Overall, my August 2009 trip to Disneyland Paris was positive. I think I wrote a day 1 review back a few weeks after the trip. I never got around to finishing it, so I thought I'd at least post about the end of the trip and our unfortunate situation.
We had a couple middle nights at the off site Radisson.
However, for the final three days it was back to Disneyland Hotel Paris!
They finally gave us our room late in the day. The main elevators in the lobby is all we had to take. Up to level 3 I believe, and down a short hall. What a short walk! Fantastic.
We stepped inside the room. Beautiful. The walls, carpet, bathroom fixtures, everything was brighter, cleaner, and seemingly newer than the room we had had on the opposite side of the hotel a few days earlier.
Furthermore, while trees did obstruct most of the window view, it looked down on the entrance to the park, the entrance close to the Disneyland Hotel doors. I could hear the train, hear the people bustling, and get a couple glimpses of the people too. I loved hearing the park, I was in the park effectively.
The first night was beautiful, and we woke up the next day ready to head to another Early Entry morning, breakfast at 7:30, and then the park straight away at 8:00. Yes, it was hard to get the breakfast in within 30 minutes plus walking time out to the park gates, but not impossible for fast eating Americans. Each day we had breakfast on the California Grill side except the final day, which was over at the buffet style place. Obviously, they're both great. I loved the scrambled eggs, breakfast potatoes, and I'd try a pancake here and there, they had real syrup from USA, but the pancakes were basically ice cold. Sometimes the glasses to pour your water or juice into stunk really bad, which was gross.
Ok, so day two of this second part of our trip, we got in the park 2 hours early. Fun, did a bit in fantasy land, plus tried Space Mountain again. What a shame about space mountain though. It physically hurt our heads banging against the seat. I think we might have got mild concussions from it. It hurt bad. The ride was *not* too intense, it's just that it's setup to bang your head about. I've never been on a ride like that anywhere else in the world, but both Space & Indiana Jones roller coaster was like that in Paris. It really took away the fun of the rides. Rather than be scared for the big drops and whatnot, you're just worried about surviving physical injury to your brain. So these major attractions were a let down.
We ran out of things to do in the early morning time, so we probably made our way back to the room (I believe I had an Orange Fanta from the shop in the hotel), and then went over to the opening of the Studios park. Crush line was so long already though! We waited 3.5 HOURS!!! It kept breaking down, restarting, etc. Countless people gave up and left, but we hung in there.
FInally, we were probably 30 people away from loading. It broke again, and this time "you must leave, ride down indefinitely!" People began to get hysterical and gave their full feelings to the cast member (not me though, I was mad, but I don't think you should get angry when you're in another country). So we sadly moved towards the exit, and a nice lady was there being harassed by guests. She was giving out passes to come back later that day or the next day. Finally she got to us with everyone else pushing ahead of us. We were kind to hear, and she was kind in return, and we got a pass for the next day.
We returned to our rooms, tired and hungry after that wait for nothing but a pass. We ordered Disneyland Hotel room service! Wow. What a treat.
I had the cheese pizza and my mother had the vegetarian sandwich. We also had salads, plus cola lights from the gift shop with lots of ice from the ice machine. We also ordered the kids ice creams, which were the cornetto cones, delicious. They brought those on ice.
We enjoyed lunch, and then headed out to get rental car to go to mall. On the way out in hallway, we passed a mini bar guy and said hello/bonjour. The parking people had lost our car key, but then found it another another name. Odd.
We shopped a little at mall and got some snacks/drinks at the grocery store inside it. We then returned to room and had a couple of our newly purchased sweets, and then went out to the hotel store or ice machine for some more drinks.
We came back and noticed what we hadn't a few minutes ago. Gold coin candies all over the floor, plus I opened mini bar and found that there was a missing coca cola and bueno candy wrapper. A curtain was also pushed out, was someone behind it? We hit it, scared! Nothing there, looked under beds, clear. Thank goodness, but scared.
Called lobby, not too interested, but said they'd investigate.
Headed down to lobby, manager lady came out. Heard the story, we said we did not feel safe in the room, she said we could have a new room.
She came up to the old room and saw the evidence of bueno wrapper. Computer showed he actually ate two buenos and the 1 coca cola. None of our stuff seemed to be missing, but the turn down coins sprinkled had been tucked away deep in some our luggage. Also, had the person been in the room behind the curtain the first time we came in? Who knows, hopefully not.
We went to the other room, taking our own luggages as could it have been a bell person who did this? The new room was old and dirty looking and looked out on some kind of patio with guys out there, right at your window edge, it was annoying. Plus, the windows wouldn't lock properly. I felt less safe, headed down stairs and told them I was going to an off site property that was safe. Manager lady came out, and said "don't you want another room instead?" I said sure, I just thought you'd be mad at me, she said, no problem.
Next room didn't give us our view or magical sounds back, but it was a bit cleaner, looked out on a wall of trees, and was a larger family size room.
We check under the beds for intruders. Feel a bit ok, but still shaken up. COuld this have been someone who targeted us, or random act?
Knock on door? What is that? The manager of room service, he said they are investigating the intruder (they don't use that word of course), and he brought us a gift of a plate of fruit wrapped up. However, he discussed we had no table in our new room, and he said he'd get on top of that too. He was a nice guy, but didn't want to talk much about the intruder.
Next, knock on door. Manager of maid service. A really nice lady, a character, fun and witty. She said, no table, who did this? ha-ha. She said a table and chairs would be delivered soon.
We went out just to use our hotel fast pass for the day before it expired at Big Thunder.
Came back for bed, checked under beds again. Very nervous, and didn't set alarm to get up for early entry as we had planned.
Woke up slow the next day and had breakfast. WEnt to the parks, crowded, without the head start. We did get to use the break down pass for Crush, amazing ride! The only ride at DLRP that really impressed me. Fun! Too bad it breaks and has low capacity.
That night we had dinner at Blue Lagoon, scared of room service in case that had something to do with the intruder.
Went to bed. Next day left CDG back to USA.
Got home and wrote executives at Disney about the intruder, to try to find out the story.
Finally got a call back from a guy at the resort in Paris. It was the mini bar guy we had passed in the hallway on the way to the mall Val d'Europe. He had no business in our room as our mini bar was full. They said they are surprised as many employees have been there since the opening of the resort, and this was VERY unusual. They would take appropriate action.
They knew we couldn't return to Paris anytime soon, so they refunded us 1 night, which was $700 or so.
Overall, obviously the $700 was not worth losing our great room, feeling upset, and not knowing until we were back in USA for 2 weeks, who the intruder had been.
I wonder why he did it. Did he just need a snack or did he want to snoop through stuff? It wouldn't have bothered me as bad if he had just taken the treats and ran, but he obviously ate them in the room, chocolate bits were on the carpet, and he left trash behind. It seemed like he wanted to be rude.
Well, thats my story. Someday I will return to Disneyland Paris. There were things I liked and didn't like about it, but it was still a great experience if I can forget a couple things.
Thanks for reading.
We had a couple middle nights at the off site Radisson.
However, for the final three days it was back to Disneyland Hotel Paris!
They finally gave us our room late in the day. The main elevators in the lobby is all we had to take. Up to level 3 I believe, and down a short hall. What a short walk! Fantastic.
We stepped inside the room. Beautiful. The walls, carpet, bathroom fixtures, everything was brighter, cleaner, and seemingly newer than the room we had had on the opposite side of the hotel a few days earlier.
Furthermore, while trees did obstruct most of the window view, it looked down on the entrance to the park, the entrance close to the Disneyland Hotel doors. I could hear the train, hear the people bustling, and get a couple glimpses of the people too. I loved hearing the park, I was in the park effectively.
The first night was beautiful, and we woke up the next day ready to head to another Early Entry morning, breakfast at 7:30, and then the park straight away at 8:00. Yes, it was hard to get the breakfast in within 30 minutes plus walking time out to the park gates, but not impossible for fast eating Americans. Each day we had breakfast on the California Grill side except the final day, which was over at the buffet style place. Obviously, they're both great. I loved the scrambled eggs, breakfast potatoes, and I'd try a pancake here and there, they had real syrup from USA, but the pancakes were basically ice cold. Sometimes the glasses to pour your water or juice into stunk really bad, which was gross.
Ok, so day two of this second part of our trip, we got in the park 2 hours early. Fun, did a bit in fantasy land, plus tried Space Mountain again. What a shame about space mountain though. It physically hurt our heads banging against the seat. I think we might have got mild concussions from it. It hurt bad. The ride was *not* too intense, it's just that it's setup to bang your head about. I've never been on a ride like that anywhere else in the world, but both Space & Indiana Jones roller coaster was like that in Paris. It really took away the fun of the rides. Rather than be scared for the big drops and whatnot, you're just worried about surviving physical injury to your brain. So these major attractions were a let down.
We ran out of things to do in the early morning time, so we probably made our way back to the room (I believe I had an Orange Fanta from the shop in the hotel), and then went over to the opening of the Studios park. Crush line was so long already though! We waited 3.5 HOURS!!! It kept breaking down, restarting, etc. Countless people gave up and left, but we hung in there.
