Disneyland Paris Jan 2012

[peep]

Note: There are hardly any photos in the following trip report; this was mainly down to weather.

Thursday 19th January 2012

I’d spent the previous night at Nic’s parent’s house so her Dad could drive Nic and I a few mins up the road to Ebbsfleet International rail station. We left really early in the morning and arrived at the station quite early so we grabbed some food at Nero and waited for the train to arrive. We then got on our train to Lille. Like an hour later we had arrived in Lille and with a 50 min wait for our connecting train we headed to the bar for a drink. They played this ok pop song on the TV but the video had some awful dance routine like it was from the 90s, it made us chuckle. Before we knew it it was time for our TGV to Disneyland Paris. We were on the upper deck of the train and the seats were really comfortable.

We arrived at Marne-la-Vallée/Chessy (in other words Disneyland Paris) about 11:40 and then we proceeded over to our hotel, Disney Santa Fe. It was about a 15 minute walk but it’s a nice one. The queue for checking in was quite long but after a while we found ourselves talking to the amazing Stefano who had a nice chat with us because he spent several months in Brighton. We cheeckily asked for one of the updated rooms but they must have been full as we got a pretty standard room but with these amazing bed covers …

We decided to get the free shuttle bus to the park and after a few minutes we were back in the Disney hub which was when Nic remembered she had left the park tickets on the side in the room. PANIC! So we then ran back to the same bus to go back to the room to get the tickets to then get the bus back to the park So much faffing about, we were both hoping this was not a sign of what was to come.

So finally we were past security and entering the Walt Disney Studios. The Stars ‘n’ cars parade was just starting as we exited the Studio 1 building. The park was rather empty, we looked at the time board, longest queue was Crush’s coaster at 20 minutes, I couldn’t believe what I was seeing, Crush never gets under an hour when I usually go lol. We opted that our first ride of the day would be Rock ‘n’ Rollercoaster avec Aerosmith. It was walk on. WIN! We then walked round and did it again straight away. Both times we got the same song which was a shame but it rode quite well, if a little slow.

Next up was Tower of Terror which, once again, we walked straight onto. We got English audio in the actual lift segment which was awesome, seems like such a rare thing. But yeah, Tower was just epic, I think Nic fell in love with it.

We were getting quite hungry by this point so we headed back into Studio 1 for a quick meal in there. We both had a chicken burger meal. I don’t know if it’s changed since I last ate in there but I really enjoyed the burger, quite filling.

We thought it’d be a bad idea to do a thrill ride after food so we opted for a show. The English version of Stitch Live! Was about to start so we headed in there. The pre-show (usually an ad for the Disney TV channels) somehow broke with several cast members walking around scratching their heads in confusion. We then headed into the main room. For those that don’t know what happens I’ll try not to spoil it but it’s a live interaction show with an animated Stitch. It’s really good fun and I was one of the chosen peeps which was very amusing.

Cinemagique was about to start as we left Stitch Live so we walked straight into the theatre. I absolutely love this show and I recommend that everyone goes to see it if they visit the Studios. It’s full of little surprises and is just great entertainment.

Crush’s coaster was advertising like a 15 min wait so we went straight for it. The queue literally started in the building, I don’t think I’ve ever seen the queue that short before. We got a fairly decent spin on the first half of the ride which was awesome. Still love the lift hill, it’s just so fab.

We then headed over to Toy Story Playland and went straight into the awesome queue for RC Racer. On the way to the area we found Pluto, Nic was overjoyed…

I think there were about 3 people in front of us to give you some idea of how empty it was Now to understand what I’m about to say you should probably read the following topic on magicforum.eu HERE. So this girl wants peeps to look out for this cast member called Lionel and guess who was batching RC Racer? Yep, that’s right, crazy Lionel! We both fell into a little fit of hysterics but we didn’t have the guts to say anything to him about this girl on the internet. He seemed really active and a bit mental, no idea what he was going on about but he seemed to be having quite a conversation with the ladies in front of us. Anyway we got on and had a great ride. It’s already starting to feel a bit bumpy which is not a good sign but I still enjoy it.

On our way out of the Toy Story area we decided to have a quick ride on the Toy Soliders parachute drop. It’s a fun little ride and it provides more air time than it really should, awesome sauces. Oh and the horrific metal flooring has gone which means the amazing themed floor can be seen again.

We then found ourselves back in the Hollywood Tower Hotel. This time we got both the pre-show and the ride audio in English, mega win. The ride op was really awesome too.

Next up was another ride on Rock ‘n’ Rollercoaster and we got a different song. It still wasn’t one of the epic tunes but it was still nice to have a different track and a different light show than what I’ve already seen. So yeah, awesome happened.

The park was nearing the end of the day so we decided to head into Armageddon to prolong our time in the park. As usual it caused lots of annoying faff because of the burdenous pre-show. Still, lots of awesome effects went off in the main room and it made it all worthwhile.

Nic decided she wanted to have a little look inside the shop inside Studio 1 on the way out so we had a little wander in there. We were amused at one of those toys that when you press a button something spins and lights up because this one was one of the princesses and it was her dress that spins round. Easily amused clearly defines both of us. We then left the Studios park and headed over to the Village. As we had food fairly late in the day we decided to leave food for a couple of hours so went in search of evening entertainment.

Billy Bob’s had a line dancing event advertised and a live band a bit later on so we decided to go back when the line dancing thing began. Nic then noticed that King Ludwigs had happy hour so we went in, grabbed a table and got 2 beers for the price of one. While we were in there that French pop song that played in the bar in Lille came on the TV, we were laughing at the dancing again for some time, here be this amazing video…

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jofvK5iPDDY&feature=autoshare[/youtube]

How amazing is that!? So after we drunk our pint of beer we headed into Billy Bobs and got more beer, found a table and prepared ourselves for some line dancing awesomeness. Surprisingly I’d never actually stepped foot in Billy Bobs before and I just have to say it’s pretty awesome. The line dancing thing turned out to be like a club of line dancers with a lady who got up on stage to teach everyone a routine. Anyone could join in but after about a minute of seeing the routine we were very glad we didn’t. However watching other randomers join in was hilarious, like, in actual fits of laughter at times. One couple decided to just join in despite turning up just as they were starting to do the routine to the song, they actually had no idea what they were doing. There was another lady who was actually fab, she was really good but she just couldn’t be arsed to spin so just like pranced around in time with the music till she fit back in with the routine. I am so glad that we went in there, that hour passed so quickly due to the amazing time we were having watching all these people attempt these routines.

We thought she had actually started with quite a hard one and then there was this massive break and when she came back she started teaching this routine which actually went on FOREVER. OMG I actually have no idea how anyone could remember so many parts to a dance routine, even the pros looked baffled. I remember getting back from going to the loo at one point and Nic just turned to me and went “she’s still teaching the same routine” and we just both laughed. I think it actually took them a good 40 minutes from beginning of teaching the routine to actually dancing it to music.

The whole line dancing thing was starting to come towards and end, or at least felt like it, so we headed to Earl of Sandwich for some food. This is when I was like “yep, that alcohol has gone straight to me”, in other words, I felt quite drunk. Whoops. So having an epic sandwich at the Earl was exactly what I needed.

After filling up on awesomeness we then sashayed into the Disney stores to kill some time before the band started. We spent a fair bit of time faffing about and occasionally messing around with hats…

We then went back into Billy Bobs and just got some soft drinks before realising all the good seats were gone so we had to sit at a table sort of behind the stage which was a bit meh. The band were ok, it was country music, all sounds rather samey to me. All the line dancers were still around and decided to take it in turns to dance to the music. It was like they all knew exactly what they were all going to do without even discussing it, I thought that was pretty awesome. It really felt like a scene from a TV show or film, very surreal moment.

Then we spotted the mental dude. I have no idea how long we were watching him for but wow, I’ve never seen anyone go so crazy for country music. We don’t know if he was just wasted/high/whatever, actually just insane or was tacking the piss out of the music. But for whatever reason he was just going mental for every song, nodding along, trying to sing along to songs he clearly didn’t know and just being all round mental. I don’t care, it was hilarious to watch.

We then managed to get a table in a better position. The crazy guy was actually getting more mental as time passed and at this point the bass guitarist was actually struggling to sing because he kept laughing which just made the whole situation more hilarious. There was even a crowd forming on one of the other floors just watching this guy.

After a while we decided to call it a night and walked back to the hotel where I realised how comfortable the bed was, or maybe it was just because I was extremely tired. Hmm.


Well thanks for sticking with that epic report of day one. You deserve a cookie if you managed to read all of it. I should be writing up day two fairly soon.

 

[furie]

Where's my cookie???

Excellent report as per Peep, read every word. I can't believe you heartless bastards didn't pass on a message of love... Actually, I can believe it

 

[Nic]

Just to put this in context, I'd only been to DLP once before, in 92 or 93, something like that - a LONG time ago anyway. Way before anything cool was built. I've not been to any of their other parks. Whilst I do believe in the "Disney Magic", enjoy most of the films, had an Xmas temp job at a Disney Store 10 years ago, and LOVE Pixar, I'm not a massive Disney fangirl.

As per, Peep has been stupidly thorough, so there's not a lot left for me to say, really. Therefore, I'll try and focus more on opinions than a step-by-step account. Oh yeah, plus, while I took loads of photos, most of them were crap, and the rest were of fairly random stuff.

Right, now, on with the show!

