Final Day: 26th Sep- Saturday.
Unfortunately because I had booked an early afternoon flight I didn't have the time to go into the parks today, but I had made a reservation at Cafe Mickey for 8:00am as a goodbye from us to Mickey and friends! I had made the reservation from home before the trip.
On the way to Cafe Mickey I got some last shots of Hotel New York from the back
1. The lovely water fountain things...
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2. The hotel..
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3. Hotel and ice rink which was being constructed the first few days we were there. There had been construction boards up all around it. It was still not open yet however....
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4. beautiful view of NPB hotel we had as we walked to the parks each morning...
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We arrived at Cafe Mickey's before 8am and I have to say we were both tired, esp mum!
She also had a bit of a sore tummy so could only really drink tea and eat a little bit of some bread type thing. I had fruit salad and croissants which where lovely! :D :D :D I love the design of the little buffet area...
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I really do think it's a great way to end the disney experience and I would do it again...
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Of course first out was Mickey...
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and me getting blinded by the sun :P ...
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Then there was Minnie.. this is the first time I have met her in cafe Mickey..
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mum
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then chip and dale - I thought they would have spilt up to go around the tables but they went around together..
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then prince john...
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followed by goofy..
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there wasnt really many people in for breakfast at all so it was hard for the characters to fill their time to be honest....
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There was no surprises with the characters who were there but I really liked it as a goodbye to Disneyland! :D
On the way back to our room to finish packing everything up we passed minnie doing her meet and greet in the lobby....
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she must have ran from Cafe Mickey to HNY :P :wink: :wink: :wink:
I took some last minute room photos..
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me relaxing on the very comfy bed and the duvets which I loved...
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I also had to run down to the shop to get a security tag taken off one of the plushes I had bought the day before in the parks! This was the second time on the trip this had happened to me and thankfully I had my receipts but it is pretty annoying..so a warning to anyone going....check your purchases for security tags after purchasing them to save hastle! :wink:
It was then time to say goodbye! :cry:
I dropped of our room key in the box provided and we waited outside for the VEA shuttle bus..
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We had a nice journey back to CDG, a quick check in and a smooth journey back to dublin! We were both so exhausted but agreed it had been a great trip! I think we both miss it already!! :wink: :D :wink:
As Pete's Dragon said at the end of his report I had a slight feeling of 'been there, done that' when I was walking around DLP and I have been considering america but at the same time I love the feeling of being home when i arrive back at DLP! :D :D :D
I hope you enjoyed my trip report....here is a few things I forgot to mention-
Breakfast at Hotel New York - we did try it one morning esp as this was the first time we would experience the hot food, although i didn't want hot food so I stuck to fruit salad and croissants. Mum tried the hot food and didn't like it. she actually had to spit out the scrabbled egg as she said it was horrible - mum can be over dramatic though :P :P :P we were basically too tired most mornings for breakfast though
Meeting the princesses - I decided against paying a huge amount for the meet and greet in aurberge de cendrillion, as I don't even like the menu and it's not worth it really. The only princess I really would of wanted to meet was Belle as I love her golden dress! And who was on the castle stage on our first full day in Disneyland Park only Belle! I had to start queuing and for anyone who has been in that queue you will know how slow it goes! The meet and greet was to stop at 12:30pm I think it was (or 1:30 can't remember which) and at 11:30 belle changed to Cinderella and her prince, I was going to panic when I remembered they switch every 30 mins and by the time I was near the front it would be another 30 mins and belle would be back...thankfully I was right.......
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Cast members The majority I met were ok and I say ok because there was only a few I could say were disney standard and actually friendly! The worst being a man in the emporium which I mentioned on one of my day reports and then a worker in the bakery who was just really annoyed looking and didn't even say please or thanks....what made her even worse was before she served me a guy came up asking for another bun claiming the one he got wasn't fresh so that really didn't make her any nicer to me.
