Disneyland: Mickey’s Halloween Party

This year my husband and I decided to take our kids to Disneyland to attend Mickey’s Halloween Party.  Since we have annual passes we thought this would be the perfect time to buy the extra ticket (yes, you must purchase a special ticket ) to attend the event, and also stay a couple extra days at the happiest place on earth.  This was our first time to the party so I didn’t know what exactly to expect. We ended up having a wonderful evening, and would totally recommend it to any Disney lover.  For this post, instead of me giving you a run-down of exactly what we did, I thought it would be better to give you a few tips and tell you about some of the things I learned about the event.

1 Buy your tickets early!  When I say early I mean like summertime early.   The party only happens on certain evenings throughout September and October and tickets sell out quickly.  For season pass  holders, tickets went on sale mid-June and opened up to the general public a week or two later.  They only sell a limited number of tickets to the party, so if you are planning to attend I would start planning when the kids get out of school for the summer.

2 You get to dress in costume!  This was a big selling point for me.  I love halloween and I love dressing up in costumes, especially a themed family costume. It took us a while to pick a theme that we all agreed upon, but in the end I think Peter Pan suited us perfectly.   Disneyland normally forbids anyone over the age of 14 from wearing costumes in the park, but Mickey’s Halloween Party is the exception to this rule. This is your only opportunity to dress up like your favorite Disney characters.  Although… it is important to read the costume guidelines on the Disneyland website.  There are strict rules as to what is and is not allowed.

3 Show up early.  Even though the party didn’t start until 7pm, our tickets allowed us to enter the park as early as 4pm.  As you can imagine everyone else with a party ticket also wants to get in the park as early as possible, so the security lines get extremely backed up around this time. We got there about 3pm and only had to wait about 10 minutes to get through security.  People who arrived at 4 had to wait nearly an hour or so.

4 Take advantage of the short lines for the rides.  One of the best things about this event is that only party ticket holders are allowed in the park after the party starts.  This means really short lines! This is the time to ride the rides that normally have the longer wait times.  We were able to walk right on to some of our favorite ones like Indiana Jones, Thunder Mountain, and Dumbo.  If there was a line, we never had to wait more than about 10 minutes to get on.

5 There are two parades, so don’t stress if you miss the first one.  The same parade happens at two different times throughout the evening.  We found the first one was a lot more crowded than the second.   If your kiddos can handle it, it might be worth waiting for the second parade since it is less crowded and easier to snag good viewing spot.  We went to the first one and found a place to sit about 30 minutes before the parade started.  One thing I did like about watching the first parade was that the fireworks show is right after, so it was nice to already be in a good spot to watch the fireworks.

6 Last but not least, bring a bigger bag! I know this sounds like a silly one, but trust me, it makes the night a little easier.  The bags they give you for trick or treating are small and fill up pretty fast, so it was nice having a bigger one for the excessive amount of candy we accumulated throughout the night.

Well there it is, just a little bit of my insight on this magical event.  We sure enjoyed ourselves and maybe next year you will too!