Let's jump right in and start with the hotel room. We were staying at Santa Fe (Disney's cheapest on site option). To be honest, it was a bit of a dump. Think an old style Travelodge. Tolworth. Yeah. The thing is, I don't have a problem with Travelodges, not even Tolworth, especially not if its only cost me £9. Thing is, it's Travelodge. You expect it to be crap. If you go to Disney, and stay in a resort hotel, even the 'cheap' one, you expect it to carry at least a hint of the Disney "attention to detail is King" and "everything must be perfect" mantras. Unfortunately not. The paintwork was all scuffed, drawer handles were missing, wallpaper was peeling off etc etc. I'm not going to whinge too much because it was spotlessly clean, we got it stupidly cheap and I was asleep 95% of the time I was in there. I just feel that it lets the brand down, and as the first real 'Disney' thing I experienced on the trip, was a bit of a let down. OK, that's enough about that.

Moving on...

After all the faff, it was about 1:30 by the time we got to the parks. As a result (and, believing that it would close at 5pm) we decided to start in the Studios and see how much we could get done in the few hours we had left. Initial impressions were good, although to be honest, at that exact moment, I was so excited, I could've been walking through a pit knee-deep in turd and I'd have still thought it was amazing. So much so, that I completely failed to notice walking through the courtyard. I quite liked Studio 1 initially. It's size, and the number of shiny things was really overwhelming. I can only imagine what it'd be like to take a small child in there for the first time. I think they'd explode.

First ride of the trip was Rock n Rollercoaster. I knew it had Aerosmith based on-board audio. I knew it was launched. That was it. For some reason I didn't realise it was a "cred in a shed". Apart from the fact that we got a pretty crappy song for our first (and 2nd!) run, it was pretty fab. Getting off it, my very first comment was "OH. MY. GOD! Something's wrong. VERY wrong. I just got off a SMOOTH Vekoma! MIND. BLOWN!". Yeah, that incredibly goony statement pretty much sums it up really. The audio and stuff is pretty good, but I feel they could've made more of it, matching the punchlines in the cred to crescendos in the music etc. All in all, I enjoyed it, and it was far more than a +1.

Next up was Tower of Terror. I'd literally dreamt of going on one of these since I was a kid, so was a bit scared that it'd turn out to be a case of "never meet your heros". I needn't have worried. OMG! <3 <3 <3 There aren't enough lessthanthrees in the world to summarise how much I love that ride. I don't think I've ever been on anything that gives you such powerful airtime for such a prolonged period. To the point that subsequent re-rides prompted shouts of "This is OBSCENE!" on the middle 'big' drop XD

After lunch, there was a Stitch show in English about to start so we headed straight there. I still don't know how they manage to sync the animation to the live voice *baffled!* Whilst it's not really my thing as such, it was a nice idea, and I'm sure kids (and Mark!) would adore it. Plus, John got picked on, which is always hilarious

Next, we went to see Cinemagique. All I knew was that it was "a love letter to cinema... with a few surprises!". That's a pretty good summary. I like to think I'm pretty hard to fool when it comes to special effects and illusions and stuff, but some of it left even me scratching my head at the end! Please don't ever dis-count it because "I don't do shows!", it really is worth it.

Crush's coaster was pretty good. First thing that struck me was how cool the station is. Second thing was how amazingly efficient they were at batching it. I don't think I saw a single seat go empty. This was on a quiet day. Other parks need to watch and learn. Anyway, our first ride was a little disappointing - we ended up facing away from most of the theming/effects/animations etc. Considering that 50% of riders will be in that situation, I'm surprised that, Disney of all people, hadn't designed it to be seen from both sides. Our 2nd ride was on the opposite side and made all the difference, but first impressions are what matter, and the damage had already been done.

Next up was RC Racer. OMGWTFBBQONEELEVEN IT HAS SCALEXTRIC TRACK AS A QUEUE LINE! I actually nearly exploded with joy. This is seriously the single most exciting bit of theming I have ever seen in my entire life. It's a shame, then, that the ride is turd. Oh well, apparently it's a +1 even though it's basically a Disk'O that doesn't spin. OK. Whatever.

Believing that the park would shut at 5, it was now about 10 to. With no queue, we thought we'd squeeze in a quick go on the Toy Soilders parachute thingy before rushing to Armageddon to squeeze the last remaining drops out of the day. It was quite good. I can't recall having been on anything similar. Could've done with a bit more airtime. Plus, the hole in the parachute means that you get a wet leg if it's raining </3

Thinking that we were really pushing our luck for time now, we noticed that ToT was still open. Clock said 5:05. What?! Oh well, lets go on it if they'll let us! Did I mention how much I love that ride?

Once we got off, we realised that they'd obviously extended the opening time by and hour till 6pm. That meant we still had plenty of time to get another ride on Rock n roller before finishing the day in Armageddon. Those of you who have ever seen me in a) any of the CWoA Halloween mazes b) the Clone Zone pre-show/walk through, or c) Thorpe as the Clowns are about to be unleashed, know that I HATE the unexpected. Not knowing what was going to come next did scare the crap out of me at points (yeah, might've even grabbed John's arm like a proper girl - sorry! haha) and it was quite impressive. That said, it is all quite dated. The pre-show, whilst amusing, is dated and needs to die. Plus, has anyone even seen Armageddon, much less give a **** about it?!

So, yeah, that was our day at the studios. There were no queues. It was fab. Here's the only photo I took all day (I was having just too much fun to bother!)

More when I can be arsed!

 

[Gavin]

I think I'm the only person on here who hates Cinemagique.

Since when has Martin Short ever been appropriate?

 

[marc]

Cannot stand him tbh but I did like the show.

 

[Martyn B]

Tower of Terror is fab. Never have I seen a ride where so much attention to detail was put in, and the staff are awsome too. I love that confusing bit where you fly out of the seat, yet you're still going up... I always frown at that point, becauese I just dont get it! :lol:

And I had to lol at this:

Initial impressions were good, although to be honest, at that exact moment, I was so excited, I could've been walking through a pit knee-deep in turd and I'd have still thought it was amazing.

I was like that too on my first ever Disney visit!

 

[peep]

Friday 20th January 2012

We had opted to get to breakfast just after 8, when we got there the buffet diner was fairly busy. As Nic pointed out to me, the selection on offer was not very desirable for gluten haters. However we thought it was just fine, with a nice selection of cereals and croissants. We filled up and headed back to the hotel room to chill out for a bit. I think this is when Nic discovered the audio stories on the TV service. They were like a mix between an audio book and the film soundtracks, it was pretty cool.

So after a while we then decided to walk over to the park, stopping in the Disney Village shops on the way to kill some time. We enter the park and head straight for Discoveryland. We had to join a fairly large group of people for the rope drop, when it dropped everyone had to slowly walk behind cast members. I’d never seen this done before but I liked it, meant no one was pushing and shoving to get somewhere first, it was all very calm and sensible. Obviously the first ride we went to was Space Mountain: Mission 2. We ended up being in the second row of the first public train of the day, whoop. It felt quite dark inside, like a lot of the effects hadn’t been turned on but I could kinda hear the soundtrack so all was good.

Originally we intended to watch Captain EO next as it’s next to Space but it wasn’t open yet (and there was no mention of when it’d open). So as it was closed we decided to take a trip to the moon of Endor, also known as Star Tours. I really enjoy this attraction, showing its age now but it’s just good fun. Do wish Paris had Star Tours 2 though. Nic wanted to check out the castle and the dragon so we headed up through the “La Galerie de la Belle au Bois Dormant” walkthrough which tells the story of Sleeping beauty through the use of real stain glass windows, props and tapestries.

We then headed down into the basement of the castle to visit the dragon. It’d just come out of refurbishment so it looked awesome, I love the lighting in the room.

Time to go on some of the Fantasyland rides now. Snow White and the Seven Dwarves was first up, it was walk on, not a lot to talk about really apart from the cool effect with the evil Queen. As we exited we then tried to ride the Pinocchio attraction but it had broken down so we decided to come back to it later. We then went over to Peter Pan’s Flight which we walked straight on. I love this dark ride, mainly because the film was one of my childhood favourites.

The back part of Fantasyland was mainly closed off due to refurbs and changing the interior and exterior of the theatre under the train station. This unfortunately meant that Nic didn’t get to ride the amazing Casey Jr. So we moved on past all the construction boards and the flat rides over to It’s a small World. Yep, it was time for one of the catchiest songs in existence. We managed to walk straight on and enjoy the attraction of stereotypes. At the exit is now the Princess Pavilion, it opened last year and is a special indoor meet and greet area for the Disney princesses. There was a film crew blocking the entrance when we got there, they seemed to be filming one of the cast members just doing his job, whether this was for a cast member tutorial video or a fly on the wall documentary following a day in the life of one we couldn’t quite decide.

There was about a 20 minute wait but it was ok as the interior is very nicely decorated with a fake stain glass window and prop for each princess. It also plays their songs in the background. The only issue with the pavilion is that you don’t know what princesses you’re going to meet but in a way it makes it more exciting and luckily enough we got to meet two of the better princesses. The first princess we met was Belle. She was quite chatty and pretty cool, she really looked like Belle too which was awesome, here’s my pic with her…

Our next princess was Tiana from Princess and the Frog. Once again she was really cool and chatty and really looked like Tiana.

After getting to spend some time with the princesses we had to exit the pavilion and opposite in the random tent was Rapunzel and Fynn, the queue was fairly long for them so we just grabbed a quick photo of them in between kids going up to them.

We then made our way to the other side of Fantasyland to enter Adventureland. As we entered we just managed to catch the random Peter Pan show with Captain Hook. It was a bit random.

It was then time to ride Pirates of the Caribbean. Absolutely love this ride, doesn’t matter how many times I ride it I still love it. However there were quite a few effects turned off and some of the animatronics were missing, not like these were things that non-regulars would notice but ya know, it’s always nicer to see everything working the way it should be. Still PotC is epic.

We then continued our trek through Adventureland over to Indiana Jones et le temple du peril. I quite like this coaster and the theming is epic but I don’t really know many people that like it so I was thrilled that Nic agrees with me that it’s a cool little coaster.