FInally, we were probably 30 people away from loading. It broke again, and this time "you must leave, ride down indefinitely!" People began to get hysterical and gave their full feelings to the cast member (not me though, I was mad, but I don't think you should get angry when you're in another country). So we sadly moved towards the exit, and a nice lady was there being harassed by guests. She was giving out passes to come back later that day or the next day. Finally she got to us with everyone else pushing ahead of us. We were kind to hear, and she was kind in return, and we got a pass for the next day.
We returned to our rooms, tired and hungry after that wait for nothing but a pass. We ordered Disneyland Hotel room service! Wow. What a treat.
I had the cheese pizza and my mother had the vegetarian sandwich. We also had salads, plus cola lights from the gift shop with lots of ice from the ice machine. We also ordered the kids ice creams, which were the cornetto cones, delicious. They brought those on ice.
We enjoyed lunch, and then headed out to get rental car to go to mall. On the way out in hallway, we passed a mini bar guy and said hello/bonjour. The parking people had lost our car key, but then found it another another name. Odd.
We shopped a little at mall and got some snacks/drinks at the grocery store inside it. We then returned to room and had a couple of our newly purchased sweets, and then went out to the hotel store or ice machine for some more drinks.
We came back and noticed what we hadn't a few minutes ago. Gold coin candies all over the floor, plus I opened mini bar and found that there was a missing coca cola and bueno candy wrapper. A curtain was also pushed out, was someone behind it? We hit it, scared! Nothing there, looked under beds, clear. Thank goodness, but scared.
Called lobby, not too interested, but said they'd investigate.
Headed down to lobby, manager lady came out. Heard the story, we said we did not feel safe in the room, she said we could have a new room.
She came up to the old room and saw the evidence of bueno wrapper. Computer showed he actually ate two buenos and the 1 coca cola. None of our stuff seemed to be missing, but the turn down coins sprinkled had been tucked away deep in some our luggage. Also, had the person been in the room behind the curtain the first time we came in? Who knows, hopefully not.
We went to the other room, taking our own luggages as could it have been a bell person who did this? The new room was old and dirty looking and looked out on some kind of patio with guys out there, right at your window edge, it was annoying. Plus, the windows wouldn't lock properly. I felt less safe, headed down stairs and told them I was going to an off site property that was safe. Manager lady came out, and said "don't you want another room instead?" I said sure, I just thought you'd be mad at me, she said, no problem.
Next room didn't give us our view or magical sounds back, but it was a bit cleaner, looked out on a wall of trees, and was a larger family size room.
We check under the beds for intruders. Feel a bit ok, but still shaken up. COuld this have been someone who targeted us, or random act?
Knock on door? What is that? The manager of room service, he said they are investigating the intruder (they don't use that word of course), and he brought us a gift of a plate of fruit wrapped up. However, he discussed we had no table in our new room, and he said he'd get on top of that too. He was a nice guy, but didn't want to talk much about the intruder.
Next, knock on door. Manager of maid service. A really nice lady, a character, fun and witty. She said, no table, who did this? ha-ha. She said a table and chairs would be delivered soon.
We went out just to use our hotel fast pass for the day before it expired at Big Thunder.
Came back for bed, checked under beds again. Very nervous, and didn't set alarm to get up for early entry as we had planned.
Woke up slow the next day and had breakfast. WEnt to the parks, crowded, without the head start. We did get to use the break down pass for Crush, amazing ride! The only ride at DLRP that really impressed me. Fun! Too bad it breaks and has low capacity.
That night we had dinner at Blue Lagoon, scared of room service in case that had something to do with the intruder.
Went to bed. Next day left CDG back to USA.
Got home and wrote executives at Disney about the intruder, to try to find out the story.
Finally got a call back from a guy at the resort in Paris. It was the mini bar guy we had passed in the hallway on the way to the mall Val d'Europe. He had no business in our room as our mini bar was full. They said they are surprised as many employees have been there since the opening of the resort, and this was VERY unusual. They would take appropriate action.
They knew we couldn't return to Paris anytime soon, so they refunded us 1 night, which was $700 or so.
Overall, obviously the $700 was not worth losing our great room, feeling upset, and not knowing until we were back in USA for 2 weeks, who the intruder had been.
I wonder why he did it. Did he just need a snack or did he want to snoop through stuff? It wouldn't have bothered me as bad if he had just taken the treats and ran, but he obviously ate them in the room, chocolate bits were on the carpet, and he left trash behind. It seemed like he wanted to be rude.
Well, thats my story. Someday I will return to Disneyland Paris. There were things I liked and didn't like about it, but it was still a great experience if I can forget a couple things.
Thanks for reading.
