Disneyland Paris
At the time of travel my daughters were four and six years old and had been looking forward to Disneyland for nine months so they were very excited. We checked in for the Eurostar one hour before departure, but this time soon passed, as we were able to pick up our park tickets, maps, programs and a goody bag each for the girls from the Disneyland Express Luggage Desk.
The Eurostar journey was very smooth and quick. We left Ashford at approximately 11am; the journey took two hours, so with France being one hour ahead of the UK we arrived in to Marne-la-Valle's, Disneyland Paris at approximately 2pm. We opted to leave our luggage at the Express Luggage Desk to be transferred directly to our hotel and we proceeded straight in to the parks which are literally 50 metres from the train station.
After using the maps and program to plan our assault on the parks we decided to spend this first half day in the Walt Disney Studios Park, then a full day in the Disneyland Park, then Walt Disney Studios Park on the third day and Disneyland Park again on the fourth day.
We managed to complete about half of that first park that afternoon, getting used to the Fastpasses and seeing which rides and attractions had the biggest queues, before heading to The Sequoia Lodge Hotel. We could have walked there comfortably in about five minutes, but by this stage the children were tired so we took the shuttle bus which probably took longer!
Upon checking-in we booked our breakfast times then proceeded to the concierge to book the 'all you can eat' buffet for that evening. The queues are always really long for the restaurants so it’s a good idea to head for them slightly earlier than your designated time.
We found that throughout our stay there were always different Disney characters visiting the hotel which provided lots of excellent photo opportunities for the children. Similarly there are also plenty of photo opportunities in the Parks throughout the day as well.
We had thought of booking lunch with a Princess, but this would have used up a whole afternoon and you don't know which Princess the children will meet. Instead we queued for the Princess Pavilion where you have a royal meet and greet with a Disney Princess. Admittedly, we queued for 60-90 minutes but when it was our daughter's turn to meet Cinderella the audience seemed to go on for ages, a good 5-10 minutes and my girls and Cinderella were engrossed in conversation with each other, providing more excellent photo opportunities.
I would recommend going to the Princess Pavilion early to avoid the long queue rather than going there when the long queues have already formed. We found similar queues at Meet Mickey Mouse, so the same applies there. The other really long queue we encountered was for Moteurs...Action which is a stunt show spectacular. Although it took a long time, they did seem to fit everyone in to the grandstand.
There are several parades throughout each day that are really exciting for the children, hence we did see some of them more than once with the Disney Dreams laser show on the Princess Castle in the evening a spectacular show. For all of the parades it is advisable to get a good position 30 minutes before they start. I think my particular favourites were the Pirates of the Caribbean underground cruise and "It's a small world".
On the last morning we were able to hand our luggage to the Bellboy at the hotel and proceed straight to the Parks, then in the afternoon we went straight to the train station where we collected our luggage before boarding the train at 6pm.
Throughout our stay the girls never once complained about being tired, though they definitely were and seeing the looks on their faces as they screamed at all of their favourite Disney characters was really wonderful. We definitely intend to return for another visit in a few years.