The day that I have been waiting for has finally arrived. It is ironic for a 26 year old guy (read: man) to be excited to go to Disneyland but I have a sad childhood. I had never been overseas when I was a kid. So don't talk about Disneyland. Lol. Indeed this is my first time and although I am not a big fan of Mickey and friends (at least not as big as an anime fan I am), I am still very excited.
Right from the evening before, all the ingredients for a disastrous day were in place. My sister was more interested in playing the rides while I was more interested in looking at things, watching performances, and taking pictures with Disney characters. She refused my suggestion to plan the timing as certain performances and photo-taking opportunities had allocated time slots. Just bear in mind this paragraph to see how ridiculous my sister became at the end of the day.
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| Welcome to Disneyland ^o^ |
The journey to Disneyland took about 45 minutes but we arrived there at about 10am, just nice since it was the park opening hours. There were already a lot of people and there was a long queue for the bag check. We cleared that at about 1030am and the excitement began. We started with Disneyland Park. Just by looking at the buildings, the surroundings, the shops, and the displays on the shop fronts from the point of entrance up to the Main Street area already blew us away. Hehe.
Not to far from the entrance, we queued up for photo taking with Goofy. It was not to crowded and it took us only about 20 minutes to queue. Not to mention that there are quite a few late teenagers or adults in the queue too. Yay! I noticed something nice about the person inside Goofy: s/he really immersed her/himself into the character and goofed around while interacting with whoever's turn. Some people in the queue may find this irritating if the main purpose is just get a photo and be done with him. However, I thought it was a nice touch to spend a few minutes for people who have been queueing for a long time rather than a quick "come here-take photo-and go". There is another interesting thing which I was not aware of. There is this culture of asking for the autograph from these characters. Lol. Well, they will just write the name of character down but I think it will be something that children will treasure.
I realised that the parts marked by Mickey's finger in the maps refer to the places where certain characters will appear for photo taking opportunitites. Thus my main aim was to search for these places first. We then saw Eeyore as we passed by Central Plaza. The queue was not too long and my sister wanted to go there. I begged to differ because I rather find Mickey, Minnie, Donald, etc first. I regard them as more "important" characters to me and I don't want to waste time for Eeyore and miss out on the rest. I tried to reason with my sister (anyway we had 2 cameras so we could separate if she wanted) and she grudgingly agreed.
We continued to Adventureland to the next Mickey's finger and I found none. Only after the trip I realised that these characters would only be around at certain timings only -_- Anyway the next one was Meet Mickey Mouse which is a phototaking with Mickey Mouse. As expected, Mickey is the most popular character and he has an attraction just to take photo with him. The queue was very long but it was indoor. The queue-ing area is a stage and various Mickey cartoons are shown so that people do not get bored when queueing. Again, Mickey was as animated as Goofy and that made the 1 hour plus of waiting worthwhile. There was a professional photographer for Mickey and after taking photo, we could purchase pictures (which of course I bought).
In search of our next Mickey's finger, we decided to enter Alice's Curious Labyrinth (Alice in Wonderland). After that, we were disappointed to find that photo taking with Disney Princesses were not going all time like Mickey. There are only 4 timings to get queue numbers and since it was still too long until the next timing, we decided to walk around first. The next stop was Sleeping Beauty's castle. On the level one was a souvenir shop. My sister spent too long time there that we only continued to the basement for the Dragon's Lair or the dungeons. We actually did not go up to see the castle interiors. Darn!!!
Almost half a day gone and we only had Goofy and Mickey. I asked the information for Minnie's whereabout and that was our next destination: Toon Plaza at Walt Disney Studios Park. Minnie will only appear at 2pm and we decided to have lunch after Minnie first. Surprisingly, there was already a queue. Bleah. Never underestimate a girl who is sunburnt + hungry + PMSing. My sister got infuriatingly irritating as Mickey and Minnie decided to take a break when there were only 2 more groups ahead of us. Well it was so hot so I understood if the people inside the customes need a break. By complaining non-stop, my sister would not make Mickey and Minnie appeared more quickly or anything.
We already had Mickey so we actually only wanted Minnie. Minnie was animated etc but this Mickey seemed bored. Haha.. Anyway with that done, we had our lunch and then went to the nearby shops. After that, I actually wanted to go back to Disneyland Park to go to the castle and get a queue number for the next photo taking session with the Princesses. My sister preferred to walk in the Walt Disney Studios as we only went to Toon Plaza and ate lunch.
We saw the Disney's Stars 'n' Cars passingby halfway. After that, for no reason, my sister just got angry that we missed that and brought back about Eeyore. Of course that just called for a war. Hey, I suggested to plan things the night before which she refused and now she got angry because we missed out the parade! Go eat shit man! After that, we split. Bloody shit! Did she think that I was not angry that I missed out the parade, the Princesses, and the castle??!! Zz.. I am sure if things were planned the night before, things would turn out better.
After splitting, I went back to Toon Plaza area and to my horror I saw so many Disney characters for photo taking. There were Daisy, Minnie (alone), Pluto, etc. The queue for each was quite short (perhaps about 10 people) but there was no park officers to help me take photos. Haiz.. I did not dare to queue and ask the the person behind me because there was no guarantee that they understood English. And people on the queue were mostly family with young children so honestly, I was quite embarassed.
I decided to return to Disneyland Park although I knew I already missed the Princesses :( Decided to look at the shops. One complaint about Disneyland: what's the point of stamping our arms before we exit when we have to show our tickets to re-enter? Lame shit! My sister's ticket was with me. I regretted being too nice and worried for her not able to re-enter for the main parade at 7pm: Disney Magic on Parade! She mistook that gesture as me feeling guilty and scared to leave her alone in a foreign land. Pui.. Wasted $20 trying to get her. In the end my phone lost roaming signal when she tried to contact me so I hoped she got her dose of worrying too. I was happily shopping then. Lol.
To get a clear view of the parade, we were being kiasu and started choping seats since 615pm. Lol.. Crazy I know but well.. it's once in a life time. Lol.. My sister used my camera to snap photos while I used hers to record video of the parade. In the middle of the parade, my camera ran out of juice. I had to fumble for the spare battery in the midst of recording. Haha..
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| Still so bright and hot at 630pm! Embarassing plastic bag but who cares :p |
I wanted to go home after that as I did not want to wait for the Disney Dreams! show which only happened at 11pm. My sister checked the shops out for Abu soft toys. Unable to find at Main Street area, I suggested to go to Adventureland because Aladdin's area was there so perhaps the shops there had Abu. No Abu but out of curiousity, we actually entered Le Passage Enchange d'Aladdin. Basically there are a lot of dioramas depicting various scenes from Aladdin. This is the only Aladdin-related thing which I encountered. Bleah.. No Aladdin and Jasmine on the 2 parades also :(
Even until we exited the park, my sister was still wanting to try her luck for Abu and her key chain. We went to Disney Store at the Disney Village. She got her key chain but not her Abu.
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| Disney Star Wars! Saw this at one of the display outside Disney Store |
I bought the following items
-"Meet Mickey Mouse" photos: 18 Euro
-Disneyland Paris 20th Anniversary Vinylmation set: 20 Euro
-Eiffel Tower + Mickey figurine: 20 Euro
-Mickey Mouse small plushie: 20 Euro
-Peter Pan plushie: 20 Euro
-3x Disneyland Paris medallions: 6 Euro
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| Taken at the hotel.. Forgot to include the medallions |
I knew my sister still felt sore that I did not want to stay to see the Disney Dreams! Parade. Initially I wanted because I thought the park closing hour was 10pm. The park closed at 11pm! Just imagine if the parade ended at 1130pm, we still need to walk quite far to the train it could easily be 12am. Another 45 minutes train journey and we would be walking back to our hotel at 1am!! Asian tourist carrying big shopping bags walking in the middle of foreign land at 1am in the morning?? No way I was willing to take a security risk..
And more importantly, we still had another day in Paris and there were still tonnes of places to visit.. Gotta save time and energy for Paris landmarks after all..
I am a bit lazy to share pictures of the parade. Haha.. Will do it another time becase there are a lot of photos. Hoho..
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