Help me plan a NYE trip!

Disneyland
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Just booked a 2 night stay 12/30-1/1. YAY!! It will be me, DH, and DS 14 and we’ll be staying at DLH. I’m psyching myself up to deal with crowds and we’ll have PH and G+. Planning for 3 days in parks (1/1 we’ll leave for airport around 1:30). Any tips for us? How would you use EE time as well as park reservations? Right now, I’ve reserved MK for each day (due to concerns about closing park capacity on NYE) and it doesn’t look like much is available in CA for EE. Usually, we are rope droppers with an afternoon break. Do we need to plan on staying in the park all day on NYE? How crazy will it really be?? Appreciate any and all advice!

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My advice for Disneyland is to always make full use of early entry and the two first hours of operation. Crowds tend to trickle in until afternoon when they arrive in force. Of course, New Years Eve and the surrounding days will be extremely busy, so no matter what you do, you will be waiting in long lines. But relatively speaking, you will be better off earlier in the morning.

I usually start two days at DL for every one starting at DCA. There is definitely a benefit to early entry at DCA as well, but there are many more attractions at DL in general.

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Thanks @Jeff_AZ! Any special events/happenings we should try to plan for on NYE? (for example, good place to make a dinner reservation, etc.)

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I have never been for NYE myself. The one thing I’ll say is that if you want to get dining reservations in advance, log in about 10pm Pacific the night before you hit 60 days till your trip. Keep checking throughout the evening. Often reservations get posted that night. If you’re east coast time, just wake up as early as you can to check.

But if you don’t get reservations, there is very often walk-up availability day of. You’ll have to show up right when a restaurant opens to get on the list – you sign up using the app usually, not in-person, but it is geo-fenced so you have to be nearby.

Overall, try to be super flexible and have low expectations about how much you can get done.

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