Sunday – Rock n Roll
September 13th, 2009 , 20:57
Goals for the day: get to EuroDisney, get checked in, have lunch, ride the Rock ‘n’ Rollercoaster (as it would be closed the rest of the week). So we’re up early, too early for a Sunday, and head out to the station. Get the train, change at Lille (interesting as we waited and waited and no train info, finally get told 5 minutes late, 10 minutes late get on the train and sit. And sit some more. Train finally left 23 minutes late. Not helped by small child singing the same two word phrase over and over and over and over and over – for over an hour the same two words sung. There will be days of this.) Finally get to EuroDisney. Goal one accomplished.
Find the shuttle to the hotel, get on it, crammed in with the thousands. Are very surprised when we turn into the hotel as it was very close to the park. Manage to get to the front of check-in queue despite being nearly the last off the shuttle – we didn’t have several large bags which we couldn’t carry, several children wanting to run off in several directions, or pushchairs we couldn’t lift or push! Get checked in, get all the information, park tickets, and get settled into the room. Goal two, accomplished.
Hotel is interesting – it’s more like several hotels all in a complex and, as it’s the Santa Fe Hotel, it’s all fake adobe! We knew we’d arrived at the hotel – on the roof of the front building is a huge Clint Eastwood billboard.
Once sorted, discuss how to get to the park. Decide that, as we’ve been sitting on a train for hours and the shuttle bus was packed, we will walk and we head out to walk the way the shuttle bus came in. However, along the way Joe spots a sign which seems to indicate we can go along a path at the back of the hotel. Hmmm, interesting. So we go check that out and discover a lovely footpath that leads to Disney Village and from there the parks. The footpath runs along the ‘Rio Grande’ which is the apparently man made river running between the Santa Fe and the Cheyenne Hotels. Cheyenne is all wild west wooden buildings and it was interesting seeing it. So we discover we’re a 20 minute walk to the parks – way better than the shuttle!
Get to Disney Village and see a sandwich shop so stop and get sandwiches and drinks. Beer for Joe even. Have lunch and goal three is accomplished.
Head into the Disney Studio Park and head straight for the Rock ‘n’ Rollercoaster, but get held up by a parade. So watch the tail end of the parade and when that passes dash onwards. Get to the rollercoaster and are looking for the entry and how long the wait is (35 minutes) when someone stopped Joe, shoved something in his hands, waved, and dashed off. Joe looked down and we had two fast track tickets to the coaster for right then! Look at each other, shout ‘thank you’ at departing bloke and child, and head for the fast track lane which was then a quick walk to the ride! We were on the ride in minutes and it was wonderful. Great fun and I want to do it again! Goal four and final goal accomplished!
So we had the rest of the afternoon and walked around the studios park, seeing the layout and riding the rides. We managed just about everything but the Finding Nemo ride, then headed back out in search of dinner. Went to Billy Bobs Saloon and had ribs and chicken which was very good. Also had a couple of drinks. Joe has decided that Disney is much better after a couple of beers! When we left it was getting dark so Joe suggested going to see the park all lit up.
Got to the Disney Park and headed in to get photos of the castle. Ended up in Discovery land with the steampunk decor and saw the wait for Space Mountain was 10 minutes. So Joe said ‘let’s go!’ His goal – the brief view of the park as you are shot up and out on the first hill. Less than 10 minutes later we’re flying through Space Mountain having a wonderful time. Once we came off that the park was closed so we headed back to the hotel for some sleep. Up early the following morning!
