Disneyland Paris Trip report - last day!

Friday 14th February - last day :(

We all got up showered, dressed etc and struggled out of our room with all of our cases at about 9.30ish - there was no EMH so there was no rush and we wanted to do the Studios this morning anyway. We left all of the luggage at the hotel storage room ready to be transported to the train station later and then started our wander towards the village, waving goodbye to the Hotels Santa Fe and Cheyenne as we went (literally - I'm sure other people must have thought we were loons waving and shouting goodbye to everything on the way!!).

The main aim of being in the studios this morning was to meet Mushu - E had not stopped talking about him since we missed him earlier in the week so it was today's 'must do' item and I was busily crossing everything I could that he would actually appear!! We were a bit early for the characters in Production Courtyard so we went over to one of the shows, Animagique, to see if we could watch that instead; sadly it had just started so we couldn't go in and the next show wasn't for another 45 minutes so we left that and headed past Crush's Coaster (only a 30 min queue - I need a trip on my own to do the rides!!) and went to see which characters were are out for Meet & Greets. It was Mickey Mouse on his own so E waited 5 minutes to see him again and we took a few snaps. Buzz wasn't out yet so we decided to wait as there was no queue at the time - there was just one English family in front of us on their first ever trip so we spent the next 20 minutes chatting to them about our trips and what they had done, whilst their son and mine compared autographs. I love how you can just chat to complete strangers as if you've known them all your life and it not be weird at Disney!!

Buzz came out to great fanfare and high five'd our boys on his way past as they were at the front of the queue and the Cast Member kindly stamped their autograph books because Buzz can't sign personally (big hands!!). E had a great time meeting Buzz again, he really loved the interaction and trying to copy his poses!

That done we wandered back to Production Courtyard to wait for the characters to come out. It was really damp, windy and overcast today & that horrible cold that seems to sink right down into your bones. We waited for five minutes and there was no sign of any characters yet so E got in the buggy and I wrapped him up in the little blanket I keep in it and I headed over to the little snack stop next to the Tower of Terror ride to buy hot chocolate & coffee for L and I. We spent some time looking at all the giant posters and E was talking a lot about Maleficent, pointing out all her pictures everywhere - as I mentioned he's scared of lots of things but for some reason he's really taken with her, even though we've never seen the film and to me, she looks quite terrifying!

After about another 10 minutes we saw some movement behind the gates and out came Ariel - our first princess :) E was happy because we met her when we queued at the Princess Pavillion last year (he refused to do it again this trip - 'it hurts my feet waiting that long for a princess Mummy') so he thought that she must remember him! She was lovely and really spent time chatting to him whilst she drew bubbles in his autograph book. Just as we were leaving Ariel, Mushu arrived - thank goodness for that!!! We rushed over and were right near the front of his queue line - E was over the moon and couldn't stop grinning. He kep telling L that Mushu isn't much bigger than him so he must be four too haha. Mulan was there too but E said he didn't want to meet her but L really wanted to see Mary Poppins and Bert so we queued for them and they were really talkative with E, spending quite a bit of time with him and asked if he lives near London as that's where they're from etc (good job he doesn't understand accents yet, they were decidedly un-English lol).

We spotted Aladdin and Jasmine over near Tower of Terror so we rushed over but the Cast Member said that he had closed their queue line but that they'd be back in 20 minutes time. By now E was absolutely freezing - whilst waiting for Buzz earlier on he had been running his hands up and down the railings in the rain water so his woollen gloves were soaked and by now his hands were blotchy and red they were so cold. A couple of days previously he'd spotted some giant Mickey hands for sale inone of the shops but I'd said he couldn't have them (meany Mummy strikes again), so L said that as he was so cold we'd go to the shop and she'd buy him some to warm him up so we headed into Studio 1 for some retail therapy. Two pairs of fleece gloves (one for E and one for L who realised she'd packed her gloves in her case), one pair of giant Mickey hands, a huge fleece blanket, a Peter Pan toy set, a long life Mickey bag and some sweets later we finally left the shop laden down with bags!! Sadly cuddly Sven and Kristoff were not to be on this trip, much to our disappointment but it did mean that we could buy some other stuff instead so there's always a silver lining.

We headed back outside and E was showing off his giant hands to anybody that happened to walk past, much to their amusement! The characters were all having a break for now so we went to test out the scream machines at the Monsters Inc set and E gave Mike his traditional cuddle plus an extra one for a friends little boy back home . We wandered down to show E the Moteurs, Action, Stunt show area to see if he would give it a try later on (well, you never know!!) but of course it was a no! I was excited to finally find the raining umbrella though (a prop outside one of the shops that actually rains!) but it's not raining, presumably because it's winter and there was enough of it falling out of the sky already! Back we went to see which characters were out and as we walked back we saw Gaston from Beauty and the Beast striding across the courtyard to Aladdin and Jasmine's spot, right by us. We've never seen him before so we waited and were second in the queue; E was a little bit nervous - Gaston was huge and of course talks in this big, booming voice. When It was our turn, Gaston shouted to E 'come here boy, what are those ludicrous hands - are you a mutant?!' at him, E and I were in fits of giggles (not sure what L thought at this point haha) as he ran over and got his book signed. Gaston was AMAZING!! He is my favourite face character by far now, he was so so in character and the cast member playing him obviously loves his job. He got E to pose with his giant hands in the air to show everyone and then as we were getting ready to leave he said to E 'who is that ridiculous woman with you, shoo, go on, take her away' - I haven't seen E laugh like that in ages and I had a huge lump in my throat, close to tears it was so so special. Since we got back he keeps telling all of his friends about Gaston telling mummy she was ridiculous and needed to shoo lol.

As we were putting the autograph book away Aladdin and Jasmine wandered over with their Cast Member who had a little tiff with the cast member with Gaston as he'd 'stolen' their space - Aladdin and Jasmine didn't seem to care and wandered off underneath the portico (the bit with the chairs and tables) to find their own space and their cast member ended up chasing after them! They found a great spot in front of the arches, looking back into the courtyard - I think they should just leave it to them to find a suitable spot next time haha. When it was our turn Aladdin chatted to E whilst Jasmine signed his book and then they swapped - but disaster, the pen runs out! Argh, clearly had too much use this week lol. Aladdin asked the cast member if he could have another pen and he wouldn't let E leave until it was signed, which I really appreciated. They then showed him how princes and princesses pose in Agrabah so he could copy them.

We'd had an amazing morning in the studios but we took E's pen running out as a sign to leave and headed back to the main park to find somewhere warm for lunch. Lots of goodbye waves to everything again as we leave!

It was about 1pm by this point and we were all a bit cold and damp so we decided we needed somewhere nice to sit and enjoy lunch. We settled on Plaza Gardens, which is a buffet restaurant at the end of Main Street - for some reason it's never really appealed to me before but I am so glad we tried it, it was lovely! We queued for about ten minutes and then paid the cashier, before being shown to a table by the waiter who took our drinks order to get. We had a fabulous lunch at the buffet, there was so much to choose from and E loved watching a man carving pictures into watermelons in the central section. I wasn't sure if refillable drinks were included in the price but L and I both asked for another drink expecting to pay for it but we weren't charged for them so presumably they were.

We spent just over an hour in there and would definitely go back again, shame we didn't try it before really! We then had a final wander round the lands (to wave goodbye obviously!!) and did some last minute shopping in Main Street before saying a sad farewell to the park. We went to the village to grab some drinks and snacks (brownies) for the train ride home from Earl of Sandwich and had a last look round the shops, trying on fabulous ears / hats in the Disney Fashion store and then that was it, time to head to the train station to collect luggage and board the train home :(

So, it had it's ups and downs but despite the illnesses we still had a fabulous week - it didn't stop us too much and looking back, it was nice to come home a little rested instead of completely exhausted for a change!! There were lots of things that I wanted to do that we didn't manage (Dreams & Stars and Cars to name just two - trying not to be too gutted about that!!) but, we have never ever seen so many characters out and about and had such fantastic interaction with them all so really, really can't complain.

Now to plan the next trip ;)

AFUK x

Day 3 - Disneyland Paris trip report

Day 3 of our Disneyland Paris trip report - Tuesday 11th February 2014 

E woke up at 6am - very, very unlike him on one of our DLP trips as usually we all sleep later from all the excitement and walking about; it's one of the things I love lol. On this trip there was only Extra Magic Hours (EMH) on two of our five mornings and this was one of them but typically, not expecting to be up and ready, we had booked to have a character breakfast at the restaurant Cafe Mickey (CM) in the Disney Village. We decided that it would be too much of a rush to do an hour in the park and then back to CM in time for breakfast so instead we had a relaxing couple of hours having showers, getting ready etc and left the hotel just before 9am to walk to the village.

We arrived early but they let us in and before we'd even taken our coats off and sat down Gepetto from Pinocchio came over to give E a cuddle. L was very impressed with breakfast and we all enjoyed the hot buffet.  We filled up on the pastries and fruit (no croissants though, they'd run out unfortunately) to prepare us for the day ahead. Before our trip E had said that he wanted to find Chip & Dale because we couldn't find them on our Christmas visit so he was absolutely over the moon when they were at breakfast - he couldn't stop cuddling them and was saying 'look Mummy, they remember me from when I saw them on my first holiday'; he was only 2 on his first visit so I was amazed he remembered so much about it! He also saw Mickey, Goofy and Pluto before we left at 10.20ish and walked to the Studios park.

It seemed really busy in the Studios that morning but I think it was probably because Crush's Coaster, one of the most popular 'thrill' rides, wasn't open yet (technical issue I think) so there was a huge queue snaking across the central section of the park between two of the theatres that took some negotiating!

We had a wander round past a little area where Buzz Lightyear & Mickey Mouse were doing M&G's (big queues, we decided to leave it for another day) and headed to Toy Story Playland - this is a fairly recent addition to the Disney Studios and, as is fairly self explanatory, is themed around the Toy Story movies! E wanted to see the giant Rex the dinosaur but he still didn't want to go on any rides so we just showed L around and E had fun pretending to drive the RC Racer remote control car in his 'car wash', which is basically just another little area to take copious amounts of photo's! 

We walked over to watch one of the theatre shows, Cinemagique, but I hadn't read the programme properly and hadn't realised that it actually closed today for the DLP AGM but all was not lost as just as we arrived Remy, the rat from the Ratatouille film, came out for a M&G. We rushed over and were second in the queue - yippee! We had quick cuddles and he signed E's autograph book, which he was very happy about. As we were having our photo taken more characters - Mushu (the dragon from Milan), Lilo & Stitch, Daisy Duck and Woody from Toy Story - came out from behind the scenes.

Remy from Ratatouille

We had great fun queueing to meet them all except Mushu who we missed as by the time we'd seen the others his queue line was closed. E loved meeting Woody - he was totally in awe and completely dwarfed by him as he was so, so tall. 

I always feel a little bit lost in the Disney Studios Park as it doesn't have the same magic for me as the main park so when E said that he'd had enough and wanted to leave we popped to the shop by the entrance for a look around. L bought E a lovely china plate and little cup for home which we arranged to have sent back to the hotel to collect later on in the day and we then left the studios (with high fives to the funny cast member at the gate lol) and walked over to the main park instead.

When we got into the park we walked past Goofy, Minnie & Duffy and decided that we'd start by purchasing the soft toys that E wanted. When we visited in November we bought him the soft toy versions of Anna and Olaf (characters from the Disney Frozen movie) and, in addition to that, he got the Elsa one for Christmas so I'd promised that we could get Sven & Kistoff on this trip to almost complete the set - he'd seen them in the shops on Main Street in November but being the mean mummy that I am I'd said that he couldn't have them all so he chose Anna & Olaf. An hour into our search we've scoured all the shops along Main Street and I have that horrible sinking feeling in my tummy when none of them have a single Frozen soft toy for sale. Plenty of other merchandise (although the clothing is all for girls - very frustrating!) but not the ones we wanted. Uh oh! I distracted E by telling him we'd try some other shops later on and we headed to Frontierland to have a look round. The queue times for rides were very short most for most of this week as it's a quiet time of year to go - this morning it was only a ten minute wait for Big Thunder Mountain, which is another popular thrill ride. As it was only me that wanted to ride anything we didn't stop - one day soon I'm just going to go and do all the rides by myself haha!

We enjoyed showing L the lake around the ride and where the paddle boats normally are (they were being refurbished so weren't running, which is a shame) and showed her the Pochohantas Play Village for younger children, which was also closed (apparently due to the weather although it was a beautiful sunny day!) and then headed across towards Adventureland. As we went past the Hakuna Matata restaurant on our left we saw King Louis from the Jungle Book doing a M&G on the right - he gave great cuddles but E was a little disappointed that he couldn't sign his book lol. Usually at the Cast Members are able to stamp the autograph books for characters that can't hold a pen or are unable to sign but there wasn't one for King Louis unfortunately.

E wanted to see if Peter Pan and Wendy were out again today so we headed over to their M&G and saw Captain Hook - he makes E very nervous so he was not sure about him but the Cast Member explained that he was just closing the queue for Hook but if we wanted to join it and wait a few minutes Peter & Wendy would be along, so we waited. We chatted to some people in the queue whilst we were waiting who were also character hunting today - we had good fun comparing who we'd all met and then Peter & Wendy arrived! All of a sudden E was very shy - so far, none of the characters he'd met had been 'face' characters so hadn't spoken & he was thrown a bit that Peter & Wendy wanted to chat!! They were absolutely fantastic with him, really brought him out of his shell by asking where he lives and if it was near Neverland etc They signed his book and had photos taken with him and then they said that Tinkerbell had been to sprinkle fairy dust on him and 'flew' him down the steps back to me - it was just magical and since we got home he's not stopped telling people that Wendy & Peter taught him how to fly up in the sky, brings a lump to my throat every time!

E decided that he could actually go on a ride now and wanted to go on the 'big dragon horse' on the carousel so off we went and I lifted him onto this giant horse on the outside of the carousel - for a child who is scared of everything I have no idea how he was happy sitting that high up!! We had fun going round and waving to Nanny each time we saw her. After that he said he wanted to do IASW again but L needs the loo so we headed there first - whilst we wait for her (couldn't possibly go in, what with all those flushing toilets lol) E said he was really cold and wanted to get in the buggy so he sat down and I wrapped him up in the blanket that I keep underneath it - he was asleep within seconds! Bearing in mind he hasn't used a buggy at home for about two years it felt very odd having him nap in it. 

We decided that as he was asleep we'd have a nosey around the shops that we had missed out earlier - Tigger & Eeyore were doing a M&G outside the Plaza Gardens restaurant but we didn't want to do it without E so we walked past. We went down Discovery Arcade (covered walkways down each side of Main Street) and headed straight for Harringtons - I love this shop so much, it sells beautiful glassware, crystal and other trinkets but I don't ever dare take E in it when he's awake as he would want to touch and pick everything up! L bought a glass for my niece and we watched whilst her name was engraved on it. She also bought her a beautiful tiara in there and it was only 15 euros - she's 10 years old so maybe a little bit old for a tiara generally but she's an Irish Dancer and has to wear one when she's in competitions so should be perfect for her.

We left the park and wandered round World of Disney megastore before heading back to our room for a rest. It turned out to be an extended rest as E slept for 3.5 hours!! Unheard of! I think the few days of being poorly and the early start had finally caught up with him.

When he finally woke up we decided to go back to the park to watch Dreams, which is a light and laser show projected onto Sleeping Beauty's castle, and then go to our reservation at Cape Cod in the Newport Bay hotel but as we walked out of our room it was absolutely pouring with rain! We started to walk along the river but we hadn't taken the buggy and L was really struggling against the weather so we diverted into the Sequoia Lodge hotel instead of going to the park and decided on an early dinner in Hunters Grill restaurant instead as I love this buffet.

It was lovely and quiet and the food was brilliant as always - the only down side was that I wasn't paying proper attention when I was using the food tongs and lifted my hand a bit too high, burning it on the heat lamps that kept the food hot. I took an ice cube out of my drink and wrapped it in a napkin but it was very quickly apparent that I needed something more substantial on it so I asked the waiter for some more ice and he brought me a large cup full with a stack of napkins - very embarrassing!! I had to sit through the whole meal with it wrapped up, repeatedly changing it as the heat from the burn kept melting the ice! We had a really enjoyable meal other than that and when we were finished we popped upstairs to look round the hotel boutique (still no Frozen soft toys - eek) and sat by the fire in the bar. More and more people were coming back to the hotel soaked from the rain that didn't seem to be letting up so we decided that we should head back to the Hotel Santa Fe, we needed to collect L's shopping from earlier in the day and E wanted to FaceTime Daddy again so we went to the bar via the shop.

Another day was over already, time flies when you're having fun!!

AFUK x