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Hello,

This week I received two interesting pictures from a guest of the site and I want to share them with you. The first is of the Toy Story Mania building at DCA. I have been calling the concrete thing in front of the entrance a fountain, and this past week a tree was planted there, so it is a planter not a fountain, I guessed wrong.

Secondly it seems the Christmas tree was having some problems with the rain/wind/etc…

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

Hello all,

Friday was a nice relaxing trip to the Disneyland Resort. The crowds were mild as was the weather. Most wait times at DCA were under 30 minutes throughout the afternoon and at Disneyland most of the long lines were approaching an hour but many closer to the 30 minute mark. Even Nemo seemed to be just over an hour the couple times I walked by.

Jason

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

Disneyland & DCA Thoughts and Observations:

• I caught the High School Musical 2: School’s Out!- show that rolls through DCA three times a day right now. The crowd was fairly strong and into the show and a good half hour before the show there was a healthy crowd milling around. The format for this show is very similar to the Pep Rally that was running before. A dozen or so performers come out via the rolling stage, walking, or a golf cart. They then go through abbreviated versions of many of the songs from the popular Disney Channel movie. There were a couple of times throughout the show where they pulled kids out of the audience to participate. I think audience participation is a nice touch but these seemed very rushed and the performers were working hard to corral the kids and then a couple minutes later had to do it again and then again… Overall this is a very high energy show and if you are a fan of the film you will probably enjoy the show. I think the timing/subject matter is a bit odd. The theme song is "School’s Out" and the course is about it being summer, this seems like it would have been better timed to have been released back in June and run all summer instead of debuting the middle of August just in time for Back to School.

• I found it a bit amusing that the Spiel at the Monorail station was still the old one that includes the comments about moving away from the moving ramp (the old speed ramps), which are long gone now with the remodel and had not really been running much before.

• We ate dinner at Storytellers Cafe and I would call this the worst meal I have had there. I found the service to be slow, they managed to goof up my order (which was a well done hamburger and the one I received was pretty much rare, not even medium well) and to top it off they mis-charged us. For those of you who order the cheeseburger/hamburger watch your bill. Seems the computer thinks its $11.50 but the menu says $10.50. The waiter made it right for us but we had to ask, again. This is the third time its happened over the past few months which seems really poor to me that they cannot either update their menu or their computer. One other random comment, has anyone ever received warm corn muffins? The bread is always warm and fresh but the corn muffins seem to be cool to cold and just not that good and I am curious if anyone has had warm/hot ones and if they are better, seems like they would be? Last observation, it was getting a little ridiculous Friday in terms of birthday celebrations. We think over the course of our dinner every table on our side of the restaurant had a birthday celebration. I understand people celebrating, but this just seemed a bit over the top for us….

• A guest of the site checked in with this interesting report:
  "I was on the 14th floor of the Paradise Pier hotel last week after the park’s closing. We were able to see some of the fountain testing for the Walt Disney’s Wonderful World of Color. They had those main set of fountains on in the middle of the barges and the white rings that you can see in your shots from the sun wheel are the up lights for each of the fountains. They also had 2 Fantasmic-like water screens running (they looked bigger than the ones for Fantasmic) with a white rectangle of light on one of them (projector testing I’m assuming). The one screen was between the fountains and the sun wheel and the other one was to the west of the fountains between the fountains and the orange stinger. "

  Request: If anyone is staying in the Paradise Pier Hotel and able to get any shots of the testing, I have had several requests so anything you would be willing to share I know would be appreciated by other guests of the site.

Be sure to check out the picture update that goes with this Geekspeak column, it can be found in our updates section

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Send comments, questions, any other email to: disneygeek@disneygeek.com

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

Hello all,

Friday was another great day at the Disneyland Resort. The weather was calm, the crowds were average, and I just relaxed and roamed the parks. The lines at most attractions were what you would expect for the summer with the subs being the only really long line and even that was shorter than the 120 posted minutes. Over at DCA the lines were well under an hour at Soarin’ and GRR (Screamin’ was down when I walked by). I had a very small agenda on this trip, basically to catch the College Band and to stop by the Gallery again since it was still open for a few extra days.

