Gocanes0506
Earning My Ears
- Joined
- Dec 16, 2023
Went on a business trip to Japan this past month and stayed over for 5 extra days to experience Tokyo. My wife came as well and we made 2 days of the 2 parks.
Disclaimer: my wife is the Disney person so my reviews are likely harsher than those that love Disney.
Positives:
English is the 2nd language for instructions there.
We stayed on the east side of Tokyo and getting to the park took 50 minutes via the train but it was really easy to get there. Google maps was a life saver. Get a transportation card on your phone.
Prices are fantastic, tickets, food, merchandise
Merchandise is almost 100% different.
Luckily it 40th anniversary so their equivalent to Genie + was free.
The people
Negatives:
Getting home train was confusing because I didn’t read the destination station properly, twice (same line of trains).
Not many rides
Lines can be very, very long
Food there didn’t match my palate. I try to eat all kinds of different foods too.
They do a lot of refurbishment. While a positive, it isn’t if you are there during the offseason and rides are down
Disneyland. A lot like the US parks. They love different flavors of popcorn. Salted was okay. Milk chocolate was not. We had a 3rd flavor but I can’t remember what it was. It wasn’t good either.
Unfortunately the beauty and beast ride was down but the area was well themed. That made my wife half happy.
Space mountain was more intense than Disney Worlds version. I didn’t enjoy that. I hear that its closing in July though.
Monsters inc ride was different. You shine flashlights on monsters inc helmets to show the monsters while avoiding randall.
Thunder mountain is thunder mountain.
Its a small world is the same but they add characters in their countries and all the characters work properly. The entire thing was in English.
Gotta get a popcorn bucket. My wife got the light up beauty and the beast one. They all kinds of ones that beat out the US ones for creativity.
Its the year of minnie mouse there. Everything minnie.
The parades and shows are very popular there. Im guessing with the lack of rides, they have to be. The electric parade was cool. We didn’t stop to see any shows because we couldn’t understand them, we watched from afar. The fireworks, which are regularly cancelled, were cancelled.
Disney Sea. The park was well themed. you were immersed in a section’s theme until you moved on to the next one. There wasn’t much break in the themeing either. Very few rides. Soarin is DW’s soarin minus flying over Tokyo and Disney Sea at the very end. The line can get up to 5 hours. 5! We were there during off times so it was “only” 2+ hours. I don’t do lines so I paid the 2000 yen each for us to skip the line. Worth it to not spend hours in the line but the ride wasn’t worth it. The pre-show looked cool. It was about human’s drive for flight showing a ton of early flying machines. At least that is what im telling myself as I couldn’t understand it.
Indiana jones is like a more intense Mickey’s runaway. Sinbad’s like Pirates but 10+ minutes long. Pirates is still the same. Gondola rides and another water ride were tame.
The other big ride was Journey to the center of the earth. It was like Splash mountain for ride style but dry. You journey to the center of the earth and see weirder creatures as you slowly go a long. Then you drop on the coaster, not intense. Very short and strange but people wait hours to ride it as well.
Avoid the mickey pizza. Mayonnaise and hamburger meat, on a pizza. Wut?
There was a nice bakery off to the right when you enter into the park in the Mediterranean area. They had good stuff.
They do flavored churros as well there. Chocolate orange one was disappointing.
Overall:
The people are awesome. We intentionally went to Disneyland on a rainy day to shorten the lines. It was great but, the people were better. They would get up when done eating even in the rain. Its nice to be around people not about themselves. Also they are extremely nice and respectful (not just Disney employees) when you are trying to buy something and only know 3 japanese words. The Disney employees carry around pocket translators to help.
I also enjoyed people watching. All ages and genders wore minnie ears. They have giant character heads you can wear. All ages wearing those. A lot of folks dance the choreographed moves at the shows. Matching outfits with merchandise is big there (not just t-shirts like in the US) and having their kids in full costume. That was more enjoyable to see them get into that much than the parks.
We tried as much stuff as we could there but I couldn’t get into the food there. I even left the waterfalls and went back to the rivers and lakes that I am used to (hamburgers and pizza) just to eat something and they were just edible. Some of it is due to the fact you are used to US snack tastes. They don’t do a lot of sugar there, which is nice, but it does make churros and other things less enjoyable than what you are used to.
It was worth it since I was in Japan already but i wouldn’t rate it is a must go to. The flight is long and the park is only so good.
Let me know if you have any questions.
Disclaimer: my wife is the Disney person so my reviews are likely harsher than those that love Disney.
Positives:
English is the 2nd language for instructions there.
We stayed on the east side of Tokyo and getting to the park took 50 minutes via the train but it was really easy to get there. Google maps was a life saver. Get a transportation card on your phone.
Prices are fantastic, tickets, food, merchandise
Merchandise is almost 100% different.
Luckily it 40th anniversary so their equivalent to Genie + was free.
The people
Negatives:
Getting home train was confusing because I didn’t read the destination station properly, twice (same line of trains).
Not many rides
Lines can be very, very long
Food there didn’t match my palate. I try to eat all kinds of different foods too.
They do a lot of refurbishment. While a positive, it isn’t if you are there during the offseason and rides are down
Disneyland. A lot like the US parks. They love different flavors of popcorn. Salted was okay. Milk chocolate was not. We had a 3rd flavor but I can’t remember what it was. It wasn’t good either.
Unfortunately the beauty and beast ride was down but the area was well themed. That made my wife half happy.
Space mountain was more intense than Disney Worlds version. I didn’t enjoy that. I hear that its closing in July though.
Monsters inc ride was different. You shine flashlights on monsters inc helmets to show the monsters while avoiding randall.
Thunder mountain is thunder mountain.
Its a small world is the same but they add characters in their countries and all the characters work properly. The entire thing was in English.
Gotta get a popcorn bucket. My wife got the light up beauty and the beast one. They all kinds of ones that beat out the US ones for creativity.
Its the year of minnie mouse there. Everything minnie.
The parades and shows are very popular there. Im guessing with the lack of rides, they have to be. The electric parade was cool. We didn’t stop to see any shows because we couldn’t understand them, we watched from afar. The fireworks, which are regularly cancelled, were cancelled.
Disney Sea. The park was well themed. you were immersed in a section’s theme until you moved on to the next one. There wasn’t much break in the themeing either. Very few rides. Soarin is DW’s soarin minus flying over Tokyo and Disney Sea at the very end. The line can get up to 5 hours. 5! We were there during off times so it was “only” 2+ hours. I don’t do lines so I paid the 2000 yen each for us to skip the line. Worth it to not spend hours in the line but the ride wasn’t worth it. The pre-show looked cool. It was about human’s drive for flight showing a ton of early flying machines. At least that is what im telling myself as I couldn’t understand it.
Indiana jones is like a more intense Mickey’s runaway. Sinbad’s like Pirates but 10+ minutes long. Pirates is still the same. Gondola rides and another water ride were tame.
The other big ride was Journey to the center of the earth. It was like Splash mountain for ride style but dry. You journey to the center of the earth and see weirder creatures as you slowly go a long. Then you drop on the coaster, not intense. Very short and strange but people wait hours to ride it as well.
Avoid the mickey pizza. Mayonnaise and hamburger meat, on a pizza. Wut?
There was a nice bakery off to the right when you enter into the park in the Mediterranean area. They had good stuff.
They do flavored churros as well there. Chocolate orange one was disappointing.
Overall:
The people are awesome. We intentionally went to Disneyland on a rainy day to shorten the lines. It was great but, the people were better. They would get up when done eating even in the rain. Its nice to be around people not about themselves. Also they are extremely nice and respectful (not just Disney employees) when you are trying to buy something and only know 3 japanese words. The Disney employees carry around pocket translators to help.
I also enjoyed people watching. All ages and genders wore minnie ears. They have giant character heads you can wear. All ages wearing those. A lot of folks dance the choreographed moves at the shows. Matching outfits with merchandise is big there (not just t-shirts like in the US) and having their kids in full costume. That was more enjoyable to see them get into that much than the parks.
We tried as much stuff as we could there but I couldn’t get into the food there. I even left the waterfalls and went back to the rivers and lakes that I am used to (hamburgers and pizza) just to eat something and they were just edible. Some of it is due to the fact you are used to US snack tastes. They don’t do a lot of sugar there, which is nice, but it does make churros and other things less enjoyable than what you are used to.
It was worth it since I was in Japan already but i wouldn’t rate it is a must go to. The flight is long and the park is only so good.
Let me know if you have any questions.
