Trip Report - Shanghai - Disney Asia Extravaganza

[corrie563]

We (family of 4, 2 adults, 10yo and 8yo) just got back from going to every Disney Park in Asia over the past few weeks.

This is the Shanghai leg, the first leg, I will get around to posting the other legs in the appropriate forums.

Our photos are on Instagram Corrie563 or pixiedustadventurers
Youtube vids going up weekly on pixie dust adventurers channel, subscribe so you get notified as they go up, there is a video for each day plus haul videos for each leg.
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC-26GBEQTv3F9Ys822UkOBgand lastly the blog www.coolinwithkids.blogspot.com

Happy to answer any questions.

 

[corrie563]

Day 1



Travel day



We had heard all sorts of things about taxis from the airport, so we booked Mr Orange. Nothing better than a car service that is there to greet you on exit with a sign that has your name on it. We used them to depart as well. Brilliant service. Worth the money for the piece of mind.

Arrive toy story hotel
Find play area, launch pad, cute lobby. Lotso store and Sunny Side Market and cafe. Ate at cafe for buffet dinner. 20% off for people staying at the hotel. Traditional Chinese food, we were a bit worried when we got in about whether we would find much vegetarian food, and it turned out better than we expected! Lots of opportunities for all of us to enjoy our food.

Super early night, massive day tomorrow!

Toy story hotel
This hotels theming is 100! So much attention to detail. Service is amazing, if a cast member doesn’t understand you, they seamlessly grab someone who can. The play room wasn’t quite as awesome as expected, and the launchpad too, but I’m sure that on a hot and humid day it would provide relief! There are meet and greet opportunities with no lines, the kids loved meeting Woody and Jessie while we finalised our park tickets.

Rooms are clean, well themed, comfortable, only downside is there are only 6 Disney movies on the TV, and none were family favourites (was shocked to find that you couldn’t watch a Toy Story movie in the Toy Story hotel). We did need an iron, I tried google translate but they didn’t understand, my husband googled a picture of an iron and one was brought up to our room. Download google translate, for translating words, especially for checking the written word, was awesome for ingredients!

Don’t buy your park tickets before you arrive, they give you extra hour in the parks in the morning, and a free fast pass for the day if you buy tickets on site as a guest at the hotel (have an idea of what you want to ride and what time, pick afternoons as they are usually all gone before then). They do charge children by height and age, so my 10yo daughters park tickets were adult prices!

We ate dinner at the Sunny Side cafe, we were all incredibly tired, and it didn’t occur to us that it would be Chinese buffet, which is obvious in retrospect! The kids seemed like they wouldn’t be eating much at all, and same for us being vegetarians. Surprisingly there was more than expected for us, and by the second time going back, the kids were trying different foods. If you stay in the hotel it’s 20% off. Their Bok Choy was amazing, as was the tofu and coriander salad. My meat eating daughter loved the braised pork belly, and the freshly made dumplings were good too. I was happy to eat a plate of veggies after 20 hours of travel and plane food.

 

[indoshakespeare]

Don't you love having kids who are adventurous eaters?

 

[corrie563]

Don't you love having kids who are adventurous eaters?

The thing is that they aren't my son is a vegetarian and my daughter is super fussy! But we managed. The Tokyo city leg was by far the easiest to feed everyone.

 

[corrie563]

Day 2

Shanghai Disney park

We got up early, the first shuttle leaves at 7.35 for an 8am park opening. Shuttle is complimentary with hotel stay. You must stay together for entry as you get an entry card for the extra hour and must enter together. We got there at 6.45 out of confusion on our part, and were the first in line. The queue was massive by the time we left and not everyone got on, might try going for 7 tomorrow?

Pin trading: so many cast members have pins on lanyards, lots of fakes, but also some gems. The kids love trading, a fun way to spend some time.

Stickers: almost every cast member at an attraction has stickers that relate to the attraction or area. My daughter would go up and say hello in Chinese, ask for stickers in English and thank you in Chinese, we got quite a few really cool ones.

Schedule
Shuttle to downtown for our extra morning hour.

Despite being told no food, we read on the park rules that you could take dry snacks, so we did.

Walk on pirates (the best ride at Shanghai, so much more amazing than any other ride I have ever riden)

Buzz lightyear twice walk on

Adventures of Winnie the Pooh twice

Peter pans flight

Cherry popcorn and Donald Duck icy pole

Once upon an adventure walk through of the castle

Eat at toy story land no veg option, that was closed, this happened a lot

Walk on woodys round up

Tron with Marley and mark went solo, I loved it, but I was the only one!

Mickey’s magical express parade, pushy people, but we got a good view! The people were 2-3 deep but felt hat they needed to be full body touching you.

