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[Festival Disney]

Well, our Holiday came and went and now I'm going to attempt a Trip Report  :?
I've already written most of it out on my laptop, but unfortunately the battery is rubbish so you'll all have to wait 'til I get  back home to read it   (still in France for another 12 days but not in Disney, unfortunately   )

Here's the Intro bit and some highlights...
We were staying in a campsite about 20 minutes from Disneyland Paris called "Camping 4 Vents". It's a really great site and I recommend it to anyone who's going to stay in a tent/Caravan. In summer, they keep the gates open past midnight for the guest who have stayed to watch Fantillusion and the Enchanted Fireworks and all of the amenities are spotless.
We had arrived at 4 vents on the day before (18th July) and had decided to go to Disney Village for a look around the lake and Hotels, which surprised my parents at the quality and beauty of them (especially the DLH and HNY!). The next day, we left for DLP at 8am and got back at 12:30am.  :shock:
Highlights
The Good  
- It was a beautiful day and the marching band was playing as we entered DLP  /
- The lack of decorations on Main Street and le Chateau
- Great CM's all through the day
- Captain EO was really great and we all enjoyed it
- Showtime Spectacular was a lot of fun!
- The food. We ate in Fuente del Oro and Last Chance Cafe and were very impressed with the food both times  :thumbs:
- Disney's Once Upon a Dream Parade and Disney's Fantillusion were both AMAZING!!
- The Enchanted Fireworks were brilliant and the perfect end to the day  =D>
The Bad  :evil:
- The smoking was ridiculous! I  swear that every single French person over 15 smokes. The entire Disneyland Park seemed like one big ash tray to them, just throwing their butts everywhere and blowing smoke anywhere  :|  (No offense if you're French and you don't smoke) If DLRP just enforced the smoking rule that they put in the park guides... ](*,)
- The heat. OMG it was sooooooooo hot!! I believe it reached 35 celcius at one point during the day.
- Cleanliness. Generally, it was good throughout the park but there were certain places that let it down. We were eating at last chance cafe and all the tables were a mess with meat bones etc. on the floor...  [-X
- Rivers of the Far West need something doing to them very soon! as Kristof wrote in the Photos Magiques TR, a lot of the effects were broken (apart from old Joe), Molly Brown looked demolished, the emergency BTM walkways look hideous and there were plastic bottles and other litter everywhere  :!:. Not Cool. Also, the Mark Twain is in a bad state of repair (at least on the surface). Hopefully it'll get the same treatment as the MB is getting...

Other than that, we had a brilliant and magical day!  :lol:

Disney Village (18th July)
(more to follow)

Disneyland Park (19th July)
(more to follow)

[littlemermaid83]

Look forward to hearing more.

I also agree about the smoking, I wish the rule was more enforced but sadly it isn't

[Reiana]

So, Disneyland should be here in Bavaria know, because smoking is strictly prohibited from August 1st.
No smoking in restaurants, bars, public buildings or other institutions open to the public.
Sorry for off topic.

Can't wait to read more  :thumbs:

[tubbsy]

Theres only smoking in restricted places within the UK but nobody seems to enforce it in certain places. Havent been to Legoland for a few months, but at the beginning of the year people were still puffing away in front of members of staff who didnt say anything even though its no smoking.

[dagobert]

So, Disneyland should be here in Bavaria know, because smoking is strictly prohibited from August 1st.
No smoking in restaurants, bars, public buildings or other institutions open to the public.
Sorry for off topic.

Can't wait to read more  :thumbs:

Well done Bavaria! Hopefully that will happen everywhere else in Europe, too.

Smoking is really a big problem, but I have to say that we have never seen people smoking in queues or buildings. Maybe because we have always been to DLRP in the off seasons, so there were not so many people in the parks.

[Festival Disney]

Right, I'm currently undergoing the tedious process of uploading my pictures and videos and also giving my report (which kinda resembles an essay, be warned :lol:) a final edit and once over. Stay 'tooned

[Festival Disney]

Day 2 – Disneyland Park  

Well this was it - the big day at Disneyland Park. I had planned to get up at around 7ish and had set my alarm clock, but when it went off I simply turned it off and went back to sleep .  I finally awoke again at around 8 o clock and wasn't too happy! I rushed to get dressed into something cool as the weather on my iPod had predicted temperatures in the mid 30's...

