The Disneyland Book of Secrets 2014: One Local's Unauthorized, Rapturous and Indispensable Guide to the Happiest Places on Earth (125 page)

Always striving to deliver the absolute best in entertainment,
Disneyland
unveiled a brand new parade,
Mickey’s Soundsational Parade
, on May 27, 2011.

Instead of non-
Disney
music, the parade’s songs are familiar tunes from
Disney
’s most beloved films. 
Mickey
leads the band composed of
Disney
characters, and dancers and drummers add to the excitement.

Given its more traditional,
Disney
-themed flavor,
Mickey’s Soundsational Parade
marched right into Guests’ hearts.  Parade routes are more crowded than ever as Guests throng
Disneyland
’s streets to catch glimpses of their favorite characters.

One of the show-stopping number is
Aladdin
and company (
Genie
, harem girls,
Abu
) performing crowd-pleaser
Prince Ali
. 
Tiana
and
The Little Mermaid
each have their own float, and the other princesses share real estate on a third float.

Guests revel in music from
The Lion King, Mary Poppins
,
Peter Pan
, those adorable
Three Caballeros
–the focus of the
Soundsational Parade
is on
Disney
features with sensational songs, winningly performed by top-notch Cast Members. The visuals are as terrific as the music; witness the glamour of the
Aladdin
costume, the spectacle of synchronized
Chimney Sweep
dancers, and the surreal sight of
Mary Poppins
and
Bert
gliding down
Main Street
on carousel horses.

Parades–especially
Disney
parades–should bring out the kid in all of us. 
Mickey’s Soundsational Parade
delivers that true
Disney magic
.
Did You Know?
  Parades are a valued tradition at
Disneyland
, starting with the parade on
Opening Day
in 1955.  That first parade included
Disneyland
’s
Horse-Drawn Streetcar
,
Autopia
cars,
Conestoga Wagons
,
Fess Parker
and
Buddy Ebsen
riding horseback in the roles of
Davy Crockett
and
George Russel
, respectively, the
Mouseketeers
, and very early versions of the costumed
Disney Characters
which had been borrowed from the
Ice Capades
.
Night Vision:
  Parades usually run twice day, in the mid-afternoon (around 3:30 pm) and evening (around 6:30 pm). 
Disneyland Parades
don’t operate at night except during holidays or for special events. 
Holiday Vision:
  During the holiday season from November through New Year’s Day, the
Disneyland Parade
becomes a Christmas parade, complete with elaborate floats that depict
Santa
’s workshop, Christmas trees, dancing gingerbread cookies, enormous decorations, and other holiday elements. 
Santa Claus
himself appears on a giant sleigh at the parade’s culmination.  Of course, there are plenty of
Disney Characters
in the parade–like
Pooh
and
Tigger
riding sleds–clad in festive holiday gear, helping Guests to join in the holiday spirit!
FastPass:
  No.  Parades are scheduled, mobile shows that move between the
“it’s a small world”
area and
Main Street
’s
Town Square
and as such don’t lend themselves to the
FastPass
format.  The route is marked on Guests’
Disneyland Guide Maps
, the colorful foldout maps that are available at the park’s
Main Entrance Turnstiles
.  For the best views, Guests usually claim a spot along the parade route about half an hour to an hour in advance, depending on how crowded the park is that day.  Group members can take turns saving the spot while others take turns enjoying food, beverages, attractions, or stopping at adjacent rest rooms.  Parades typically pause on
Main Street
near
Town Square
, and the
Central Plaza
(
Hub
), and near
“it’s a small world”
.  During parades these areas become bottlenecks; if you’re not interested in watching the parade or getting caught up in the crowd, choose alternate routes during those times. 
Kid’s Eye View:
  I’m not a big fan of parades in general.

Disney California Adventure Park

Disney California Adventure Park:  The Origin and the Spirit

To all who believe in the power of dreams... welcome.

Here we pay tribute to the dreamers of the past ...

The native people, explorers, immigrants, aviators, entrepreneurs

and entertainers who built the Golden State.

And we salute a new generation of dreamers

who are creating the wonders of tomorrow ….

Michael
D. Eisner
,
DCA Opening Day
, February 8, 2001

To all who come to this place of dreams … welcome.

Disney California Adventure celebrates the spirit of optimism

and the promise of endless opportunities, ignited by the imaginations

of daring dreamers such as Walt Disney and those like him

who forever changed – and were changed by – the Golden State.

This unique place embraces the richness and diversity

of California … Its land, its people, its stories

and, above all, the dreamers it continues to inspire.

