Universal Orlando, Disney World Orlando, and Disneyland California just announced that masks will no longer be required in indoor attractions and settings for vaccinated guests. This is in effect already at Universal Orlando and starts Feb 17, 2022 for both Disney parks. They will still be required on transportation, such as shuttles, buses, monorails, and the Skyliner.
Here’s the text snippet from the Disney World site:
Beginning February 17, 2022, face coverings will be optional for fully vaccinated guests in both outdoor and indoor locations. We expect Guests who are not fully vaccinated to continue wearing face coverings in all indoor locations, including indoor attractions and theaters. Face coverings will still be required by all Guests (ages 2 and up) on enclosed Disney transportation, including Disney buses, monorails, and Disney Skyliner.
UPDATE: As of March 15, 2022, masks are optional for vaccinated guests on the Skyliner also.
Here’s the snippet from the Disneyland site:
Beginning February 17, 2022, face coverings are required for unvaccinated Guests (ages 2 and older) in all indoor locations, including throughout indoor attractions and indoor queues. Face coverings are required for all Guests, regardless of vaccination status, in certain indoor settings including Disney shuttles and in health settings, such as in First Aid. Face coverings are optional for Guests in outdoor areas.
Here’s the snippet from the Universal Orlando site:
Face coverings are optional for fully vaccinated guests. For guests who have not been vaccinated, face coverings are encouraged while indoors.
For the full details on this and other current restrictions, refer to the following pages from the parks:
As of this writing, Universal Hollywood and other parks have not announced any changes to their mask requirements, but be sure to check the website for each park before you go.
The National Museum of American History is working on a future project, and they’re looking for images that capture your experiences as guests at Disneyland and Walt Disney World. They want all kinds of photos – candid or posed, all ages and abilities, doing all kinds of activities around the parks. Find that funny ride photo!
If you submit a photo and/or story of yourself, you might appear in the museum! Here’s how:
Please send your photo/s to NMAH-DisneyStories@si.edu with a few sentences about the photo and your Disney Park story. Don’t forget to include your name and the best way to get in touch with you!
Check this article from the museum for more specifics.
Grad Nite festivities will be back at California Adventure park in Disneyland Resort in California! On select nights in May and June 2022, Class of 2022 high school graduates, can celebrate with access to rides, foods, photo ops, and more with other graduates in this after hours party.
Dates for the 2022 parties are:
May 13, 14, 18, 20, 21, 25, 26, 31
June 1, 3, 4, 7, 8, 10, 11, 17
Registration is now open. There are 3 ticket options ranging from just access to the party to access to both parks during the day as well.
Grad Nite is a very popular tradition for many California high schools. You may want to plan around these dates if you’re not participating.
This February, in celebration of black culture and heritage, Disney World and Disneyland California invite you to Celebrate Soulfully through music, food, art and more.
There will be many performances, exhibits, treats, and, of course, merchandise at the parks and resorts on both coasts. For a listing of these events, check out this Disney Parks article.
With Valentine’s Day approaching soon, Disneyland has several new offerings to help you celebrate. There will be many specialty treats at the restaurants in Downtown Disney and the Disneyland resorts. Also, there will be plenty of gift ideas at the numerous stores.
If you really want to go all out, book a stay at one of the Disneyland resorts. There’s currently an offer to save up to 25% off select rooms for visits now through April 7, 2022, when booked by March 17, 2022.
ESPN and Disneyland are teaming up for tons of Super Bowl related events from February 9 – February 13, 2022.
There will be fan experiences in California Adventure Park and Downtown Disney with games and giveaways. ESPN will have broadcasts from inside the park those few days, so viewers at home can catch some of those too. I imagine some ESPN personalities and perhaps some football notables will be there as well, though no guarantee on that.
If you’re a football fan, or if you’re not, plan accordingly. More details are listed in this ESPN Touches Down at Disneyland article by Disney Parks Blog.
