Disneyland Update: Spooky Time Ends & Christmas Moves In!

Snow has begun to fall at the Disneyland Resort as holiday enchantments push out pumpkins. Now that Halloween has ended you’ll be seeing Christmas trees in no time at all. But not everything is magical right now at Disneyland. Cast member unions are in tough negotiations with the company over updated contracts. Let’s take a look at what’s happening at the resort…

Disneyland Contract Troubles

This week, Dusty reported on the ongoing cast member contract negotiations. It seems negotiations had begun to break down between the unions and Disney. In response, Disney posted publicly to all cast members that they’re offering $17/hr as the new base minimum rate. But while all employees saw this internal post, it’s really just for union employees represented by the “Master Services Council.” What’s not being offered here is any increase (yet) for long-term employees or for those not represented by Master Services. 

We’re hoping that cast, who have been working under extreme conditions since re-opening, are able to receive proper compensation for their hard work. This is a delicate and complex situation:

Disneyland Strike Update: Crisis Averted – Here’s What Cast Get

Along with contract negotiations, I’d like to mention cast ticket admission. A few months ago, we commented that cast members still weren’t able to visit the parks on their days off. A few weeks ago this was rectified, with a few caveats (they had been blocked out since the park re-opened in April). Unsurprisingly, cast member self-admission is by reservation only just like everything else. Cast can only hold 3 reservations at a time and Disney has opted to make reservations one park per day (No park hoppers). 

Being able to visit the park is an improvement, but the restrictions sound a lot more limiting than even the Magic Key passes. Only 3 reservations and no park hopping seem a little ridiculous for hard-working employees, especially considering free admission is one of the major perks of working for Disney.

There’s more availability on the cast calendar than there is for the Magic Key calendar (or so we’re told; just about every day but holidays can be reserved). The “comp tickets” that were needed to visit the park over the last few months don’t quite have the same availability, looking a lot more like the Magic Key calendar. It sure feels like cast benefits are an afterthought right now.

Halloween Meets Christmas

It’s that time of year, Halloween and Christmas collide… as Disneyland installs holiday decorations just as Halloween wound down this weekend. Halloween pumpkins and Christmas snow clash in front of Sleeping Beauty Castle, but not for long.

A special thanks to Andy Castro who sent in some extra photos for everyone to enjoy.

Most— if not all— of the snow has fallen on the castle. The hanging icicles are in place as well. With temperatures still soaring into the 90s last week, it was a little jarring to see the never-melting snow even though it was nearly hot enough to bake a pie in the castle forecourt.

All the pumpkins will start to be removed today. You can expect more wintertime enchantment to take its place in the coming days.

Main Street Holidays

On Friday, I noticed that the trees along the street received their twinkling lights. Once you see the camouflaged extension cord, you cannot unsee it. 

But Main Street has Christmas all year-round now…

I rather like the new Plaza Point shop. It’s cute, but more importantly, it fits quite well with the turn-of-the-century setting of Main Street. As a bonus, lots of different cultural interpretations and holidays are included in a way that feels organic.

For more about Plaza Point – Holiday Shoppe, be sure to take a look at our full walkthrough below:

FIRST LOOK: Plaza Point Holiday Shoppe NOW OPEN at Disneyland

A Toon Holiday

The toons have begun decorating in ToonTown. Lots of fun, carefree wreaths and garland now adorn the land.

Along with holiday decor, Roger Rabbit’s marquee has been returned with no noticeable changes. The FastPass sign was swapped out for a Lightning Lane one.

Characters are still hanging out in front of their houses since the indoor areas are still closed to guests.

It’s nice to see them out here, but they’re hard to see during large portions of the day due to the lighting. They’re shrouded in shadow because of the way the sun hits their porches. It was tough to edit these photos so they could be seen. 

What does look great are the Christmas decorations lit up at night.

A Mardi-Gras Christmas

The party has begun in New Orleans, which is adorned with beads, masks, and lots of gold and green.

The old Mansion will continue to be occupied by Sandy Claws through January. 

Jack and Sally materialize on the balcony regularly to terrify welcome visitors to the Mansion.

Christmas Critters

Critter Country is getting in the holiday spirit too. Lots of natural-looking garlands are strung up everywhere.

Santa still hasn’t begun setting up, but we’ll see him soon enough.

Disney California Christmas Adventure

California Adventure hosted its final Oogie Boogie Bash last night, but that didn’t stop them from putting up holiday decorations. Juxtaposed right next to the spooky Grizzly Peak treat trails and the ominous Villains Grove are spark jars, holiday wreaths, and garland.

Regardless, I do love Grizzly’s decorations. Their homemade appearance is charming.

Pacific Wharf is looking festive as well. The decorations themed to the individual restaurants are adorable.

A celebration is setting up in Paradise Park. Viva Navidad will be returning this year. So that makes one Disneyland parade and one California Adventure street party. It’s exciting to have entertainment returning!

Construction and Refurbishment

Small World Holiday

Small World went down last week to begin installing the holiday overlay. Most of the light strands are up now, the bulbs just need to finish being inserted. They may even already be done by now.

