Paris Trip Day 7

Today was the best day of our trip, if you ask the kids. Yesterday we decided to look into the cost of tickets to Disneyland Paris and discover them to be half the price of the tickets in the US so we adjusted our schedule and did all of our souvenir shopping yesterday in order to have a full free day to enjoy the park.

There were no issues getting the kids up this morning. We were out the door on time and arrived at the park by RER train line A without getting on the wrong train (something we’ve done before).

The park is a 40 minutes train ride from Paris and the station is right in front of the gate to Disneyland Paris. We were at the door right as they opened to the public at 10 am.

We walked all the way back to the park and spent the morning in Fantasyland where the most original rides reside (Mad Hatter teacup, Pinocchio, Peter Pan, Snow White, and It’s a Small World). Out of those the kids really enjoyed Peter Pan and It’s a Small World.

The rides are duplicates of what you would find in the US except all of the dialog is in French, making it hard to understand what’s happening.

After Fantasyland we headed to Discoveryland for some lunch and to ride Buzz Lightyear laser blast, and to drive in Autopia. The kids loved driving! Emilia was a bit apprehensive about being in the car by herself. I was riding with Stella in the car right in front of her. At first I let go of the gas pedal so I could check on Emilia, who was far behind me. Stella, who was steering, did not like how slow we were going so she shifted her body so her little leg could reach the pedal and pushed it all the way down. She was so far down she could barely see through the glass, but she was elated to be driving. She told me she was ready to drive the family car when we got home. We’ll see about that!

Carson was riding with Todd on a different track. We crossed paths a couple of times during the ride. He gave up the pedal to Todd because he couldn’t quite reach the pedal and see where he was going. I am pretty certain that was all of the kids’ most favorite ride ‘til that point.

We decided to get a fast pass ticket to Star Tours and headed over to Adventureland to ride the Pirates of the Caribbean. There were two drops on this water ride. They were nothing big, but the first rollercoaster-type drop the kids had experience that day. Carson rubbed his stomach after the first drop, leaned over and told me he didn’t really like the ride. I think more out of surprise that anything else, but by the end of the ride they were ready to go back and do it all over again.

After Pirates we visited Robinson Crusoe’s treehouse and Aladin. We skipped the major ride “Indiana Jones and the Temple of Peri” because Carson and Stella did not meet the minimum height requirement.

We walked over to Frontierland for Phantom Manor. The kids were pretty spooked by it and glad when it was over. I don’t believe it was any scarier than our neighbor’s display, but it was unfamiliar to them, and therefore spooky.

After that, it was time for us to catch the Star Tour ride with our fast pass tickets. We just walked to the front of the 25 minute wait time line and were let right in. This is probably the ride where we wished we understood French the most. There was a lot of dialogue in the storyline that we missed. The ride was fun nonetheless. We were buckled in our individual seats and given 3d glasses to wear. We were in a cabin that held five long rows of seats all facing a large screen up front. The floor of the cabin would shift and tilt to give the illusion of flying through space while avoiding obstacles in our path. It was quite fun, but Carson thought it too short.

Each ride has an average wait time of 30 minutes, except for a very few that were popular and lasted up to an hour. We decided to wrap up our day by riding Big Thunder Mountain, which Stella was tall enough to do. While in line I had to leave to take Stella to the bathroom. When I returned with her Todd was quite a ways ahead in line. Instead of cutting in front of the cue for all those people, I was able to hoist Stella up to reach him and the other two kids and I opted to not go.
They loved the ride and thought it was the best one out of the whole park. They called it the fastest most terrifying ride they had done. Stella’s hands were frozen gripping onto the lap bar and Emilia closed her eyes during the drops.

After the ride we decided to call it a night and leave the park at 7:30pm after 9 ½ hours of fun. We got some crepes at the train station and rode the train back into town.

To celebrate our last night, we decided to walk a few blocks from our apartment to the Jewish quarters for some falafel. It was delicious! The service was excellent, the food plenty and the price reasonable. After a week, I was tired of the same French food at every café we ate. This was just what I needed.

And with that, the Paris leg of our trip end. Au revoir Paris! ‘Til next time.