I'll admit it…I'm terrible at keeping up with this blog. Since my last post about Medina Sedonia we've traveled to Switzerland and Barcelona. Maybe I will catch up and blog about those trips soon. Since we just got back from Disneyland Paris this past Sunday I thought I would blog about it while it is still fresh in my mind.
There is so much to say about Disney Paris. I will start with the logistics. We flew out of a Malaga, Spain (2.5 hours away but the price was right) on a Tuesday, stayed at hotel at Charles de Gualle Tuesday night, stayed at Disney Wednesday through Saturday and stayed at the same airport hotel Saturday night. We had a very early flight out of Paris and Disney is not near the airport. We also arrived in Paris Tuesday afternoon, so decided to take the girls to the Eiffel Tower on Tuesday before heading to Disney.
I did a lot of research and pre-planning for this trip. We chose to go during the slow season, however it was still very busy. We knew the weather was going to be cold but weren't expecting rain everyday on top of the cold. We bundled up and made the best of it. I had also packed two umbrellas that came in handy. I feel like we crammed a lot into 5 days and it's hard to write about all of it so here is my Disney top ten list:
1. Getting to Disney - you have a few options when getting to Disney. We flew into Charles De Gualle airport and decided to take the RER train. It was about a 45 minute trip and cost 36 euro for the four of us each way. You can also book the bus through Disney or take a high speed train that would have cost more but the ride is only 10 minutes.
2. If you can - Stay at a Disney hotel. We had a 5 minute walk to the park from our hotel, which was great for going back and forth when we didn't want to be there all day. Breakfast was included in our stay as well as our park tickets for the entire time we stayed there. They also held our bags on our last day so we could check out of the hotel and still go to the park.
3. Take advantage of early park hours. If you stay at a Disney hotel you can enter the Disneyland Park two hours before opening. Not every attraction is open but the most popular ones are. We took advantage of this and the girls were able to do all the rides they wanted plus more without waiting in any lines!
4. Pack snacks and water. You are allowed to bring your own food and drinks in. We packed water and snacks, which allowed us to save money and time. Plus - it's great to pull out a snack when the kids were getting restless in a longer line.
5. Purchase a meal plan as part of your stay. If you stay at a Disney park you have the option of getting the half board meal plan or full board. The half gets you one meal a day and the full two meals. We did the half board plan and used it for dinner every night. You can eat at many of the hotel restaurants and all the restaurants in the Disney Village. You have to make reservations beforehand.
6. Meeting the characters. This probably caused me the most stress the entire trip because my kids couldn't wait to meet every character and get their autograph. However, the characters aren't around all the time. There are special times when they come out and if you aren't there on time you end up waiting in a long line. Make sure you read the program to know the times, places and characters to meet.
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| Snow White |
7. 3-4 days is enough! Disneyland Paris isn't anywhere near as big as in the states. There are only two parks and they are both small. You can easily see everything in 3 or 4 days and that doesn't mean you will be on the go all the time.
8. Getting to Paris. If you made the trip to the Paris area to go to Disney you might as well see some of city while you are there. You can set up tours at your hotel or do it yourself and get there on the Metro.
9. Check the weather! Check the weather before you go and dress appropriately. I knew before we went that it was going to be cold and rainy so I packed hats, gloves, jackets with hoods and umbrellas. Thankfully we stayed mostly dry!
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| My favorite picture! |
10. Preplan! Leading up to the trip I did a lot of research so that life would be easy while we were there. I downloaded a map of the parks before we went and we checked off what we wanted to do for sure. I measured the kids and looked up the rides they weren't tall enough for so we wouldn't even waste our time going to them. We made a plan at breakfast of where we were going to go first, what rides we would get fast passes for, what shows we would see, etc. This saved time in the park. We didn't stay at the park all day…we got there early and spent the afternoon in the pool or napping before going back at night.
If you are looking to relax a Disney vacation is not for you…although we did find time to enjoy the hotel pool and even fit in a nap one of the days. The good thing about being on the go all the time is that we all slept really good every night, which doesn't always happen when the four of us are sharing a hotel room. We've done a lot of traveling since moving to Spain and this was one of our best trips. Watching Lily's eyes light up when she met Minnie Mouse melted by heart and having Rebecca tell us every night before bed, "today was the best day of my life" made the whole trip worth it!
At the end of the summer, before school started, we took a week long trip to Belgium, Luxembourg and The Netherlands. It was one of the best trips we've taken so far since being over here.
Our trip began in Seville, Spain where we flew to a small airport about an hour outside of Belgium. We flew Ryanair, the discount airliner that usually doesn't take you to the main airport. This was okay with us because we were renting a car and staying at the airport hotel for the night before driving to Luxembourg the next day. We didn't arrive until 11:00 p.m. so we all needed to go to bed before driving a few hours!
Finally after a good night sleep and yummy breakfast we were on the road to Luxembourg City, the capital of Luxembourg. We had done some research before and had to decided to stop in Bastogne, Belgium on the way to see the Mardasson Memorial and have lunch. The memorial honors the memory of 76,890 American soldiers who were wounded or killed during the Battle of the Bulge. Located right next to the memorial is the Bastogne War Museum which we did not visit. The views from the memorial were beautiful and the memorial itself was amazing. Both Eric and I were in awe of this amazing place in Belgium that honors American fallen soldiers. It is unreal to think that 76,890 people were wounded or killed here during WWII…there really are no words.
The next morning we checked out and got ready to head back to Belgium, this time to Brussels. Before leaving Luxembourg we visited Petrusse Casemates, which are underground ruins of an ancient castle in the city center. We also stopped at the Luxembourg American Cemetery and Memorial about 2 miles away from where we were. The cemetery contains the remains of 5,076 American service members, most of whom died during the Battle of the Bulge. General George S. Patton Jr. is also buried here.