Jason

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

Disneyland & DCA Thoughts and Observations:

• I saw the carriage rides again, as you saw in the pictorial updates, so I guess this is a regular dream come true event now. I saw them load some guests, they had an umbrella with some water for the guests while they waited near the crosswalk at the Tram Stop. The carriage pulled up, they got in, and then they were off. I was surprised at the pace the horse went at, it was quite fast. This is a nice little touch and the guests onboard seemed to really enjoy it.

• Over at DCA the Pier attractions were having some problems on Friday. Screamin’ was down, Jumpin Jellyfish was reduced to one tower, and the Zephyr was closed due to wind. So add all that up and half the attractions in the area were closed.

• I spent some more time up in the Disney Gallery as you saw in the pictorial update. According to the CMs (as well as several websites) the Gallery closes Tuesday. As I mentioned last visit this is a disappointing.

• As I went to leave the garage I ran into some car troubles (my battery died). I flagged down a Disney Security person, who was off to another call and said he’d be back in a few minutes to help. 20 minutes later another CM came by and tried to help me out. His jump start kit did not work so I still had to call AAA but now it seemed every 5 minutes or so a CM stop by to check on me or drove by or pulled up to talk for a while. Overall after the initial waiting I’d have to say the Disney security people were friendly and tried to help as much as they could.. In the 2 hours I was in the garage with the hood of my car up (and I was parked in the first spot right next to the main walkway so almost all cars exiting had to drive by me) only one guest stopped to see if I needed any help. I was a little surprised by that, I thought at least a couple in that time period would say something. Even the ones walking to their cars ignored me for the most part. Also I was surprised that the custodial CMs who emptied the trash cans did not stop and at least offer to call security, they just drove on by. Luckily for me I left the parks early so I was waiting at 7pm instead of 10pm or 11pm.

Be sure to check out the picture update that goes with this Geekspeak column,
it can be found in our updates section

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

Hello all,

Friday was a picture perfect day at the parks. For late July the weather was cool and the crowds were not bad. Both parks felt a bit mellow to me. There seemed to be a lot of people around, but many of the wait times seemed reasonable to relatively short for the summer. Nemo was the long line of the day at about an hour and half for most of it (I saw 2 hours posted but walking over there it seemed closer to 90 minutes). Most of the other attractions were well under an hour. Haunted Mansion was actually a walk on in the early afternoon and Pirates was probably about 10 minutes only.  I hopped on Small World during the parade and had my own "private cruise" as well as the boat in front of and behind me empty.

Jason

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

Disneyland & DCA Thoughts and Observations:

• One of the main reasons for this trip to the parks was to walk around the Disney Gallery one last time. It is slated to be closed by the end of the month and the rumor is part of it will be converted into a guest suite to be used as a prize for the year of a million dreams (which is dragging on into its second year soon) and the rest will be handed over to Club 33 to allow it to expand. I think this is a really short sighted idea and it seems to me that this space is one of a handful left that really makes Disneyland unique compare to other Disney parks. Its an out of the way corner that regular guests can stumble upon and discover something truly Disney or that regular guests know of and just enjoy to hang out. Not to mention the store seems to do really well in terms of sales and add in the Fantasmic offerings it seems to be a money maker to me. I will definitely miss having the opportunity to stroll through and look at the current exhibit, pull up a seat at one of the tables and just relax for a few minutes, or stand on the balcony and overlook New Orleans Square.

• As you saw in the pictorial update many of the Year of a Million Dreams banners, decorations, etc.. are now gone from the parks and some new ones have started to pop up. I think the new ones work much better than the old ones… I am still not a big fan of the campaign or the colors.. The campaign itself just does not seem to have any excitement with it, but at least those plastic "swans" or whatever they were supposed to be will no longer be scaring the real swans in the castle waterways.

• I also noticed the two new attraction posters in the train tunnel. The Remember Dreams Come True one is the first one I remember with a corporate logo on it.. all the ones in the past were just the attraction weren’t they? Does anyone remember seeing one with a corporate logo in recent years..

• Speaking of corporate advertising DCA has two new ads. Both are on the Pier, one replaced the midway games billboard and the other is painted on the wall near the restrooms by Screamin. The one by the restrooms continue the series that have been popping up around the parks (I first noticed the one in the Wharf at DCA, then the Hungry Bear at Disneyland, and now this one. I am not a big fan of these and how many ads do they really need. They already have plaques in all the restrooms at both Walt Disneyworld and Disneyland.. do they really need these big painted ads too?