Small World will re-open in holiday mode next Wednesday.

Fantasyland/ToonTown

Construction continues on the entrance to ToonTown and the entrance to the Fantasyland Theater. The ToonTown paving project is pretty close to finishing, we may see the walls come down soon. It’s just the red bricks and a more defined walkway/fenced-in area to right.

Work is also ongoing for Mickey and Minnie’s Runaway Railway. The building is nearly ready to have the facade installed.

Pelican’s Landing

Work is now visibly moving at a fast pace at Pelican’s Landing. Harbour Galley is currently closed as the area around it is expanded with additional seating.

Concrete is being laid and textured.

It looks like parts of the dock are coming to fruition.

Tarzan’s Treehouse

Tarzan’s Treehouse is still behind wraps in Adventureland. No re-opening date is scheduled yet.

World of Color

The major refurbishment of World of Color is still ongoing. The lagoon remains drained as the fountains are worked on.

A couple covered areas are set up to facilitate the work.

A look from above…

Disneyland Refurbishment Calendar (updated 10/29/21):

Big Thunder Mountain should be reopening on Thursday!

Currently Under Refurbishment:

• Big Thunder Mountain Railroad: (September 7th-November 4th)
• it’s a small world Holiday Install: (October 24th-November 10th)
• Kingswell Camera Shop: (September 11th-November 13th)
• Harbour Galley: (October 18th-November 19th)
• Sailing Ship Columbia: (September 20th-November 24th)
• Tarzan’s Treehouse: (September 1st-TBD)
• Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage: (July 12th-Winter 2022)

Upcoming Refurbishments:

• Indiana Jones Adventure: (November 8th-10th)

Attractions Offline

• Donald’s Boat
• Goofy’s Playhouse
• Mickey’s House
• Minnie’s House
• Star Wars Launch Bay
• Red Car Trolley
• Blue Sky Cellar

Goodbye Halloween

I love Halloween Time at Disneyland; the sights, the sounds of the season of tricks and treats. While I’m ready for the holiday season (and the return of a parade!), I’ll miss Halloween Screams. It’s the best part of the season (and perhaps the best Disneyland fireworks show), so here are a few photos to reminisce.

One of my main purposes of going to the park (besides writing this update) was for treats. Unfortunately, this year was a bit lacking, but I found two items that were definitely hits. The first is the Hungry Bear’s Pumpkin Cheesecake Funnel Cake. Soft funnel cake, topped with creamy spiced pumpkin cheesecake filling, and finished with vanilla ice cream. A deliciously complex dessert.

The Royal Street Veranda re-opened halfway through Halloween Time, adding a seasonal item, the Pumpkin Fritters. Less fritter and more donut hole, these fried pumpkin balls come with a pumpkin spiced cream cheese dipping sauce. Incredible.

This and That

It’s been lovely to walk around the park and see more entertainment. I caught the Pearly Band playing by Small World, drawing a sizable crowd, which included Bert and a penguin.

Also drawing a big crowd was the mariachi band in Frontierland. They really add to the atmosphere around the land. A lot of people were joining in singing with them too, which was fun.

In Tomorrowland, in front of Pizza Planet, there’s a Coca-Cola sign that was damaged during one of the recent storms. 

Some of the letters are missing and half of the galaxy swirl behind the bottle broke off. The neon as a whole is in pretty bad shape, many of the letters don’t light up at night.

Splash Mountain’s exterior lighting has been out for a while. At night, it’s hard to see the mountain. The inside hasn’t been much better.

Indiana Jones’ projector room has cut half of the video that plays, only playing safety information on a very short loop. You’ll likely hear it a few times while waiting.

The actual ride has multiple effects that aren’t working, including the lighting on the doors to different chambers, the chambers themselves, and even the snake animatronic isn’t moving well. 

Here’s a weird observation. At Ronto Roasters, there’s a wonderfully detailed room next to the entrance of the marketplace. For some reason, a table with napkins was inserted right in front of it, blocking the view. Hopefully Imagineering sees this photo of what operations has done to their expensive show element and tells them to move the table. 

Another observation, there seem to be more trash cans out in the park lately. A small change, sure, but the lack of cans was inconvenient when I had to go hunting every time I needed to throw away something. Hopefully more return soon.

I’ll take this as a sign things are normalizing, although we wonder how this affects Custodial as their staffing problems continue (currently there’s a $1,000-1,500 hiring bonus for a few departments, including Custodial).

Isn’t the myth that Walt decided every 30 steps (or is it feet?) there should be a trash can because that’s how long a guest will hang onto a piece of trash?

To round out today’s update of Halloween meeting Christmas, I thought a few Haunted Mansion Holiday details were in order. 

It’s now the holiday season so…we wish you scary Christmas…

For even more photos and history of the Haunted Mansion Holiday overlay (that just turned 20 this year!), take a look at our writeup below:

Disneyland’s Haunted Mansion Holiday Celebrates Its 20th Scary Christmas

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Let’s Hear From You

Are you ready for the holiday season? What do you think a fair starting wage would be for cast members that doesn’t leave them living in their cars? Let us know in the comments below.