Disneyland & Crowded = Synonymous Words

So I sat down, Master EJ (Age 2) asleep in the bedroom. Ready to do my next post on our Berlin trip. But instead, I read this post on another blog I follow, Baby Takes Berlin. And all my inspiration to write about Berlin went out the window. Instead I find myself writing about our four nights/three days at Disneyland Paris: one of the places we visited whilst touring France in July – that I still haven’t caught up blogging about. Oops. Does it matter if all my blog posts are out of sequence date-wise? Probably not – so here goes.

I was not the one who wanted to go to Disneyland Paris. The reason we decided to incorporate Disneyland into our French tour was not even the children. It was for John. He had never been to a Disneyland. And he considered it a must. I went to Disneyland Tokyo for part of a day in 2001.

Outside the entrance Tokyo Disneyland – 15 February 2001

The parade…had as much trouble back then getting close enough to take photos as I did in Paris!

So anyway, why not? I knew our boys would not be old enough for many of the rides. And I knew there was a big chance Master OJ (Age 4) would not like the Disney characters in oversized dress-up suits. Heck, our boys didn’t even really know what Disney was until we visited. Now EJ (Age 2) is Mickey Mouse mad…also aided by the Mickey Mouse PJs I bought him & the Mickey Mouse Clubhouse TV show (which I wish John had never introduced them to; this was after our Disneyland visit!). Sure, they knew Lightning McQueen from Cars. And Buzz Lightyear & Woody from Toy Story. But not Mickey & Minnie, Pluto & Goofy etc. Children these days don’t really watch cartoons with the classical Disney characters in them. Well, not children that I know of. I am sure those with the Disney Channel on pay TV might.

So we got online and booked a hotel. We chose one of the official Disney hotels and this decision is something I will never regret – the ease of having very regular (albeit always crowded with standing room only) shuttle buses to take you to & from the parks made the transportation part of our stay very simple.

A shuttle bus waiting outside our hotel

About Hotel Santa Fe:

However, the hotel itself – Hotel Santa Fe – felt tired and worn…It only has a 2 star rating, so I shouldn’t be too hard on the place. But it is massive (several mostly one-storey accommodation blocks) & impersonal — with the feel that room facilities and fittings have been well-worn by the number of guests staying there before you. Think motel, not hotel.

On the subject of rooms – rooms have ceiling fans, not air-conditioning. The room was just large enough to fit two double beds (necessary for the four of us). Admittedly, it did appear to have new looking quilts and these were a fun Cars movie design that completes the American great south-west theme…so long as you can stand the boldness of the colours (of carpet & bed quilts)! But it was kept clean with regular (& good) servicing. They had to come in & replace our actual bed when we first arrived (not at our prompting) as it was broken underneath…we had not yet laid down on it though, thankfully! The huge grey trolleys, used by the hotel staff to service the rooms with linen & toiletries, were just kept in the corridors ALL day. It seemed they had no space to tuck these away neatly. We did have a good range of ‘pay-TV’ channels.

And like I said, the hotel was busy. We queued for ages on arrival to get to reception. And we had to queue EVERY morning, in one of two lengthy queues for breakfast.

Here is a video that gives you an idea of the size of their restaurant La Cantina & its self-service approach to breakfast:

My other never-will-forget experience at Hotel Santa Fe was sitting in their laundromat for about 4+ hours on one of the days I could have been in the park. The boys went to Walt Disney Studios this day. But by this point, we had already visited Hong Kong, Moscow, Bad Homburg (Germany) & Luxembourg – so we were running short of clean clothes. And I welcomed the idea of finding a laundromat. The washing machine was fine. But it took me 6-7 coupons in the dryer (each coupon equalled another dryer cycle that I had to sit & wait to finish) to get my clothes dry! And each coupon was two euro. That is nearly AUD$20 at a laundromat. Crazy! Plus, you have to buy the coupons in the store, quite a walk from the laundromat. I had to make several trips up there – because each time I thought, “Surely, this will get the clothes dry”. But one dryer was leaking…water was puddled on the floor. And each time a cycle finished, I’d open the dryer only to find my clothes were still sopping wet. So even with two dryers going at one time, I was in the laundromat from after (a late) breakfast until about nearly 5pm, when I caught a train to Paris to stay overnight with a friend.

