Disneyland Trip Report: Part 3

When I last left you, my family had spent the day with us at Disneyland and was headed back to enjoy more time in San Diego while we extended our stay at the Disneyland Resort.

I will not go into too many day-by-day details here because I covered a lot of that on my Instagram page, but I do want to share a few standouts and new experiences from the rest of our trip.

One of my favorite things about Disneyland, and really any Disney vacation, is that it can feel so nostalgic. You can experience something you loved as a child, revisit family favorites, and still, no matter how often you go, there is always something you have not done. For this part of the trip, a few things really stood out: rope drop, snacks, June weather, Park Hopper, and one very good Paint the Night decision.

Rope Drop

I could probably write an entire blog post just on rope drop, but for now I will say this: we love it.

No matter how tired we are, we would rather rope drop, get a lot done in the cooler morning hours, and take a midday break than skip it altogether. Nothing beats the weather and lower crowds first thing in the morning.

A few rope drop wins from this trip:

• We rope dropped Peter Pan one morning and waited under 10 minutes. You do need to be right at the rope, and you should expect to line up to the right under the castle once let in

• We rope dropped Soarin’ at California Adventure and were on and off before official park open (this is one of the rides that actually lets you line up in the queue of ride)

• We rope dropped Mickey and Minnie’s Runaway Railway just to try ToonTown in the morning, and it was such a nice start. No crowds, calm energy, and honestly an ideal way to begin the day if you have little ones
  

Food

One of my sisters lives in LA and has a Magic Key, so she was able to join us for part of the trip. This was great for many reasons: the company, the chance to ride a few things with my husband that my daughter does not love, and the opportunity to try more food because my sister and I love to split.

Snacks won this trip for me.

A few favorites:

• Fried pickles from Smokejumpers Grill at California Adventure

• Cheese stick from Corn Dog Castle, also at California Adventure

• My forever favorite garlic cheesy pretzel bread from Maurice’s Treats at Disneyland

Other Thoughts

June remains supreme weather-wise.

The mornings were cool, the afternoons were mostly mild, although a few were a little warmer than I would have liked, and the evenings were perfect. We really do love early June.

We also used Park Hopper this trip, and it was a great addition for us. Park Hopper is usually the first thing I suggest dropping if you are trying to save money, but two of our four Disneyland days had early closures, so we wanted the option to hop over to California Adventure.

I am so glad we did.

The mornings on party days or early closure days are often so light that, even without Park Hopper, I might still prefer starting at Disneyland and enjoying the lower crowds, even if it means being kicked out early. Just something to think about when choosing your dates and tickets.

Paint the Night Tip

Paint the Night ends soon, so if you will be in the parks before it ends on August 20, here is my biggest tip: save your energy and watch the second show at 10:45 p.m. from Main Street near the Railroad station.

We only got there about 20 minutes early and had the perfect view. Characters were hanging out beforehand, we were able to mobile order Gibson Girl ice cream in time for the show, and it ended up being such a perfect ending to the day.

All in all, it was another wonderful Disneyland trip that I already miss.