From January 21 – February 13, 2022, Disney California Adventure Park will celebrate Lunar New Year! Join the celebration with wishes for health, luck and prosperity throughout the Year of the Tiger, featuring Chinese, Vietnamese and Korean cultures.
Highlights include:
Mulan’s Lunar New Year Procession
Appearances by Disney characters dressed in festive attire
The months of January and February are usually when the Disney theme parks like to do annual maintenance on their rides, especially water rides. Make sure to check each parks’ refurbishment calendar when planning your trip dates to make sure a favorite ride won’t be closed.
Below are just some main ones that I’m seeing as of this writing. In the calendars, scroll down to the Closed for Refurbishment section of each park, for the days that you’re considering.
These calendars also show the scheduled times for the numerous shows and fireworks too (of course, subject to change), so it’s good to check them if you want to plan dining reservations or ride times around certain ones.
At Disney World, some notable closures include Expedition Everest at Animal Kingdom and Splash Mountain at Magic Kingdom. Additionally, the Magic Kingdom railroad and a few shows still haven’t reopened. Blizzard Beach is also now closed, but Typhoon Lagoon has reopened.
At Disneyland, the monorail will be closing permanently and Toontown is slated for a major refurb in the coming months. Currently, Splash Mountain and the Finding Nemo Submarine Voyage rides are closed.
Check the calendars often, especially if your trip is still several months or even weeks away, since closures and dates for their reopening can fluctuate often. Closures do happen year-round, not just on January and February.
Of course, this applies to any other theme parks, or any other attraction/location, that you may be interested in going to as well. Always check their websites before you lock in your travel plans and before your trip dates, for any closures and changes. Or, you can use a travel agent, like me, who will stay on top of any changes for you. 😁
Let me know if you want any help figuring these out.
Disneyland California just announced several new holiday parties, called Disney Merriest Nites! The parties will consist of unique holiday themed activities such as character appearances, parades, food, merchandise, and of course, access to certain rides and attractions with lower wait times. Several Disney characters – Mickey, Miguel, Tiana, Elsa, Lilo & Stitch, and Buzz – will host mini-parties around the various lands within the park, so it’ll be like 6 parties in one.
As of now, there are 5 available nights, but I wouldn’t put it past Disney to add more dates as these sell out. The parties last from 8pm til midnight, but guests with a party ticket can enter the Disneyland park at 5pm to enjoy the regular park activities first. Tickets cost $165 for all nights (11/16, 11/30, 12/7, 12/9) except the first one for $175 (11/11), and will be available to purchase on the Disneyland site or app starting September 14th.
For more details on the party, check out the official Disneyland page:
UPDATE 07/24/2024: The Genie+ service has now been retired at Disney World in Orlando. View my Lightning Lane page to learn all about the new service. The Genie+ functionality at Disneyland California remains the same, just renamed to Lightning Lane.
UPDATE 10/8/2021: Disney just announced that the start date of these services will be Oct 19th. Check out my more recent blog post for the list of rides included in each park and pricing info.
Disney just announced the new Genie service that will appear in the Disney World MyDisneyExperience app and the Disneyland app. This will include some new features, plus the new paid replacement for FastPass+/MaxPass that has been rumored for awhile now.
Here’s my summary of everything as I understand it right now. There are tons of articles out there about this, so I’ll try to boil it down a little here.
From what I have read/seen so far, it sounds like an “assistant” type feature within the app that’ll give you recommendations on which rides to do next based on ride times and your defined interests. You can specify if you like princesses, Star Wars, and a few other things (they haven’t shown all the things you can specify yet, but it’ll probably be things like thrill rides vs tamer rides, etc) and the Genie will form a suggested itinerary of rides you might like, along with their current wait times. It’ll work together with all the features in the app now, like booking dining and such, so everything will be all in one place. This part of the app enhancement will be free. Everyone can just use this Genie “assistant” by using the Disney apps for each park. It’ll be there by default.
Then, there will be two additional premium features that you can add on.
