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9/11/22 - 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.

9/11/22 - Disneyland Resort

Hello Everyone!

I took two very brief walk throughs of the Disneyland Resort today.   One at park opening and one in the early evening.   The reason for this is I opted to move my car from the hotel I was staying at to the Disney parking structure so it would be easier for members of my group that were going to the parks and not the Expo today plus I would be under cover out of the sun vs in a parking lot.

Thoughts and Observations:

  • The parking lines for the toll booths at the Mickey and Friends structure were about half way toward the entrance when I arrived just after 7am.  They moved relatively quickly and I was parked and on my way to the parks earlier than planned.

  • The former Downtown Disney, now cast member, parking lot landscaping and renovation project is complete and reopened.  Cast members were parked there and you could walk through the lot again.  The new landscaping is more minimal offering much less shade throughout.

  • Pluto's Pumpkin Pursuit 2022 started this weekend. There are 13 pumpkins located throughout Downtown Disney to search for.  Game boards, stickers, and prizes are available for purchase at several locations.  They sell for $9.99 plus tax.  When I walked through none of the retail locations were open yet so I did not see the prices or actual game boards.  I managed to find 10 of 13 pumpkins on my quick walk through Downtown Disney. Not sure if the ones I missed are inside stores or I just missed them.. will have to go look on a future visit.

  • I arrived at Disneyland about 10 minutes before park opening and had no delays entering the park. The assembled crowd for the rope drop in the hub looked about average from the last few days I have visited this early.

  • I ended up rope dropping the park exit more or less since I needed to walk over to the Anaheim Convention Center to check in for the Parks presentation this morning. I left Disneyland by 8:15am, so I was in the park under 30 minutes.

  • On the way out I passed Donald Duck. He was hanging out at the train station with his Halloween costume on interacting with guests in a socially distant way.  I prefer these interactions for pictures as you can see more interactions and the characters more clearly without the hassle of waiting in a line.  The disadvantage is for those that want a signature or to hug the character.  I like the idea of offering both throughout the day which is what they appear to be doing.

  • While walking along Harbor Blvd. to the convention center I had to walk around a few homeless people sleeping and just hanging out in the walkway as well as near the bus stops.  This is always a jarring experience and watching guests reactions as they encounter this on their way to and from the parks is interesting and not the best memory for them to have of Anaheim/California.

  • After the D23 Expo I walked back to the parking structure to meet my group.  I took Disneyland drive this time and stopped by the Paradise Pier Hotel to see how the transformation is moving along.  On the exterior facade elements/signs have been removed and more are being removed and painting is underway.  Inside no substantial visible changes in the lobby area yet.  One thing to note is you cannot reach use the back door to reach Downtown Disney you need to go out the front due to construction staging area in the parking lot out back.

  • The scrim on the construction fence for the Downtown Disney project was removed (most likely due to the weather over the weekend) so you could get a ground level view of the project.  Grading is underway with several machines on site to move the earth around as the site is prepared for the new buildings.  It was interesting to see from that perspective vs the Monorail.

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.

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