pigby
<font color=66CC33>This one might be a little more
- Joined
- Dec 11, 2000
- Messages
- 3,410
Got back late Boxing Day, exhausted but happy.
Crowds - the heaviest I've seen - on Boxing Day it was wall to wall people - we just did shows and Honey I Shrunk the Audience - I think it's a good idea when crowds are that bad and left the park early to do Panoramagique and ice skating outside HNY.
Thought we would get a 'window' of light crowds late Christmas Eve and Christmas Day - nope. Examples of queuing times - BTMR 90 minutes (Saturday night) IASW 60 minutes (Christmas Day). It did get quiet after Fantillusion though - managed to ride Dumbo with a very small wait!
Weather - as expected cold (especially late in the day) but dry - a little bit grey though and foggy on Christmas Day. We didn't care cos we were well wrapped up.
Christmas market- situated between the two parks - quite pretty - loved the hot mulled wine and the roasted chestnuts.
Food - ate at Blue Lagoon, Auberge de Cendrillon, Lucky Nugget and Bella Notte - will put reviews on the existing restaurant posts (with some photos) - but the ambience in all of these was great - food quality OK to good. Our favourite was the Auberge.
Hotel - Sequoia Lodge was very busy as expected but extremely beautiful and Christmassy - the pool looked lovely and bigger than I expected but we just didn't get time to use it, unfortunately. We also didn't get the time to drink in the bar - when we returned from the park we were ready for bed. The rooms were as we expected really - the beds were very comfy, I thought and we all slept really well! I thought the beds in the Cheyenne were quite hard and I didn't sleep well there in May. Our room wasn't in the best location - furthest away from the main building and overlooking a car park but we didn't spend any time gazing out the window anyway. Next time though, we might splash out on a Montana room.
Breakfast - I chose early sittings (7 and 7.30am) trying to avoid the busy times between 8 and 9am - but we found that the busiest times were actually after this time. We never managed our breakfast time anyway - there is a line for people on time and those who aren't. Twice we walked right up (around 8.30pm) but the time we turned up at 10am ish (Christmas Day) the line was massive, so we skipped breakfast that day.
Shows - we loved Winter Wonderland - had great seats for this one and DD videotaped it for us - it was probably our overall favourite.
On our last day, we saw Winnie the Pooh show, which was aimed at 'our younger guests' so we didn't expect much, but it was fab - very cute and we saw the characters Kanga and Roo, who we have never seen at any Disney park before.
We saw the Lion King in May but wanted to see this again, went to the area wehere you queue at 11am on Christmas Day and then realised that you were queueing for the 2.30pm show and you could go back at 3pm and queue for the 4pm or 5pm show that day. Unfortunately our Christmas meal at Lucky Nugget was at 2.30pm so we couldn't see the 2.30pm show nor queue for the later shows. Therefore we cancelled our second planned trip to Studios on Boxing Day and went back to see the show then - luckily it was worth it. We got to the theatre with 10 minutes to go, by which time there was only a few seats left - wished we'd gone much earlier to get a better seat. We also saw the lighting up ceremony - thought this was fabulous - brought tears to my eyes when the tree lit up and all the lights on Main Street) - this was much more than I thought it would be - hadn't realised all the characters that took part in this.
Parades - Saw all the parades - Fantillusion was our favourite, which we saw twice. We stood in Central Plaza by the castle the first time and the second time opposite Bella Notte near the big archway (which is a great place - few people and you can see the parade from a distance). The first time, the parade stopped a couple of times with the villains floats changing (i will have to watch the video to remember exactly what they did) and the princess floats stopped and elevated the princesses and they went round on a carousel. The second time, we watched the parade it didn't stop - we wondered if this was to do with where we watched the parade - maybe it had stopped in front of the castle - if so watching the parade near the Bella Notte isn't such a great idea (the first time we watched it was best). We also saw the parade in Studios on the day we arrived and the daytime parade in DLP on Christmas Eve. On Christmas Day, we spent the time the daytime parade was on queueing for Autopia (25 minutes still but much shorter than it had been)
Crowds - the heaviest I've seen - on Boxing Day it was wall to wall people - we just did shows and Honey I Shrunk the Audience - I think it's a good idea when crowds are that bad and left the park early to do Panoramagique and ice skating outside HNY.