On our way through Adventureland we stopped at one of the many stalls to have a look at the merchandise on sale. Then randomly, out of nowhere, Aladdin runs up to this barrel full of plushes and asks into it “are you in there?” and then ran off, wtf? It all happened so fast we didn’t even have time to fully notice what was going on, gotta love the way the characters run around the parks.

So we continued onwards into Frontierland for some Big Thunder Mountain time. We only had to queue about 20 minutes which wasn’t too bad, there’s plenty to look at in the queueline, and the detail is just insane. We were sent to be in second row but the two ladies that were meant to be sitting in front row looked a bit scared of being at the front and asked if we’d be ok swapping with them, we were happy to oblige. The ride is good fun, a classic family rollercoaster. The sound on the lift hill really aggravates my ears though, it’s a bit of a downer on a decent attraction.

We then headed over to Phantom Manor. There was no queue which was nice. My favourite part of Phantom is the grim grinning ghosts, I usually have that little song in my head for hours. On our way out of Frontierland we decided to walk round Legends of the West, which is an interesting walk through attraction most people don’t even notice, it makes up the fort entrance to Frontierland. There are lots of stairs and lots of little rooms with some scary looking characters inside with little plaques telling a little bit about their story and what makes them a Legend.

So as we came out to the central plaza we noticed lots of characters everywhere. Awesome, we met Chip and Dale (or Tic and Tac in France).

Other characters that were out but we didn’t get to get a pic with included Goofy, Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, Eeyore and Tigger. We then went back into Adventureland to check out the Aladdin walk through. There was a group of British girls who somehow caught up with us by the time we got to the end and they went mental for the last scene, like, screamed and took lots of photos, we awkwardly shifted towards the exit. We then continued through Adventureland for a bit, on our travels we spotted Rafiki by the Hakuna Matata restaurant so we went over to see him. Rafiki is awesome.

We then headed over to the Aladdin “magic moments” area to pose with the lamp which gives off smoke.

We were getting a bit hungry by this point but we didn’t want a big meal so we went into Caseys on Main Street for a hot dog. The hot dogs in there are huge but for the price you pay you expect it to be that sort of size. We were also given a special receipt which granted us a free hot drink after 3pm in certain places in the parks. As Caseys exits on to the Liberty arcade we decided to walk down and have a look in the Liberty Enlightening the World room. It’s such a random addition to such a fantastically detailed park.

We had somehow managed to do pretty much all the major attractions already and we didn’t really want to re-ride a coaster after just eating so we opted for a show. There was only one show to see, Captain EO. Oh yes, 80s mega cheese featuring Michael Jackson. We missed getting into a screening by like a second which was annoying because it meant we had to wait for that pre-show to finish before they let us in to then wait for ages to then start the next one. Anyway we were finally in the auditorium and sitting down to watch Captain EO. It’s such a dated film but it’s so fun and the seat effects were working in time (think that’s a first for me). Nic absolutely loved it.

We then hopped onto the Disneyland Railroad. We decided it would be a more interesting way to get to Fantasyland. I still love the fact that the railroad actually has its own little themed tunnel in Frontierland and goes through Pirates of the Caribbean. Very cool.

So we got off in Fantasyland. For some reason the park all of a sudden felt busier. We continued over to Pinocchio so Nic could ride the last dark ride in the area. Like the other Fantasyland dark rides I find it hard to talk about but it’s a fun little ride.

It was well gone 3pm at this point so we popped into Belle Notre restaurant for our free hot drink. We actually spent quite a lot of time in there. By the time we left there was only about a 10-15 min wait until the parade started and due to the quite miserable and damp weather most of the parade route was empty. We decided to stand opposite the castle stage, felt weird being the only people standing there for ages. Then as it got closer to the parade time it got quite busy around us, oh well. Due to some changes being made to the parade floats for the 20th anniversary celebrations starting in April I wasn’t sure how it was going to come out. It wasn’t too bad in the end, the first float had been replaced by a very temporary float for all the usual gang of Mickey and his friends and then the princesses just had to prance around instead of standing on the finale float. Still, gotta love the music and seeing all the characters.

As the parade finished we headed round to Discoveryland again for some Space mountain action. We walked straight on and it was a good ride as usual. Upon exiting the ride we then headed round to the Nautilus walkthrough. It’s random but I like it, got to love the giant octopus effect.

We then spent ages in the Main Street shops before checking out the Duffy takeover in one of the shops. I quite like how they push the story of Duffy but it all seems a bit much? It’s really expensive to get a Duffy plush too.

So we left the park and decided to hit up Ludwigs again to take advantage of their happy hour. We spent our time in there trying to figure out where we wanted to go for our evening meal. We finally decided to go to a buffet but then it was like, which one? Finally we settled on trying out the buffet at Hotel Cheyenne. I’d never been in before and it looked quite cool. We got seated and settled down pretty quickly and then we hit up the buffet. It had a decent selection of food, if you didn’t like the speciality of the buffet they had a kids section too which actually had some decent options. So yeah, food was rather nom, was worth checking out.

