Flossbolna
Sea days are just so relaxing!
- Joined
- Sep 8, 2006
- Messages
- 13,832
Introduction
Let’s start with a warning: This is not the freshest of all trip reports. Our trip was in summer 2017. Life got hectic with many things just after our trip and now it is finally slowing down and I have many notes and pictures from the trip, so I hope it will still write a trip report that is worth reading. I am definitely excited about sharing our adventures with you!
Not fresh?!?! You can get fresher seafood at the local Red Lobster! For my part, I will simply say that M and I have had a roller coaster few years. And it isn't easy to write on a roller coaster, believe me, I am always taking out my pen and journal on RnRC and Big Thunder! We have had all sorts of good, bad and ugly ... everything from my mom having her car stolen to hurricanes to health issues with family to weddings to ... to ... even spending the longest 45 minutes of my life in a Disney outlet store with a bunch of crazed wide-eyed newbies from ... from ... sorry, this is hard to get out ... from ... from ... Delaware! So, as you can see trip report writing just wasn't on our minds. Besides, I think we still owe a trip report from our January 2016 trip to Europa Park and DLP and Paris ... and I think we never finished a trip report from M's short visit to FL in February of 2017 and ... you get the point. But I can promise you two things here: 1.) This report will be worth it; and 2.) It will REALLY be worth it!
On to the hard facts about this trip:
Travel time:
June 28 to July 16, 2017
Destinations visited:
Shanghai Disneyland, Shanghai, Tokyo Disney Resort, Tokyo and Kyoto
Travelers:
Me (Magdalene) and my – then boyfriend, now – husband Michael
Yes, she used the Dark Arts and Black Magic and somehow gained a husband. Please, please save meeeeeeee!!!!!!
Authors of the trip report:
Mainly me – in this lovely blue color – and some comments from Michael – in dark red. I do look so good in red, don't I?
Some more background:
This trip had been talked about between us for years. Michael had been to China and Japan before and wanted to go back, I had plans to go to Japan even before I knew Michael. So, when we started dating, we quickly figured out that this was a trip that we really wanted to do together. We already had a tentative date once already, but then changed our travel plans. I am not sure if we ended up going to California instead or on one of our cruises? I think the first plan was a late 2014 trip and we figured it was going to cost too much after our DCL Panama Canal cruise, so naturally we took another DCL voyage and went to WDW to save money. I will now pause for 60 seconds for y'all to laugh as much as you require. Anyway, at some point in 2016 I had seen some really good airfare to Japan with a stopover in China from Europe (I am German and live in Germany, Michael is from Florida and is splitting his time between Germany and the US, yes it is unconventional, but it works for us) which got us thinking that we should combine a visit to Shanghai Disneyland with Japan.
So, sometime in the dark weeks of a German January we sat down and looked at the feasibility of doing that trip in the summer. Actually, we started getting serious about it in August of 2016 while sitting at a lovely little café in a nearby college town in Germany on a warm day. We knew that summer was going to be hot there, but one of us had a special birthday coming up in July (I hate to admit it, but I did indeed turn 35. I know I look amazing but 'tis true.) and we thought it would be nice to celebrate the birthday with a special trip.
And things started to fall into place very quickly. A short search produced good fares and we ended up booking open jaw tickets from Nuremberg, where we live in Germany, via Zurich to Shanghai and then back from Tokyo via Munich to Nuremberg for 650 € per person. At first we had planned to book a flight on a no-frills carrier from Shanghai to Tokyo, but then realized that we could use Lufthansa Miles & More miles for booking tickets on ANA. This worked out great as Lufthansa charges silly high fees for booking with miles on their own flights, but using the miles on ANA we just paid 15 € each in taxes.
In hindsight, I sometimes thought when planning the trip that we should have either arrived in Osaka or left from there as it would have eliminated backtracking from Kyoto to Tokyo. But it really was a minor issue and the trip ended up being so wonderful as it was, that I am very happy with our plans now. This trip was as close to perfect as one could be, but originally I wanted to go to Osaka to -- naturally -- see Universal Studios Japan. My other half, now known as the old ball and chain, gently put her foot on my throat and explained that we were doing enough theme park touring and so ... we'll just have to take another trip in the future.
We ended up getting the Japan Railpass for the travel between Tokyo and Kyoto and were able to use it for some shorter train trips, too. We did break even, but only saved a small amount. However, it made things really easy. I thought for a long time that trains were amazing in Europe. Well, once you visit Asia, you aren't nearly as impressed.
I will get more into details about the hotels we stayed at when we get to them. All in all we found early July to be a time when there was plenty of availability at decent prices in hotel rooms. You could tell that it was not a typical travel season.
For the Disney portions of our trip both the www.disneytouristblog.com and www.tdrexplorer.com websites provided a wealth of information. I can highly recommend both of these resources.
With regard to Japan in general I have to admit that I had difficulty in finding resources that were good for me. I had the Lonely Planet Japan, which was good, but somewhat not enough detail for the two places we wanted to visit. So, I got the Lonely Planet pocket guide for Tokyo and the normal Lonely Planet for Kyoto, too. Then I felt a bit overwhelmed with info for the short time we were there. I looked at some good internet resources out there as well, one was www.japan-guide.com, which were good, but sometimes overwhelming, too. In hindsight I think I should have chilled a bit more. We did not have that much time anyway and it is always easy to pick out some of the big sights and move on.
I have to admit something here that will shock you, so sit down. I can be lazy at times. M is an amazing trip planner and once it was obvious this trip was going to happen, I just sat back and let her run as wild as Delaware kids in a Disney outlet store!
If you have any questions about the planning process, let me know and I will be happy to help!!
I will add a few preview pictures to this first post to tide you over until the next update!
