Thanksgiving day questions???

[Bob O]

How busy will it be at DL or DCA on the saturday after thanksgiving. We arrive on that day at LAX around 11:00am and was wondering how busy the parks will be and if it is worth going??? If the parks were too busy we would just go to downtown disney, visit DL hotel/Grand Calif and take it easy and visit different days. Any advice/help would be appreciated!!

 

[Sonya in Boise]

I have no idea how busy that Saturday will be, but I do know that most Saturdays are very busy, even 'off" season. And that Thanksgiving day and the day after are two of Disneylands [bold]busiest[/bold] of the year. So I would assume that Saturday would be summer crowds busy. But that is just my take on it.

The park should be open until midnight that day, so you may just want go in later in the evening and use fast pass to ride some rides and relax. Enjoy the holiday things. If you have park hoppers, DCA is normally slower than Dinsey, but it closes earlier.

 

[Dana_Buckley]

We went to DL 2 yrs ago on Fri, Sat & Sun after Thanksgiving, it was a total madhouse! We had a stroller which made for a difficult time manuevering through the crowds. People were cutting across our path constantly. We waited over an hour just for the monorail to go back to the hotel. Dumbo 90 min, Small World 70min (that's all I remember).

If you have AP you could go for the parade & firewworks, and maybe a few FP, but I wouldn't count on getting to do very much. I wouldn't pay for a ticket just for that day.

 

[Bob O]

We are going to DL/DCA for either 3 or 4 days and were considering maybe going on the Saturday at about mid-day or maybe going the following Sunday when we would ahve about 5 hrs till we have to leave to go to the airport. We dont know which time we would get more bang for the buck at the parks in regards to crowds. We were also considering going that day(sat) to DCA as i here that park is not often busy. So we are just tring to finalize our plans. We already plan on going Monday and Wednesday and Friday of that week, only going on firday to see the Electical Light parade other wise i would go on a week day to avoid crowds.

 

[Bob O]

We are planning to go to DCA the first Friday of December so as too see the light parade. How busy should it be in the park that day??? How soon should we get our seats for the parade and where are the best viewing area??

 

[Bob O]

A question about DCA rests???
Are there any rests. in DTD that is ok for familes and not as fancy or expensive as a Rain Forest/ESPN ??? I saw a brochure and say no McDonalds or any other Rets. that wasnt a sit down place. Any place like goofys kitchen that used to be in DTD in Orlando or a place that sells sandwhichs like a palce called "pantry"(not sure of correct name in dtd in Orlando??

 

[Sonya in Boise]

With the days you will be in DL/DCA area (Mon 12/2, Wed 12/4, Friday 12/6) you should be able to see a lot of the sights if you get to the park at opening and take a break in the afternoon. The first few hours of opening are very low crowds and you will be amazed at how fast you can ride rides. Monday and Wednesday should be fairly slow, but Friday gets busy in the afternoon. That weekend 12/7-8 is the candle light processional and it should have moderate crowds.

I would think that if you went Sunday 12/8 first thing in the morning you could get a lot done before heading to the airport. Sat 12/7 will be buiser than a normal "off season" saturday due to the CLP. DCA should be slower than DL that weekend, also.

For the Light parade, I would say 45 minutes to a hour should give you very nice seats. We showed up 10 minutes before start and had standing area behind the first row of sitting people. My mother in law was able to sit in front of the tree next to us. Kinda in the road, but she didn't get run over or anything.

Any place along the main walkway (sunshine plaza) is good. There are some benches that are fairly close to the street and some planters that are raised that would be nice to sit on. I noticed when we were there that at the beginning of the parade route there is no curb. The sidewalk is the same level as the street, so it was a bit uncomfortable to sit on the ground. I didn't notice if there was a curb towards the end of the parade route.

DTD has a few "take out" kinda places. One is Wentzels Pretzels. They have different flavor pretzels and a hotdog wraped in a pretzel. We got 3 pretzel dogs, 2 speciality pretzels, a slurpy type of drink and it was a little less than 20.00

Then there is a window at Napels Pizza Place. For 5.00 you get a large (plate sized) slice of pizza and a soda. I enjoyed the pizza here and had it a few times. My girls (3yrs and 2yrs) each ate a whole piece for dinner. It might be cheaper to just buy a whole pizza, but we liked the different slices. I loved the Veggis one and the girls ate the cheese. My husband like the Combo. It is thin crust, with a nice red sauce.