Attached to the restaurant is a bar so we decided to check it out, turned out there was a performer about to start, great timing. He played an array of tracks from Green day to Queen. He was actually pretty good. As his performance went on more and more people formed this HUGE group. Their ages varied so we spent a good amount of time trying to figure out why they were here. If they were part of a uni group, new British cast members on their training period or something else. We’re still not sure but they were loud and there were lots of them. When the guy performed Queen’s ‘I want to break free’ the inevitable happened, with the audience being like 99% British the place spontaneously erupted into singing along with the main parts of the song. The guy looked so baffled and it was friggin’ hilarious. So glad we were there to witness that.

We then trundled along back to our hotel room where we chilled out and watched this awful Disney channel film called Dadnapped. It confused me because it starred actors from a variety of Disney Channel shows. Have I mentioned yet that it was awful? It was then time to sleep.

Once again thanks for reading. Final part should be up by the end of the weekend.

 

[Nic]

Day 2 (Part 1): Disneyland Park, 20/1/12

As mentioned before, I'd been once before when I was a kid, so had a few vague memories of the place, but it still felt like I was seeing it all for the first time.

As we walked through under the hotel, the steam train was in the station. It was a great way to be greeted to the park. As we walked through under the station, I could feel the excitement building. I knew that as soon as I got my first glimpse of the castle, the Disney magic would really hit me. I wasn't disappointed.

I'm quite ashamed to say that I was almost in tears, which is utterly ridiculous. There was just something about that one sight that made me just feel like a kid again, completely forgetting the world outside. I know that was always Walt's goal for his parks, and that legacy has definitely been continued here.

We walked round to Space Mountain Mission 2 and got on the first public train of the day. I was really surprised at how much the launch loses power, only just about crawling over the crest of the hill - unless there's a dirty trim up there? The rest was alright. Basically the same layout as RnR, but a lot darker inside, so a lot more disorientating. It's also a bit more head-bangy, more what you'd expect from a Vekoma, but still not properly rough. All in all, a pretty reasonable coaster.

The queue line for Star Tours was one of the few vague memories I have from DLP as a kid, so it was a bit odd seeing it again. The ride itself moves a lot more than I was expecting. The video is so dated now, it's in desperate need of a re-boot. Star Tours 2 needs to happen asap. The other thing I actually HATED was the fact that you exit into an arcade. There clearly used to be something themed and good in there that they've just ripped out and plonked a handful of game machines in. It was hideous, and not at all what I'd expect from the kings of immersive theming.

By now I was desperate to get inside the castle. I'm really disappointed that it's just the gallery and the dragon's lair. I feel that they really missed a trick in not having a viewing platform near the top, and not using it to house some other kind of attraction. Anyway, it's still awesome! The stained glass windows are amazing!

Maleficent <3 <3 <3

We then went down into the Dragon's Lair. He's recently had a complete refurb, and looks fab!

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ef6z33sezMU[/youtube]
(The quality wasn't great to start with, but YT has somehow made it even worse. The original isn't that dark, and you can see more of the background </3)

Snow White dark ride was next. It's one of those proper old-skool dark rides with cars on rails that goes round black-lit painted board scenery. It was very well done, but all parks have one of these, and it just didn't feel special enough for Disney. Although we didn't ride it until later on, Pinocchio is exactly the same, and there's nothing much else to say about that either.

Peter Pan's Flight is much more what I expected from a Disney dark ride. Although the ride mechanism is starting to show its age, the scenery is still very impressive. I really enjoyed it, despite the numerous, over-zealous block brakes.

It's a Small World was next. This was another thing I had vague memories of as a child. All in all it was lovely, but there's a few things that spoilt it a bit for me. Firstly, the ceiling. It's very high and bright white, making it INCREDIBLY obvious that the whole thing is just plonked in a giant warehouse. Surely it wouldn't have hurt them to put some kind of false ceiling in, or at very least paint it all black to make it feel a little more enclosed. As it was, it just all felt very temporary, like a shopping centre Santa's Grotto or something. It also sounded like the music wasn't synced properly as we went round. I still enjoyed it, but these little things just didn't seem very Disney to me.

Next was one of the longest queues of the day - Princess Pavilion! Yes, there were gaggles of families, each with a collection of small girls... then there was John and myself! haha! It's really nicely done and very well organised. You queue along the wall, past a fake stained glass window, and icon for each princess. They're all very prety.

Then we saw something else very "un-Disney"

Eugh.

Anyway, a few minutes later and it was our turn. We were led into a room, not knowing who would be there to greet us.... Belle!

I was quite surprised that they not only let you take photos on your own cameras, but that the official photographers are quite happy to take them for you! With such an obvious opportunity to rake in the cash, that's not something that most parks would allow. Anyway, then it was onwards into room two...

