Disneyland Ride Tracking Sheet

Here is the ride chart my family uses to track our rides at Disneyland. Since we go from Monday through Thursday, I have space under each day for Shelby, in this case, to put a tick mark under which day she went on each ride.

Disneyland Ride Chart		Shelby			2015
Land	Ride	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday
Main Street USA	Disneyland Railroad
	Great Moments with Mr Lincoln
	Main Street Cinema
	Main Street Vehicles
	The Disney Gallery
Tomorrowland	Astro Orbitor
	Autopia
	Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters
	Captain EO Tribute Closed
	Disneyland Railroad
	Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage
	Innoventions
	Jedi Training Academy
	Monorail
	Space Mountain
	Star Tours
	Starcade Closed
Fantasyland	Alice in Wonderland
	Casey Jr Circus Train
	Dumbo
	Fantasy Faire
	It's a Small World
	King Arthur's Carousel
	Matterhorn Bobsleds
	Mr Toad's Wild Ride
	Peter Pan's Flight
	Pinoccio's Daring Journey
	Pixie Hollow
	Sleeping Beauty Castle
	Snow White Grotto
	Snow White's Scary Adventures
	Story Book Land Canal Boats
	Tea Cups
Frontierland	Big Thunder Ranch
	Fantasmic
	Frontierland Shooting Expedition
	Mark Twain Riverboat
	Rafts to Tom Sawyer Island
	Sailing Ship Columbia
	The Golden Horseshoe Stage
	Thunder Mountain Railroad
	Tom Sawyer Island
Adventureland	Indiana Jones
	Jungle Cruise
	Tarzan's Treehouse
	The Enchanted Tiki Room
New Oreans Square	Disneyland Railroad
	Haunted Mansion
	Pirates of the Caribbean
Critter Country	Davey Crocket Explorer Canoes
	Splash Mountain
	Winnie the Pooh
Mickey's Toontown	Chip N Dale Treehouse
	Disneyland Railroad
	Donald's Boat
	Gadget's Go Coaster
	Goofy's Playhouse
	Mickey's House
	Minnie's House
	Roger Rabbit's Cartoon Spin

Disneyland News and Rumors August 2015

Some major announcements were made at the D23 expo last week. For those who are not familiar with the D23 expo, it is the expo that Disney holds every year in Anaheim to update fans on the happenings of all things Disney. The past 4 years had been rather uneventful as it relates to additions to the Disneyland. But not so this year.

The Force Will Be With Us Soon!
For starters Bob Iger, Disney's CEO, announced that both Disneyland and Disney World will be building Star Wars Lands at each of their properties. A video of the announcement can be seen below:

The crowd erupted as Bob Iger announced the Star Wars Land in Anaheim. I'll have to admit, I got a little teary-eyed as I saw the excitement on Mr Iger's face as he was getting ready to make the announcement followed by the audience's reaction.

Two hours after Bob Iger made the announcement, it was Bob Chapek's turn to give further details on the project. Unfortunately not much in the way of details was given other than some small tidbits about the 2 news rides that will be coming to the Land. The first will allow guests to fly the Millennium Falcon on a "customized secret mission." The second ride will "put you in the middle of a climactic battle between the First Order and the Resistance." Both rides and the much of the new land will be based on the new trilogy coming out, with the exception of some old trilogy characters making appearances here and there from time to time and a possible Cantina eatery which, according to theverge.com, Bob Iger was quoted as saying, "...there will be one." Three artists depictions of the new Star Wars Land are posted below:

 Not mentioned either is weather Star Tours will move into the new Star Wars Land or if it will stay where it has been for the past 30 years in Tomorrowland.  No completion date or even a date when construction will get underway was given but the expansion will take place in the northern reaches of the park as shown in the below picture:

Update: Although it was originally thought that Mickey's Toontown would be a casualty of the new Star Wars Land, the official @DisneylandToday said this on August 16th- "It is not replacing Mickey's Toontown. It will be in the Big Thunder Ranch area, inclusive of some backstage locations." So the Star Wars Land boxed area in the picture above is close to being accurate except Toontown is safe and additional storage buildings to the north need to be added into it.

