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View Full Version : The first time I went to DCA (last year) I really liked it.



Alf
06-23-2004, 02:19 PM
I know I am probably going to get flamed for saying this but... I really liked DCA when I went to it... I like all the outdoor theme music and I loved Grizzly River Rapids (very well themed). I really enjoyed the music in Condor flats!. I like the painted back drop in the hollywood portion. I Love the bay! I live in San Francisco and I've lived in Santa Cruz and when I was at the "warf" I felt like I was on the ocean, swear I smelled salt water.. . It was open and relaxing a very California... it may not be Disney Sea but I'd take it over Six Flags any day of the week!

Tinker Bell
06-23-2004, 02:43 PM
I think DCA is ok. Not much there to entertain me or my kids.( oldest 8 youngest 2)If I want to see California well I will go see it.I will go to the ocean ( I here it is only a half hour away)If I want mountains well there big bear and where I just moved from Yosemite.If I want hollywood well its just over there.The rides are ok.My 4yr is just barley 40 inch so not much she or her little sis can do.I think DCA is good maybe for the people from outside of CA who don't have time to see CA.So I will go left instead of right when getting off the tram.No need to go right.

aztectodd
06-23-2004, 02:49 PM
I'm with you Alf...I really like it as well and I'm from San Diego and live in Los Angeles now. I love DCA. I think it's a good park, good theming, lots of things to do and see, shows, rides, etc. Then again, I take DCA for what it's worth. It's not Disneyland, and it shouldn't be compared to Disneyland. It's a different park altogether and because of that should live up to different standards. It's clean like a disney park but has a different feel, and to me, thats refreshing. I also am happy that they are doing things to improve the place. I think given a legit 10 years, DCA will be much better than it is right now, and the #2 park in So. Cal behind the forever #1 Disneyland.

DisneyDaniel
06-23-2004, 03:46 PM
Glad to hear it! You're not alone--many people like (or love) Disney's California Adventure, too. Like many other things (movies, restaurants, etc.) most people are more vocal when they dislike something. People who are pleased or content with something are usually silent or more quiet. Sometimes I think Annual Passholders are more picky and nit-pick about every detail about amusement parks. Of the dozen or so people who I accompanied to DCA for the first time, not a single one of them disliked the day there. If fact, most of them agreed with me about the highlights and enjoyable experiences available at DCA. See you there!

newhdplayer
06-23-2004, 04:44 PM
I know I am probably going to get flamed for saying this but... I really liked DCA when I went to it... I like all the outdoor theme music and I loved Grizzly River Rapids (very well themed). I really enjoyed the music in Condor flats!. I like the painted back drop in the hollywood portion. I Love the bay! I live in San Francisco and I've lived in Santa Cruz and when I was at the "warf" I felt like I was on the ocean, swear I smelled salt water.. . It was open and relaxing a very California... !

You are not supposed to like DCA! Read all the DCA threads here before posting such an outrageous opinion.

SCUBAbe
06-23-2004, 05:54 PM
I really love it to.. :) ..my daughter and I spend most of our time there. My parents are coming around. The morethey go over there the more they like it. The are pretty old school though about DL...so It's taking some time..LOL

Emma
06-23-2004, 07:49 PM
For the most part, I like DCA. It's no Disneyland, but I like it.

There are definetly some things I would change.. things that I think were cheaply done, without the original Disney *magic*

However, I LOVE Soarin' Over California, I LOVE California Screamin', I LOVE The Grizzy River Run, and I LOVE It's Tough to be a Bug (And yes, I know they copied DW on that one)

I do have to say though, I took my 4 year old on a ride a few months ago-- I don't know the name, it was the Caterpillar from A Bug's Life... like a little train. Anyway, my four year old thought it was so boring, I thought she was going to kick me in the shin for making her wait in line to ride it. :D

But overall, I agree with most of you. DCA isn't bad at all.

rentayenta
06-23-2004, 08:11 PM
I like DCA. I love Disneyland. I am old school.

tink1234
06-23-2004, 08:26 PM
I think DCA is ok. Not much there to entertain me or my kids.( oldest 8 youngest 2)If I want to see California well I will go see it.I will go to the ocean ( I here it is only a half hour away)If I want mountains well there big bear and where I just moved from Yosemite.If I want hollywood well its just over there.The rides are ok.My 4yr is just barley 40 inch so not much she or her little sis can do.I think DCA is good maybe for the people from outside of CA who don't have time to see CA.So I will go left instead of right when getting off the tram.No need to go right.


I am glad you said this. I live in OK and I do believe that I am able to see some of CA while in DCA. While I would love to see the real CA, DCA gives me a flavor of it until I am able to see the parts of it DCA samples.

I would have to agree with you about there not being much for young children to do. When we visited DCA my children saw Heimlech's train, the bug movie, the muppet movie and the carousel. We also took them through Animation. I know there is more in Bug's Land, but not much else in other parts of the park. I do wish there was more. In DL there are more rides than not that they can ride.

