports and other favs, which was a real treat for him now that we can't have DirecTV and we axed the not as good more expensive Comcast.


Overall we really enjoyed our stay at the Hyatt Place Anaheim Resort/Convention Center. The staff was always very friendly, attentive, and welcoming. And we actually did have to interact with them several times because our keycard kept getting demagnetized the first two days and we also mistakenly were charged for parking. The breakfast was as expected, although with food being one of Mik's favorite parts of Disney we mostly skipped it.

As much as we love this place, it's borderline far to walk to parks. Totally will be great for D23 Expo and would stay for other future trips, but the Hyatt House under construction even closer to Disneyland is an extremely appealing option once it opens this December. It'll probably be more points, but weighing that with being closer and having a kitchen may make it our pick for Disneyland when we can't use DVC for Grand Californian. Until then, though, the Hyatt Place is enjoyable and makes it possible we may be able to do Disneyland not just every other year for the Expo again, especially if we can snag mileage award tickets to/from Orange County with mom's miles, which doesn't seem to be easy without planning way in advance (6-9 months) and/or being extremely flexible (ex. flying up to Seattle to get to D.C. and 3 hour layovers). 

Hint/Shoutout to Mom: Keep traveling for work and racking up the American miles and Hyatt points, please. We love them almost as much as you!

Destination Info:
Hyatt Place Anaheim Resort/Convention Center
2035 S. Harbor Blvd.
Anaheim, CA 92802

Saturday, May 23, 2015

Disneyland Diamond Celebration 24-Hour Event

Date of Visit: May 22, 2015



We didn’t actually last 24-hours, but we never planned to and actually Mik ended up lasting much longer than I expected. We left the hotel around 4:30am and Mik enjoyed his Diamond Mickey Rice Krispy treat that I had brought back for him a previous day.




 We were in line for security by 5am. It was much like the Expo, although the park was already opened so it actually was moving pretty smoothly by the time we got there. Once through security it was no line to get into Disneyland. We briefly stopped in the entrance plaza to get a photo of the diamond as the day before too many people were taking pictures when we tried and this time mostly people were rushing to get on to Main Street. Even stopping for some pictures we were on Main Street by 5:30am.


Main Street was a little crazy with it being wall to wall people back to the Emporium. Mostly people were not pushy, though, and the only real issue was that we got mixed in with the Emporium line. Once we figure out how to get out of that and then trying to get enough space to go at the right angle across the tracks it we ended up in a decent spot to wait for the park to open.


While we were around the corner from being able to see the fireworks go off over the Castle, we still got to enjoy the fireworks go off behind the train station and the shops on Main Street. Then it was the normal surge of crowd at park opening other than it was much farther backed up on Main Street. Still we got through and walk on to Buzz Lightyear within 10 minutes.


We just missed the wheelchair vehicle when we got to the front, so we actually had to wait to ride, but that’s pretty normal and actually had a nice conversation with the Cast Member since the ride was still empty and they didn’t have to direct people unloading much. As usual we went around twice. The second time we got stopped in the photo tunnel and I racked up one of my best scores.


After Buzz Lightyear, we wandered over to the Castle to get some photos with the 60th logo, which had been unveiled after we left the park the day before.



We then walked over to the Toontown Station and rode the Disneyland Railroad around the park once. I thought it was funny when we went by Autopia and Mik asked what that ride was. I guess it’s been awhile since we last took him on it.



After the train, it was not even 7:30am and Mik was already asking to go back to the hotel. We stopped for some breakfast in Fantasyland including a 24-hour event souvenir mug and then got a 60th bucket in Frontierland before he decided that we should brave the pin store line before leaving.


The line for the Little Green Men Store Command ended up reminding us of the D23 Expo. It certainly does seem crazy to stand in line for what ended up being five hours just to spend money. Honestly, I probably wouldn’t do it if Mik wasn’t interested in it. It’s just ends up being good quality time and certainly preferable than ending up back at the hotel after only a few hours in the park, which is what happens most days with Mik. About two hours into the wait they announced that they were out of the Being Up All Night Makes me Dopey pin, which is the pin Mik really wanted. We didn’t want to bail, though, because we had already waited so long and we knew there was still a decent amount of other pins to choose from even though we didn’t know exactly what they were.


