home > Columns > Geekspeaks >
2/15/13 - My thoughts and observations from Friday at the Disneyland Resort including True Love Week, Oz the Great and Powerful preview, and more as I roamed the parks.
 The Geek Speaks:

Welcome to the disneygeek.com Geek Speaks section. In this section I will post my comments on trips to the parks or other Disney related events.

2/15/13 - My thoughts and observations from Friday at the Disneyland Resort including True Love Week, Oz the Great and Powerful preview, and more as I roamed the parks.

Hello all,

Friday was a great day at the Disneyland Resort. The weather was what you want in February... the highs touched the low 80s, there was a nice breeze and the lows hit the 60s as I was leaving the park and dropping to the 50s by the time I reached home. The crowds were on the high side thanks to the great weather and the holiday weekend, many schools had a four day weekend and were off Friday too. So wait times for attractions were on the long side with most of the E-Tickets beyond the hour mark the entire time at both parks.

Jason

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

Thoughts and Observations:

  • First stop of the day for me was Disneyland to check out the latest Limited Time Magic, True Love Week. Or you can call it an expanded Valentines offering.
    • Town Square, the Castle, and Snow Whites Grotto all received some decorations for the event. There were also some new photo opportunities and backdrops at the Meet and Greet on Main Street. The decorations were on the light side but were ok except for the banner on the castle which looked poor to me. I thought the Grotto area by the castle had some nice touches.
    • The Meet and Greets were ok and there seemed to be a healthy line for Minnie/Mickey and Donald/Daisy. The Princesses out in Small World Mall were joined by the Princes which was a nice addition, the line looked slightly longer than usual for the Princesses but then again the park was crowded so a little hard to tell if it was the Princes or the crowds that made for the extended wait.
    • After sunset there was a brief projection/light event/show on the Castle. I thought the event itself was decent but the fact that it had no schedule and the handful of cast members we spoke with had no idea either was a little frustrating and meant I ended up hanging out in front of the castle for well over an hour. In the end they ran the show at 7:30 and 8:30, not sure if there were later showing but I would assume there was. I thought with such a short event, 2 minutes, they could have run it more frequently. Either every quarter or half hour would have made more sense to me. Here is some video of the event, in person the lighting effects looked much better than they do in this video:


    • There were also some cupcakes available around the parks for the event. I thought it was interesting that they were labeled as seasonal cupcake, no custom label or signage at the Wharf Cafe or Cafe on Buena Vista Street.

  • A few weeks ago Belle started to wear a new dress for the Meet and Greets. Here is a side by side of the old, bright yellow, and the new more subdue yellow dresses.


  • The Disneyland Resort is starting to enforce the Fastpass time window. It has been an unspoken practice since the system rolled out that the end time really did not matter, they only looked at the date and start time to allow you to get in line. But now there are signs up at all distribution machines alerting guests that they are expected to use the passes during the time window printed on them. Cast Members are to start enforcing this too. Walt Disney World made the policy shift a year or so ago. One note on the signs I thought it was a nice touch that they took the time to make them match the area they were in and not just generic signs. On the tickets themselves I did not see any changes.

  • The Salute to the Golden Horseshoe Revue run has ended and the Billies have returned to the Golden Horseshoe stage. The menu for both the Stage Door Cafe and the Golden Horseshoe have reverted back to their old menus, except I noticed inside the cheese sticks are gone.

  • Several attractions have returned this week. In Critter Country Splash Mountain, I spoke to a couple people and they said it looked great inside and things were working again, no changed jumped out to them. Tom Sawyer Island has reopened as have the Tea Cups.

  • Since it was presidents weekend I stopped by the Main Street Opera House to see Great Moments with Mr. Lincoln. I was disappointed to find the Voices of Liberty were not performing today. Also odd Disneyland will be celebrating presidents week next week, guess True Love bumped Presidents. As I noted in the update and on the blog thought it was interesting how many tourists or infrequent guests were in the audience. The Cast Member gave the normal introduction spiel and then said now it is time to dawn your 3D glasses, they are under your seat. At this point more than half the audience bent over. Also interesting after the film portion and before Mr. Lincoln takes the stage the audience applauded. Great to see everyone into the show!

  • The Main Street Opera House was taken over for another Annual Passholder movie night, so the last Great Moments showing was at 3:00pm. To celebrate True Love Week they were showing Lady and the Tramp. I think this is a great idea and hope the crowds have been materializing and enjoying it. Unfortunately I could not fit it into my visit. Has anyone gone to a movie, curious how it is in the theater?

  • Heading over to DCA not too much new or interesting to report. I did find it noteworthy that the Silly Symphony Swings appear to have had the entire ride mechanism removed for work. I guess the maintenance on that type of attraction is extensive. I also thought it was odd that there were still a couple Lunar New Year items around, namely menu items at the Wharf Cafe but nothing else.

  • I attended the first screening of Oz the Great and Powerful sneak peek in HollywoodLand. Friday night was an Annual Passholder preview and Saturday it opened to all. I thought it was a great idea to open it for APs. The sneak peek itself on the other hand really did not make me want to see the film more. I was disappointed with the CG effects and it just did not sell me on the film. Not sure if it was where I was sitting, problems with the show, or just that they did not set it up but I was surprised they did not take the chance to spray water on the audience at a couple points. They used the strobe light and wind effects as usual but no water at the showing I was at.

  • I returned to Disneyland as Soundsational was making its way through Town Square and up Main Street. They had the backstage walkway open on the West side of the street but it was for exiting guests only. Those of us entering had to go through the crowds or stores.

  • Fantasmic Return and nothing really jumped out at me as being changed. Did anyone else catch a showing, did I miss anything? As I looked around the audience it was disappointing to see only a handful of Glow with the Show Ears. There were a couple right where I stopped so at least I was able to see them in action but am surprised they really are not catching on at all. The effect is great to see.

Interesting Web Finds/Notes:
Below are some interesting links, notes, and rumors I found/stumble across/or have been informed of since the last Geekspeaks column.

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

Stop by the Geek's Forum to discuss this and other Disney topics.. click here

Send comments, questions, any other email to: disneygeek@disneygeek.com
Back to previous page

 

Quick Note

Check out the geek speaks archive for past updates.

 

Interested in Helping out?

If you are a fellow disneygeek and interested in sharing your insights, pictures, thoughts drop us an email here we are always looking for contributors.