Robert A. Iger, DCA Rededication Day,
June 15, 2012

On February 8, 2001,
Disney California Adventure Park
(
DCA
) opened just across the plaza from much older sibling
Disneyland Park
. 
DCA
opened with 55 acres to
Disneyland Park
’s 100+ acres, and in 2008 attracted less than 6 million visitors, as compared to
Disneyland Park
’s gate of 17+ million.  In the fairy tale universe for which
Disney
is famous, in those early days one could compare
DCA
to the “ugly duckling” of the
Disney Theme Park
family.  Even
Disney
fans and
Disney
insiders criticized
DCA
over the years, sometimes quite cruelly.  The dissatisfaction was rooted in the knowledge that
Disney
could do better, and a sense of betrayal that it had not.

Like a hero
ine in a
Disney
film,
DCA
had a lot of obstacles to conquer even before it got started.  Originally intended to be a grand
EPCOT West
, an ambitious partner to
Disneyland
in the way that
EPCOT
is a substantial sister park to
Walt Disney World
’s
Magic Kingdom
, geographical and budget constraints prompted execs to scale down
DCA
to a park about half the size of
Disneyland
, with half of the attractions.

DCA
was designed as a tribute to the state of California, an immersive celebration of its wilderness, history, entertainment, recreation, and cuisine.  It was built for a more mature audience than
Disneyland
, focused on adults rather than children, couples more than families.

Downtown Disney
and the luxurious
Grand Californian Hotel and Spa
, constructed at the same time and as part of the same resort expansion as
DCA
, met and even exceeded Guest and critic expectations when they opened.  But they were more modest endeavors, a shopping/dining district and hotel, respectively.  For
DCA
, the expectations for the new theme park, the anticipation of being immersed in a new
Disney
landscape and world, were understandably higher.  And unfortunately, after the park opened in 2001–even
before
it opened–the word was that
DCA
disappointed.

There were four major complaints: 
DCA
was too small, both in terms of space and number of attractions;
DCA
didn’t offer enough attractions and shows for children and families; the park didn’t feature any
Disney
characters; and it lacked
Disney
magic
.

* * *

DCA
had to be small. 
Disneyland Resort
has always been plagued by space constraints. 
Walt
himself regretted early in
Disneyland
’s existence that he’d only purchased 17 parcels totaling about 140 acres of orange groves, walnut trees, and strawberry fields on which to develop his vision of a uniquely immersive theme park.

Once his park opened in 1955, the land around park property was quickly blighted by a legion of tacky little shops, motels
, and eateries, dedicated to making money off the tourists that
Disneyland
drew, imitating
Disneyland
’s themed lands with images of rockets and tikis.  Some of us love Googie, and some of us love kitsch, but
Walt
and his team were unhappy that the surrounding properties didn’t measure up to the high standards of imagination, quality, wholesomeness, and cleanliness that
Disneyland
embodied.

To provide one oasis of quality accommodations,
Walt
entered into an agreement with
Jack Wrather
.
Wrather
was an oil tycoon and film and television producer (of “The Lone Ranger” and “Lassie”, among other hits) and he and
Walt
were friends. 
Wrather
and second wife
Bonita Granville
(best known for playing Nancy Drew on the silver screen in the 1930’s) lived in
Holmby Hills
not far from the
Disneys
. At
Walt
’s behest,
Wrather
and business partner
Maria Helen Alvarez
constructed and ran a family-friendly hotel across the street from
Disneyland Park
, and called it the
Disneyland Hotel
.

It officially opened in October of 1955, several months after the park launched, but wasn’t fully completed or fully operational until 1956.
  It cost about $15 to stay overnight–about $150 - $180 in today’s dollars.  A tram ferried hotel Guests to and from the park.  The
Disneyland Hotel
complex continued to expand–and sometimes contract–over the years, until it became the compact, three-tower gem with the dazzling pool complex that Guests know and love today.

Why didn’t
Disney
construct the
Disneyland Hotel
?  Both the company and the man were financially strapped after
Disneyland
was built.  As always,
Walt
had sunk all of his own resources into his vision.  Even with investments from
ABC
and other sponsors and backers, it took most of
Walt
’s own assets to craft a theme park at the high level of quality that he demanded.  He even borrowed against his life insurance policy to complete
Disneyland Park
to his satisfaction.  From his youth,
Walt
went for broke with his visionary projects.  He knew that if the product was good enough, the public would go all in too, and a profit would be made–a win-win for everyone.

As
Walt
had known it would be,
Disneyland
was soon a success and a highly profitable enterprise.  Soon
Walt
had the resources for his organization to purchase and run the
Disneyland Hotel–
but
Wrather
always refused to sell it.