Tiana was really chatty, and seriously the most convincing 'live' Disney princess I have ever seen. Having the opportunity to meet the princesses on your own, without having to elbow other people out of the way, and in such lovely surroundings really is fantastic, and well worth the queue.

Rapunzel and Flynn were outside. We couldn't be arsed to queue.

The Peter Pan show looked a bit odd. It was all in burdenous French, so God knows what was going on

They were refurbishing the pirate ship, so we couldn't go on it

Next up was Pirates of the Caribbean. I've been on some amazing dark rides over the last year that were clearly inspired by this in various ways (the water cred and the Arab thing at Efteling, the one at Gardaland etc) so I was really looking forward to riding one of the originals. I have to say, I was actually a little disappointed. I don't know if it's that I don't understand the story, that some of it was being refurbished, if it was too dark to see or a combination of the three, but it seemed to be AGES before we actually saw anything interesting. The sections with the animatronics were very good, but it seemed to takes ages to get there. Some of the scenery was also excellent (I love the bit at the end with the waterfalls) but again, there were also sections that seemed a bit, well, dull. Don't get me wrong, it's still a very good dark ride, but perhaps my expectations were a little high.

That's loads... more later

 

[marc]

It's really good reading different views, nic yours are very similar to mine about the parks.

 

[peep]

Saturday 21st Jan 2012

As it was our final day in the resort already (time flies when you’re in Disneyland Paris) we decided to make the most of the day and as they were operating Extra Magic Hours we opted to make use of it. However this required us to get up at silly o’ clock to check out and head over to the parks. We dropped our key cards off at reception and got on the next bus. When we got there the bag check thing hadn’t opened yet and due to the freezing cold weather we hid in the train station by the heaters.

Once they were open we headed through and dropped our luggage off at the concierge. We then headed into the Disneyland Parc. We had booked to have our breakfast in the Plaza Gardens restaurant. The atmosphere was quite nice and relaxing, I don’t know how the staff were so awake, we could barely cope at this time of the morning. It had a slightly larger range of products on offer for breakfast compared to the hotel which was nice.

After the nice food we headed into Discoveryland. I should mention now that the attractions open are quite limited during extra magic hours, for example only Fantasyland and Discoveryland are open during this period. We headed straight for some Space Mountain goodness but as we approached we noticed it was closed, I asked a cast member why and she informed me if had broken down temporarily. Ok, so we went round to Star Tours instead. Well, I suppose it’s one way to wake us up lol.

By the time we had exited Star Tours Space Mountain had re-opened. We walked straight on and it felt like more of the effects were on compared to the previous day. It was now approaching 10am so we joined the growing crowd waiting for Frontierland to open. The park opening announcement went off on the sound system around the park and we all walked slowly over to Big Thunder Mountain. We ended up waiting around 15 minutes before getting on. It was already quite clear to us that it was going to be a lot busier than the previous two days.

We then made our way over to the back of Adventureland where we rode Indiana Jones et le temple du peril. As we were in Adventureland and Nic hadn’t really seen it yet we went up the Family Robinson Treehouse. I attempted to show Nic the skyline of Paris in the distance but the weather was a bit too cloudy to see it properly.

Then we made our way over to Pirates of the Caribbean which we had to wait a good 10-15 mins for. As we were heading towards the exit we noticed a mass of characters in the Central Plaza area again. We attempted to get a photo with Scrooge McDuck but he had some massive crowd around him and as we approached he decided that trying to say hello to some ducks and failing at climbing over the fence would be more entertaining. To be honest it was rather amusing but all the kids were really confused and it was a bit awkward.

So we moved round to Donald Duck. He had an equally huge crowd and he was cornered by this fence. The crowd were getting quite nasty to try and get in next, some couples had been waiting patiently before we even walked over and they only just got a photo before we did and even my pic was a struggle and a half. Parents were literally pushing us out of the way as if we were standing in their way just for the hell of it, so rude, they then went on to act as if we were the problem, urgh. There was this hilarious moment though, so wish I had filmed it, this kid got his pic with Donald and as he was walking back to his parents Donald decided to pull his hat down, the kid literally turned around and gave this expression of pure evil and made this little odd screech, Nic and I were laughing for ages about that. After the masses of kids being rammed into Donald I managed to quickly jump in and get a very quick pic but due to the crowds pushing themselves forward so much all the time there was hardly any space and Donald starting joking about falling over the fence.

That is probably the only problem with the roaming characters in Paris, they seem to bring out the worst in people when there are large groups and the people being patient and just waiting their turn just get left at the side and forgotten about. There’s nothing the characters can do, some manage to keep it in order but most tend to struggle when there are so many people around.

I think we then attempted to get a pic with Goofy but by then all the characters were being told to go back. So we then we continued towards the exit and made our way to the Studios. The Studios park was really busy, good thing we got most things done on Thursday. We headed straight into the next performance of Animagique. I quite like this show, mainly for the very catchy song at the end of the show. The performers are really good, pink elephants on parade <3

We then made our way to the other side of Studio One to find loads of characters coming out that you’d find in the Cars ‘n’ Stars parade. It was a bit weird, but who are we to complain when we got to meet a couple of characters. Nic was amazed at the sight of Mulan and then we went over to Remy who was awesome. He made sure everyone got their turn and was ensuring there wasn’t pushing etc.