Stuck in the laundromat at Disneyland Paris Hotel Santa Fe

I hope I haven’t bored you too much (I am sure I have bored you at least a bit…and probably burst your bubble about the magical mystery of Disney). But hopefully someone reading this blog who is trip planning will be forewarned because of this blog entry. The Hotel Santa Fe is fine. It is just not great. And it is crowded in summer. By the way, there is internet available but the woman at the hotel front desk talked us out of buying an internet quota…because it is too complex to set up. So at two hundred Euro a night (approximately AUD$250/night) one does expect better.

One benefit of staying in a Disney owned hotel such as Hotel Santa Fe (as opposed to the Radisson Blu or Marriott’s Village d’Ile-de-France) is that each morning there are visits from a Disney character or two. So you get a great photo with some of them, without fighting the crowds in the park. Unless of course, your child is freaked out by them – like Master OJ (Age 4) and runs the other direction! Here are some pics with Master EJ (Age 2):

With Goofy

With Minnie

Master EJ (Age 2) with Minnie

About Disneyland Park itself:

Once we arrived (perhaps it was after our first visit inside the park), I decided to search for an App for my iPhone to guide me around the park. I chose one called An Unofficial Guide to Disneyland Paris:

iPhone App: An Unofficial Guide To Disneyland Paris

I thought this app was brilliant! The author (Annel Delorme) is a Mum with a sense of humour who is an annual pass holder to Disneyland Paris. She spoke so bluntly & frankly about what we could expect! And boy, she was right. If you are thinking of going to Disneyland Paris and own an iPhone, do check out the app store or here is one link and here is another link with more information. For instance, in the section of the app When You Should Go, she says,

“First you must go when the French children are still in school. This means you have to go before the 1st of July…the summer months at Disneyland Paris can be absolutely packed. Think lemmings. Think sardines. Think parents pushed to, and beyond, the point of meltdown. If you must go in July/on a weekend, try to pick one where the weather forecast is a bit dodgy. Or when there is a strike. Or a passing nuclear cloud. Anything that would dissuade the weak, or nervous of temperament.”

And I would totally back her up on this. I don’t think I realised how synonymous the words Disneyland and crowded are! And that was even when the weather WAS dodgy! Yep, it rained the whole week! So forgive me for sounding snobby about Disneyland. At least I have had the chance to go. To Paris & to Tokyo. And I realise that is more than the majority of the Australian population, let alone other countries with a lower GDP. But I think I must be one of the “weak” that the iPhone app author described — cause I wasn’t impressed about the rain! I guess rain & I will get more well acquainted during my time living in Germany. And I will learn that you go about life regardless of it. You just rug up in warm, wet weather gear and deal with it (sidetrack: did I mention that the boys now have fleecy lined rain jackets & pants…and that is the norm here for school children??!!). But in July, I was still thinking like an Australian city slicker – who had been through years & years of drought (with the recent exception of the January floods in 2011) – where our children no longer know what a backyard sprinkler looks like*. We had to buy the boys new jackets…either that or go on the bus back to the hotel to get some from the suitcases in our hotel room. Actually, thinking back, I’m not even sure we had packed sufficiently warm jackets in our suitcase, given it was still summer. Master EJ (Age 2) is wearing his in the Minnie pic above. This is Master OJ (Age 4)’s. It is Disneyland Paris’s 20th anniversary this year.

Master OJ (Age 4)’s new Disney jacket

Master OJ (Age 4) modelling his new jacket (!)

Because it has been already six months since our visit to Disneyland Paris, the memories are already starting to fade. I think you get the picture already that you have to queue (a long time) for everything. For rides. For the so-called fast passes, you still have to queue to get one. And you can only have one at a time. So if you queue in the fast pass queue to get a seat on the Buzz Lightyear ride, it will print you a ticket for say, 2:35pm…when it is only 12 midday. And then (as I found out the hard way), you cannot queue for a different ride and say, get a ticket for 3pm and so map out your day at Disneyland in a logical way…until after you’ve used the 2:35pm tickets. And by then the next ride ‘fast passes’ might be printing tickets for 6pm! Wait time when we were there were around 90 minutes on the popular rides. Or with a fast pass, perhaps 20 minutes plus the time to get the fast pass ticket. You can buy a premium fast pass but that costs 60 euro per person, per day! This is an detailed website about fast passes, if you need more information.

My Fastpass for Buzz Lightyear Laser Blast (issued 12:23pm for a 2:05pm ride!)

