First time-3 night 2 parks

[kmill99]

Great point about DCA closing earlier. Those last 2 hours at DL until 12 can be used to great advantage (literally walked on RotR before it closed. And the whole ride worked like I haven't seen at HS past 4 times I rode it)

 

[petunia]

at 8am when the parks open.

At Disneyland the onsite guests have early opening. Everyone goes through bag check and security from 7am. Everyone then lines up at the entrance turnsyles in the esplanade. At 7.15am they open the gates and everyone gets scanned in.

Everyone can go onto Main Street and up to The Hub. There is a roped off entrance in from of The Plaza restaurant for onsite guests to access early opening from 7.30am.

All other guests are held at the hub.

At 8am there is a welcome announcement, all the ropes are dropped and all the lands are open and Genie + becomes active.

Regardless of if Im in the park or not I can make a genie at 8? And then follows same as wdw, either next one is 2 hrs after or after scanned into current one?

 

[petunia]

The MagicBand+ does not work for the hotels at DLR at all, so it would just be for your tickets/Lightning Lanes. It doesn't matter where you are staying. Only the MB+ will work at DLR, so no regular MB or 2.0 versions.

Not sure what version ours are but they are several years old..so assuming they will not work?

 

[BrianL]

Not sure what version ours are but they are several years old..so assuming they will not work?

the MB+ have the lights and vibration effects and a charging cord - you'd know if you have them I think. They have been out for a couple of years now though.

 

[Bad Pink Tink 2.0]

Regardless of if Im in the park or not I can make a genie at 8? And then follows same as wdw, either next one is 2 hrs after or after scanned into current one?

No you have to be in the park for Genie + to be activated.

Once you are in the park and Genie+ is activated, then yes it follows the same as WDW, next one is 2 hours after or after scanned into current one

 

[twodogs]

at 8am when the parks open.

At Disneyland the onsite guests have early opening. Everyone goes through bag check and security from 7am. Everyone then lines up at the entrance turnsyles in the esplanade. At 7.15am they open the gates and everyone gets scanned in.

Everyone can go onto Main Street and up to The Hub. There is a roped off entrance in from of The Plaza restaurant for onsite guests to access early opening from 7.30am.

All other guests are held at the hub.

At 8am there is a welcome announcement, all the ropes are dropped and all the lands are open and Genie + becomes active.

When we were there in July and then a few weeks ago, we had EE and I was able to book my first LL right when we scanned into the parks, even though it was before 7:30am and the parks opened to all at 8am. The RETURN time could not be before 8am regular park opening, but I could start booking earlier than 8 am.

 

[pharmama]

Sadly I dont think world of color is playing on our dates..

It's definitely running on your dates, even though I don't know exactly what they are other than end of November. WOC runs nightly unless it's down for maintenance which I don't believe is currently projected on any calendars. Perhaps you were looking for showtimes for the regular WOC which indeed will not be running. But they will be running World of Color: Season of Light which is the holiday version (and my favorite WOC show, though I admit I haven't seen the newest Disney100 show). Expect two shows per night (9pm and 10:15pm) when DCA has a 10pm closing.

 

[Kit Jackson]

Unless you are major serious Star Wars fans, you can skip Galaxy's Edge, because it's pretty much a carbon copy clone.

There are other rides with the same name, but there are substantial differences so they are worth riding even for WDW expert veterans, like Pirates of the Caribbean.

Visit CarsLand at night. It is amazing. It is Disney imagineering and building at its absolute finest. Riding Radiator Springs Racers at night time is a different experience from riding it during the daytime, but the ride is amazing at any time of day.

As other people have said, all PhotoPass pictures (not just the ride photos) are included with Genie+.

If the reason you are not getting Park Hoppers is financial, I respect that. Everyone has a different vacation budget and decides how to allocate the funds differently, and that's totally okay. However, if you can afford it, I highly recommend it because it so easy to bounce back and forth between the parks. This can be helpful if rides are down or if one park has significantly shorter wait times than the other.

Here are my nerdy Disney suggestions. Disneyana on Main Street has concept art, a map, and a model of Disneyland on opening day. Take a minute near the Partner's statue, look at the castle, see all of the lands emanating from the Hub, and think about the fact that Walt Disney imagined, designed, and supervised the construction of what you see, and that it's still here in a very smilier form more than 60 years later.

 

[ktlm]

Great point about DCA closing earlier. Those last 2 hours at DL until 12 can be used to great advantage

I can't believe I forgot about that! We always hop over to DL for those last 2 hours! If we aren't going to WOC, we hop right before or after it starts to beat the crowd out of the park. That would be very useful on a 2 day trip too when you don't have much time. Another reason hoppers are great at DLR if you can fit them in the budget.

 

[chezcurrie]

Another vote for hoppers. As context would you be ok going to Epcot and only spending time in future world, when world showcase is right there? That’s basically hoppers at Disneyland because of how close the parks are. It takes longer to walk to the buses from the turnstiles at WDW than to park hop at Dland.