Trading with Cast members I honestly believe that cast members keep any pins they get for trading in which they like themselves.. they slimply out them on their jackets, ties etc. Also when I asked a guy in one of the studios to trade he pointed at certain pins saying he would only trade them and not others on the lanyard - which is against the pin trading rules, any pins on the pin trading lanyard he has to trade with guests. I asked where the ones he wasn't going to trade his and he didn't answer...so I was guessing they weren't. I could have told him he was in the wrong but i wasn't in the mood to create a fuss, I just said no thanks and left. However 99% of other cast members where happy to trade with me - which i don't blame them because my pins for trading where much better than theres really. I was surprised at how nearly all cast members had the same plain mickey and the individual fab 5 pins on their lanyards.
Avoiding the scrum I have to say for the first time I decided that I was not going to do the whole scrum thing for characters (although i had to a bit with mum for tigger). If there was no civilised queue for things or if it got too much/too many people I walked away and I think it's the best thing I could have done because the trip is so much more relaxing!
Crowds I was very surprised at how busy the parks were for september, even though I was always aware many uk families seem to go then as it is cheaper. Although I have to say thankfully the time waits on rides didn't seem that bad which was odd.
Pin trading night read about it in the Pin trading night topic
Merchandise, spending and sales items! Both mum and I had just over 1000 euros each and between us we brought back about 280 euros! I wouldn't say I bought lots but i guess it all adds up, plus we had to buy a lot of drinks as it was so warm and at 2.50 a bottle it soon adds up too. We also did 3 meals which I would consider costly which was twice at annettes and once at the rainforest cafe! And we always tip 10 euros for a table service restaurant (5 each). All Mickey's magical party items seemed to be in the sale and I seen one or two other items down in price which is a nice change for DLP! :D =D> :D/
I will post pictures and information of my purchases in the merchandise topic in the next few minutes! :D :D :D
Link to my merchandise page...
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Thank you for posting your fantastic trip report Aveen, I've enjoyed reading every bit of it. I'm glad that you and your Mum both had a great trip :)
Great report Aveen, is Cafe Mickey in the morning any good? May consider doing this when we go back in Nov when we don't have EMH on the Tuesday.
I agree about it being busy, but luckily the queues for the rides were low :P
Thanks for a fantastic Trip report Aveen (& Mom) =D> My daughter Olivia and I enjoyed reading and looking at your fab photos. The hotel looks great and we are delighted that we have booked it for january 2010 - after seeing your photos we cant wait :D/ :D/ :D/
Quote from: "littlemermaid83"Great report Aveen, is Cafe Mickey in the morning any good? May consider doing this when we go back in Nov when we don't have EMH on the Tuesday.
I agree about it being busy, but luckily the queues for the rides were low :P
I definately thought it was worth it for leaving day as I wouldn't get into the parks and it made leaving a bit easier :D . I have to say though if your not staying at one of the hotels close to it I wouldn't say it's really worth it no...not if you have already met the usual characters that they have in there....plus the food is the same as the free hotel breakfasts.. I just wanted to take the opportunity of going whilst i was so close in hotel new york but i wouldn't have bothered if I was staying in the santa fe or something if you know what i mean?
Brenjo- that was my first time staying at Hotel New york and I have to say the location was just fabulous! I don't know if I will be able to go back to staying at a different hotel after having stayed there! It's great to basically walk out of your hotel and be there! no shuttle buses etc! I hope you have a great time!! :D :D :D
Quote from: "Aveen2008"Quote from: "littlemermaid83"Great report Aveen, is Cafe Mickey in the morning any good? May consider doing this when we go back in Nov when we don't have EMH on the Tuesday.
I agree about it being busy, but luckily the queues for the rides were low :P
I definately thought it was worth it for leaving day as I wouldn't get into the parks and it made leaving a bit easier :D . I have to say though if your not staying at one of the hotels close to it I wouldn't say it's really worth it no...not if you have already met the usual characters that they have in there....plus the food is the same as the free hotel breakfasts.. I just wanted to take the opportunity of going whilst i was so close in hotel new york but i wouldn't have bothered if I was staying in the santa fe or something if you know what i mean?
