Where to start each day?

[eargal]

i will be taking my children and my niece and nephews from March 3 to 6th. 5 kids ages 11,12,13,14 and 15. My two have been to DLR 10 times. Niece/nephews once and literally only experienced 8-9 attractions over 3 days between 2 parks. They slept in went out to breakfast and wandered into parks after 11:00 without a plan.

We will have 3 day hoppers and are staying across the street. My general plan is Thursday Friday and Sunday at DLR and Sat at Knotts. Only option to use MM is Thursday. However, that would mean doing our "start at DCA" day would have to be on Friday or Sun which are EMH for on site guests right?

Might it be better for us to forgo MM and do rope drop for DCA on Thurs, DL on Friday and Sun?

So weird to even think about but we usually stay on site and use EMH every day!

 

[Girimama33]

Sine the kids are older, I would skip MM and start at DCA. You can hit DL at park opening on Friday and Sunday.

 

[chickapin parterre]

the group of tweens might very well value RSR as the best at the resort so yes, a Thursday in DCA would be a great value. The disadvantage, which you may not know as EMH visitor, is that when you join the long line at the FP for RSR on a EMH, is that RSR may very well be late into the morning..... So single rider at RSR may ver well be a strong consideration in how you plan. Then on Friday and Satruday, you are on a level playing field with everyone who enters Disneyland.

 

[agamble]

I think it may be a better idea to forgo the MM. We had APs last year and so no MM. Our strategy was to go to the opposite park for rope drop. This worked very well for us as far as crowds go and getting things done in the morning.

When we use MM we tend to head to Fantasyland and ride all the attractions in the first couple hours. Not to say that you shouldn’t go to Fantasyland with the older kids because they’re still great rides, but I would think their priorities may be towards more thrilling choices. I say go opposite of early entry days and start at DCA Thursday. You can still kick out most of the Fantasyland rides in the first hour on Friday if that’s important to your group.

Also check the calendar ahead of time. On our last trip it happened that Disneyland had MM one day at 7AM, regular opening was at 8AM, and DCA didn’t open until 9AM. We spent the first hour at Disneyland and then hopped over to DCA just as it opened. That may have been an odd day due to the weird closures they had that week leading up the 60th kick off, but it’s always good to check the schedule.

 

[eargal]

Thank you everyone for your responses. It seems unanimous that we should skip MM. Now I need to put some research into the Star Wars themed stuff.