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Birthday brownie at Ariel's Grotto make your celebration sweeter. Mm marshmallows. (Julie Wolfson/LAist)
Here at LAist we love freebies as much as anyone. We like to give you the heads up about free breakfast, free cupcakes, free tickets and more. So when we heard that Disneyland was giving free tickets on your birthday, we thought the least we could do was go check it out.
The process for getting into Disneyland free on your birthday is pretty simple. The rules say bring a driver's license or passport for adults and a certified birth certificate for kids. The offer gets you into one park. Or you can upgrade to a park hopper by paying the difference in price (adult one park $69, park hopper $94, you pay $25). Season pass holders get a credit toward purchases in the park equal to the free ticket they would have received.
Best of all you get this amazing birthday button. Throughout the day employees, characters and park goers wished her a happy birthday. Sometimes being around smiley nice people really does make your day.
Many people we talked to asked questions like: Is it really free? Yes. Can I go on another day? No. Did your daughter have the best time? Yes.
Now to be fair, once inside the park, it's hard not to spend money at every turn. We splurged on the three course lunch at Ariel's Grotto. After all Ariel, Sleeping Beauty, Cinderella, Belle, and Jasmine wanted to wish our little one happy birthday too. After riding Soaring Over California, the new Toy Story Ride (it's awesome), several Bug's Life rides, Mr. Toad's Wild Ride, Star Tours, Pirates of the Caribbean, watching the Jedi Training Academy, and meeting Iridessa and Tinkerbell at Pixie Hollow we found a quiet table at The Blue Bayou (as quiet as Disneyland can be) for dinner. At the end of the meal there was a candle in her dessert.
Disneyland may actually be the happiest place on earth--at least during the weeks in the winter when the park isn't crowded or hot.
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HINT: If you let the kind folks at information services desk know that it's your anniversary, honeymoon or your first visit to the park, they will give you a pin similar to the birthday one shown above. The pin gets you lots of attention and sometimes if the ride attendants take notice, they will let you cut in line!
Yes! I went on my birthday in January. It was very much fun. It was strange to see so many people w/ the same birthday as me in one place. (They ran out of the birthday pins though, so I had generic "I'm Celebrating!" pin, instead. ) Most of the ride attendants wished me happy birthday, and I got free dessert after lunch at the Blue Bayou. Yay, Disneyland!
IT'S MY BIRTHDAY IN 20 DAYS
If you go to the Mission Tortilla Factory at CA Adventure, you get a free bag of fresh, hot tortillas if it is your birthday while everyone else gets only one! I just did it!!!
Yes the birthday button does have its perks. In addition to getting a ton of attention and birthday wishes, a Disney "VIP" took us from the back of the line to the front for Mr. Toad's Wild Ride and then walked with us to our next destination...Pixie Hollow.
Who will be lucky enough to have their birthday during the Wine Festival at California Adventure?
When is it? Please say March 9th.
When I saw a billboard for this I told my lovely wife about it and we both signed up on their website for our free birthday passes. Can't wait!
I can't wait for my birthday now!
My random Disneyland tip of the day: When it comes to long lines, one way to be somewhat successful at avoiding the crowded days (if you're planning on going on a day other than your birthday, of course) is to look at the season pass blackout dates. The ones that are blacked out are usually the busiest.
Yes I must say, the fact that we went on a weekday in the winter when it wasn't crowded made it even more magical. We walked right on to Star Tours and Pirates. Sweet!
Julie, word on the Disneyland boards is that you could have gotten the 2-fer ticket for free as a SoCal resident(http://micechat.com/forums/blogs/in-the-parks/928-knotts-says-ride-2009-socal-military-discounts-much-more.html) - of course, that is for 2 different days and you would have only been able to get in one park on your daughter's birthday, which would have nixed Ariel's Grotto and the Toy Story Midway Mania. I'm just wondering if they actually offered? Sounds like you had fun! We took my mom on her birthday and we've never seen so many people with birthday badges in the parks, at least one per group! You could say Happy Birthday to eveyone walking past and usually be right. I just wish you got in free on your UNbirthday!
Yes they offered the 2-fer- but we knew we were only going that day. I think with that offer-the ticket last for a month.
And yes- I vote for an UN birthday offer too!