TwinsRmyLife
Earning My Ears
- Joined
- Feb 12, 2008
- Messages
- 48
Hello everyone, just got back from an amazing week at DLR and thought I would post a trip report. I was me, my husband and my 12 year old twins that went. I read these boards religiously leading up to our trip and am thankful for all the tips, hints and just everyone sharing their magical stories.
First of all I want to give a huge shout out to the Marriot Residence Inn Maingate. I rarely, if ever, saw them as a recommended hotel on these boards. I get that people mostly ask for recommendations on Harbor, right across from the park, but honestly this hotel is 15 minute walk to the turnstiles. an easy walk in the mornings, and if we were too tired in the evenings we cabbed it back, $5 ride. It's not your typical hotel layout, they are pods of 8 rooms (4 on bottom, 4 on top) and I can say we never heard anyone else around us the whole week. huge rooms with full kitchen, beautiful grounds and pool area. full hot breakfast, lots of selections (which for us is an important feature when staying at any hotel), free parking and amazing staff. oh and right across the street from the garden walk where all the good restuarants are! they are rated high on trip advisor too, so anyone looking for a hotel and don't mind being a bit off harbour blvd, stay here!!
I'm not going to detail every day but I'll breakdown crowds, wait times, favorites, etc
before we left I noticed the week we were there was listed as 'ghost town' crowd levels on some crowd predictor sites. While I wouldn't call it ghost town I would say most of the time it was great. that being said if that was 'ghost town' I wouldn't want to be there when it was 'super busy' lol! the mornings we would do DL and did most big ticket rides with no more than a 10 minute wait. we didn't even really need to FP, although we did, just to save a sometimes 20 or 30 minute wait. We did CA in the afternoons. on the sunday we got a RSR fastpass at around 12:30 and they were still available for 8-9 callback time. we did ride it Single rider first on the day because it had an hour wait, but then at night as a family. way better ride at night anyway!!
CA in the afternoons was mostly quiet as well. other than RSR and toy story, but we never waited more than about 25 min for toystory (which was one of my favorites!) everything else was 5-10 minute waits. oh and grizzly always had a 45 min wait because it was super hot out a few of the days, so we saved our FP for that ride every day to get cooled off.
A couple days it was too hot by mid afternoon so we went back to hotel for rest and swim. I understand the week before we were there it was over 100 degrees. can't even imagine. 90ish was too hot for us!! evenings and mornings were lovely though
eats: we didn't eat too much in parks. just treats mostly and a couple lunches. we ate all dinners outside the park and had all great meals
Went to universal one day and loved it, haven't been there in 18 years
WEnt to venice beach one day. beautiful, but if you are planning on a beach day I would do one of the more close beaches. 2 hours to get home that day because of traffic.
one thing I need to mention is on thursday CA closed early at 6:00 for some reason. this caused a HUGE amount of crazy over a DL. I heard people say that they have never seen the park that busy. mainstreet was so jammed around 8pm that you literally couldn't get out or move anywhere. the CM's had to form a human line down the middle so those coming out would be on one side of them and those coming in would be on the other. so that def put a damper on one of our evenings, so we just left
I think thats about it. this is our second trip with our kids, first when they were 6. totally different experience, but both great ages for different reasons.at 12 there are no meltdowns or asking for every little toy they come across..hahah. we spent 4 full days in the parks and felt that was plenty of time to do everything and our favorites over and over.
For everyone with a trip coming up..have TONS of fun!!
First of all I want to give a huge shout out to the Marriot Residence Inn Maingate. I rarely, if ever, saw them as a recommended hotel on these boards. I get that people mostly ask for recommendations on Harbor, right across from the park, but honestly this hotel is 15 minute walk to the turnstiles. an easy walk in the mornings, and if we were too tired in the evenings we cabbed it back, $5 ride. It's not your typical hotel layout, they are pods of 8 rooms (4 on bottom, 4 on top) and I can say we never heard anyone else around us the whole week. huge rooms with full kitchen, beautiful grounds and pool area. full hot breakfast, lots of selections (which for us is an important feature when staying at any hotel), free parking and amazing staff. oh and right across the street from the garden walk where all the good restuarants are! they are rated high on trip advisor too, so anyone looking for a hotel and don't mind being a bit off harbour blvd, stay here!!
I'm not going to detail every day but I'll breakdown crowds, wait times, favorites, etc
before we left I noticed the week we were there was listed as 'ghost town' crowd levels on some crowd predictor sites. While I wouldn't call it ghost town I would say most of the time it was great. that being said if that was 'ghost town' I wouldn't want to be there when it was 'super busy' lol! the mornings we would do DL and did most big ticket rides with no more than a 10 minute wait. we didn't even really need to FP, although we did, just to save a sometimes 20 or 30 minute wait. We did CA in the afternoons. on the sunday we got a RSR fastpass at around 12:30 and they were still available for 8-9 callback time. we did ride it Single rider first on the day because it had an hour wait, but then at night as a family. way better ride at night anyway!!
CA in the afternoons was mostly quiet as well. other than RSR and toy story, but we never waited more than about 25 min for toystory (which was one of my favorites!) everything else was 5-10 minute waits. oh and grizzly always had a 45 min wait because it was super hot out a few of the days, so we saved our FP for that ride every day to get cooled off.
A couple days it was too hot by mid afternoon so we went back to hotel for rest and swim. I understand the week before we were there it was over 100 degrees. can't even imagine. 90ish was too hot for us!! evenings and mornings were lovely though
eats: we didn't eat too much in parks. just treats mostly and a couple lunches. we ate all dinners outside the park and had all great meals
Went to universal one day and loved it, haven't been there in 18 years
WEnt to venice beach one day. beautiful, but if you are planning on a beach day I would do one of the more close beaches. 2 hours to get home that day because of traffic.
one thing I need to mention is on thursday CA closed early at 6:00 for some reason. this caused a HUGE amount of crazy over a DL. I heard people say that they have never seen the park that busy. mainstreet was so jammed around 8pm that you literally couldn't get out or move anywhere. the CM's had to form a human line down the middle so those coming out would be on one side of them and those coming in would be on the other. so that def put a damper on one of our evenings, so we just left
I think thats about it. this is our second trip with our kids, first when they were 6. totally different experience, but both great ages for different reasons.at 12 there are no meltdowns or asking for every little toy they come across..hahah. we spent 4 full days in the parks and felt that was plenty of time to do everything and our favorites over and over.
For everyone with a trip coming up..have TONS of fun!!