There are benches all over DD and we just sat on a bench and ate dinner. There is also a Haagen Dauz (sp) that is very yummy and the line moves fast, even though it looks long.

Inside The Grand Calirornian hotel is White Water Snacks. They have muffins, sweet rolls, salads, made to order hamburgers and chicken sandwiches. Good food and inexpensive prices for the DLR area. GC has an entrance in the middle of DD and is very easy to access.

Disneyland Hotel has a Goofy's kitchen, it's a character buffet. I don't know if that what you are looking for, I have never been to WDW.

Hope that helps.
Sonya

 

[Bob O]

Sonya, thanks for all the help!!! The Rest. in GC sounds very interesting, what are their hours if you know??
So how bad would the waits be on Sat for DL or DCA??

 

[Sonya in Boise]

Bob, I would assume that White Water Snacks would be open the same hours as DD. Mon-Thurs till 10pm, Fri-Sun 11pm. It serves breakfast and coffee so I would think it would open 7 or 8 am. I'm not definate on these times, but these would be my guesses.

As for how busy DL/DCA would be on Sat, I would think Sat late morning to evening 6-7 pm would be pretty busy at DL. 40-60minute waits for the mountains in the stand by lines. DCA should be the same for Soarin/Screamin, but 20-40 minutes for the rest.

We were there in the off season in Oct and on a Friday Soarin/Screamin has 35 minute waits. We used Fast Pass and the single rider lines in DL and got to do a bunch of rides. But we were not in the parks on Saturday past 11am. It was fairly busy by then in both DCA and DL.

If you guys have the days on your passes and want to go to DL on a Sat. I say go. Just be aware that you may do more sight seeing than riding, but enjoy the night life of DL and take it slow. Ride the sailing ships, get a hot chocolate/coffee and sit on a bench and enjoy the people watching. Do you shopping that day.

 

[Charlieanna]

Re: how busy it is on the Saturday after Thanksgiving...

We usually go about this time of year to catch all the Christmas festivities and went over the Thanksgiving holiday (Thurs, Fri, Sat, Sun) the year before last and it was so busy it was depressing.

It's fine if you just want to wander around and look at stuff, but plan on standing in lines for rides for a very long time, and being sandwiched in most other places.

It also got busier as the sun went down, I think not only because people who had gone back to their hotels for a rest earlier are coming back, but because many of the locals (and their visiting family and friends) are heading to the park for the evening festivities. - It was wall to wall people everywhere, especially for the parade and the fireworks in DL. People were staked out 2 hours in advance for the parade. I even saw two fights erupt along the parade route (both relating to strollers running into people in the crowds) and saw another instance of a woman having a fit in the small hat store in Fantasyland because others were chastizing her for coming in with a stroller (which was empty!). She actually knocked another woman down purposefully pushing her way out! (are there Disneyland police??)

So, I don't mean to be a downer here, just go well-rested and prepared to wait if you can't choose another day. (and I suppose think twice if have to take a stroller.)

The Sunday after Thanksgiving is better yet, especially mid to late day probably because people are leaving to return home to go back to work and school. The Monday after Thanksgiving is wide open. It's hard to believe how much difference a couple days can make (but then the park hours go back to opening later and closing later for a couple weeks).

The week after Thanksgiving and the first week of December is prime time to go in my opinion, and the crowds are very managable, but you can have fun no matter when you go if you keep the right attitude on and don't let the other spoil-sports get in your way. (why do people have to be cranky and nasty in the happiest place on earth anyway!)

 

[Bob O]

Thanks for all the info!!!! Its seems i maydecide to spend Saturday swimming at the hotel and visiting DTD and Dl Hotel/GC as while i like to enjoy the sites, i love to ride rides!!!! and i HATE LONG LINES!!!! Seems like i would get more done on a sunday morning/early afternoon than on the crowds on Staurday, though the temptation not to go will be hard.