• One last note on ads, as you saw in the last page of pictures they have replaced the display cases at the Grand Californian, right before you go out to Downtown Disney with new ads (well this was probably done a while ago but I just have not walked by there).. anyways the displays are covered up and instead just a poster ad is in its place in one window. Seems to be another of the many cut backs. Also wonder if the tag line for the time shares will ever change… I cannot believe its a secret to anyone who has visited a Disney park/resort in recent years. There are signs, ads, banners, carts, videos, TV channels, vans, busses, etc… everywhere.

• Seems the Ratatouille characters in NOS are fairly popular. Their line looked about as long as the line for Captain Jack Sparrow when he used to be in that location.

Be sure to check out the picture update that goes with this Geekspeak column, it can be found in our updates section

Send comments, questions, any other email to: disneygeek@disneygeek.com

To read about previous trips visit our archive at: http://disneygeek.com/columns/geekspeak/

Hello all,

Friday was a great day at the Disneyland Resort. The weather has returned to normal around here (warm, mid 80s, during the day, cool at night) and the crowds were not too bad. Most of the major attractions were well under an hour most of the afternoon/evening. Even Nemo seemed to be under 90 minutes most of the time. Wonder if the holiday in the middle of the week split up the traditional crowds (I have not read anything, how was Wednesday at the parks, my guess it would have been less crowded than usual for the 4th?)

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

Disneyland & DCA Thoughts and Observations:

• I spent a good hour and half at DCA today, which is much more time than the past few weeks. I walked to almost all the corners (skipped the Tower of Terror area) to see what was going on, and to sum it up, not much. The walkways had a fair number of people but things seemed fairly dead to me and for it being summer, the crowds seemed light to me. Its kind of sad the lack of live entertainment in the park. The bands on the Wharf stage are long gone, even Road Trip is gone this year, the backlot stage now only holds the Drawn to Animation show. The Cars characters have permanently moved into Condor Flats it appears and no longer drive the Pier to make an appearance.

• The Lazygeek had not been on the subs yet, so we decided to line up and go for a ride. The line had a posted time of 90 minutes, but it moved a little quicker than that. It was about the same as I waited last time, an hour fifteen. I did enjoy the wait a bit more this time since it was later in the day and the sun was behind the Matterhorn, where as last time it was the heat of the day.

  • While waiting we noticed the subs were in order this time around (meaning numerically)

  • They were handing out a new version of the VMK quest. The challenges/questions were the same, but this time the back panel had the maze shrunk and a VMK prize card was added (its the middle of the sub, you can get the front and back by playing the Nemo game online

  • Our adventure started off on a different note… just as we started to "dive" a woman in the middle of the boat stood up and was having some trouble (seems she had some claustrophobia issues and did not know/think about it before boarding). The CM stopped the sub and talked to her for a minute then they made their way to the front of the sub and he popped the hatch so she could get some fresh air. After a couple minutes she sat down on the first seat by the stairs and he closed the hatch but did not seal it. He said they could not return to the dock since the boat behind us was already there. So at this point he had to go forward to get out of the middle of the lagoon and if she needed/wanted him to stop again to just ask and he would stop and open the hatch fully so she can poke her head out. So we continued on with the hatch closed, but not sealed so there was a gap. They turned the waterfalls off while our sub went through the area (or else we would have gotten quite wet). Some water did come in during the mine sequence and the Lazygeek got fairly wet on one side (we had the end two seats but then moved down two to let this woman and her husband have the seats at the bottom of the staircase). After exiting there were a couple CMs who took some time to talk to this woman off to the side to make sure she was ok

  • This was only my second time on the new version of the attraction and this time I spent more time listening to the narration and looking around, vs. taking pictures and I really enjoyed it. The narration has some good lines in it and the animations were much more enjoyable without worry how my pictures would come out.

• We rode Buzz and the Lazygeek managed to hit a 100,0000 point target, it was located on the large Zurg figure near the beginning of the ride. He was aiming for the hole under the medallion on the figure (with his aim though not sure what he actually hit).. this one target accounted for more than half his score. Anyone else have any Buzz tips to share?

Be sure to check out the picture update that goes with this Geekspeak column, it can be found in our updates section

Since this is the first time putting the Geekspeak’s section on the blog I would like your feedback. Is this better, worse, the same as putting it on the traditional page (to view how this section normally looks check out: http://disneygeek.com/columns/geekspeak/