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Hello all,

Friday was a great day in the parks. I would describe the crowds as average summer. There were quite a few guests around but the lines really were not too bad, with a couple of exceptions. As the day went on the crowds grew and by night fall the parks were fairly crowded, and Downtown Disney was full. What a difference a week makes weather wise.. last week we were in the 90s and hot today, it was overcast and in the 60s/70s in the morning/evening and touching the 80s in the afternoon.

Jason

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

Disneyland & DCA Thoughts and Observations:

• We started off the morning at Disneyland, arriving a little after the park opening, which turned out to be perfect timing since the park opening crowd had already dispersed. It was great to be able to spend some time in Fantasyland without the crowds and we were able to make it through all the attractions in about an hour (well almost all we skipped the Storybookland boats since we did Casey Jr. and the Matterhorn). It has been quite a while since I was able to roll through 9 attractions in an hour at Disneyland, it was great!
  
  
• We were over at DCA for the rope drop and it was fun to see the mass of guests heading for the Pier. Unfortunately Toy Story was down and CMs kept telling you that as you made the hike to the Pier but many people did not seem to understand, care, or believe what the CMs were saying. After hiking out there it was funny to watch the various reactions.. they ranged from dazed/confused to angry to boredom. We hung around the area, killing some time on the Sun Wheel and in the midway shops. They finally allowed a line to form a little after 11 and they re-opened a little after 11:30 I believe. We made it on around quarter till noon. As we waited I was watching the maintainance CMs come out, try to cycle attraction, then head back in to work on it. I never could overhear what the issue was but it was definitely touchy as it they started and stopped the cycling several times. Once we rode everything seemed ok, except there was a lot of waiting to move on to the next game, seems the load/unload area was backed-up and this caused everything to be slower.
  
  
• Mr. Potato Head was working most of the time when we were around. I got to hear his routine a couple of times, since I was standing near by waiting for the attraction to open.. In the evening he did develop an issue and a maintainance CM came out and was working on his ear. It appeared a sensor/reflector had fallen out.
  
  
• In the evening when we went back to ride again we decided to give the line a try. It said a 90 minute wait, but since we had nothing else to do and it was comfortable out we decided why not. The line ended up taking about 100 minutes, so the estimate was off. As we crossed the walkway the sign there said 40 minutes and it was closer to an hour from that point till we were on.
  
  
• Over at the Golden Horseshoe in Disneyland there is a new configuration for the food queues. Instead of one long line and then the CMs take whoever is next there were three lines, one for each station. I thought the old system was more fair for all. With the new system if you get behind a couple people ordering for large groups you will be there forever where as the person next to you could get behind someone ordering a couple of drinks... this just does not seem right.. wonder what was wrong with the old system.
  
  
• Since we arrived early we were stuck parking outside in Timon. Usually this doesn't bother me too much since you pull right out, park, then can zip right back to the garage and leave. Its usually very efficient, but Friday as we were leaving they were trying to force you out by Downtown Disney. The problem with this is Downtown Disney was a mess... since it was a Friday night and the place was packed, the surface lot was full, and they were directing people over to the garage. I do not understand why they did not have the it set up for guests exiting to use the garage exit, why force them out to the traffic mess and through all the lights to get to the freeway... it makes no sense to me...
  
  

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