RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
It was an incredible day and the park is amazing! You're welcome for the detail - it's really the only way I know how to do things
An Asian Disney and Universal Adventure - Trip Report COMPLETED 6/23
- Thread starter RachelleBeaney
- Start date
It was an incredible day and the park is amazing! You're welcome for the detail - it's really the only way I know how to do things
RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
Just found your trip report. Really enjoying it. I'll have to go back and read your older reports while I wait for new posts on this one!
I'm glad you found us, it's great to have you reading along
Will try and post regular updates but yes, I think my older reports are worth reading too Hopefully they help take you to the wonderful world of Disney - that's why I read reports here, in between trips!
RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
Day 9 - Part 1 - Our worst Disney Day!
Because of how good we'd had it on Thursday with crowds at the park, we had decided to relax our schedule this morning, leaving the hotel at 8:10am for a 9am opening, getting to the park about 8:20am. With the crowds we'd experienced the afternoon before we figured it wasn't a busy time at the park. We were wrong in our thinking! I don't know why, but from one Thursday to the next day, Friday, things changed so much. The Spring Festival (Chinese New Year) crowds suddenly appeared at the park! It took us 40 minutes to get through the security check point and in the gates, we got in right as the park opened but missed rope drop completely and were behind enormous crowds already streaming into the park!
I did forget to mention, the day before at the ticketing gate we discovered another stupid mis-managed process at Shanghai Disneyland. We had a ticket voucher we booked online, but we needed proper tickets to get into the park, and there was no guest services area to exchange the tickets. After finding a CM to ask we were told this would be done at the entry gate, which would have been fine, except there was a whole process the staff at the entry gate was required to do to provide you you're tickets (including checking your Passport). Because of this the lines to enter the park moved SO slowly! It would make much more sense to have a separate line at a Guest Services or a Ticketing window for this part of the process (like other parks!). In addition, as we were visiting for two lots of 2 days (you can only buy up to 2 day passes, and all passes are dated) we would have to do this again when we went in on Sunday! The process is also further complicated as staff have to check the dates of your ticket to make sure they match the actual date of visit. Anyway, we didn't have to go through this process the second day, but many other people did, so of course the lines moved ridiculous slowly!
Anyway, we had finally gotten into the park and we thought we'd try go to get Fastpasses for Soaring Over the Horizon, as we knew it was the longest wait in the park. For some reason that particular day Faspass distribution wasn't available, and the wait for the attraction was already 120 minutes! So we decided to skip it and instead make it a priority the next day (we knew thanks to signage Fastpass would be up and running again the next day (Sunday), and we already had plans to show up much earlier the next morning!).
After wasting time finding out there were no Soaring Fastpasses available we headed over to our second preference Fastpass, Seven Dwarves Mine Train. This had the second longest waits during our visit (Roaring Rapids was closed) and was usually longer than TRON, plus we'd experienced TRON the night before. We cut through Gardens of Imagination to get to Fantasyland and saw something that made our stressed out selves smile - a leaf Mickey!
We got to the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train Fastpass distribution station, but of course it was well past opening by now and there was a long wait. It took us about 15 minutes to get the Fastpass. Like I said, it was really silly that they only had 1 Fastpass distribution area in each land/area - well they actually had two in Fantasyland but rather than splitting the attractions across them (i.e. Seven Dwarfs on one - as it was most popular, and Peter Pan and Winnie the Pooh on the other), everything was on both! In addition there were only 7 distribution machines at the second Fantasyland Guest Services location (where we were) so it's no wonder distribution went so slowly! Plus, the Chinese guests seemed really confused how to work the machines, and the system was way more complicated then it needed to be (especially with multiple choices for the ride you wanted)! Anyway, we finally managed a Fastpass and the strangest thing happened, something that has never happened to me before. We must have been on the cusp of a new Fastpass distribution window because my ticket got a Fastpass for 11:55am - 12:55am and Jared's got 12:00pm - 1:00pm. It wasn't really a big deal, we just both waited until after 12, but it was such an interesting thing to see I had to take a picture!
At this point the SDL wait times app told us TRON was still only at 10 minutes, so we decided to rush over to ride it. On our way through we did notice that the Fantasyland attractions (other than Seven Dwarves Mine Train) were still only posting 5 minute waits. When we got to TRON however the wait was at 30 minutes (turns out we hadn't refreshed the app
) and we decided we didn't want to wait that long just now, so we thought we'd head back to Fantasyland where Peter Pan had only posted a 5 minute wait. Of course by the time we got back the wait was 20 minutes! We were a little annoyed with ourselves here as we could have avoided a longer wait by just refreshing the app! Then we became even more annoyed when we saw guests going under ropes in the queue to skip past people in the line. As we got towards the end of the queue one lady even opened a closed gate and skipped nearly 70% of the line! After that she was on the phone to other people in her party trying to get them to do the same. When they didn't get to the gate before she was out of site of it to show them where to enter the line, she left her daughter (who was maybe 8 or 9) alone in line and was then not with her when she got to the front of the queue! The CM's had to make her wait until her mum caught up! So much of this fumed me! Not only did they blatantly try and bend the rules that applied to everyone else for them (i.e. we all had to wait in that line!), she then abandoned her daughter to try and help other people skip the wait too! This was without a doubt the worst instance of line cutting we saw in the parks, and it made me wonder why there weren't more CM's policing these gates and roped off areas (the gate in question was literally right next to the attraction entrance!). I would have said something to this lady but I don't speak Mandarin, and the other guests in line didn't seem to care!
