WDW family takes on DL for the first time staying at Paradise Pier Club Level UPDATE 9/12/17

[Samandmom]

Recently back from our first trip to CA!! We are a WDW family of several trips and our last trip was Christmas 2013 (yes we are due for another but as the kids got older it became harder to go often). WDW might be in the plans next year.
We have been trying to get to the West Coast for a few years now and finally have!! When we originally started looking into booking the trip we were going to stay at a hotel across the street, I can't remember the name at the moment but I think it was a Best Western. Upon further looking into booking I played around and priced out Paradise Pier Club Level Theme park view. At that point we just decided to splurge a little and went with it. We figured this maybe our one and only trip to CA/DL or if we ever go again it maybe a long time from now. When we first booked we booked 8 nights but after thinking about it we thought we should move closer to USH for the last 3 nights.

Trip dates Friday 8/18 - Saturday 8/26. Staying 5 nights at Paradise Pier Club Level Theme Park View and 3 nights at Sheraton Universal in just a basic room.
Characters partaking in this trip:
Me = Minnie Mouse (about 12 WDW trips)
Hubby = Mickey Mouse (about 12 WDW trips)
17 yr old son = Spider Man (about 8 WDW trips
14 yr old daughter = Ariel (about 6 WDW trips)
18 yr old nephew = Buzz (he has only been to WDW once when he was about 7 and only vaguely remembers it)

Friday 8/18/17

We flew in from Hartford CT to Chicago to LAX. The first day was dedicated just to traveling and what a long day it was. We had been up since 5:30AM EST and finally settled in at 1:00 AM EST.

The plan for the day was to get there and then try out In N Out Burger for dinner.
When we finally arrived and checked in it was already after 7:00 pm local time so we had just missed the Club Level's cocktail hour. So we just had some drinks (soda, water, juice and some desserts). Not a huge selection but enough to nibble on before dinner since we were starving and really
thirsty.
Club Level dessert offerings


How our room was set up since hubby and I were celebrating 20 yrs!


Mickey Rice Krispy Treats in our room the first night.



We then headed to In N Out Burger for dinner. When we arrived it was really busy and we were tired so we decided to get it to go plus we wanted to catch the 9 pm showing of World of Color from our room.
We made it back in time and enjoyed watching WOC but we didn't enjoy In N Out. The fries were very gross and the burgers just ok. Not long after we settled in and called it a night and very anxious for our first day in DL!!

First day thoughts:
Weird seeing city traffic and then oh look there's Disneyland!
I think if we fly to CA ever again we would look into a non stop flight!
Oh and It's a Small World after all!! While leaving to go to In N Out Burger someone calls out our last name in the lobby! It was people we knew from all the way from CT

 

[goofballs]

Looking forward to reading the rest of your report.
Bummer that In N Out was such a disappointment. We enjoyed it, but for us it wasn't quite what it was hyped up to be. And I could see that it would not travel well at all.

 

[Samandmom]

[GALLERY=][/GALLERY]

Looking forward to reading the rest of your report.
Bummer that In N Out was such a disappointment. We enjoyed it, but for us it wasn't quite what it was hyped up to be. And I could see that it would not travel well at all.

Thanks for reading!
We did think maybe the fries were gross since we didn't eat them right away.

 

[Samandmom]

Can anyone help me? I'm trying to upload a picture so I clicked on Upload a file and then chose the pic it shows it downloading but then says the file is too big. I'm doing this on my phone if that makes a difference. Do I need to do it on my laptop and make the file smaller?

EDIT

I downloaded an app to resize the pics but now I need to figure out how to place pic under the paragraph it belongs to.

Got it!!!!

 

[hootey]

Look forward to pictures and a report about the rest of your trip

 

[Samandmom]

Saturday 8/19/17

Today's plan was to visit DL for Early Entry that began at 7am. Brunch at Goofy's Kitchen and to watch one of the very last MSEP.

We all awoke on this morning around 5:30, being that our bodies were still on EST. We got ready and headed down to the 2nd floor for the Club Level. BTW we had a room on the 14th floor, I should have mentioned that on the previous report. The time was around 6:25 so we had to wait a few minutes for them to open, there was another family also waiting.

We walked in when they opened shortly after. They offered three types of cereal Froot Loops, Raisin Bran, and corn flakes in one of those things you turn a knob to get the cereal out.