It wasn’t until 1989 that
Disney
finally assumed ownership of the property. 
Wrather
had died, and
Disney
, under
Michael Eisner
’s leadership, purchased
Wrather
’s company, including not only the
Disneyland Hotel
, but assets like the
RMS Queen Mary
in Long Beach, the famous cruise ship which had been retired and converted to a hotel.

For most of its history,
Disneyland
was a theme park of about 80 acres, with a massive parking lot to the south.  The parking lot accommodated more than 15,000 cars daily, and millions of cars annually.  The parking space was needed for Guests, most of whom were local and most of whom, in car-crazy Southern California, drove to
Disneyland
.  So the parking lot remained largely untouched, and the theme park’s size remained, for the most part, static.

From time to time, as with
Pirates of the Caribbean
(1967),
Haunted Mansion
(1969), and
Indiana Jones Adventure
(1995),
Disney
tunneled outside the encircling
berm
to construct hidden show buildings large enough to accommodate these
E-ticket
adventures.  The
Eyeore
section of the parking lot, for example, was demolished to construct the
Indiana Jones Adventure
building.  But on the whole,
Disneyland Park
remained the same shape and size it had been since
Walt
’s day.

It was in the late 1990’s, under the controversial leadership of
Cynthia Harris
and
Paul Pressler
, that a substantial reconfiguration began. 
Disneyland Park
would expand and become the
Disneyland Resort
, a place where Guests would want to spend days, not just hours.

Instead of the massive
EPCOT West
(
WestCOT
) expansion considered in 1991, it would be a far more modest expansion, but with an ambitious–some would say impossible–goal.  Somehow the resort had to grow within the existing boundaries, which by the late 1990’s was about 510 acres.  Two new hotels, a shopping and dining district, and an entire new theme park would be shoehorned into the 510-acre footprint.  To make that happen, existing properties had to change, or were eliminated outright.

In 1984 the
Emerald Hotel
had opened to the southwest of the
Disneyland
parking lot.  It was a non-
Disney
enterprise.  Eventually re-named the
Pan Pacific Hotel
, it was acquired by
Disney
in 1995 and became the
Disneyland Pacific
Hotel
.  As part of the
Disneyland Resort
expansion, it was christened anew as
Disney’s Paradise Pier Hotel
and refurbished with a beach resort theme, since it would be overlooking the
Paradise Pier
district of the new theme park.

Portions of the
venerable
Disneyland Hotel
, including its original buildings, were torn down to make way for
Downtown Disney
, a winding, whimsical modern main street with a movie theater complex and upscale stores and restaurants. 
Downtown Disney
gives Guests a safe and entertaining, albeit pricey, downtown district immediately adjacent to the hotels, convenient for them and profitable for
Disney
, since it entices Guests to remain on property rather than spend their money in the streets of
Anaheim
beyond the resort gates.

The most dramatic change was to the oceanic parking lot south of
Disneyland Park
.  Most of the lot, which in its heyday held over 15,000 cars at a time, was uprooted to make way for the
Grand Californian Hotel and Spa
and the new, 55-acre theme park,
Disney California Adventure
.

It was the end of an era.  For decades, Guests had parked on the grand asphalt prairie and either hoofed it to
Disneyland Park
’s distant entrance or rode the free trams to the park gates.  By the end of a day at
Disneyland
, many Guests forgot where they parked; even though the lot, vast as a Siberian plain, was subdivided into districts named after
Disney
characters, many Guests forgot to scribble down where they were parked, or to circle the area on their parking ticket map.  Was it the
Thumper
section?  Or
Tinker Bell
?  Or
Sleepy
?  Who could remember after a day of euphoria and sugary treats?  Luckily, Cast Members had developed a system, based on arrival time, for directing lost Guests to their vehicles.

Most of th
e
Disneyland
parking lot was demolished to make way for the
Grand Californian Hotel
and
DCA
.  A small southeastern portion of the lot was retained, and named the
Timon Lot
.  There was no way that the
Timon Lot
, or the
Zazu
and
Simba
lots near the
Disneyland
and
Paradise Pier Hotels
, could accommodate all of the resort Guests’ vehicles, so the gargantuan
Mickey and Friends Parking Structure
was built north of the
Disneyland Hotel
and west of
Disneyland Park
.  Six stories tall, the structure holds 10,250 vehicles.  It is one of the largest parking structures in the world.  Cars and motorcycles presently pay $16 per day.  There’s also a pricier open area, the
Pinocchio Lot
, for large vehicles ($21 for oversized vehicles; $26 for buses).  Free trams shuttle Guests who park at
Mickey and Friends
or the
Pinocchio Lot
to and from
Downtown Disney
.