Welcome to planDisney, Tony! What a wonderful vacation you have planned! We brought my wife’s parents along for our daughters’ first visit to Disneyland and I still treasure the memories we made together. I am happy to help you help your older parents have a magical visit.
As you mentioned, I would recommend linking your parents' tickets to your
MyDisney account. This will allow you to not only assist them with scanning into the theme parks, but also allow you to book their Lightning Lane reservations throughout your visit. To link the tickets, open the
Disneyland app, tap the menu button in the lower-right corner, select "Tickets and Passes," then tap the "+" icon in the upper-right corner and choose "Link Tickets and Passes." You can either scan each ticket's barcode or enter the ticket ID manually. Once everyone's tickets are linked, you will be able to view the group's tickets and help manage reservations from your mobile device.
When it comes to booking
Lightning Lane return times, the Disneyland app will also be your friend here. After your entire party has scanned into a theme park, and you have purchased
Lightning Lane Multi Pass access, you can now schedule return times for yourself as well as your parents. One item to remember: to ensure you all are able to have the same return times, be sure that no one else has scheduled a Lighting Lane Multi Pass reservation. Once a return time has been booked, guests are unable to book their next return time until either 120 minutes have passed or they have scanned in for their attraction, whichever is first. If a member of your party has already scanned in for an attraction and you would like to experience a ride together, then, everyone will need to either wait two hours or until the person has scanned into their already booked Lightning Lane.
Finally, while you are not able to link
dining reservations across MyDisney accounts at Disneyland, you are able to make dining reservations on your parents' behalf. You have a couple of options for booking dining reservations at the Disneyland Resort. On the Disneyland website, you can check availability for all dining reservations that are up for grabs for a certain date and time. You can also filter that search by location and choose Disneyland, Disney California Adventure, the Disneyland Resort Hotels, or Downtown Disney. If you have a specific dining location in mind that you would like to reserve for dinner, you can use the search window on the Disneyland website and check availability on that dining location's page. For a more mobile option, you can use the Disneyland Mobile App to check for dining reservations. Simply tap the (≡) button on the bottom bar, and then tap “Reserve Dining” under the “My Visit” section. You’ll follow the same steps as the website instructions there as well. Also, don’t forget you can make Advanced Dining Reservations up to 60 days before the date you wish to dine!
Tony, I hope this information helps you and your parents have a wonderful visit to the Disneyland Resort. If you have any additional questions, please don’t hesitate to reach out to us again at planDisney!
Enjoy your visit!
David