I will admit this is where I struggled most with DL. There are plenty of food options, but at WDW I know my treats and I know my meals…plus there are always plenty of reservations to be had over there.
At DL, we still ate plenty of good food, but I had no reservations made in advance…so deciding where to eat took up a chunk of time every meal.
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If you are likely to limit your time in the parks to 7 or 8 hours in a day, I would definitely skip the After Dark event and buy a two day pass. You can do without Park Hopper with a 7 hour day, or get it if you’re not sure which park will be your biggest draw. For sure, get LLMP for both days to minimize line time and maximize your days. While Rope Drop makes for an easier first two hours, if your boys will be grumpy at that hour (most teen boys are, right?), you can get by without RD as long as you have LLMP and know how to maximize it.
As for when to go: Try to avoid weeks where there is an After Dark event if you can. Check to see when Grad Nites end, and try to visit between that and Pride Nite. If you must visit during an event week, book the event nite park for your day in that park; crowds are notoriously low until 3 p.m. in the event nite parks. If you prefer to do your 7 hours all at once rather than doing a big mid-day break, and you are there on event day, then don’t get PH. Otherwise, get PH so you can do the non-event park in the evening.
You’ll hear lots of preferences on hotels. HoJo is close and decent (not Wow!), and has a very nice pool with lots of lounges, which may be important for you since your time in the parks will be limited. It"s my go-to, though I’m finally going to try Candy Cane Inn, which some wise Liners swear by. Small pool, but breakfast is included, rooms are updated, and it"s close and even has a free shuttle.
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I hope y’all are up for a planning challenge!
I know it is very, very, VERY ill-advised, but the only time DD25 can really go is 4th of July weekend. 
It will be her, DS16.1, DS16.2, and myself.
They will fly in Thur 7/2, one park on Fri 7/3, the other park on Sat 7/4, and fly out Sun 7/5. DD25 is booking tickets as I type. 
Objective is NOT to see as much as possible. Objective is to have some good family time and sample both parks (mainly the things that differentiate it from WDW). And eat, of course.
I assume my priorities are booking park tickets and making park reservations (I did check that both are available both days), and then hotel.
Questions:
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I have a AAA membership so think I can book discounted tickets through them. Are there any options that might be significantly cheaper I should look at?
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Thoughts on which park to do which day?
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For fireworks viewing, my sound intolerance issues making “viewing from a distance” preferable. Is there someplace that would be the equivalent of viewing from Polynesian Beach at WDW or the boat tour or whatever?
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Any other packages we should consider booking?
I’ll start looking at hotels!
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This may not be as bad as you fear cause most APs (Magic Keys) will be blocked. That’s the single greatest driver of crowds at Disneyland.
Oddly, WDW has low crowds on 4th of July. I haven’t looked at the crowd calendar to see if the same is true of Disneyland but that would be interesting.
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I always check Costco and Undercover Tourist. Pretty much go with whatever is cheapest among all available retailers.
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If you want to see the Fourth of July fireworks at DL, you’ll want to do that on the 4th. Which is probably what a lot of other people will do. So if the fireworks are not a priority, maybe swap that.
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You could watch them from the esplanade between the parks, from the main drag in DCA, or maybe there is a special spot in Grand Californian or Disneyland Hotel, but I’m not sure.
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It’s been 20 years since I was there on July 4, but the morning in DL was one of the best I’ve had because crowds were non-existant until around 11. We figured most guests came in late because FWs were their priority and they planned to stay late. Who knows if it’s still that way, but it may be a decent gamble to book DL for the 4th since you don’t plan to be there late, anyway. The caveats is that you’d need to RD to get the benefit. If RD is out, then I’d book DCA for the 4th.
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I’m not familiar with distance watching at WDW, but I do know you can watch FWs from some hotels, without music, though. The rooms with a park view at HoJo should allow viewing from those rooms’ balconies. The sound is still pretty loud from there, however. In fact, it’s loud everywhere…enough so that they don’t do FWs during the week when school is in session, because the locals don’t like it. Still, it’s further and less noise than inside the park.
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Thanks to everyone for all the info so far! I so appreciate not having to start from ground zero. (And, not surprisingly, @Jeff_AZ is so incredibly clear and helpful with the LL info!)
So I’m trying to get serious about getting the more critical elements planned over the next couple of days.
My current thoughts for feedback…
Planning to get 2 day tickets with LLMP, 1 day per park. Both parks are available for both days as of now.
My kids will be coming from central time zone so I am hopeful that will work to my advantage and we can do rope drop, afternoon break at the hotel, then close down the parks both days. DL is open 8am-midnight both days and CA is open 8am-10pm both days so I’m thinking it is better to do CA first so we get to bed earlier to make rope drop the next day.
I am definitely weighing how much I want to cater to my noise intolerance issue versus my love of fireworks and wanting that full experience.
Has anyone watched the fireworks from Fifth Rooftop at Grand Legacy? Apparently they pipe the soundtrack in so that may be a good option. Their reservations open 30 days out so I still have a shot at those and would aim for a 8pm or later reservation (ideally 8:30pm maybe?).
