First off, this is
not event for my fellow haunt friends.
This is definitely a family event full of rides, trick or treating, and
some entertainment that wasn’t worth my time.
That being said, I’m doing this review on my full day experience. Then you can make the decision whether this
is an event for you.
PRICE
The reason why I
signed up for this event is the price.
Now Annual Passholders can complain that the price is too much. But for a non passholder, the price is great,
especially if you REALLY want to go on two rides that got some attention,
Thunder Mountain and Alice in Wonderland.
The price is
$65. Included in this price is parking,
which runs about 17 dollars. Take out
the price for parking, you are paying $48 for the event, which I think is a
great deal. Plus you get into the park 3
hours before the park opens and get some extra’s that I’ll go into in a
second. Considering the price for a one
day, no park hopping pass is about 100 dollars, paying half that for 8 hours in
the park is a great deal in my book…well, a great deal at Disney that is ;-).
BEFORE THE PARTY
My brother and I
arrived at Disneyland around 1:00 PM.
Jay got some backlash from his parking attendant regarding him being
there way too early, but I didn’t have an issue. Parked in the Donald parking lot and met Jay
by the escalators.
We then had a great
lunch at Rainforest Café…who has said that, right? Our waiter was awesome, coming from the fine
state of Florida and he worked at Disney World in the entertainment field. He kept coming back to us to refill our
drinks and talk about his old days in Florida.
Very nice guy and made for a nice experience.
Afterwards, I took
Jay over to Trader Sam’s for his first experience at the bar. Jay says it was one of his favorite things to
do that night. We both got two drinks,
and they were good stuff. I like how the
special effects moments didn’t go on so much that you couldn’t have a conversation. You could just chill, talk, and get sprinkled
on from time to time. I think it will be
a place that Jay and I will hang out at for years to come. The Python drink was UNBELIEVABLE.
Like I mentioned
earlier, we got in the park at 3 pm. The
rest of the public was already in there so lines were long and the fast passes
were gone. We decided to see the
extended preview of Big Hero 6, which looks fantastic. A great way to relax and get air
conditioning. After that, we took the
train around to Toon Town.
Toon Town was opened
as a Pre Party location for the party guests.
It was our first experience with trick or treating, and boy did we get a
lot of candy. There was three Trick or
Treat trails located in Toon Town. One
around the fountain by Roger Rabbit, one through Mickey’s house and Minnie’s
house, and then one around Goofy’s boat.
With just those three trails, we almost filled our bag up with
candy. We also went on Roger Rabbit for
a spin through Toon Town. Or just to see
Jessica Rabbit, but you didn’t see my write that ;-).
After Toon Town we
went over to Big Thunder Ranch for their Pre-Party Trick or Treat areas. There were some art areas, pumpkin carvings
and I believe some snacks could be bought back here. Really miss Billy Hill and the Hillbillies. This was their home, at least recently.
PARTY TIME
The main reason for
me to sign up for this party was to go on Big Thunder Mountain and Alice in
Wonderland. So first up, we went on
Thunder Mountain. Thanks to only those
with tickets for the party able to ride, we walked right on. Boy is it smooth, and that ending was really
awesome. Fun riding a ride while
protecting your candy, lol.
For the next 30
minutes, we hit a couple more Trick or Treat trails, tried to ride Splash
Mountain but it was down, walked over to Haunted Mansion but Jay wanted to wait
for it to be dark, and ended up walking over to Space Mountain – Ghost Galaxy
for a ride. Took about 20 minutes in
line, then we were on. Jay’s first ride
through, fun as always and I didn’t see any real changes from previous years.
Headed back to
Haunted Mansion Halloween layover and rode that. I think the ginger bread house this year is
my favorite. It’s an Iron Maiden type
device with balls over the nails, I think?
I think there was a Ginger Bread man inside too. Other than that, I think the ride was the
same as last year…I think.
Splash Mountain was
on so we went on for a ride so we could get our 2.99 digital picture. We did a great pose, coming to Instagram
shortly. At the scene where brer fox is
pushing Brer Bear and an alligator has Brer fox’s tail, we stopped. And the ride went 101. Pretty cool to walk through the last scene of
the ride, then out the back onto backstage, then back in again. They gave us fastpasses, but none of the
rides were really using fastpass and the lines were okay. So I still have it.
Oh, and that 2.99
digital copy? Apparently they stopped
doing that and it’s now 14.99. That
sucks majorly. BOO DISNEY!!
Walked Jay to Main
Street and he headed home. I went over
to ride Alice but it was closed for the fireworks. Did some trick or treat trails, watched the
new Halloween overlay video on Small World, and then headed over and rode
Pirates. After Pirates went back to
Alice, which had a long line, and finally got to see the new scenes. The ride does look beautiful and there’s tons
more to see thanks to the video projection.
But the Queen still looks the same, I thought she was being upgraded too?
Finished the night
with a ride on Thunder Mountain at night, which looks a lot better than the
day. Ended up with 3 bags of candy, some
souvenirs for the kiddies, and headed home, arriving in Manteca at 6 AM.
An amazing weekend
with friends and family. Unfortunately I
didn’t get to see everybody I wanted to in So Cal, just not enough time. But I’ll be back soon, love it down there.
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