California: Going Back to Disneyland

Being a Georgia Girl, trips to Disney World can be a quick four day weekend trip. While Disney World is greatly magical and will always stay on the top of must visit theme parks, there is something about visiting the original, DISNEYLAND.

Right from the beginning of planning this trip there were noticeable differences between the resorts.

• In California there are only two parks, Disneyland and California Adventure. In Florida, Disney World consist of several parks, 4 parks including 2 water parks.
• There are only three hotels properties at Disneyland: Disney’s ParadisePier, Disneyland Hotel, and Disney’s Grand Californian Hotelcompared to the endless amounts of property hotels at Disney World. In California, off property hotels are much closer and some are in walking distance to the parks.
• The size of the resort is much smaller, traveling from the hotels to the parks is fairly easy. If staying at an on-property hotel you can walk to the parks and the Downtown Disney District. Guests of the hotels even have access to an exclusive Disney California Adventure park entrance, located inside Disney’s Grand Californian. You also have an option to walk to the Downtown Disney District to catch a monorail that will drop you off right in the Tomorrowland section of Disneyland Park.
• Park-hopping is the easiest because the park entrances are right across from each other.
• While Fastpass is offered free across all of the major parks, Disneyland still uses paper tickets for Fastpass and not the digital access as there is at Disney World. However, with a fee you can upgrade to digital access. Upgrading also includes Memory Maker, which means all your photos that are taken on rides and by Disney’s photographers that are around the park can be downloaded at no additional cost. You will however have to pay for physical copies.
• When it comes to rides there are some variations and some are exclusive to that location. An example would be Disney Studios’ Tower of Terror is Guardians of the Galaxy – Mission: Breakout! at California Adventure. Though the ride may only seem different by theming, it makes for a completely new experience, that’s completely worth it.

If planning a trip to Disneyland, be prepared to experience Disney as it was truly intended. Characters roaming freely. An intimate setting, as the parks are smaller. And of course it is just as Magical!