home > Columns > Geekspeaks >
08/10/12 - My thoughts and observations from Friday at the Disneyland Resort.
 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.

08/10/12 - My thoughts and observations from Friday at the Disneyland Resort.

Hello all,

Friday marked the final day of the 2012 All American College Bands season so I wanted to take in one last set of performances by them. The weather was predicted to be hot the hot (and for us Southern Californians humid) side. As I arrived at the resort the temperature was about 90 degrees. Luckily the humidity never really materialized and there was even a decent breeze much of the time. I had wanted to use the weather as a training exercise for my next Florida trip, but it never really got near that misery level. The crowds around the parks were on the mild side. Not sure if that was due to summer wrapping up or the weather. As the sun set and it cooled down the normal uptick in wait times did materialize. But for most of the afternoon waits were well under an hour for most attractions, even Splash checked in at 40 minutes a couple of times until late afternoon when it crossed the hour mark.


Jason

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

Thoughts and Observations:

  • I spent the first portion of my visit at Disneyland. Out at the new Fantasy Faire project you can see the frames for the buildings starting to rise up above the walls. The buildings seem on the large side to me. Should be interesting how this impacts traffic flow in the area and how it all fits into the hub. I am guessing the forced perspective on the facades as well as trees will help.

  • Speaking of the Faire inside the Opera house the Tomorrow section of the photo display has been updated to feature concept art. It had featured Star Tours which is now moved over to the Today section.

  • Over at California Adventure noticed the Racers down a couple of my trips by. So seems the downtime plaque continues. Hopefully they are becoming shorter and less frequent. Or at least the bugs known and solutions underway. When it was operating I noticed they are no longer posting times on the single rider line. It is still operating just no promise of a wait time. In general when the line stretches toward the entrance sign you are looking at a good hour. I found it interesting at one point I overheard cast members telling guests in the Fastpass Return line that their wait would be close to an hour too. If that is true not sure how much a Fastpass really saves you. If you had to wait 30-40 minutes to pick it up in the morning then an hour to use it you are going to be pushing the two hour mark that is fairly common for the stand by line. The key to any of the three lines right now is for the attraction to be running and keep the line moving.

  • Walked by the Flying Tires and it seems there are now less beach balls and I watched a couple cycles and the focus seems less on those which I think is a good thing. I did not overhear anyone so not sure the general reaction. Again I noticed very very few single riders. In a handful of cycles maybe saw two or three only. I should have timed it but it seemed the load/unload times were speeding up a bit.

  • Speaking of timing as I roamed the parks today I could not help but notice and run into what seemed like an army of cast members walking around with clip boards, stop watches, and counters/clickers. Seems they are in full data collection mode as they try to analyze the new guest flow and traffic patterns of the resort. Being a numbers guy I would love to see some of those stats and how they match up to general observations.

  • As I mentioned above the main purpose for this visit was to enjoy the last day of the 2012 All American College Band. Their 11 week run in the parks came to an end Friday evening. They have a dedicated following of fans, parents, and supporters and always draw decent crowds to their sets. The final shows are always the most fun for me. The band members are having a good time and it shows! I was a little disappointed they ended the evening with their regular train station set and did not have an extra encore one like the previous couple of years.

    Here is a video of their finale:



  • As night fell I wandered through the Mad T Party. There seemed to be an ok crowd there, but the long lines for the bars were not present. They were still doing a solid business but guests were not backed up waiting while I was there (around 8pm).

  • I watched World of Color from a stand by location in front of the Little Mermaid. Had an ok view of the show but from that distance you do feel disconnected. The Glow with the Show Ears still have not really penetrated but I did notice a couple more than previous trips. The couple in front of me are what I am sure many in marketing would love as poster guests. There were two of them and they purchased three sets of ears. They each wore one and held one in front of them to see what happened during the show.

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.