I'm off to Disneyland Paris in October - what to expect?

[rival81]

Hi all, I am visiting Disneyland Paris for 2 nights and 3 days (2 park pass) mid-October this year and was wondering if anyone here has been there and could offer some tips, or advice. I'm not sure what to expect in terms of visitor numbers... will it be fairly quiet this time of year? I'm looking at booking a 'package' deal including accomodation and tickets on the Disneyland Paris web site. Cost is around $780 for two people for two nights three days.

[mattcrombie]

I went November last year from 16th till 23rd and found it to be quiet. Not sure for the month of October, it will be getting cooler weather.... As for the parks... There the most expensive disney parks out there.... but totally worth it. Hollywood studios park is very very small. Its kinda sad how small it is infact. You will have it all done within half of the day. Disneyland amazing. The park is just the most beautiful Disney park that exists. Its so green, Lush and the themeing is perfect. Nothing out of place... The gardens are amazing.... Just be prepared to pay the huge prices... The euro isnt very good for us aussies at the moment, its basiclly double.... The Disney Pins you would get at Disneyland in California you would pay a rough price of $8.95 USD each, There 8EURO in Paris. Thats $16. Food is expensive.... souvenirs and much more.. .Its totally worth it though, i didn't think about it much, Its a once in a life time. The Down Town Disney is not that great either. But a good experience. ask if you want to know anything

[MaxThrust]

Lots of bad queuing, and generally pushing in, or standing in front of you at the parades when you've waited an hour in place. Expensive, and strangely the longer of queues are the kiddy rides.. Peter Pan is always bad.. get a fast track, dumbo is long. Big ride queues can be small, and go during the parades if you can, or stay late as lots of the coaches leave b4 the park closes. Watch out for pick-pockets ( we lost a camera ) Ride rock'n'coaster if you go to the studio. If you stay in the hotel , then I think you still get early entry. ( the cowboy one is the cheapest/decent one ) Food is expensive. Can be very hot in the summer, and sub-zero in the winter.

[DonjaiInLA]

Yeah, the pickpockets seem to have annual passes, I guess after a couple of visits they start to pay for themselves , they have warning signs at the front of the park about it. You should check when the off season starts, because they put alot of their big rides down over a couple of weeks for maintenace, when I went we were very dissapointed.

[rival81]

I see, and when did you go Don? I'm considering the 2 day 3 night package which will be 400 Euros ($800 Australian). Not cheap by any means, you have to add food on top of that. I'm not sure if it's worth it to be honest, i've already been to Disney in Anaheim and my fiance (we will be on our honeymoon) has been to the Disney parks in Florida AND Anaheim.

[MaxThrust]

I think most people go to disney for disney rather than the rides. If its the rides, then look at the other european parks instead.

[DonjaiInLA]

So if you went to Disneyland and every ride and show was closed or canceled, you'd be happy with the "Disney"? You'd be disappointed. I went in November 2007

Edited February 7, 2009 by DonjaiInLA

[Gazza]

All this time they have been barking up the wrong tree. They shouldn't have they bothered replicating successful E-Ticket attractions like Big Thunder Mountain, Haunted Mansion, It's a Small World, Space Mountain, Tower of Terror etc. Instead they should have just made the Disney parks one giant Mickey Mouse meet and greet place.

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

Despite the success of the rides, (and I can only comment on DL Calif.) but I found one of the days we spent there just seeing all the shows - not a single ride in the whole day, and it was one of the more memorable, because it wasn't so much "in queues" all day, but really opening our eyes to the park. DL Calif is amazing, and the attention to detail is fantastic. I would say that without the rides, it could still be very much enjoyed by the public attending the shows that they put on. Of course Gazza, you are very much right, the rides are certainly a big ticket to the parks success and popularity, but that one park (and only one) could stand on it's own without rides.

[DonjaiInLA]

DL Calif is amazing, and the attention to detail is fantastic.

Is that why their pretty much starting from scratch?

one giant Mickey Mouse meet and greet place.

All I can imagine is the park the way it is now, only with one big Character Breakfast in Main Street

[DaptoFunlandGuy]

Don - they are certainly not starting from scratch at DL Calif.... I think you might be confusing it with Disney's California Adventure, as opposed to DisneyLAND California.

[DonjaiInLA]

My bad, I read it wrong I guess, the "Calif" just overpowered my brain, speaking of perfect detail, if you follow westcoaster.net, you will see that they have been upping the standard even more, Sleeping Beauty Castle tour is back open and the attention to detail in there is amazing, plus there repaving main street and fixing up some warn facades... I can't wait to go back

[mickey_079]

A TR has just been posted on theme park review. Check it out if your interested. TR DL Paris

[Marc Park]

I just got back from a trip a few weeks ago. The place is great and pretty much what everyone has said about the price of food is true. It is very expensive. Eating MC Donald's at Disney Village is pretty much your cheapest option. Do have a meal at the Blue Lagoon next to Pirates of the Caribbean. I wont let you in on the secret in case you dont already know. Also Walts Restaraunt was really nice as well. I stayed at Disneys Newport bay club and it was really good. All the DLP Hotels on the lake are really close and you can walk in a few mins to both parks. I recommend this book http://www.amazon.com/Brits-Guide-Disneyla...0673&sr=8-2 It came in handy to get feel for the place and has good tips about saving time and money in the parks. Disney Hollywood studios was a bit of a disappointment. It was VERY small but does have a few really good rides. TOT and Rock N Roller Coaster are standouts. Any other questions feel free to ask me.

[gauge]

My partner and i went last week and after being at Thrope park and Pleasure beach the week before we were not expecting much. But WoW we had a great time, the park is so lovely and green compared to Disney L.A. We were not even really planning on going on any rides as from wot i remembered from Disney L.A. the waits were worth it. But the line ups were quite good, max being around 30 mins and that was for Temple of Doom and Peter Pan. Forget about the silly prices as they are crazy and you will really enjoy yourself. Have fun!

