shinedalgarno
Earning My Ears
- Joined
- Feb 26, 2005
- Messages
- 35
Friday, October 14th, 2005
Cast:
Me, mother of 3, Disney fan
DH, tolerates Disney for me and the kids, secretly loves it. Fully expected HKD to be one lone Chinese guy, running people up and down a dirt road on a rickshaw.
DS13, Biggest Disney fan in family, we went to HK Dis primarily for him. His life goal is to go to every Disney park in the world, and being in China, we were just too close to not cross this one off of his list!
Sis28, my dear sister who lives in Shenzhen in mainland China for a year. She is why we made the trip to China and our impromptu tour guide as well
Well, we made our dream trip to China finally. After we were done seeing the Great Wall and other famous places, our trip could not be complete without visiting Hong Kong Disneyland. This is no easy task, as we were staying in mainland China and had to cross the borders again. We were very nervous about finding our way to Disney.
At the border crossing, we showed a Disney pamplet that I had picked up at the Hong Kong airport when we orginally arrived in China. This was very valuable, as we were shown the way to the Wonderland Express!!!! I must say that Disney has made it VERY easy to find your way to them! What a relief! The price was 80 HK dollars each way or 150 HK for roundtrip. We opted for just purchasing one way as we decided to return through Lo Wu and go shopping. 80 HK dollars is about $10 US, not a bad deal at all!
When we arrived at HKD, we realized that we would have been much better pre-purchasing our tickets the day before and using the ticket dipsensers to pick them up. There was no line whatsoever for this service. You did, however, need to make sure you had the original credit card the purchase was made on. The ticket line, on the other hand, was the worst line we stood in all day! Go figure!
There is something I must tell you about Hong Kong....even in October, it was absolutely, unbearably hot. We feel the same about Florida and prefer to go in only the chilliest of months. If returning to HKD, I would only do it in December or January....it is REALLY hot there!!!
When we entered the park we strolled through some of the shops on Main Street, U.S.A. The prices were very similar to what you would pay in the U.S. The least expensive T-Shirts we could find were around $15 US dollars. They did have some pins for trading that were about $3.15 US, so I must say the pins were much cheaper here, as I don't recall ever seeing any at the US parks for less then $8, and I am not even sure I saw them that low. My son, of course, pin traded with the cast members and really enjoyed himself, although the cast did not yet have a wide selection of pins on their lanyards.
We then headed over to ride the Jungle Cruise. Right away we were stopped by a show happening in Adventureland....it was a very high energy show with colorful costumes and large, pretend animals. Sort of an African themed dance party. The cast was GREAT! They really involved the audience and it was a great start to our day! The Jungle Cruise was a TON of fun. Took the English version and literally WALKED ON to the boat.....it was really cool to hear the ride done in English with this strong accent! We knew we were in Disney AND knew we were in China....AWESOME!
We rode the teacups and Philharmagic in Fantasyland....again, NO WAITING!!!! We were so excited!!!
We had lunch at the Royal Banquet, across from the Dumbo ride. It had an interesting choice of food and was thankfully in the air conditioned indoors....I got a dim sum basket for about $6 US, my son paid the same for sushi. My sister got a kid's meal fried chicken fingers basket with fries and juice for around $3 US and it looked great (you can tell who in this bunch LIVES in China and who is visiting by what we ordered, that's for sure)! My husband ordered a tempura basket and paid around $6 US. We thought the prices were GREAT!! Much more expensive than mainland China, but about the same as eating in Hong Kong and much less than eating at Disney in the states!!!
We went over to Tomorrowland to ride Space Mountain. The line was longer, about 30 minutes, so we took the single rider line that was only a 5 minute wait. I don't think that the local visitors understand the single rider line yet, as we took turns going it was practically a walk on for both groups. We LOVED Space Mountain.....the ride seemed much smoother and it was fun to hear the reactions of the Chinese people on the ride. They don't quite 'scream' like we do!!
We also rode the Buzz Lightyear ride. Yes, I know we didn't have any small children with us....we just couldn't resist...NO LINE AGAIN! Had a great time on that one!
The only 'long' lines for rides that we saw all day were for Pooh's ride, Dumbo and for Space Mountain......also, the lines for meeting the characters were very long. Another poster that had done HKD mentioned their dissapointment at the characters not wearing some traditional local costumes....I couldn't agree more. Had Mickey and Minnie been dressed in Chinese garb, we would have waited out the line and gotten our pics for sure!
We shopped our way out, buying mouse ears, etc.....I think they were about $7 or so US dollars.....but we wanted ears for the family that said Hong Kong.
One thing I did notice is that when you meet characters there is a cast member there that will take your whole families picture together, I thought that was really nice.
Overall, what a GREAT time! We loved not having to wait in lines. We did miss some of our Disney favorites though, Haunted Mansion, It's a Small World in particular would have had special meaning. This is absolutely a half-day park. Had we gone expecting a full day, we would have been sadly dissapointed. Since we wanted a fairly quick expereince so that we could have more experiences in China outside of Disney, we were very pleased with our ability to see so much so quickly and be able to leave mid-day not feeling as if we had missed much. The park is BEAUTIFUL, we loved the backdrop of the mountains and they did a great job of reminding us we were somewhere ELSE
If you are in Hong Kong, you should really go to this beautiful little Disney park. I am excited to see it again in 10 years after they have done some expansion. Don't go expecting it to be cheap like the rest of China though, we saw US prices on many items, but even with that, wish we would have bought more to remind us of our great time!