Mam was already up making some coffee when I knocked on the caravan door to wake everyone up. Dad was being a stubborn pain and wouldn't get out of bed, and Matt was still asleep. I quickly turned the stereo on loud and the French songs quickly made them move. After a quick breakfast of cereal and orange juice/coffee, I assembled the backpack with sunglasses, suntan lotion, crisps and a big bottle of water before jumping in the car and arguing with dad over the fact that he didn't need the sat-nav on because we'd done the route four times last year and I knew where to go anyway! What is it with men and their sat-nav's?!  

The journey took around twenty minutes, which was eased by my homemade cd of my favourite Disney songs (Basically the Fantillusion soundtrack, "Just like we dreamed it" and the OUADP soundtrack). We pulled off the A4 auto route and the excitement mounted when we saw the DL hotel, ToT and le Chateau . We rounded the corner and passed under the "Disneyland" toll booth and entered the car park. It was surprising to see all the motor homes already parked up but I guess most had pulled in the day before and stayed the night? We got a space in the fourth row and noticed that almost none of the other cars were listening to the CM's who were trying their best to direct the influx of European drivers. There were two CM's conversing with each other in French, their faces and body language suggesting a conversation along the lines of "why don't they listen to us!?". Then came the first of the snide comments from my mother... "This wouldn't happen in America".  :roll:

Despite her negativity, I was determined to prove her wrong and show them just how great our Disneyland is!
We walked up the moving walkways and saw some soldiers walking down towards the car park. I then explained the reasoning for their presence is because the train station and the resort hub not being part of Disney (hope I'm right ). We came to the hub and scurried past the pathetic street sellers and camera people, forcing their cameras in the faces of unsuspecting guests and lobbying their tacky Eiffel towers and stupid yapping dogs...
We passed through the security tents and entered Fantasia Gardens. The band was out playing the Mickey's Magical Party theme tune and it was nice to see them out.  :thumbs:

Mam, Dad and Matt:


It was approaching 9:30 as we passed through the turnstiles. It was so great to be back after all the waiting and mounting excitement. I must admit the NGF decorations on Main Street Station weren't all that vulgar in person. We grabbed some park maps and programmes and I was pleased to see a horse drawn streetcar out! We jumped in the queue and within ten minutes were setting off up Main Street! As the car turned the corner by Town Square Photography, the opening announcement started playing. We got off at Central Plaza and it's amazing how good the castle looks when you see it in person. It was now time to turn around and explore the shops of Main Street whilst they were still quiet. We passed Gibson Girl and the other eateries and entered Main Street Motors before making our way through the candy palace and TS Photo's. The little telephone where you can eavesdrop is a great touch and dad thought it was really cool.

Town Square:


We crossed the square over to the Storybook store and I saw the French version of "from sketch to reality" that I quickly flicked through and I must say it has some great photos in it. We crossed the road and went into the Emporium and took a glance at Dapper Dan's Haircuts before crossing the street and into Lilly's Boutique.

Dapper Dan's:


It was now time to proceed to Frontierland! Before entering though the fort, we went to have a look at the new tepees and they look really great, with lots of smoke coming from one of them.

Teepees:


It was then time to walk over to BTM and grab a fastpass before proceeding to Phantom Manor.

Frontierland:


The queue was really short and we were inside within five minutes.

PM and us in the queue:




One thing I picked up on this time was the paintings in the corridor near the loading station that follow you with their eyes as you walk along, great touch. I think most things were working of PM, the only thing I can remember was one of the grim grinning ghosts heads wasn't on so it looked a little strange!.
We came out of the Manor and went for a look up boot hill and read all the graves and had a listen to the "beating" one. I was very pleased to see the water splash on BTM working, giving off a lot of water as each train passed. We walked around Thunder Mesa for a while and popped back out to central plaza to see the All Stars Express until our 11:25 fastpass slot came along.

When we got to the FP entrance, there was a queue formed so I kind of knew that they were waiting for their 11:30 slot so we tried to slip past politely to get to the CM but one English lady was having none of it and wouldn't let us pass and said we should have queued earlier! The entire point of fastpass is to try and cut down the queue and were all rather annoyed by this. We did finally get in and got as far as the bridge over the tracks where we waited for about five minutes before the queue moved rather swiftly down to the loading station. The ride was really great, the waterfall at the top of the first lift was on and is a really great touch, the spinning raccoon things weren't working though, nor the explosion rocks but I'm pretty sure everything else was . We got off and saw our picture which was quite funny but didn't buy it.

Next on the list was the Riverboat so we got in the queue just as Mr. Twain was arriving. We got on and stayed on the bottom deck towards the front where it was nice and empty. I must say that I was very disappointed at the state that the boat was in – weeds growing here there and everywhere, paint peeling and missing. To say it was in a state is an understatement.