This year we will make sure they see Alladin and will plan for as many rides as we can. I hope we can fill a day there will 4 dc under 8!

Emma
06-23-2004, 08:45 PM
I would have to agree with you about there not being much for young children to do. When we visited DCA my children saw Heimlech's train.....

Ahhh... thank you... Heimlech's train! That was it..

Hakuna Makarla
06-24-2004, 04:44 AM
well let me tell you, first off Montana is very boring! we do not have theme parks, no parks acually. 2 water parks that are only open 2 months out of the year, and they are so small that you can not really call them water parks. we have only the dumb traveling carnivals that come to our town 2 times a year and those are dirty little afairs that have total of 5 kiddie rides( cars and a small roller coaster) and 4 big adult rides. The same every year, no changes and so I am sure DCA will be like AWSOME TO US!!

I am looking forward to just taking it all in and having a ball seeing all the cool stuff!

rentayenta
06-24-2004, 05:34 AM
well let me tell you, first off Montana is very boring! we do not have theme parks, no parks acually. 2 water parks that are only open 2 months out of the year, and they are so small that you can not really call them water parks. we have only the dumb traveling carnivals that come to our town 2 times a year and those are dirty little afairs that have total of 5 kiddie rides( cars and a small roller coaster) and 4 big adult rides. The same every year, no changes and so I am sure DCA will be like AWSOME TO US!!

I am looking forward to just taking it all in and having a ball seeing all the cool stuff!


I am living in Utah now. We have Lagoon-bleh! DL and DCA will be amazing for you. I can imagine if I hadn't grown up very close to DL I would probably love DCA.

Have a wonderful trip!!!

tstan70
06-24-2004, 06:53 AM
we really like DCA. I have a 4yr old that has spent 12 days of her short life at the Disneyland resort. Of those, 3-4 of them have been at DCA. At first glance, it doesn't seem like there would be much for her to do there, but I was very pleasantly surprised. Believe it or not, she LOVED the Boudin Bread bakery of all things. Sure, she likes the rides at Flik's fun fair, King Triton's carrousel, Playhouse Disney, the interactive water-play areas, but to my surprise, there were things that she just can't get enogh of that were surprising to me.
Even with spending a few days in DCA, we still haven't seen a few of the shows like "It's tough to be a bug", "California Dreams" and "Jim Henson's Muppet Vision 3D". My daughter isn't tall enough to go on several of the rides, but loves what she can do there.

In the past few years, I have a new love for Disneyland and DCA. I now try to look at things through my child's eyes rather than what I would enjoy. this means that we don't always get to go on the "high-thrill" rides, infact, I haven't even been on GRR yet. I get to experience each ride as my daughter grows and is tall enough to ride them. (Last september she went on Soaring over California, Star Tours and the Matterhorn for the first time). We have spent time just enjoying the parks rather than feeling the need to rush through everything and ride every ride 5 times. That is one reason why I really like DCA. There is so much to see and just "take in"

As a family, we will continue to go to both parks when we take our vacations to Anaheim. We make sure that we stay for several days so we don't feel rushed and we try to go during the off season - even if that means missing a few attractions that are in rehab.

blondiemouse
06-24-2004, 07:40 AM
Yeah we first visited in March and thought OK this ain't no Disneyland but DCA is a good day out. We also visited Knotts for a day and really enjoyed that but DCA was better-now a certain beer drinking photographer with a very bad DCA problem constantly posts that DCA isn't a patch on Knotts. We found DCA is better than Knotts which in itself is a good theme park so DCA ain't the disaster some people say it is. Actually I'd love some of the DCA haters to see a certain 2n'd Disney park in Europe although seeing what DCA does to them I don't think it would be good for their health :D

julia
06-24-2004, 10:49 AM
Hi,

I love California Adventure and I love Disneyland. They are so different, but I like them both very well. I love sitting and eating dinner on the patio at the Wine Country Trattoria, I love watching the Electrical Parade, I love "Soarin' Over California...." But, the little girl in me still adores the Tea Cups, Its A Small World, Cinderella's Castle and it brings back so many great memories. I swear I can feel a special sort of extra special Disney magic in Disneyland, like Walt Disney's wonderful spirit or fingerprints are everywhere.

Best Regards,
Julia

AliciasMom
06-24-2004, 11:21 AM
My hubby and I took our then 9 month old daughter to DCA in February. We were taking advantage of the 2fer deal that they had going on for So Cal residents at the time. We were expecting to be bored out of our minds due to all the horrible reviews we had heard about the park. It was a big surprise that we actually had a great time. Alicia got to meet a lot of characters. We had lunch at Arial's Grotto and my daughter just loved seeing all the characters walking around. We snapped some really adorable pictures of her with Minnie Mouse. We didn't go on any of the "cool" rides since neither one of us wanted to go on them by ourselves but we had a great time taking Alicia on the kiddies rides.

I love DL for the magical disney atmosphere but I like DCA for the relaxing, "just chilling" atmosphere. DCA is no DL but I still like it.