Please feel free to ask any questions you have about HKD or our trip to China, I will try to answer the best that I can!!!
Cast:
Me, mother of 3, Disney fan
DH, tolerates Disney for me and the kids, secretly loves it. Fully expected HKD to be one lone Chinese guy, running people up and down a dirt road on a rickshaw.
DS13, Biggest Disney fan in family, we went to HK Dis primarily for him. His life goal is to go to every Disney park in the world, and being in China, we were just too close to not cross this one off of his list!
Sis28, my dear sister who lives in Shenzhen in mainland China for a year. She is why we made the trip to China and our impromptu tour guide as well
Well, we made our dream trip to China finally. After we were done seeing the Great Wall and other famous places, our trip could not be complete without visiting Hong Kong Disneyland. This is no easy task, as we were staying in mainland China and had to cross the borders again. We were very nervous about finding our way to Disney.
At the border crossing, we showed a Disney pamplet that I had picked up at the Hong Kong airport when we orginally arrived in China. This was very valuable, as we were shown the way to the Wonderland Express!!!! I must say that Disney has made it VERY easy to find your way to them! What a relief! The price was 80 HK dollars each way or 150 HK for roundtrip. We opted for just purchasing one way as we decided to return through Lo Wu and go shopping. 80 HK dollars is about $10 US, not a bad deal at all!
When we arrived at HKD, we realized that we would have been much better pre-purchasing our tickets the day before and using the ticket dipsensers to pick them up. There was no line whatsoever for this service. You did, however, need to make sure you had the original credit card the purchase was made on. The ticket line, on the other hand, was the worst line we stood in all day! Go figure!
There is something I must tell you about Hong Kong....even in October, it was absolutely, unbearably hot. We feel the same about Florida and prefer to go in only the chilliest of months. If returning to HKD, I would only do it in December or January....it is REALLY hot there!!!
When we entered the park we strolled through some of the shops on Main Street, U.S.A. The prices were very similar to what you would pay in the U.S. The least expensive T-Shirts we could find were around $15 US dollars. They did have some pins for trading that were about $3.15 US, so I must say the pins were much cheaper here, as I don't recall ever seeing any at the US parks for less then $8, and I am not even sure I saw them that low. My son, of course, pin traded with the cast members and really enjoyed himself, although the cast did not yet have a wide selection of pins on their lanyards.
We then headed over to ride the Jungle Cruise. Right away we were stopped by a show happening in Adventureland....it was a very high energy show with colorful costumes and large, pretend animals. Sort of an African themed dance party. The cast was GREAT! They really involved the audience and it was a great start to our day! The Jungle Cruise was a TON of fun. Took the English version and literally WALKED ON to the boat.....it was really cool to hear the ride done in English with this strong accent! We knew we were in Disney AND knew we were in China....AWESOME!
We rode the teacups and Philharmagic in Fantasyland....again, NO WAITING!!!! We were so excited!!!
We had lunch at the Royal Banquet, across from the Dumbo ride. It had an interesting choice of food and was thankfully in the air conditioned indoors....I got a dim sum basket for about $6 US, my son paid the same for sushi. My sister got a kid's meal fried chicken fingers basket with fries and juice for around $3 US and it looked great (you can tell who in this bunch LIVES in China and who is visiting by what we ordered, that's for sure)! My husband ordered a tempura basket and paid around $6 US. We thought the prices were GREAT!! Much more expensive than mainland China, but about the same as eating in Hong Kong and much less than eating at Disney in the states!!!
We went over to Tomorrowland to ride Space Mountain. The line was longer, about 30 minutes, so we took the single rider line that was only a 5 minute wait. I don't think that the local visitors understand the single rider line yet, as we took turns going it was practically a walk on for both groups. We LOVED Space Mountain.....the ride seemed much smoother and it was fun to hear the reactions of the Chinese people on the ride. They don't quite 'scream' like we do!!
We also rode the Buzz Lightyear ride. Yes, I know we didn't have any small children with us....we just couldn't resist...NO LINE AGAIN! Had a great time on that one!
The only 'long' lines for rides that we saw all day were for Pooh's ride, Dumbo and for Space Mountain......also, the lines for meeting the characters were very long. Another poster that had done HKD mentioned their dissapointment at the characters not wearing some traditional local costumes....I couldn't agree more. Had Mickey and Minnie been dressed in Chinese garb, we would have waited out the line and gotten our pics for sure!
We shopped our way out, buying mouse ears, etc.....I think they were about $7 or so US dollars.....but we wanted ears for the family that said Hong Kong.
One thing I did notice is that when you meet characters there is a cast member there that will take your whole families picture together, I thought that was really nice.
Overall, what a GREAT time! We loved not having to wait in lines. We did miss some of our Disney favorites though, Haunted Mansion, It's a Small World in particular would have had special meaning. This is absolutely a half-day park. Had we gone expecting a full day, we would have been sadly dissapointed. Since we wanted a fairly quick expereince so that we could have more experiences in China outside of Disney, we were very pleased with our ability to see so much so quickly and be able to leave mid-day not feeling as if we had missed much. The park is BEAUTIFUL, we loved the backdrop of the mountains and they did a great job of reminding us we were somewhere ELSE
If you are in Hong Kong, you should really go to this beautiful little Disney park. I am excited to see it again in 10 years after they have done some expansion. Don't go expecting it to be cheap like the rest of China though, we saw US prices on many items, but even with that, wish we would have bought more to remind us of our great time!
Please feel free to ask any questions you have about HKD or our trip to China, I will try to answer the best that I can!!!
)