We rode Peter Pan only once on the trip, thanks to consistently long lines and our lack of concern at prioritising it as the first or second Fastpass of the day. The attraction was definitely an improvement on the US versions, the movement of the figures (some of which were AA's) and the integration of screens and other effects really added to the experience of what is already one of my favourite Disney dark rides! The 'rollercoaster' style track they used also seemed to add smoother movement, and allowed you to speed up and slow down easier depending on the scene you were visiting. I wish I had gotten to ride this attraction again, as it hasn't stuck in my head as much as other rides at the park!
After the ride I realised I had left certain feminine hygiene products required for the day in the hotel room! The day had pretty much been a disaster already up to this point, and I felt like a complete failure as I knew if I had planned for busier crowds, gotten to the park early, and not forgotten something in the hotel it wouldn't have been as bad! Still when planning for Shanghai Disney I didn't have any idea the kind of crowds we'd be facing in mid-January (honestly I had thought with actual Chinese New Year being at the end of the month it would still be ok, I didn't know about the Spring Festival holiday). So I was pretty distraught realising we'd have to go back to the hotel (because there was no where in the part that sold/distributed these products!). We left the park at 10:30am, and lines were still crazy for people trying to enter the park. When we came back we decided to eat lunch at Downtown Disney because it would be less manic. We also thought it would allow the crowds of people still waiting to get into the park to die down. It didn't really, and we had a bit of a wait to get back into the park! We planned to try for a TRON Fastpass before heading to our Seven Dwarves Mine Train Fasspass, but when we got to the Fastpass Distribution area there were people EVERYWHERE, the line looked ridiculously long, the passes weren't until 7-8pm, and we were about to miss our Seven Dwarves Mine Train Fasspass window so we sadly hurried into Fantasyland without a pass.
When we got to Seven Dwarves Mine Train the wait was 150 minutes, so we at least felt we could make good use of the one Fastpass we had gotten for the day! We only had to wait 15 minutes so this Fastpass was well worth it.
The ride itself was very similar to the US version, though with a different end scene and different views on the outside portion of the ride (the inside portion was the same I believe). We love this ride, it's great fun, so we enjoyed ourselves on it!
When we exited Seven Dwarves Mine Train the crowds had become oppressive!! They only time I've ever felt that pegged in and crowded was in Tokyo on a previous trip to the Senso-Ji Temple on a public holiday called Culture Day. There, the narrow walkway to the temple was overrun with Japanese visiting the temple to celebrate the festival, but the crowd levels were in part due to the narrowness of the path. Here, the paths were wide with plenty of space for crowds, however this day even the space provided by Disney for the crowds of Shanghai did not seem adequate! Here is a shot of the walkway through Fantasyland. Yes, this is a walkway and is not comprised of lines or people waiting for anything, just simply people moving from point A to point B!
We headed over to Pirates of the Caribbean to find it down (seriously we were having the worst run of luck this day). By this point I was thoroughly overwhelmed by the crowds, completely depressed by the disaster that was this day and so confused how the wait times could be as high as some of the waits I'd seen on the app during opening week! After resting in Treasure Cove for a while we decided we couldn't cope with my more this day and for the first time ever we decided to ditch out on a Disney park early! It was really that bad! After a bit more thought we decided we'd at least stay to watch some shows, and get them out the way, as I had heard with the huge capacity of Shanghai Disneyland's theatre's it was pretty easy to see shows at the park! We went to get into the 1:30pm show (at 1) but it was completely full, so we decided to take pictures around Treasure Cove while we waited for the 2pm show. There was also a showing of Tarzan at 3:45, so we decided we'd do both those shows and then head out.
The picture taking was actually fun, though it wasn't the best day for it, and it relaxed me again!
We found a Photopass photographer in Treasure Cove, which was great!
Once again they were great at coming up with poses for us to try. This one was supposed to be a heart I think!
Continued in Next Post...
Because of how good we'd had it on Thursday with crowds at the park, we had decided to relax our schedule this morning, leaving the hotel at 8:10am for a 9am opening, getting to the park about 8:20am. With the crowds we'd experienced the afternoon before we figured it wasn't a busy time at the park. We were wrong in our thinking! I don't know why, but from one Thursday to the next day, Friday, things changed so much. The Spring Festival (Chinese New Year) crowds suddenly appeared at the park! It took us 40 minutes to get through the security check point and in the gates, we got in right as the park opened but missed rope drop completely and were behind enormous crowds already streaming into the park!
I did forget to mention, the day before at the ticketing gate we discovered another stupid mis-managed process at Shanghai Disneyland. We had a ticket voucher we booked online, but we needed proper tickets to get into the park, and there was no guest services area to exchange the tickets. After finding a CM to ask we were told this would be done at the entry gate, which would have been fine, except there was a whole process the staff at the entry gate was required to do to provide you you're tickets (including checking your Passport). Because of this the lines to enter the park moved SO slowly! It would make much more sense to have a separate line at a Guest Services or a Ticketing window for this part of the process (like other parks!). In addition, as we were visiting for two lots of 2 days (you can only buy up to 2 day passes, and all passes are dated) we would have to do this again when we went in on Sunday! The process is also further complicated as staff have to check the dates of your ticket to make sure they match the actual date of visit. Anyway, we didn't have to go through this process the second day, but many other people did, so of course the lines moved ridiculous slowly!