[MaxThrust]

My partner and i went last week and after being at Thrope park and Pleasure beach the week before we were not expecting much. But WoW we had a great time, the park is so lovely and green compared to Disney L.A. We were not even really planning on going on any rides as from wot i remembered from Disney L.A. the waits were worth it. But the line ups were quite good, max being around 30 mins and that was for Temple of Doom and Peter Pan. Forget about the silly prices as they are crazy and you will really enjoy yourself. Have fun!

No report on Thorpe and blackpool ? Thorpe park was my local park (5km) in the uk, did you get to ride SAW ?

[gauge]

No report on Thorpe and blackpool ? Thorpe park was my local park (5km) in the uk, did you get to ride SAW ?

We really liked Thorpe Park and Loved pleasure Beach. The Big one at Blackpool was without question the best coaster i have ever been on, so high, so fast and so long. It was great going on the woodies as it's been years since i last went on one. The themeing at Thorpe Pk was much better than i was expecting, not so much like "worlds" like Dreamland or Disney but more how every ride was themed to the max. We went on a Tuesday the day after Bank holiday thinking that the crowds would be small. Well for the 1st 90 min or so all rides expect Saw were a walk on, but as the day went on the lines were crazy. At one stage the line up for Saw was 3 hours! We ended up buying a fastrac pass which works( and works very well, much better than Q4U ) on all rides apart from Saw, so we waited till 90 mins before the park closed to line up on it. It took around 90 mins to finally get on it but the wait was well worth it! The themeing for that ride is amazeing and takes the cake as far as i'm concerened. As for the ride... so smooth and quiet and the indoor part at the start of the ride is a big shock, big dip and a fast loop before you even go outside and start to climb to the top knowing that a 97 degree drop awaits. Overall it did live up to what we were hoping for and the wait was indeed worth it. One thing we liked about Saw was that on most cars they had a full ride video of you that you could purchase in the photo shop after the ride a bit like Slingshot if you like but we were unlucky that our car was not equipped with the cam.

[Gold Coaster]

Shame. I have a DVD of my ride on Vapor Trail at Sesame Park (had a quick visit there on a tour, don't laugh ) & it's a brilliant keep sake to have albeit with a bit too much stock footage and not as much footage of my ride as I'd have liked. Having missed out on a video of Raptor at Cedar Point the year before, I'm glad to at least have this in my collection.

[Wazza1]

I actually went last week to Disneyland Paris, it was the day after a public holiday (we went on a Friday) and it was choc o bloc full of people. I have never queued so much anywhere in my life. (Even Disneyland Calif in the middle of summer was not this bad) The queues out the front for all ticket booths stretched about 80m, (my advice pre pay on the internet if you can) we ran into some fellow Aussies inside who said they queued for over an hour just to get inside. Queues were pretty large for everything (best wait we had was for Space Mountain, even in the middle of the day was only 30mins, bad luck for those who grabbed a fastpass for that) We grabbed a fastpass for Star Tours, as it is notoriously slow at loading, the regular queue was 90mins, even with our fastpass, and going back late in the afternoon (5:30 pm) we still queued in the fastpass queue for 30mins on our return. The queue for Thunder Mountain was a little over an hour, so to for Indiana Jones (which we happily queued for) Couldn't help ourselves and went on Pirates of the Carribean & Its a Small world, just because they were short queues and any trip to Disneyland would not be complete without it. Here is a pic of Thunder Mountain If you have small kids, there were hell long queues for the Tea cups and for Autopia, (or whatever its called) and some of the other kids rides. Also, whilst you are buying food and drink don't even think about trying to do the conversion from Euro into Australian dollars as you will have a heart attack. Infact that goes for Paris generally. Speaking of Paris, I also took myself along to a large Carnival in a Park at the edge of the city called "Faire du Trone" It was basiaclly a massive tempoary carnival that rolls into town for a couple of months every Spring. I did go on the best temporary roller coaster I have ever been on here. Called "King" And they had plenty of other rides as well, here is a couple. Finally, if you are comming to Paris, I HIGHLY reccomend going to Parc d'Asterix (which is based on the Asterix cartoons) it has some pretty dammed good rides, especially a couple of awesome looking roller coasters. I am going there next week

[friendsarama]

I was there in early October last year for 3 days. The first two (a Saturday and a Sunday) were insanely busy and I think I managed 2 rides on each of the days (if the queues get over an hour I generally don't bother). My last day, the Monday, was dead. The longest wait was 45 minutes for Crush's Coaster at the Studios park, and about the same for Big Thunder in Disneyland park. I did every major attraction (Space Mountain, Buzz Lightyear, Pirates, Haunted Mansion, Indiana Jones, Big Thunder, Tower of Terror, Rocknrolla Coaster and Crush's Coaster) by 1PM. It was great. So my recommendation is, don't bother on the weekend. My big complaint about the Disneyland Paris park is the entertainment. I think it's generally quite pathetic by Disney standards. The Candelabration show was probably the most dissappointing thing I've ever seen in a Disney park (short of the fireworks in Tokyo Disneyland - but at least everything else in those parks makes up for that!), and even the parades are generally much more basic. The Lion King show is pretty weak in comparison to its international relatives as well. The best thing about the parks is the layout (I find it the most immersive of the 'Disneyland' parks in terms of theming), and it really is the most beautiful (albeit not necessarily the best maintained). Big Thunder, Space Mountain and Crush's Coaster are definitely the highlights for me! When are you going specifically? Out of coincidence, I'm actually heading back myself this year and will be there for a couple of days in mid October too. Hope this helps! Mickey C