Tower had a queue time of 50 minutes so we decided to grab a fast pass for Rock ‘n’ Rollercoaster and then queue up for Tower. The queue seemed to move a lot slower than usual. When we got into the queue area after the library we noticed that not all elevators were operating, we reckon it was due to lack of staff. Still, once we were on it was a fantastic ride, as per usual.

We then walked straight past the 20-odd minute queue for Rock ‘n’ Rollercoaster. We managed to get a different song again which was great, it was one that even I hadn’t heard before and I really liked the colour of the lighting inside (each train has different colour scheme in the lighting).

As we exited it was time for the stunt show. It was slightly delayed due to the amount of people entering the arena, I don’t think I’ve seen it full before. I think the show is really good but once you’ve seen it seeing it for a second time seems a bit silly, it’s just so long and drawn out. However I really like the change from Herbie to Lightning McQueen. Even though it’s a plug for Cars 2 at least it has a bit of a story to it and is actually entertaining, whereas Herbie used to come out after a montage, split in half and then hide again. So yeah, I approved of this change.

We wanted another go on Tower so we queued up again to re-ride, this time it took us about 60 minutes to queue, it moved really slowly still so we played Merlin Top Trumps, this then prompted the group behind us to play a card game, lol.

As the park really was busy we decided to leave and head back over to the main park for dinner. We knew that we wanted to go to one of the buffet restaurants. In the morning we had seen a new poster advertising Pizza Planet becoming a pizza pasta buffet so we headed over to that. By the time we got there it had already shut so we went to Agrabah Cafe instead. It’s really different in there, epic theming and an unusual array of food (for a theme park). I like going in there to try food I haven’t had before as there is always something new out to try. It was also really dead when we entered but it was like quite a few people followed us in as it was getting slightly busy by the time we left.

For some reason we started to panic about time at this point in regards to catching our train home so we rushed through the Main Street shops so Nic could grab a few bits. We then picked our luggage from concierge and headed for the train station. Yeah, we got there way too early but it’s better than getting there late. It then turned out our train would be arriving 10 minutes late (retard in French – LOL - immature). It finally turned up about 15 minutes late and then we both slightly panicked about missing our connecting train in Lille (we originally only had 30 mins to run over which even then would be a push). Once we were in Lille there were announcements telling everyone to get to the Eurostar train ASAP. Turns out there were about 40 others in the same position as us so they delayed our Eurostar train. Love Eurostar <3 Magically our train got into Ebbsfleet early too <3 <3

It was a great trip to DLP and I love going with people that haven’t been before or not for a very long time and we were so lucky to have two days of no queues. Thanks to Nic for arranging the booking of everything and being awesome company. Thanks to you for reading through my ramblings, comments are greatly appreciated: D

I leave you with a pic of the Disneyland Hotel....

 

[furie]

Eugh, characters </3

I remember a few instances of adults pushing little kids over to get their kids to the front of the queue; absolutely disgusting behaviour there at times over them. We just stopped trying to be honest and used the official hotel meet and greets, or if we spotted one alone we'd grab one. If there was any kind of queue then we just avoided like the plague no matter what.

 

[marc]

Yep that's what we found as well tbh, mark had to wait for Stitch to walk off as he could not get close.

Also for the Stitch show all the kids and parents ran to the front and pushed everyone out the way.

 

[Martyn B]

Lol, Stitch Live.

I always let people push in on that, so I can just trod in last, and hide at the back. I ALWAYS get picked on in there <//3

 

[nadroJ]

In the Magic Kingdom characters always have a chaperone and make sure everyone queues up in an orderly fashion, you can get your photo and have a little chat/play with the character and move on nicely. With the roaming characters, although a great touch, people just leave their dignity behind and fight for the character's attention, which is stupid not only because you and everyone else now have a photo with half a dozen randomers in it but it also takes away from the magic of watching the characters interact, which is sad =[

I do enjoy Disneyland Paris, but it's hard not to compare it to the, in my personal opinion, better park in Florida. Like Nic pointed out, there are a few things that one just doesn't and SHOULDN'T expect from Disney that unfortunately take away from the magic a tad.

 

[Gavin]

I just don't get the excitement to have a picture taken with an out-of-work "actor" in a costume. Yeah, I'm a miserable, old git, but I felt the exact same way when I went to The Magic Kingdom (I was eleven at the time).

We headed straight for some Space Mountain goodness but as we approached we noticed we were in Disneyland Paris.

Fixed.

 

[marc]

Problem is there is no point going back to Orlando until 2013.

Gavin your edited post made me piss myself.

I enjoy some of the characters but hate the princesses, their just everywhere I want villains.