First Disneyland. Please help.

[DisneyFan13US]

My wife and I recently returned from WDW so she could run the half marathon over WDW Marathon Weekend. While we were there she started talking about wanting to do a very short weekend trip back to WDW for the Wine and Dine Half Marathon. Jokingly, I said that we should go to Disneyland instead so she could run in the Disneyland Half Marathon to complete the Coast to Coast Challenge. I assumed it was one of those conversations that you have and nothing ever comes from it. I mean, no way do we do two Disney vacations in a year. However, her love for running took over and she agreed to look into it. That night she showed me a text she had received from her mom with reservations for all of us for a week in September at Peacock Suites (her parents are members of Shell Vacation Club)!!

After planning every detail for our last trip for myself, my wife, and my parents, I'm ready to just sit back and relax and not plan this trip down to the second. However, I do have some quick questions.

I know flying into SNA is ideal, however flights to LAX are cheaper. We usually fly Southwest being in Dallas but their September dates won't open until the end of February. Any chances their prices are cheaper or would it be better to just book now? Right now it's around 540 round trip for the both of us on United.

How bad is the drive from LAX to Disneyland? I know it's not nearly the same beast but driving in Dallas rush hour traffic doesn't bother me. I also know enough to not take the I-5.

Any other hints or tips I should know about? When we were at WDW, we had Tonga Toast and Breakfast Lasagna solely because of the DIS.

 

[ClosetDisneyJunkie]

My wife and I recently returned from WDW so she could run the half marathon over WDW Marathon Weekend. While we were there she started talking about wanting to do a very short weekend trip back to WDW for the Wine and Dine Half Marathon. Jokingly, I said that we should go to Disneyland instead so she could run in the Disneyland Half Marathon to complete the Coast to Coast Challenge. I assumed it was one of those conversations that you have and nothing ever comes from it. I mean, no way do we do two Disney vacations in a year. However, her love for running took over and she agreed to look into it. That night she showed me a text she had received from her mom with reservations for all of us for a week in September at Peacock Suites (her parents are members of Shell Vacation Club)!!

After planning every detail for our last trip for myself, my wife, and my parents, I'm ready to just sit back and relax and not plan this trip down to the second. However, I do have some quick questions.

I know flying into SNA is ideal, however flights to LAX are cheaper. We usually fly Southwest being in Dallas but their September dates won't open until the end of February. Any chances their prices are cheaper or would it be better to just book now? Right now it's around 540 round trip for the both of us on United.

How bad is the drive from LAX to Disneyland? I know it's not nearly the same beast but driving in Dallas rush hour traffic doesn't bother me. I also know enough to not take the I-5.

Any other hints or tips I should know about? When we were at WDW, we had Tonga Toast and Breakfast Lasagna solely because of the DIS.

Nice! I have a couple of good friends who are runners and I can totally see them doing something like this.

I can't speak intelligently about the airfare question, but maybe someone else on the board from TX can speak up.

The drive from LAX to Disneyland can be very tough from a traffic perspective. I haven't found it to be unbearable, I've done it several times and if prices are significantly cheaper I'd do it again, but it's far from ideal. It'll depend a lot on the day/time that you're coming in (and conditions, even if you come in during a non-peak time you can get unlucky and have an accident in front of you to fight through). But if you're asking less about traffic and more about the experience of driving down there, I find the nervousness about it to be overblown. Map out your destination/exits in advance, and you'll be fine. You switch freeways several times from LAX to DLR, but things are well marked and it's not that complex of a trip.

If the timing is tight in any way, though, I'd pay more to go to SNA.

Not everyone experiences driving in SoCal the same, of course. It doesn't bother me much at all (aside from crawling along at times).

As a WDW vet, now, I'd recommend taking a look at Hydroguy's thread on the topic, it's great! Lots of good info there.

http://www.disboards.com/showthread.php?t=1162599