Background
We love Disney Parks. Carter has been to 3 of 4 Disney World Parks in Florida, Disneyland and California Adventures in California, Tokyo DisneySea, and Disneyland Paris!
In February 2023, we spent a day at California Adventure in Anaheim. I promised Ellie last year that when she grew to 42 inches, we could go again. It was nice to do a repeat trip soon because it meant less pressure to do all the rides and we got to slow down and experience some new things! Below are some general tips and our itinerary of our day at the park.
We often try to save money on trips by using points and miles on our flights and hotels and by doing 1-day single park trips instead of multi-day park hopper tickets. For this trip, we stayed for a few days near Huntington Beach and our last day near Anaheim/Cypress. For more on our flights and where to stay, see this post here.
General Tips
Research: As early as possible, start researching your plans and have a rough idea of what your priorities for the day will be. Sites such as WDW news, Undercover Tourist, Disney Tourist, and the official park website will give you an idea of what the top rides are and the layout of the park.
There are also constantly changing procedures for how the lines work with names such as fastpass, maxpass, lightning lane, genie, etc. Even reading what other people have done 2 months ago may not apply to your visit, but it’s still good to get a general idea.
Get there early! I know it’s vacation and sleep is valuable, but the first hour of the park is a prime time to get as many rides in as possible, and then you can take a mid-morning break to re-group and figure out the rest of the day. If you’re staying off-site, you’ll need to add time for driving in, going through security, and making your way through the turnstiles. Also, often the parks will actually open 30 minutes before official. Again, read some of the blogs that are dedicated to staying up-to-date on current procedures.
Save time and money on dining: We packed breakfast from the hotel and ate it while walking between rides. Take advantage of mobile ordering in the park and quick-service options. Share a meal when possible, and save room and money for snacking (Both brought from home and purchased at stands)
Prepare yourself and kids for lines: Unless you’re going on a truly slow day such as a rainy Wednesday in the off-season, you’re going to experience lines. Activities and snacks and patience patience patience are so important. Phone apps and other games are nice to bring along. Also, many lines have theming that you as the adult can help direct attention to and ask to point out characters and colors.
Don’t minimize “small” rides and experiences: This is a tip for myself as well as others. Don’t be overly focused on big-name rides. Some of the characters will have minimal waits and some of the artistry shouldn’t be rushed through just to get on to the next item on a to-do list. One of our favorite things we did in Disney California Adventure was a drawing class. Soak in the magic! Listen to a band on main street. Use the Tangled themed bathroom near It’s a Small World. Sit on a bench and eat a Mickey ice cream bar. It’s the happiest place on earth!
Park Highlights and Itinerary
California Adventure
Date of visit: February 2023
Kids’s ages: 5-year-old Ellie and a newly 8-year-old Carter.
Highlights: Spiderman Webslingers, Goofy Sky School, Animation Academy
We decided on this trip to purchase Genie+ access. This allowed us to use the app to book ahead shorter waits for multiple rides throughout the day: Goofy’s Sky School, Incredicoaster, Monsters, Inc. Soarin’, Toy Story Midway Mania!, WebSlingers. We didn’t use it for Grizzly River Run or Guardians of the Galaxy – Mission: BREAKOUT!
One of the key tips for all Disney trips is to start your day on time. “Rope drop” is the term used for arriving 30 minutes early and being at the entrance turnstiles when the rope drops to mark opening. We arrived at the garage at 7:30 and got through security and the trams and were at the middle of the group for rope drop for an 8:00 open.
This was a rough itinerary of all the highlights we hit:
8-10: Book Toy Story Genie+ as soon we entered park, Luigis dancing cars, Toy Story Mania standby, Toy story Genie, Book Goofy Sky School, Inside Out, Sky School standby, Sky School Genie, Book Incredicoaster Genie+, Jellyfish, Incredicoaster, Book Soarin Genie+:
Phew! That was a lot. The beginning and end of the day are the absolute best to do fun rides. We followed the rope drop crowd to the Cars Radiator Springs Ride. However, the wait was already 60+ plus and we didn’t want to start the day with a long wait. So we walked over to Luigi’s dancing cars and walked on and then headed to Pixar Pier. There were limited waits for standby and we used Genie to book rides with immediate times. As soon as we scanned into a ride, I was booking the next ride. The toy story ride is similar to the one at Epcot and you shoot and score points. All heights allowed. We skipped the ferris wheel this time. Sky School was a surprise hit. Relatively tame but with some nice drops. Ellie loved it and was thrilled that this was a ride that she “earned by eating veggies last year”. Incredicoaster was a little tough for tummies after multiple rides. (It’s 48 in and Ellie needs to keep eating more veggies)
10-12: Churro break, Little mermaid, Redwoods playground, Soarin, Book Webslingers Genie+: After our whirlwind morning, it was nice to walk and not need to rush. There were toy story characters near the Ferris wheel but our kids weren’t interested this time. The playground had some rope climbing areas and a small zip line. The kids did some laps while I called southwest to fix some flight issues for the next days. Oh also! At noon, I refreshed and booked a virtual queue spot for the World of Color show later in the evening. Soarin is always a favorite ride. Ellie was so excited to see the Eiffel tower after our recent trip there!
12-2: Ate some lunch and watched some Avengers action sequences: The Avengers area was an immersive area similar to Harry Potter World in Orlando. There’s soundtrack music, superheroes wandering around, a giant quinjet on the “headquarters” and themed restaurantsPyms kitchen is a a favorite easy stop. They have mobile ordering so we ordered as we walked and picked up some pasta, chicken sandwiches, shwarma, pretzels and beer. We watched a action sequence by the quinjet and a short wakanda Dora Milaj show. Very fun!
2-4: Animation Academy: Near Hollywood area, the Animation building has a lot of cool attractions. There’s Turtle Talk, Elsa meet, Belle’s library, and one of our favorite activities: Drawing classes! Check out those drawings!!
4-6: Spiderman, Cars land: We had a Genie plus reservation for Spiderman at 4. The ride actually went down briefly and they issued us a multi-experience pass that was good at Spiderman or other rides at any time. Because we technically didn’t redeem the Spiderman pass, we booked another Spiderman Genie+ (you can usually only do one of each ride) By the time we walked over, the ride was running again and we able to do this ride twice! This was a super fun ride! Similar to Toy Story in some ways with its shoot and score virtual reality overlay. But so much cooler and more intense. Everyone had a blast slinging spiders and robots and defeating the bad guys.
We then spent a little time in the Cars land area. The mater ride had a short wait and we also enjoyed seeing the Cars characters to meet and cool theming in the area.
6-8: Paradise Pier dinner, Monsters Inc, We had ramen and bulgogi burritos (yum!) near the Pixar pier area and then headed over to monsters inc for our last ride. A very slow silly ride we probably won’t do again. We then walked over to get viewing spots for the evening show at 9. However, we had gambled earlier with our decision to not take a mid-day naps and this is when we questioned our decisions lol. It started to rain and we decided to leave and watch a video of the show instead 😛
Final Thoughts
Disney days are always so exhausting but always so fun. We have family in California and might make this a yearly tradition. Everything is still so magical and I want to bottle it up for as long as possible