We are staying in the Santa Fe lol....I usually wouldn't even consider it but we are only going for 4 days and i have a character obsessed daughter, she wouldn't care if she met Goofy 50000 times she still loves seeing him. Plus we don't have EMH on the Tuesday so i thought it be a good way of doing something in the morning.
Did it have hot food at the breakfast?
I usually stay at the santa fe by the way so please don't think I was being snooty by using it as the example hehe its just when i usually stay there i have thought about the character breakfast and then didn't bother because of the bus hastle! :P maybe I am just lazy hehe!
Yeah they did hot food I think as far as I remember, although I always have fruit salad and croissants hehe- yum yum!
If Kyra loves the characters that much then maybe it is a good idea :D :D :D when your a disney hotel customer you pay less, i think its like 16 for an adult and like 12 or something for a child, I am not exactly sure :P (sorry crap memory hehe)...just remember to take that wee paper pass thing with you that you use for EMH's :D
there are 2 breakfast sittings - one at 8 and one at 9! we did the 8.00 one andit was pretty quiet but at least that way you will get more character interaction :D
Thanks Aveen, glad the 1st sitting is at 8am i'll be more interested in eating breakfast then.
Think i will add this to my booking next week.
no problem :D hope it turns out to be brilliant! your so lucky going back again so soon! :D :D
Quote from: "Aveen2008"no problem :D hope it turns out to be brilliant! your so lucky going back again so soon! :D :D
I know! DD has no idea we are going......I can't wait to see her face when she finally realises lol.
aw wow! :D do you live far from the eurostar port?
Aww, me and my friend really want to do Cafe Mickey in January. Since breakfast is included in the hotel price though, we would probably only want to do the evening meal, which would probably be much more crowded.
:P And well done for sticking out the que for the Princess meet and greet! I got in it once, but after waiting for like 20 minutes and only taking a few steps forward I got tired of waiting.
Quote from: "Masamune"Aww, me and my friend really want to do Cafe Mickey in January. Since breakfast is included in the hotel price though, we would probably only want to do the evening meal, which would probably be much more crowded.
:P And well done for sticking out the que for the Princess meet and greet! I got in it once, but after waiting for like 20 minutes and only taking a few steps forward I got tired of waiting.
I know it really is an awful queue and in many ways I think they should reduce the interactions wither each person to make it go quicker but then I see the little girls talking to the princesses and I think that actually it should be like that and if you really want it then you either have to just get there early or wait. It's the 3rd time I have met a princess on that stage. First time was cinderella in July 08 and mum and I stood for an hour and a half!! :shock: :shock: :shock: mum actually got really bad sunburn on the back of her neck. Second time I think was nov 08 and we went straight to the castle stage when the rope dropped to fantasyland that morning so we were second in line to meet aladdin and jasmine and this tim I think I queued an hour to meet belle! I just had to because I love the dress :P but it is really slow!! :roll:
That's my 3rd time in cafe Mickey, we usually do the evening meal and are there at 6 when it opens for the evening, the characters usually come out pretty quickly after that time and the crowds are less but I quite like cafe mickey when it is busy as it has a great buzz about it and the characters do come around to all the tables unless one of the silly ones accidently misses it or something, which only happened us once with eeyore. In Jan I would say it will be quiet so you wouldn't have to worry about crowds. :D
We might give it a go then! :P My friend's fave character is Prince John, so I'll hold off telling her that you met him in Cafe Mickey, just incase we don't meet him as well. We're still torn between Cafe Mickey and The Lucky Nugget Saloon. We had a character meal there in January and it was great! But then, that was an all you can eat buffet, which I'm not sure Cafe Mickey is.
