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1/26/24 - Disneyland Resort - Lunar New Year
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1/26/24 - Disneyland Resort - Lunar New Year

Hello Everyone!

I ventured back to the Disneyland Resort Friday to check out the Lunar New Year festivities and enjoy a nice weather day at the parks. Temperatures today topped out in the 70s and cooled to the low 60s by the time I left with a slight breeze at times.

Thoughts and Observations:

  • The crowds seemed to be like a pre-covid Friday.. very mild in the afternoon but as soon as the sun set it became very crowded feeling. A friend was arriving after 7pm and it took about 90 minutes form exiting the freeway to reaching the parks. Ball Rd, the parking structure entrance, security, and the tram all had substantial waits for them.
  • I had a much more pleasant arrival experience, about 20 minutes from parking to park and maybe 5-7 minutes from freeway to parking today. I drew a poor spot about a handful of cars from the end of a row on the roof of Mickey and Friends so it was a good hike to the escalators and back to the car.
  • The Lunar New Year Celebrations are centered in Disney California Adventure again this year with comparable offerings to last year. There is a new meet and greet featuring Turning Red but no other big changes jumped out to me on a first visit.
  • This year the Grand Californian joins the celebration with a doll display and a large dragon kite in the lobby as well as guest performers or story time throughout the week. I thought it was great to see more at the Grand Californian. I am surprised Downtown Disney does not do much for the celebration. Maybe once the expansion is complete they will.
  • The Lunar Marketplaces are back and popular like always. The lines were healthy but moving throughout the afternoon but grew worse as the sun set and looked to be several dozen people long to order and then again to pick up your food at a number of locations. It is the first weekend of the festival which may be contributing to long lines too.
  • Mulan's Lunar New Year procession has returned and it runs the full parade route again. It started each of its four runs Friday in Hollywood Land and traveled to Paradise Gardens. The parade was on par with previous years. Mushu gets a special shout out since it is the year of the dragon. No other new dragons, new characters or new performers are in the parade this year.
  • I enjoy the procession and entertainment for Lunar New Year but wish they would bring back the guest performing groups to the park. The community groups as well as acrobats really added to the festivities.
  • I mention the Bay Area is hosting a Turning Red photo op. I walked by a handful of times and missed them each time. There was a good size line waiting for them but I did not have the patience to wait.. so maybe next trip I will catch them. I did walk through Redwood Creek and when I did Raya only had a couple guests in line.
  • I was a bit surprised San Fransokyo Square did not really participate in the festivities except for a couple menu items at each location.
  • The Pixar Place Hotel opens this coming week (Jan 30th). I stopped by on Friday to see how it looked. They are still working on finishing touches in the public areas with curtains up in the lobby and teams were installing exterior signage. The rest of the artwork is now installed in the lobby and other signage looks complete. I enjoyed seeing some of the artwork. I found it interesting the heavy focus on Elemental and other recent films. Wonder if the plan is to update for the latest film? I also tought it was interesting that the Great Maple Restaurant is closed from 2-5pm. I guess guests do not take an afternoon break to eat at the hotel? If you are a fan of the background music at the new hotel Disney has released a digital album with it. (Press Release on the Pixar Place Hotel Digital Album)
  • At Disneyland the Haunted Mansion project is in full swing. Construction walls now encircle the mansion grounds and magnolia park. The train station is currently not accessible. I did find it interesting the walls stop short of the Haunted Mansion merchandise cart, so the gift shop portion of the project has not started yet. You could make out the top of some heavy equipment and tree removal but not much else from ground level. The walls feature a number of signs and some artwork as well as a photo lense available through the app while you are in the park.
  • Pirates of the Caribbean has been added to the Genie+ lineup. The couple times I walked by the posted wait was 20-30 minutes and the return was not backed up so it was moving. I did not go by in the evening when the crowd was heavier though.
  • There was only one Monorail in service when I went for a ride this afternoon. Not sure if there was a problem or just reduced operation.
  • I closed out my evening with Hurry Home and a bit of World of Color. I think the seasonal addition to the show is great and wish they would do more of these. World of Color ONE is the current show playing and it is not high on my list of versions of the show. They ran into a technical issue and had to restart the show after a couple minute pause. I left as the retry was underway, but heard the second go around went all the way through with no issues.
  • As I road up the escalator at the parking structure I could see the spotlights for Mickey's Mix Magic moving around. I was expecting to hear fireworks and be able to see some when I reached the top but there were none. Seems they opted to just run projections on Friday. The wind did not feel bad, maybe it was worse at higher elevations?

Here are some recent posts to the Geek's Blog:

Disney Related Press Releases

Be sure to check out the picture update that goes with this Geekspeak column, it can be found in our Disneyland Resort Pictorial Update section

Trip logs and mileage reports are in the Park Miles section.

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