danimaroo
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Sep 21, 2011
Chapter Two: Ive got a GOLDEN TICKET!
Day 1: November 29th, 2012
As we left off, we were FINALLY making our way over to Disneyland!! I was so excited, I could hardly contain myself.
Now, in Disneyland, its a lot more common to stay at a Good Neighbor Hotel, meaning an off-site but close-by hotel. Disneyland does not have the space like Disney World in terms of creating more resorts/hotels,
So, Disneyland instead teamed up with certain hotels, calling them Good Neighbor Hotels where you can book Disney packages. Wed considered staying at the Grand Californian.. until we saw the price tag.
I think the only way well ever stay there is if we buy into DVC, hahaha.
ANYWAY, the nice thing about our hotel that we chose was the location. It was literally right across the street from the Disneyland entrance. The photo below shows the view from right in front of our hotel.
We walked across the street and of course I made us take photos in front of the sign!
The walk is maybe 5 minutes, and then youve reached the ticketing area, right before you go through bag check/into the parks area.
We couldnt go in quite yet because we had a few big things we needed to take care of first!
We approached the ticketing booth and the CM who helped us was super nice! I wish I remembered her name because she was just so friendly and helpful.
We told her we wanted to purchase PREMIER ANNUAL PASSPORTS!
Okay, for those of you who have been following along with my PTR, youll obviously remember how Matt and I made the decision to buy these.
If you didnt follow my PTR, Matt and I figured out pricing-wise that we would actually save money between all of the trips we have planned for the next year if we bough the Premier Annual Passport (the AP that gets you into BOTH parks for a year), vs. buying tickets for each individual trip.
This was a huge decision because of the large amount of money this requires. I mean, these things are not cheap $850 per pass!
I dont think people buy these very often because the woman had to go and get them from a different booth or something, haha.
She handed us the pamphlet that explains what exactly the Premier Annual Passport is, but wed done our research and knew what we were getting ourselves into, then asked for our IDs.
Obviously, like I said it gets us into both Disneyland and Disney World parks, along with all waterparks in Disney World, and Disney Quest. It also gets us a 20% discount on most Disney merchandise, and 10-15% off most food in Disneyland parks.
Disney World there are less food discounts, but you do still get the 20% off merchandise (which is super helpful, by the way!).
We were both ridiculously excited, and I just HAD to take photos of the whole experience because like I said in my intro, Im a goober.
While we waited for her to input all of our info into the system, I was getting antsy looking at the entrance
We told her it was my first visit and my birthday, and she gave me a birthday pin which she decorated all awesomely! Probably the best one Ive ever gotten!
She also gave Matt an Im Celebrating pin, which I thought was pretty cute.
Finally, after we signed a few papers and whatnot, we were given
THE GOLDEN TICKETS!!!!
Oh Mylanta. We were both SUPER excited. I mean, this is the ultimate park ticket right there!
I dont think this grin wiped off my face for awhile.
While there, she also printed out our Holiday Time Tour tickets for Saturday, as well.
We thanked her and were finally on our way into Disneyland! Obviously that was our number one stop, since we had to go into the park where it all began.
I just loved how they decorated even the GATES. I mean, Disney is just the best when it comes to the smallest details, right?
In Disneyland, they scan your tickets VERY differently than in WDW. There are no finger scanners or anything like that; instead, they scan a barcode on the back of your ticket.
I think this is because there are a lot of locals who go to Disneyland and have APs, so the need to check peoples APs and IDs is much higher.
The downside to this is the lines to get in move MUCH slower. You often have people who haven't signed the back of the APs, don't have a photo, completely don't realize you need to buy your tickets at the ticketing booth, etc.
Anyway, when the CM scanned ours, she told us we needed to go get our photo taken with a PhotoPass photographer.
Basically after they did that, whenever our AP got scanned in the system, our photo would show up on their screen, thus not needing to see our IDs (though ours never showed up because it apparently takes 48 hours for the system to register them or something).
Fortunately, there was a PhotoPass photographer right near the front entrance by the train station, so we hopped in line to get our AP photos taken.
The train was coming in just as we walked in, and I was so excited!!
I mean, how cool is it to be seeing the original park?! I was in awe, and we hadnt even made it to Main Street yet!
We decided this would be the perfect time to have a PhotoPass photographer take a photo of us looking all pretty, so after we got our AP photos taken, we had him take a few with my camera in front of the entrance.
I was pretty happy with how this one turned out below!
After we had our photos taken, we headed to Main Street for the first time I just love this sign so much. I am fairly certain I got a little choked up seeing it.
The first thing I saw was the beautiful tree. Oh that tree was gorgeous! This being my first time in Disney during the Christmas season, I was immediately just thrown into sensory overload. Every ornament on the tree was just beautiful.
Honestly, you probably would have found me in a coma if Id walked in at night and seen everything lit up, haha.
Matt then pointed out the neat gas lamps on the street. I LOVED these, it is just SO perfect. Some of them even had vintage little mailboxes attached to them.
Next: the reveal of the castle for the first time ever, and continuing to explore Main Street!
Continued in next post
Day 1: November 29th, 2012
As we left off, we were FINALLY making our way over to Disneyland!! I was so excited, I could hardly contain myself.
Now, in Disneyland, its a lot more common to stay at a Good Neighbor Hotel, meaning an off-site but close-by hotel. Disneyland does not have the space like Disney World in terms of creating more resorts/hotels,
So, Disneyland instead teamed up with certain hotels, calling them Good Neighbor Hotels where you can book Disney packages. Wed considered staying at the Grand Californian.. until we saw the price tag.
