This is a biggie for me to have crossed off the list. I spent four whole days looking after my niece, taking her on her first flight and navigating Disneyland with her and my (no-sense-of-direction-at-all) dad and survived to tell the tale. It was exhausting and expensive but completely and utterly worth it.
We set off on the Friday morning for the short 2 hour flight to Charles de Gaulle airport all rosy-cheeked and excited despite the early morning wake-up call. As I always am when travelling I was nervous about making sure it was all timed right and that everything was checked off the list but it all went smoothly and we were safely belted in for takeoff with no tantrums. I was a bit worried that my niece would hate it, scream and then cry for the rest of the flight. She didn’t, she loved it especially takeoff and the flight passed without incident.
We had a few issues trying to find out way to the VEA bus-stop (thanks to my inability to read signs) but we got there and the rest of the journey to DisneyLand was a breeze. The bus from Charles De Gaulle takes less than an hour and takes you to all the official Disney hotels. We were only staying in their partner Dream Castle Hotel so had another 10 minute (free) shuttle journey before we arrived.
The hotel itself was very nice and well worth the bargain price we paid for it. I’m not going to go into a long review about it though and I while would recommend it for families travelling on a budget I’m not sure it would be quite as suitable for a romantic couples getaway. It has a bar, (very expensive) restaurant, swimming pool, spa and gym most of which I didn’t get the chance to use! All the hotels also provide free shuttle buses to the train station which is located right at the entrance to Disney Village and the parks (there are two in case you didn’t know!). We spent a nice chilled evening in the pool and then had an early night. (Unfortunately I spent half the night awake while my niece threw up with the excitement!)
This weekend was (almost) completely for my niece so she was in charge. She had the choice of the two parks and chose to visit the Disneyland Park itself on the Saturday (she wanted to see the castle) and save our visit to the Studios for the Sunday. This worked out quite well as the parks were open later on the Sunday and Disneyland Park is quite a bit bigger than Disney Studios. After a short wait in the main queue we were redirected to a special disabled queue. (my niece has various health issues that I don’t want to go into on this blog but the worst of these affects her legs so we weren’t entirely sure how she would cope with two full days of walking) Unfortunately, I can’t remember the name of the guy who served us but he could not have been nicer and explained that we would have to pay for her ticket (€91 for a 2-day, 2-park ticket) and I as the carer would get in for free! (Score) he also advised us where within the park we could collect a special card that would allow us to either skip the queue so she didn’t have to wait or get a time to come back for the really busy rides. We then paid for my dad’s ticket using Tesco Clubcard deal vouchers that we sent off for before they changed their worth so we saved some more money there! (Just goes to show that just because you’re somewhere expensive doesn’t mean you have to stop being moneysaving!) After some faffing about because our first set of tickets wouldn’t work we were in and we were off!
We spent the rest of the day going from area to area, ride to ride with hardly any time to stop and breathe. My niece loved every minute of it and her disabled pass was a godsend. If we hadn’t had it there was no way we would have gotten through all that we did. Late afternoon early evening there were waits of over an hour for even some of the smaller rides. My niece is (generally) a true girls girl and loved Fantasyland most with its old fashioned carousel and teacup rides:
She adored Sleeping Beauty’s castle even though she was disappointed she couldn’t ‘go to Aurora’s room and play with her’. We had a great time in Disoveryland with Buzz Lightyear’s Laser Blast and the Star Tours simulator. We didn’t spend much time in Adventureland as she wasn’t tall enough to ride the Indiana Jones rollercoaster and wasn’t interested in the Pirates of the Caribbean ride (which I’ve been on before in Florida and can honestly say is awesome!) but we did explore Adventure Isle and it’s caves as well as having a well-earned rest while she played in Pirates Beach. We saved Frontierland and Big Thunder Mountain til last which was a shame as it was the only rollercoaster she was allowed on and by the time we got there we had missed the ferry-boat ride and only had one chance on the coaster. BUT… to say she loved it would be the understatement of the century and I will never forget the grin on her face as we dismounted. I think it was the best possible way to have ended the day.
We started off our Sunday quite sleepy so set out a bit later than intended. I was a bit concerned that my niece wouldn’t enjoy the second day as much as looking at the flyers Walt Disney Studios seemed to be much smaller than Disneyland itself and there were a few rides that we weren’t sure she would be big enough for but thankfully my worries were unfounded and we had another fantastic day.
Walt Disney Studios is a calmer paced park that the main one in that it does a lot of stage performances and interactive shows but with an excited six-year-old in tow we didn’t really get much of an opportunity to enjoy these! The one exception being an interactive Lilo and Stitch show which was just fantastic as it involved the kids and the audience. I thoroughly recommend it! The Studios is also definitely the better park for the more daring theme park goers with the Rock n’ Roller Coaster and RC Racer (both of which I unfortunately didn’t get to ride on) but they also have plenty for the kiddies with Crush’s Coaster and Aladdin’s flying carpets. It also seems to be the main home for the new generation, namely Toy Story, Wall-E and Monster’s Inc which I completely and totally adore as you can tell by the piccies below:
We also had time to catch the fantastic Studio Tram Tour where you get to see lots of props and sets that were used in actual movies as well as see how some of the real special effects are done. Well worth a look and a lovely chance to chill. The biggest surprise of the day was my niece wanting to go on the Tower of Terror and then loving it so much we went on again later! There were grown men and women screaming their heads off which she just sat there gripping on for dear life with the biggest smile on her face. (I think she’s going to be a bit of an adrenaline junkie like her auntie!!)
Unfortunately we didn’t get the chance to see any of the parades and my niece wasn’t interested in the meet and greets (although she stood fascinated staring at a wicked witch from one of the movies for absolutely ages while not daring to go anywhere near her!) Despite this I would still say we packed in probably more than you should into a weekend and were utterly exhausted the next day for our trip into Paris itself (separate post coming for that. I’m almost done with this one I’m sure you’ll be glad to hear!)
I’ve included just a few pictures to brighten up this ridiculously wrong post but I have hundreds of others and it’s given me the facilities to start working towards another 101 goal: #67. Make my niece a scrapbook. I’m also still searching for my inspirational quote to turn into a piece of art (#68) so a crafty post coming up soon hopefully!
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