Nevertheless, the cruise was uneventful but I must agree with Kristof where he mentions (in his July photo report) the "Rivers of the bad show". The emergency BTM walkway thing is very ugly, and I really do see no reason why they don't try to hide it somewhere out of sight. The Molly Brown was still just a bare shell. If they kept maintaining the boats properly with paint and some weed killer rather than just have one massive refurb, ED SCA could save a heap of cash that could be spent on some other things such as... cleaning out the rivers! Honestly now, the amount of plastic bottles and other litter in that river is unbelievable. The broken moose's and geysers were just the icing on the cake for me. I was quite let down by the rivers :/ Luckily, the rest of the family seemed oblivious to all this but did complain that it was rather boring :roll:.

But anyway, rant over! It was 12 by this stage and I wanted to go to Fuente del Oro as I'd read countless good reviews about it and we weren't let down! Matt, Dad and I all had Fajita's whilst Mam had the chilli. It was all really tasty and everyone enjoyed the meal. We had ample amounts of coke with the meal and the restaurant was quiet, clean and tidy.
It was now really (and I mean really) hot by this point, and we needed something calm to do after our lunch so it time for a look around the Adventure Isle trails followed by Pirates! The cave systems really are fun to explore and get lost in and a great break from the massive heat. The only let down was the state of the pirate ship. From a distance it looks ok-ish but once you get up close, it really is awful . We crossed the pont-suspendu and walked down into the caves under the tree house before continuing to Pirates. The queue looked really long and was sticking outside the covered area, but we knew from last year that it moves at a steady rate and within five minutes we were at the indoor queue. It was so nice to get in from the massive heat and into the air conditioned corridor. Within twenty or so minutes, we were sat in our boat and passing the Blue Lagoon. The ride was really great with most if not all effects working! Dad still managed to fall asleep (he'd been driving near constantly since Thursday) but the drop soon woke him up .

We came out of the ride and I had decided that I wanted to on it's a small world, so off to Fantasyland it was. It was then that we first noticed it. The flower beds near chalet de la marionette had loads of Cigarette butts in and Mam was starting to complain about the people smoking everywhere (more about that smokey subject later) and asked why it said in the map about smoking areas if nobody took any notice. But we entered Fantasyland and it's such a nice place to be with all the canals and nice trees. Dumbo really did look spectacular (there's no other word). The mouse in the teapot wasn't bobbing up and down ant there was no smoke.

As we were getting up to it's a small world, it was nice to see the old mill spinning .
We got in the queue for small world and within five minutes we were in our boat. The fountains weren't working and there was a paper cup floating in the middle of the right hand fountain... not nice! We got in to the small world, I pointed out the Welsh dancers to everyone... and overall it was a rather pleasant cruise. It wasn't as bad as I had thought and to be perfectly honest, I quite enjoyed .
As we popped out of the tunnel and back into the real world, we remembered how hot it was and that it's not just WDW that benefits from air-con! :lol:.

It was onto Dicoveryland now to see Captain EO which was showing every 10 minutes!

Waiting for Captain EO:


We got into the nice cool pre-show room and everyone sat on the floor. About five minutes later came the announcement that everyone had to stand up and move as gar forward as possible. So we did.
Five or so minutes later, came another announcement where the cm said something similar to "can everyone move maximum forward please". English obviously wasn't her forte, but we knew she meant everyone to move as far forward as possible, but this American guy behind us was moaning to his party about "how much further does she want us to move? We're already packed in here like sardines; does she want us all to get up close with the person in front or what?" I know that because he's American he may not know that not all Europeans aren't all that good with their English, but cut her some slack! It was more directed to the people at the back of the room who were more dispersed  : roll:.
So we watched the pre-show (which was quite long-winded and hard on the old legs after a day of walking) and then went into the theatre where we were asked to move all the way over to the end of the row. This didn't happen. The film started and I really can't praise this attraction enough. It was brilliant. All the in-theatre effects were really good and although the film is dated, it has a timeless feeling about it. Everyone applauded when MJ appeared and there was something special about it :thumbs:.
Mam and Dad decided they wanted to take a rest so Matt and I went and queued for Space Mountain. It was advertised as a 45 minute wait, but we decided to brave it. It may have been because it was so hot, but there wasn't all that smoke coming from the cannon and of course, no recoil. The first bit of the queue was outside and although there was a no-smoking sign at entrance to the queue, there was a guy smoking in front of us – not cool – so I left a big gap between us and him. The Nautilus lagoon looked really nice and clean, but sadly still no bubbles. Once we got inside, it was warm verging on hot and someone in front of us was quite aromatic .
We got to the loading station and got put in the second row. I think this was a good thing as I've read that the further back you go, the bumpier it gets. We set off for our journey into space and the audio was working! It didn't really matter though, as it was so quiet that most of the time you couldn't hear it :roll:.

