mamadragona
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Feb 28, 2015
- Messages
- 181
Hi all,
First, thank you to all those that helped me plan. I had a few threads looking for information, and it all really helped. I felt the DLP specific trip reports get lost in the trip reports area, so I hope it is okay to put here.
Context: I am from the US. I have been once to WDW (Stayed in AoA then AK) and once on DCL on a land/sea trip last year. I have been once to DL in California about 25 years ago as a kid. So I am a novice Disney sampler
. I arrived from London with my husband and two kids (DS 8 turning 9, DD 6 with dairy and aubergine/eggplant allergy - not life threatening) where we had spent 5 nights, and we flew out of Paris CDG. My husband and kids went back home, and I went to a conference.
We booked: Sequoia Lodge, 4 nights (buy 2 get 2 nights early booking package special) Wednesday to Sunday in July. Booked a Princess and Prince lunch at Auberge de Cendrillon, a Mickey Cafe breakfast, a day excursion to Paris (Eiffel Tower), and the Photo pass. We also had a half board meal plan (Plus) and reserved in advance and ate at: Mickey's Cafe, Blue Lagoon, Hunter's Grill, and Chez Remy. We also tried Rainforest Cafe for lunch. We came in from London via the direct Eurostar Disney Train, but booked via Eurostar without luggage service) and we left via the Disney Airport Shuttle service (booked at time of reservation).
Okay, so here are my general thoughts, and I'll try to go in order.
1) I got a train car that serves food and has a table seating for 4 on the train. I did this in part because it advertised meals with dietary restriction availability. But this is not true on the way in apparently - only for the full meal on the way out. On the way in my daughter did have some bread and an apple and OJ, but that was it. Insist all kids use the train toilettes before it stops at Disney. You have to pay for restrooms at the train station and they only use EUR. I only had GBPs in bills. And it took so long to figure that out that we missed the first shuttle to the hotel and had to take the second.
2) The first night, we arrived via train in the midafternoon, and had promised the kids pool time first until dinner. My kids favorite by far was the pool. However, crap happens (literally), so when it shuts down for some time, it was REALLY nice to be within walking distance of Disney village and the park. Like REALLY nice. I felt I could be much more flexible rolling with the punches than at WDW where shuttle service takes a lot of time. The room was close to everything - pool, exit, promenade to the parks. Just perfect. Also, this was just after Nice/Bastille day and security was intense initially. It was a little scary, but also we felt very safe and felt that DLP was taking it seriously.
3) Sequoia grounds and pool were lovely. As was the main area and restaurants. Location was great. But the rooms were a little run down. BUT I also had this experience at AK, so I'm actually not all that surprised. The big difference for me was that I didn't feel I had to walk a really long time to get to breakfast or the pool. But that said, it would be nice if the rooms were a little updated. I also didn't get as nice room service as I remembered at WDW either. Service was cursory. And there was no laundry facility only dry cleaning laundry (extremely expensive item by item payment). Apparently the one bank of laundry machines (at Cheyenne) was out of order, so I had to resort to handwashing enough by hand to get us through the week.
3) We did our first meal at Cafe Mickey was at 6:30 - excellent service and excellent food accommodations. My kids liked the food here for dinner a lot - probably their favorite restaurant food wise. I was just eh about the dinner food. We got to see several character rotations. I smiled so hard my cheeks hurt. Tigger was WONDERFUL! Big lesson though - don't be in a hurry at meal time. If you are in a hurry, do the buffets instead. Here is a note - you cannot put a tip on credit card payment for your drinks or whatever. So you must have small bill/coin cash if you wish to leave a tip. I am still not entirely sure what is proper tipping etiquette, but when we had cash, we always left something. Obviously I learned this the hard way and didn't have cash at one place
.
4) OMG Dreams was AMAZING - like brought tears to my eyes. I did it the first night, which was a great idea because it was midweek, and presumably less crowded, and because my kids weren't worn down after a full park day. Cafe Mickey and Dreams was just the thing to get all of us in the mood. Note, DD got pretty scared when they brought out Villians toward the end. In between, we poked around Studios and did the magic carpet ride like 3 times because it had a 5-10 minute wait. (just my speed BTW - I am not a fan of the big rides). I was a little surprised there seemed to be only 1 location for half-board snack redemption in Studios!
