TR(tdl/sdl/hkdl)-> This Is Where Your Dream Begins; A New World in Every Chapter. COMPLETED 12/8!!!

[katt789]

Tuesday October 11/2016


It’s 5:15 in the morning…..


UGH


ONLY FOR DISNEY


Dante was up right with us getting ready for work, and gone before we were ready to go. Kara & I walked to Kasai station and found the bus stop no worries. The bus was LATE though, and it was suuuuuuuper packed, but that’s okay! It made a couple of more stops, and then WE WERE IN DISNEYLAND AAAAHHHH!!!!


The lines for the turnstiles were already huge, but not insane, and there was a separate area for hotel guests, as they got in 15 minutes early!

Then it was TIME TO GOOOOOOOOO!!! AHHH!!! THE PARK WAS OPEN!!!! We scanned our tickets, (I’d grabbed a map/times guide the previous night) and it was OFF TO THE RACES!!! Seriously…there are cast members everywhere holding signs that say “no running” and “walk please” but no one actually follows those rules, the only time you’ll see stuff like that in Japan…in Disney!

The park was ALL decked out for Halloween and it was seriously amazing and incredible!! We were both SO INCREDIBLY OVERWHELMED instantly, like, this place is absolutely incredibly wonderfully, AMAZING, and we’d just stepped in the gates!!


We however, had a game plan, that we couldn’t deviate from, so we cut down the little side street off World Bazaar to head into Tomororwland (along with all the crowds) in our passing by the shopping, I shrieked when I saw the shirts we’d been wanting in the store on the corner, and we made a mental note to head back there right away! Tomorrowland looked very similar, but also had the huge addition of Monstropolis, which was (sort of )where we were heading! A fast pass was in order, and the line didn’t seem too crazy thankfully! The best part was that the machine LAUGHED when you pulled the fast pass! SO KAWAII AND PERFECT I AM CRYING.


Post securing fast passes, Kara & I promptly did what a pro-Disney park attendee would do, and headed back to the Bazaar for some shopping…bahaha!! They had one of the shirts we wanted…the Rapunzel one but…..


IT WAS ONLY IN KIDS SIZES


AND I’M TALKING TEENY KIDS SIZES


Okay…maybe the largest size wasn’t too small, Kara managed to squeeze herself into it, but said it was not comfortable, and felt rather short. I took it up to the desk to ask a cast member if they had adult sizes; there was a bit of a language barrier, but after checking the log book she determined they didn’t have them. When I asked if they were elsewhere in the park, she said yes, so hope was not gone yet!


Shopping lagging us down a little bit, we had to do something exciting, right?! Bahahha, I kid, I kid, being in Tokyo Disney was PLENTY exciting for us! We had a fast pass for one of the biggest rides in the park, so why not walk over to Fantasyland to see about the other one? Naturally, we got distracted by a very beautiful sight & photo shoots occurred!

JUST LOOK AT IT! IT’S INCREDIBLE!!!

The hub is gigantic too! SO much space!!! While we were crossing through it, I noticed that one of the food kiosks had the pumpkin cinnamon bun I’d had my eye on! (thank you TDRexplorer for the pointers!) naturally, since breakfast was already 3 hours ago, I got one!

It was okay, not warmed or anything, so that would’ve helped, but I’ll take it!! Kara & I also noted that the cart sold the Alien Mochi, so we’d certainly be back for that!!


Figuring that the easiest way to Fantasyland was through the castle, we obviously took the most magical route, just simply amazing at everything, crying at all the detail and just living life! Fantasyland was set up so similar it was eerie, like, we were in our home park, but 100% NOT at the same time! We weren’t quite sure where to find Hunny Hunt, but we DID see that Snow White’s Scary Adventures had NO wait, and with limited options to ride that Stateside, we jumped on! The ride was just as fabulous as we’d remembered, and it was interesting to note that they asked us to take our ears off before the ride began!


We managed to avoid the Evil Queen, and witnessed the prince & the princess ride off into the sunset, and emerged back into Fantasyland to the MOST WONDERFUL smell!! We followed the delicious sent over to a popcorn cart!! OF COURSE! THE FAMOUS FUN FLAVORED POPCORN!



…and I KID you NOT, the line was longer for the popcorn than it was for any of the rides we could see…


To help pass the time, Kara went “live” on facebook for a bit, it was about midday back home, so there were some people watching/chatting with us for a bit. I spent some time on Instagram, as some local Tokyo Instagrammers had reached out to me, asking if I was in the park that day, and if we had any questions! She sent me the set times for the “roaming” characters that came out both in Fantasyland & Main gate, and gave her recommendations for where to watch the parades! She was SUPER sweet, and helped us out throughout the week!!


And then, it was time to DIG IN!

Popcorn cost: 300Yen


It was milk chocolate flavored and MAN WAS IT DELICIOUS!! The popcorn bucket they were selling was cute too, I can’t remember exactly which one it was, but we were holding out, knowing that we didn’t really have room to take a giant bucket back home with us…or through the rest of Asia!! Munching on the popcorn (and probably dropping it everywhere…we were excited…and we’re messy people) we found our way over to Hunny Hunt, to find, that the wait time was well over 30 minutes. I THINK it was around 45-50, and I just didn’t really want to waste our morning waiting in the line, and we agreed to grab a fast pass for it when we could!


