PTR -- last minute and on a budget :-)

[janischa]

UPDATED: SEE BELOW FOR SECOND VISIT IN SEPTEMBER

Not even two months ago we had a lovely holiday in WDW and after having spent more than half a year preparing our holiday there, I just couldn't go cold turkey on disney so given our severely depleted piggy bank, we decided to anywayz squeeze in a very very budgetted eurodisney trip


first attempt: We tried pricing a package via the 50% off flash sale, but for a 2 night trip prices simply still seemed to steep for us, especially considering the short length of the stay (i think it was almost 400 euro for the santa fe)

next attempt: The hunt for cheap tickets: knowing we'd likely also want to make a short trip in December, we started investigating the option of an annual pass. We found a great promotion on ce multiavantages dot com website where we ended up paying only 320 euro for annual dream passes for the 3 of us (DH, DD3 and me). I initially wanted to get us the fantasy pass, which would have cost us 240 euro but i couldn't bear the tought of no entitlement to EMH made us choose the dream passes) And yes, I know it's amost the price of the package, but i see it as a future savings (who am i fooling ^-^) Anyway, these passes give us free parking and 10% discount in the restaurants, so that would be great as well, while we still have the flexibility on not being obliged to eat in the parcs if we don't want to.

The hunt for cheap lodging: This was a very very tricky one, because i'm very demanding. I wanted something charming, as cheap as possible and still available this summer. In return, i was flexible in my dates (any last minute cancellations, someone ????) and willing to stay max a 20 minute drive from disney (DH uses a company car, so little transport cost). And behold, i found something utterly charming with rave reviews. It's a B&B, 15 to 20 min drive, and it's located in this old mill with the most friendly owners (according to the reviews i've read). Price for the 3 of us inclusive of breakfast ? 85 euro a night. So for our 2 nights, we'll be paying 170 euro. Total trip cost: 320+170 = 490 euro. Since another friend felt like going on a weekend trip with us in september (guess where and since we'll be going again in December (i want to see those decorations, and i'm guessing my DH and I might make it a romantic trip with only the 2 of us) and again in July 2012 (we're already in the process of booking this fab villa), those AP are a great deal !!!

Food: We'll be making sure to eat well at breakfast and take along some snacks to pass lunch. If needed, we'll eat at some counterservice restaurants (which one would you recommend ??????????????) and one night, we'll be having dinner at the B&B (28 euro a person, 18 euro for DD)

Character interactions: We've decided for once to skip the character meals. We may though do the afternoon tea party given that it's a cheap way of seeing the characters and getting some snacks. Is there savoury food as well ? I'm betting on some luck to catch some surprise appearances (do these ever happen in DLP ?) and we'll be catching some parades. Since with our AP we're not in any hurry, we can afford to make time for things other people may hurry along past or go to less popular character interactions. Anyone tips for this ?????????????

Recycling DD's wardrobe: Since we were lucky enough to have an American friend who made DD beautiful dresses for a very friendly price (she makes them professionaly and they are beautiful), DD will be able to wear these again this summer in DLP. They're very original dresses; one is of snowhite and each of the 7 dwarfs embroidered on her skirt. I'm hoping this will help her get some more character interaction here and there and maybe, who knows, some pixie dust

 

[janischa]

oops, i forgot to add that we'll be going 2-4th august

 

[smallpig]

Food: We'll be making sure to eat well at breakfast and take along some snacks to pass lunch. If needed, we'll eat at some counterservice restaurants (which one would you recommend ??????????????) and one night, we'll be having dinner at the B&B (28 euro a person, 18 euro for DD)

Lucky you with all the trips - sounds great!

We liked Colonel Hathi's and Hakuna Matata for counter service meals, one set meal (about 10 euros) was plenty for 2 (definitely for 1 adult and 1 child) - particularly if you are snacking.

Also found Earl of Sandwich prices really good compared to cost of hot dogs etc in the park.

 

[Ms Poppins]

Some good plans.

