Disneyland without Genie Plus

[disneyseniors]

We just got back from our first trip in six years and we did 3 days in the park (actually 2 1/2)), Genie plus was an absolute god send the first two days but by day 3, we decided not to purchase it as we really didn’t need it. My advice for a 5 day visit would be to purchase it at least two days. By our third morning, we only had to do the FL rides which we easily knocked out in the first two hours on Standby and by the time we left around 2:00pm we had ridden nearly every ride in both parks (except Peter Pan and Small World). We rode BTMR 3x and rode Matterhorn, POTC, Guardians, and Incedicoaster 2x.
The crowd level was 8 or 9 on each of our days in the parks. The longest line we stood in was about 25 minutes and the average wait time was about 8 minutes. This is the sole reason we never rode PP., in that I didn’t want to wait more than 30 minutes.
It really comes down to a strong rope drop strategy (zag while others zig) and of course utilizing Genie plus, though I really think you won’t need it more than 2-3 of your 5 days.

I see that you said the crowd levels were an 8 and 9! That seems high. I have a question about the crowds. We are thinking of going to DL for the first time the first of April. Are the crowd levels as high as reported in WDW? I was just wondering if we should expect mega crowds as a "norm" now? Thanks for the great report too

 

[Wilcojoe]

Just started gathering info about G+. So if read the thread correctly, you're waiting 30-60 minutes for G+ rides (I know there's a wide range)? How much time are you saving with it?

No that would be the wait time for Standby lines. Our average wait for Genie plus rides this week (crowd levels of 8 and 9) was about 8 minutes. The longest we waited for any Genie plus ride was 25 minutes.

 

[Wilcojoe]

I see that you said the crowd levels were an 8 and 9! That seems high. I have a question about the crowds. We are thinking of going to DL for the first time the first of April. Are the crowd levels as high as reported in WDW? I was just wondering if we should expect mega crowds as a "norm" now? Thanks for the great report too

I would expect 8 to 9 level crowds from now thru summer. But keep in mind it’s really only terribly busy from about 11:30am-7:00pm. The first 3 hours of the day are absolutely perfect, with minimal lines during the first two hours specifically.

 

[disneyseniors]

[Thank ="Wilcojoe, post: 63839180, member: 581455"]
I would expect 8 to 9 level crowds from now thru summer. But keep in mind it’s really only terribly busy from about 11:30am-7:00pm. The first 3 hours of the day are absolutely perfect, with minimal lines during the first two hours specifically.
[/QUOTE]

Thank you so much. We are morning people, so the first 2 hours would work out for us. I really don't want to do GE or LL, but we'll see.

 

[LizzyS]

Just started gathering info about G+. So if read the thread correctly, you're waiting 30-60 minutes for G+ rides (I know there's a wide range)? How much time are you saving with it?

I actually found most return times to be less than half an hour or almost immediate. That will vary, of course, but I felt like the return times were a bit quicker than they were with Maxpass.

 

[LizzyS]

I would expect 8 to 9 level crowds from now thru summer. But keep in mind it’s really only terribly busy from about 11:30am-7:00pm. The first 3 hours of the day are absolutely perfect, with minimal lines during the first two hours specifically.

Getting there at open is the best advice possible, agreed.

 

[duckboyone]

Personally I would suggest 4 days with park hoppers as opposed to your 5 day schedule. I honestly don’t think I could spend 2 entire days in DCA. Four days with hoppers will allow you to ride everything you want and see the shows. There isn’t much going on right now with shows but that will change when you guys visit.

That extra $60 for a park hopper, for 6 passes, even across a few days, is just too rich for my blood unfortunately. And, I didn't realize that the Hyperion wasn't showing anything currently.

But we love DCA enough to usually fill a couple of days. We repeat ride the good ones, and when my kids were younger we would spend a lot of time at the Animation Academy and Redwood Creek area.

Now, w/o the Hyperion and my kids being older, maybe it will be tougher to fill two days, but I think we'll find plenty to do. We'd better, we're stuck with it

 

[Kit Jackson]

Yeah, now it's $69 for one day, $169 for advance purchase, and $200 for regular purchase and all your pictures. We use the heck out of it!

Genie+ includes PhotoPass. Based on these numbers for PhotoPass, (and if I did the math correctly, which given that it's me, is a HUGE if) it seems as thought it is less expensive to buy Genie+ for a 5-7 day trip then it would be to purchase PhotoPass for the same length of time. For someone who wants PhotoPass, it might make more sense to buy Genie+ for that, use it for the photos, and then decide once in the parks if they want to use it to access LL for rides.

 

[katyringo]

Yeah, now it's $69 for one day, $169 for advance purchase, and $200 for regular purchase and all your pictures. We use the heck out of it!

just for clarity those prices are WDW prices.
Photopass + 1 week (active for 7 days) is $78 at Disneyland. For one day it is $39.

OR it comes with genie + for $20 a day.

OP is going for 5 days so if they are interested in pictures, but are absolutly sure they won't purchase genie+ they would be better purchasing photopass+ 1 week.

if they think they might buy Genie + at all- they would be better to buy it for at least 1 person each day just for the pictures.