* After you read this report you may want to check out the pictorial updates in our Disneyland Resort Pictorial Update section

Hello all,

Saturday was a great day in the parks and a great trip to the Disneyland Resort. We stayed the weekend (well Friday and Saturday) at a local hotel. The goal of the trip was the Candlelight on Saturday and to just relax. The weather was cold in the morning, overcast and drizzles in the afternoon, then clearing in the evening. That managed to keep the crowds down a bit most of the day. The opening hours at Disneyland were really quite, a great way to visit the park and not constantly running into other guests. As the day wore on the park filled up, peaking in the even for Beleive and the Candlelight. DCA had what I would call an average crowd, Soarin about 30 minutes most of the day.

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

Disneyland & DCA:

• We arrived bright and early, planning on reaching the park by 7:30ish. We were shocked to find the garage did not open until 7:30.. so much for getting in really early. By the time we reached the park it was about about 15 minutes to opening. Some in our group needed to pick up their passes for the day and we thought we would be off.. of course we were not. The passes for the Candlelight were not ready and the CM said to come back at 9. That seemed really poor considering the letters that went out said 8am. Talked to a CM in City Hall about it and they were no help at all. Finally around 8:45 they showed up and the others got in the park. I could not believe the CM expected the guests to wait outside for an hour with nothing really to do, that was extremely poor, seems they could have figured out some other fix,

• We spend about 4 hours in the park in the morning roaming around and visiting some of our favorite attractions at both parks then headed back to the hotel for the SC football game then back for the Candlelight. So not too much to write about happening in the parks. It seems like the castle is decorated as much as its going to be this year, just the one center section. Wonder why, we saw more several weeks ago.

• The Candlelight this year had a couple new additions. One was another soloist who sung his own number and sung a duet with the regular soloist. No changes to the sets that I could tell. The show was great as usual. The chior sounded impressive. Marie Osmund was the guest narrator, I have to say she is not one of my favorites. Her voice just didn't work for me. Hard to compare to some of the past narrators we have seen. At first I wanted to skip Saturday and go Sunday, but luckily I was convinced otherwise since I read Sunday was canceled due to the weather.

• The crowd for Believe seemed to fill up quicker than we usually see on Fridays when we go, but much closer to show time, guess its because of DCA's later closing maybe.. or the Candlelight.. not sure. Anyways, the street seemed to be fairly empty at about a couple minutes after nine then 10 minutes or so to show time it swelled up and was quite full. The crowd control seemed to be working really well, guess the extra staffing for the Candlelight paid off. The flow to Main Street then out of the park afterwards was great. Kind of sad they had to basically put CMs arm to arm down the middle of Main Street and have them "yell" at guests... remember the days when CMs did not have to yell..

• This was my first experience using shuttles to get from the hotel to the parks, usually I just drive for the day or from the hotel. But we decided to take advantage of it. First off our stop stunk, it was the white area (out by the Taxis), I felt like I was still at the Pop Century with the furthest walk possible... The shuttle schedule was prompt and effecient, no complaints there. The busses were old motorcoaches, not too good, but they worked. Overall it was a pleasant experience, minus the walk of course.

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

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