I think the only way well ever stay there is if we buy into DVC, hahaha.
ANYWAY, the nice thing about our hotel that we chose was the location. It was literally right across the street from the Disneyland entrance. The photo below shows the view from right in front of our hotel.
We walked across the street and of course I made us take photos in front of the sign!
The walk is maybe 5 minutes, and then youve reached the ticketing area, right before you go through bag check/into the parks area.
We couldnt go in quite yet because we had a few big things we needed to take care of first!
We approached the ticketing booth and the CM who helped us was super nice! I wish I remembered her name because she was just so friendly and helpful.
We told her we wanted to purchase PREMIER ANNUAL PASSPORTS!
Okay, for those of you who have been following along with my PTR, youll obviously remember how Matt and I made the decision to buy these.
If you didnt follow my PTR, Matt and I figured out pricing-wise that we would actually save money between all of the trips we have planned for the next year if we bough the Premier Annual Passport (the AP that gets you into BOTH parks for a year), vs. buying tickets for each individual trip.
This was a huge decision because of the large amount of money this requires. I mean, these things are not cheap $850 per pass!
I dont think people buy these very often because the woman had to go and get them from a different booth or something, haha.
She handed us the pamphlet that explains what exactly the Premier Annual Passport is, but wed done our research and knew what we were getting ourselves into, then asked for our IDs.
Obviously, like I said it gets us into both Disneyland and Disney World parks, along with all waterparks in Disney World, and Disney Quest. It also gets us a 20% discount on most Disney merchandise, and 10-15% off most food in Disneyland parks.
Disney World there are less food discounts, but you do still get the 20% off merchandise (which is super helpful, by the way!).
We were both ridiculously excited, and I just HAD to take photos of the whole experience because like I said in my intro, Im a goober.
While we waited for her to input all of our info into the system, I was getting antsy looking at the entrance
We told her it was my first visit and my birthday, and she gave me a birthday pin which she decorated all awesomely! Probably the best one Ive ever gotten!
She also gave Matt an Im Celebrating pin, which I thought was pretty cute.
Finally, after we signed a few papers and whatnot, we were given
THE GOLDEN TICKETS!!!!
Oh Mylanta. We were both SUPER excited. I mean, this is the ultimate park ticket right there!
I dont think this grin wiped off my face for awhile.
While there, she also printed out our Holiday Time Tour tickets for Saturday, as well.
We thanked her and were finally on our way into Disneyland! Obviously that was our number one stop, since we had to go into the park where it all began.
I just loved how they decorated even the GATES. I mean, Disney is just the best when it comes to the smallest details, right?
In Disneyland, they scan your tickets VERY differently than in WDW. There are no finger scanners or anything like that; instead, they scan a barcode on the back of your ticket.
I think this is because there are a lot of locals who go to Disneyland and have APs, so the need to check peoples APs and IDs is much higher.
The downside to this is the lines to get in move MUCH slower. You often have people who haven't signed the back of the APs, don't have a photo, completely don't realize you need to buy your tickets at the ticketing booth, etc.
Anyway, when the CM scanned ours, she told us we needed to go get our photo taken with a PhotoPass photographer.
Basically after they did that, whenever our AP got scanned in the system, our photo would show up on their screen, thus not needing to see our IDs (though ours never showed up because it apparently takes 48 hours for the system to register them or something).
Fortunately, there was a PhotoPass photographer right near the front entrance by the train station, so we hopped in line to get our AP photos taken.
The train was coming in just as we walked in, and I was so excited!!
I mean, how cool is it to be seeing the original park?! I was in awe, and we hadnt even made it to Main Street yet!
We decided this would be the perfect time to have a PhotoPass photographer take a photo of us looking all pretty, so after we got our AP photos taken, we had him take a few with my camera in front of the entrance.
I was pretty happy with how this one turned out below!
After we had our photos taken, we headed to Main Street for the first time I just love this sign so much. I am fairly certain I got a little choked up seeing it.
The first thing I saw was the beautiful tree. Oh that tree was gorgeous! This being my first time in Disney during the Christmas season, I was immediately just thrown into sensory overload. Every ornament on the tree was just beautiful.
Honestly, you probably would have found me in a coma if Id walked in at night and seen everything lit up, haha.
Matt then pointed out the neat gas lamps on the street. I LOVED these, it is just SO perfect. Some of them even had vintage little mailboxes attached to them.
Next: the reveal of the castle for the first time ever, and continuing to explore Main Street!
Continued in next post
But congrats to you guys for taking the plunge to get them, they are so amazing! The discounts alone made them so totally worth it for our trips. We bought SO much stuff with that 20% discount.
I'm sure you can convince him... 
But seriously, I just adored it.
I know exactly what you mean though! The whole park has a familiar feel to it, but then things aren't exactly where you expect them to be. It feel so disconcerting! After going to DL twice in a row though, I found it a little strange when we finally went back to WDW again. I caught myself taking the wrong way to Space Mountain or looking for Star Tours in Tomorrowland. 
can we still be friends??) I'm not sure I would like the Haunted Mansion all changed. It's my favorite ride! I mentioned to my Mom that WDW's Mansion is better because it's longer and she looked at me like I had 2 heads because I noticed the differences. I'm glad I'm not the only one 
