Ingredients:
-1 close friend (or add to taste)
-1 direct train
-1 Disney hotel
-2 Disney parks (In this case, I used "Studios" and "Disneyland" but you can substitute Epcot or Animal Kingdom as necessary)
-1 special occasion (only fresh occasions will suffice; use only if in season, otherwise omit)
-1 camera (optional)
-2 vinylmation figurines for garnish
Prep time: 1 day
Cook time: 1 day
Difficulty: Easy-Medium
Instructions:
1. In a medium sized bowl, loosely combine your friend and the direct train. Let rest for 2.5 hours. Jenna and I got a pretty early start from Oxford on Thursday morning, catching a train at 7:30 am. As is always the case when traveling in this country, you always need to take a preliminary form of transportation to get to your desired mode of transport. Bus to airplane... bus to Tube to train... train to walking... In this case it was train to Tube to Eurostar. Anyway, we caught the Eurostar at 10:30 from London St. Pancras, bound directly for Disneyland Paris (literally!).
2. Add just a pinch of the hotel to begin the melding of flavors. Arriving in Disneyland, we caught a five minute Disney bus to the Hotel Santa Fe to attempt to check in. The poor staff member behind the desk was in training and barely knew enough English. After we sufficiently confused him (and vice versa), he informed us that our rooms were not yet ready but we could leave our bags there and head to the parks.
3. On a floured surface, knead one of the parks sufficiently to knock out all the air. If necessary, use some drops, inversions, and corkscrews. (Reference: Julia Child, "Mastering the Art of French Speaking"). Garnish lightly and set aside. With the afternoon in front of us, we headed over to Disney Studios, the smaller of the two parks. Now, this theme park actually redefines the word small (perhaps I should have titled the blog 'It's a Small Park After All?') because in only 25 minutes, one can walk the park's perimeter. Thus, upon entering 'Studios,' we headed straight to its most central and most prominent landmark: Hollywood Tower of Terror. (Note: At the end of the recipe, I will compare the French rides with their Florida equivalents). Needless to say, it kicked off our park hopping with a bang!
From there, we queued at another great ride, the food cart, so I could grab some lunch. Due to several complicated requests by patrons and an absence of the ever-important hot drinks, nearly 25 minutes elapsed before we reached the window. While this gave me plenty of time to plan my order in French (une Brezel et une muffin), I failed to ascertain the correct pronunciation of Brezel (German =/= French). Results: massive embarrassment, a hearty laugh and the assistance of my French-speaking dance partner (Jenna, in French: "I'm sorry, he speaks German"), and a dearth of muffin. Oh yeah, the other hilarious moment? Realizing that 'salted' pretzels are not actually salted, but coated in sesame seeds. Oh well.
Anyway, this lead to a fantastic couple hours of fun. We rode Aerosmith's Rockin' Roller Coaster, the Studio Backlot Tour, Slinky Dog's Zigzag ride, and the RC Racer coaster. Unfortunately the queue for Crush's Coaster was too long for us, so we picked up a pair of vinylmations (see picture below) and walked around, taking pictures.
4. Using a hand mixer, whip the second park and the special occasion together on slow speed until barely mixed, or until the colors start to run. Place the mixture in the fridge to chill. As 19:00 came and went, 'Studios' closed, so we walked across the plaza to Disneyland. Yes, that's right. No monorail, nor bus, nor train needed - just a 5 minute walk, door to door. Passing through security, we were soon greeted with a giant "20" hanging over the entrance. As it turns out, Thursday was the 20th anniversary of Disneyland Paris, and there we were, serendipitously having dinner and aiming to watch the fireworks show in front of Sleeping Beauty's castle.
I know this will come as a big shock, but Main Street USA looked pretty much the same as it does in Florida. Similar turn-of-the-century architecture with the Mississippi/Louisiana (French) influence. We grabbed dinner in a cafeteria style place on Main Street and headed to 'City Hall' to try to procure birthday buttons. Sadly, our hopes were dashed because Disney Paris is not allowed to distribute buttons; the French government deems them a safety hazard (consequently... no comment on the guards with assault rifles outside the park). Instead, the gentleman gave us a pair of posters signed by all the characters - one in French and one in English!
