1st Disneyland Paris Trip November 2019

Erzengel

DIS Veteran
Joined
Apr 4, 2014
A little backstory. Wife and I are big Disney fans. We got married at Disney and we go as much as we can because we have family in Florida. We've been going to Disney World since before we met each other. We started branching out a few years ago by going to Disneyland in California.

We had a 7 day group tour of Amsterdam, Bruges and Paris. At the end of our tour, we stayed 3 extra days to do Disneyland Paris.

First we stayed at the good neighbor Hotel, I'Elysee Val d'Europe. It's a very nice boutique hotel. With a bar and place to eat downstairs. There is a bus stop across the street and it took less than 8 minutes to get to the park. The place was pretty economical and we had no complaints about the hotel. It was very clean, centrally located place to stay. Depending on the season, the bus picked you up twice an hour and from the park twice an hour until 11:45 PM. Breakfast was additional and we added it and it's the typical breakfast buffet you get at hotels.

Personally, we like to enjoy Disney on the weekdays to avoid crowds but because of the way our group tour ended, we had to do Friday through Sunday.

Friday - November 15
We got to Disney Movie Studios and it's cold. Very cold. It snowed. It's the first time I've ever been in a Disney Park when it snowed. Crush was closed. It felt too cold to go on RC Racer. We did the Big Bang Noel show, Ratatouille (Which we loved. Hope that this is the one that is coming to Epcot) We did a Frozen live action show, a Frozen 2 sneak preview) and the Back Lot tour. We missed Tower of Terror as it closes an hour and a half so they can utilize the attraction as a backdrop for a show. We left early to check into our hotel and then to Disney Village for the Wild West Show which was very enjoyable.

Saturday - November 16
We travel to Disneyland Park. It's not as cold today but I go through the day putting on and off my hat. We do every ride. Hyperspace Mountain, Star Tours, Pirates, Phantom Mansion, Buzz-Lightyear Laser Blast, Big Thunder Mountain, Snow White, Pinocchio & It's a Small World.

Indiana Jones was permanently closed. Railroad wasn't operational.

Overall, I loved loved, Hyperspace Mountain. I've been on the ones in obviously WDW and DL and this has been my favorite so far because it goes upside down.

Star Tours, I finally got Kylo Ren, Jakku & Crait of course in French. We just ate at Pinocchios for dinner and the counter service was good.

We finished the night watching the Illuminations which was very well done. I have a feeling their fireworks can't be as intense at say WDW because of noise restrictions.

Sunday - November 17
This was clean-up day. We did both parks again. We did Tower of Terror, RC Racer and Crush's ride at DS and Peter Pan and redid rides like Hyperspace Mountain and Star Tours again. We ate at Captain Jack's but it was jarring because they had an issue with the Pirates ride so they had to turn on the house lights. The food was decent.

Overall Reaction

We really enjoyed Disneyland Paris. They have some really great rides and we'd like to go back when they add the Marvel aspects and hotel. As I said Hyperspace Mountain was my favorite. But I loved Crush's and Ratatouille. There were slight differences between a lot of the other rides but we enjoyed trying to find the differences.

The food, we were warned from reading sites like here that it wasn't to the standard of WDW. Maybe it was because we had low expectations but the food was decent just not what we were use to. There were some highlights like the Han in Carbonite shortbread and Christmas Tree ginger trees.

Some pet peeves, were the lack of buttons like "First Time to Disneyland Paris", trading pins are not as big here. No magicbands, still paper fastpasses and having to call or go to Customer Service to make dining reservations. No fastpasses for rides like Crush and rides being down in general. And of course the European smoking takes a lot of getting use to.

Personally, again we'd go back but DLP. It's a must do for any Disney Park fan but I don't think we'd ever just come here as a reason to go. If we are near Paris in the future, we'd consider it.
 

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