DorisZ
06-24-2004, 07:39 PM
My family enjoys both parks, but we are only able to visit once a year so I'm looking at it from a different prospective than someone who is lucky enough to visit weekly or maybe even more often.

The first time I went to DCA, I was expecting the worst and I was very pleasantly surprised. So love it or hate it, everyone should take the opportunity to experience it for themselves before they make up their minds.

Anyway, DCA may have problems, but so does DL. If they would have put the money in DL that they spent on DCA, I probably would have been happy. I think we all agree that TL is in a very sad state. But the reality is that the money has been spent on a 2nd gate so when I'm there for my 4 or 5 days, I will go to both parks and thoroughly enjoy myself!

And even though the detractors would wish DCA back into a parking lot, I just don't see it happening. :)

Marty
06-25-2004, 11:28 PM
In the spring of 2002, a guy I knew was putting together a Disney package for families. Fly down on Friday and return on Tuesday – three whole days at the happiest place on earth.

Wanting everything to be perfect for my girls, I took a look around the net to see if I could glean any information. And that’s how I stumbled across Mouseplanet – and more particularly, this very message board. And what a resource. I just wanted to pick up a few hints and here was this treasure trove of information. I lurked around mousepad for a few weeks, read most of the threads and came away with a pretty solid understanding what it took to get the most out of our little holiday.

I learned how to take advantage of the fast pass system, what snacks and goodies I should look out for, the best strategy when hitting the attractions, things my girls should look out for … you know the drill.

But I also picked up another valuable nugget of information. Namely that Disney had recently constructed a second park and that it was a complete failure. A true piece of crap. I had read and believed all these threads. There couldn’t be any doubt. The same posters who were getting me all enthused about what Disneyland had to offer were also deriding the new park in withering terms. So I decided that we would skip DCA. We only had three days at the resort, no use in wasting out time at what was obviously a sub-standard park.

But my wife wanted to see the Electrical parade, and it was getting pretty crowded at Disneyland on the Saturday afternoon, so I reluctantly agreed to make our way over to DCA for dinner and to get some spots for the parade.

Boy, was I shocked. I loved the place right off. So did my wife. As we walked around I tried to come to terms with my what I had read on this message board. DCA wasn’t horrible, in fact it the very opposite of horrible. The next day we ended up spending most of our time at DCA. The same was true of our last day as well. My girls had a super time at both parks, but my wife and I fell in love with DCA. How could all those posters who were so right about Disneyland be so wrong about DCA?

The kicker was that everyone else who had come down on the package I was on felt the same way. Many had been to Disneyland before. But everyone absolutely adored the new park. Before we flew down I had mentioned to some of the other people we were traveling with how terrible DCA was supposed to be. So you can imagine my embarrassment when these same people sought me out on the flight back so I could explain where I picked up this idea. What could I say? Clearly I had been mistaken.

Well, two years later we returned to the resort again (last March). And I have to tell you that DCA was an extremely important factor in our decision to return. Too bad we couldn’t wait until TOT had opened up. But no matter, just another reason to come back again.

Alf
06-26-2004, 09:29 AM
Exactly!

beanpole
06-26-2004, 02:49 PM
I waited until last year before finallly venturing into DCA. To my surprise, I found myself having a wonderful time. Now I couldn't imagine a 2-day trip to the Disneyland Resort without spending at least part of each day at DCA. It's the 'salt' that provides an exciting counterpart to Disneyland's 'sweet'. (where's the sour and bitter, at Knotts and Magic Mountain respectively? :) ).

For me, a typical weekend day at the DL resort goes like this:
8:00 am - 10:00 am: Disneyland
10:00 - 1:00: DCA
1:00 - 2:30: lunch at either park, Downtown Disney or nearby restaurant
3:00 - 5:00: take a break at the hotel for a swim and a nap
5:00 - DCA closing: DCA
DCA closing - DL closing: Disneyland

This plan guarantees early morning and late night touring at both parks, which usually means shorter queues for attractions.

SCUBAbe
06-26-2004, 03:43 PM
wow, the last time we went we did almost the same schedule, but we didn't stop to nap or swim. We just stayed at DCA.. :)

GeminiAngel
06-27-2004, 12:30 PM
Don't worry, I'll back ya. I LOVE IT, LOVE IT, LOVE IT!!!!!! :D
really I do.

Tikiboy7
06-27-2004, 01:00 PM
I know I am probably going to get flamed for saying this but... I really liked DCA when I went to it... I like all the outdoor theme music and I loved Grizzly River Rapids (very well themed). I really enjoyed the music in Condor flats!. I like the painted back drop in the hollywood portion. I Love the bay! I live in San Francisco and I've lived in Santa Cruz and when I was at the "warf" I felt like I was on the ocean, swear I smelled salt water.. . It was open and relaxing a very California... it may not be Disney Sea but I'd take it over Six Flags any day of the week!


I love DCA too! :geek: