Friday June 10th 2005
Cast: Me (23) and my girlfriend Claire (25). In the photos, I'm the blonde with glasses, and she's the brunette.
NOTE: Click the little thumbnail images to see larger versions of the photos! I'm having to post the reports in sections as I have too many images! The board won't let me post more than 20 at once!
We're here! Hurray! I panicked last night, thinking we'd sleep in this morning at the Travelodge and end up missing the Eurostar, but I needn't have worried as we woke up on time this morning, at which point I experienced a huge sense of relief! I was quite excitable first thing this morning, when I realised that it was 6.30am and we had lots of time to get ready.
We had breakfast at King's Cross Travelodge (which is where we stayed overnight) and then braved the Tube at rush hour. We made our way to Waterloo station, and then to the Eurostar terminals, where I got quite excitable again at the "9:39 Disneyland Resort Paris" notice on the departures board whee! After check-in, I managed to set off the security alarm and had to be frisked by a rather scary, stony-faced butch lady, who didn't look happy with me. I later realised that I'd left my watch on oops. I then cried on approximately three separate occasions after Passport Control! The first time was when I saw the Disneyland Resort Paris desks in the departures lounge; the second was when a mean lady tried to push ahead of me in the Disney Express queue and her husband told her off, and she said, "Well, I do have two children with me!" or something like that, and I took offence (I was emotional, okay?!); and the third time was when we were boarding the Eurostar, I think, but I can't remember why. It may have been the sight of all the children in their little Disney t-shirts.
There are a couple of things I think I should note. We queued for ages after check-in at the Disney Express desk, only to be turned away just as we were approaching the desk and told that we could sort out Disney Express on the train. We didn't know this, as everyone seemed to be queuing for it, and we could've had a sit down and a cup of tea if we'd known! Also, when boarding the train, ignore the big painted numbers on the sides of the coaches. They don't seem to mean anything, and the number you need to look for (when locating your coach) is on a little screen in green lights. I got very confused by this at first, but that may just be me! Also, remember to put your name and seat numbers on your luggage. We'd got ours all stowed away in the luggage compartment and then we were told to put our seat numbers on our suitcases, and had to pull them out again!
I felt much, much better after getting into our seats on the Eurostar (and escaping the backpack clan, which was out in full force, pushing and shoving all over the place!), and, as we were in First Class, we got lovely extra-width, reclining seats and lots of special treatment. First of all, we were brought glasses of water, and I was offered a children's activity pack. Ahem! Then we were given a little menu card for our three-course "breakfast", which was actually served at lunchtime. We got sausage, tomato, omelette, beans, a croissant, a bread roll, jam, a yoghurt, fruit, orange juice... loads of stuff. It was really nice as well. The staff kept bringing us coffee, tea and hot chocolate (tip: save your cup from breakfast, as they keep re-filling it!) and then hot towels. It was really lovely and I was <em>incredibly</em> impressed with Eurostar; I wouldn't hesitate to travel with them again.
The Disney cast members (in yellow polo shirts - not the train staff) came around to see everyone once we'd entered France (which, incidentally, was looking much sunnier than the UK, which we'd left twenty minutes previous) and this allowed us to check into our hotel whilst we were still on the train. They handed out our park tickets, luggage tags (they asked how many we needed, so we asked for four - they're colour-coded to match your hotel, so ours were green for Sequoia Lodge), and the little vouchers for Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, park maps, Good Morning Fantasyland vouchers, and also some other documentation we needed. It was all very convenient and it meant that when we arrived at Disneyland at 1.30pm (French time), all we had to do was take our suitcases and bags up a single escalator, and hand them in to the Disney Express service, which would then transport them to our hotel for us. This all worked very well indeed, and we had checked our backs into the Disney Express service within five minutes of our arrival.
So after that, I cried a little bit more (despite thinking I wouldn't!) and we wandered around Disney Village and Lake Disney for a while, admiring the Panoramagique balloon and thinking how sad Sequoia Lodge looked with all its scaffolding! We then headed to the Disneyland Park - eeee! We took the Disneyland Railroad train (which I'd never been on before) to Discoveryland, and then went on Star Tours, which Claire seemed to enjoy a lot. Next we queued for Space Mountain: Mission 2, the new and updated version of the old Space Mountain: De La Terre A La Lune ride, which always used to be one of my favourite rides. This was a completely different ride and I'm afraid to say that I was quite disappointed by it. The launch was fantastic as always (and it is, quite literally, breathtaking), but the entire ride seemed very dark to me and I could barely hear the music. I missed the old, magical music and the only two parts of it I really enjoyed were the launch, and a part where you corkscrew through a tunnel of swirling red light. Claire didn't seem too impressed either, but I'd read that sometimes, certain speakers and lights don't work, so I assumed that was the case and planned to do the ride again at some point.
Cast: Me (23) and my girlfriend Claire (25). In the photos, I'm the blonde with glasses, and she's the brunette.
NOTE: Click the little thumbnail images to see larger versions of the photos! I'm having to post the reports in sections as I have too many images! The board won't let me post more than 20 at once!
We're here! Hurray! I panicked last night, thinking we'd sleep in this morning at the Travelodge and end up missing the Eurostar, but I needn't have worried as we woke up on time this morning, at which point I experienced a huge sense of relief! I was quite excitable first thing this morning, when I realised that it was 6.30am and we had lots of time to get ready.
We had breakfast at King's Cross Travelodge (which is where we stayed overnight) and then braved the Tube at rush hour. We made our way to Waterloo station, and then to the Eurostar terminals, where I got quite excitable again at the "9:39 Disneyland Resort Paris" notice on the departures board whee! After check-in, I managed to set off the security alarm and had to be frisked by a rather scary, stony-faced butch lady, who didn't look happy with me. I later realised that I'd left my watch on oops. I then cried on approximately three separate occasions after Passport Control! The first time was when I saw the Disneyland Resort Paris desks in the departures lounge; the second was when a mean lady tried to push ahead of me in the Disney Express queue and her husband told her off, and she said, "Well, I do have two children with me!" or something like that, and I took offence (I was emotional, okay?!); and the third time was when we were boarding the Eurostar, I think, but I can't remember why. It may have been the sight of all the children in their little Disney t-shirts.
There are a couple of things I think I should note. We queued for ages after check-in at the Disney Express desk, only to be turned away just as we were approaching the desk and told that we could sort out Disney Express on the train. We didn't know this, as everyone seemed to be queuing for it, and we could've had a sit down and a cup of tea if we'd known! Also, when boarding the train, ignore the big painted numbers on the sides of the coaches. They don't seem to mean anything, and the number you need to look for (when locating your coach) is on a little screen in green lights. I got very confused by this at first, but that may just be me! Also, remember to put your name and seat numbers on your luggage. We'd got ours all stowed away in the luggage compartment and then we were told to put our seat numbers on our suitcases, and had to pull them out again!
I felt much, much better after getting into our seats on the Eurostar (and escaping the backpack clan, which was out in full force, pushing and shoving all over the place!), and, as we were in First Class, we got lovely extra-width, reclining seats and lots of special treatment. First of all, we were brought glasses of water, and I was offered a children's activity pack. Ahem! Then we were given a little menu card for our three-course "breakfast", which was actually served at lunchtime. We got sausage, tomato, omelette, beans, a croissant, a bread roll, jam, a yoghurt, fruit, orange juice... loads of stuff. It was really nice as well. The staff kept bringing us coffee, tea and hot chocolate (tip: save your cup from breakfast, as they keep re-filling it!) and then hot towels. It was really lovely and I was <em>incredibly</em> impressed with Eurostar; I wouldn't hesitate to travel with them again.
The Disney cast members (in yellow polo shirts - not the train staff) came around to see everyone once we'd entered France (which, incidentally, was looking much sunnier than the UK, which we'd left twenty minutes previous) and this allowed us to check into our hotel whilst we were still on the train. They handed out our park tickets, luggage tags (they asked how many we needed, so we asked for four - they're colour-coded to match your hotel, so ours were green for Sequoia Lodge), and the little vouchers for Buffalo Bill's Wild West Show, park maps, Good Morning Fantasyland vouchers, and also some other documentation we needed. It was all very convenient and it meant that when we arrived at Disneyland at 1.30pm (French time), all we had to do was take our suitcases and bags up a single escalator, and hand them in to the Disney Express service, which would then transport them to our hotel for us. This all worked very well indeed, and we had checked our backs into the Disney Express service within five minutes of our arrival.
So after that, I cried a little bit more (despite thinking I wouldn't!) and we wandered around Disney Village and Lake Disney for a while, admiring the Panoramagique balloon and thinking how sad Sequoia Lodge looked with all its scaffolding! We then headed to the Disneyland Park - eeee! We took the Disneyland Railroad train (which I'd never been on before) to Discoveryland, and then went on Star Tours, which Claire seemed to enjoy a lot. Next we queued for Space Mountain: Mission 2, the new and updated version of the old Space Mountain: De La Terre A La Lune ride, which always used to be one of my favourite rides. This was a completely different ride and I'm afraid to say that I was quite disappointed by it. The launch was fantastic as always (and it is, quite literally, breathtaking), but the entire ride seemed very dark to me and I could barely hear the music. I missed the old, magical music and the only two parts of it I really enjoyed were the launch, and a part where you corkscrew through a tunnel of swirling red light. Claire didn't seem too impressed either, but I'd read that sometimes, certain speakers and lights don't work, so I assumed that was the case and planned to do the ride again at some point.
I can't believe that's only the first day... took me ages to write up!
I must say you look absolutely fine in the photos - all that worrying about swimming costumes when you're not even chubby!!! I wonder why I've never noticed the elephants and crocodile by the Rainforest Cafe? Must have a look for them next time! The pictures of the SL were very interesting too as we're staying there later in the year. Looking forward to part deux!!! 
