For some reason I had placed my original pre-trip report in the Tokyo board, but as there have been so many changes to the plans I might as well continue here
It's almost 100 days before departure! *Excited*
Shanghai
I am in the Netherlands, my friend lives in Belgium, we will fly separately with Emirates to Dubai, and then transfer together to the flight to Shanghai.
We arrive around 15:30 at the airport, so hopefully no problems with baggage or at customs and we will be at the
Charms Hotel around 6 PM. We are doing this trip on a budget and for a 3-star hotel we got a good deal. Probably as we are in a room without windows
It has a lot of amenities like a gym, but also a spa-like area with a barber, pool tables and by the looks of it places to play chess and Mahjong. If we have time, I'd love to see their karaoke facilities
Our hotel is near the People's Park and about 20-30 minutes walk to the Bund. Depending on our jetlag we will probably go here to see the Bund at night and find a place somewhere to eat. There is a roof top bar called Flair in the Ritz Carlton which is supposed to be good.
After this we have 2 days to explore the city. To be honest, I haven't looked into Shanghai sightseeing yet. I have a long list, but no shortlist yet. Some options are:
- Fuxing Park
- People's Park
- Yuyuan garden
- The Bund (we might want to do a night time river cruise, anyone here done it?)
- Jade Buddha Temple
- Longhua Temple
- City God Temple
- Shanghai Museum
- Shanghai Science & Technology Museum (My friend, she is an engineer, she might enjoy this)
- China Art Museum
Disneyland Shanghai
Then on the 2nd day we will move to the
Toy Story hotel. We have a Garden View Room, mainly because the Standard Rooms were already gone. We should arrive around 5 or 6 PM, I think. Also depends a bit till when the park is open, as this is a Saturday I hope till late. After settling in, we will go into the park for the evening entertainment and hopefully to have a character dinner in the Royal Banquet Hall.
We have 2 full days in DLS, a Sunday and a Monday. It's the end of the summer/vacation season, so it will be hot, no idea how crowded it will be. We love characters, shows, parades, we will probably try to see certain shows twice. And of course Pirates and Tron. I am not a big Soaring fan, I enjoy it, but never understood why it is so popular. I just want to walk around and enjoy the ambiance, little cultural things like Chip 'n Dale doing Tai Chi, the garden of 12 Friends, the Wandering Moon restaurant (this area looks gorgeous on
@zanzibar138 's pictures). The entire park just looks gorgeous. Oh, and had I mentioned Pirates? I wanna see Pirates! At least 3 times!
Not too afraid of the cultural differences, my mother has travelled to China several times and I know her stories and pictures
. Also working at Amsterdam airport for a few years has hopefully prepared me for all cultural incidents we might come across. I'm not too worried about squat toilets. As a child we went camping in France a lot, this is the 80s I am talking about, many camping sites had squat toilets. I haven't used them for years, but I think I should be fine in case no Western option available.
Hong Kong
On Tuesday we have an early flight to Hong Kong. We plan to take a taxi to the airport. I take it, it will not be much problems to ask Guest Services to order a taxi at the right time? We land at 12:45PM. Hopefully in our hotel (
Evergreen Hotel ) around 2:30 - 3PM. Also here a room without windows. Hong Kong was hard to find a decent hotel for a decent price, and near public transportation (read: on the right routes to Disneyland
)
On our long list of things to do within 2,5 days:
- The Peak
- Symphony of Lights
- Wong Tai Sin Temple
- Sky100 (This is an Observation Deck with 360 degrees view over Hong Kong and the harbour, looks really nice)
- Harbour Cruise (might combine this with seeing Symphony of Lights)
- Ladies Market
- Temple Street Night Market (this one is close to our hotel)
- Jade Market
Originally, like almost everyone else, we had planned to go see the Big Buddha. But we might exchange that for the temple of the 10,000 Buddhas. It's a little less known, so there should be less tourist. Fun for me is that a few years ago, one of my favorite tv shows had an episode at this temple.
Disneyland Hong Kong
Here we are not doing a split stay, but staying in the hotel in the city. What I've read the subway from DLH to the city goes till late (also as it's on the same route as from the airport to the city) so we don't need to rush too much after closing the park. Really curious about Mystic Manor and Grizzly Mountain. I've never seen Iron Man (it's on the list to see before our trip starts). And as a show person I cannot wait to see Mickey and the Wondrous Book and Paint the Night and the parade.
I must admit, I am a bit worried about visiting DLH, as the entire Toy Story Area is similar to our home park in Paris. Also Buzz Lightyear, I expect this to be almost identical to ours. I love Jungle Cruise in the US parks, but I'm afraid things will get lost in translation here. 2 days seem a bit too long. I don't think we will get bored that quickly, we can always take it slow and the shows do take up time. But still... Either way, really happy to see the old castle before it gets replaced.
Tokyo
Again an early flight to Tokyo, probably will catch the subway to go back to the airport. We fly with Hong Kong Express, a low cost carrier, and the lowest fare was pretty good, but when you look at adding extra options as bags, meals (also a strict warning not to bring your own food!) etc. it's not so low cost anymore
We should arrive around 2:25PM at the airport, baggage, customs, rent Wifi thing, get cash and then go to
Wise Owl Hostel, hopefully arrive around 5PM. I hadn't planned on staying in a hostel (I'm over 30 now, I don't mind budget travel, but my days of room sharing with strangers are over ;-) ) but also Tokyo was a bit tricky to find a hotel on the right train route. Also because I am travelling with my friend, not my significant other, we needed a room with 2 single beds, which was a challenge! We do have a private room, which is incredibly small, but it does have a sink. This hostel is fairly new, therefore I hope the condition of the rooms and beds are still good ;-) I like that they have a little cafe in house where you can get coffee and a muffin for 4EUR (4.4USD). Just enough to start the day before we head into town. We stay here for 7 nights.
A friend has just toured through Japan for 3 weeks and brought back some cash and his Pasmo card for me
Depending on our mood that half day, we will just explore the area. Walk in the direction of Tokyo Station, we are close to the Ginza district.
Then we have 1 day in Tokyo, 4 weekdays in Disneyland Tokyo and then 1 more day in Tokyo. As there is so much to see and do in Tokyo, this is going to be very hard to make choices on what we will do.
We will probably try to see on our first day in the city:
- Tokyo Museum
- Harajuku area and shopping centers
- Meji Shrine
- Shibuya Crossing
Disneyland Tokyo and Disney Sea
4 full days. In a slow week, according to crowd calendar websites, we should be good. But still we will go in with a plan! Rope drop, utilize fastpass, skip Toy Story Mania, try the lotteries. In Disneyland Big Thunder Mountain and Jungle Cruise will be closed unfortunately, and maybe It's a Small World, as there is no end date mentioned for that. In Disney Sea the Magic Lamp Theater, but looking at it, that's not that important. I'm looking forward to see the Disney Sea, the park everyone raves about. A bit scared it won't live up to the expectations, but we will enjoy every last minute of it. Looking forward to all the shows and classics. See Pooh's Hunny Hunt, Monsters Inc., Journey to the Center of the Earth, Indiana Jones, Tower of Terror
I get happy just thinking of all the amazing stuff they have in Tokyo
Tokyo again
After 4 glorious days, we have our 2nd full day in Tokyo, no fixed plans yet. But probably:
- Akihabara area
- Ameyoko
- Go to a Rabbit Cafe!
( we wanted to visit at least one 'unusual' cafe)
We have a night flight, my guess is to go back to the airport around 9PM. Then to return our wifi things, get something to eat and then it's back to Dubai together and then on our own to Amsterdam and Brussel.
to me 