You also have to queue for lunch. We ate in Videopolis Theatre in Discoveryland, grabbing food from Café Hyperion. They mainly run Disney animated shorts on the video screen here. But there were some school dance groups performing that day. The boys sat down to watch while I queued for food. The queue was so long, the performances had finished before I had got the food!

So by all means come to Disneyland Paris. But be prepared for queues (which is never fun with young children) and secondly, be prepared for it to cost a lot of money! And I personally don’t think coming for just one day is worth it. At least in the summer, you can see so little of the park and ride so few of the attractions (rides) in one day that it really does not make it worth it.

There are four ‘worlds’ – Frontierland, Adventureland, Fantasyland, Discoveryland plus Main Street, U.S.A.

Discoveryland Entrance, Disneyland Paris

One of the things I enjoyed the most was The Tarzan Encounter  live stage show in the The Chaparral Theater in Frontierland:

According to this article, it would seem that The Tarzan Encounter and the Fantillusion Parade only returned for the summer. It was good until Master EJ (Age 2) started screaming in fear about the huge blue Genie from Aladdin!

I think I’ve said enough. So here are some other pics:

Le Château de la Belle au Bois Dormant (English: The Castle of The Beauty Sleeping in the Wood)

Dumbo the Flying Elephant

Mickey Mouse Clock at entrance to Disneyland Park

Celebrating 20 years in 2012!

Main Street U.S.A.

Buzz Lightyear Laser Blast: a must for young Toy Story fans

Pocahontas Indian Village: fancy name for a playground

Pocahontas Indian Village (playground); a useful respite from the crowds

Steamship Molly Brown

Thunder Mountain (I didn’t get to ride on this attraction)

Captain Hook’s Pirate Ship

Disneyland Railroad

Disneyland Railroad wait times: 60 minutes

Outside park entrance… Disneyland Paris’ 20th anniversary year

Entrance to the park

Main Street U.S.A.

Mickey balloons

Le Château de la Belle au Bois Dormant (English: The Castle of The Beauty Sleeping in the Wood)

So despite the rain, crowds & queues, we still had fun. I think the boys look back on Disneyland Paris with good memories. And I think I enjoyed Walt Disney Studios even more (a second park right beside Disneyland Paris). Our ticket included entry to both parks. In actual fact, I think we enjoyed Walt Disney Studios more than Disneyland itself. It was not as crowded, has a lot of Cars movie rides for younger children, has a fun parade for younger children (with no blue scary Disney characters) and generally was a better day out for us, than the day/s we spent at Disneyland itself. Here are some pictures of Walt Disney Studios:

Entrance gate to Walt Disney Studios Paris

Entrance gate to Walt Disney Studios Paris

Walt Disney Studios ‘Walk Of Fame’

Walt Disney, holding Mickey Mouse’s hand

Hollywood Tower / The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror

The Armadillo vehicle from the film Armageddon

Sorcerer Mickey Mouse Fountain

Slinky Dog Zigzag Spin in the Toy Story Playland

Slinky Dog Zigzag Spin in the Toy Story Playland – in the rain!

Toy Story Playland

Toy Story Playland

The boys at Walt Disney Studios, Paris

Goofy – Disney Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade

Disney Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade

Disney Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade

Disney Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade

Disney Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade

Disney Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade

Disney Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade

Disney Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade

Disney Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade

Disney Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade

Disney Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade

We thought the Stars ‘n’ Cars Parade was better than the parade at the Disneyland Park – it was certainly more age appropriate, lacking the scary characters that must, from a small child’s perspective, seem to loom out at you. In fact, I’d go so far as to say that the whole Walt Disney Studios suited small children more than the mainstream Disneyland Park. It was great – without the severe queues, even in summer. We queued quite a while for Slinky Dog Zigzag Spin but still not 60 or 90 minutes like the popular rides at Disneyland Park. Walt Disney Studios was a lot of fun. And I haven’t even shown you videos of “Moteurs…Action! Stunt Show Spectacular” (which the boys watched on their own (the day I spent in the laundromat).

Finally, I will leave you with some pics from the Cars Quatre Roues Rallye, a Cars movie themed ride which spins like Hatter’s teacups. Lots of fun for our boys!

Cars Quatre Roues Rallye, or Cars Race Rally

Cars Quatre Roues Rallye, or Cars Race Rally

 

* I realise there are far more important effects of drought.