Need general advice for DCA and DL touring plans

Disneyland Touring Plans
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First timers! We are heading to DCA and DL in 2 weeks. I feel so lost. I was on point with my WDW trips and still can picture the location of everything.

We will be staying on property and taking advantage of early entry for DCA and 1 DL day and a 2nd DL without early entry. We also will have LL multi pass. Kids are 4.5, 10, 11, 14, 16 and 2 adults. What definitely want to do RSR and would be willing to pay for LL. We would like to do Rise, but will not pay extra since we did it a few times at WDW in the past.

What would be your suggestions for how to start our day with early entry assuming we want to do all rides not closed during our visit? (Incredicoaster will be closed :sob:)

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If you’re at the front of the line (from the esplanade, not GCH entrance), you might be able to RD Guardians Mission Breakout and then hop in line for RSR before park open. I would probably go that route. Those are both rides you will probably want to do more than once.

At DL, I tend to like to RD FL, but not PPF. An alternative is Matterhorn and/or Space Mountain. You can’t go wrong!

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Is there a holding place for park open rope drop? Where are they held? And if we do guardians is their are certain way to get to the line for RSR?

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There are different spots based on which ride you are RD’ing. Head left from the main entrance to get to Guardians. I think the cut through from Avenger’s Campus to Cars Land is closed, so you’ll have to exit Avenger’s Campus and then head left again at the next turn to get to Cars.

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For one start in each park @Julianne_fki’s starting suggestions are exactly what I’d do.

Guardians is a great RD option if it’s a ride you really are excited about it, because you’ll likely want multiple rides on it (for fun and potential variety in different song) and can only get 1 LL.

The walkway is closed right now between Avengers Campus and the back side of Carsland, so yes exit Avengers Campus (I recommend going past Webslingers so you can see the main entrance, I especially love the music there) and then turn left on the main walkway and you’ll get to the Carsland entrance.

Being eligible for Early Entry, there may be specific roped pathways to use to keep you ahead of the rope drop crowd that will be being held at some point between the Carthay Circle hub and entrance to Avengers Campus, so pay attention to the various CMs and signage as you go.

But a definite perk to early entry is that you can be positioned to knock off 1 blockbuster/E ticket ride with no wait and then if that works, still have time to queue up to have the same effect for Racers (assuming it opens on time with the regular park opening). The regular rope drop crowd has to make it all the way from their rope to the back of Carsland before park open so you have a definite advantage being able to position at the ride entrance before that.

And I would recommend using the last 10 or so minutes of early entry to get into position. If it doesn’t open within 15-20 minutes of regular opening, pivot and use the LLSP to get one guaranteed ride on it. It’s a fun one that is easily a top choice for most people to re-ride, but it’s definitely tricky to reduce waits for re-rides since. One option is single rider (but your 4.5 yr old wouldn’t be able to do it but maybe one adult can take them to one of the other Carsland rides that are a hit with that age group while the rest single rider for a repeat ride on Racers).

And then for a DL start, definitely Fantasyland for one day only. We love to start with Alice or the Boats first. My older kids will usually then break off to Matterhorn while we take the little kids on Dumbo. Then we’ll get to the boats if we haven’t done them yet and finish up with any of the other 3 dark rides (Snow White, Pinoccho or Toads), that we feel like (again skipping PPF), and the carousel and Casey Jr. Train. If you skip some of the above you’ll still be able to hit MMRR in Toontown before waits build (or hit the ChipNDale Gadget/GoCoaster first if it’s still a 25 min wait or less if you have an LL for MMRR). I would also check out the lines for Mickey’s and Minnie’s houses before they build.

And then I usually try to have an “exit” plan for Toontoon since my kids coule play there forever. So either a show, or meal or LL for small world lined up to keep us moving to the next step and promise the kids we can come back in the evening if there’s time when lines are atrocious everywhere and play more then.

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Oh and Rise is fairly easy to find pockets of time when the line is lower. Usually towards the end of the night (though you risk it going down more since sometimes by 9-10pm it tends to be ‘done’ for the day and if it does go down during that time it’s like a 99.99% chance that it’s staying closed). Also, about 45 min after rope drop is a good time when Rise tends to dip (so if Toontown isn’t a high priority) you could head to GE. If you see it go down to 40-45 min that’s when you run. If it gets up to 55-60 by the time you get back though, beware that it could be even longer. So you do just kind of have to have some luck and see the app time go way down while you’re relatively close to it.

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We are doing 2 days at DL but only one with Early entry

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Ohhhh ok, the DL’s early entry day should definitely be in Fantasyland and you could even do Alice first (the boats won’t open until reg open) and t hen if the Peter Pan line at the end of EE isn’t crazy long (at most one & half switchbacks past where the line goes under the sign), jump in it (that should be about 20-25 min) and then you’ll have a front row seat to watch the reg rope drop crowd elbowing to get behind you. And that should be about the lowest you’ll find for a PPF wait in DLR.

Your non-EE day should be a start at Adventureland or Frontierland since nothing on that side opens with EE anyway. I love doing one Fantasyland start and one “West” side start of the park. And then I save Tomorrowland for nighttime since after (but also definitely during) fireworks waits tend to peter out there and I enjoy it so much more with the lights than I do in the daytime.

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Thank you so much!!!

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How are the waits for TSMM? Thst is my youngest’s favorite. We will need to do that one multiple times. We will have multi pass. What is the best way to ride that one multiple times? We go later this week.

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Lines can get long for TSMM, however if you RD it you can usually ride it twice in a row & then use LLMP for a third ride later in the day.

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We love starting at TSMM and have done it successfully 2-3 times at RD with walk-on or minimal waits. We also will try to get in 1-2 times with a RS on Incredicoaster and make it to the fun wheel/Pal-Around to get it done before waits build there.