Thanks for this great update with some great photos and a lot of lovely stories :)
It has been very nice for me to read and now I am even more ready for my trip next week!
Quote from: "Aveen2008"me relaxing on the very comfy bed and the duvets which I loved...
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Aveen , did you get this top from ASDA for £5-£6 ? I really want to get it . Love the trip report ! x
Hey
yeah I did get it from asda lol I think it was about £8 at the time it was about a month or so ago maybe more :D
Great finale Aveen, and a lot of money spent in the process.. :shock: :D
Thanks for sharing your experience.. :wink: :D
Thanks for posting your great trip report :) it was lovely to read because, as I have said elsewhere, we were there the exact same dates as you and also staying in HNY!
it's a shame you didn't like the breakfast in HNy - we loved it! Except on the Friday when it was in the horrible conference centre for some reason and was cold.
It's also too bad you had bad experiences with cast members. We were so impressed with almost all of them....except the waiters in Cafe Mickey who tried to chat us up and take us out dancing in Paris! yuck - not what you expect in Disneyland at all, we were affronted!
I wish I had the technical savvy to post my own trip report, but I don't even know how to put photos in a post.
Thanks again for your nice detailed report, I tried hard but couldnt find myself in any of your photos lol.
If you can't add photos why not write up a trip report, it would still be great to read!:)
Putting photos into a post isn't hard..once you have learnt to do it you will realise how easy it is.
All you need to do is: upload (fancy word for add) your photos to a site such as http://www.photobucket.com (http://www.photobucket.com) - it is free, you simply just join.
once you have done that you can come on here and start a post, just like you normally do.
When you get to a space where you want to add a photo, go to photobucket (have it open in another screen from the one your typing in).
Then find the photo you want out of the photos you have uploaded.
If you hover your mouse over the photo you will see a little list comes up with Email & IM, Direct link, HTML code and IMG code. What you want is the IMG code so go down to it and click on it - it should turn blue (meaning it's highlighted) then right click on it and click copy.
Then come back to the screen on the forum where you wanted to enter the photo and just right click and paste and that's it the photo will appear in your post :D
OR
If you go to your photo and you do not see the little list with the various codes then all you need to do is click on the small image of your photo to make it come up fully on the screen. Then right click on it and go to 'properties'. A small screen will pop up. Go to where it says Address (URL),
copy the address it will start with http and end with a number.
Then come back onto your forum screen where you want to enter the photo and type [ i m g ] then paste in your address which you copied and type[ / i m g ] no spaces required i just had to put in spaces so it wouldn't show up werid when typing this
give it a go :D
Thanks so much for the tips Aveen...think I will give it a try! Might take me a few days but I'll get there! it will be fun to remember my trip, though I'm still a bit sad to be home.
Quote from: "loladelorean"Thanks so much for the tips Aveen...think I will give it a try! Might take me a few days but I'll get there! it will be fun to remember my trip, though I'm still a bit sad to be home.
me2 I wish i was back there already! :(
awwwwwwww its all done!!!! :cry: I really enjoyed it...paul was reading some last night too!!!!!! :)
Quote from: "Simbasgirl"awwwwwwww its all done!!!! :cry: I really enjoyed it...paul was reading some last night too!!!!!! :)
i'm kinda sad too that it's over:( i posted it on your forum too last night it took ages even though it was mainly copying and pasting! Hey to Paul *waves* hehe! :P :D/
Thanks for sharing your hols with us :) Loved it all =D>
Quote from: "Epcot_Boy"Thanks for sharing your hols with us :) Loved it all =D>
aw thanks! :D
Hi Aveen2008,
thanks for your trip report. I really enjoyed reading your trip report over the past days. It looks like you and your mum had a great time at DLRP. I'm sorry about your pin trading experiences. I also collect pins, but I'm not a trader.
Thanks again for your trip report.