We were practically in Tomorrowland by this point, and were basically in the line for Space Mountain, when we realized that some characters would be coming out in Fantasyland in a few short minutes, and we desperately wanted to track down a Gypsy, and some other friends, so it was back to behind the castle for us! It was easy enough to know we were in the right spot and at the right time due to the other girls our ages with GIANT cameras, lol! We ended up waiting a bit longer than either of us really wanted to, but eventually they started to come out! Unluckily, it was all fur characters, and all ones we’d met in other parks already! Boo! Kara did see the Wonderland & Neverland crew’s come out closer to Small World, and we hung around kinda watching everything, but were hoping there was more coming! It came close to the time they would be coming out at the front of the park, so we started to head back up there! Kara decided she was too hungry to wait, and stopped to grab some Mochi on the way through the hub!

She said they were super good, and had different flavors inside, chocolate, strawberry & custard! They were definitely on my list of things to try! Cost: 360Y


Upon arrival at the front of the park we had a few minutes to wait before anyone would start coming out, so we hung around.

Soon enough, characters started coming out, and we were surprised to see that there were quite a few repeats that we’d seen in Fantasyland, and no one we were really interested in seeing, especially the Fairy Godmother, because lets be real, this is just scary…

No thank you…


It was a little disappointing, but hey, we were still in Disney, and still had a few more days, and KNEW that we’d at least be seeing Alice post parade! And hey, we had a fast pass burning a hole in our pockets! It was time to find some Monster’s!

The Monster’s Inc Ride & Go Seek was cute, it’s sort of similar to the one in California, but your car has a flashlight, that you shine on the M logo to try and find Boo/make her pop up from various places. It was a cute ride, and fun to do!


With another fast pass available, you can imagine that it was quick back to Hunny Hunt, hoping that they weren’t out by now! (despite it being early still, it was a concern). They weren’t! And we were able to score one for AFTER the nighttime parade! Wowza!



Hope you enjoyed part 1 of our Tokyo Disneyland Day!!! Not to worry, there is WAY more fun where that came from!!! [/COLOR]

 

[Candycane83]

Loving your report!!! We just got back from WDW for my son's first trip last night and dreaming of going to Asia next year! This is certainly helping with the Disney withdrawal and of course in my head, I'm scheming... ahem, I mean planning on when to go next year! Can't wait for the next installment of your report!

 

[Grumpy's Wife]

I'm so excited that you finally got to go into a Disney Park. Your pictures are great. I love trying to compare them to Magic Kingdom. What is up with Fairy Godmother? Wrong on so many levels.

 

[katt789]

The two of us considered that we had spent the majority of the time on one half of the park, and we should probably venture across into the lands of Adventure, and we knew our lunch destination was over there, so it was a good idea. Then Kara promptly remembered about Country Bears and FREAKED OUT, see, we LOVE ourselves some Country Bears, sometimes it’s the only “attraction” we get on in a day at Magic Kingdom, and here, it’s in Japanese, which clearly would make it 10000 times better!

When we pulled up to the theater, we noticed that it was all decked out in the “Summer Vacation” version…interesting since it was October and the rest of the park was decked out for Halloween, but sure, that made sense. It was a little bumming out since we were excited to see the original version all in Japanese, but, this version ended up being absolutely WONDERFUL as well!! It was pure hilarity, and still one of our favorites! We both tried to video a bit, but apparently that’s not allowed #whoops. This was also somewhere else that they asked for ears to be taken off before the show began! Bonus points for when you’re sitting behind someone with obnoxious ears….or any ear hat really…

By this point, it had been at least 5-6 hours since our last actual MEAL, and even then, a 5am breakfast when you’ve got to get your butt to Disney isn’t a big meal, it was time for lunch! We delved further into Critter Country, and found ourselves outside of Gramma Sara’s Kitchen!

I had, again, heard about this through TDRexplorer, their Halloween set looked delicious, and it’s INSIDE SPLASH MOUNTIAN SO HOW COOL IS THAT?!?! The place was open, and at first it appeared that the line was OUT THE DOOR, YIKES!


Luckily, the way that Tokyo works during busier times like this, is, well, EFFICIENTLY! They had a line out the door that we waited in, they stopped the line at the top of the stairs, and then would let a certain amount of people down the stairs at a time, where you would be let to ordering lines! It at first seemed interesting and perhaps odd, but it worked wonderfully, and kept the restaurant more clear for moving around and those who already had their food! BONUS!

We both ended up getting the special Halloween set, which came out to being around $15. (1580Yen to be exact) It had pumpkin soup, ketchup rice(in the shape of a pumpkin!) a small side of veggies/pasta salad, and a meat in mushroom sauce (I seriously can’t remember what it was, I know it was not pork, but that’s about it), a piece of apple pie AND A DRINK!