You could always take a wander round the on-site hotels to see if you can catch some characters there. Don't know if the DLH still does the 4pm characters in the lobby - someone might know - but that would be a good opportunity too.

 

[DLPdaft]

In my experience there are lots and lots of surprise (ie unscheduled) character appearances at DLP - but as you are going in the middle of all European school holidays, I'd imagine the scrums would be pretty big around them all, no matter where you find them.

Cowboy Cookout tea party is just sweet stuff, no savoury.

 

[Kazzabelle]

Hope you have a wonderful time and the park and the meets are not too busy for you

 

[kizzabel]

Sounds like a fab trip in the making. Hope you have a great time

 

[alstox]

Thanks for the budget tips ...we're off there next week (8th August) so they will come in very handy.

 

[janischa]

just back today.. and despite it not being quite what we expected, we had a very nice time...

Tuesday: We left off with a not too great start.... the evening before our girl got sick in the car and vomited all over. So we cleaned up the car seat as good as possible and set off Tuesday morning to France. Then our gps started acting up (and kept doing so the whole trip), leading us the wrong way quite a number of times and we got unlucky getting stuck in a number of traffic jams.... (i think instead of a 3.15 hour trip it ended up being a 5 hour trip and us being quite stressed) result: instead of being able to spend a first few hours in disney, we had to rush in and out (i really wanted to get my vouchers already exchanged for the real annual passes). Donald's bureau next to the disneyland hotel was not open, so we actually had to go in the parc to the place for the annual passes between fantasy land and discovery land. There they guy at the counter first didn't understand where we had bought our vouchers from, but after some help of a colleague, he managed to get us set up. Then it was time to leave again for our B&B (we had told them we'd arrive at 5.30 pm), which was less than a 20 minute drive door-to-door.

My thoughts/tips for that first day:
If you arrive around the afternoon, then ignore all the parked cars and drive as close to the front as possible. There is often some space totally up front because of people having arrived early and having left mid morning (or because of spaces having been left vacant; they do this weird thing in the morning where they purposely leave open spaces for the masses to walk through). Keep in mind though that you can't drive into a car lane and turn back; you gotta do a full tour again.
I had no problems not having to pay for parking despite it only still being a voucher and not yet the actual pass.
I am really happy we ended up doing the B&B; room and breakfast cost us 85 euro (actually it should have been 100 euro for the 3 of us) and i don't think we lost much more time than if we would have stayed in the santa fe. In addition, the B&B was gorgeous and my worries for staying with a toddler in such an elegant place were totally ungrounded. The owners were fabulous, even setting up a mini table and chair for her dinner. And while the dinner we ordered with them, was simple, it was very nice and very good value for 28 euro a person (we had melon +cheese + ham as starters, cod with veggies as main dish, a cheese dish and icecream+cake as dessert).