Anyway, we had finally gotten into the park and we thought we'd try go to get Fastpasses for Soaring Over the Horizon, as we knew it was the longest wait in the park. For some reason that particular day Faspass distribution wasn't available, and the wait for the attraction was already 120 minutes! So we decided to skip it and instead make it a priority the next day (we knew thanks to signage Fastpass would be up and running again the next day (Sunday), and we already had plans to show up much earlier the next morning!).
After wasting time finding out there were no Soaring Fastpasses available we headed over to our second preference Fastpass, Seven Dwarves Mine Train. This had the second longest waits during our visit (Roaring Rapids was closed) and was usually longer than TRON, plus we'd experienced TRON the night before. We cut through Gardens of Imagination to get to Fantasyland and saw something that made our stressed out selves smile - a leaf Mickey!
We got to the Seven Dwarfs Mine Train Fastpass distribution station, but of course it was well past opening by now and there was a long wait. It took us about 15 minutes to get the Fastpass. Like I said, it was really silly that they only had 1 Fastpass distribution area in each land/area - well they actually had two in Fantasyland but rather than splitting the attractions across them (i.e. Seven Dwarfs on one - as it was most popular, and Peter Pan and Winnie the Pooh on the other), everything was on both! In addition there were only 7 distribution machines at the second Fantasyland Guest Services location (where we were) so it's no wonder distribution went so slowly! Plus, the Chinese guests seemed really confused how to work the machines, and the system was way more complicated then it needed to be (especially with multiple choices for the ride you wanted)! Anyway, we finally managed a Fastpass and the strangest thing happened, something that has never happened to me before. We must have been on the cusp of a new Fastpass distribution window because my ticket got a Fastpass for 11:55am - 12:55am and Jared's got 12:00pm - 1:00pm. It wasn't really a big deal, we just both waited until after 12, but it was such an interesting thing to see I had to take a picture!
At this point the SDL wait times app told us TRON was still only at 10 minutes, so we decided to rush over to ride it. On our way through we did notice that the Fantasyland attractions (other than Seven Dwarves Mine Train) were still only posting 5 minute waits. When we got to TRON however the wait was at 30 minutes (turns out we hadn't refreshed the app
) and we decided we didn't want to wait that long just now, so we thought we'd head back to Fantasyland where Peter Pan had only posted a 5 minute wait. Of course by the time we got back the wait was 20 minutes! We were a little annoyed with ourselves here as we could have avoided a longer wait by just refreshing the app! Then we became even more annoyed when we saw guests going under ropes in the queue to skip past people in the line. As we got towards the end of the queue one lady even opened a closed gate and skipped nearly 70% of the line! After that she was on the phone to other people in her party trying to get them to do the same. When they didn't get to the gate before she was out of site of it to show them where to enter the line, she left her daughter (who was maybe 8 or 9) alone in line and was then not with her when she got to the front of the queue! The CM's had to make her wait until her mum caught up! So much of this fumed me! Not only did they blatantly try and bend the rules that applied to everyone else for them (i.e. we all had to wait in that line!), she then abandoned her daughter to try and help other people skip the wait too! This was without a doubt the worst instance of line cutting we saw in the parks, and it made me wonder why there weren't more CM's policing these gates and roped off areas (the gate in question was literally right next to the attraction entrance!). I would have said something to this lady but I don't speak Mandarin, and the other guests in line didn't seem to care!We rode Peter Pan only once on the trip, thanks to consistently long lines and our lack of concern at prioritising it as the first or second Fastpass of the day. The attraction was definitely an improvement on the US versions, the movement of the figures (some of which were AA's) and the integration of screens and other effects really added to the experience of what is already one of my favourite Disney dark rides! The 'rollercoaster' style track they used also seemed to add smoother movement, and allowed you to speed up and slow down easier depending on the scene you were visiting. I wish I had gotten to ride this attraction again, as it hasn't stuck in my head as much as other rides at the park!
After the ride I realised I had left certain feminine hygiene products required for the day in the hotel room! The day had pretty much been a disaster already up to this point, and I felt like a complete failure as I knew if I had planned for busier crowds, gotten to the park early, and not forgotten something in the hotel it wouldn't have been as bad! Still when planning for Shanghai Disney I didn't have any idea the kind of crowds we'd be facing in mid-January (honestly I had thought with actual Chinese New Year being at the end of the month it would still be ok, I didn't know about the Spring Festival holiday). So I was pretty distraught realising we'd have to go back to the hotel (because there was no where in the part that sold/distributed these products!). We left the park at 10:30am, and lines were still crazy for people trying to enter the park. When we came back we decided to eat lunch at Downtown Disney because it would be less manic. We also thought it would allow the crowds of people still waiting to get into the park to die down. It didn't really, and we had a bit of a wait to get back into the park! We planned to try for a TRON Fastpass before heading to our Seven Dwarves Mine Train Fasspass, but when we got to the Fastpass Distribution area there were people EVERYWHERE, the line looked ridiculously long, the passes weren't until 7-8pm, and we were about to miss our Seven Dwarves Mine Train Fasspass window so we sadly hurried into Fantasyland without a pass.
When we got to Seven Dwarves Mine Train the wait was 150 minutes, so we at least felt we could make good use of the one Fastpass we had gotten for the day! We only had to wait 15 minutes so this Fastpass was well worth it.
The ride itself was very similar to the US version, though with a different end scene and different views on the outside portion of the ride (the inside portion was the same I believe). We love this ride, it's great fun, so we enjoyed ourselves on it!
