Cast Members:
Me – Raci (28), been constantly planning for our trip for 8 months!
My DD – Jaci (8), so excited to be going to Disney!
Our Friend - DF, still wasn’t excited until we arrived when everything changed!
Her Son - DFS (7), Got excited a few days before our trip!
Day 3, Mon 12th March 2007.
It was our first morning waking up in Sequoia Lodge and after a very poor night, I woke for the day about 5.15AM. I didn’t sleep well the whole week but rather than bore you all every TR day I’ll just say it now. The room IMO was really hot even when we turned the thermostat right down, so getting to sleep was hard – I read by torchlight after everyone else was asleep. Also in a double bed with Jaci, I’ve never known anyone move, kick etc so much. I’ve never noticed it as much at home. And then as soon as I woke, no matter how early, my mind started thinking Disney and every morning I was too excited to go back to sleep.
So at 5.15 I was raring to go, but just had to keep as quiet as possible. When I did get up I discovered that for some reason the back-up camera battery for the digital camera hadn’t charged during the night, so I took the 35ml camera with me as a back up. By 8 we were all up, sorted and ready to leave the room.
We headed down to the concierge desk because our tea-party tickets had said we had to reserve our time slot when we arrived. Also we wanted to book our meal at Café Mickey’s for Wed. Then we headed out of the hotel just before 8.30 and had a slow wander round the lake and over to Disney Park for our early entry with good morning fantasyland breakfast.
Through bag check and then we followed everyone through fantasyland gardens round to the right-hand side entrance where the queue for GMF was. There were a lot of people there before us even though we’d arrived at 8.50. Then they started letting people through the gap in the ropes, at this point they were checking people’s GMF tickets and turning away lots of people, many with young children, who only had park passes. I felt very sorry for those kids being brought down an hour before they would be allowed in. Then we were through the rope, used our park passes to go through the turnstile and we were in just before 9.
Main Street looked so different nearly empty, but with the sun shining from behind and blue skies it was so lovely. We saw a police car standing empty with no queue so jumped in, much to DFS delight, and got off at the other end of Main Street. More pics of the castle and then we followed everyone through to ‘Au Chalet de la Marionnette’ for our breakfast. We arrived early enough that after having had our tickets checked again there was still plenty of free tables. So we found seats and then headed up to choose our food. There was lots of choice and it was all very tasty. As happened every morning Jaci ate more than everyone, and thoroughly enjoyed her chocolate croissants. DFS struggled because he’s not a big morning eater and although there was apple and yogurt the same as he’d have at home, he wasn’t keen. So we had a nice relaxed breakfast, and looking at the queue that built up while we were there, with very few empty tables left we were extremely glad we’d got there nice and early. Au Chalet de la Marionnette was beautifully themed inside with murals and other details from Pinocchio. A really nice setting for breakfast.
When we’d finished we headed out to the rides to fit some in before all the crowds came in at 10.
So first up it was Dumbo, and of course it had to be the pink one for us and the green one for DFS. There was no queue at all, Jaci loved controlling where Dumbo flew and I loved the view over Fantasyland from the top. The ride was pretty smooth, no big jerks when Jaci decided we were going to bounce up and down at the end. Next the kids wanted to go on the carrousel while there was still no queue. So we headed over and choose our horses. Of course the kids wanted to go on the biggest they could see which were at their highest level. So after some giggles as we helped them climb up we were all saddled up and off we went. The kids loved it, although to me it was just a standard carrousel but with more detail on the horses and nicer music. Jaci liked pretending she was on one of Mary Poppin’s merry-go-round horses and jumping it off the ride. There was still no queue so we asked a CM if we could stay on the ride instead of walking although through the queue area again, it was no prob. This time we put the kids on the smaller size horses, a lot easier. But as we were on them we saw the crowds coming through and the carrousel didn’t start until people had come through and it was full, a little frustrating as we’d hoped to get over to do Peter Pan for when it opened at 10.
When we came off we headed straight over to Peter Pan but the queue had already built up so we got a fast pass for 11.05 instead. Then after a look over the hedges at Alice’s curious labyrinth we headed down to It’s a Small World. There was only a 5 min wait and then we were in our boat. Well we knew the song from DLP sing-along vid, so it was great to experience the ride. There was so much to see, in all directions. 2 very excited kids and their Mums as well, spent the whole ride saying ‘Wow, look at this, look over there, we’re in …. or oh, look at that.’ I’d wondered before how people could go on the same ride so many times in a trip, but now I understood, there was just so much to see. We all loved it. When we came off we had a look at the little houses at the end and peeped through the windows. I can’t remember what that area was called.
20 minutes before our fast pass time started so we headed over to Casey Junior to convince DFS that not all roller coasters at Disney were as ‘scary’ as BTM. There was no queue at all so on we went, Jaci and I were driving Casey Junior’s engine and DF and her son were in the front row of the carriage behind. I really liked the Disney touch at the beginning when Casey Junior said the same as he does on the film. It was a lovely ride around the storybook land looking over the boats as we whizzed past. We all loved it and as there was still no queue we walked straight round for another go. This time we were further back and got a great view of CJ as we went round the corners. DFS had loved it and said it was Disney’s best coaster. We would have liked to try the storybook boats but we promised the kids we’d come back and do them both another time. Then we headed over to Peter Pan as it was time for our fast pass ride. We were very pleased to realise that in an hour and half we’d managed 6 rides, more than in the whole of our first day.
Fast Passes are great! We walked straight past the whole Peter Pan queue, there was no FP queue at all. So we were straight on, the kids moaned at the start in London that they’d turned the lights down and they couldn’t see as well as the day before. Of course they hadn’t, we were just so quick in the queue that our eyes hadn’t had time to adjust between the bright sunshine outside and the night scenes in the ride. As we came over Neverland they cheered up and enjoyed the rest of the ride. It was just as magical as the night before and although we spotted lots of extra detail we still didn’t spot Tinkerbell.