We were also super happy to see that it all came on real plates and with real silverware! YAY! It was DELICIOUS, seriously, loved every part of it, and we were amazed that it came with THAT much food for the price! In WDW, it cost that much for just a burger, fries & drink, this came with so much more! The other HUGE bonus; I got an iced coffee, praying that it wouldn’t be too disgusting, and WAS SO FREAKING HAPPY WHEN IT CAME OUT LITERALLY JUST ICE & COFFEE!!! It was simply heaven!


Gramma Sara’s Kitchen: 10/10!


Knowing that it was a bit crowded that day, and knowing how seriously the locals take entertainment in Tokyo Disneyland, we figured it was about time to get a spot for the Happiness is Here Parade! I mean, it was only 1.5 hour early…that’s totally normal, right?


(lets be real, we’re usually in Frontierland an hour early in wdw, we just don’t claim spots that early)

We cute. Don’t worry though, we didn’t spend the entire time waiting taking selfies, Kara (map in hand) ran off to get Haunted Mansion fp’s, and when she got back, I ran off to Tomorrowland to try my hand at the Lottery for One Man’s Dream II. (Some of the shows in TDR are too crazy to have open seating, so you scan your ticket like you would for a fast pass, select how many people, and then see if you win, OR, for this show, you can go to the first show of the day). We didn’t win, BUT, I picked up some more dessert on the way back to our parade spot!

Kara had more too, because THAT’S JUST HOW GOOD THEY WERE! Man, I could REALLY go for some right now!!

To pass more time, we made sure our friendliest friends were ready to go;

That’s a Mulan Itty Bitty doll, but for purposes of our friends group, it’s our friend Pearl….bahahha…


Kara played around with her camera, making sure that all her settings were ready to go!

Where she spent some time creeping on the Chans, because, I mean, just look, THEY ARE ADORABLE!! All the kids had the most adorable outfits, but not your classic princess dresses you might normally see! Our favorite was the Donald Duck outfits!! I’m not sure if we have one in our pictures, but I’ll try to find one online if we don’t!!



Then…guys….guys…GUYS!!!


IT WAS TIME!!


WE WERE PROBABLY FOR SURE SHAKING WITH ANTICIPATION TRYING NOT TO CRY OUT OF EXCITEMENT AND JUST SO NOT READY FOR THE PARADE!!!


I’d watched it on youtube years back, and we’d both listened to the soundtrack all the time, but Kara hadn’t seen a LICK of it, and we knew it was amazing. To really give you a true experience, here:

CLICK THE LINK!!![/COLOR]

 

[katt789]

To give you a little bit of atmosphere as we take a journey with you!

SMILE! Happiness is here!!

SO MUCH KAWAII!!


We were also pleasantly surprised to find that lesser seen characters/movies in the states were pretty well represented! Aristocats even made an appearance!!

Kara was more than happy to see her favorite Stitch out there too! And on a carasoeul horse, how adorable!!

The most important was about to round that corner into the hub though!! Speaking of people who don’t get enough recognition over in the States, boy, Tokyo is the place for them!!

ahhhhh!! Like WHAT EVEN?!?! ON AN ELEPHANT?! THIS IS INCREDIBLE AND I’M DEFINITELY CRYING….okay…maybe only a little crying…


Aladdin & Jasmine kick off the royalty section, so there was plenty more princesses to come, and even some familiar faces!!

Even despite being on the opposite side of the float, Belle still managed to catch a peak of us, which was super exciting!!

They continued on with an ADORABLE Wonderland unit, I mean, just LOOK at these outfits, and there’s EVEN TEA IN THEIR HATS LIKE WHAT EVEN?!

Casual...KING of hearts…cause he’s totally everywhere…

EVERY unit was seriously insane, the dancers were all so freaking cute, and it was super nice to see a daily ops parade that showcased so much technique from their performers!

And of course, to close out the show, the Boss Man & his Lady come soaring through!

In case you haven’t caught on yet, we were ABSOLUTELY blown away by the parade, it was BEYOND anything we could have imagined. The music was SO catchy, super upbeat & high energy, all the performers were incredible, the costumes so detailed and beautiful, it was seriously just ALL SO PERFECT. We were both in SUCH a high post parade, it was incredible!!! [/COLOR]

 

[MomoMama]

Your photos are AMAZING! I love that Chip n Dale's photo with the castle in the background, and Mickey and Minnie's parade again with the castle in the background. Fantastic shots!!!

I am blown away by the parade too just by looking at your photos! I really hope to see it next time!

 

[AusAnnie]

Loving your photos - especially Mickey & Minnie with the castle!!!

 

[missangelalexis]

Are those the park tickets? They are SO cute!

The FP machine sounds so cute!

Ugh the castle is perfect! Love all the Halloween decorations!

Fairy Godmother is SO creepy!

Your lunch sounds like it was good value. Glad you enjoyed it!

The parade looks fantastic! Loved seeing all the pictures.

Sounds like you guys are having a blast already!

 

[Candycane83]

Your parade pictures (and all your other ones too) are absolutely amazing!!!! If I do get to go this year, I need to convince my family to sit for an hour and a half to watch that parade!!!

