Plan A or Plan B

[livinintexas]

Our family of 4 (me, dh, 15 and 17 year old daughters are heading to CA for spring break. I am considering 2 options.

Plan B would mean there would be no fireworks and shorter park hours but we would have 3 full days instead of one day being on our arrival day after a red eye flight. Do you see any advantages in one over the other?

Saturday March 7 arrive 6:00AM LAX, check in Grand Californian , DLR

Sunday March 8 DLR

Monday March 9 DLR

March 10 check out GC / Long Beach (to visit friends)/ check in Loews Hollywood Hotel

March 11 WB Studios Tour / Loews Hollywood Hotel

March 12 Universal Studios Hollywood / Santa Barbara Double Tree

March 13 Santa Barbara / drive to San Jose in PM / Embassy Suites

March 14 Blackhawks game 1:00 in San Jose / Santa Barbara

March 15 Santa Barbara / evening flight LAX

OR

March 7th Loews Hollywood Hotel / Universal Studios (ideal would being able to check in our hotel at 7:00am, nap, and then Universal but we may have to suck it up and kill time before park opening)

March 8th WB Studio Tour/ Loews Hollywood Hotel

March 9th Long Beach(to visit friends) / Check in GC @ DLR

March 10th DLR

March 11th DLR

March 12th DLR

March 13th drive to San Jose

March 14th Blackhawks v Sharks game 1:00 / drive to Santa Barbara after game

March 15th Santa Barbara / LAX for 7:50 flight

Thoughts?

 

[Butterfly123]

I would take the three full days when you won't be as tired, because Disneyland itself is pretty tiring. Although I will say that the RDCT fireworks are my favorite.

So are you really driving from Santa Barbara to San Jose for a Sharks game and then driving back to Santa Barbara? That is a lot of driving for a hockey game!

 

[SMD]

I would consider flying home from San Jose, Oakland or SFO. Also, you don't have to use all 3 days consecutively on a DLR ticket. So if you want to put the Long Beach day on arrival day, you could do the 8th at DLR, then Hollywood/Universal, then check into your DLR hotel. You'd get fireworks that day. I'd probably also look into either flying into Long Beach, or if you decide to start at Universal get a flight into Burbank that leaves the morning of the 7th so you don't have to arrive at 7am, try to get a hotel room to rest before Universal.

 

[Eeee-va]

Am I reading right that Plan B has an extra night at the Grand Californian? If so, I'd definitely do that! But if Universal is a big priority, maybe Plan A and if money/time aren't a big issue, you can get a 4th day on your tickets and do a couple hours in the parks before you check out. Early morning is by far the least busy time to tour the parks.

(RUMORS are that there will be a more modest fireworks show while they prepare a new show for Disneyland's 60th anniversary, so I would not make big plans around fireworks. Winds can also cancel fireworks anyway, especially if it is the excellent Remember...Dreams Come True show, which has a lot of fireworks very near the castle.)

 

[cmpeter]

I like plan B...but I agree, driving back and forth between Santa Barbara and San Jose is a long trip (4-5 hours each way). Can you fly out of San Jose or even SFO or Oakland?

The trip from Santa Barbara to LAX is at least 2 hours, assuming you don't hit traffic. It could be busier since it's a Sunday and folks are returning from their weekend plans.

 

[livinintexas]

Plan B allows for an extra night at GC. I'm leaning towards visiting DLR mid week.

I booked our DIRECT Anchorage to LAX ticket for $400 r/t which is excellent airfare and even better since it is Anchorage's spring break. This was before the hockey schedule came out.

Our family (originally from Chicago) are die hard, never miss a game Blackhawks fans thanks to the NHL package on Direct TV. When the schedule was released of course I was hoping for a game w the Ducks or the Kings and then I saw there was a game against the Sharks (a team we also like a lot) and knew my family would want to go.

We discused the 10 hours of driving and came to the easy decision to go. We also got face value tickets on ticketmaster. We pay double for home games in Chicago and this year most likely won't see any except in San Jose.

Originally, I was thinking going to DLR on arrival day was the best use of our crack of dawn arrival but decided Universal may be better since it can be seen in less time. The main reason we are going is for the studio tour (Friends fans).

The last night is also tricky. Our flight isn't until 7:50PM so we will check out of the hotel and be homeless. I had thought of driving from San Jose after the game (should end by 4:00pm) and drive to Universal (Hilton) and go to the park on our departure day.

I would like to visit Santa Barbara too.

So must do:
3 days DLR
San Jose on the 14th
Hollywood, Long Beach
WB tour
Universal

Bonus
Santa Barbara

Any other ideas for an itinerary?

 

[Nonsuch]

...Our family (originally from Chicago) are die hard, never miss a game Blackhawks fans thanks to the NHL package on Direct TV. When the schedule was released of course I was hoping for a game w the Ducks or the Kings and then I saw there was a game against the Sharks (a team we also like a lot) and knew my family would want to go.

We discused the 10 hours of driving and came to the easy decision to go. We also got face value tickets on ticketmaster. We pay double for home games in Chicago and this year most likely won't see any except in San Jose...

You are dedicated fans
I go to most Sharks home games, but miss a few for Disney trips

You will enjoy San Jose Arena, fans are encouraged to go down to the glass during the warm up
The drive between San Jose and Santa Barbara is not too bad, I have driven round trip on the same day

Go Sharks!

 

[jina]

I'll be at that game w/ DD4 (will be DD5 by then). One of the few afternoon games this season (DD goes to bed @ 7pm). Should be an exciting game, especially that late in the season.

You may want to keep an eye on southwest airlines flights. You can get round trip tickets for as little as $130-150 pp which would save you 2 days of driving unless you really have your heart set on SB (The drive up 101/1 is gorgeous if you haven't done it but it's long!). If you do want to drive I'd do the boring route one way (I-5 to 152 to 101) and save you an hour or two although you'd miss SB on that route.

Southwest flies from SJC to most of the LA area airports. We do SJC to SNA for our DL trips although we will try the drive again for our next trip - it's just so frustrating to waste 2 full days driving up and back and we're exhausted after dealing with LA traffic. Burbank is a great option if you're going to be around hollywood and I don't think it would cost any different if you were to say fly out of BUR and back to LAX. If you were to check bags, there are no bag fees for the first 2 bags per person I believe.

The Shark Tank is 5 min from SJC if you did same day you could probably just do uber or a cab from SJC to the tank. Oh - and it's not like Giordano's or Lou Malnati's but Pizza Chicago is a 10 min walk to the tank and has decent deep dish and excellent thin crust gluten free pizza (if anyone in your family can't eat gluten). They open at 11am (we were there today) and we had plenty of time before our 1pm show (Wicked). I haven't been to warm up in the past few years but I used to go 1hr before the puck dropped and sat down near section 116 for a great view of the Sharks. Go to section 113 for the Hawks warm up and you can cheer (or in my case heckle) from their exit).

Go Sharks!

 

[livinintexas]

Thanks for the great warm up tip!! We will be there cheering on our Blackhawks!! We do watch a lot of Sharks games too, but this time we will proudly be wearing our Hawks jerseys!

I have thought about flying but airfare x4 makes it a very expensive day. We don't mind the drive either. Although we love Alaska, we do love a love a lower 48 road trip.

Do do my youngest daughter's carsickness issues , we will take the "boring" route but maybe make a stop in Solvang on the way there.

I'm working on a plan C....

We may end up in CA in the summer. I'm hoping to get my daughter in a volleyball camp at Long Beach State so we can visit Santa Barbara then.