Genie+: For a given fee per person per day, you can turn it into a Genie+ (note the plus sign) service. This is basically a paid version of FastPass+ and MaxPass that used to exist in both parks and works very similarly. This enables you to pick the ride time window for your next ride and not have to go to the ride until that time, rather than standing in a long line in that queue.
When it’s time to go to that ride, you will go through the “Lightning Lane” instead of the usual Standby line, so you’re not waiting in a line. They’ve basically just renamed the old FassPass/MaxPass lines to now be called “Lightning Lanes”, so don’t let this info confuse you. Just equate Lightning Lanes to FastPass/MaxPass entrances and Genie+ to the old FastPass+/MaxPass system.
Like before, you can only hold one time selection at a time, so you have to wait until you ride that one before you can pick your next one. The exception is that if the return time is more than 2 hours away from your selection time (or 2 hours after park opening time), you can pick the next ride after 2 hours so it’s not like you’re stuck with a huge block of time where you can’t pick anything. There’s no limit, so you can select rides all day as long as times are available, but you can only pick each ride one time throughout your day.
If you intend to park hop that day and want to use the Genie+ service at the other park too, make sure you buy the one that let’s you use it at multiple parks instead of the specific park one.
When you buy the Genie+ service, it also includes some additional features, like photo downloads at Disneyland and VR Snapchat filters at Disney World. Unfortunately, it does not include the actual photo downloads at Disney World, so you will still have to buy the Memory Maker package separately if you want the photo downloads.
You can buy this Genie+ add-on starting at midnight of the day you intend to use it, and then pick your first ride starting at 7am of that day.
Individual Lightning Lane Selections: The second add-on feature is the ability to select ride times for up to 2 rides per day that belong in this category. These are the really, reeeally popular rides, like Mine Train and Radiator Racers, that aren’t included in the above Genie+ category. The cost of these will vary by availability. Their prices are listed in the MDE app where you go to buy them.
You do not have to buy the Genie+ service in order to buy these Individual Lightning Lanes, so you can pick and choose if you just buy one or the other or both, depending on which rides you think you need them for.
As a benefit to guests staying at a Disney resort, if you’re buying the Individual Lightning Lanes, you can make that first selection at 7am each morning, without needing to be in the park. The 7am head start is especially helpful since these will be the really popular rides that may run out of times quickly. If you are not staying at a Disney resort, you can make your first selection at park opening time for the park whose ride you’re buying it for.
They will continue using the current Virtual Queue system for some reeeally, reeeeeally popular rides that come along. Check the MDE app to see which ones currently have Virtual Queues. If they have a Virtual Queue, most likely, that means you cannot just walk up to it and wait in a Standby line. Virtual queues are still free. It sounds like these rides will be included in the Individual Lightning Lane category as well. So, if you aren’t able to get a virtual group or choose not to go through the stress of even trying, you would be able to just pay for an Individual Lightning Lane pass for it.
So, essentially, the rides will be divided into 4 categories – ones that are usually pretty low waits that they don’t even include any passes for, ones with moderate waits that you can buy Genie+ to get passes for, ones with high waits that you have to buy specific Individual Lightning Lane passes for, and ones with super high waits that you have to join a Virtual Queue to ride.
Of course, you can just use the free Standby queue to ride any of the rides still, besides the ones with only Virtual Queues. It just depends on your wait tolerance level and which rides you want to ride. You have the flexibility to decide how you want to make use of this depending on ride times for that day. It comes down to a time vs cost decision – so whether it’s worth it will differ for each person.
All of these features are supposed to roll out this Fall, though they didn’t give a specific date, so I guess we’ll see if they reveal more details before then. There are still some unanswered questions too. Who knows? Even some of what they’ve revealed so far may change between now and then. Once it rolls out, we’ll see for sure how it works and what other features are included. I’ll keep you posted if there are any major changes. It’s not that far away.
In the meantime, if you want to read the full article and watch a video from Disney revealing this new enhancement, go to the sites here:
Adventures By Anne 