Our DL DCA plans, what when!?

[Jaymcee]

Just wanted some expert opinions on our travel plans! We arrive in LA, Anaheim after a 12 hour flight and some taxi traveling either side on Wed 4th jan. We are planning to use the afternoon to go to DL and get our tickets. We can probably spend a couple of hours there that afternoon/evening doing a couple of rides but figure the 4 kids will be quite tired. Therefore getting up to use our only early entry on Thurs 5th would be difficult, so am thinking we should visit DCA this day as we can probably make it to the park early enough for that. Then thought on Fri 6th we would do DL using a touringplan.com day 1 plan, then either Sat or Sun use our early morning entry and do the 2nd day of the plan. We can park hop as well so can spend the other weekend day doing things we missed at either park?
Does this sound ok? Only concern is if the Thursday is a quieter day should we be trying to do DL on this day? Just not sure we could make it early enough!!
Is it true that DCA gates generally open earlier than 10?
We also have a couple of days at the end of our Trip to spend in the parks to, we have 4 kids, 2 seniors and 3 adults so I am not sure we'll be that fast getting around the parks! Figure if we follow the plans we will do all right perhaps skipping the out thing that we can revisit later!
Counting down the days, my last visit was 1992 and only for 1 day! Kids have never been!
Thanks for your thoughts!

 

[jdb in AZ]

Just wanted some expert opinions on our travel plans! We arrive in LA, Anaheim after a 12 hour flight and some taxi traveling either side on Wed 4th jan. We are planning to use the afternoon to go to DL and get our tickets. We can probably spend a couple of hours there that afternoon/evening doing a couple of rides but figure the 4 kids will be quite tired. Therefore getting up to use our only early entry on Thurs 5th would be difficult, so am thinking we should visit DCA this day as we can probably make it to the park early enough for that. Then thought on Fri 6th we would do DL using a touringplan.com day 1 plan, then either Sat or Sun use our early morning entry and do the 2nd day of the plan. We can park hop as well so can spend the other weekend day doing things we missed at either park?
Does this sound ok? Only concern is if the Thursday is a quieter day should we be trying to do DL on this day? Just not sure we could make it early enough!!
Is it true that DCA gates generally open earlier than 10?
We also have a couple of days at the end of our Trip to spend in the parks to, we have 4 kids, 2 seniors and 3 adults so I am not sure we'll be that fast getting around the parks! Figure if we follow the plans we will do all right perhaps skipping the out thing that we can revisit later!
Counting down the days, my last visit was 1992 and only for 1 day! Kids have never been!
Thanks for your thoughts!

The parks "should" be quiet enough to just play things by ear. If I had just come off a 12 hour flight with 4 kids, I sure wouldn't want to rush to the parks! Where are you staying? Hotels on-site sell tickets to Disneyland, which would save you some time there. Thursday is forecast to be your lightest crowd day, so I would go to Disneyland then, with or without an early entry. You don't say where you're flying from -- if it's from the east you'll probably still be accustumed to earlier time zones and getting up won't be much of a problem.

 

[Jaymcee]

Thanks! We are flying from the New Zealand so time zones are against us! Figure we have enough time in the parks in general that you might be right in going to DL on Thursday! I think the kids will be very excited to see something on the Wednesday so think they will be happy to go and redeem tickets! We are staying at Hojo's.

 

[skiingfast]

Can you get your tickets ahead of time? It will save money to do that versus buying at the parks. You can also buy your tickets at the Hojo, that would work just fine.

It will be busy, that is still a vacation week.

Touring Plans is ok. Not great, not good, just ok. A lot of people prefer to use Ride Max for DLR.

DCA opens at 9:30, between then and 10am you can get WoC show tickets, ride Soarin and get soaring FPs. Probably ride Little Mermaid as well.

 

[Jaymcee]

We will get our tickets Wed pm, we hv purchased voucher already so transferring should be easy I hope! Thanks for the advice on ridemax, have the software so will start looking at it more closely, good thing is can punch in later start times and print out several options before we go! Will get onton that once Jan dates appear (hopefully soon).
Thanks heaps.

 

[farmfresh]

Hi there fellow NZ visitor!
have done this many times (the flight, the ride, the MM!) Probably a good plan to use MM Saturday. But it would be somewhat better crowd wise if you can manage thursday (my kids are always very excited to be up). Besides if you are staying nearby, you can always pop home for a rest in the pm..

You'll find DCA opens at 9.30, for Soarin ride and for fast passes to the World of Colour Show, and people also line up at the fartherest rope drop to for Toy story Mania Ride.

I think you need a bit more of a plan for the days, just to accommodate your range of ages.

A lot depends on your personal style, but many people would always enter at the Dl park first (because it opens earlier) even if only to pick up a FP set, before heading over to DCA.

Some of the popular rides require a very fast walk to get to first thing if you want to ride with a small wait only - star tours, the subs, and toy story spring to mind, and only Star tours has fast pass ) so you might want to make sure all your party like that plan.


Whichever day you do DL, use your MM for Fantasyland - the famous order is on a sticky here somewhere. Use another morning for star tours Fps and subs perhaps.

In any case, be at park opening, either park and Mm or not , 30-35 mins before the opening time.

Have fun