The other choices they had were assorted fruit, (apples, bananas, melons) hard boiled eggs, instant oatmeal packets, and bagels with a few choices for toppings (cream cheese, butter, jelly and PB). They also had mini muffins and cheese danish.



For drinks they offered milk, OJ, water, soda cans, coffee, hot tea, hot chocolate and juice boxes. Plenty of choices for everyone!



We ate our breakfast quickly and then made our way over to DL. The walk takes about 15 minutes.


We had a great morning and accomplished a lot!! We arrived at DL a little after 7 am and took a leisurely stroll on Main St to take in how it compares to MK.

The castle is so cute we called it the baby castle.


We then headed over to Tomorrowland and grabbed a FP for SP (ok am I crazy but it felt way faster then WDW's version) with a return time of 8:10. We then rode SP with about a 10 min wait. We then walked over and did Nemo (cute ride but not worth a second ride).

Then I had my son and nephew go grab us FP's for Star Tours but they came back with Buzz FP's instead. They said they made a mistake and later I saw how they could make the mistake. (The machines are close together) We then did Autopia (I liked this better then MK's version) we then grabbed Star Tours FP's and then used our FP's for Buzz.
We had some time before ST so we headed over to Fantasyland and did Snow White, Pinocchio and Mr Toad's ride all with pretty much walk ons.

We then pulled FP's for Matterhorn and then back to ride ST. After ST we went to the gift shop outside of the Buzz ride to get our pin and Lanyard for booking with Disney Visa. (Cute pin and Lanyard).

It was then time to ride Matterhorn and lastly we did Small World. (Loved this version with all the characters from Disney movies). The time now was 11:30 so we headed to the DLH for our 12:00 Goofy's Kitchen reservation.

I only have details of what order I did rides on this morning because I had typed it up for a post I made. So other days will not be this detailed of the order of rides

To be continued

 

[hootey]

Great pictures of the Club Level breakfast bar. Reminds me of a nice hotel I had to stay at on the east side of Astoria Oregon a little over three years ago. Newer Hotel on hwy 30 overlooking the Columbia River had a breakfast bar very similar to the pictures you posted. Was the best food we had during our stay in Astoria. We ate all we could every morning. It did have the Do-it yourself waffle machine, they were great! Fresh Mickey Waffles would have been better though! Hope the club breakfast was better!

 

[Samandmom]

Great pictures of the Club Level breakfast bar. Reminds me of a nice hotel I had to stay at on the east side of Astoria Oregon a little over three years ago. Newer Hotel on hwy 30 overlooking the Columbia River had a breakfast bar very similar to the pictures you posted. Was the best food we had during our stay in Astoria. We ate all we could every morning. It did have the Do-it yourself waffle machine, they were great! Fresh Mickey Waffles would have been better though! Hope the club breakfast was better!

Yes Mickey waffles would have made the breakfast way better!! Before leaving for our trip I had read a post about Mickey waffles at Club Level so I got very excited. I read the post and it was for DLH

 

[hootey]

Yes Mickey waffles would have made the breakfast way better!! Before leaving for our trip I had read a post about Mickey waffles at Club Level so I got very excited. I read the post and it was for DLH

Macy's has the Mickey Waffle machines for sale. I hope to get by Macy's and get one for myself!

 

[Samandmom]

Saturday 8/19/17 continued

Goofy's Kitchen

We made our way over to DLH for GK's through Main St and then downtown Disney. We didn't realized it at the time but from Small World we could have just gotten on the monorail and it would have been closer. But anyways we arrived and took pictures outside with the sign for Goofy's.
Once inside we waited in a short line to check in. I had purchased the character meal in advance as part of our package. I paid an additional $250 for the deluxe character dinning so it came out to $50 a person and this included tax and tip. Not sure if we really saved anything though?

Receipt



We then got in a short line to meet Goofy. While waiting in line they called our name so hubby went over to them and said that we were still in line for Goofy and that we were next. They said no problem and waited for us. They sat us in a half circle corner booth which was quite and private. While I did enjoy our own little corner I felt like we were missing out though when all the characters did a little dance and show every 30 or so minutes.