Thought we would get a 'window' of light crowds late Christmas Eve and Christmas Day - nope. Examples of queuing times - BTMR 90 minutes (Saturday night) IASW 60 minutes (Christmas Day). It did get quiet after Fantillusion though - managed to ride Dumbo with a very small wait!
Weather - as expected cold (especially late in the day) but dry - a little bit grey though and foggy on Christmas Day. We didn't care cos we were well wrapped up.
Christmas market- situated between the two parks - quite pretty - loved the hot mulled wine and the roasted chestnuts.
Food - ate at Blue Lagoon, Auberge de Cendrillon, Lucky Nugget and Bella Notte - will put reviews on the existing restaurant posts (with some photos) - but the ambience in all of these was great - food quality OK to good. Our favourite was the Auberge.
Hotel - Sequoia Lodge was very busy as expected but extremely beautiful and Christmassy - the pool looked lovely and bigger than I expected but we just didn't get time to use it, unfortunately. We also didn't get the time to drink in the bar - when we returned from the park we were ready for bed. The rooms were as we expected really - the beds were very comfy, I thought and we all slept really well! I thought the beds in the Cheyenne were quite hard and I didn't sleep well there in May. Our room wasn't in the best location - furthest away from the main building and overlooking a car park but we didn't spend any time gazing out the window anyway. Next time though, we might splash out on a Montana room.
Breakfast - I chose early sittings (7 and 7.30am) trying to avoid the busy times between 8 and 9am - but we found that the busiest times were actually after this time. We never managed our breakfast time anyway - there is a line for people on time and those who aren't. Twice we walked right up (around 8.30pm) but the time we turned up at 10am ish (Christmas Day) the line was massive, so we skipped breakfast that day.
Shows - we loved Winter Wonderland - had great seats for this one and DD videotaped it for us - it was probably our overall favourite.
On our last day, we saw Winnie the Pooh show, which was aimed at 'our younger guests' so we didn't expect much, but it was fab - very cute and we saw the characters Kanga and Roo, who we have never seen at any Disney park before.
We saw the Lion King in May but wanted to see this again, went to the area wehere you queue at 11am on Christmas Day and then realised that you were queueing for the 2.30pm show and you could go back at 3pm and queue for the 4pm or 5pm show that day. Unfortunately our Christmas meal at Lucky Nugget was at 2.30pm so we couldn't see the 2.30pm show nor queue for the later shows. Therefore we cancelled our second planned trip to Studios on Boxing Day and went back to see the show then - luckily it was worth it. We got to the theatre with 10 minutes to go, by which time there was only a few seats left - wished we'd gone much earlier to get a better seat. We also saw the lighting up ceremony - thought this was fabulous - brought tears to my eyes when the tree lit up and all the lights on Main Street) - this was much more than I thought it would be - hadn't realised all the characters that took part in this.
Parades - Saw all the parades - Fantillusion was our favourite, which we saw twice. We stood in Central Plaza by the castle the first time and the second time opposite Bella Notte near the big archway (which is a great place - few people and you can see the parade from a distance). The first time, the parade stopped a couple of times with the villains floats changing (i will have to watch the video to remember exactly what they did) and the princess floats stopped and elevated the princesses and they went round on a carousel. The second time, we watched the parade it didn't stop - we wondered if this was to do with where we watched the parade - maybe it had stopped in front of the castle - if so watching the parade near the Bella Notte isn't such a great idea (the first time we watched it was best). We also saw the parade in Studios on the day we arrived and the daytime parade in DLP on Christmas Eve. On Christmas Day, we spent the time the daytime parade was on queueing for Autopia (25 minutes still but much shorter than it had been)
Lovely to see your posted highlights already.
