We Just Got Back On August 1, After Five Fun-Filled Days at DLR

[S. S. Columbia]

We just got back Sunday from a two week trip to Southern California. We spent five fun-filled days at DLR, and we had a wonderful time! This was our fifth trip to DLR in three years (and in Aug. '08 we spent 12 days at WDW). My son is now 8 and my daughter is 7. When we finished riding Winnie the Pooh I didn't see where they went, but I knew where they'd be. Sure enough, they were in Pooh Corner.

Here are some general comments. I hope they're helpful.

We finally saw Great Moments With Mr. Lincoln, and I really liked it. It was well done, and it reminded me of the American Adventure at Epcot. I think the show opens around 11:00am and closes around 7:30pm, and it's an easy show to see any time of the day. Here's my advice: Don't Miss!

Main Street Cinemas is showing historical DL clips instead of Steamboat Willie and the usual cartoons from the 1930s. They were showing Dateline Disneyland (the original braodcast from July 17, 1955) and some other Disneyland clips from the 1950s. It was a nice change of pace. And the Cinemas is another good place to cool off from the summer heat.

We finally went to Innoventions, and I was surprised that my DS8 and DD7 enjoyed it so much. We saw ASIMO -- it was interesting. (BTW, they pronounce it OZ-imo.) My kids had fun playing some of the free XBOX360 video games.

On Buzz Lightyear I scored 116,000 and finally got to Level 4 ("Space Scout"). This silly video was helpful, and the guy who made the video also made a map.

It was great to see the Disneyland Band playing in Town Square at 12:00 Noon. They played some wonderful songs from Alice in Wonderland, the Little Mermaid, Peter Pan, Aladdin, Lion King, and Cinderella. You can check the Times Guide. I think they also play at 9:00am by the DL entrance.

My DD7 was picked for the Jedi Training Academy! My daughter used a sign, and it was the cheapest, quickest sign that we ever used -- I wrote "Pick Me!" on an 8 1/2" x 11" piece of paper. We're 6 for 6 when we use signs, and B.S. (Before Signs) we were 0 for 2. Even if you aren't visiting with children, JTA is a show that's worth seeing. I think you will find all of the jokes to be fun-ny.

We saw Captain EO. It was cheesy, and we liked it. We saw it twice.

The Billy Hill & the Hillbillies show was good fun. I had heard that the shows were shorter, but it didn't seem that way. There were still plenty of seats available about 30 minutes before the 5:30pm show (I was concerned that the last show of the day might be extra crowded). The show was full at 5:30pm. The fish & chips were good, and my kids ate the chicken breast nuggets. The hot fudge sundae was also good. All in all, it was a nice break and a fun show.

We watched the Aladdin show from the mezzanine level. A nice thing about sitting in the mezzanine is that you have a good chance of getting a front row seat, which gives you a nice unobstructed view of the show. I slightly prefer seeing the show from the orchestra level, but the mezzanine was a nice change of pace.

Somehow we always walk right past ITTBB, but this time we finally saw it in DCA. (We saw it a couple of years ago at AK.) Remember, magnifying glasses are for looking at little things, not cooking little things.

At 2:30pm we saw the musical chairs show at Coke Corner, and we saw the Mad Hatter, Alice, and Peter Pan. My daughter was picked and she was an Unwinner. It's a fun show (the Mad Hatter was very good), and it's a good place to meet & greet the characters, etc. But with all that said, IMO this is just a second-tier show. And it gets really hot at 2:30 in the afternoon in the summer.

We watched the Magical Fireworks from the IASW Plaza, and IMO the view from the IASW Plaza area was awful. You can see the fireworks in the sky, but IMO it isn't the same when you can't see the castle, and you really don't see Tink or Dumbo, either. The following night we watched Magical from the hub, and it was very good.

We saw World of Color three times, and we enjoyed it all three times. My favorite viewing spot was at the front rail in the red Wet Zone -- here's a link to my brief report. I also liked seeing WOC from the front rail in Preferred Dining -- here's a link to my brief report. HydroGuy wrote about the front rail in Preferred Dining (link). When I saw WOC from just in front of the "VIP Section" there was a 10-year-old sitting on someone's shoulders, and it blocked a good part of our view -- here's my brief report. Some day I hope to watch WOC from the "Blue Bridge" (link). FWIW, the following thread is filled with some excellent advice about WOC from "Disneyland 1951" (link).

We spent two weeks in Southern California, and we also visited Legoland, the San Diego Zoo, Moonlight Beach in Encinitas, Knott's Berry Farm, Universal Studios Hollywood, and an Angels game. I hope to post some more about these when I find some time.

I hope this post is helpful.

See post #13 for some brief dining reviews from the trip.

