A while back Nic and I booked a little weekend to Disneyland Paris for her birthday. I won't go over every little detail, but I will talk about changes in the park etc.
Saturday 6th
Our day started at silly o clock after a night of drinking (because we're idiots). Tilda Swinton was on our Eurostar train!!! After getting off in Paris and getting the RER to Disney we dropped our bags off, Nic purchased an annual pass and then we headed into the park. The park was really busy. Urgh.
Still, spotted some of the nice Spring touches being added to the park (which doesn't start for another month!). These touches include little eggs dotted around the park themed to some characters.
We walked past It's a Small World which was looking very colourful (recently got a new colour scheme). We'd ride that later so I'll move on to our first ride of the day... Casey Jr! We had to queue about 30 minutes but we got a front row and it was a new cred for Nic! In the queue in front of us was a Scottish woman and her two kids. They were just sticking their hands in a jar of knock-off Nutella and just licking their fingers, they then continued to just touch everything in the queue (eww) - they became a running joke through the rest of the weekend (Edward Nutellahands).
Nic then went to the annual pass office to get her pass printed. The cast member noticed it was her birthday so got her a special certificate printed out (some sort of princess declaration?). First time I'd heard about these being a thing (only for annual pass holders?) and no one else seemed to know they existed too.
Main Street had a lot of Spring based banners up already...
This amused us because the shop windows still had their Christmas displays. A nice addition for the Spring season though. It was time for our posh lunch in Walts. It was very tasty and our waitress was super efficient.
We then hopped over to the Studios for the Art of Disney Animation (in a terrible state) and then queuing for some time for Ratatouille. Nic seemed to enjoy it.
We then got all of the air time on Tower of Terror before playing Rock 'n' Roller Roulette. The aim of the game is to bet on what train you'll get. The options are:
1 - Train with loud and awesome soundtrack but breaks up when it moves
2 - Train with no audio/blown speakers
3 - Good quality audio but rubbish soundtrack
Train 3 was the winner this time. Oh well.
Back over to the main park now and we took a Pirate themed adventure. The queue was quite long, but so was all the other queues. Some guys in the back of the boat seemed to love Pirates as they kept singing along to the song, this amused us. The duelling pirates were still missing and the random projection battle was back.
Over to Fantasyland now for some Small World action.
So Small World was looking absolutely amazing, it was all so bright and colourful. Probably the best condition I've ever seen it in.
Due to the Fantasyland closure for Dreams, cast members sent us on a stupid route which meant we headed back to Adventureland, we spotted some more eggs...
We wanted to grab a snack before Dreams so we grabbed a Jedi burger in Videopolis. They've added lots of Force Awakens banners in there which is fab.
We then managed to get a fairly decent spot for Dreams. The projection water screens weren't on but that was probably due to the strong winds.
It was then time to leave the park and over to our hotel for the night, the Sequoia Lodge. This was my first time staying here, it was really nice but I don't understand why they're so expensive. The breakfast in the morning was nice though.
Sunday 7th
We got up at a stupid time so we could join in the Extra Magic Hours. Kinda glad we did because the queue for breakfast as we were leaving was grotesque. Some more Spring banners...
More eggs...
After a quick ride on Space Mountain the crowds had caught up with us so we toured the castle. Then a quick voyage with Pinocchio before taking a ride on the carousel.
Also new for Spring this year, a new Tinkerbell thing
We then hopped over to the Studios for opening. We joined the queue for Tower of Terror. The cast members were in a really good mood, the guy before the libraries was really going for it, which was cool. As Nic had never done it we then queued FOREVER for the tram tour of disappointment. It really is laughable how bad it is these days.
I then had to run over to the Disneyland Park for a preview of "le Foret de l'enchantement" - Or the Enchanted Forest. It's a brand new show in the Frontierland theatre. They were having select previews for Dream annual passport holders. No photos were allowed but I will tell you it was unusual. The costumes were weird, very Disney meets Cirque du solei. The choice of music was great though and the new song was nice. Everything was sung live which was a lovely touch but they did sound a bit nervous, probably something that'll disappear by the time I see it again in April. The whole staging of it was a little odd but it did look nice.
Characters/songs included was Pocahontas (with a pointless and gormless looking John Smith), Tarzan, Rapunzel and Flynn (When will my life begin and I see the light) and Baloo and King Louie (I wanna be like you).
We had lunch in Agrabah cafe which was nice because I haven't done that for ages. We tried and didn't like quite a few mystery desserts.
We then queued forever for Phantom Manor with some amusement provided by an Irish family in front of us. The little girl left some item outside a restaurant and basically created a river from all the crying and her two older brothers were just not helping the situation. At one point they said something which made the girl cry and the mother was trying her hardest not to burst into laughter which set us off.
Nothing of note really happened inside. Oh, apart from one of those same kids informed his family that Big Thunder was down because it killed someone (think he's referring to when a bit of rock injured someone in the front, so he was close).
We then took a ride on the Temple of Peril. I do enjoy this ride. It was then back to Pirates where I ended up being a bit too obvious at one point with my nodding/humming along with the queue soundtrack, but it was fine because a cast member did the same thing.
We then caught the parade which Nic hadn't seen since they'd made changes over the last few years. Lots of people watched it too, I still can't get over how busy this weekend - IN FEB - was.
We then made our last ride of the trip our last ever trip to Endor! With Star Tours closing next month (ready to become version 2 for early next year) this was our last chance to ride the original version. Sad times, but version 2 is amazing, so I'm pretty excited about next year.