5) Day 2 (Thursday) was Disneyland park day. After a lazy morning and pool visit, we walked over for our lunch reservation. On the way my daughter complained about her shoes. So we stopped in a shop to buy her sneakers. Both times we stopped in a shop, the cashiers were soooo nice and wonderful. Excellent CM interaction. Auberge de Cendrillion had wonderful service, excellent character rotation - my favorite character interaction was Rapunzel - she was so funny, and they provided kids with something for signatures (I can't believe I forgot their autograph books!!). The salad was great there, but the meals weren't excellent - DH said his chicken was very overcooked (actually he told me to clarify - inedible). The kids were just ho hum about their meals. As in Cafe Mickey, they made DD's pasta dairy free, but it was a slightly different recipe than Cafe Mickey and she was disappointed. However, it was still worth in overall because some fo the longest park lines were for character spots. Half-board - I didn't ask about subs for the half board snacks - I just let DD have the donut - which did make her crabby later, but it made her happy at the time, LOL. Most ridden ride was the tea cups. Loved those. DH waited for us because they make him dizzy, but it worked well. The DLP app was wonderful. We could really check everything out and make decisions about what to stand in line for. We didn't have to stand in line for anything more than 20 min on this day (later the two bigger rides at Studios was it). I wasn't bummed out really about the closures because there was only one I was really bummed about - Star Tours, and I suffered though it
. I liked that all the rides were just a little different than WDW. We did see Peter Pan at one point and he said hello to DD who was dressed as a bit of a Tinkerbell Princess. PoC ride was wonderful and then Blue Lagoon was one of the best meals I had. At Blue Lagoon they put a candle on DS's dessert. This was really nice as I had originally ordered a cake, but had to cancel it since they couldn't accommodate no dairy for DD. Again DD at both places was able to get a no dairy and eggplant accommodation. The only downside was that they only really had fruit at most places for dessert, so she sometimes felt left out. I really enjoyed Blue Lagoon though - great service and ambiance. And the weather!!!! I would never try WDW in late July for fear I would fry from heat and crowds, but DLP was soo much better on this account. Beautiful weather the whole trip.
6) Day 3 (Friday) - "American" Breakfast at Cafe Mickey then Paris trip through DLP (leaves from Hotel NY nearby). The kids enjoyed the American food more than adjusting to the continental style hotel breakfast, but the food wasn't very accurately American. I mean it was okay by American standards, but not great. I think it was more of a UK breakfast as the scrambled eggs were more runny, the bacon was not crispy but more ham like, etc. which I've noticed is the custom in the UK. The tour, by Paris City Vision, was WONDERFUL!!! Take personal security warnings seriously though - one in our party had her credit card lifted! The guide spoke everything in both English and Spanish. For me this was excellent, because I got all directions twice, in two languages I could understand, so I didn't miss a thing! LOL. My daughter was enthralled by the Eiffel Tower. She has been wanting to go to Paris so badly. My son has some sensory issues and the crowds and heat were much more difficult for him. By the end of this day, he had a total breakdown - poor kid. The bus was calming, but I had to make it up to him the next day with a very relaxed morning in the hotel and pool. I know this was chartered through another company, but I would have liked a little Disney music or something on the bus. Lastly, due to the long day out, I opted for dinner in the hotel. The buffet was AMAZING. I think this was the best buffet I have ever had! So many choices! Really nice.