Wednesday: We started off with a delicious breakfast (8 types of home made jam !!!) and headed for the parcs. The day started rainy which i didn't mind because i reasoned it may decrease the crowds, but in the end it became a sunny day, which was good as well Now the good thing about having an annual pass is that it takes the pressure of the NEED to HAVE to see anything. So we leisurely walked down main street and decided to do Pinnocio's first (25 minute wait). Pinnocio's was nice; my girl was at first a bit afraid of the dark, but in the end she enjoyed the ride. After that we did Dumbo, which was a 45 minute wait (though i do think it was quite a bit shorter) and was really worth it. In Orlando, my girl had been a bit indifferent to riding Dumbo, but here, immediately after, she kept asking to go a second time (uhhhhh, no darling, i don't think so......) I guess because the parc is smaller it has this more intimate feel and the views from Dumbo were really nice !! It was worth the wait in my view (though i wasn't up for round two ) After that we decided to go for some lunch and went to Videopolis (or hyperdrome ?). Great place for a toddler, since it's quite cool and dark in there with huge screens playing cartoons, which means as parents you get a short break eventhough the burgers are really BAD (my hubbie had a burger and it was the worst ever..... i had the chicken nuggets and they actually were pretty good). After that we bumped into some characters who did not have too much of crowds (yet); the 2 boys from Alice which were really funny, playing with the kids and later chip and dale, which contrary to their american counterparts, were a little boring. We did quite some 'taking in the sights' instead of hurrying from ride to ride, which suited us fine (and did take some self control from my side....) The next ride we did was Peter Pan for which we had gotten a fastpass (we arrived much too late, but the guy didn't care.... it seemed very much the general attitude there actually, people just not really caring....). Was nice. A fun ride in the teacups followed after a very short wait. It's a classic, but i still love it. We took an enjoyable break in the icecream place next to Bella note (hmmm, lovely mint icecream with huge chocolate chunks). Another very very fun ride followedjust fast and thrilling enough for our girl) the chester's (?) circus ride (15 minutes wait), in fantasyland near those sweet little boats. Here there were some character appearances as well by the way and less crowded, but we didn't do them.Then later we did Buzz (on a fastpass), which brokedown halfway our ride, just at the place where the large evil robot needs to be shooted and which got our girl repeatedly saying 'he's naughty, he's naughty...' and me hoping it'd restart before she really freaked out The best part of this ride was actually the animatronic Buzz in the waiting line (you also see him with the FP). After Buzz, we headed for our dinner in the Agrabach (?) cafe, which is basically an oriental buffet. I thought i had read some good reviews on this place and i had phoned earlier in the day to get a free fastpass along with dinner here. The food was dissapointing though.... I love a good maroccon place, but this was really no good in our view. There is a really broad variety of dishes, which is good, but the dishes themselves are a let down. Very little tasty. I really missed the distinguishing taste of spices, spicy or not... Only the lamb tajine was okay. Even the desserts, among which those lovely pistache and sugary cookies, tasted dry and not what they should have tasted like. We finished up and then noticed a lot of people sitting on the curbs. Parade time... (7.20 parade; i think wishes come true or peter pan's flight; the fantillusion was only pas 10 pm, way too late for our girl). So we hesitated between seeing the parade and hitting some more rides, when we out of the blue noticed a corner at the white ropes. I asked the girl working there if this was a good spot and she smiled and told me this was an excellent spot. I think people overlooked it because it was a corner (people were sitting on the curb next to it, but not on the other side of the corner of the white rope). She told this was one of the places where they do a longer stop (and later i found out this is also the place where peter pan and friends actually pick out kids to dance with !!!!). It's a tiny little bit further from the broad way to the castle and opposite from the broad 'square' (i still have no good view of the parc's layout...). My girl (and we as well) enjoyed the parade very much. The animatronic of the bad lion of the lion king is wonderfull, seems so real !!! And peter pan was wonderfully casted... my only regret is having a shy daughter who wasn't up to joing the dances with peter and wendy After the parade, we decided it had been enough of a day for our girl and we headed back. It had been a lovely day.

My thoughts for that day: We really love DLP. It's much smaller of course than it's american version, but it definitely has it's own charm. Somehow the way fantasyland is set up and looks, it actually held more appeal for me than it's american version. But tastes are very personal, aren't they. For example, for me paris' sleeping beauty castle is more pretty than cindy's larger castle. I love it's shapes and forms and being able to go up and under it (sleeping dragon hiding there). I also love the level of detail and how everything is just so pretty, if you just have the eye of looking around..... (like the little toad above the english pub ???). What i didn't like has been mentionned before: the mobbing of the characters. People, even adults, have no inkling of waiting lines and even if there are only 4 kids/mum's with a kid on the arm, patiently waiting, you have people shooting in front of you, without the character's guide interfering. The smoking can also be bothersome, but that you can still avoid. What was funny for me, was all these people simply lying on the grasses where i'm sure they were not supposed to be lying and nobody saying anything about it. Of course, the general attitude of 'whatever' also did come in handy when taking in food in the parcs despite there being signs which prohibited this. Finally, after a very busy day in the parcs, i was quite happy to come home to a very quiet peaceful place. If my girl wouldn't have been so tired, it would have been nice to sit on our terrace, looking out at the wonderful landscape with a glass of wine....

