ANAHEIM – With little girls in sparkly dresses and Mickey Mouse-eared toddlers often in tow, parents are excitedly sauntering up to a new attraction at Disneyland – before pausing in shock.

Some roll their eyes. Others try to persuade their kids to do something else. Some couples split up – Dad with a backpack stays in line, while mom takes the children on rides.

On a recent Wednesday morning, the wait to see two people outfitted as Anna and Elsa from Disney’s hit animated movie, “Frozen,” was more than two hours.

“Frozen” has surpassed “The Lion King” as Disney Animation’s most successful movie of all time, making more than $950 million worldwide. The frenzy has a by-product: unprecedented waits in line to meet Disney characters.

They wait to see the white-haired queen, Elsa, with her shimmery, blue dress, and younger sister Anna, a princess, wearing a simpler dress and braids in a room with a backdrop of a kingdom.

The characters were to stay put just long enough to promote the film’s Nov. 10 opening. But in Anaheim and Florida parks, Disney recently extended their stays, indefinitely.

According to unofficial Disney apps that track line times, that two-hour-plus wait is the regular fare to see the characters.

“It’s worth it to see the look on their face when they meet them,” said Josie Johnson of Olympia, Wash., whose daughter Chloe met the royal sisters for her seventh birthday.

Kristi Hayden of Modesto hoped to avoid the long line she had noticed one Sunday by returning midweek with her daughters Elise, 7, and Everlee, 2.

No luck.

“Elsa is her favorite character right now,” Hayden said about Elise, beaming after leaving the room. “She wants an Elsa dress so bad, but they are all sold out.”

At first glance, the line doesn’t appear daunting, the queue going back and forth with the chain-cordoned pathway winding around to the entrance.

A sign is placed to show guests the spot where they are 120 minutes from the characters.

Over New Year’s Day weekend, the wait was three and a half hours, said Fred Hazelton, the statistician for TouringPlans.com, an unofficial app and website that tracks Disney wait times.

Meanwhile, it takes 30 to 75 minutes to meet other princesses, nearby. And as little as 15 minutes to meet Merida from “Brave,” Hazelton said.

When “Tangled” came out in theaters in 2010, the longest waits were 90 minutes for Rapunzel and Flynn Ryder, said Kelly Johns, founder of Mousewait.com, another wait-time app.

(To see current wait times, go to Mousewait.com or TouringPlans.com.)

The “Frozen” room is open from 11 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., with the queen and the princess taking five-minute breaks every 45 minutes.

Some families, of course, move on.

“It’s longer than the movie,” one mother told her two girls. “Let’s just go ride the carousel. We’ll go another day.”

But plenty stay, braving the line for photo ops and quick chats with Elsa, the icy queen, and Anna, the younger, adventurous princess.

Elizabeth Moreno of Temecula strategized with her sister: They would each take their families elsewhere while the other clan waited. Without her sister’s help, Moreno said, she would have passed.

Moreno clutched autograph books as her two daughters – Kyra, 4, and Grace, 2 – wrapped around her legs and tugged on the line ropes.

“This is my first goal, while the kids are still fresh,” Moreno said.

Jenny Allen of El Paso, Texas rested on a brick wall on her third and final day at Disneyland with her two daughters – Emma, 3, and Elizabeth, 5.

During the trip, the family’s longest wait had been 40 minutes for Space Mountain. Allen and the children were tired of walking.

“The girls love it,” Allen said from near the back of the line. “You do what you can for the girls.”

Was it worth it?

Days later, Allen mulled that over.

“Once in a lifetime, it was,” she said. “I wouldn’t do it again.”

Contact the writer: 714-704-3793 or stully@ocregister.com