7) Day 4 (Saturday) - After a lazy morning, we went to Rainforest Cafe. I let DS pick this because his sister's Paris wish had definitely been the star the day before, and it was his birthday this trip. He had gone in London and LOVED it, so he was looking forward to it. And it was not busy for lunch. But although dairy allergy was accommodated, the overall experience was awful. Awful service, DS never got his birthday song, nothing. Also VERY expensive for just lunch. I don't know how the two locations could be so different! So anyway, in general today the crowds were back in full force. Breakfast was crazy, Studios was crazy. If I'd had control over it, I might have booked all mid week instead of being at the park on the weekend. But eventually there were ebbs and we made it back on the magic carpet, the Slinky was a total hit (I even took the kids twice in a row on this while DH snuck off for the ToT which he said was sooooo scary), and the kids tried the army parachute. We snuck a glimpse of Cruella DeVille and Sully was available for a time for pictures (but it was too hot that day and so he had to leave before my daughter made it through the line). We went to Ratatouille, but it was clear that the wait time was longer than we anticipated and we wouldn't make it before our dinner reservation, so we left the queue, and just went right to Chez Remy, though 20 minutes early. Unfortunately they couldn't seat us early, so we had to wait (this was never the case at WDW - I could always get an earlier table) Chez Remy was awesome in ambiance, and I enjoyed the food - though the portions were a little oversized for me. DD with her aubergine allergy was really limited here and they were very strict with allergies, really only wanting to give us the Natama menu, but DD was not thrilled with that, so in the end she had plain pasta, which she didn't like either. So although my meal was excellent here - DD ended up really not liking her meal at all . I stopped at Disney Village to take pictures in the Lego store - the sculptures were amazing. We got one last dip in the pool after dinner as I sadly packed us up...
8) That's it. Breakfast in the morning. I went down to the desk and after much difficulty was finally able to print my boarding passes (their printing system was broken). We took the CDG shuttle home. I like the WDW shuttle better because it has Disney movies, music, etc. This was really just a bus ride, and the operator didn't even help with getting bags off the bus. It was a sort of anticlimatic ending. Sad too. My son was sooo sad the night before that it was the last day. It was all he could talk about. They took Iceland Air home (the bag check in line was huge, but there was virtually no wait for security screening) and didn't care for the food there either, but my daughter fell in love with Iceland apparently.
Summary -
DLP is a total winner - dare I say I enjoyed it more than WDW?? Hotel location, park walk-ability - within and between parks as well as between park and hotel, pricing (the USD was relatively strong, but also I spent much more for less at WDW), crowd levels, wait times, weather, ambiance, beautiful castle and dragon - DLP was a total winner for me. In particular with littler kids and don't caring about the big rides, there was overall little waiting. If my kids were younger, the proximity to the hotels would be a boon for naps as well. I felt much more relaxed without being slave to the FastPass, hotel shuttles, and 180 day/60 day booking frenzy of WDW. I didn't "DO" everything in 2.5 days, but I did feel I was able to sample a lot of what I had wanted to without a lot of stress - which is my idea of a vacation. I could have easily done more days, spent a little more time at the pool, and worked our way up to a few of the bigger rides. Language was never an issue - everyone spoke English, and signage was in English. We did our best practicing of French, but it never lasted more than a few words before they had us made. I also just loved the amount of diversity we experienced on this trip - in London too, for that matter. I felt my kids left with a much bigger understanding of how big and diverse things are compared to our rather homogeneous US state.
Downsides - room was a little underwhelming, food was not as consistently excellent as WDW. I had some of the best food in my life at WDW. I assumed French chefs would give WDW a run for its money, but it came up short in this department (my best meal at WDW was at Be our Guest - I didn't see much of anything themed to Belle here??). While I do feel a few of us had great meals, none of us had one restaurant that we just all really loved - though Hunter's Grill came close. Photopass wasn't quite the same - no camera operators at certain photo op locations. I missed the ease of using the wristbands to get around. I also didn't see a lot of CMs available for questions. Just one at the wait time board at Studios. Every other CM we saw was either counting at a ride or sweeping/working. No one just smiling and welcoming, as in WDW. Perhaps this is the real US complaint with DLP customer service? When I did interact with someone, they were all very nice, particularly the CMs in the shops. One small exception for some bored counters (they had tally sheets or counting devices) but at the Carousel on Thursday, the actual operator (an older gentleman) smiled and dance a jig. It was so nice to see.