We’d planned to get FP’s in the morning for Buzz if the time worked with lunch so we headed towards the castle and Discoveryland. As we headed up a path under the castle we saw our first characters of our holiday. We were all very excited and went running over. They were walking past waving, but wouldn’t stop for photos or autographs. The children were so excited to see them but disappointed at the same time. We saw Prince John, Goofy, Suzy and Perla (2 mice from Cinderella) and the Sheriff of Nottingham. They had just finished the Main Street meet and greet. DFS had a small sulk about no autographs but we cheered both kids by telling them that in an hour they would see lots of characters at lunchtime. We re-started our walk over to Discoveryland getting slightly distracted on the way when we spotted a wishing well, so the kids dropped in their cents and made a wish. It was next stop Buzz Lightyear where we collected our fast passes for about 3.30PM and then had a look round at what we could do before we headed out for lunch.
All the queue’s seemed a lot bigger than they’d been in Fantasyland and it was such a difference in style it was quite a shock. We settled for Star Tours as the queue was just 15 mins and it was only 11.40. There were some giggles between DF and I over mis-pronunciations about the type of ride it was
with an extra t being added, the kids wondered what was going on. None of us had seen any of the Star Wars films except DFS who’s seen the first one at a friend’s house once. I told Jaci it might be a bit similar to things she’d seen on Star trek to give her a little clue about what to expect. I liked the way in the final part of the queue they prepared you for your voyage. We entered our spacecraft and stowed our things in the spaces under the seats. Then it was seatbelts on and we were off. It was definitely the best simulator I’d ever been on, I liked the g-force effect when you went into hyperspace. Jaci liked it at the beginning but then she started panicking a little because she felt like she was going to slide out under her seatbelt. So I missed quite a bit of the end but I still enjoyed it and would go on again if there was only a short queue.
It was now 12 o’clock and we had pre-booked lunch at the Lucky Nugget Saloon for 12.30 so we headed out of Discoveryland back across Main Street where we all got very excited again when we spotted lots of different characters. We saw Gepetto, King Louie, Eeyore, Donald Duck, Tigger, Goofy, Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham. The kids managed to get Gepetto’s autograph, he was lovely, Jaci’s pen hadn’t written properly so he borrowed another one and re-wrote his name on the next page. Jaci was so pleased he did. Then they had photos with King Louie but he showed them he couldn’t do autographs. We must have just caught the end of meet ‘n’ greet again as the characters started leaving, so it was quick snaps and waves as they walked past. Then DFS spotted Goofy (his fave character) again and he was still signing autographs, but when DFS was at the front Goofy had to go and DFS was very upset. So after we’d calmed him down we walked through the fort and into Frontierland to find we’d come in right near to Lucky Nugget.
We’d arrived bang on time and a friendly waitress showed us to our seats, we were sitting in the main ground floor area near where you first come in. LN had a great atmosphere as a couple of characters were just heading back in and everyone was waving. We ordered our drinks from the waiter who was very helpful. We made sure all the cameras, autograph books and pens were on the table ready and then went to get food from the buffet. There was a good variety of different choices to suit most people. Jaci’s favourite was when she spotted Mickey, Minnie and castle shaped pasta to have with the bolognaise sauce. All 4 of us found plenty of choices we liked and all really enjoyed our food.
When the characters started coming round the kids were so excited, their faces really lit up. They came out 3 or 4 at a time and either worked there way around the floor tables or the raised tables around the edges. There were characters out the whole time we were in Lucky Nugget, they would keep swapping over and any that did the upper tables during one time out would swap over and do the ground floor ones the next time out or vice-versa. We saw Friar Tuck, Pluto, Prince John, Donald Duck, Daisy Duck, Stitch and Robin Hood. There was also a guy singing and playing guitar on the stage for some of the time.
Jaci and DFS very quickly got into the swing of autographs and photos while they were eating. The interaction was really good. Friar Tuck came round first and took the kids by surprise he was there so quick, Pluto gave them both big hugs, which they loved and Prince John acted very regally, just like his character. Donald was funny and Daisy was very sweet and got huge cheers when she came out. Stitch was cheeky and really interacted with all the children, he took DFS hat and was wearing it which was very funny. We made our children stay at the table and the majority of other parents seemed to do the same, which really helped. We stayed for about 1 hr 45 min. We had finished our meal and I have to admit we were just hanging on to see Robin Hood who’d missed our table first time round. Then his minder asked him to go round the upper tables before he’d come to us again, so I took the children over and had a quick word to explain that they’d already missed him once. It was no problem for them to get a quick photo and autograph. We just didn’t want to block the table waiting another half hour for him to come out again, but this was the only occasion during character meals we let the kids ‘chase’ a character.
The whole meal was fantastic and well worth the money, it was 95.90 euros for all of us. I would happily go back and would recommend it as a lovely relaxed way to meet lots of characters.
Jaci had been asking ever since we’d arrived if she could go and explore inside Sleeping Beauty’s Castle. So because we had a bit of time before our Buzz FP’s and we knew queue’s for rides would be fairly long we decided to separate for an hour and then meet up near the castle to go over to Buzz. So Jaci and I headed up into the castle for a look around, she was so excited to be in Aroura’s castle and see so many things from the film. We went round slowly looking at everything. The stained glass windows looked amazing with the sun shining brightly outside. The tapestries were great and it was very clever the way the fairy dust sparkled over Aroura while she slept next to the spinning wheel. We found the snoring suits of armor by accident, as when we were standing next to them it suddenly started and we took a few seconds to work out where it was coming from, Jaci thought it was very funny. I’d remembered the changing stained glass window and we watched it change, I probably wouldn’t have noticed if I hadn’t read about it here. Then we headed out onto the balcony to see the views across Fantasyland, which was lovely. But then it happened! The second battery of the day, the one that hadn’t charged properly, ran out. It sounds like a small thing but I was so annoyed it was only mid-afternoon! Anyway after we’d thoroughly explored the castle we headed down the winding tower staircase.
