19 July 2015

Top 10 Tips for a Disneyland Paris Holiday

Hello!
Yep, it's another Disney post again!
Today, I wanted to write about some of the things that we did in order to prepare for our holiday to Disneyland Paris and also some of the advice that I would give you in order to make the holiday as fabulous as possible. Whether you'll be going with the kids or on your own, these tips are so important and I would really recommend to take them on board. If you have any questions about our trip, don't hesitate to ask me in the comments below!
Here we go!

1) Take full advantage of Extra Magic Hours
If you're staying in one of the main Disney hotels, they offer a thing called 'Extra Magic Hours'. This means that the park opens two hours early, at 8am, for guests staying in these hotels. I know 8am is early but these two hours are so important if you want to get on some of the biggest attractions and meet characters. The main characters (Mickey, Pluto, Goofy, Minnie, Donald etc) gather around Main Street to meet guests and the main attractions in Fantasyland are open with only 5 minute queues. If you do these rides in the morning, you won't get stuck in the massive waits that follow later on in the day. Extra Magic Hours are also the perfect time to start queueing up for a reservation ticket for the Princess Pavilion. 

2) Early Breakfast
Make sure that you have an early breakfast. I would recommend to go down for breakfast between 7 and 7:30am because after that it gets bombarded with kids, you have to wait in a queue for a table and the food goes quite quickly. Make things less stressful for yourself. 

3) Be nice and polite to the characters
My next blog post is going to be on how to meet characters in Disneyland Paris, but for now, I cannot stress how important it is to be nice to the characters. Don't just crowd them and shove your autograph book in their face, wait patiently, speak to them, ask them how their day was. If they are your favourite character, tell them, I promise you they'll absolutely adore you.

4) Book in advance for a character dining experience meal
The character dining experiences are definitely worth it. If you're not familiar with what they are, basically the different characters will come around the tables whilst you're eating for a meet and greet with you and your family. We didn't book in advance for our character experience meal and sadly we were unable to get in. If you're 100% sure that you want to do one then book online when you book the holiday or book as soon as you arrive at the hotel. Whatever you do, do not leave it until the last minute.

5) Do some of the bigger rides at night
We watched Disney Dreams on our first and last nights in the Disney Park which meant that the other nights, we did a lot of the rides. People start getting their places for Disney Dreams at about 8-9pm which means that the ride queues get shorter. I would personally recommend going on Thunder Mountain on a night, it's so much fun!

6) Take a Water Bottle
Once you're in the Disney park, they really do have you captive. Drinks are so expensive so my recommendation is to take a water bottle and keep re-filling it with water from the water taps that are placed around the park. That way you're saving quite a bit of money. The water taps tend to be near the toilets, near some of the biggest attractions and at the front of the parks.

7) Do Stars in their Cars
Stars in their Cars is one of the best character meet and greets there is. It's classed as a parade but it is definitely more of a meet and greet. Everyday, different characters ride around the Disney Studios in their cars and as the crowd congregates in a circle, they go around, take selfies and sign autographs. It's such a good time to meet characters that you wouldn't normally see walking around the park so definitely take advantage of that.

8) Use the Fastpass service/Single rider queues
At most of the main attractions they offer a fastpass service which allows you to get a little ticket with an allocated time slot. When you go back at the time given, you get on the ride a lot quicker which makes the experience a lot less stressful. Also, the single rider queues are a god send if you're willing to ride on your own or with another family. For example, if it is a four seater ride, and a family of three have taken up one slot, you would take the extra seat. The queues for this are so small which means you get on the ride a lot quicker and most of the time, you still end up with your friends anyway.

9) Go for evening meals either extra early or later on in the night
Now it depends what you want to do. For evening meal, if you're only half board like we were, I would recommend going for your evening meal whilst the afternoon parade is on or at about 7:30-8pm. The restaurants are very quiet at this time and you get in really quickly!

10) Disney Photopass
Finally, the Disney Photopass is the last thing that I would really recommend taking advantage of. Before we went on the holiday, we heard a lot of bad reviews about this, but we were convinced to do it and it was honestly one of the best things we did. We had no problems at all with it. When you meet one of the main characters, there tends to be a professional photographer with them. They will take professional photos for you, and if you have a photopass, they will put them on the pass for you so that you can access all the photos taken at home for 365 days. It was the best thing we purchased and the photos were of such high quality. Definitely think about getting one because they are completely worth it!

I hope that's helped some people if you're planning a trip to Disney soon!
Lots of Love
Meg
xox

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