 

[katt789]

Loving your report!!! We just got back from WDW for my son's first trip last night and dreaming of going to Asia next year! This is certainly helping with the Disney withdrawal and of course in my head, I'm scheming... ahem, I mean planning on when to go next year! Can't wait for the next installment of your report!

Ahh how amazing!!! Asia was wonderful!! Definitely lots of info here for you lol!!! Ahahaha, yes yes yes!! Disney in Asia too is just the most amazing!!!

I'm so excited that you finally got to go into a Disney Park. Your pictures are great. I love trying to compare them to Magic Kingdom. What is up with Fairy Godmother? Wrong on so many levels.

Yay!!! Thank you so much, most of them are Kara's at this point, but end of Day 2 mine kinda come back into play!! It's so weird, the worst part was not taking the map when you were going for a bathroom break & expecting there to be one in the same place when there wasn't lol!!! SO CREEEEEPY!!! I think it's just a casting thing, since FGM would be an elderly white female, that would be her only role, so they make her fur instead....

Your photos are AMAZING! I love that Chip n Dale's photo with the castle in the background, and Mickey and Minnie's parade again with the castle in the background. Fantastic shots!!!

I am blown away by the parade too just by looking at your photos! I really hope to see it next time!

Thank you!!! Mostly Kara's at this point, but mine come out later on! Lol!!! Happiness is here is truly amazing!!! I hope you get to see it tooo!!

Loving your photos - especially Mickey & Minnie with the castle!!!

Thank you!!!

Are those the park tickets? They are SO cute!

The FP machine sounds so cute!

Ugh the castle is perfect! Love all the Halloween decorations!

Fairy Godmother is SO creepy!

Your lunch sounds like it was good value. Glad you enjoyed it!

The parade looks fantastic! Loved seeing all the pictures.

Sounds like you guys are having a blast already!

They are!!!! Super kawaii!!! Special for the 15th anni!!

They were super cute!! The castle was super pretty, it's my favorite, there are small differences between wdw and it too!!

SO FREAKING CREEPY!!

Delicious!! I'm so glad we fond that place!!

thank you! parade was amazing!!!

Your parade pictures (and all your other ones too) are absolutely amazing!!!! If I do get to go this year, I need to convince my family to sit for an hour and a half to watch that parade!!!

Thank you!!!! Most are Kara's right now, but next day mine finaly pop up!! And YES!!! You might not have to sit that long, but definitely plan on watching it! it's easy to walk up and stand behind people too since everyone in the front HAS to sit donw!

 

[katt789]

Hoping that maybe our luck would continue, we headed back into the shops in World Bazaar to see if the shirts were in any of the other stores….no luck…maybe we would find a cast member who spoke more English? Luck!! However we then found that the shirts were for sure no longer being sold in adult sizes. WAAAAHHH!!! Tangled & Beauty and the Beast were two of the ones we definitely wanted! I texted Abby to let her know, as our plan had been to pick the Tangled ones up for our whole squad, and we headed out of the store.

We went down the pathway leading off to the left side of the park off World Bazaar, to find Pirates of the Caribbean tucked away in the little corner! Number one, what a weird place! Number two, the wait wasn’t long at all, yay! The ride was awesome, much like California’s version, even with it going through the Blue Bayou at the beginning!


Having remembered about the Blue Bayou, we wanted to check out that menu, so we wandered through that way (finding nothing interesting, and certainly no gumbo on the menu). It was the first time we’d been in Adventureland! Everything was pretty packed, including the popcorn cart, where they were selling a Stitch popcorn bucket.


Kara walked past, completely enamored by it, but trying to reason with herself that she didn’t have room for it in her luggage, after all, it was only week 2 of 6!! Well…we made it about 5 feet past the popcorn stand before she exclaimed that she NEEDED it, and before we knew it, she was the proud owner of a popcorn bucket!





The stand was selling curry popcorn, which was a plus as it was a second flavor knocked off the list! We both liked it too! The other added bonus was the “hands free” popcorn eating, since it would just hang from your neck, so convenient!


From some messages I’d gotten earlier in the day, I knew it was about time to go see Alice at the front of the park, so Kara, Stitch & I headed back that way to wait.

Before too long, everyone started to make their way out from the magical entrance! Alice was among the first few, and gave us an excited way before disappearing across the courtyard! I kid you not, she legitimately disappeared! We had stuck around to see who else would be coming out (and got very excited to see Belle was around) and completely lost sight of Wonderland within seconds! When neither of us could spy her around, we followed Belle over to her spot and vowed to try to see Alice after!


So the way that most character meets work in Tokyo is, the characters all come out, and they go to various spots around Fantasyland/Maingate, and everyone kinda crowds around them. It isn’t insane though, partially because the Instagram crew is more there to take pictures OF them, not with them, and the characters are in charge of picking who gets to come up and say Hi! ADDED BONUS!! There’s no pushing and shoving or having to be aggressive to get into the meet because everyone waits for the character to pick them instead!


It also added up to be a huge bonus for us being not Japanese….it was clear that the characters appreciated having someone they could have a fluent conversation with!