 

[Dobie]

Quite helpful. I'm glad you had so much fun!

 

[Carrie in AZ]

Great info!!! Thanks so much for taking the time to write about your wonderful trip!!

 

[silence]

I'm interested to know what your kiddos thought of Universal. My DD is the same age as yours and our trip to that park was not at all what we had been hoping for.

 

[Michelle2]

This is such helpful info! Your pictures from all 3 places really put into perspective of where we want to be.
I have a question....You had said in your review that if someone wants to be in the Red Wet zone at the railing to get in line by 6:45 - 7:00, but yet you had said there were only 4 other people in the red wet zone too. Did it fill up fast after you had arrived? Do all of the wet zones fill up fast? Do most people tend to stay away thinking that they will get wet?
Thanks!

 

[I'm mikey]

sounds like you had a fantastic trip. thanks for sharing.

 

[HydroGuy]

Thanks for the report. We need to do the front wet zone next time. I would have liked to do it this time too. Oh well.

The thing I liked about preferred viewing area was that it was not very crowded in the viewing section while the FP sections looked like people packed in like sardines.

 

[S. S. Columbia]

I'm interested to know what your kiddos thought of Universal. My DD is the same age as yours and our trip to that park was not at all what we had been hoping for.

My DD7 really enjoyed Universal Studios Hollywood.

I'll tell you about her day: (FWIW)

She really liked the following:

Simpsons ride. We rode it twice. The second time the wait was 30 minutes, but they play classic Simpsons video clips throughout the queue -- so the ride was actually better with the longer wait.

Revenge of the Mummy. My DD7 and I rode it twice. She saw the movie The Mummy before the trip, so she had an idea of what to expect. It’s a dark coaster, and it had some creepy effects (like skeleton arms reaching down from above). Before we rode it, I told her that the ride would be “fun scary” – so she was o.k. with it.

Jurassic Park ride. Dinosaurs gone wild! Just to be on the safe side, we wore cheap $1 ponchos, and that helped. I thought this ride was nicely done.

WaterWorld show. It was a very good show. The visitors in the green seats (the wet zone) can get completely soaked. Lots of action. Lots of fire.

Animal Actors show. My DD7 thought the animals were cute. Especially the dogs.

Blues Brothers show. They asked for some audience participation, and somehow my DD7 and DS8 were on stage with a few other visitors. Frankenstein was nearby from the House of Horror -- Frank is quite the dancer.

Shrek 4D. Not super great, but it had some good laughs. And it had a decent pre-show.

Special Effects show. They showed some movie tricks, but it was entertaining and had some funny bits. The bits about using Computer Graphics were very interesting.

She found the following to be so-so:

Studio Tram Tour (with King Kong in 360). My DD7 really couldn’t care too much about movie sets -- she’s too young for Norman Bates, etc. -- but there were still a couple of action scenes in the tour that were interesting, and my DD7 has seen the movie Jaws. I won’t say much about King Kong 360, except to say that we liked it a lot. There are screens on each side of the tram (40’ high x 180’ across). On our first Tram tour, King Kong 360 had a technical problem and we didn’t see it! (There were some unhappy campers on our Tram, including the one guy who tossed his 3D glasses off the Tram.) USH gave everyone $10 in “Universal Dollars” and a pass to see the Tram again without waiting. We really wanted to see King Kong 360, so later in the day we rode the Tram a second time.

Two things my DD7 didn’t care for:

House of Horrors. It’s an anytime walkthrough attraction. I told her that it would be “fun scary,” but it was a little too much for a 7-year-old. She didn’t dislike it, but it was a bit too edgy.

Terminator 2 show. My DD7 didn’t dislike it, but she wasn’t familiar with the story. I’m one of the few people in the world who hasn’t seen T2, so I was kind of neutral on this one -- although it had some good action.

Well, that was our day at USH. We arrived just before it opened at 9:00am, and we left just before it closed at 9:00pm. It was a very “commando” day, but we all really enjoyed the park.

 

[KCmike]

We did most of those same things this time around as well. Great Moments, EO, saw the DL band in front of the castle, etc. Glad you had a good time.

I would LOVE to hear about your adventures outside of DL. I've always have been interested in the other theme parks.

 

[gatorfreud]

I really wanted to see Captain EO and Mr. Lincoln... even had them on my schedule... but somehow we STILL ended up missing them.

Kim

 

[S. S. Columbia]

This is such helpful info! Your pictures from all 3 places really put into perspective of where we want to be.
I have a question....You had said in your review that if someone wants to be in the Red Wet zone at the railing to get in line by 6:45 - 7:00, but yet you had said there were only 4 other people in the red wet zone too. Did it fill up fast after you had arrived? Do all of the wet zones fill up fast? Do most people tend to stay away thinking that they will get wet?
Thanks!

