Monday noonish we all piled into the car and headed off to two fun filled days at Disneyland Resort Paris. We drove all day at arrived at our hotel in Château-Thierry just after dinner time. Someone asked how we could put up traveling with so many kids for so long. That is the beauty of technology that didn't exist when we were kids. Each row of seats shared a mini dvd player and they just watched movies most of the time. It was quite painless, and we were even able to find relatively clean, normal bathrooms to use at gas stations along the way, rather than the nasty hole-in-the-floor ones that used to be the norm along the freeway there.
The next morning we woke up, got dressed and drove the last 30 minutes to Disneyland. The kids were so excited, they didn't want to waste time putting on things like gloves and hats, but it is February after all, and it was cold! The actual air temperature wasn't so bad, but the wind was rather cutting. But we are hardy Swiss now, so we just put on our winter coats and enjoyed the fact that the cold weather kept the crowds away.
Just like last year, there wasn't much of a line for most of the rides. For the others, we just used our fast passes, or came back later when the line had gone down. We tried to minimize the walking this year, and just stayed in two areas per day. The kids' feet were still sore after the first day, but I think that had more to do with the type of shoes they wore rather than the amount of walking. The next day we put their winter boots on them, and they complained a lot less.
Alexandra and Papa skipped most of the rides last year, since she was so small. This year, though, she was big enough to come on almost everything with the other kids. She loved everything but Pirates of the Caribbean. During It's a Small World, she would point to every new little figure she saw and make the cutest noise. It was a cross between a shout of "Aahhh!" and a giggle of delight. Over and over through the whole ride. She had the biggest grin on her face, and I even tried to get a picture of it.
The girls left their autograph books in the car and Noah forgot his at home, so even though we saw Mary Poppins, Sleeping Beauty, Prince Phillip and Snow White with a few of the dwarves, we got no autographs from them. :( The next day the girls remembered their books and we saw Minnie Mouse, so that was definitely a highlight.
Some friends of ours from church also happened to be at the park at the very same time. We met up with them on Wednesday for lunch and to watch an African drum show. During the performance I looked at Chris and said, "Well, if you didn't have a headache before, I am sure you do now!" They were very loud, but it was also quite funny when they pulled people up out of the audience to come dance with them. The kids really enjoyed the show and spending a bit of time with their friends.
The best experience of the trip for me was finding a new roller coaster buddy. Ever since I married Chris, I haven't been on any roller coasters. While we were dating, he came to Las Vegas with my brothers and I and we went on one of those virtual roller coasters in Luxor. The chairs you sat on tilted slightly forward, backward and to the side, but you never actually moved. You just watched a movie of you being on a roller coaster. It was fun, but not anything too hair raising. Well, we walked out of there and Chris had turned a strange color green, his skin was clammy and he had to sit down for a minute to calm his stomach. That pretty much ended my roller coaster riding. It isn't as much fun by yourself, and I couldn't put him through the real thing, if he reacted that badly to a fake one.
But this year, I was able to talk Nicholas into coming on Space Mountain with me. He was kind of nervous while we were waiting in line, there was an awful lot of screaming going on. I explained to him that some people
just screamed like that to make it more exciting. I also promised him that nothing on the ride could hurt him and there wasn't anything scary waiting to reach out and grab you. It was like sledding, only really super fast. He wasn't totally convinced, but he did climb into the seat with me. Now, this Space Mountain is totally different from the Space Mountain I grew up with. The whole blast-you-into-space thing at the beginning is much more powerful, you go upside down completely twice, and it is in general much, much cooler. At the end of the ride, I asked Nick if he liked it and he smiled real big and nodded his head. In fact, he couldn't stop grinning for the next 10 minutes. I told him next time we go, we would have to try Big Thunder Mountain and Crush's Coaster as well. Now I just have to convince the girls that it would be a fun thing to try…
As we were walking back to the car at the end of the second night, we were already planning our next trip to Disneyland. Only this time, I think I want to take the kids to the original Disneyland, the one I visited every summer for 20 years. Chris' only comment was, "No, no more Disneyland. I am sick of Disneyland." Sorry, sweetie, I think you're a tad outnumbered.
Sounds like fun. Makes me want to go do Disneyland espeically because I think Mindy's getting old enough to go on some of the rollercoasters too. Is that true? Would the girls have been able to go if they wanted to? I know she would want to, we went on one little rollercoaster at Lagoon, and she had to go twice (once with me, once with my sister). She loved it!
The girls could have gone on a couple of the roller coasters, but not all of them. They just weren't ready. How about next summer for Disneyland? I will post more details on Yammr.
Oooh, that would be awesome to go together!