In the end, though, when we got to the front they had the Dopey pins (restocked at some point?). This gave Mik enough motivation to stay in the parks for lunch before heading back to the hotel. At first we went to the nearby Tomorrowland Terrace, but after 15 minutes of the line going nowhere I bailed that idea and decided to find somewhere else with a line actually moving. We ended up at the healthy snack spot in Tomorrowland, which had no line and was actually a much better option all around for lunch for both of us. Also, picked up some Mickey pretzels at a nearby cart with very short line to carry back to hotel for a snack later.


After refueling and resting a little from standing in line for hours, we headed out of the park leaving around 1:45pm. The park was crowded at this point and apparently it closed for capacity not longer after that, but actually it was not as crazy as we thought (Buzz line was still only 20 minutes when we left and we’ve seen worse on spring break and summer trips) and it was the longest park day with Mik in years. Definitely glad we did it even if we did miss out on most of the special event stuff.

Destination Info:
Disneyland
1313 South Harbor Boulevard
Anaheim, CA 92802

Thursday, May 21, 2015

Disneyland: Sleeping Beauty Castle Virtual Walkthrough Experience


Date of Visit: May 21, 2015


Mik wasn't interested in going on any rides this morning after two rounds of Buzz Lightyear. However, he still wanted to hang out in the parks long enough to get lunch. Thus, we wandered over to the castle for him to visit the dwarfs, which he likes doing and for once there wasn't some character hanging out over there and we got to really enjoy it including seeing the whole fountain show. Then I remember there was the accessible version of the castle walkthrough, which we've never done before.


The accessible experience is located in a room off to the left of the path through the castle when looking at the back of the castle. The room is decorated with things that fit the theme including a case of royal crowns, jewels, and trinkets and a royal seeming bench that you can watch the virtual walkthrough from.


The virtual walkthrough is a video that plays on loop. It is basically an animated version of going through the attraction and the story is read aloud as well as shown with captions on the screen. It is really well done and Mik thought it was good for what it was, but we only watched a little bit of it because he just isn't interested in Sleeping Beauty at all.

Destination Info:
Disneyland
1313 South Harbor Boulevard
Anaheim, CA 92802

Monday, August 19, 2013

Disneyland: Enchanted Tiki Tiki Realms at Disney Gallery

Disneyland: Enchanted Tiki Tiki Realms at Disney Gallery
Date of Visit: August 12, 2013

The Disney Gallery is located next to The Disneyland Story and Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln exhibit/show area on Main Street. It is partly a store, as most of it is artwork for sale, but it also is a themed exhibit. The current exhibit called “Tiki Tiki Realms: Celebrating 50 Years of Enchantment,” which is about the Tiki Tiki Room attraction.

Disneyland: Enchanted Tiki Tiki Realms at Disney Gallery


Mik enjoyed rolling around and viewing the different artwork and seeing the animatronics up close. Of course, his favorite, though, was the miniature collectibles they sell in the shop.

Destination Info:

Disney Gallery at Disneyland
1313 South Harbor Boulevard
Anaheim, CA 92802

Saturday, August 10, 2013

Disneyland: Mickey’s Magical Map


Date of Visit: August 9, 2013


Mickey’s Magical Map is a musical show performed in the Fantasyland Theatre.  We arrived about 30 minutes before the show and were directed to wait at the bottom of the ramp that leads up to the restrooms by the theater.



About 20 minutes before the show they led us up to the top of the theater near the train station. This was kind of a hassle, since it leads through the area barely large enough for people to be waiting for their party using the restrooms.  I don’t get why they don’t juts direct you around the other way like when you go to the train station, as that area is much wider and is only crowded when the train just unloaded.


We were led down a ramp to select a spot in the flat bottom area of the theater right before they let everyone else into the theater.  Since it is not stadium style, we decided to take the last of the two spots in the front for wheelchairs, so our view would not end up blocked by someone in front of us.

Disneyland: Mickey’s Magical Map
I enjoyed the show, as it was a kind of interesting musical adventure featuring Apprentice Mickey and songs from a variety of Disney movies.  Being in front was good for the view, but Mik absolutely hated the loudness of the show, which did seem to partially have to do with them trumpeting right in front of us in parts and the speakers being right there for everything.  He did not really want to see it in the first place, so was quite annoyed with it in the end because besides fireworks it is the only thing we have done in a long time that has bothered him.

Destination Info:
Disneyland
1313 South Harbor Boulevard
Anaheim, CA 92802