When we exited Seven Dwarves Mine Train the crowds had become oppressive!! They only time I've ever felt that pegged in and crowded was in Tokyo on a previous trip to the Senso-Ji Temple on a public holiday called Culture Day. There, the narrow walkway to the temple was overrun with Japanese visiting the temple to celebrate the festival, but the crowd levels were in part due to the narrowness of the path. Here, the paths were wide with plenty of space for crowds, however this day even the space provided by Disney for the crowds of Shanghai did not seem adequate! Here is a shot of the walkway through Fantasyland. Yes, this is a walkway and is not comprised of lines or people waiting for anything, just simply people moving from point A to point B!
We headed over to Pirates of the Caribbean to find it down (seriously we were having the worst run of luck this day). By this point I was thoroughly overwhelmed by the crowds, completely depressed by the disaster that was this day and so confused how the wait times could be as high as some of the waits I'd seen on the app during opening week! After resting in Treasure Cove for a while we decided we couldn't cope with my more this day and for the first time ever we decided to ditch out on a Disney park early! It was really that bad! After a bit more thought we decided we'd at least stay to watch some shows, and get them out the way, as I had heard with the huge capacity of Shanghai Disneyland's theatre's it was pretty easy to see shows at the park! We went to get into the 1:30pm show (at 1) but it was completely full, so we decided to take pictures around Treasure Cove while we waited for the 2pm show. There was also a showing of Tarzan at 3:45, so we decided we'd do both those shows and then head out.
The picture taking was actually fun, though it wasn't the best day for it, and it relaxed me again!
We found a Photopass photographer in Treasure Cove, which was great!
Once again they were great at coming up with poses for us to try. This one was supposed to be a heart I think!
Continued in Next Post...
Last edited:
LumosQ102
How many days left on the countdown?
- Joined
- Oct 16, 2011
Just discovered (well, over the weekend) and caught up on your trip report - I echo everyone else when I say that the photos are fantastic. Loving your writing too, its a journey I'm keen to take soon. Its good to have the full set!
Now, casting your mind back to the start of your TR and your evening Zoo trip - there is indeed another zoo that opens at night. Its not in a rainforest, but it is rather old and lovely - the London Zoo. You should stop by London when you visit Disneyland Paris.
Now, casting your mind back to the start of your TR and your evening Zoo trip - there is indeed another zoo that opens at night. Its not in a rainforest, but it is rather old and lovely - the London Zoo. You should stop by London when you visit Disneyland Paris.
RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
Just discovered (well, over the weekend) and caught up on your trip report - I echo everyone else when I say that the photos are fantastic. Loving your writing too, its a journey I'm keen to take soon. Its good to have the full set!
Now, casting your mind back to the start of your TR and your evening Zoo trip - there is indeed another zoo that opens at night. Its not in a rainforest, but it is rather old and lovely - the London Zoo. You should stop by London when you visit Disneyland Paris.
Thank you so much for joining in! I'm really enjoy the photos and my storytelling The Asian parks are definitely well worth a trip and the best part is that it is doable in one holiday! We still haven't gotten to Disneyland Paris but it's definitely on my wish list, as is London (how I yearn to go to London!) ... I didn't realise the zoo there was open at night so will definitely keep that in mind for when we visit
elcmum
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Mar 27, 2014
G'day! (From one Aussie to another!)
I love love love the photos and the storytelling! Thanks for sharing your experience -- even your frustration with your day in Shanghai. I hate when you want the best for a situation and everything else outside of your control just messes with your plans.
In another aside, I had to watch a YouTube video of the Tron ride. It looks AMAAZIINNNNNNG.
I love love love the photos and the storytelling! Thanks for sharing your experience -- even your frustration with your day in Shanghai. I hate when you want the best for a situation and everything else outside of your control just messes with your plans.
In another aside, I had to watch a YouTube video of the Tron ride. It looks AMAAZIINNNNNNG.
RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
Hi fellow Aussie
It's so lovely to have you here! Thanks for reading along - I'm glad you are enjoying it! Yes, that day in Shanghai was really frustrating but when I look back now I realise it was just one day and the rest of the trip (for the most part) was free of any issues (I did get a very bad chest infection which caused us to miss some fun but no more planning fails). It was terrible but we didn't let it ruin our experience of Shanghai Disney, and when I get to it and continue with the report you'll see the next few days we learned from our mistakes and managed to have a great time! TRON was amazing!! So amazing
RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
Day 9 - Part 2 - Pirates and Apes
So when we last left off we were renewing our very frustrated spirits with some photography of the beautiful Treasure Cove (probably the more beautiful area at Shanghai Disneyland in my opinion). We still had more time so we continued to take pictures.
Treasure Cove is so rich in detail, there are gags and hidden gems everywhere you look! The attention to detail was one of the reasons it became my favorite area of the park to spend time.
Like this, Fort Snobbish, dedicated to King George of Great Britain - that one really made me laugh!
Pirates of the Caribbean continued to remain down (we'd wander back towards it to check every now and then, hoping it might be up and we might get to hope in a really short and newly formed line for it!).
Soon though it was 1:30 and we thought we should line up for the 2pm showing of Captain Jack's Stunt Spectacular. I don't have a lot of pictures to show here so I'll start with a summary. It will be brief as the show was sort of meh in my opinion. It was all in Mandarin (obviously) so we couldn't understand what was going on and I suspect the humorous 'gags' explained by the cast would have added to our enjoyment of the production. There were one or two pretty cool stunts, but overall it was pretty boring for us, as we couldn't invest in the story of what was going on. There is one pretty amazing stunt in the show that makes it worth seeing (see pictures below), but only after you've done EVERYTHING else and only when you have time, and if you miss it, it wouldn't really be the end of the world.