We then popped into ‘la Chaumiere des Sept Nains’ to look for a dressing-up outfit for Jaci. She’d set her heart on a Princess Aroura one, so we were on a mission.
In this shop there were 3 different style Aroura dresses. I had encouraged Jaci to look at ones without the Aroura pic on the front, as they would be less limiting for play options when we got back. But it was okay as she also preferred the one with rose buds on a panel down the front. It was, of course, the most expensive – 59Euros for a dressing-up outfit! 
They didn’t have a size 10yr so we went to try a size 12yr. It fitted nicely but even with shoes on the bottom cm would have been dragging on the floor. Not a prob at home but not suitable, at that price, for walking around outside. So we checked again for a 10yr, but there wasn’t one in any style. I asked if any other shops would have the one with roses as we had only seen Aroura pic dresses in other shops and the lady rang Emporium on Main Street who said they had one in 10yr. So crisis averted Jaci said she would wait, albeit a little reluctantly.
It was now time to go and meet DF and her son for our Buzz FP time. So we put our dress mission on hold and headed back to Discoveryland. We went to join the FP queue, well what a deceiving idea! You only by-pass half the queue before joining the regular queue for about 10 mins and several people gave us evil looks as though we were pushing in, I started to feel a little guilty even though I had nothing to feel guilty about. The queue inside the building has nice pics along the walls as you walk through but that first time was very strange as we had no idea how far the queue was, every time we turned a corner there was another corridor to queue along. But we finally got to the front and into our space cruiser.
Jaci wasn’t keen on having to get in while it was still moving but it was fine, and then we were off. DF and son were in the first one with Jaci and I behind. I’d forgotten to tell DF how to move the car around so shouted to let them know once we were going. It was great fun, I hadn’t been sure I would enjoy it but I did. I was so determined to shoot all the Zurgs. I was doing pretty well as part way through my score was just over 100,000 but then Jaci said, “Mum my numbers won’t move.” So I had to do the honorable thing and swap guns, at this point the cruisers paused so I managed to get Jaci’s score up to just over 100,000 as well and then we swapped back over. I really wish I knew which shaped Z’s scored best because I certainly never managed to score so high after this first time. My score if I’d kept my own gun all the way through would have been around 180,000 so I was very pleased. I did tell Jaci the next time she would have to use her own gun the whole way through. I think she enjoyed it but just didn’t quite get the aiming idea very well and assumed that whenever a Z she was looking at flashed she had shot it.
It was a very good ride and the pictures when we came off were so funny. Jaci was looking forwards with her gun pointing sideways but I looked so serious, total concentration. Even after asking where it was taken, I never remembered to smile at the right time, I was always concentrating too hard. I think one of the best parts for the kids was playing with the Buzz guns in the shop as we came out, but the noise they made ….. I’m so glad we convinced them not to get one! I did buy 2 lovely mugs with Mickey holding our initials, R&J, so we could have a hot choc back at the hotel.
When we left Buzz we decided we’d go and explore adventure isle so we headed back across to Main Street where we discovered the parade was in full swing. We managed to find a corner where the kids could squeeze through to see everything while we watched over people’s heads. It did look good but we put it on the list of things to re-do another day when we could get a better view. Plus we’d missed at least 1 float. Once the crush on Main Street cleared we headed for Adventureland where we fully explored adventure isle, all the caves, passages, the bridge and around the lake. We let the kids take it in turns deciding which way to go and they liked being in charge. One of Jaci’s favourite parts was finding the treasure under skull rock although DFS wasn’t keen on the dark passages. The rope bridge was a lot of fun although I suspect the pictures (35ml camera) might come out a bit blurry as people walked past and the bridge shook. We were disappointed not to be able to go on Captain Hook’s ship as I thought we would be able to explore it, also in a lot of brochure pics there is a statue of Captain Hook but it wasn’t there. We decided to leave Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse for another day. We then wandered off to the back of Adventureland to check out Indiana Jones, which Jaci had wanted to go on before we left. DF and her son both said no way but Jaci was still keen, which would have meant I had to go on with her. There wasn’t much of it you could see, so I wimped out
and told Jaci we’d go on BTM again during the day and it would give her a chance to think about Indiana because we could always come back another day.
By now it was getting close to park closing so we headed back to Main Street where we separated again to do shopping. Jaci and I were back on our mission and headed straight for the Emporium. When we found the dressing-up section there were no Aroura dresses with roses only the ones with a pic of Aroura, but they did have one of these in 10yr. So we headed for the changing room with a 10 and 12yr of the different style dress. The 12 was still slightly on the ground and the zip seemed a lot tighter to do up. We tried the 10yr and had the same trouble with the zip also we were both covered in glitter from the skirt. So I decided it was not suitable I just didn’t want to pay a lot for something I knew there were probs with. Jaci was starting to get upset about leaving the shops without ‘her’ dress, so I went and spoke to someone in the shop to see if the could recommend a different shop to look for the rose Aroura dress in 10yr. Again they were very helpful and said it might be worth looking in the Disney Store in the village otherwise we were probably out of luck.
So we headed out of the park and over to the village to the Disney Store. On the way over I chatted with Jaci and explained we were not going to get the dress with the pic on. However if there was not a 10yr rose Aroura dress, then later in the trip we would buy the 12yr one for her to wear at home, but she would have to accept it couldn’t be worn in the park. She said that was okay, but I could picture the future battle over it. When we got to Disney Store we found the dress section and there was a 10yr rose dress! Jaci hugged it like her life depended on it, looking at me with big puppy dog eyes. Kids always know just how to get you with that one, so we headed for a changing room again. It was a very strange shape and smelt stale inside but we’d found the dress and that was all that mattered. Jaci tried it on and it fitted wonderfully, she was absolutely delighted. So we headed to the tills with the long awaited Aroura dress and the spending money took a major hit. But it was all worth it, to make one of her Disney dreams come true!
As we came out of the Disney Store we could see Panoramagique up in the sky and I wasn’t going to risk missing out when we were so close. I rang DF on her mobile (v expensive to do!) and said we were going to go on Panoramagique, did they want to try it too? I knew DF had been nervous about it before but was gradually coming round to the idea when she saw it every day. She said yes, they were already in the village so we waited for them and headed down to the lake. I was very disappointed
when I realised that I would only have my 35ml camera but hey at least I could take some photos and maybe we could just go up again another day. When we arrived at the kiosk it was about 6.30PM and there was no queue (in fact we never saw a queue, although that may be different in the summer). The tickets were Adults E12 and Children E6 so very reasonable. As we got our tickets it was just going up, it looked even more enormous from underneath! It was lots of fun to watch how high it went. Jaci and I were really excited, DFS was a mix of excited and nervous and DF was trying not to be nervous.
Once it had landed and everyone was off, it was our turn to get on. There were about 10 people as well as us so plenty of room to move around in the ring. The sun wasn’t in a great place for pics as it was over Disney park but hopefully they’ll come out okay. The view was amazing
it was a clear, sunny day so we could see a long way. I walked round to look out over the hotels, the Studio park and Disney park. It looked very different from above when you saw it all laid out in front of you. It was well worth doing even though the time it was up went really, really fast. I would happily have paid to go up again later in our stay (there was never a chance though). Then we were back on the ground with a tiny bump, it had been a really smooth ride. Everyone was glad they had done it, and enjoyed the views. I don’t think DF and her son would go up again though although they managed to take a couple of pics over the side.
By now we were all getting hungry so we headed back to the hotel to drop off the shopping bags before we headed back into the Village for dinner. The kids were very tired and really needed to have a quick tea and get to bed. However we had told them in the morning that we hoped go to the Rainforest Café for dinner. We all really wanted to eat here during our trip and knew that this was the only chance we would have. So we decided to go and just hope the queues were not to bad. When we arrived the queue was just out to the door, and the kids went to look at the alligator. DFS had perked up a bit but Jaci was getting miserable as she was so tired but she didn’t want to leave. We decided that we would have to queue wherever we went so we might as well just stay. It took around 20 mins til we were at the front of the queue. While we were queuing through the shop we experienced our first thunderstorm, which shocked the kids a little, we hadn’t told them about it. Even the shop had great theming, a snake above the queue caused much hilarity when the people in front hadn’t spotted it until they were directly underneath. It’s a shame my German wasn’t better but one lady ducked and jumped over the rope before she realised.
Then we were shown to our table, in the section with the elephants. After we’d ordered our meal I got the first inkling of just how tired Jaci was as she started crying for no real reason. She settled a little when our waiter brought some bread, but then she spotted the 2 elephants moving and decided the smaller one looked sad so she started crying again. We settled her down by saying it didn’t look sad, just tired like she was. So with a cuddle she calmed down. Dinner arrived and the next hiccup began.
The kids had both chosen rainforest rascal cheese burgers, but when DF cut DFS burger in half it was completely red inside.
I checked Jaci’s and it was exactly the same. Now I know in France steaks are often redder inside than in the UK but I’d never seen it happen with a burger before, has anyone else? 
The kids didn’t want to eat them red so we called the waiter over and he was very nice about it and took them back when we explained. In the meantime we gave the kids bits of our meals to keep them happy. In about 5 mins the waiter brought the kids meals back and said could we check these were okay, they were. It was a completely new meal as the ketchup we’d put on the first meals was not there. It made them go back up in my estimation as they hadn’t just re-done the burgers.
The kids did enjoy their meals and so did we. I had Rasta Pasta and it was absolutely delicious, I would happily go back and have it again. DF had Turkey (I can’t remember its proper name) and said it was very nice. We waited for the kid’s ice creams at the end as they’d both perked up a bit and then headed out. The meal for all of us was 82.70 Euros and even with the problems with the kid’s meals I would still go back again.
When we came out it was about 9PM and we all wanted to head back to the hotel and bed. We had to pop to reception on the way to the room as we wanted to see who would be doing meet ‘n’ greet in the hotel in the morning. It was going to be Mickey
so we made a note of the times as we all wanted to see Mickey and we hadn’t managed to yet. I then went over to find out about breakfast in the hotel because no-one had explained it at check-in. This was because we had GMF breakfast booked for 3 mornings plus a character breakfast but we would be in the hotel on our final morning. The lady was very helpful and said we needed 1 breakfast card for each day but we could only get them up to 3 days in advance. I think I’d confused her because she then gave us cards for Tue and Thu even though we had GMF and said we could come back tomorrow for the card for Friday.
Then we went up to our room to get the kids into bed. DFS dropped off fairly quickly but Jaci had got her second wind and was refusing to settle. Plus I disturbed her quite a lot when I suddenly realised we could see the castle from our window.
I tried to be as quiet as I could but it was so exciting. It looked just like the christmas photos I’d seen on here with the white fairy lights over the turrets, like a real fairytale castle. It had not had these lights switched on the previous night when we were in the park after dark. I had to let Jaci out of bed to have a quick look as she knew I’d seen something exciting and wouldn’t have slept without knowing. After we all calmed down, Jaci eventually fell asleep at 11PM. We chatted for a short while and made a few plans for the next day, then DF went to sleep and I attempted to! 
Me – Raci (28), been constantly planning for our trip for 8 months!
My DD – Jaci (8), so excited to be going to Disney!
Our Friend - DF, still wasn’t excited until we arrived when everything changed!
Her Son - DFS (7), Got excited a few days before our trip!
Day 3, Mon 12th March 2007.
It was our first morning waking up in Sequoia Lodge and after a very poor night, I woke for the day about 5.15AM. I didn’t sleep well the whole week but rather than bore you all every TR day I’ll just say it now. The room IMO was really hot even when we turned the thermostat right down, so getting to sleep was hard – I read by torchlight after everyone else was asleep. Also in a double bed with Jaci, I’ve never known anyone move, kick etc so much. I’ve never noticed it as much at home. And then as soon as I woke, no matter how early, my mind started thinking Disney and every morning I was too excited to go back to sleep.
So at 5.15 I was raring to go, but just had to keep as quiet as possible. When I did get up I discovered that for some reason the back-up camera battery for the digital camera hadn’t charged during the night, so I took the 35ml camera with me as a back up. By 8 we were all up, sorted and ready to leave the room.
We headed down to the concierge desk because our tea-party tickets had said we had to reserve our time slot when we arrived. Also we wanted to book our meal at Café Mickey’s for Wed. Then we headed out of the hotel just before 8.30 and had a slow wander round the lake and over to Disney Park for our early entry with good morning fantasyland breakfast.
Through bag check and then we followed everyone through fantasyland gardens round to the right-hand side entrance where the queue for GMF was. There were a lot of people there before us even though we’d arrived at 8.50. Then they started letting people through the gap in the ropes, at this point they were checking people’s GMF tickets and turning away lots of people, many with young children, who only had park passes. I felt very sorry for those kids being brought down an hour before they would be allowed in. Then we were through the rope, used our park passes to go through the turnstile and we were in just before 9.
Main Street looked so different nearly empty, but with the sun shining from behind and blue skies it was so lovely. We saw a police car standing empty with no queue so jumped in, much to DFS delight, and got off at the other end of Main Street. More pics of the castle and then we followed everyone through to ‘Au Chalet de la Marionnette’ for our breakfast. We arrived early enough that after having had our tickets checked again there was still plenty of free tables. So we found seats and then headed up to choose our food. There was lots of choice and it was all very tasty. As happened every morning Jaci ate more than everyone, and thoroughly enjoyed her chocolate croissants. DFS struggled because he’s not a big morning eater and although there was apple and yogurt the same as he’d have at home, he wasn’t keen. So we had a nice relaxed breakfast, and looking at the queue that built up while we were there, with very few empty tables left we were extremely glad we’d got there nice and early. Au Chalet de la Marionnette was beautifully themed inside with murals and other details from Pinocchio. A really nice setting for breakfast.
When we’d finished we headed out to the rides to fit some in before all the crowds came in at 10.
So first up it was Dumbo, and of course it had to be the pink one for us and the green one for DFS. There was no queue at all, Jaci loved controlling where Dumbo flew and I loved the view over Fantasyland from the top. The ride was pretty smooth, no big jerks when Jaci decided we were going to bounce up and down at the end. Next the kids wanted to go on the carrousel while there was still no queue. So we headed over and choose our horses. Of course the kids wanted to go on the biggest they could see which were at their highest level. So after some giggles as we helped them climb up we were all saddled up and off we went. The kids loved it, although to me it was just a standard carrousel but with more detail on the horses and nicer music. Jaci liked pretending she was on one of Mary Poppin’s merry-go-round horses and jumping it off the ride. There was still no queue so we asked a CM if we could stay on the ride instead of walking although through the queue area again, it was no prob. This time we put the kids on the smaller size horses, a lot easier. But as we were on them we saw the crowds coming through and the carrousel didn’t start until people had come through and it was full, a little frustrating as we’d hoped to get over to do Peter Pan for when it opened at 10.
When we came off we headed straight over to Peter Pan but the queue had already built up so we got a fast pass for 11.05 instead. Then after a look over the hedges at Alice’s curious labyrinth we headed down to It’s a Small World. There was only a 5 min wait and then we were in our boat. Well we knew the song from DLP sing-along vid, so it was great to experience the ride. There was so much to see, in all directions. 2 very excited kids and their Mums as well, spent the whole ride saying ‘Wow, look at this, look over there, we’re in …. or oh, look at that.’ I’d wondered before how people could go on the same ride so many times in a trip, but now I understood, there was just so much to see. We all loved it. When we came off we had a look at the little houses at the end and peeped through the windows. I can’t remember what that area was called.
20 minutes before our fast pass time started so we headed over to Casey Junior to convince DFS that not all roller coasters at Disney were as ‘scary’ as BTM. There was no queue at all so on we went, Jaci and I were driving Casey Junior’s engine and DF and her son were in the front row of the carriage behind. I really liked the Disney touch at the beginning when Casey Junior said the same as he does on the film. It was a lovely ride around the storybook land looking over the boats as we whizzed past. We all loved it and as there was still no queue we walked straight round for another go. This time we were further back and got a great view of CJ as we went round the corners. DFS had loved it and said it was Disney’s best coaster. We would have liked to try the storybook boats but we promised the kids we’d come back and do them both another time. Then we headed over to Peter Pan as it was time for our fast pass ride. We were very pleased to realise that in an hour and half we’d managed 6 rides, more than in the whole of our first day.
Fast Passes are great! We walked straight past the whole Peter Pan queue, there was no FP queue at all. So we were straight on, the kids moaned at the start in London that they’d turned the lights down and they couldn’t see as well as the day before. Of course they hadn’t, we were just so quick in the queue that our eyes hadn’t had time to adjust between the bright sunshine outside and the night scenes in the ride. As we came over Neverland they cheered up and enjoyed the rest of the ride. It was just as magical as the night before and although we spotted lots of extra detail we still didn’t spot Tinkerbell.
We’d planned to get FP’s in the morning for Buzz if the time worked with lunch so we headed towards the castle and Discoveryland. As we headed up a path under the castle we saw our first characters of our holiday. We were all very excited and went running over. They were walking past waving, but wouldn’t stop for photos or autographs. The children were so excited to see them but disappointed at the same time. We saw Prince John, Goofy, Suzy and Perla (2 mice from Cinderella) and the Sheriff of Nottingham. They had just finished the Main Street meet and greet. DFS had a small sulk about no autographs but we cheered both kids by telling them that in an hour they would see lots of characters at lunchtime. We re-started our walk over to Discoveryland getting slightly distracted on the way when we spotted a wishing well, so the kids dropped in their cents and made a wish. It was next stop Buzz Lightyear where we collected our fast passes for about 3.30PM and then had a look round at what we could do before we headed out for lunch.
All the queue’s seemed a lot bigger than they’d been in Fantasyland and it was such a difference in style it was quite a shock. We settled for Star Tours as the queue was just 15 mins and it was only 11.40. There were some giggles between DF and I over mis-pronunciations about the type of ride it was
with an extra t being added, the kids wondered what was going on. None of us had seen any of the Star Wars films except DFS who’s seen the first one at a friend’s house once. I told Jaci it might be a bit similar to things she’d seen on Star trek to give her a little clue about what to expect. I liked the way in the final part of the queue they prepared you for your voyage. We entered our spacecraft and stowed our things in the spaces under the seats. Then it was seatbelts on and we were off. It was definitely the best simulator I’d ever been on, I liked the g-force effect when you went into hyperspace. Jaci liked it at the beginning but then she started panicking a little because she felt like she was going to slide out under her seatbelt. So I missed quite a bit of the end but I still enjoyed it and would go on again if there was only a short queue.It was now 12 o’clock and we had pre-booked lunch at the Lucky Nugget Saloon for 12.30 so we headed out of Discoveryland back across Main Street where we all got very excited again when we spotted lots of different characters. We saw Gepetto, King Louie, Eeyore, Donald Duck, Tigger, Goofy, Robin Hood and the Sheriff of Nottingham. The kids managed to get Gepetto’s autograph, he was lovely, Jaci’s pen hadn’t written properly so he borrowed another one and re-wrote his name on the next page. Jaci was so pleased he did. Then they had photos with King Louie but he showed them he couldn’t do autographs. We must have just caught the end of meet ‘n’ greet again as the characters started leaving, so it was quick snaps and waves as they walked past. Then DFS spotted Goofy (his fave character) again and he was still signing autographs, but when DFS was at the front Goofy had to go and DFS was very upset. So after we’d calmed him down we walked through the fort and into Frontierland to find we’d come in right near to Lucky Nugget.
We’d arrived bang on time and a friendly waitress showed us to our seats, we were sitting in the main ground floor area near where you first come in. LN had a great atmosphere as a couple of characters were just heading back in and everyone was waving. We ordered our drinks from the waiter who was very helpful. We made sure all the cameras, autograph books and pens were on the table ready and then went to get food from the buffet. There was a good variety of different choices to suit most people. Jaci’s favourite was when she spotted Mickey, Minnie and castle shaped pasta to have with the bolognaise sauce. All 4 of us found plenty of choices we liked and all really enjoyed our food.
When the characters started coming round the kids were so excited, their faces really lit up. They came out 3 or 4 at a time and either worked there way around the floor tables or the raised tables around the edges. There were characters out the whole time we were in Lucky Nugget, they would keep swapping over and any that did the upper tables during one time out would swap over and do the ground floor ones the next time out or vice-versa. We saw Friar Tuck, Pluto, Prince John, Donald Duck, Daisy Duck, Stitch and Robin Hood. There was also a guy singing and playing guitar on the stage for some of the time.
Jaci and DFS very quickly got into the swing of autographs and photos while they were eating. The interaction was really good. Friar Tuck came round first and took the kids by surprise he was there so quick, Pluto gave them both big hugs, which they loved and Prince John acted very regally, just like his character. Donald was funny and Daisy was very sweet and got huge cheers when she came out. Stitch was cheeky and really interacted with all the children, he took DFS hat and was wearing it which was very funny. We made our children stay at the table and the majority of other parents seemed to do the same, which really helped. We stayed for about 1 hr 45 min. We had finished our meal and I have to admit we were just hanging on to see Robin Hood who’d missed our table first time round. Then his minder asked him to go round the upper tables before he’d come to us again, so I took the children over and had a quick word to explain that they’d already missed him once. It was no problem for them to get a quick photo and autograph. We just didn’t want to block the table waiting another half hour for him to come out again, but this was the only occasion during character meals we let the kids ‘chase’ a character.
The whole meal was fantastic and well worth the money, it was 95.90 euros for all of us. I would happily go back and would recommend it as a lovely relaxed way to meet lots of characters.
Jaci had been asking ever since we’d arrived if she could go and explore inside Sleeping Beauty’s Castle. So because we had a bit of time before our Buzz FP’s and we knew queue’s for rides would be fairly long we decided to separate for an hour and then meet up near the castle to go over to Buzz. So Jaci and I headed up into the castle for a look around, she was so excited to be in Aroura’s castle and see so many things from the film. We went round slowly looking at everything. The stained glass windows looked amazing with the sun shining brightly outside. The tapestries were great and it was very clever the way the fairy dust sparkled over Aroura while she slept next to the spinning wheel. We found the snoring suits of armor by accident, as when we were standing next to them it suddenly started and we took a few seconds to work out where it was coming from, Jaci thought it was very funny. I’d remembered the changing stained glass window and we watched it change, I probably wouldn’t have noticed if I hadn’t read about it here. Then we headed out onto the balcony to see the views across Fantasyland, which was lovely. But then it happened! The second battery of the day, the one that hadn’t charged properly, ran out. It sounds like a small thing but I was so annoyed it was only mid-afternoon! Anyway after we’d thoroughly explored the castle we headed down the winding tower staircase.
We then popped into ‘la Chaumiere des Sept Nains’ to look for a dressing-up outfit for Jaci. She’d set her heart on a Princess Aroura one, so we were on a mission.
In this shop there were 3 different style Aroura dresses. I had encouraged Jaci to look at ones without the Aroura pic on the front, as they would be less limiting for play options when we got back. But it was okay as she also preferred the one with rose buds on a panel down the front. It was, of course, the most expensive – 59Euros for a dressing-up outfit! They didn’t have a size 10yr so we went to try a size 12yr. It fitted nicely but even with shoes on the bottom cm would have been dragging on the floor. Not a prob at home but not suitable, at that price, for walking around outside. So we checked again for a 10yr, but there wasn’t one in any style. I asked if any other shops would have the one with roses as we had only seen Aroura pic dresses in other shops and the lady rang Emporium on Main Street who said they had one in 10yr. So crisis averted Jaci said she would wait, albeit a little reluctantly.It was now time to go and meet DF and her son for our Buzz FP time. So we put our dress mission on hold and headed back to Discoveryland. We went to join the FP queue, well what a deceiving idea! You only by-pass half the queue before joining the regular queue for about 10 mins and several people gave us evil looks as though we were pushing in, I started to feel a little guilty even though I had nothing to feel guilty about. The queue inside the building has nice pics along the walls as you walk through but that first time was very strange as we had no idea how far the queue was, every time we turned a corner there was another corridor to queue along. But we finally got to the front and into our space cruiser.
Jaci wasn’t keen on having to get in while it was still moving but it was fine, and then we were off. DF and son were in the first one with Jaci and I behind. I’d forgotten to tell DF how to move the car around so shouted to let them know once we were going. It was great fun, I hadn’t been sure I would enjoy it but I did. I was so determined to shoot all the Zurgs. I was doing pretty well as part way through my score was just over 100,000 but then Jaci said, “Mum my numbers won’t move.” So I had to do the honorable thing and swap guns, at this point the cruisers paused so I managed to get Jaci’s score up to just over 100,000 as well and then we swapped back over. I really wish I knew which shaped Z’s scored best because I certainly never managed to score so high after this first time. My score if I’d kept my own gun all the way through would have been around 180,000 so I was very pleased. I did tell Jaci the next time she would have to use her own gun the whole way through. I think she enjoyed it but just didn’t quite get the aiming idea very well and assumed that whenever a Z she was looking at flashed she had shot it.
It was a very good ride and the pictures when we came off were so funny. Jaci was looking forwards with her gun pointing sideways but I looked so serious, total concentration. Even after asking where it was taken, I never remembered to smile at the right time, I was always concentrating too hard. I think one of the best parts for the kids was playing with the Buzz guns in the shop as we came out, but the noise they made ….. I’m so glad we convinced them not to get one! I did buy 2 lovely mugs with Mickey holding our initials, R&J, so we could have a hot choc back at the hotel.
When we left Buzz we decided we’d go and explore adventure isle so we headed back across to Main Street where we discovered the parade was in full swing. We managed to find a corner where the kids could squeeze through to see everything while we watched over people’s heads. It did look good but we put it on the list of things to re-do another day when we could get a better view. Plus we’d missed at least 1 float. Once the crush on Main Street cleared we headed for Adventureland where we fully explored adventure isle, all the caves, passages, the bridge and around the lake. We let the kids take it in turns deciding which way to go and they liked being in charge. One of Jaci’s favourite parts was finding the treasure under skull rock although DFS wasn’t keen on the dark passages. The rope bridge was a lot of fun although I suspect the pictures (35ml camera) might come out a bit blurry as people walked past and the bridge shook. We were disappointed not to be able to go on Captain Hook’s ship as I thought we would be able to explore it, also in a lot of brochure pics there is a statue of Captain Hook but it wasn’t there. We decided to leave Swiss Family Robinson Treehouse for another day. We then wandered off to the back of Adventureland to check out Indiana Jones, which Jaci had wanted to go on before we left. DF and her son both said no way but Jaci was still keen, which would have meant I had to go on with her. There wasn’t much of it you could see, so I wimped out
and told Jaci we’d go on BTM again during the day and it would give her a chance to think about Indiana because we could always come back another day.By now it was getting close to park closing so we headed back to Main Street where we separated again to do shopping. Jaci and I were back on our mission
and headed straight for the Emporium. When we found the dressing-up section there were no Aroura dresses with roses only the ones with a pic of Aroura, but they did have one of these in 10yr. So we headed for the changing room with a 10 and 12yr of the different style dress. The 12 was still slightly on the ground and the zip seemed a lot tighter to do up. We tried the 10yr and had the same trouble with the zip also we were both covered in glitter from the skirt. So I decided it was not suitable I just didn’t want to pay a lot for something I knew there were probs with. Jaci was starting to get upset about leaving the shops without ‘her’ dress, so I went and spoke to someone in the shop to see if the could recommend a different shop to look for the rose Aroura dress in 10yr. Again they were very helpful and said it might be worth looking in the Disney Store in the village otherwise we were probably out of luck.So we headed out of the park and over to the village to the Disney Store. On the way over I chatted with Jaci and explained we were not going to get the dress with the pic on. However if there was not a 10yr rose Aroura dress, then later in the trip we would buy the 12yr one for her to wear at home, but she would have to accept it couldn’t be worn in the park. She said that was okay, but I could picture the future battle over it. When we got to Disney Store we found the dress section and there was a 10yr rose dress! Jaci hugged it like her life depended on it, looking at me with big puppy dog eyes. Kids always know just how to get you with that one, so we headed for a changing room again. It was a very strange shape and smelt stale inside but we’d found the dress and that was all that mattered. Jaci tried it on and it fitted wonderfully, she was absolutely delighted. So we headed to the tills with the long awaited Aroura dress and the spending money took a major hit. But it was all worth it, to make one of her Disney dreams come true!
As we came out of the Disney Store we could see Panoramagique up in the sky and I wasn’t going to risk missing out when we were so close. I rang DF on her mobile (v expensive to do!) and said we were going to go on Panoramagique, did they want to try it too? I knew DF had been nervous about it before but was gradually coming round to the idea when she saw it every day. She said yes, they were already in the village so we waited for them and headed down to the lake. I was very disappointed
when I realised that I would only have my 35ml camera but hey at least I could take some photos and maybe we could just go up again another day. When we arrived at the kiosk it was about 6.30PM and there was no queue (in fact we never saw a queue, although that may be different in the summer). The tickets were Adults E12 and Children E6 so very reasonable. As we got our tickets it was just going up, it looked even more enormous from underneath! It was lots of fun to watch how high it went. Jaci and I were really excited, DFS was a mix of excited and nervous and DF was trying not to be nervous.Once it had landed and everyone was off, it was our turn to get on. There were about 10 people as well as us so plenty of room to move around in the ring. The sun wasn’t in a great place for pics as it was over Disney park but hopefully they’ll come out okay. The view was amazing
it was a clear, sunny day so we could see a long way. I walked round to look out over the hotels, the Studio park and Disney park. It looked very different from above when you saw it all laid out in front of you. It was well worth doing even though the time it was up went really, really fast. I would happily have paid to go up again later in our stay (there was never a chance though). Then we were back on the ground with a tiny bump, it had been a really smooth ride. Everyone was glad they had done it, and enjoyed the views. I don’t think DF and her son would go up again though although they managed to take a couple of pics over the side.By now we were all getting hungry so we headed back to the hotel to drop off the shopping bags before we headed back into the Village for dinner. The kids were very tired and really needed to have a quick tea and get to bed. However we had told them in the morning that we hoped go to the Rainforest Café for dinner. We all really wanted to eat here during our trip and knew that this was the only chance we would have. So we decided to go and just hope the queues were not to bad. When we arrived the queue was just out to the door, and the kids went to look at the alligator. DFS had perked up a bit but Jaci was getting miserable as she was so tired but she didn’t want to leave. We decided that we would have to queue wherever we went so we might as well just stay. It took around 20 mins til we were at the front of the queue. While we were queuing through the shop we experienced our first thunderstorm, which shocked the kids a little, we hadn’t told them about it. Even the shop had great theming, a snake above the queue caused much hilarity when the people in front hadn’t spotted it until they were directly underneath. It’s a shame my German wasn’t better but one lady ducked and jumped over the rope before she realised.
Then we were shown to our table, in the section with the elephants. After we’d ordered our meal I got the first inkling of just how tired Jaci was as she started crying for no real reason. She settled a little when our waiter brought some bread, but then she spotted the 2 elephants moving and decided the smaller one looked sad so she started crying again. We settled her down by saying it didn’t look sad, just tired like she was. So with a cuddle she calmed down. Dinner arrived and the next hiccup began.
The kids had both chosen rainforest rascal cheese burgers, but when DF cut DFS burger in half it was completely red inside.
I checked Jaci’s and it was exactly the same. Now I know in France steaks are often redder inside than in the UK but I’d never seen it happen with a burger before, has anyone else? The kids didn’t want to eat them red so we called the waiter over and he was very nice about it and took them back when we explained. In the meantime we gave the kids bits of our meals to keep them happy. In about 5 mins the waiter brought the kids meals back and said could we check these were okay, they were. It was a completely new meal as the ketchup we’d put on the first meals was not there. It made them go back up in my estimation as they hadn’t just re-done the burgers.The kids did enjoy their meals and so did we. I had Rasta Pasta and it was absolutely delicious, I would happily go back and have it again. DF had Turkey (I can’t remember its proper name) and said it was very nice. We waited for the kid’s ice creams at the end as they’d both perked up a bit and then headed out. The meal for all of us was 82.70 Euros and even with the problems with the kid’s meals I would still go back again.
When we came out it was about 9PM and we all wanted to head back to the hotel and bed. We had to pop to reception on the way to the room as we wanted to see who would be doing meet ‘n’ greet in the hotel in the morning. It was going to be Mickey
so we made a note of the times as we all wanted to see Mickey and we hadn’t managed to yet. I then went over to find out about breakfast in the hotel because no-one had explained it at check-in. This was because we had GMF breakfast booked for 3 mornings plus a character breakfast but we would be in the hotel on our final morning. The lady was very helpful and said we needed 1 breakfast card for each day but we could only get them up to 3 days in advance. I think I’d confused her because she then gave us cards for Tue and Thu even though we had GMF and said we could come back tomorrow for the card for Friday.Then we went up to our room to get the kids into bed. DFS dropped off fairly quickly but Jaci had got her second wind and was refusing to settle. Plus I disturbed her quite a lot when I suddenly realised we could see the castle from our window.
I tried to be as quiet as I could but it was so exciting. It looked just like the christmas photos I’d seen on here with the white fairy lights over the turrets, like a real fairytale castle. It had not had these lights switched on the previous night when we were in the park after dark. I had to let Jaci out of bed to have a quick look as she knew I’d seen something exciting and wouldn’t have slept without knowing. After we all calmed down, Jaci eventually fell asleep at 11PM. We chatted for a short while and made a few plans for the next day, then DF went to sleep and I attempted to! 