Thursday: Check out time :-( We had planned to pass by Disney Hollywood, but instead enjoyed taking our time to enjoy the breakfast, passing by a local market and then decided we needed to head home.... Since we'd be here in another month (we're planning our next trip in september), i didn't really mind....

 

[Ms Poppins]

Sounds like you had a lovely time

Fantasyland is still my favourite place, for all the reasons you've mentioned. I love the buildings and attention to detail.

On our last visit we were waiting outside the toilets opposite Peter Pan and a lady beside me was taking a photo of the roof of the toilets. She commented that people must have thought she was mad taking pictures of toilets, but I agreed with her that the whole area is just lovely. Another reason why I too love Dumbo - the view is just what Disney is about for me

Thanks for sharing - and lucky you going again in September

 

[janischa]

and it was a tiring, but fun trip !
We went saturday 17th sept (disneyland) and sunday 18th sept (studios)
The parcs were PACKED !! Of course, due to one kid just curing from a double ear infection, another one developing a cough, last minute organisational issues which led to our company (6 adults & 2 kids) being split over 2 B&B, an adult needing to first see the docter,....we only started out late in the parcs. Still, it was a lot of fun.

So, this is what news I learned this time

* My hubbie and me having AP, we split out over the 2 cars to get free parking (otherwise 15 euro a car, ouch !!)
* We made a last minute booking (the day itself) for the cowboy coockout at 12.30. Despite a packed parc, it wasn't too busy there. The food was quite good for 'fast food'; one of us had the ribs which he found okay and i had the angus burger which was really good !!
* One of our friends was on a special diet, meaning he wouldn't order. Maybe because we were a larger group, no one said anything about us only ordering for 5 adults instead of 6 in the coockout. We got 6 fastpasses though because we also took a kid's menu.
* For the fastpasses, we had to ask the cashier explicitly. The manager then helped us out. Seemed though we were the only ones aware of this perk.
* We would definitely do the coockout again. LOTS of character interaction. We had Mickey come by like 2 times and Minnie 3 times and she was really nice. She spent some minutes and tried giving my daughter a hug and a kiss. We also saw Pluto, Goofy, Brother Bear, Eeyore.
* If you don't mind missing the parade, it's an ideal time to do the fantasyland rides.
* We didn't get to do thundermountain. The fastpass line was horrendous, I think like a 40 minute wait... for a fastpass ???????
* Space Mountain loads quite easily, so the line typically goes faster than estimated

Studios:
* Stitch show. Try to be among the first in row and when you get in the first room, move to the most righthand part. You'll be in at the front and if you sit on the blue carpet, you have more chance of stitch talking to your kid. It's a very lovely show.
* Cars parade: If you want to see the show, wait half an hour prior to the show at the other side of the square opposite the stitch attraction. If on the contrary, you prefer to have character interaction, wait at least !! half an hour early BETWEEN stitch and the square. (the thing in the middle however will block your view to see the show). We stayed there and it was great. You have to be on the front row though as only the front row gets to interact. (if you're late, better go to the other side to see the show; there second or third row is still good) We got a LOT of time with among others: Aladdin & Jasmin, Woody (we saw him two times and he tried playing with our iphone trying to take pictures of my friend), Jessie, Gaston (hilarious, he came back 2 times to talk to my girl), Ariel, Muschu. We also saw Mulan, Snow white & Droopy, Mickey & Minnie, Donald & Daisy, Mary Poppins, Remy, the blue monster of monster inc,... but we didn't get to really interact with those. It was really exciting and fun.
* You can grab some food in one of the take aways near Stitch and eat it waiting for the parade. The chicken mc nuggets were GOOD !
* Both Parachute drop and Crush Coaster have single rider lines. The one of parachute drop moves fast, the one of crush coaster sooooo NOT
* If you have a fastpass and a small kid, you can ask for a baby switch pass for the Tower of Terror, which allows you to fastpass 2 people. So one fastpass and a kid, can result in 3 adults using the fastpass line !!! You can play with that

HAVE FUN