Bouncin’ through Disneyland

Okay, so I’ve been moving the site around a bit — and have been busy with a bunch of personal stuff. But life it settling down and I’m getting back on track with Disney stuff… Look for more next weekend.

Simply a quick shout out to Mickey Mouse has he celebrates his 80th birthday. Boy, does he look great for his age!!!

ANAHEIM, Calif. (November 11, 2008) - When it comes to celebrating the magic and sparkle of the holidays, there’s no place like the Disneyland Resort, the Merriest Place on Earth. From November 21 through January 4, the annual Disneyland Resort holiday celebration will be more dazzling than ever.Guests will enjoy the return of the holiday’s most popular offerings as well as be immersed in new entertainment at both Disneyland and Disney’s California Adventure parks.

Sleeping Beauty’s Winter Castle, first introduced in 2007, will be decorated even more elaborately this holiday season with additional snowdrifts and icicles. After dark, a sensational new holiday lighting and special effects show will carry the magic of the holidays from the Castle all the way to the Christmas Tree in Town Square. And, for the first time in 53 years, the Christmas Tree will be completely artificial, which enables Disneyland to present a holiday light show like no other with more than 62,000 energy-efficient LED lights. (more…)

The OC Register just reported on a article: Disney park guests to get mobile alerts - but wait a minute, this is just like I project I’m working on. Then again, I cannot put a GPS on Mickey Mouse, I can report many of the bits of information they’re talking about. Let’s see who can get their site published first… Then again, I also have the domain name!

The best way to get started with your Disney vacation is to visualize how you want the trip to end, what is your ultimate goal? It is to enjoy time with your family? Get away from the office? Relax? Spoil the grandchildren? What is it that you want remember at the end of the trip, what are those objectives?

Why ask this question, you may ask. The reason is that many people have bought into the great marketing that the Walt Disney Company kicks out every holiday. Then they save all year, work overtime, and then spend what amounts of a life’s savings on a weeklong trip; spend even more then they had saved so they can enjoy all of their hard work; and then have their child have a melt-down at 3pm on the first day! But since we’ve spend all this money, worked so hard, traveled so far, we drag out family militaristically through the park – because we’re at Disneyland, we have to have fun!

Or here is another scenario… half way through the day your child just rode Autopia for this very first time, and they loved it… they ask to go again. You just waited in a 45 minute line and this was your second ride so far. The reality is that if you tell them, “if we have time later” – it typically doesn’t happen. Why? Because Disneyland is so expansive, with over 100 acres, even with 5 days in Disneyland, you still will not have experienced everything. So typically, there is “no time later”… But, if you’re there as a family – then another time through the ride would be a great memory for them – and it can be great family time together in line.

Another tip we’ll share later centers directly over the vacation or relaxation part of a Disneyland vacation. Many people think it will be relaxing, but the only way for this to be true is if you intentionally make it this. There are many things which are vying for your attention that, if you let it, will consume all of your available time. If you want a Disney vacation to be relaxing, it can be, but just decide that up front and later we’ll share how this can become reality.

Finally, understand what can realistically be accomplished and you’ll have a great time. I recently took a trip with my son (17 months) and our 6 year old friend – yes, a boy’s trip to Disneyland. It was for exactly 24 hours (travel time included). We had an absolutely amazing, fantastic trip – spent only about 10 hours in the park any everyone thorough enjoyed themselves. Tyler loved the fact that he got to drive the Autopia cars twice, experience snowfall, and fight Darth Vader on stage after being selected as a Jedi Padawan. Fantastic trip, very short, but met our expectations.

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Finances may be turing around and my wife’s school schedule may have her finals done before our friends trip ends. So things may be back on — we’ll just need to wait and see. Praise the Lord!

It appears that the refurbishments are well ahead of schedule and we’ll see the return of this fan favorite attraction with a famous or infamous song - it’s a small world after all… Reliable sources of information (but not offical) indicate an opening before the Thanksgiving holiday season! I cannot wait to see this attraction again, complete with some of the new additions. And hopefully some of the noisier anamated characters will have received a good lube job.

Over at MousePlanet it was reported that the little known Shopper Pass program has been discontinued. This program enabled visitors to enter the park for up to one hour at no charge enabling them to purchase in-park merchandise without having to have general park admissions. If you failed to return within the 1-hour timeframe, you would be charged full general admission. The article over at MousePlanet did not disclose a reason for this change. However it has been reported elsewhere that this program has been abused, as this program has been posted on websites as a way to see fireworks or parades for free.

Fortunately most of the items available inside of the park can be found at World of Disney in Downtown Disney, or by contacting DelivEARS.

Back in September I suggested that one of the reasoning’s for closing down the Vineyard Room at the Golden Vine was due to some preparations for some new premiere viewing for a waterfront show in DCA, ala Illuminations. However, I am slightly embarrassed to learn that Disney official released information regarding this waterfront show back in 2007 in this press release on page four:

The dramatic and unique Disney’s World of Color will bring new nighttime excitement to Paradise Pier. This nightly panorama of spectacular water effects, colorful lighting and music will bring Disney animation to life with an entirely new creative and technical approach. The 9,000 person viewing area offers prime waterside viewing of the show – and provides a site for live entertainment, music festivals, and outdoor film premieres.

So it sounds like my suspicions of a new waterfront show were correct, it now just stands to reason that something of a premiere spot will be created, although that prediction has yet to be proven. I’ve also learned that the Vineyard Room has been used as overflow for Club 33, as well as for a replacement when it has been closed for refurbishments or repairs. Who knows, maybe this will become the next official, exclusive Club 33 since at last report, the wait-list for Club 33 was closed due to an overwhelming back-list. When added to some of the other reports over the last two years, that Disney is making changes to attract more exclusive and refined clinte, it may make sense. We saw the Timekeeper shoppe on Main Street replaced by what was billed to be a more up scale boutique store, along with official releases from Disney in 2006/2007 regarding the development of more up scale and exclusive destinations.

Then combine that with the recent quarterly earnings reports from Disney stating that while resort attendance was down, spending was up. It leaves us little room to guess where Disney may be investing their next development funds. Yes, there are some general public upgrades to DCA, 1.1 billion to be exact - but I just wonder how much more planning and funding will go into more exclusive destinations and activities?

Once again, the Disneyland Resorts have everyone pays the kids price promotion. This is normal during the low season to help boost attendence, and it does just that. The park is never really “empty”, but there are a significantly lower number of people - lines are shortened in half or better - but there are still lines. Beginning January 6 through April 28, 2009 reservations through the Walt Disney Travel Company, or affiliate agents, will book select 2 night (or greater) packages with restort tickets at kids prices. Packages begin at $95 per person at the Disneyland Hotel or $68 at a good neighbor hotel.