A few days ago Bethany surprised me with a surprise visit to Disneyland Paris! Now personally, I’m not a HUGE Disneyland guy. I get that among theme parks they reign supreme, but often it feels like 9 hours of walking for 20 minutes worth of rides. However, I’ve never gone to Disneyland with my daughter so… I’m excited.
After a few transfers we arrived in Chessee, France and walked out of the train station into the magical arms of Mickey Mouse. I’m always 50/50 on experiences like this for Adah. She’s not really at a spot where she cares about cool sites. I mean she loves people, and dogs, cats, trains and planes but Eiffel Tower? Eiffel Tower Schmiffel Tower, I’d rather chase a pigeon. Luckily Disneyland caters to her demographic.
We walked in to the Disney Christmas parade. Adah watched in confusion as these larger than life characters danced on floats singing Christmas tunes through the streets. She was interested, mildly entertained and slightly concerned. We then walked down main street towards the castle for that classic Disneyland photo in the plaza center. It didn’t really go to plan…
Disneyland Paris is very similar to Anaheim but on a smaller scale. It feels distinctly like Disneyland but different enough to force you to check the map a few times. Adah’s first ride was tea cups, we got a few chuckles, good enough for our first go at things. After that we checked out Alice’s maze ending in the castle. Adah loved it and ran through it with glee saying “uh oh” upon reaching every dead end. By the end she was wiped and took a nap I went on the Indiana Jones ride, here a roller coaster with a loop, I wish Bethany could’ve gone darn that baby growing inside of her!
When Adah woke up we went on Casey’s train ride, Storybook boat tour and It’s a Small World. She loved It’s a Small World and starred with open eyed glee as the children from different nations sung in unison. She snuggled up to momma and soaked it all it. These are the experiences that Disney offers better than anyone else.
As the temperature dropped our rides became indoor rides covering all the important ones: Pirates of the Caribbean and Haunted Mansion (yes we took our under 2 year old on this) and headed off to grab some grub for our Thanksgiving meal. Most food joints were closed around this time and options were limited by a parade blocking main street so we sadly went to an American themed restaurant. We ordered the saddest Thanksgiving meal you could imagine a plain hot dog with dijon mustard and star nuggets and fries for Adah. Happy Thanksgiving!
After the parade there was only a few minutes before the end of the night fireworks so we headed over to buzz lightyears ride. Adah loved fighting the Zerg so much we did it twice! She was our navigator, we were her gunman and Bethany totally killed more aliens than me!
The night ended with a great fireworks and animation display that had Adah in a mixture of Away awe and fear. Mostly awe.
Bethany knocked it out of the park. Disneyland was a blast. Probably just the time of year but ever ride we went on was a walk on, no wait no nothing. The only rides that had a wait were Thunder Mountain and Peter Pan (not sure why on that one). If you ever want to save a ton of time and maximize your Disneyland ride times fly out to paris mid November and shoot of to Disneyland Paris. Totally worth it and not at financially irresponsible.