After re-entry, we couldn't find our picture so went off to find Mam and Dad lying on the grass round the corner. It was time to redeem our free coke that we got from lunch so we headed to Cafe Hyperion through the heat of Disco-land. The new floors outside Star Tours look really good, but it makes you realise the state of the rest of the floors. We got the drink which was rather small, but none the less, it was free and then headed for Sleeping Beauty Castle.
 
We went the way that goes down past the wishing well and into the dragon's lair. The experience was slightly spoiled because some idiot was smoking inside :roll: but the dragon seemed in quite good condition, she had a few bottles to play with as well :roll:. It was then up the steps to the gallery. The water trickling was on and really nice to see. Again though, some person had the cheek to smoke! I was rather peeved at this. Apart from that, we had a nice look around the castle and then proceeded out over the new bridge to central plaza where character train was coming from Main Street. It didn't stop though and just continued on the parade route.

It was so hot and we were all starting to get tired so a ride on the Disneyland Railroad was in order. We went to Main Street Station and got in the queue. As we were moving through the queue, we went behind the little "station master only" room and there was a big pile of litter on the floor :devil:.  Worse still, while I was leaning on the railing, I noticed a dead baby rat/mouse! It had obviously been there for a few days and had ants on it and really wasn't all that pleasant to look at but luckily the line began to move... The ride was great, but after Discoveryland station, there seemed to be a lot more litter by the sides of the tracks so I hope they do get around to clearing that.
After the full circle tour, we walked down the stairs and decided to get a good spot for the parade.

Waiting for the Parade:


We sat on the curb outside the Town Square side of TS Photography. It was a good 45 minutes before the parade was due to start, but people had already begun to sit (including us). The parade started and we were all really impressed with it. Truly magical! Sadly, Maleficent was still missing from the villains and the Tiana music seemed a bit out of place, but it was truly a great spectacle! :thumbs:.

Parade Pics:








It was 18:55 and we walked with the crowd up to central plaza to watch the hub show, but left after 5 minutes as we were too hot to stand and watch. It was now 8 and we were all hungry, so we decided to go for the Cowboy Cookout, but when we got there, it was closed since 5 apparently... in High season? So we ended up eating in Last Chance cafe. Matt had found a table, but the last tenants had regretted to clear their mess and Mam had to do it. When we finally got the food, it was quite good. Matt had Chicken Wings that were yummy, I had Ribs that were yummy, Dad had the Texan Platter and Mam had the Chicken Nuggets. We weren't overly impressed with the Restaurant as there was lots of food (mainly bones) all over the floor, and there were people smoking everywhere even though we were in the covered area? I'm sure it says in the guide to the parks that all restaurants operate a non smoking policy? :roll:.

Now that the temperature was beginning to drop, we decided to give the hub show another try since it was the last one of the day, and we all really enjoyed it. The sparks bit at the end is a really good touch. Matt even let out a "wow" then .

Le Chateau during the show:


Just before the show finished, I saw a place to sit and wait for Fantillusion and dashed over to get sat down. Unfortunately, we were sat next to a group of loud French teenagers. They were almost constantly smoking and Mam was really annoyed because she was sat closest to them.

It was 45 minutes before the parade came, but when it did, it was all worth it! The Magical Garden changes seemed to be for the best with the characters all dancing in time to the music and shaking hands as they walked. Jafar stopped right in front of us! There was sooooo much dry ice and it was everywhere, our legs were covered in it! I had forgotten how awesome transformations were! The snake was so awesome, and it seemed more lit up than in some videos I've seen on YouTube. When the parade started moving again, the road was frozen in places lol. Aladdin stopped in front of us for the happy ending, and that was super good too. By the end though, one of my feet was so dead that I couldn't walk!

Seeing Fantillusion again has given me renewed faith in it. It's such a good show even with half of its original floats! The parades are some of the things I can't wait to see on my next visit! We followed the parade to where Main Street meets Central Plaza and got right in the middle of the street for the Enchanted Fireworks. The castle looked absolutely breathtaking all lit up without any crappy decorations (except of course Tink). The fireworks were of course amazing and everybody loved them - the perfect end to our magical day!
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I still have some videos and Day 1 at Disney Village to follow soon  :lol:

[norhel]

Great report!