And that was it! We made our way back home and I got drenched walking from the train station in stupid wind and rain. It was a nice little weekend. Thanks for reading
Saturday 6th
Our day started at silly o clock after a night of drinking (because we're idiots). Tilda Swinton was on our Eurostar train!!! After getting off in Paris and getting the RER to Disney we dropped our bags off, Nic purchased an annual pass and then we headed into the park. The park was really busy. Urgh.
Still, spotted some of the nice Spring touches being added to the park (which doesn't start for another month!). These touches include little eggs dotted around the park themed to some characters.
We walked past It's a Small World which was looking very colourful (recently got a new colour scheme). We'd ride that later so I'll move on to our first ride of the day... Casey Jr! We had to queue about 30 minutes but we got a front row and it was a new cred for Nic! In the queue in front of us was a Scottish woman and her two kids. They were just sticking their hands in a jar of knock-off Nutella and just licking their fingers, they then continued to just touch everything in the queue (eww) - they became a running joke through the rest of the weekend (Edward Nutellahands).
Nic then went to the annual pass office to get her pass printed. The cast member noticed it was her birthday so got her a special certificate printed out (some sort of princess declaration?). First time I'd heard about these being a thing (only for annual pass holders?) and no one else seemed to know they existed too.
Main Street had a lot of Spring based banners up already...
This amused us because the shop windows still had their Christmas displays. A nice addition for the Spring season though. It was time for our posh lunch in Walts. It was very tasty and our waitress was super efficient.
We then hopped over to the Studios for the Art of Disney Animation (in a terrible state) and then queuing for some time for Ratatouille. Nic seemed to enjoy it.
We then got all of the air time on Tower of Terror before playing Rock 'n' Roller Roulette. The aim of the game is to bet on what train you'll get. The options are:
1 - Train with loud and awesome soundtrack but breaks up when it moves
2 - Train with no audio/blown speakers
3 - Good quality audio but rubbish soundtrack
Train 3 was the winner this time. Oh well.
Back over to the main park now and we took a Pirate themed adventure. The queue was quite long, but so was all the other queues. Some guys in the back of the boat seemed to love Pirates as they kept singing along to the song, this amused us. The duelling pirates were still missing and the random projection battle was back.
Over to Fantasyland now for some Small World action.
So Small World was looking absolutely amazing, it was all so bright and colourful. Probably the best condition I've ever seen it in.
Due to the Fantasyland closure for Dreams, cast members sent us on a stupid route which meant we headed back to Adventureland, we spotted some more eggs...
We wanted to grab a snack before Dreams so we grabbed a Jedi burger in Videopolis. They've added lots of Force Awakens banners in there which is fab.
We then managed to get a fairly decent spot for Dreams. The projection water screens weren't on but that was probably due to the strong winds.
It was then time to leave the park and over to our hotel for the night, the Sequoia Lodge. This was my first time staying here, it was really nice but I don't understand why they're so expensive. The breakfast in the morning was nice though.
Sunday 7th
We got up at a stupid time so we could join in the Extra Magic Hours. Kinda glad we did because the queue for breakfast as we were leaving was grotesque. Some more Spring banners...
More eggs...
After a quick ride on Space Mountain the crowds had caught up with us so we toured the castle. Then a quick voyage with Pinocchio before taking a ride on the carousel.
Also new for Spring this year, a new Tinkerbell thing
We then hopped over to the Studios for opening. We joined the queue for Tower of Terror. The cast members were in a really good mood, the guy before the libraries was really going for it, which was cool. As Nic had never done it we then queued FOREVER for the tram tour of disappointment. It really is laughable how bad it is these days.
I then had to run over to the Disneyland Park for a preview of "le Foret de l'enchantement" - Or the Enchanted Forest. It's a brand new show in the Frontierland theatre. They were having select previews for Dream annual passport holders. No photos were allowed but I will tell you it was unusual. The costumes were weird, very Disney meets Cirque du solei. The choice of music was great though and the new song was nice. Everything was sung live which was a lovely touch but they did sound a bit nervous, probably something that'll disappear by the time I see it again in April. The whole staging of it was a little odd but it did look nice.
Characters/songs included was Pocahontas (with a pointless and gormless looking John Smith), Tarzan, Rapunzel and Flynn (When will my life begin and I see the light) and Baloo and King Louie (I wanna be like you).
We had lunch in Agrabah cafe which was nice because I haven't done that for ages. We tried and didn't like quite a few mystery desserts.
We then queued forever for Phantom Manor with some amusement provided by an Irish family in front of us. The little girl left some item outside a restaurant and basically created a river from all the crying and her two older brothers were just not helping the situation. At one point they said something which made the girl cry and the mother was trying her hardest not to burst into laughter which set us off.
Nothing of note really happened inside. Oh, apart from one of those same kids informed his family that Big Thunder was down because it killed someone (think he's referring to when a bit of rock injured someone in the front, so he was close).
We then took a ride on the Temple of Peril. I do enjoy this ride. It was then back to Pirates where I ended up being a bit too obvious at one point with my nodding/humming along with the queue soundtrack, but it was fine because a cast member did the same thing.
We then caught the parade which Nic hadn't seen since they'd made changes over the last few years. Lots of people watched it too, I still can't get over how busy this weekend - IN FEB - was.
We then made our last ride of the trip our last ever trip to Endor! With Star Tours closing next month (ready to become version 2 for early next year) this was our last chance to ride the original version. Sad times, but version 2 is amazing, so I'm pretty excited about next year.
And that was it! We made our way back home and I got drenched walking from the train station in stupid wind and rain. It was a nice little weekend. Thanks for reading