Thank you for the trip report. It was Brilliant. I loved reading it. :D
A big thanks for sharing Aveen!! Enjoyed it! :D
Quote from: "loladelorean"Thanks for posting your great trip report :) it was lovely to read because, as I have said elsewhere, we were there the exact same dates as you and also staying in HNY!
it's a shame you didn't like the breakfast in HNy - we loved it! Except on the Friday when it was in the horrible conference centre for some reason and was cold.
It's also too bad you had bad experiences with cast members. We were so impressed with almost all of them....except the waiters in Cafe Mickey who tried to chat us up and take us out dancing in Paris! yuck - not what you expect in Disneyland at all, we were affronted!
I wish I had the technical savvy to post my own trip report, but I don't even know how to put photos in a post.
Thanks again for your nice detailed report, I tried hard but couldnt find myself in any of your photos lol.
You don't have to have pictures to make a great trip report, it's everyones experience that I'm interested in. It's good to see Disneyland from someone else's perspective and I've found things out and done things in the park that I would never normally do otherwise. Last time I went I dragged my boyfriend round the caves of adventureland for hours trying desperately to find the throne that I had seen in a trip report! If you've got a facebook account you can also send people a public link to view the photos.
Aveen: Great report, I replied in your day four post (I think!!), I've got a good hint for beating the scrum around characters fairly if you want to give it a look! It looks like you and your mum had a fab time
Quote from: "jeakat24"Quote from: "loladelorean"I wish I had the technical savvy to post my own trip report, but I don't even know how to put photos in a post.
Thanks again for your nice detailed report, I tried hard but couldnt find myself in any of your photos lol.
You don't have to have pictures to make a great trip report, it's everyones experience that I'm interested in. It's good to see Disneyland from someone else's perspective and I've found things out and done things in the park that I would never normally do otherwise. Last time I went I dragged my boyfriend round the caves of adventureland for hours trying desperately to find the throne that I had seen in a trip report! If you've got a facebook account you can also send people a public link to view the photos.
Thanks jeakat, obviously I got over my apprehension and my own trip report is now underway! I like reading the reports too, but I think photos provide colourful punctuation to the text, and lend the report a wider dimension. So much about DLP is visual, so putting my photos in was quite important to me.
Thanks to Aveen, I know now how easy it is to do! Hopefully the trip reports I'm creating now are enjoyable to read and look at, I've been getting kind feedback so I think they are. Thanks for the encouragement here jeakat, I dunno if you'll find any advice in my report but I hope you enjoy it all the same!!
You're welcome loladelorean! I have now read the first three parts of your trip reports and they're great, I can't wait for the next installment!
I agree that the pictures do punctuate the text and they are always good to see but I guess I'm just a sucker for a good story! Your photo's are great by the way, I always look at other peoples photos with a hint of jealousy that I can't take any that good, but I've also had a few good comments about mine, I think very few of us are actual pro's but I think it's really hard to manage to take a bad photo of Disneyland!! :D
Quote from: "jeakat24"You're welcome loladelorean! I have now read the first three parts of your trip reports and they're great, I can't wait for the next installment!
I agree that the pictures do punctuate the text and they are always good to see but I guess I'm just a sucker for a good story! Your photo's are great by the way, I always look at other peoples photos with a hint of jealousy that I can't take any that good, but I've also had a few good comments about mine, I think very few of us are actual pro's but I think it's really hard to manage to take a bad photo of Disneyland!! :D
I think this is true about the photos! I'm always really jealous of the amazing photos people post on here, but I just don't have the eye for it. As you say, every photo is good of Disneyland. My boyfriend is a great photographer....but he won't come to Disneyland with me :( (trust me I'm working on it!)
I was hoping to get the next bit of my report done today but I'm not sure I'll have time now, got loads of uni work then working tonight. It will be up before the end of the weekend though! It's really nice to get good feedback from people so thanks jeakat and everyone else :D
Thanks for the great trip report. Looks like you had a lot fun.