The total expansion will be 14 acres. To give a little perspective, Cars Land in California Adventure was almost 12 acres. It sounds like the only existing part of Disneyland that will be removed for the makeover will be The Big Thunder Ranch.

In other Star Wars News, the bottom level of the Innoventions building in Tomorrowland is currently under construction to become Star Wars Launch Bay - an interactive attraction that will allow guests to see props from the upcoming movies. Here is the official statement from Disney on the new Launch Bay:

This interactive experience will take guests into the upcoming film, Star Wars: The Force Awakens, with special exhibits and peeks behind-the-scenes, including opportunities to visit with new and favorite Star Wars characters, special merchandise and food offerings. Star Wars Launch Bay will be located in the Animation Courtyard at Disney’s Hollywood Studios and in Tomorrowland at Disneyland park. Also at Disneyland park, Star Wars Launch Bay will share the space with the reimagined Super Hero HQ, featuring opportunities to meet and take photos with super heroes like Captain America and Thor, as well as experience the returning Iron Man Tech Presented by Stark Industries. Both experiences will be available for guests later this year.

As described in the statement, the top portion of the Innoventions building is getting a Marvel makeover. Also Micechat reports that the old Captain EO building is rumored to be getting outfitted with a new movie preview for The Force Awakens.  The target completion date for this temporary "mini" Star Wars Land in Tomorrowland is mid-November 2015. Also rumored for November 2015 is a new sequence to be added to Star Tours based on The Force Awakens.

Another interesting bit of news to add to the new Tomorrowland equation is reported by Change.org. They report that as of September 25, 2015 bands will no longer play at Tomorrowland Terrace. Weather this is related to the makeover that Tomorrowland is getting is speculative, but it's hard to imagine it's completely unrelated.

Disney's Property Acquisitions.
Over the past year or so, Disney has been buying various building around the Disneyland area. Two such places they bought last year are 1515 and 1585 S Manchester Ave, next to the freeway. One of the office buildings is 160,000 square feet. Another property they purchased is the Carousel Inn. According to the Orange County Register, it was purchased on March 23 for $32 Million. Suzi Brown, a Disneyland spokeswoman confirmed the purchase and added that the current management group that is running the Carousel Inn will continue to run it. In essence, Disneyland is not going to add the Carousel Inn to it's list of Hotel properties, but rather is probably going to use it as a part of a future parking expansion. Micechat reports that Disneyland is planning on building a major parking structure, to be complete by 2018 in space across Harbor Blvd and behind the many hotels there. That is where the Carousel Inn comes into play. Again, according to Micechat, the Carousel Inn will be demolished and a sky bridge will be constructed above Harbor Blvd allowing safer passage from the new parking structures to Disneyland. A view of what this will look like can be found below:

Carousel Inn is marked with the star. 

Adding the new parking structures will help ease the burden of the current parking problems at Disneyland and, depending on the capacity of the structures, may allow for future expansion of Disneyland as well.

Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters
Last but not least, the Disney Parks Blog is reporting that the new ride that is currently under construction replacing Luigi's Flying Tires, will be called Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters. According to the blog:

Luigi has invited all of his cugini (cousins) from his hometown of Carsoli, Italy, to visit his Casa della Tires. To help celebrate Race Day in Radiator Springs, they will demonstrate the dances of their village with Cars Land guests when the all-new Luigi’s Rollickin’ Roadsters opens early next year.