After the show finished we headed straight over to Tarzan and were in line 45 minutes before the scheduled start of the show (still a little ways back and no where near the front of the line but better placed to get a good seat then we were for the stunt show, which, even turning up 30 minutes early, we only just got into).
This brings me to another example of really terrible crowd behaviour we witnessed at Shanghai Disneyland. In order to explain what was going on I'll need to outline the Tarzan theatre for you. It was almost a 'theatre in the round' type production, with a square stage with a viewing are at the front and on the left and right sides. The theatre was also HUGE, and has stadium seating probably about 20-30 rows high. As they started letting guests stream into the theatre for Tarzan all the guests were bee-lining for the centre rows in the centre section, however the CM's were blocking access to the main centre rows and asking guests to go around to the edge of each side of the centre section and file into each row (this made sense as it would eliminate people leaving gaps, as everyone would want to be as close to the centre as possible). Rather than doing as directed a whole group of people were trying to push there way past the 2-3 CM's blocking the central entrance to the seating! These poor CM's were yelling and screaming, and if the crowd had succeeded in pushing their way past them there would have been a good chance they would have been dead or gravely injured having tumbled down 20-30 steps! I had to give them credit for sticking to their guns and maintaining that barrier to the centre section as the onslaught of guests streamed into the theatre! They had their arms linked and were willing to put their safety on the line to get guests to follow the rules (my guess is that, had they put a rope up instead guests would have ignore it and gone under it anyway, hence why the need for a barrier of people!). I've never seen anything like it in a theme park before, I'm fairly certain it would break all kinds of OHS rules in the US parks, but none-the-less these CM's were determined to get guests into the theatre correctly!
Anyway Tarzan was INCREDIBLE! For the first time that awful awful day, which we watched on in awe, I felt the magic of Disney. Unlike Captain Jack's Stunt Spectacular, where understanding Mandarin was key to understanding the show, Tarzan was more artful and there was no real dialogue, only music and acrobatics, which told the story of Tarzan. The songs were also all in English, and it was great fun to sing along. There was a Mandarin narrator in parts of the show, probably explaining the story, however if you've seen Tarzan you'll know exactly what's going on. In addition to the fact you could actually understand what was happening here, this show had THE most incredible stunts and acrobatics I've ever seen in a Disney production! It was breath taking! Beautiful ribbon gymnastics (Tarzan and Jane were beautiful spinning and flying together), incredible stilt stunts (yes one man actually did multiple flips in the air on stilts landing on those stilts) and amazing Chinese acrobatics (there was a section where a pyramid of men jumped in unison over a jump rope). There was also lots of heart in the show, lots of drama, beautiful lighting and stage design, it just had it all! We loved it so much! Anyway, without any further rambling here our pictures of the show.
Continued in Next Post...
So when we last left off we were renewing our very frustrated spirits with some photography of the beautiful Treasure Cove (probably the more beautiful area at Shanghai Disneyland in my opinion). We still had more time so we continued to take pictures.
Treasure Cove is so rich in detail, there are gags and hidden gems everywhere you look! The attention to detail was one of the reasons it became my favorite area of the park to spend time.
Like this, Fort Snobbish, dedicated to King George of Great Britain - that one really made me laugh!
Pirates of the Caribbean continued to remain down (we'd wander back towards it to check every now and then, hoping it might be up and we might get to hope in a really short and newly formed line for it!).
Soon though it was 1:30 and we thought we should line up for the 2pm showing of Captain Jack's Stunt Spectacular. I don't have a lot of pictures to show here so I'll start with a summary. It will be brief as the show was sort of meh in my opinion. It was all in Mandarin (obviously) so we couldn't understand what was going on and I suspect the humorous 'gags' explained by the cast would have added to our enjoyment of the production. There were one or two pretty cool stunts, but overall it was pretty boring for us, as we couldn't invest in the story of what was going on. There is one pretty amazing stunt in the show that makes it worth seeing (see pictures below), but only after you've done EVERYTHING else and only when you have time, and if you miss it, it wouldn't really be the end of the world.
After the show finished we headed straight over to Tarzan and were in line 45 minutes before the scheduled start of the show (still a little ways back and no where near the front of the line but better placed to get a good seat then we were for the stunt show, which, even turning up 30 minutes early, we only just got into).
This brings me to another example of really terrible crowd behaviour we witnessed at Shanghai Disneyland. In order to explain what was going on I'll need to outline the Tarzan theatre for you. It was almost a 'theatre in the round' type production, with a square stage with a viewing are at the front and on the left and right sides. The theatre was also HUGE, and has stadium seating probably about 20-30 rows high. As they started letting guests stream into the theatre for Tarzan all the guests were bee-lining for the centre rows in the centre section, however the CM's were blocking access to the main centre rows and asking guests to go around to the edge of each side of the centre section and file into each row (this made sense as it would eliminate people leaving gaps, as everyone would want to be as close to the centre as possible). Rather than doing as directed a whole group of people were trying to push there way past the 2-3 CM's blocking the central entrance to the seating! These poor CM's were yelling and screaming, and if the crowd had succeeded in pushing their way past them there would have been a good chance they would have been dead or gravely injured having tumbled down 20-30 steps! I had to give them credit for sticking to their guns and maintaining that barrier to the centre section as the onslaught of guests streamed into the theatre! They had their arms linked and were willing to put their safety on the line to get guests to follow the rules (my guess is that, had they put a rope up instead guests would have ignore it and gone under it anyway, hence why the need for a barrier of people!). I've never seen anything like it in a theme park before, I'm fairly certain it would break all kinds of OHS rules in the US parks, but none-the-less these CM's were determined to get guests into the theatre correctly!