Belle pulled us in and asked how our adventures had been going, and what stories we had been reading recently. We told her they were mainly ones about this Kingdom, and we chatted a bit about Kingdom’s back home, and then had the attendant take our picture!

We said our goodbyes to Belle, and continued on our hunt for a wildflower! Kara soon found her, hidden under the awning of the Emporium, she had her hood up, which made her even harder to find in the sea of people!

Kara joined in on the character creeping with the locals, and I wished I hadn’t packed my camera away after parade! I only had the time to dig it out though, because Alice was calling us up shortly!! We chatted about flowers, she commented on our lovely bows, and asked if we’d made any friends so far today. We told her it was really just Belle and herself so far, lol. Alice then had us pose like flowers!

Kawaii!!


We thanked her and started to search around the courtyard to see who else had smaller crowds around them. Naturally, we’d met 2 characters you could meet stateside, and ones that we’d met plenty of times…good for us…so Kara wanted to go see Wendy, as she’d never met her before.

We hung around for a while, but she was trying to finish up with all the Chans as her attendant was clearly trying to get her back offstage, so we just creeped for a while, bahaha. Happy that we’d gotten to see at least 2 characters, we made our way back inside the park to find that the Halloween parade had just started to hit the hub. It’s one of those stop & go ones, so we stopped to see the very start of it. When it wasn’t very entertaining (so far) and we realized our fast pass was coming up in Fantasyland (and the parade would lock us on the opposite side of the park) we left.


If you want to check it out here it is:

The part with the floats hadn’t reached us when we left, for a better idea.


Our fast passes were for Haunted Mansion, which had the whole Nightmare Before Christmas overlay, which we were very excited about! It was fantastic, even though it was all in Japanese! Lol, there was much more Sally in it as well, which was awesome.

Kara suggested eating some dinner next, since we were near where we wanted to, and the way the night was scheduled out. I wasn’t too hungry, but figured it was the best plan.

Queen of Hearts Banquet Hall!!! One of THE most popular and favorite placed in Tokyo Disney to eat!! It’s a QS, buffeteria style restaurant. Meaning you go through a line, and pick out what you’d like as you go through the line. (like a cafeteria….hence the name)

Kara chose the Burger Patty with a heart of cheese

While I chose the roast beef

Well…it was certainly a good thing that I wasn’t that hungry! The plates didn’t have much on them…which was disappointing to me. It was a good quality, but pretty pricey, especially compared to lunch! We enjoyed the experience though, and you were definitely paying for good atmosphere!


We had a bit of time to kill, so we pondered through Fantasyland, noticing that there was honey popcorn near Hunny Hunt!

Which I’m pretty sure we got, not sure if it was right then, or a bit later on, but I know we had it on the first day!! Toontown was practically calling to us, so we ventured through there, checking things out.

We spent a good chunk of time in Toontown, exploring the shops and wandering through some of the houses, though we didn’t wait in any lines, it was a great time killer!


Parades were clearly the popular thing, so we figured we should get a spot for Dreamlights next.

It had (in real life) been a decent chunk of time since dinner, and I hadn’t really eaten that much/been hungry then anyways, so I ran off to grab some food. It ended up taking WAY longer than I’d expected, around 30 mins in total. I’d gotten a Mickey Burger, and asked for a cup of water. This is when I discovered that in the QS places, there’s a little water stand with cups off to the side! Yay for self service and not having to wait in lines!

Things are just tastier when they’re Mickey Shaped!! Soon after I finished my burger, it was time for the PARAAAADEEE!!! It was either tonight, or the next time we watched it, but I know I livestreamed it on Facebook, especially since DEP had JUST closed in WDW and the music is the same for both parades! [/COLOR]

 

[katt789]

The hub was plunged to darkness and we were soon immersed into the world of glittering, sparkling lights and magic!!

[


Alice is ontop of the Chesire Cat here! Super kawaiii!! The parade may have the same basic idea as the one in the States, but even ¼ of the way through it was already a million times better!!

Now, we had been sitting on the far side of the hub that the parade hits second, and Kara had EVEN SEEN THE GIANT GENIE FLOAT ROUNDING THE BEND, but somehow had been way too into the parade to notice the royalty coming towards us until they were RIGHT THERE! I swear, the highlight of this trip was Kara’s reactions. She had NO CLUE that Aladdin & Jasmine were in Dreamlights, and promptly FREAKED OUT when she saw them and it was the MOST adorable!

Right after that pair was one of our other favorite Disney couples and one of the most beautiful parts of the parade!!

The parade ends off with the fab 5 ish style characters, and its just wonderful!

Our reactions to Tokyo Disney Dreamlights: it was amazing, I mean, are you even surprised?? Tokyo certainly had a way with entertainment, and a way to make it absolutely unbelievable. I’ve always loved DEP, but this brought it to a whole other level, a level that I REALLY enjoyed watching and got a thrill out of! It was amazing and it was EVERYTHING!!


The parade ended, and we followed it through the park over to Fantasyland where we did our absolute BEST to get to Hunny Hunt on time, and were REALLY hoping that they wouldn’t be 100% strict on our return time. I was worried based off what I’d read, and if we missed this ride, I’d be beyond bummed out, LUCKILY for us, they let us in, but it was post parade rush, and we weren’t super late or anything!