ETA - made some spelling fixes and clarifications.
First, thank you to all those that helped me plan. I had a few threads looking for information, and it all really helped. I felt the DLP specific trip reports get lost in the trip reports area, so I hope it is okay to put here.
Context: I am from the US. I have been once to WDW (Stayed in AoA then AK) and once on DCL on a land/sea trip last year. I have been once to DL in California about 25 years ago as a kid. So I am a novice Disney sampler
. I arrived from London with my husband and two kids (DS 8 turning 9, DD 6 with dairy and aubergine/eggplant allergy - not life threatening) where we had spent 5 nights, and we flew out of Paris CDG. My husband and kids went back home, and I went to a conference.We booked: Sequoia Lodge, 4 nights (buy 2 get 2 nights early booking package special) Wednesday to Sunday in July. Booked a Princess and Prince lunch at Auberge de Cendrillon, a Mickey Cafe breakfast, a day excursion to Paris (Eiffel Tower), and the Photo pass. We also had a half board meal plan (Plus) and reserved in advance and ate at: Mickey's Cafe, Blue Lagoon, Hunter's Grill, and Chez Remy. We also tried Rainforest Cafe for lunch. We came in from London via the direct Eurostar Disney Train, but booked via Eurostar without luggage service) and we left via the Disney Airport Shuttle service (booked at time of reservation).
Okay, so here are my general thoughts, and I'll try to go in order.
1) I got a train car that serves food and has a table seating for 4 on the train. I did this in part because it advertised meals with dietary restriction availability. But this is not true on the way in apparently - only for the full meal on the way out. On the way in my daughter did have some bread and an apple and OJ, but that was it. Insist all kids use the train toilettes before it stops at Disney. You have to pay for restrooms at the train station and they only use EUR. I only had GBPs in bills. And it took so long to figure that out that we missed the first shuttle to the hotel and had to take the second.
2) The first night, we arrived via train in the midafternoon, and had promised the kids pool time first until dinner. My kids favorite by far was the pool. However, crap happens (literally), so when it shuts down for some time, it was REALLY nice to be within walking distance of Disney village and the park. Like REALLY nice. I felt I could be much more flexible rolling with the punches than at WDW where shuttle service takes a lot of time. The room was close to everything - pool, exit, promenade to the parks. Just perfect. Also, this was just after Nice/Bastille day and security was intense initially. It was a little scary, but also we felt very safe and felt that DLP was taking it seriously.
3) Sequoia grounds and pool were lovely. As was the main area and restaurants. Location was great. But the rooms were a little run down. BUT I also had this experience at AK, so I'm actually not all that surprised. The big difference for me was that I didn't feel I had to walk a really long time to get to breakfast or the pool. But that said, it would be nice if the rooms were a little updated. I also didn't get as nice room service as I remembered at WDW either. Service was cursory. And there was no laundry facility only dry cleaning laundry (extremely expensive item by item payment). Apparently the one bank of laundry machines (at Cheyenne) was out of order, so I had to resort to handwashing enough by hand to get us through the week.
3) We did our first meal at Cafe Mickey was at 6:30 - excellent service and excellent food accommodations. My kids liked the food here for dinner a lot - probably their favorite restaurant food wise. I was just eh about the dinner food. We got to see several character rotations. I smiled so hard my cheeks hurt. Tigger was WONDERFUL! Big lesson though - don't be in a hurry at meal time. If you are in a hurry, do the buffets instead. Here is a note - you cannot put a tip on credit card payment for your drinks or whatever. So you must have small bill/coin cash if you wish to leave a tip. I am still not entirely sure what is proper tipping etiquette, but when we had cash, we always left something. Obviously I learned this the hard way and didn't have cash at one place
.4) OMG Dreams was AMAZING - like brought tears to my eyes. I did it the first night, which was a great idea because it was midweek, and presumably less crowded, and because my kids weren't worn down after a full park day. Cafe Mickey and Dreams was just the thing to get all of us in the mood. Note, DD got pretty scared when they brought out Villians toward the end. In between, we poked around Studios and did the magic carpet ride like 3 times because it had a 5-10 minute wait. (just my speed BTW - I am not a fan of the big rides). I was a little surprised there seemed to be only 1 location for half-board snack redemption in Studios!