Anyway Tarzan was INCREDIBLE! For the first time that awful awful day, which we watched on in awe, I felt the magic of Disney. Unlike Captain Jack's Stunt Spectacular, where understanding Mandarin was key to understanding the show, Tarzan was more artful and there was no real dialogue, only music and acrobatics, which told the story of Tarzan. The songs were also all in English, and it was great fun to sing along. There was a Mandarin narrator in parts of the show, probably explaining the story, however if you've seen Tarzan you'll know exactly what's going on. In addition to the fact you could actually understand what was happening here, this show had THE most incredible stunts and acrobatics I've ever seen in a Disney production! It was breath taking! Beautiful ribbon gymnastics (Tarzan and Jane were beautiful spinning and flying together), incredible stilt stunts (yes one man actually did multiple flips in the air on stilts landing on those stilts) and amazing Chinese acrobatics (there was a section where a pyramid of men jumped in unison over a jump rope). There was also lots of heart in the show, lots of drama, beautiful lighting and stage design, it just had it all! We loved it so much! Anyway, without any further rambling here our pictures of the show.
Continued in Next Post...
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RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
Day 9 - Part 3 - In the Jungle
As we watched Tarzan, and I felt the emotion of the story, I'll admit to having a small breakdown of tears, in part from the beautiful emotion of the show, in part as a release of all my frustrations for the day! This beautiful production was wonderful therapy after a long, crazy, tiring and disappointing day and reminded by of why I love Disney theme parks so much, even when they frustrated and annoy me.
An example of some of the stunning lighting!
I would go so far as to state that the Tarzan show at Shanghai Disneyland is the best Disney stage show production I've seen in the parks, they did a fabulous job and it's well worth seeing if you visit!
Continued in Next Post...
As we watched Tarzan, and I felt the emotion of the story, I'll admit to having a small breakdown of tears, in part from the beautiful emotion of the show, in part as a release of all my frustrations for the day! This beautiful production was wonderful therapy after a long, crazy, tiring and disappointing day and reminded by of why I love Disney theme parks so much, even when they frustrated and annoy me.
An example of some of the stunning lighting!
I would go so far as to state that the Tarzan show at Shanghai Disneyland is the best Disney stage show production I've seen in the parks, they did a fabulous job and it's well worth seeing if you visit!
Continued in Next Post...
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RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
Day 9 - Part 4 - Golden Hour
Tarzan reinvigorated our spirits, and when we were done, and we saw that a beautiful golden light had begun to bath the park, we decided to nix our plans to leave right after the show and run around taking more photos. In addition, the clouds of fog had lifted and there were blue skies every which way you looked! We started off in the entrance to the Camp Discovery (a Adventure play area and rope course in the park) which has beautiful views of the ginormous Roaring River Rapids Mountain.
This post will mostly be pictures - because we took A LOT!
We actually found an empty path in the crazy business that was this awful day at Shanghai Disneyland!
We found another Photopass photographer in Adventure Isle - score!
Continued in Next Post...
Tarzan reinvigorated our spirits, and when we were done, and we saw that a beautiful golden light had begun to bath the park, we decided to nix our plans to leave right after the show and run around taking more photos. In addition, the clouds of fog had lifted and there were blue skies every which way you looked! We started off in the entrance to the Camp Discovery (a Adventure play area and rope course in the park) which has beautiful views of the ginormous Roaring River Rapids Mountain.
This post will mostly be pictures - because we took A LOT!
We actually found an empty path in the crazy business that was this awful day at Shanghai Disneyland!
We found another Photopass photographer in Adventure Isle - score!
Continued in Next Post...
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RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
Day 9 - Part 5 - We're still here!
We continued in run around photographing the park, the light was just so beautiful, and we all of a sudden had no need to escape the crowds while we were enjoying capture Shanghai Disneyland and all it's beauty! We headed into Treasure Cove...
From Treasure Cove were wandered into Gardens of Imagination. We spent a bit of time exploring the Wandering Moon Tea house, which was beautiful!
The sun was close to setting by this point and we managed a couple of sunset shots of the castle.
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We continued in run around photographing the park, the light was just so beautiful, and we all of a sudden had no need to escape the crowds while we were enjoying capture Shanghai Disneyland and all it's beauty! We headed into Treasure Cove...
From Treasure Cove were wandered into Gardens of Imagination. We spent a bit of time exploring the Wandering Moon Tea house, which was beautiful!
The sun was close to setting by this point and we managed a couple of sunset shots of the castle.
Continued in Next Post...
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RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
Day 9 - Part 6 - Our Worst Disney Day comes to an end, it ended well
For whatever reason, as much as we said we'd wanted to escape the park as soon as possible, we kept being drawn in by the beautiful light and areas to explore. The crowds didn't seem as bad by this point either, so we continued taking pictures as the sun set. We were back in Gardens of the Imagination, looking at the beautiful Chinese Zodiac Mosaics.
The castle really is spectacular!
Looking back towards Mickey Avenue from Gardens of the Imagination
Classifying Gardens of the Imagination as a land is going a bit far. As a 'themed area' of the park it doesn't really hold up. However, when considered the hub of the park it is magnificent, and without a doubt the best hub area designed by Disney, with plenty of delightful photo opportunities, and pathways from one place to another. The lagoon area is a really nice touch too, adding some water does make the whole area much more beautiful.