With that, we popped into a store to buy some coloring supplies and then we staked out a spot in front of the castle to wait for the fireworks an hour later. I have to admit, I quite enjoyed coloring Pirate Mickey in the freezing cold in front of the castle. Jenna colored Snow White. Just goes to show what possibilities an Oxford education can lead to!
The show, entitled "Disney Dreams," was excellent and unique. It combined fireworks, video projection, lasers, and water spouts. The musical plot followed Shadow (from Peter Pan) as he first let all the magic out of the "second star on the right" and then had to go recollect it from various Disney stories. Going into the day, I had been curious to find out how Disney would appeal to a multilingual audience. In this case, half of the music was in French and the rest was in English; a very apt means of sharing linguistic differences. You haven't lived until you've seen Lumiere sing "Be Our Guest" in French.
5. Let rest overnight... but not eight hours. Preheat oven to 630. After the show, Jenna and I headed back across the plaza, past the train station, to Disney Village. We popped into Starbucks for a quick snack and drink while the crowds dispersed, then caught our bus back to Santa Fe (haha). Exhausted but excited for another day, we quickly turned in, setting our alarms for 6:30.
Naturally, the night was too short. We groggily awoke and headed to breakfast, where we were met by a massively redundant stockpile of pain au chocolat, croissants, and... dinner rolls? There were literally cornucopias of jam and butter, vats of fruit cocktail, some cold deli-style ham, and miscellaneous hot drinks. Apparently we were on the early end of breakfast, because an army of anxious kids and less-anxious parents had assembled by the time we headed out to catch the bus to the parks.
6. Remove second park from refrigerator. Break into five distinct chunks and roll each out alternately. Do not allow to come to room temperature. We arrived at the park by 8:00 to take advantage of the "Extra Magic Hours," when the park is open solely for Disney hotel guests. It was a glorious, albeit chilly morning, and we enjoyed having free reign over the near-empty park. This involved walking onto the Tea Cups (Fantasyland), Space Mountain (Discoveryland) twice, and Buzz L'Eclair's Laser Blast in rapid succession; by 9:30, our addled brains needed a break. After sitting in the sun, munching a couple apples for a while, we got back to more brain addling... on Indiana Jones et le Temple du Peril!! Even though I asserted that "Temple du Perillllll" does not have the same ring as "Temple of Doooooom," the roller coaster was still really fun.
As one may be able to guess, we did not exactly visit the five theme lands in a logical order. In fact, we were all over the place. After Indiana Jones (Adventureland), we went to Phantom Manor (Frontierland), then Pirates of the Caribbean (Adventureland), and the Storybook Ride (Fantasyland). At last, it was time for lunch... in Main Street USA.
7. Place in preheated oven for one hour. Upon removal, toss lightly and cover with the first park. Garnish generously. Allow to cool completely before serving. After a nice lunch at Walt's on Main Street, we agreed to return to 'Studios' in hopes of catching a couple of the attractions we had missed on the previous afternoon. Unfortunately, Crush's Coaster was closed due to technical difficulties, but we did go to the Animation Studio - which had a brilliant montage about the power of movies - as well as two shows exclusive to Disneyland Paris, Animagique and Cinemagique. Animagique is sort of a stage adaptation of the Magic Kingdom's "Philharmagic." Mickey and Donald Duck work in an animation studio and the former leaves for the day with instructions to Donald to not touch the key to the film vault. Predictably, curiosity gets the best of Donald, who enters the vault only to find himself among myriad Disney films, such as The Lion King, The Little Mermaid, Jungle Book, and Mary Poppins (again, half in French, half in English). At last, Donald finds his way out of the vault the following morning, where Mickey awaits... unamused but unsurprised. I really enjoyed this show because it was presented in black light with fluorescent costumes and puppets. The visual appeal of the stage and timeless quality of the music made for an excellent show.