Now, for anyone who is okay with spoilers, here’s a link to the ride through on Youtbue!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SEyEI6WELDo


We boarded our Hunny pot not knowing a SINGLE thing about the ride, I’d skipped over it every vlog I’d watched, and we were READY! Well, the whole trackless system along was amazing enough, then it was hilarious to see the characters talking in Japanese and


SPOILERS



When we got into the Tigger room, and the ENTIRE FLOOR STARTED BOUNCING, OMG I WISH WE HAD BEEN VIDEOING THAT REACTION SO BAD!! IT WAS ABSOLUTELY INCREDIBLE WE SQUEALED WITH JOY!!



****SPOILERS DONE***



The ride was INSANE and AMAZING and I wish I could ride it again right now, it KICKS BUTT!! UGH!! TOKYO HAS ALL THE NICE THINGS!! And we’d only explored one of the parks so far!!


I’m out of pics for the night so I’ll spare you the details. We headed over to Adventureland, in search of more fun things to do, and found that since the fireworks/ Once Upon a Time show was over, the park had COMPLETELY CLEARED OUT! COMPLETELY! It was SO dead!!


We were walking around Adventureland trying to figure out where to go when the poor cm’s at the Tiki Room looked like they were BEGGING people to come in, so we headed on in, and without an English Translator, which seemed to confuse them. We were both super excited, since it’s been taken over by Stitch, and we ALMOST had a private viewing! There were only 2 other people in there with us!!


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=32xxerzh3XU


There’s the link.


Now, this show starts out not too weird, it’s about halfway through that the middle carousel of birds come down WEARING STITCH EARS LIKE WHAT?!?!?! And then of course Stitch himself shows up to take over, and all was insanely awesome!! Kara & I were both in FITS of laughter, and it was another thing I WISH we had been videoing because you simply cannot recreate the reactions to something like this!!


Thankfully, Stitch and his birds let us go, and we wandered further into the Jungle…there were no English skippers at this time, but that was more than okay, chances are we wouldn’t have taken one anyways! We boarded our Jungle Cruise boat and made on our adventure. It was pretty similar from what I remember, until we got to the part where the lions are eating the zebras and


**SPOILER ALERT**


OH. EM. FREAKING. GEE.


As we pull up to it, freaking CIRCLE OF LIFE STARTS PLAYING SUUUUUPER LOUD OVER ALL THE RIDE, AND ALL THE LIONS, WHICH ARE EATING THE OTHER ANIMALS LIKE WHAT IS THIS?!?!!


KARA AND I LOST IT! LIKE WHAT ARE YOU TOKYO?! COMPLETELY CRAZY?!! GEEEZEEE!!



** done**



Basically it was all amazing and we were all really happy to have all these first reactions to rides that we’d already experienced elsewhere, it made me super happy that Disney Parks kept things different in each of its parks!!


When we docked back from our 2 week fight through the jungle, we checked the time; we weren’t sure what time the last bus back home was, and were even less sure of how much a cab would be if we were late (heads up,,,Uber was INSANELY expensive..) so we figured it would be time to find our bus and head home.


We had accomplished a LOT today, and BOY was it an insane day. Thinking back on our first day in Tokyo Disney just gives me WAY too many feels, it truly is on a level ALL ITS OWN, like, I cannot begin to explain to you just how incredibly amazing it is, just how much it stands above the other parks. IT’S INSANE!


When we got home, it was a quick debrief with Dante about our day, and we were all quick to bed, it had been a long day, and we were all up for another one tomorrow!



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[Grumpy's Wife]

Great updates. The parade pictures are wonderful.

Love the Mickey shaped burgers. Now we need that!

I keep forgetting to ask about the snack you had. The one with the three little green circle things. What is that?

 

[missangelalexis]

What a great day!! I'm glad you were able to meet a few characters. Dream Lights looks amazing! And the Pooh ride sounds really fun!

 

[xlsm]

I've been following but haven't commented yet for some reason?? I love following along with your Tokyo adventures so far!! L-O-V-E the parades and I can't wait until the DisneySea posts!!

We just got back from WDW, and I can't remember why, but I was telling my 13 year old about how scary FGM is at Tokyo Disneyland...I googled the picture and showed him, and he hated it, LOL! So I saved the picture and brought it out from time to time to torture him. We're weird

 

[katt789]

Great updates. The parade pictures are wonderful.

Love the Mickey shaped burgers. Now we need that!

I keep forgetting to ask about the snack you had. The one with the three little green circle things. What is that?

Thank you!!!

Lol, they're Mochi!! It's hard to explain, they're like, custard/pudding filled things...they're super good!!

What a great day!! I'm glad you were able to meet a few characters. Dream Lights looks amazing! And the Pooh ride sounds really fun!

It was awesome!!! Everything was seriously so amazing, and the pooh ride was seriously a highlight! Such incredible technology!

I've been following but haven't commented yet for some reason?? I love following along with your Tokyo adventures so far!! L-O-V-E the parades and I can't wait until the DisneySea posts!!