Then we were out and onto Mickey Avenue, making our way out of the park.
And we finally left, hours after we originally planned!
We headed into Downtown Disney for some dinner, and found a delightful Shanghai Disney version of a Tigger tail, yum!
And so ended our second day at Shanghai Disneyland. Even with all the drama and frustration our day didn't end up being that bad, and we still had a great time at the park!
Continued in Next Post...
For whatever reason, as much as we said we'd wanted to escape the park as soon as possible, we kept being drawn in by the beautiful light and areas to explore. The crowds didn't seem as bad by this point either, so we continued taking pictures as the sun set. We were back in Gardens of the Imagination, looking at the beautiful Chinese Zodiac Mosaics.
The castle really is spectacular!
Looking back towards Mickey Avenue from Gardens of the Imagination
Classifying Gardens of the Imagination as a land is going a bit far. As a 'themed area' of the park it doesn't really hold up. However, when considered the hub of the park it is magnificent, and without a doubt the best hub area designed by Disney, with plenty of delightful photo opportunities, and pathways from one place to another. The lagoon area is a really nice touch too, adding some water does make the whole area much more beautiful.
Then we were out and onto Mickey Avenue, making our way out of the park.
And we finally left, hours after we originally planned!
We headed into Downtown Disney for some dinner, and found a delightful Shanghai Disney version of a Tigger tail, yum!
And so ended our second day at Shanghai Disneyland. Even with all the drama and frustration our day didn't end up being that bad, and we still had a great time at the park!
Continued in Next Post...
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MickeysBelle
Earning My Ears
- Joined
- Apr 6, 2015
The castle looks amazing as well as the whole park.
Your trip is inspiring me to plan a similar trip in the future.
Glad to hear the day didn't end up too bad for you.
The Tarzan rocks show at Animal Kingdom was one of my favourite shows.
I was sad when it was replaced.
Your trip is inspiring me to plan a similar trip in the future.
Glad to hear the day didn't end up too bad for you.
The Tarzan rocks show at Animal Kingdom was one of my favourite shows.
I was sad when it was replaced.
RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
I'm glad I'm inspiring you to take a trip - the parks are amazing and so worth a visit for any true Disney park fan! They are really fun and different and new.
Yes, I guess the lesson for us was that even when things go badly you can still find joy in the small things (for us it was taking photos)...
I never saw Tarzan rocks at Animal Kingdom (a bit before my time of Disney travels I think) so I don't know how the two compare, but if you loved that I'm sure you'd love Tarzan at Shanghai Disneyland.
Aussie Wendy
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Jul 4, 2008
We just went to SDL and met Aurora in the Banquet Hall before going upstairs and seeing the rest of the MM crew so wonder why you didn't get a princess?
RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
Strange - perhaps they mix it up every now and then!
katt789
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Mar 14, 2010
Subbing in!!! We did an Asia all around trip last fall but certainly didn't do as much as y'all! We skipped the Universal's lol!!
THOSE PHOTOS ARE AMAZING!! I'm still kinda struggling with my nighttime shots, so I'm going to be that person and ask a million questions lol! What lens did you use for the night ones? Tripod or no? Also how late after close did you have to stay to get them so EMPTY?! THAT'S AMAZING!!
They're beautiful!!
Okay...back to reading now!
THOSE PHOTOS ARE AMAZING!! I'm still kinda struggling with my nighttime shots, so I'm going to be that person and ask a million questions lol! What lens did you use for the night ones? Tripod or no? Also how late after close did you have to stay to get them so EMPTY?! THAT'S AMAZING!!
They're beautiful!!
Okay...back to reading now!
katt789
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- Mar 14, 2010
Okay, so I will totally admit that I MAY be skipping the actual city parts right now, lol #sorry. Universal Singapore looks so cute! Amazing photos! And glad there's some different stuff there than the other parks, it looks super fun, even with it being smaller!
I LOVED HKDL, it's quietness and quaintness really made me love it, and to top it off Grizzly Gulch & Mystic Manor, like, WHAT AMAZING RIDES!! I'm SO happy we were vlogging while GG started to go backwards and caught us all by surprise! Lol. It's seriously amazing that the waits for those 2 are so little all the time!! Was there no wire work in FOLK?! The bird (white leotard outfit) came out of the floor/stage and up on a wire/silks when we were there! I really enjoyed the show, and I'm an HUGE LOVER of Folk at DAK, like, #1 fan, lol. It definitely had its differences, and the US version is by far my favorite, but the HK version definitely moved me, and the moving stage really blew me away! Amazing photos!! I really wish we'd gotten more of HKDL!!
Okay, onto Shanghai! Yay! I can't wait to hear what you thought about it!! I'm bummed we didn't get to stay onsite, although we saved a TON of money and it still only took us under 30 mins to get from our BnB to the front gate!
We definitely went to Cheesecake factory twice when we were there, (don’t have it in Canada either..) Love the Chinese New Years decorations!! UGH, we had SUCH struggles with photopass, though we were handing over our own camera, we seriously only dealt with it once and vowed not to again. UGH PIRATES YEEEESSSS I legitimately cried a single tear of happiness. I'm obsessed with all things pirates/POTC, the movies are my favorites, and the fact that SDL has a land completely dedicated to them made me so happy, add on the fact that the ride was MINDBLOWINGLY AMAZING, ugh, so much happiness!