I’m thinking we would do Fifth Rooftop on our CA day (as opposed to
The other alternative I’m looking at is booking the Fantasmic dining package. Apparently if you book the first Fantasmic show, you can just watch the fireworks afterwards from there and they do projections on the water screens? (Yes, I realize this will be fairly noisy for me, but sounds like the convenience may be worthwhile.) Only the standard package is still available, and unfortunately Cafe Orleans is sold out for the first show, so that leaves me with River Belle Terrace or Rancho del Zocalo. I’m leaning towards Rancho.
The other alternative I was considering is watching the Fire of the Rising Moons version of the fireworks from Galaxy’s Edge.
VVP (Very Vague Plan):
Thu 7/2 - check in at a hotel TBD; pick up my kids from LAX (flight arrival 8:50pm)
Fri 7/3 - rope drop CA, return to hotel for break after lunch, return to park for a few hours, 8:30pm reservation for 9:35 fireworks at Fifth Rooftop at Grand Legacy (if can’t get the reservation, just ignore the fireworks that night and close out the night at CA)
Sat 7/4 - rope drop DL, return to hotel for break after lunch, either go to Fire of the Rising Moons (if we watched standard fireworks from Fifth Rooftop the night before) or Fantasmic package (if unable to get Fifth Rooftop reservations for Fri), close out the night at DL. FWIW, I don’t think my kids will really care if we see Fantasmic or not.
Sun 7/5 - kids flight leaves ONT (not LAX) at 2:40pm, I will return to the hotel for one additional solo night
Mon 7/6 - check out of hotel
Am I thinking right that we should do Fifth Rooftop on our CA day so we can take advantage of staying until midnight on our DL day? Or am I going to wish we had more time at CA and less time at DL? If we did Fifth Rooftop on our DL day, I don’t think it would be worth it to go back into DL after the fireworks?
All feedback welcome!
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Yes I have done this and it is a really nice option. One stop shop. Honestly if you can handle Fantasmic, you should be ok with the fireworks from that spot. Of course you know your tolerance better than anyone so take that with a grain of salt.
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I think having more time at Disneyland is preferable. You can definitely use all the time you have in both parks, but if you’re going to skip out early one night and not come back, I would choose the DCA night.
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You could, but it would require some serious resolve and you’d probably decide to just go back to your hotel.
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I ALWAYS wish I had more time at DL, and never feel that way about DCA. And if you have the energy to go back to DL after the FWs to close down the park, I think it’s totally worth it on a summer night. Closing down DL is magical.
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Yeah, one factor is definitely length of exposure, so Fantasmic and fireworks back-to-back might push my envelope, especially if we want to stay at the park afterwards. (I can generally handle about 15-20 min of most sound levels without issue but it starts getting dicey past that.) I am starting to stalk Fifth Rooftop to see exactly what time they start accepting reservations and will use the Fantasmic package as a backup option.
Completed:
I purchased 2 day tickets with LLMP through AAA.
I booked us at Park Vue Inn after reading the Off-Site Hotel thread and doing my usual level of overthinking. $1107 total (including free parking) for 4 nights over a holiday weekend seemed very reasonable. The location is just Wow! I was able to get a queen + bunk bed, which I think the twins will much prefer to 2 queens, so that swayed me quite a bit. (ETA: FWIW, I read somewhere that with my AAA discount, I could save $10/night but I would need to call Park Vue to book. I decided it wasn’t worth the hassle but just wanted to note that for others.)
I think that’s all the critical bits for now as I wait for Fifth Rooftop reservations to open in a few days so I’m going to put planning on a back burner until then.
Oh, confirm my thinking on magic bands after a quick dive on updated info? So our 2020-2021 era WDW magic bands are now obsolete and there is zero reason to bring them? We can just load the DL app on all 4 of our phones to handle tickets/LLMP? So the only reason to buy a magic band+ might be to buy one to share to play the game in Galaxy’s Edge?
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Correct, unless your MBs specifically include a “+” in the description in the app, they don’t work at Disneyland. And your phone will work fine. You can load everyone’s tickets on each phone so you really only need one phone per group that is traveling together. Only need another phone if you are splitting up.
Also you can easily use a single profile / Account and all just log into the same one to access tickets, mobile orders, etc. without having to share those plans across multiple accounts.
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lol. This planning on the fly without researching every detail months in advance typically works fine for my usual nomading, but not sure about Disney! I don’t know what I don’t know!
I didn’t realize California Adventure had their own nighttime spectacular. So do we definitely want to see World of Color Happiness?
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I love World of Color and it is definitely worth seeing at least once. But on the other hand, the Happiness iteration is not my favorite. If you are in the area, you can watch from the bridge to Pixar Pier without a LL or desert party or anything.
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How early would you recommend getting there?
So…pivoting my plan to incorporate World of Color on our CA day…
Fri 7/3 - rope drop CA (open 8am-10pm), return to hotel for break after lunch, return to park for a few hours, close out with 10:15pm World of Color
Sat 7/4 - rope drop DL (open 8am-midnight), return to hotel for break after lunch, return to park for a few hours, Fantasmic package* (9:05pm Fantasmic ie “first show”, stay for 9:35pm fireworks), close out the night at DL.
* Unfortunately, it looks like Cafe Orleans packages are already sold out for the first show so I think we’ll just do Rancho del Zocalo.
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You’re asking someone who hates waiting around for a show to start, so I would say just walk up when it’s about to start.
You’ll get a better view if you show up at least 30 minutes before it starts but can probably cope with less.
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