We just got back from WDW, and I can't remember why, but I was telling my 13 year old about how scary FGM is at Tokyo Disneyland...I googled the picture and showed him, and he hated it, LOL! So I saved the picture and brought it out from time to time to torture him. We're weird

Hahaha!! Glad you came out to say hi!!! It was amazing!!!

Lol, totally scary! She's so freaky!!

 

[katt789]

Hi all!! Happy New Year!! Now, just before we get started, I wanted to share that Kara has finished the first of our vlogs for this trip, and it's the Tokyo Disney one!! Go check it out! I absolutely LOVE IT!

Wednesday October 12/2016


Is it 5:00 am???


Why yes…yes it is….and we were up like a well oiled MACHINE. My obnoxious phone went off, I jumped out of bed to stop it, and turned on the coffee and we all started to get ready for our different days.


Kara & I took the same route as the previous day, and along the way were texting with our friend Chi! She had completed a Cultural Representative Program in Florida with us, (though she’s from Japan) and would be joining us today with one of her friends!!


We arrived an hour prior to park opening again, and did our share of waiting, and before we knew it, WERE IN A BRAND FREAKING NEW TO US DISNEY PARK!!! IT WAS SERIOUSLY EXCITING GUYS!!


Obviously we’d been excited for everything in Tokyo, but DisneySea is SUCH a completely UNIQUE park that it was just that much more exciting!!

Everything is decked out for the 15th anniversary and its lovely!! This is one of those parks where things are REALLY cut off from eye sight when you walk in, we had to take a hard right to get into the park and EVERYTIME it threw me off, like, I felt I should be walking straight! But then you get this magnificent view:

Like…I can’t….


DisneySea has a lot of things to do, but not a crazy amount of high-level attractions. All the rush was heading over to Toy Story Mania, and since we have that in the States, we opted to join the rush up til about this point

Where everyone RACED off to battle toys, and we decided it was a great time to check into a hotel.

Hightower Hotel!!! It was our plan since Chi’s friend Yuriko wasn’t a big thrill ride person, so we adventured before they got to the park!

The logistics of the ride were the exact same, go into a room, get freaked out by story line, then board an elevator that crashes to the ground, but the theming was different. I honestly couldn’t tell ya much about it, but hey, we enjoyed it! Bonus points, it was only a 10 minute wait. Weird point, the seatbelts were cross body ones, so there wasn’t quite as much “lifting” when you fell, lol.


The other big thrill ride was, naturally, on the opposite end of the park, and we definitely had to pull out the map to try and figure out the best way to get there, MAN DISNEYSEA IS SERIOUSLY CONFUSING. Like, I get the general layout of it and could find my way around it now, but it’s still confusing. I just double checked the map and was confused so that shows ya just how different it is. Our trek took us past the S.S. Columbia

And over my favorite bridge that you could see to the outside of the park, but it was super neat because you could see the ACTUAL SEA! One side, real sea, one side, DisneySea, kawaii!!


Our adventure ended with us in the Lost River Delta, where we were going to join Indy on one of his escapades!

The ride was AWESOME!! It was WAAAAAAY less jerky than the one in California (which Kara loves but I really don’t like) so I actually quite liked this one! Aside from that it was basically the same! The Arabian Coast was CALLING us when we finished our mission with the crusader, Aladdin is one of Kara’s favorite movies (and mine TBH, anything classic 90’s really….) and we could see it peaking around the corner and just NEEDED TO GO NOW. Chi &Yuriko were in the park now, and said that they would meet us over there too!

We took some pictures with Rajah, who was out front of JASMINE’S Flying Carpets, and were just in complete AWE of the AMAZING DETIAL that was put into this land, and the way you could see Mount Prometheus, and even Mermaid Lagoon peaking through but it all fit together so well!!

I mean JUST LOOOOK AT IT!! It was SO visually stunning!! It’s Kara’s favorite land in ANY Disney park!

We found the marketplace and figured this would be the place to buy the Aladdin shirts! Kara wanted one and Abby had asked me to pick her up one; I hadn’t been planning on buying one, but with Beauty & the Beast and Tangled not being available, I figured this one would fill the void! I was just about through my purchase when Chi & Yuriko found us and we all had a lovely little reunion! Chi had even BROUGHT US PRESENTS, LIKE HI, YOU’RE AMAZING.

They were little phone charm things, I got the idea to put it on my camera when I saw some girls with Princess scrunchies on their lenses! It was so sweet & thoughtful of Chi to bring us something!! So nice!!


They asked if we wanted to ride Sinbad, and we promptly headed over there, since I’d heard plenty of great things about the ride!

Sinbad’s little tiger friend, Chandu, really steals the show though, HE’S SO FREAKING CUTE! I was bummed to not find any merch of him! I would’ve LOVED a Tsumtsum or a stuffy!

SO KAWAIIIII!!!!


The ride was super cute, your basic dark boat ride through scenes thing, but the MUSIC! Oh man! I’m pretty sure it was done by Alan Menken, which duh, means it’s gonna be great. It definitely will get stuck in your head, and as I’m writing this up I’m reminded that I wanted to see if I could find it to download! Lol!! We all loved it!!


