Disney’s Limited Time Magic offering at Disneyland for the week of April 8-14 was Long Lost Friends Week. Prior to the event guests were able to participate in an online poll to select the characters that would appear at the Big Thunder Ranch Jamboree. It included characters from both classic and more contemporary Disney animated cartoons and features.

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Disneyland has done these sorts of character events in the past, and this followed the same sort of format. There were five backdrops in the Festival Arena, each with a separate queue. There were 10 sets of characters rotating every 30 minutes.

At the beginning of each session there was usually a character procession, where the new sets of characters came out and were introduced before going to their meet areas.

There was a Disney Photopass photographer at each area. They would also take a photo with your camera. In the interest of moving people through they requested only one photo/camera per group. They also requested no autographs – instead they handed out autograph cards at each station. As you can see in the photo below, the autographs were on one side, and the name of the movie was on the other side. I was very happy that they did this – it really made the lines move a lot faster, and gave the characters an opportunity to interact with the guests instead of signing autographs.

Friar Tuck, Robin Hood, Prince John, and Sheriff of Nottingham. Ooh de lally!

They alternated with The Three Little Pigs and the Big Bad Wolf.

The characters seemed to be having a good time playing off each other.

Scrooge McDuck and Ludwig von Drake.

Mulan (disguised as the warrior Ping) and Mushu. She was especially good about suggesting various poses for the photos.

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Frollo, Esmeralda and Clopin.

The most popular group was Wendy, Peter Pan, Mr. Smee and Captain Hook. They took quite a bit of time with each set of guests. The pirates were gleeful when I said I wanted to pose with them.

Governor Ratcliffe, John Smith, Pocahontas and Meeko.

Jane Porter and Terk. (What about Tarzan? I think Tarzan would have been VERY popular…)

Flora, Fauna, and Merryweather. I don’t think I’d ever seen these three except in a parade. They were very sweet.

Lilo and Stitch were obviously having a lot of fun. Stitch was getting into all kinds of mischief – like tying their handler’s pigtails in a knot.

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At one point Lilo had to leave, so Stitch did a number of poses for us while we were waiting.

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There were some special food offerings available, like these Monte Cristo Bites.

Though there were park-wide announcements throughout the day describing the event, those I talked to in line around me were annual passholders who knew about it in advance rather than day guests. It was consistently busy but not over-crowded when I was there. I thought it was a very nice event and the guests and the characters seemed to be enjoying themselves and the opportunity for more personal interaction.

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