Our 25th at the DLH - Day 1

Ms Poppins

I'm sure I'm very affected by all this Disney talk
Joined
Mar 14, 2009
Pre-trippie

The Cast

Me – Julie 44
DH – John 48

Day 1

Monday 25 February 2019

We left home around 9am and our wonderful chauffeur daughter dropped us off at the airport which is only about 15 minutes away from our home. Security was quick and we were soon enjoying some breakfast whilst waiting on our flight.

Flight took off a little late but we made up the time and were soon landing on time in Paris. Passport control was quick and with no luggage we were through baggage claim and meeting our driver from Ezyshuttle within 20 minutes of landing.

The weather was absolutely beautiful, the blue of the sky didn’t seem real. We’ve used Ezyshuttle so many times now, their timekeeping is impeccable and we always seem to go a slightly different route to Disney. Usually we see Space Mountain first but today the Panoramagique balloon was the first thing we noticed. Just an hour after landing we were driving through the gates of the Disneyland Hotel :cheer2:

Check in at the hotel was quick and the receptionist gave us directions to our room, which was on the second floor. This is the same floor as the restaurants/shop etc so quite handy. It was just before 3pm now so our room was ready.

I’d emailed the hotel a few days before and asked for a nicely situated room if possible with just one bed instead of the normal two. I’d hoped for a seating area if we didn’t have the second bed.

Our room was beautiful and just what I’d asked for – 3220. It was a corner room with a huge bed and seating area. There were some roses, water and a bottle of champagne chilling for us, such a lovely surprise.

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I just love the décor in these rooms, even if some consider them a bit dated, I think the Victorian theme of the hotel lends itself perfectly. I’ll do a full hotel review later.

Bags dropped, we headed to the park through the perfectly located exit door of the hotel.

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The park looked stunning in the sun.
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We were a tad hungry but didn’t want to eat a full meal as we had Plaza Gardens booked for 5pm so we enjoyed the Main St sunshine on our way to the Cable Car Bake Shop.

I really like it in here. We enjoyed our sit down, drinks and a chocolate muffin each.

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First look of the beautiful castle..

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We headed through the castle and had a look round Fantasyland. I couldn’t believe how busy it was. I know it was a French school holiday, but I’m guessing the good weather maybe brought more people than usual out. Wandering into Adventureland the wait time for Pirates was 40 minutes which we didn’t wait for so we strolled around instead.

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The Pirate Ship looking lovely, would have liked to see this open today.

As we made our way back to the hub we decided to just do some shopping before dinner and then noticed the Princess and Pirate Parade had started, so we stopped at the top of Main St to watch. The colours of the floats were so vibrant.

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We watched for a while then headed into the shops, not bothering with the show at the hub.

I’d missed Lilly’s boutique when we were here last so spent some time in here and picked up a tea light candle holder I wanted and some tea towels. I really love this area on Main St. The buildings and shop windows are so nice.


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When we'd finished the Pirates were making their way down Main St.

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I really enjoyed the parade although I think you'd need to stand in a few different places to see everything as the pirates and princess floats come in opposite directions before meeting at the hub. We were happy with the bits we caught and the tune was very catchy.

Feeling hungry, it was now time for our reservation at Plaza Gardens.

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Cost for the unlimited buffet is 34.99 per adult and includes unlimited soft drinks.

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It wasn’t very busy so we were seated quickly and were soon tucking into our food.

Honestly, I wasn’t blown away by the main meal options this time. I had some pork which was nice, rice, and small roast potatoes. We had a much better selection before. DH loved it and found loads of things to his taste, pizza, lamb casserole, rice, roast chicken and loads more. I kind of expected to get some salmon which seems to always have been in every Disney buffet I've ever been to, but wasn't here today.

One of my luxuries that I look forward to at Disneyland is the desserts. Today I had some black forest gateaux, pirate cake and a raspberry and almond tart – oh and a separate bowl with the delicious crème anglaise that I adore……this all made up for me not finding much else.

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DH was happy with his vanilla Cornetto- it's a running joke we have that no matter where we eat, he always wants vanilla ice cream as a dessert

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Full up, we left here and spoke to the kids in their various locations from outside Plaza Gardens and then made our way to the Studios.

Since our room was literally on our way, we nipped back to drop off our shopping and noticed that we’d had turn down service. Some nice wee chocolates on the bed.

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I love the Studios at night and seeing everything lit up, doesn’t happen often so I was happy to learn that the park was open until 19:30.

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There are boards up all the way from Art of Animation (which I know is closed forever now) right round past the Cars ride.

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First stop as ever was to Ratatoullie. Beautifully lit again the whole area is stunning. Lots of food stalls selling various food and drink, the crepe stall was always the busiest, lol.

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Nice new wee photo location

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Ratatoullie was showing a 10 minute wait for single riders so we joined the queue and didn’t wait long before we were on.

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We wandered Toy Story Playland
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And hopped aboard Slinky showing a 5 minute wait. No dancing!

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Next up was the Flying Carpets which would have been a walk on but someone leaving the ride dropped something between the carpets so they took some time to look about for the missing item. We didn’t wait long.

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We wandered over to the Hollywood Tower of Terror and waited to see the start of the Star Wars show.

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We are't big Star Wars Fans but our boys are so I recorded the beginning of it for them before we agreed to hit the shops instead, lol.

After we left the park we wandered the village shops and popped into Starbucks to get the Studios mug for our daughter, Abbey. We’d picked up the Disneyland Park one last time.

Disneyland Hotel looking stunning

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Tired now we headed back to the hotel and settled down to watch some stuff we’d downloaded to the ipad. Sleep was not long coming.
 



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