Disneyland tomorrow - quick help?

[mom2binsd]

Umm.. The drive from San Diego to Disney is minimum 1.5 hours.... If you don't encounter any delays at all... No slow down at the immigration checkpoint... Evan that early the 5 can be a bear....so I'd plan to leave at the latest by 6...

[Nemesia]

Umm.. The drive from San Diego to Disney is minimum 1.5 hours.... If you don't encounter any delays at all... No slow down at the immigration checkpoint... Evan that early the 5 can be a bear....so I'd plan to leave at the latest by 6...

Where in the SD area are you staying? We drove from Encinitas to Disneyland on a Wednesday morning back in May. Our goal was to leave by 5:30, but we left a little after 6am. We made it to Disneyland with minimal traffic. I think we arrived around 7:30 and then got something to eat in Downtown Disney. The day we were there the park didn't open until 9am. I think their summer hours are different...?

Enjoy your day!

[Nemesia]

Also this parking info from pinay (from this BB thread:http://windsorpeak.com/vbulletin/sho...iego+encinitas )
was spot-on:

If you are coming from San Diego and you want to get to the Mickey and Friends parking lot, you will need to do a lot of surface street driving. That parking structure on busy days is usually only open to people coming from the north.

So what you have to do is get off on Harbor Blvd., not Disney Way. Turn right on Harbor, then left on Ball Rd. DO NOT turn left on Disneyland Drive even though it tells you to. You will get redirected by the Anaheim police department past DLH and all the way over to the Toy Story lots eventually, negating everything you've done so far and chewing up a lot of time. You have to turn right on Disneyland Drive, then make a U-turn at your earliest opportunity. You will pass the offramp for the I-5 North on the right. Once you make the U-turn, and head south on Disneyland Drive, you will be able to access the flyover bridge to the left that the southbound I-5 traffic gets to use and you will make your way to the Mickey and Friends parking structure. If you miss the flyover bridge, do not continue south on Disneyland Drive as you will get caught up in that Anaheim PD redirection. Just circle back at Ball Rd. and try again.

[AnnieW625]

So for those saying to get there by the time it opens... it opens at 8am. So you all are suggesting leaving San Diego at 6:30am? All things Disneyland are completely new to me, but this seems like madness.

um yes because it is summer and I would actually try and leave closer to 6 esp. if you are closer to downtown. There will be some normal commute traffic, but there are carpool lanes all of the way from SD to Anaheim, but there might still be some slow downs and it could take up to 2 hours to get there.

I would just park at the Toy Story Lot as it is right at the Harbor/Katella intersection. They have a shuttle bus that drops you off at the main entrance on Harbor Blvd. I wouldn't get off at Hatbor Blvd. as you actually have to backtrack south a bit and get to the main entrance. You can get off at Disney Way too and I might suggest that if you are in the carpool lane, which I recommend esp. going through Santa Ana (because of traffic) it is an easy left off of the freeway. Note that if you use the carpool lane you cannot get out of the carpool lane for about 10 miles (from about Irvine through Santa Ana until you hit Disney Way, but IMHO it is worth it, esp. going thru downtown Santa Ana). The parking garage shouldn't be much of an issue if you get there right at 8 am, but again I wouldn't really bother with all of the city street driving to get there. If you do get off at Disney Way an easy way to get to the parking lot is to turn left off of Disney Way at Anaheim Blvd. (first left off the freeway) and then make a right on Katella and continue to the parking lot at Katella and Harbor. If you aren't in the carpool lane and the freeway is backed up (it usually isn't after downtown Santa Ana) you can get off at State College Blvd./Chapman Ave. exit., and at the first intersection turn left onto Chapman Avenue and continue on Chapman Avenue until Harbor Blvd., and then turn right on Harbor Blvd. and go north and then the parking lot is on your right.

[jbbhb]

So how was it?

[mackmama]

We didn't go. My back problem flared up, so we are pushing it back a couple of days to hopefully calm down a bit. DH is pushing hard for Disneyland instead of CA Adventures. Not sure what to do since DC really cares mostly about seeing characters.

[mom2binsd]

Can you plan for longer on the next trip. Does your dh understand what the differences are between the two placed and why CA makes more sense??? Sorry about your back!

[PZMommy]

We went yesterday. We were there right at 8, and we were able to ride most rides that were on our must ride list by noon without much of a wait. While walking around we did see Goofy and Minnie Mouse, but both had waits of over 30 minutes, so we didn't bother, as my kids didn't care. Tigger and Winnie were nearly a 45 minute wait, so we skipped them too, even though we love Winnie!! If your DS only wants to see characters, DL probably is not a good choice and CA would be a better option. Keep in mind if you go on a weekend, it will be even more crowded. I would try to stick to a midweek day. We've always had really good luck on Wednesdays crowd wise.

[ckso]

Hope you feel better soon

Disneyland also came out with their official app that tells you wait times and where the characters are.

Personally at that age I would do CA especially if you don't have much time. They have a lot of the Disney junior characters if he likes those

Also agree the character meals are pretty awesome if that's what he wants. Would be good to go to the ones at the resorts so you don't have to pay admission, meet some of the characters (ie Mickey and friends) and then do Disneyland. That way you don't waste time waiting for a quick character meet. The character meals are so much more interactive and no waiting. They come to you


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[mackmama]

Neither of us understand the differences between CA and Disneyland. We are both Disney newbies. DH read the website though and said CA sounds like it's mostly for teens?