Help Needed Picking Which Days for DL & DCA

[shaycamp21]

My DH, myself and youngest daughter (who’s 10) be in California for 2 weeks and for the SoCal portion of our trip we are staying at the Element Anaheim (got a great deal on a 1 bedroom queen suite—hope it’s as nice as it looks) from Thurs Aug 11 - Thurs Aug 18. We have decided on 3 days in the parks— 2 days in DL and one in DCA (no park hoppers but we plan on getting Genie + and hope buy a LL for RoR & Radiator Springs Racers). I am trying to figure out which days are best to go considering summer will be busy. Since we plan on staying late doing fireworks, Fantasmic, MSEP and WOC (willing to do dessert parties and or dinner packages for good seating), I was thinking that it would be better not to have any consecutive park days so we balance the busyness of the parks with a more relaxing day such as a beach day in between plus we can sleep in. So was thinking something like this:

Thurs Aug 11- arrival day (driving down from Monterey) hoping to do dinner in DTD
Fri Aug. 12 - DL
Sat Aug 13 - Laguna (or another Beach)
Sun Aug 14 - DLA DCA (not sure which park would be best was leaning towards DL)
Mon Aug 15 - sightseeing or could do beach here instead
Tues, Aug 16- DCA ( or DL)
Wed Aug 17 - it’s DH’s b-day so was hoping to get a reservation for Napa Rose
Thurs Aug 18 - return rental, fly home

If weekends are too busy we could also flip the park days to Mon / Wed and do DH’s b-day dinner on Tues. I would also love to figure out a day to do a character breakfast / brunch (probably better not on a park day?).

Any input or advice would be greatly appreciated. Thanks so much

 

[Pluto468]

I think your plan looks great. You could easily do a character meal on your non park days since they are in the hotels (aside from Plaza Inn.)
You could do Storytellers brunch one morning, and Goofy's would be a great dinner on your arrival night. I love your idea of having built in mornings where you'll sleep in!

 

[DLgal]

Don't go to a beach on a weekend. Do it Monday. And don't go to Laguna. Newport Beach is FAR better.

Friday DL is good. Sunday do DCA. Tuesday do DL.

Napa is fantastic. Definitely prioritize that!

I'd do the character breakfast Saturday.

 

[MaleficentMe]

isitpacked shows August 16 and 17th as your "best bet" crowd-wise. But really, that whole week looks decent, with "Hey, it's alright" currently listed for every day from the 12-19.
Touringplans splits up their crowd estimates by park:

12th - DL 5 DCA 3
13th - DL 7 DCA 4
14th - DL 4 DCA 4
15th - DL 6 DCA 5
16th - DL 5 DCA 6
17th - DL 4 DCA 5

So if these were my dates, I'd pick the 14th for my DL days (although that's a very late start according to the estimated park hours 10a-12a) and the 17th (9a-11p) and the 12th for my DCA day (8a-10p).

Of course, lots can change between now and then (always a good idea to look at the Convention center schedule!) YYMV!