Up Next: Travel Day
Let’s start with a warning: This is not the freshest of all trip reports. Our trip was in summer 2017. Life got hectic with many things just after our trip and now it is finally slowing down and I have many notes and pictures from the trip, so I hope it will still write a trip report that is worth reading. I am definitely excited about sharing our adventures with you!
Not fresh?!?! You can get fresher seafood at the local Red Lobster! For my part, I will simply say that M and I have had a roller coaster few years. And it isn't easy to write on a roller coaster, believe me, I am always taking out my pen and journal on RnRC and Big Thunder! We have had all sorts of good, bad and ugly ... everything from my mom having her car stolen to hurricanes to health issues with family to weddings to ... to ... even spending the longest 45 minutes of my life in a Disney outlet store with a bunch of crazed wide-eyed newbies from ... from ... sorry, this is hard to get out ... from ... from ... Delaware! So, as you can see trip report writing just wasn't on our minds. Besides, I think we still owe a trip report from our January 2016 trip to Europa Park and DLP and Paris ... and I think we never finished a trip report from M's short visit to FL in February of 2017 and ... you get the point. But I can promise you two things here: 1.) This report will be worth it; and 2.) It will REALLY be worth it!
On to the hard facts about this trip:
Travel time:
June 28 to July 16, 2017
Destinations visited:
Shanghai Disneyland, Shanghai, Tokyo Disney Resort, Tokyo and Kyoto
Travelers:
Me (Magdalene) and my – then boyfriend, now – husband Michael
Yes, she used the Dark Arts and Black Magic and somehow gained a husband. Please, please save meeeeeeee!!!!!!
Authors of the trip report:
Mainly me – in this lovely blue color – and some comments from Michael – in dark red. I do look so good in red, don't I?
Some more background:
This trip had been talked about between us for years. Michael had been to China and Japan before and wanted to go back, I had plans to go to Japan even before I knew Michael. So, when we started dating, we quickly figured out that this was a trip that we really wanted to do together. We already had a tentative date once already, but then changed our travel plans. I am not sure if we ended up going to California instead or on one of our cruises? I think the first plan was a late 2014 trip and we figured it was going to cost too much after our DCL Panama Canal cruise, so naturally we took another DCL voyage and went to WDW to save money. I will now pause for 60 seconds for y'all to laugh as much as you require. Anyway, at some point in 2016 I had seen some really good airfare to Japan with a stopover in China from Europe (I am German and live in Germany, Michael is from Florida and is splitting his time between Germany and the US, yes it is unconventional, but it works for us) which got us thinking that we should combine a visit to Shanghai Disneyland with Japan.
So, sometime in the dark weeks of a German January we sat down and looked at the feasibility of doing that trip in the summer. Actually, we started getting serious about it in August of 2016 while sitting at a lovely little café in a nearby college town in Germany on a warm day. We knew that summer was going to be hot there, but one of us had a special birthday coming up in July (I hate to admit it, but I did indeed turn 35. I know I look amazing but 'tis true.) and we thought it would be nice to celebrate the birthday with a special trip.
And things started to fall into place very quickly. A short search produced good fares and we ended up booking open jaw tickets from Nuremberg, where we live in Germany, via Zurich to Shanghai and then back from Tokyo via Munich to Nuremberg for 650 € per person. At first we had planned to book a flight on a no-frills carrier from Shanghai to Tokyo, but then realized that we could use Lufthansa Miles & More miles for booking tickets on ANA. This worked out great as Lufthansa charges silly high fees for booking with miles on their own flights, but using the miles on ANA we just paid 15 € each in taxes.
In hindsight, I sometimes thought when planning the trip that we should have either arrived in Osaka or left from there as it would have eliminated backtracking from Kyoto to Tokyo. But it really was a minor issue and the trip ended up being so wonderful as it was, that I am very happy with our plans now. This trip was as close to perfect as one could be, but originally I wanted to go to Osaka to -- naturally -- see Universal Studios Japan. My other half, now known as the old ball and chain, gently put her foot on my throat and explained that we were doing enough theme park touring and so ... we'll just have to take another trip in the future.
We ended up getting the Japan Railpass for the travel between Tokyo and Kyoto and were able to use it for some shorter train trips, too. We did break even, but only saved a small amount. However, it made things really easy. I thought for a long time that trains were amazing in Europe. Well, once you visit Asia, you aren't nearly as impressed.
I will get more into details about the hotels we stayed at when we get to them. All in all we found early July to be a time when there was plenty of availability at decent prices in hotel rooms. You could tell that it was not a typical travel season.
For the Disney portions of our trip both the www.disneytouristblog.com and www.tdrexplorer.com websites provided a wealth of information. I can highly recommend both of these resources.
With regard to Japan in general I have to admit that I had difficulty in finding resources that were good for me. I had the Lonely Planet Japan, which was good, but somewhat not enough detail for the two places we wanted to visit. So, I got the Lonely Planet pocket guide for Tokyo and the normal Lonely Planet for Kyoto, too. Then I felt a bit overwhelmed with info for the short time we were there. I looked at some good internet resources out there as well, one was www.japan-guide.com, which were good, but sometimes overwhelming, too. In hindsight I think I should have chilled a bit more. We did not have that much time anyway and it is always easy to pick out some of the big sights and move on.
I have to admit something here that will shock you, so sit down. I can be lazy at times. M is an amazing trip planner and once it was obvious this trip was going to happen, I just sat back and let her run as wild as Delaware kids in a Disney outlet store!
If you have any questions about the planning process, let me know and I will be happy to help!!
I will add a few preview pictures to this first post to tide you over until the next update!
















Up Next: Travel Day
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