Our red FPs said to return to the WOC Viewing Area between 7:30 & 8:30pm (for the 9:00pm WOC on Tuesday, July 27).

One thing I noticed is that many people know to ignore the WOC FP times, and they return to the WOC Viewing Area much earlier. At 6:52pm there were 30 or 35 guests in front of us (and as it got closer to 7:30pm that number increased as the “rest of the party” starting to join the line). At 7:31pm the CMs instructed guests in the red FP line to start walking to the viewing area. (Please keep in mind that the lining up of guests for WOC hasn’t been totally consistent. There’s no guarantee that these times will stay the same in the future, so I would recommend to arrive early and check with as many CMs as you can. Go with the answer that you hear most often. )

In the following photo, I wanted to get the front rail spot in the red wet zone that these four guests had:

In the following photo (from “Disneyland 1951”) there’s a black and white dotted line that goes from “Three Rear Screens”/“Front Screen” to “BEST”/“VIP” -- and I wanted to see the show along this line:

Map Credit: “Disneyland 1951”


When I mentioned getting in line at 6:45 – 7:00pm, I was referring to this specific spot. After the show, I walked to the yellow Wet Zone, and the view from the front rail at the center of the yellow Wet Zone also looked good (as you walk toward the left side of the yellow Wet Zone (toward the left, looking at the “stage”) there’s a pole that would get in your view). I forgot to look at the other locations on the red Wet Zone side, but I would think that the view would still be very good if you move toward the right-center (toward the right, as you’re looking at the “stage”). From my limited experience, it looked like it took at least 10 or 15 minutes for the front rails to start to fill up. I think many guests don’t have ponchos and they’d rather avoid the risk of getting soaked.

Like I mentioned above, many guests start to line up earlier than the stated time on the FP. I don’t have enough experience, but IMO arriving around 7:00pm is probably a good time (for the 9:00pm WOC) if you really want to get one of the better front rail spots in the red Wet Zone. The pre-show starts at 8:30pm, so the wait seems shorter.

HTH

 

[S. S. Columbia]

I would LOVE to hear about your adventures outside of DL. I've always have been interested in the other theme parks.

Thanks. I'll post some things when I find some time.

 

[S. S. Columbia]

Here are some brief dining reviews from our trip:

Blue Bayou - We went there twice, and we enjoyed it both times. Both times we had 11:30am reservations -- we arrived at 11:10am and we were sat at a waterside table. One time I had the Beef Short Ribs (it's boneless) and the other time I had the Five-Pepper Roast New York. For dessert we tried the (vanilla) Creme Brulee and the chocolate cake -- I really liked the Creme Brulee, but my kids didn't like the chocolate cake because they said it tasted like coffee (maybe we should have tried the Pecan Pie). Either way, I'm glad we went there for lunch -- very good service, good food, and a festive atmosphere. One day we checked in at 11:10am, and they sat us at a waterside table at 11:15am.

Plaza Inn - We finally went there for lunch, and we had the fried chicken. I'm glad we went there. I liked the Plaza Inn's decor, and I'm glad the Plaza Inn still has metal utensils instead of the cheap plastic ones.

Redd Rockett's Pizza Port - The chicken fusilli was very good and filling. They apparently have gone lighter on the chicken portion, but it was still a filling meal. It was a nice change of pace. The cheese pizza didn't look very special, but both of my kids liked it.

Carnation Cafe - This trip we skipped the Carnation Cafe, and we missed it. I like its location -- right next to Main Street -- and I generally like the atmosphere, and the food is decent. Next trip we'll be back at the Carnation Cafe.

Taste Pilots' Grill - The ribs were really good! That was a pleasant surprise.

Storyteller's Cafe - We went there at 3:00pm, so it wasn't busy at all. We didn't have reservations, and we didn't have to wait to be seated. I really liked Storyteller's. The food was very fresh and tasty. I liked the corn chowder and the Cobb salad. And Storyteller's was quiet, so it was a real nice break from the parks. I sometimes hear complaints about the service, but the waitress didn't come by too often and I felt that we could take our time. I liked the Storyteller's relaxed casual Californian vibe.

HTH

 

[APX]

You never seen T2?! That's like the best action movie from the 90s. <.<

I've never seen shrek4d, so I might check that out sometime, also Jurassic Park ride = like the ride, but HATE the drop (I hate drops/heights)

 

[123Disney]

Great info. Sounds like you had lots of fun. Thanks for sharing!

 

[edit1]

Thanks for sharing about your trip. Reading it makes me want to plan a Disney trip soon!