Fastpass buzz astro blasters

8.5 hours in the park and we were ready to check out for downtown Disney for shopping and dinner!



Shops at disneytown, dinner at Molokai. Food was okay but service really hard with language barrier. But we ate! And home to get ready for a good night of sleep! The menus I saw a couple weeks ago for the park food had changed, almost no options for us. Each place has one veggie option, but if that option is wheat, or one if the many things Mark is allergic to, we are out of luck!

 

[Lesley Wake]

Following along! And I'm going to check out your youtube channel!

 

[corrie563]

Day 3 Shanghai Disney
Got to shuttle queues at 7.10, 60 people in queue and we just got on the first shuttle. Seems crazy to get in the parks early when half of the stuff is closed.

Walked on to Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh twice.

Walked on to Peter Pan, twice!

Walked on to crystal grotto.

Did Alice’s Maze, awesome tea party at the end.

Some delicious ice dreams (Shanghai is my favourite Mickey Bar of them, all), and a visit to Marvel Universe.Picture with Spider Man.

Went on Buzz Astroblasters

Lunch at Tribal Table, good veggie option.

Ride Pirates of the Caribbean, tried Jack Sparrow stunt show, wasn’t for us, all in Chinese had no idea what was going on, then ran into Jack Sparrow outside and got a picture.

More ice creams and the Mickey’s magical express parade. There was a crowd, maybe two deep, but the people that were coming in three deep really wanted to get up close and would full body touch you to try and get closer to the rope. And many people in these situations didn't have any awareness that other children exist, one dude tried to rest his photo arm on my kids head.

Buzz Astroblasters, Peter Pan, dinner at Pinocchio’s restaurant no veggie food. Hating eating here. A bit of shopping and back to the hotel.

 

[corrie563]

Day 4
This morning it was pouring, we got to the queue for the shuttle at 7, it didn’t get busy until much later.The hotel had umbrellas to take into the park, but they were long umbrellas and we couldn't imagine taking those on rides. Fortunately I was a bit extra in my packing and packed ponchos for all! Mace wore his from the jump. In my packing I didn't pack myself a jumper, because I planned on buying a spirit jersey from each park, and there were no spirit jerseys!!!

Walk on Pirates, front row, this was THE BEST experience at Shanghai Disneyland, I would go as far as to say that this is my all time favourite attraction, it was just so immersive, amazing. At the store I saw a Halloween sweater that I had my eye on, and it was cold, so I bought it to wear on the day, ther was a deal on the umbrellas that if you spent x amount you could get a half proice umbrella, so we did that, it rained most of the day.

Walk on Adventures of Winnie the Pooh.

Peter Pan walk on twice.

Dumbo walk on.

Buzz Astroblasters fastpass but only 5 minute standby.

Some stitch corndogs for snack.

We tried for Star Wars launch bay every day, with no luck, no idea why it was closed, I really wanted to met c3po!

Lunch at Tribal Table, ordering mishap where they upgraded our kids meals to have a Pepsi - we don’t let our kids drink cola!

Walk through picture with Pluto and Goofy, queue for picture with Gelatoni and Stella Lou.

Now we were getting a bit too cold and wet for our liking. Fortunately the park is really a two day max park, so leaving in the early afternoon wasn’t worrying. Needed some down time!

Packing, using the hotel play room, watching Thor Ragnorok, and dinner in the hotel. Ready for our early flight tomorrow!

 

[Sandeep1]

I agree with you about Pirates Shanghai being awesome. My only complaint was that when I was there, for early hour, they would pack the few people that were there like sardines into the first couple rows and leave the rest of the boat open. I'd rather have a bit more personal space than be crammed in like that but I get the different culture aspect where personal space isn't really a thing.

 

[corrie563]

I agree with you about Pirates Shanghai being awesome. My only complaint was that when I was there, for early hour, they would pack the few people that were there like sardines into the first couple rows and leave the rest of the boat open. I'd rather have a bit more personal space than be crammed in like that but I get the different culture aspect where personal space isn't really a thing.

The personal space factor was huge, we saw it on that ride, but in the queues, I even had a little girl patting me at one point!

 

[eMoneyBug]

thanks for sharing

 

[indoshakespeare]

You can also walk from Toy Story Hotel to Disneyland if you want to be there very early or you think you're gonna miss the first shuttle

Walk from Toy Story Hotel to Shanghai Disneyland

 

[Sandeep1]

You can also walk from Toy Story Hotel to Disneyland if you want to be there very early or you think you're gonna miss the first shuttle

Walk from Toy Story Hotel to Shanghai Disneyland

I always took the shuttle to the park. And then just walked back to Toy Story Hotel after I left the park. Lots of signs up so very easy to do.