Heading back up, deeper into the Arabian Coast, I said that I NEEDED to try a Chandu tail that they had to eat, and Chi pointed out where they had them so we stopped for a little pick me up snack and mid morning tea!

It’s a creamy chicken filled bun, and it was SO good!!! Definitely a favorite for me!! We ate our snacks and caught up with Chi while we did so. We found out that she had a second interview for a guest relations exchange position at WDW, which was super exciting!! (and spoiler alert….SHE GOT IT!! She starts in May and I’m super excited to see her again down in Florida!!) And we talked about the various things that we wanted to do that day, things we HAD to do, and things we’d like to do, plus their recommendations since they knew the park better than we did![/COLOR]

 

[katt789]

The four of us hung around a little bit after eating, waiting to see if Jasmine would be coming out at all, and spent a bit of time exploring the Arabian Coast, marveling in its beauty.

That would be the shirt I bought, and don’t judge me for the fact that I totally wore it the next day too, it got super hot and I ended up mainly in the tank top I had underneath anyways…..bahahaha

The famous double decker carousel!!! SO CUTE!! Chi asked if we’d wanted to see the “Crystal Wishes Journey”, the show that celebrated the parks 15th anniversary, and duh, we wanted to. It was starting semi soon, so it was time to head over to the Mediterranean Harbor to get spots for it; and we GOT TO WALK PAST MERMAID LAGOOOOOOOOOONNNN ON THE WAY!! #cries

Like…just look at it…it’s so gorgeous…I wanna be part of that world so hard…. Aurora may be my girl, and I love her a lot, but I’m pretty sure Ariel’s back in my number one princess spot….I think Mermaid Lagoon kinda made that push, I was seriously ALL about the mermaids this trip!


Kara & I were SUPER happy to have Chi & Yuriko with us, because they knew their way around, and when it came to times like right now, it helped SO MUCH, they were able to get us back to the Harbor way faster than we would’ve made it! It was just SO COOL how in DisneySea everything was so separated and so well done, like, you walked from Mermaid Lagoon into a cavern that spat you out into the foot of a volcano, then you’d round a few corners and the wall would open up and you’d be in Italy….

Like…what…


We found some decent spots, and waited probably around 20-30 minutes before the show started. We certainly weren’t front row, but we were close enough to see everything!! We’d also acquired some popcorn somewhere along our walk, always time for food, am I right?! It was cappuccino flavored, and pretty good!

For a character you never see in the States, Clarice certainly was EVERYWHERE in Japan! They really love their chipmunks over there!! The show also had Gelatoni, Shellie May & Duffy!! ALL THE KAWAII!!

The show was super cute!! I don’t remember much about it….lol…a host came out and talked a bunch, introduced things, probably talked about what each of the colors of the crystals meant, but it was all in Japanese…


Then all the barges with the characters came out and it was all fun and games.

THEN all the dancers came out, they came through the crowd and were on a stage at the front of the harbor.

The barges docked briefly, so that the characters could join the fun on the stage for a bit.

When it starts off all the dancers are all separated by the color they’re wearing, representing different wishes, red represents the wish for love, blue is friendship, green is energy, and Mickey has a clear crystal that represents all of the wishes. For the finale of the show the dancers are all mixed in with the other wishes on the various stages, and there are beautiful rainbow-ey ballgowns that I would like to own, bahaha. It’s tricky to explain, especially since I just had to look all of that up….bahahah. Here’s the link! It’s a cute watch, and if you’re not heading there this year, it won’t spoil anything!!

Since we were near the entrance, we headed to the wondrous store of DUFFY to check things out. Kara & I both NEEDED Gelatoni, but held off on buying him at that moment, didn’t want to put him down somewhere and forget him!! We searched for the Duffy/Shellie May sweaters, but they were nowhere to be found, so we assumed they were sold out (they were, and heartbreakingly, they were restocked when we were in Hong Kong a month later…) Kara did pick up a little Shellie May purse though!

She was used to having a backpack with a side pocket to shove her phone in, and this one didn’t, so she kept having to take her backpack off to get her phone, her park ticket/fast pass (which in Florida we wouldn’t need either) so this was a nice little thing to keep those kind of things in! It was hilarious to see her around the parks though cause she’d have her Shellie May, her Stitch Popcorn bucket, and her camera all around her neck with her bag on her back, bahahaha! I found some suuuuper kawaii ears, that I DEEPLY REGRET NOT BUYING.

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[missangelalexis]

DisneySea sounds amazing!! Loved seeing all your photos! Sounds like such a fun day so far.

 

[xiphoid76]

I love reading this thread!!! I am sorry you did not find any Chandu merchandise. I have a stuffed Chandu that sits by my bed - I got him 2 years ago at Disney Sea. Was hoping to get another one as well as some more Chandu-related stuff. He is definitely my favorite character there! We run when the park opens right to Sindbad and usually have the ride to ourselves for about 30 minutes before anyone else comes - we get either 4 or 5 rides in consecutively all by ourselves - love it!!!