Cinemagique was also quite good, although significantly different. This show follows Martin Short as he becomes trapped in a history of film. He finds himself in the heart of real movie scenes dating back to slapstick silent comedy, while simultaneously attempting to escape the film world and return to the real world. All the while, he is followed by Julie Delpy (a French-American director/screenwriter... see Wikipedia), whom he meets and falls in love with in the first scene. At last, he escapes from the film world, only to realize that Julie could not follow; thankfully, a magician realizes his plight and summons a door for him to reenter the film world and live happily ever after.
With that, our time at Disney had essentially concluded. We wandered around a bit, taking even more pictures with our vinylmations. Finally, we walked across the plaza to the train station, and boarded the Eurostar, direct for London. Needless to say, we were exceedingly happy campers. Merci beaucoup to my amazing friend, Jenna, for a truly epic, spontaneous, and wonderful trip to Disneyland!
...And there you have it. Fun a la Friday. Serves 2.
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| Jenna (left) and I on Main Street USA |
CULTURE CORNER
Ride comparison!
Hollywood Tower of Terror - Essentially the same, except the introduction video was spoken in French, with English subtitles... making it significantly less spooky
Aerosmith's Rockin' Roller Coaster - Excellent fun! The track was very similar if not identical to Florida, but the plot line (Aerosmith are running late for a show; drive them across town as quick as possible) was omitted entirely. The introduction video just shows Aerosmith looking at a model roller coaster in the studio. Lame dude! Instead of fluorescent street signs along the track, the track is simply accompanied by various psychedelic blinking lights.
Backlot tour - About the same as Florida; the tram drives to two mock movie sets instead of one; the first is the same, but the second shows effects from the movie Reign of Fire
RC Racer - This ride does not exist in Florida. Similar to a swinging viking ship ride, RC racer simply runs forward and backward on an erect half circle track. An unexpectedly fun ride, but a tad short for my liking.
Space Mountain: Mission 2 - In my opinion, much better than it's older Floridian counterpart. The ride begins by "shooting" the car out of a "cannon" on the outside of the mountain. The car then drops down into the mountain, and winds in and around fluorescent asteroids in the dark. Unlike in Florida, Mission 2 includes both an inversion and a pair of corkscrews.
Tea Cups - Always a classic! Unfortunately, as the first ride of the day, the wheel was really tight and we could hardly get any spinning action going. Note for future Disney trips: don't ride tea cups at park opening.
Indiana Jones & The Temple of Peril - Another ride absent from Florida. This roller coaster somewhat resembles Hershey Park's Crazy Mouse coaster. The overall frame is boxy, leading to several sharp 90 degree turns. It also includes an unexpected loop.
Pirates of the Caribbean - Good, but less exciting than in Florida. Somehow I can't get into pirates speaking in French, and rum should never be spelled r-h-u-m. Also, Jack Sparrow was nowhere to be seen.
Phantom Manor (Haunted Mansion) - Essentially the same... again, the French introduction - while interesting - made it slightly less haunted.
Big Thunder Mountain RR - Unfortunately, it was closed due to technical problems, but the Paris Thunder Mountain travels all around an island. It looked to be similar, but significantly different from its Florida equivalent... so I'll have to go back and check it out sometime :-)
Words of the Day
-deux: the number of people we were taking onto each ride... not to be confused with un or trois
-brezel: a shaped bread that you attempt to order from a food cart. The 'z' is apparently very soft, like the bread's interior.... so it should almost sound like 'Brazil.'
-crepe: I assume you already know that a crepe is... but I had one in 'Studios' because I know you would never find one at Disney in the US, aside from Epcot's World Showcase
-Parlez-vous anglais?: "Do you speak English?" Very useful in France. Of course, learning this made me think back to Pirates of the Caribbean I: "Par-sley? ... Par-snip? ... Parlay! That's the one!"
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