How to Make the Most of a Trip to Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge

https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/30/us/star-wars-galaxys-edge-disneyland.html

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A long time ago (in 2015), in what may feel like a galaxy far, far away (but was actually Anaheim), Disney’s chief executive announced that the company would build two new “Star Wars”-themed lands, including one at Disneyland.

Now, Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge is set to open at last. And my colleague Brooks Barnes got to check it out. He wrote about the experience in this new Travel section piece. I asked him to share some advice about braving the madness, too:

The crowds are almost impossible to comprehend when Disney unveils a new ride. People waited seven hours to board Mission: Breakout! when it opened in Anaheim in 2017.

So imagine what could unfold on Friday, when Disneyland opens its largest expansion ever, a 14-acre area called Star Wars: Galaxy’s Edge. It includes a ride that lets you pilot the Millennium Falcon; retail theater (build a lightsaber, with help from Yoda); and an elaborate tavern called Oga’s Cantina that serves alcohol, a first for the theme park.

To prevent overcrowding, Disneyland has widened walking paths, banned extra-wide strollers and added parking spaces. You must also have a reservation to enter Galaxy’s Edge until June 24. “There is no need to arrive super early,” a Disney employee says in an advisory video, promising that everyone with a spot will gain entry. The video notes that no one is allowed to line up at the Disneyland front gates until 2 a.m.

“It should be an amazing time, not an endurance test,” Scott Trowbridge, a senior Disney executive who helped create the land, told me during an advance visit. He pointed out that the village at the center of Galaxy’s Edge — “a space version of Casablanca,” in his words — was designed to feel intimate.

[Read more about why Disney is spending more on its theme parks than it did on Pixar, Marvel and Lucasfilm combined.]

“If we made this a huge facility, you would lose the sense of story,” he said inside Oga’s Cantina, where a pint of White Wampa ale costs $13. The space can hold about 100 people.

Based on my experience, here are a few bonus tips:

1. Don’t rush out there. One of the two major rides — the more lavish one — won’t open until sometime later this year.

2. The ride that is open, Smugglers Run, involves flying the Millennium Falcon in groups of six. The best spot inside the cockpit is the front right. The person who sits there controls the jump to hyperspace.

3. Shop last. Those lightsabers ($199) are surprisingly heavy and the packaging for other must-have items, while inventive, can be cumbersome. The stuffed animals at the Creature Stall come in cardboard pet carriers, for instance. Adorable! But a lot to lug around.

[Read the full preview of Galaxy’s Edge here.]

(We often link to sites that limit access for nonsubscribers. We appreciate your reading Times coverage, but we also encourage you to support local news if you can.)

Assembly Bill 392 took a step forward on Wednesday. Here’s why that’s a big deal:

• The bill that would make it harder for the police to legally justify killing a civilian passed the Assembly on Wednesday, pushing the state one step closer to having some of the strictest limits on use of deadly force in the nation. [CALmatters]

• Here’s more about the compromise that spurred law enforcement groups to pull back their opposition, clearing the way for the bill’s passage. [CALmatters]

• And here’s more background on why the fight was so complex and fraught to begin with. [The New York Times]

In other news

• House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is slow-walking President Trump’s new Nafta deal as her feud with the president continues and as her colleagues push for changes. [The New York Times]

• Ms. Pelosi rebuked Facebook for not taking down a clearly doctored video of her speaking. “We have said all along, poor Facebook, they were unwittingly exploited by the Russians,” she said. “I think wittingly, because right now they are putting up something that they know is false.” [KQED]

• The Times’s editorial board took Google to task for its use of temporary and contract labor, as reported here. The shift, the board wrote, effectively creates a subclass of workers doing similar jobs to full-time employees but without the benefit of proper treatment. [New York Times Opinion]

• Meanwhile, contracted linguists building the company’s flagship artificial intelligence product, Google Assistant, are alleging wage theft. [The Guardian]

• A draft report examining how the state should address the risk of catastrophic wildfires recommended changing a rule that holds utilities responsible for blazes started by their equipment even if they weren’t negligent. But political leaders don’t seem keen to take that up. [The San Francisco Chronicle]

• “I’m not gonna lie.” Metta World Peace — the one and only — is ready to step back into the limelight. Again. And now he’s chilled out for real. [The New York Times]

• Sure, it’s only May and the Seattle Mariners and the Los Angeles Angels aren’t exactly hot this season. But Japanese baseball fans will be watching their matchup tonight, because it could be the first time Yusei Kikuchi and Shohei Ohtani face off on American soil. [The New York Times]

• The first game of the N.B.A. finals is tonight. The Warriors, who will face the Toronto Raptors, are so good that they’re struggling to find ways to show that winning isn’t inevitable and they still have doubters to motivate them. [The New York Times]

Maybe you embrace your area code — wear it on a hat, get it as a tattoo — or maybe you’ve spent your life trying to distance yourself from its implications. (Surely I’m not the only 949-er who feels a little sheepish about it sometimes.)

But no matter what, in California, your area code is part of your identity.

There are historical reasons for the state’s area code cultural geography, as this great 2014 piece from The Atlantic explains — and they’re closely entwined with California’s development.

So when the California Public Utilities Commission announced that a new 341 area code would be added to the region of the East Bay currently served by the 510, outrage wasn’t unexpected.

Nevertheless, as of June 22, if you have a 510 number, you’ll have to start adding the area code even if you’re calling another 510 number. Then, starting on July 22, new phone lines may be assigned numbers that begin with 341.

California Today goes live at 6:30 a.m. Pacific time weekdays. Tell us what you want to see: CAtoday@nytimes.com. Were you forwarded this email? Sign up for California Today here.

Jill Cowan grew up in Orange County, went to school at U.C. Berkeley and has reported all over the state, including the Bay Area, Bakersfield and Los Angeles — but she always wants to see more. Follow along here or on Twitter, @jillcowan.

California Today is edited by Julie Bloom, who grew up in Los Angeles and graduated from U.C. Berkeley.