we have been planning this trip for a while now. for the last few years i have wondered if we were the only family not going to disneyland. it seemed like we just kept having to say, "well, i guess we'll have to try and go next year."
but we finally made it.
and we were determined to make it count.
we researched things out to try and find a time when the park wouldn't be crowded and the lines would be short. since we homeschool, we can basically go whenever we want. our sources told us that the beginning of october and the beginning of may are the slowest times. since the professor doesn't teach classes during may and june we decided on may.
whether this strategy worked is debatable. to me it still seemed pretty crowded. i thought, "if this is a slow week, i would really hate to be here when it is 'busy.'" we found some lines were pretty short, some lines were long but moved quickly and some were just plain long. who knows, maybe everyone else googled it too and decided to come during a "slow" time. do you see now how that could backfire??
we checked around for prices and decided to go for 5 days, one park a day. each day you add to your ticket costs less, and if you want to go to both parks during the day {park hopper} it costs more. we figured we would be fine with one park at a time. {and we were.} we ended up doing 3 days at disneyland and 2 days at california adventure.
first stop: star tours
the tickets to the park were the most expensive portion. we found tickets on the website for getaway today and they seemed to have the best prices. but before we bought ours, i decided to check on ksl {our local website similar to craigslist} to just see if anyone was randomly selling their tickets for some reason. we didn't find any of those, but we did find a local travel agent who was able to get us our tickets for $100 less than what we had been able to find. {that includes every other travel agent as well as getaway today prices.} we paid $890 for 5-day tickets for the 4 of us.
minnie wanted to have her picture taken with me.
we also decided to spend less on our hotel so we could spend more days at the park. we definitely made the right call on that one. each morning we got up, showered, ate breakfast, and headed to the park. as soon as we got back to the hotel each night we collapsed and went to sleep. we were just across the street from the park at a best western. it was pretty basic, yet clean. the breakfast wasn't exactly spectacular, but our tummies were full every morning. but with so much to do inside the parks, it would have been a waste to spend extra time and money on our hotel. we spent $524 for 5 nights at the hotel.
in radiator springs
it was a great trip and definitely worth the wait*. i just hope any future vacations we take will still seem fun!
*the last time i was at disneyland was....
wait for it....
1985.
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