That's all the news for now. For my latest News and Rumors update, click here

The Disneyland Paint the Night Parade

I'll be the first to admit that I was really hoping that the Main Street Electrical Parade would be brought back for the 60th Anniversary. When I heard that Disney was going to make a new parade for the 60th, called the Paint the Night Parade, I was a little disappointed. After seeing the Paint the Night Parade in June, my mind has been changed! The Parade is amazing! It has great new relevant

floats with great music, and even had just the right amount of subtle tribute to the Main Street Electrical Parade. In this blog, I'll detail the Paint the Night Parade, float by float and also give some advice on where to watch it. If you don't want to be spoiled as to what the parade looks like, scroll down past the pictures to see the best viewing spot. Also be warned that pictures never capture the true feeling and effect of nighttime parades, especially in the case of the Paint the Night Parade, but here it goes...



The first thing you see are pixie dancers, leading the way for Tinkerbell.

On the tip of Tinkerbell's wand is a light from the original Main Street Electrical Parade.

If you are familiar with the Main Street Electrical Parade, no doubt you'll recognize this drum! A nice tribute. Peter Pan sits on top.

The drum is followed by three characters: Tigger, Genie, and Lumiere. This picture doesn't do them justice - they looked great!

Next is the Monsters Inc float. Each of the doors is a TV and the images change constantly. There are load sounds by this float which my kids weren't crazy about.

After Monsters Inc float, Lightning McQueen makes his way down the parade route.

After Lightning were some really neat dancers. This was one of my favorite parts of the parade.

Mack Truck is next, and as you can see, it is very impressive. The whole interior of the truck is made up of lights which flash on and off in amazing patterns.

More dancers follow the Mack Truck. These dancers are dressed to look like coral and are an introduction of the Ariel float that follows.

The Little Mermaid float.

An illuminated Nemo and Marlin swim after the Little Mermaid float. Who knew they were friends with flounder?

Dancers dressed in Toy Story Country Western clothes lead the way for the Toy Story float.

The Toy Story float with Woody on top.

Cast Members dressed as candelabras set the mood for the Beauty and the Beast/princess
theme.

Belle's is the first of the princesses and gets her own float! 

Belle is followed by Rapunzel (behind the dancer) and Cinderella who were relegated to smaller floats.

Due to its sheer size, the Frozen Ice Castle float is a sight to be seen. Anna and Elsa are on front with Olaf on back.

Following the Ice Castle are cast members twirling circular discs that change colors. The effects are pretty cool!

Goofy, Donald, and Minnie are next riding on floats with dancing lights that change color.

Fittingly, Mickey finishes up the parade on a float that this picture doesn't do justice to.

Our viewing area:
In the summer time, The Paint the Night Parade runs two times each night. The 8:50pm parade starts to the East of It's a Small World and ends on Main Street near the entrance of Disneyland. The 10:45pm parade starts where the first parade ended and ends by Small World, where the 8:50 parade began. People had already begun saving spots on Main Street by 5:00pm - almost 4 hours before the parade. As much as we wanted to see the parade, 4 hours equals a lot of missed rides at Disneyland so we developed an alternative strategy. Right after the 8:50pm parade is the fireworks show which runs from about 9:30pm to 9:50pm. Main Street is flooded with people at this time so avoid it, if possible, by going on rides in Tomorrowland, Fantasyland, or Fronierland. The reason I mention these three lands is so that you are close to the parade route so that once the fireworks show ends, you can rush in and grab a spot to watch the 10:45pm parade. This way you only have to wait 1 hour instead of 4 hours for the 8:50pm parade. The spot we found was on a concrete bench just around the bend from the Astro Orbitor in Tomorrowland and just before reaching the Matterhorn. We got this spot both nights we watched the parade by getting there right at the tail end of the fireworks show, around 9:40. Here is a picture of what our viewing area looked like:

Our viewing area. The parade starts from the left side of the picture, and to the right down the parade route would be the Matterhorn.

UPDATE

The Paint the Night Parade has been discontinued as a nightly addition to Disney's entertainment schedule and will only be presented on certain nights during the 2016 Holiday Season before it is replaced in early 2017 by the Main Street Electrical Parade. The Main Street Electrical Parade will be returning to Disneyland for "a limited time run". It is widely believed (though not confirmed by Disney) that the Paint the Night Parade will return to Disneyland soon, perhaps even as early as summer 2017.