5) Day 2 (Thursday) was Disneyland park day. After a lazy morning and pool visit, we walked over for our lunch reservation. On the way my daughter complained about her shoes. So we stopped in a shop to buy her sneakers. Both times we stopped in a shop, the cashiers were soooo nice and wonderful. Excellent CM interaction. Auberge de Cendrillion had wonderful service, excellent character rotation - my favorite character interaction was Rapunzel - she was so funny, and they provided kids with something for signatures (I can't believe I forgot their autograph books!!). The salad was great there, but the meals weren't excellent - DH said his chicken was very overcooked (actually he told me to clarify - inedible). The kids were just ho hum about their meals. As in Cafe Mickey, they made DD's pasta dairy free, but it was a slightly different recipe than Cafe Mickey and she was disappointed. However, it was still worth in overall because some fo the longest park lines were for character spots. Half-board - I didn't ask about subs for the half board snacks - I just let DD have the donut - which did make her crabby later, but it made her happy at the time, LOL. Most ridden ride was the tea cups. Loved those. DH waited for us because they make him dizzy, but it worked well. The DLP app was wonderful. We could really check everything out and make decisions about what to stand in line for. We didn't have to stand in line for anything more than 20 min on this day (later the two bigger rides at Studios was it). I wasn't bummed out really about the closures because there was only one I was really bummed about - Star Tours, and I suffered though it
. I liked that all the rides were just a little different than WDW. We did see Peter Pan at one point and he said hello to DD who was dressed as a bit of a Tinkerbell Princess. PoC ride was wonderful and then Blue Lagoon was one of the best meals I had. At Blue Lagoon they put a candle on DS's dessert. This was really nice as I had originally ordered a cake, but had to cancel it since they couldn't accommodate no dairy for DD. Again DD at both places was able to get a no dairy and eggplant accommodation. The only downside was that they only really had fruit at most places for dessert, so she sometimes felt left out. I really enjoyed Blue Lagoon though - great service and ambiance. And the weather!!!! I would never try WDW in late July for fear I would fry from heat and crowds, but DLP was soo much better on this account. Beautiful weather the whole trip.6) Day 3 (Friday) - "American" Breakfast at Cafe Mickey then Paris trip through DLP (leaves from Hotel NY nearby). The kids enjoyed the American food more than adjusting to the continental style hotel breakfast, but the food wasn't very accurately American. I mean it was okay by American standards, but not great. I think it was more of a UK breakfast as the scrambled eggs were more runny, the bacon was not crispy but more ham like, etc. which I've noticed is the custom in the UK. The tour, by Paris City Vision, was WONDERFUL!!! Take personal security warnings seriously though - one in our party had her credit card lifted! The guide spoke everything in both English and Spanish. For me this was excellent, because I got all directions twice, in two languages I could understand, so I didn't miss a thing! LOL. My daughter was enthralled by the Eiffel Tower. She has been wanting to go to Paris so badly. My son has some sensory issues and the crowds and heat were much more difficult for him. By the end of this day, he had a total breakdown - poor kid. The bus was calming, but I had to make it up to him the next day with a very relaxed morning in the hotel and pool. I know this was chartered through another company, but I would have liked a little Disney music or something on the bus. Lastly, due to the long day out, I opted for dinner in the hotel. The buffet was AMAZING. I think this was the best buffet I have ever had! So many choices! Really nice.