The server took our drink orders and then we went to get our food. I thought the buffet area was pretty small and didn't see a huge amount of choices. I started off with some eggs Benedict, breakfast potatoes, biscuit and bacon.
Eggs benedict = very good
Potatoes = ok
Bacon = average
Biscuits = dry



As you can see from the following pics the kids had pizza, macaroni n cheese and chicken tenders. Looks like they really liked the mac n cheese.



My favorite food was the s'mores pizza omg soo good!!



Hubby liked the pesto pasta.





Desserts



Overall I think Goofy's is over priced for what they offer and the characters took awhile to visit, we were done eating but still hadn't seen Chip so we waited.

After lunch we headed back to our room with a quick stop at the Club Level for some drinks for the room and to also see what the snack offerings were. I forgot to take pics but they offered sodas, juice boxes, water and the same breakfast coffee bar. We each grabbed a soda and a bag of chips for the room. They had Cheetos, Doritos and reg chips. They also had some snack mix, gold fishes and fruit.

Hubby and I took a little nap and the kids went for a swim. They came back in about 45 minutes, they said it was crowded. They then took naps also.

Continued in next post

 

[Samandmom]

Continued Saturday 8/19/17

We stayed in the room till 5 and headed to Club Level for cocktail hour. They had veggies with dip, a variety of cheeses, crackers, bread, bags of chips, uncrustables and every night they had a different hot food item. Tonight's was a breaded ginger chicken. (Didn't get a pic of the chicken). While eating I thought that the juice boxes would be a great drink to bring into the parks with us so we each grabbed a couple of juice boxes.




After eating we headed back to DL. The plan was to watch the 8:45 MSEP and the time was around 6:30 and people were ALREADY staking out spots for the parade all the way up Main St. We then decided that we would wait and watch the 10:30 parade.

I wanted to get some photopass pictures in front of the castle since I had already purchased max pass for the day (for photopass purposes only). There was a line so we waited. The photopass guy went to the people in front of us and said if you want pictures on the side of the castle he could take them but they declined. So he asked us and I said sure. He was AWESOME with taking pics of us. I asked him if he could take not only group pics but of us separated. He said yes, no problem so he took pics of the group, hubby and I, just my kids, my nephew alone, and just the cousins. The pictures came out great and I will be using one for Xmas cards. Even my son commented after we were done that he was good.

After our little picture session we headed to Adventure Land. My son wanted to do Indiana Jones Adventure but FP's would have fallen for the time to line up for the parade. So we checked the app and decided that the boys should go grab us FP's for Haunted Mansion. After they came back we got in line for Jungle Cruise, (didn't see too much of a difference from WDW) Pirates (hubby and I like DL's better) and then Pooh. After riding Pooh I wanted to try a tigger tail. It was sooo sweet and yummy and enough for everyone to have a bite.



After our snack we headed over to HM (pretty similar with WDW) to use our FP.

The time was about 9:30 so we decided to line up for the parade. We found a spot on Main St. and about 20 minutes later a CM came over to tell us and a few others that lined up there also that we couldn't sit there. So my hubby was a little upset because a CM we started talking to when we first sat down didn't say a word to us that were we sat wasn't allowed. So hubby asked him and he said he was sorry he wasn't thinking so he gave us a suggestion to stand across from there and that 10 min before the parade started they would rope it off and we could stand/sit there. This worked out nicely we saw the parade as it came out of the back so as soon as the parade ended we left.

Sorry don't know the name of the building but the brown top building is where we originally sat then moved across the street. We had to wait near the flag and then moved before the parade started in the street in between the two.



We went back to the room and had a snack of soda, uncrustables (we each grabbed one from Club Level earlier figuring we may want a snack later) and chips. Shortly after we called it a night.

First day thoughts:
Goofy's Kitchen pricey for the food they offer. My kids are older now and aren't into the characters as much anymore and rather do more rides in the parks then to stop for characters. So doing one character meal is a good idea for us as I see they do still somewhat enjoy them.

I'm so glad we took advantage of EE as the parks did not start getting busy till around 11. EE at Disneyland is way better then WDW since a lot more take advantage in WDW.

So nice that it only takes 15 minutes to walk back to our hotel and take an afternoon break as apposed to it taking 45 minutes or more sometimes to get back to our room in WDW.

Glad that I thought of grabbing juice boxes for the park from Club Level.