Banquet hall looks awesome!! I believe they switch out who's greeting at the door? Or at least they USED to have Aurora there closer to when the park opened? I know I've seen pictures of her there! OMG THOSE IGNITE THE DREAM PHOTOS! WHAT ARE YOUR SECRETS?!
Bummer that your last stay started out so rough!! And WOW THOSE CROWDS!! I'm super glad we missed anything crazy! The day we were in the city I got a picture from a friend on his lunch break of wall to wall crowds! Gross! Lol.
Gorgeous pictures!! Can't wait to read more!
I LOVED HKDL, it's quietness and quaintness really made me love it, and to top it off Grizzly Gulch & Mystic Manor, like, WHAT AMAZING RIDES!! I'm SO happy we were vlogging while GG started to go backwards and caught us all by surprise! Lol. It's seriously amazing that the waits for those 2 are so little all the time!! Was there no wire work in FOLK?! The bird (white leotard outfit) came out of the floor/stage and up on a wire/silks when we were there! I really enjoyed the show, and I'm an HUGE LOVER of Folk at DAK, like, #1 fan, lol. It definitely had its differences, and the US version is by far my favorite, but the HK version definitely moved me, and the moving stage really blew me away! Amazing photos!! I really wish we'd gotten more of HKDL!!
Okay, onto Shanghai! Yay! I can't wait to hear what you thought about it!! I'm bummed we didn't get to stay onsite, although we saved a TON of money and it still only took us under 30 mins to get from our BnB to the front gate!
We definitely went to Cheesecake factory twice when we were there, (don’t have it in Canada either..) Love the Chinese New Years decorations!! UGH, we had SUCH struggles with photopass, though we were handing over our own camera, we seriously only dealt with it once and vowed not to again. UGH PIRATES YEEEESSSS I legitimately cried a single tear of happiness. I'm obsessed with all things pirates/POTC, the movies are my favorites, and the fact that SDL has a land completely dedicated to them made me so happy, add on the fact that the ride was MINDBLOWINGLY AMAZING, ugh, so much happiness!
Banquet hall looks awesome!! I believe they switch out who's greeting at the door? Or at least they USED to have Aurora there closer to when the park opened? I know I've seen pictures of her there! OMG THOSE IGNITE THE DREAM PHOTOS! WHAT ARE YOUR SECRETS?!
Bummer that your last stay started out so rough!! And WOW THOSE CROWDS!! I'm super glad we missed anything crazy! The day we were in the city I got a picture from a friend on his lunch break of wall to wall crowds! Gross! Lol.
Gorgeous pictures!! Can't wait to read more!
RachelleBeaney
PrincessShelle
- Joined
- Jun 12, 2012
Subbing in!!! We did an Asia all around trip last fall but certainly didn't do as much as y'all! We skipped the Universal's lol!!
THOSE PHOTOS ARE AMAZING!! I'm still kinda struggling with my nighttime shots, so I'm going to be that person and ask a million questions lol! What lens did you use for the night ones? Tripod or no? Also how late after close did you have to stay to get them so EMPTY?! THAT'S AMAZING!!
They're beautiful!!
Okay...back to reading now!
We are lucky in Australia that we get 4 weeks annual leave, and in this case I was actually on 13 weeks Long Service Leave when we went for four weeks, so we had lot of time to see and do all we wanted. We acknowledge how incredibly blessed and lucky we are to be able to travel this way, and we love doing trips about 4 weeks in length, because it gives us time to do and see a lot!
Nighttime photography is hard for sure, and honestly I'm just so grateful I have Jared because he has really learnt how to use a camera to get it to perform to it's best. I think that's really the key for night photography, you really need to learn to use your camera on full manual mode, what settings are right for certain circumstances. But to answer your other questions, yes we do use a tripod for night photography (any night shot will look 100 times better with a long exposure) except of course in cases where things were moving (such as Paint the Night and Ignite the Dream) and then it was hand held, but we have a Canon 6D, which is a entry level full frame camera which is capable of handling higher ISOs (bumping the ISO on a camera that can't handle it is what makes night shots grainy). We have a Tamron f2.8 24mm-70mm lens, which we use for most things, and a basic Sigma zoom lens (I think it's f4.5-5.6 70mm-300mm). We do want to invest in a few more lens (maybe a prime, a wide angle and a fish eye lens) but for now the two we have do the job. Lenses capable of lower apertures (i.e. ones that go to f1.8-2.8, will be better for hand held night photography). At Tokyo Disney we couldn't use a tripod (they are banned) but still wanted to get a lot of long exposures, so we bought something called a green pod photography bean bag - a stabling device we could sit on railings, benches, ledges, even the ground which did an incredible job for us! You do have to let the beans settle before taking shots though otherwise it can cause movement and camera blur! At Hong Kong Disneyland we stayed about 1.5 hours after closing to get those empty Main Street shots, however for the rest of the park we were taking photos mostly when the park was still open. The key again is long exposures. You can have people walk through your shots but they blurr and ghost so you can't see them. And as long as there aren't too many people you can't tell they are there. At Shanghai Disney, for example we didn't try and stay past opening at all (and as a result got no photos of Mickey Avenue at night - too many people streaming out of it when we left for a decent shot, one of my only regrets of the trip). You don't really have to stay late, just be smart with your angles, find foregrounds that are close enough to your shot people won't walk in front of your camera and use your tripod for long exposures
Thanks for the lovely compliments of the pictures, I'm glad you enjoyed them.
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