For reference we don’t do hoppers at WDW because it causes us to go too hard, but at Dland, especially with only 2 days, hoppers will give you MORE flexibility.

Have a great trip!

Edited: added info

 

[petunia]

You'll want to hop once you realize how close it is. Make sure to utilize the Monorail if you want to take a shopping break. It goes from Nemo's ride right into the heart of downtown Disney. November weather is cool for California, 70-80s during the day, around the 50s at night but not anywhere near as humid as WDW. I am not able to give Genie + advice as of yet but from friends visiting it's essentially the same, and you can now use the Magicband + in the parks which I have yet to try. Do not eat at the Ihop across the street...go to Dennys. Ihop is insanely expensive for some reason, 13 bucks for an egg and 2 pieces of bacon expensive. (Learned that the hard way

It's definitely running on your dates, even though I don't know exactly what they are other than end of November. WOC runs nightly unless it's down for maintenance which I don't believe is currently projected on any calendars. Perhaps you were looking for showtimes for the regular WOC which indeed will not be running. But they will be running World of Color: Season of Light which is the holiday version (and my favorite WOC show, though I admit I haven't seen the newest Disney100 show). Expect two shows per night (9pm and 10:15pm) when DCA has a 10pm closing.

oh really?? Ya I checked the shows calendar and it just had the holiday fireworks the one night so I figured no WOC (which I had not even heard of until yeasterday)...what time can you enter the VQ?

 

[irlandaise]

oh really?? Ya I checked the shows calendar and it just had the holiday fireworks the one night so I figured no WOC (which I had not even heard of until yeasterday)...what time can you enter the VQ?

Were you looking at the calendar for DCA? Here's the schedule for the last five days of November:

https://disneyland.disney.go.com/calendars/five-day/2023-11-26/#/disney-california-adventure/

World of Color is listed as playing twice every night.

 

[NorCalFanatic]

If you rope drop DCA you can knock out almost every ride before noon. Radiator Springs is amazing Day and Night, as is the Incredicoaster. I highly recommend Guardians as well, it's a totally different experience than tower to terror (and I loved tower of terror, but rocking out to the soundtrack makes it a whole new eperience. If you use Genie + and rope drop Disneyland, try and prioritize rides without LL first. Book your first rides though as soon as you can.

The Holiday Food Festival will be going on in DCA, so it will get crowded there mid day as people park hop to eat. I find the food overall better at DCA (although we enjoy the food at both parks) people and definitely seem to migrate there for lunch....

If you can catch the piano guy at Golden Horseshoe it's always entertaining while grabbing a quick bite to it.

 

[LKing]

Genie+ includes your Photopass pictures at DLR. That is an added bonus. You can get a lot done with it.

However, MB+ do NOT automatically detect ride photos at Disneyland/DCA. When you exit a ride, take a picture of your photo and later, when you have time, enter the code into your app. The ride photo will appear in your photos.

Those last 2 hours at DL until 12 can be used to great advantage (literally walked on RotR before it closed.

Note that ROTR closes around 9 pm.

oh really?? Ya I checked the shows calendar and it just had the holiday fireworks the one night so I figured no WOC (which I had not even heard of until yeasterday)...what time can you enter the VQ?

World of Color is in DCA. Fireworks (and Fantasmic when it is operating) are in Disneyland.

 

[Curiousporpoise]

What time can you make your first g+?

As soon as you enter the parks. You cannot book before entering like WDW.

 

[SpaceMan5]

Visit CarsLand at night. It is amazing. It is Disney imagineering and building at its absolute finest. Riding Radiator Springs Racers at night time is a different experience from riding it during the daytime, but the ride is amazing at any time of day.

Amen to that. I was blown away when I first saw it at night.

The Imagineers hit that out of the park, mic dropped it and whatever other cliche you can think of.

 

[petunia]

Were you looking at the calendar for DCA? Here's the schedule for the last five days of November:

https://disneyland.disney.go.com/calendars/five-day/2023-11-26/#/disney-california-adventure/

World of Color is listed as playing twice every night.

Am I crazy, Im not seeing it from the link..this is what I see

 

[pharmama]

Am I crazy, Im not seeing it from the link..this is what I see View attachment 808540

Try clearing your cookies or using an incognito browser window. I see World of Color Season of Light under Fireworks & Nighttime Entertainment (and a bunch of other stuff under Shows as well) on the same link.

 

[irlandaise]

Am I crazy, Im not seeing it from the link..this is what I see View attachment 808540

Petunia, do you have another web browser you can try? That page uses javascript and I sometimes have trouble with Firefox not displaying all JS elements.

 

[petunia]

We are used to scanning everything with our magicbands, and since they are the old ones wont work at Disneyland, how will we scan into the park/genie+..scan from my phone I assume? If so, I know in parks have wifi as we dont usually get data, as out of country..will wifi work at park gates for entry?