Greg Lembrich
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Feb 26, 2018
Greetings fellow DISers. This is my third trip report, and it will chronicle the adventures that my daughter and I had on our June 2019 trip to Tokyo Disney. I hope you will come along for the ride(s).
My daughter Caroline and I both adore the Disney parks and love experiencing amusement parks and rides together. We have been to WDW together three times, the most recent for Spring Break 2018, and also went to California in April 2019 for an epic Spring Break trip to DL, DCA, Magic Mountain, and Knott's Berry Farm. Links to my TRs from those trips are in my signature below. One of the goals we have when going to Disney parks is to ride every ride operating at each park when we visit. After successfully doing this at all the US parks, we started talking about eventually visiting all of the Disney parks in the world and riding every ride.
My wife travels regularly for work, including frequent international travel. One of her annual business trips is to Tokyo in early summer. Neither my daughter nor I had ever traveled to Asia, so this year we were able to join her on the trip and check out our first international Disney parks. The timing was great, since my wife's work obligations fell on the calendar right after my daughter's school year ended, so it was a perfect time for a family vacation. My daughter and I could spend 3 days at the parks while my wife was working, and then we could all spend the weekend sightseeing around Tokyo together.
I am an obsessive planner, especially when it comes to vacations, and I truly go into hyper mode when it comes to Disney. I read several books and websites to do research on Tokyo Disneyland and DisneySea, as well as checking out this Tokyo board here on the DIS. TDR presented some challenges that were different from our prior trips, including the lack of digital FPs via MDE or MaxPass, a language barrier (neither my daughter nor I speak any Japanese), and needing to travel to the parks via mass transit (since we stayed in downtown Tokyo, quite a distance from TDR). But overall we found TDR pretty easy to navigate, the CMs were outstanding, and we had a great time. I welcome you to come along as I recount our journey, with lots of recaps, reviews, tips, and photos along the way.
Here are the basics for our trip:
Who? Greg/Dad (41) and Caroline/Daughter (8), from New Jersey
When? June 23, 2019 through July 1, 2019. We departed from Newark on Sunday June 23, and flew back from Narita on Monday July 1. We did 3 park days at TDR from Tuesday June 25 through Thursday June 27.
Where? We stayed at the Prince Sakura Tower hotel in Shinagawa for our whole trip. This was convenient for my wife's work that week, but was right across from the Shinagawa station, giving us easy access to the Yamanote (JY) line and Tokyo station (including the transfer to go to TDR), Shibuya, and Shinjuku.
How? We flew on United from Newark to Narita, where we took an express bus to our hotel in Tokyo. We traveled back and forth to TDR by rail by taking the Yamanote line from Shinagawa to Tokyo Station and the Keiyo (JE) line from Tokyo Station to Maihama.
What? We spent 3 full days at TDR, visiting both Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo DisneySea. Our goal was to ride all 36 operating rides at the parks, including re-riding any new favorites, as well as to see the other attractions around the parks and soak up the atmosphere.
My daughter Caroline and I both adore the Disney parks and love experiencing amusement parks and rides together. We have been to WDW together three times, the most recent for Spring Break 2018, and also went to California in April 2019 for an epic Spring Break trip to DL, DCA, Magic Mountain, and Knott's Berry Farm. Links to my TRs from those trips are in my signature below. One of the goals we have when going to Disney parks is to ride every ride operating at each park when we visit. After successfully doing this at all the US parks, we started talking about eventually visiting all of the Disney parks in the world and riding every ride.
My wife travels regularly for work, including frequent international travel. One of her annual business trips is to Tokyo in early summer. Neither my daughter nor I had ever traveled to Asia, so this year we were able to join her on the trip and check out our first international Disney parks. The timing was great, since my wife's work obligations fell on the calendar right after my daughter's school year ended, so it was a perfect time for a family vacation. My daughter and I could spend 3 days at the parks while my wife was working, and then we could all spend the weekend sightseeing around Tokyo together.
I am an obsessive planner, especially when it comes to vacations, and I truly go into hyper mode when it comes to Disney. I read several books and websites to do research on Tokyo Disneyland and DisneySea, as well as checking out this Tokyo board here on the DIS. TDR presented some challenges that were different from our prior trips, including the lack of digital FPs via MDE or MaxPass, a language barrier (neither my daughter nor I speak any Japanese), and needing to travel to the parks via mass transit (since we stayed in downtown Tokyo, quite a distance from TDR). But overall we found TDR pretty easy to navigate, the CMs were outstanding, and we had a great time. I welcome you to come along as I recount our journey, with lots of recaps, reviews, tips, and photos along the way.
Here are the basics for our trip:
Who? Greg/Dad (41) and Caroline/Daughter (8), from New Jersey
When? June 23, 2019 through July 1, 2019. We departed from Newark on Sunday June 23, and flew back from Narita on Monday July 1. We did 3 park days at TDR from Tuesday June 25 through Thursday June 27.
Where? We stayed at the Prince Sakura Tower hotel in Shinagawa for our whole trip. This was convenient for my wife's work that week, but was right across from the Shinagawa station, giving us easy access to the Yamanote (JY) line and Tokyo station (including the transfer to go to TDR), Shibuya, and Shinjuku.
How? We flew on United from Newark to Narita, where we took an express bus to our hotel in Tokyo. We traveled back and forth to TDR by rail by taking the Yamanote line from Shinagawa to Tokyo Station and the Keiyo (JE) line from Tokyo Station to Maihama.
What? We spent 3 full days at TDR, visiting both Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo DisneySea. Our goal was to ride all 36 operating rides at the parks, including re-riding any new favorites, as well as to see the other attractions around the parks and soak up the atmosphere.
Last edited: