Disneyland Paris is doing my head in

[Ms. Shuttergirl]

I'm about ready to chuck a tantrum in the corner I swear. So I haven't booked Disneyland Paris accom yet for April because I was hoping for some kind of special since we will likely need 2 rooms and the prices are astronomical.

I've looked at pricing on there for April dates before but now all of April is blocked out and it's saying these dates aren't available yet.

Grrrrrrrrrrrr.

 

[aussietravellers]

That's very strange It's only 5 months out! You should be able to book by now.

Do you select Australia as your country? Maybe try the UK or something to see if it works from their side. You may have to give them a call and book. I remember speaking to the cute french men when I booked. They were so sweet (what is it about a french accent?????)

 

[cola]

What website are you using? Whatever you do, do not use the .com one. Search through the other regional ones, use the Change your country option to check the other ones. I can't remeber the details now (I have posted in here before about it), but the .com site had no special, the .co.uk had one special 30% off, and the .ie and .be had another special of 40% off I think, and it varied a lot over the weeks I was checking (hadn't quite finalised when/where, so was checking for a while) I ended up with 40% off the UK site, and by that time .ie was 10% off. I think I left the country of residence as UK, but all the rest of the details were Australian address. Since everything was done by email, nothing was posted, didn't really matter about the country. We stayed at Hotel New York. The Disneyland hotel it literally over the entrance to DLP, and the lobby was a lot more swish than the Hotel New York, but I wanted to see the Bonfire fireworks that were at the lake outside Hotel New York (Nov 2011), and it was a lot cheaper. It was bloody freezing at Disneyland!

I just dug up my earlier thread about the discounts I found....
DLP pricing is crazy, they price it differently on all the international sites, the only certainty is that .com site will be the most expensive. ALL the international sites - .ie, .be, .co.uk, etc, almost anything other than .com will have better pricing (use the change your country down the bottom of the page to get to other sites).
Last year, I found through the .ie and .be sites had 50% off for a stay from the Tue, no discount for a stay from the Sunday, and the co.uk site have 40% off for a stay from the Sunday, and 10% off for a stay from the Tue, the .com site had no discounts.

What dates are you planning on Disneyland Paris?

 

[aussietravellers]

It was bloody freezing at Disneyland!

I have to say, that I have NEVER been as cold as I was at DLP! We left there and went to Zermatt where it was -15 most days and that didn't feel any where near as cold as DLP. We had really good The North Face, full length coats for arctic conditions and ended up going into Val D'Europe to get some balaclavas It was just so bitterly cold. Good excuse for hot chocolate though and it was a delicious one too!

Won't apply to you though Lisa, we were there in the week leading up to Christmas. But anyone else going in Dec, Jan and maybe Feb. Be Prepared! Now on a warmer note

 

[cola]

This is the offer from the 30 Oct uk newsletter..... 50% off for a 4 night stay.....

http://offers.disneylandparis.co.uk/special-offers/eb-offer.xhtml

Or were you after a shorter stay?

 

[Ms. Shuttergirl]

Thanks Cola and Aussietravellers.

We are only there for 2 nights, not enough I know but it had to be this way. We want to stay from 20-22 April. I think Disneyland Hotel will be too expensive and we could likely get 2 rooms at New York New York for the same price so would rather do that I think.

Cola - thanks for all of that information. I was looking on the .com. I'll go check out the other options you suggested.

 

[aussietravellers]

Thanks Cola and Aussietravellers.

We are only there for 2 nights, not enough I know but it had to be this way. We want to stay from 20-22 April. I think Disneyland Hotel will be too expensive and we could likely get 2 rooms at New York New York for the same price so would rather do that I think.

Cola - thanks for all of that information. I was looking on the .com. I'll go check out the other options you suggested.

We stayed at Hotel New York and were really happy with it.
It wasn't too far to walk actually it was really close to DTD and Cafe Mickey's (which we loved, yummy pizza), Annettes, and King Ludwigs (DS loved their store). Yes, as usual our trip was dictated by food Great view over the lake and the ice rink (probably not there in April). We didn't actually eat at the hotel, except breakfast every morning in the Empire State Club cause it was included.

 

[Ms. Shuttergirl]

The prices are insane.

We can get one room at DLH for 2 nights for 5 of us, so cramped conditions for $2985.

We can get 2 rooms at Hotel New York for $2429 altogether.

But still are they joking with these prices? That is so much money. I realise park tickets and breakfast are included but even so, and those dollars are in euro. I don't want to do the conversion .

I'm kicking myself because I could've gotten the early bird price of 15% off if I'd done it earlier but I was hoping for a special price to come closer to the trip.

Now I don't know what to do.

The UK website will let me book those dates but the Ireland one won't offer the dates yet.

 

[aussietravellers]

The prices are insane.

We can get one room at DLH for 2 nights for 5 of us, so cramped conditions for $2985.

We can get 2 rooms at Hotel New York for $2429 altogether.

But still are they joking with these prices? That is so much money. I realise park tickets and breakfast are included but even so, and those dollars are in euro. I don't want to do the conversion .

I'm kicking myself because I could've gotten the early bird price of 15% off if I'd done it earlier but I was hoping for a special price to come closer to the trip.

Now I don't know what to do.

The UK website will let me book those dates but the Ireland one won't offer the dates yet.

Does that price also other meals? (Full Board I think it's called) We had meal vouchers so breakfast in the hotel, then two vouchers each a day to use how we liked, for lunch and dinner.

Is that the 30% off price through the UK site?

That is very expensive. Have you looked at the other hotels, they might have something less expensive.

 

[Ms. Shuttergirl]

Well I don't know if it's 30% off. I didn't see anything that said 30% off. I went to the .com and chose the country as UK and then put in the details and that's the price it gave me. It includes breakfast only.

Perhaps I'm doing something wrong???? Gosh I hope that's what it is

 

[Ms. Shuttergirl]

The other hotels are only marginally cheaper, unless we jump down to Santa Fe but it gets mixed reviews. Not sure whether it's nice enough to please DH and MIL. It wouldn't bother me though.

 

[aussietravellers]

Just had a look, you can get a family room at Santa Fe for just over 1500 Euro.

 

[Ms. Shuttergirl]

Just had a look, you can get a family room at Santa Fe for just over 1500 Euro.

That might be the way we'll have to go.

All of the deals on the UK site you have to stay by 27 March. That is clearly the cut off for all deals on all the websites.

Perhaps they just haven't released any specials for after that yet. I'm not sure whether I'd be better to wait it out and not book until after we get back from US. Is there a chance they could fully book out by then?

I don't really want to look at one of the offsite hotels but that is just really expensive for 2 nights.

Ugh, I don't know what to do, I don't know what to do

 

[aussietravellers]

Just had a look and those dates are still during the French (Europe) school holidays. So I wonder if that's why it's more expensive.

The school holidays finish on the 22nd April.

 

[cola]

I wouldn't get too stressed about it. They are trying to make winter attractive (it's so bloody cold it needs all the help it can get!) I'm sure there will be some discounts available at a later date, it's just keeping an eye on it, and they might not have much of a discount with it being in school holidays.

What are you planning to do either side of the Disnyland stay? They have day/evening trips you can do from DLP. If you were going to do daytrips from Paris, you could probably do them from DLP, save on the Paris accom, and get the DLP half price from earlier link, with the option of mini visits to the parks and breakfast included, not exactly a true French experience, but may be an option?

 

[cola]

oooo, just saw on the .uk.co website the 1 day one night free applies to all of these dates....
· 8th November - 21st December 2012
· 4th January - 26th March 2013
· 1st - 14th April
· 2nd- 6th June
· 20th June- 31st August
· 15th September - 12th October
· 26th October- 2nd November 2013 inclusive
Mid April-May looks like they don't need to attract people, so impressive discounts unlikely.

 

[cola]

Another problem I had was mid afternoon their website seems to go into maintenance, and you get lots of error messages. It's less frustrating to check evenings and mornings Australian times.

 

[Ms. Shuttergirl]

oooo, just saw on the .uk.co website the 1 day one night free applies to all of these dates....
· 8th November - 21st December 2012
· 4th January - 26th March 2013
· 1st - 14th April
· 2nd- 6th June
· 20th June- 31st August
· 15th September - 12th October
· 26th October- 2nd November 2013 inclusive
Mid April-May looks like they don't need to attract people, so impressive discounts unlikely.

Cola - thank you so much. You have been an amazing help on this.

We have a beautiful apartment in Paris booked for 7 days and I wouldn't want to try and alter that booking. The DLP portion was just supposed to be a quick look around for our last 2 nights, 3 days before flying home after a month long trip. I think I'm going to have to make a decision about this soon, it looks like they are expecting the time I want to go there to be busy.

 

[cola]

Can you add a couple more days on to the apartment?
The train takes about 40min to get out to Disneyland, you could just make it a looooong day from Paris.
Honestly, since you are familiar with WDW, you'll probably find you can get a good feel for DLP in a day. The castle is bigger and better, and there is a dragon underneath if they have it open, I think Crush Coaster is unique, but all the other big rides are the same (well RC racer is in HK Disneyland). A lot of the smaller stuff is unique eg Alice's Curious Labyrinth, it's not particularly Disney-ish, but I got lost in there for ages, I wasn't expecting that! The Downtown Disney type bit is small.
If you go prepared to not worry about Tower of Terror etc if the queues are too big, you could possibly get away with one long day or two light days commuting from Paris. Though I will say that getting train from DLP to the airport was so ridiculously cheap and fast I'd say it's almost a good reason to stay at Disney (though even if you select English on the train ticket screens 'airport' is still spelt 'aeroport')

 

[Ms. Shuttergirl]

You know what I'm thinking Cola. I'm thinking about staying offsite at one of the nearby hotels that has a free shuttle. I spoke to my husband just now about it and he said, well it will be just like catching the bus at WDW but quicker. I'm off to at least look at those prices.

I also need to look at what the park ticket prices are if that's the case also.