7) Day 4 (Saturday) - After a lazy morning, we went to Rainforest Cafe. I let DS pick this because his sister's Paris wish had definitely been the star the day before, and it was his birthday this trip. He had gone in London and LOVED it, so he was looking forward to it. And it was not busy for lunch. But although dairy allergy was accommodated, the overall experience was awful. Awful service, DS never got his birthday song, nothing. Also VERY expensive for just lunch. I don't know how the two locations could be so different! So anyway, in general today the crowds were back in full force. Breakfast was crazy, Studios was crazy. If I'd had control over it, I might have booked all mid week instead of being at the park on the weekend. But eventually there were ebbs and we made it back on the magic carpet, the Slinky was a total hit (I even took the kids twice in a row on this while DH snuck off for the ToT which he said was sooooo scary), and the kids tried the army parachute. We snuck a glimpse of Cruella DeVille and Sully was available for a time for pictures (but it was too hot that day and so he had to leave before my daughter made it through the line
). We went to Ratatouille, but it was clear that the wait time was longer than we anticipated and we wouldn't make it before our dinner reservation, so we left the queue, and just went right to Chez Remy, though 20 minutes early. Unfortunately they couldn't seat us early, so we had to wait (this was never the case at WDW - I could always get an earlier table) Chez Remy was awesome in ambiance, and I enjoyed the food - though the portions were a little oversized for me. DD with her aubergine allergy was really limited here and they were very strict with allergies, really only wanting to give us the Natama menu, but DD was not thrilled with that, so in the end she had plain pasta, which she didn't like either. So although my meal was excellent here - DD ended up really not liking her meal at all . I stopped at Disney Village to take pictures in the Lego store - the sculptures were amazing. We got one last dip in the pool after dinner as I sadly packed us up...8) That's it. Breakfast in the morning. I went down to the desk and after much difficulty was finally able to print my boarding passes (their printing system was broken). We took the CDG shuttle home. I like the WDW shuttle better because it has Disney movies, music, etc. This was really just a bus ride, and the operator didn't even help with getting bags off the bus. It was a sort of anticlimatic ending. Sad too. My son was sooo sad the night before that it was the last day. It was all he could talk about. They took Iceland Air home (the bag check in line was huge, but there was virtually no wait for security screening) and didn't care for the food there either, but my daughter fell in love with Iceland apparently.
Summary -
DLP is a total winner - dare I say I enjoyed it more than WDW?? Hotel location, park walk-ability - within and between parks as well as between park and hotel, pricing (the USD was relatively strong, but also I spent much more for less at WDW), crowd levels, wait times, weather, ambiance, beautiful castle and dragon - DLP was a total winner for me. In particular with littler kids and don't caring about the big rides, there was overall little waiting. If my kids were younger, the proximity to the hotels would be a boon for naps as well. I felt much more relaxed without being slave to the FastPass, hotel shuttles, and 180 day/60 day booking frenzy of WDW. I didn't "DO" everything in 2.5 days, but I did feel I was able to sample a lot of what I had wanted to without a lot of stress - which is my idea of a vacation. I could have easily done more days, spent a little more time at the pool, and worked our way up to a few of the bigger rides. Language was never an issue - everyone spoke English, and signage was in English. We did our best practicing of French, but it never lasted more than a few words before they had us made. I also just loved the amount of diversity we experienced on this trip - in London too, for that matter. I felt my kids left with a much bigger understanding of how big and diverse things are compared to our rather homogeneous US state.
Downsides - room was a little underwhelming, food was not as consistently excellent as WDW. I had some of the best food in my life at WDW. I assumed French chefs would give WDW a run for its money, but it came up short in this department (my best meal at WDW was at Be our Guest - I didn't see much of anything themed to Belle here??). While I do feel a few of us had great meals, none of us had one restaurant that we just all really loved - though Hunter's Grill came close. Photopass wasn't quite the same - no camera operators at certain photo op locations. I missed the ease of using the wristbands to get around. I also didn't see a lot of CMs available for questions. Just one at the wait time board at Studios. Every other CM we saw was either counting at a ride or sweeping/working. No one just smiling and welcoming, as in WDW. Perhaps this is the real US complaint with DLP customer service? When I did interact with someone, they were all very nice, particularly the CMs in the shops. One small exception for some bored counters (they had tally sheets or counting devices) but at the Carousel on Thursday, the actual operator (an older gentleman) smiled and dance a jig.
It was so nice to see.ETA - made some spelling fixes and clarifications.
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