Euro Disney
We are in Magny-le-Hongre for a weeks stay at a resort hotel near Euro Disney. We figured this was the best choice to give the kids some play time at a kid friendly destination. We booked a hotel that had a full water park indoors so that when we weren't at the Disney parks we would have something to keep the kids occupied. The temperature is comparable to a Midwest spring, temps in the high thirties to low fifties. This spot has worked as planned but our signs of being done with traveling are starting to scream at us.
We were excited to be out of our small condo in Paris for the week and really excited to see what Disney has to offer here in France. The first day is always fun as we explore our new surroundings. We bought a four day pass to the two theme parks here, which are Walt Disney Studios and Disneyland Paris. When we were in Florida at Disney World in January we thought three days for three parks was more than enough time for our family. Why we thought four days at two parks would be acceptable I don't know. We really just wanted to fill the week and since there isn't much else to do out here on the French countryside we figured we better make sure to fill the week with all Disney.
This theme park is where Europe flocks to get their Disney fix. So we got to meet quite a few people from all over Europe. You also get folks here from Middle Eastern countries as well. The kids played with two boys from Qatar at the pool the first day here and have found friends to play with each day here at the hotel. This was what we needed, their socializing gives us a break and vice versa. The parks remind us of exactly what Disneyland in California is like. Logistically, the two parks are connected at the entrance with Downtown Disney which includes Planet Hollywood and a slew of more Disney owned retail stores and restaurants. For €802 (Euro) which is roughly $1100 you get all access to four days in both parks for two adults and two children. The parks are not as crowded here as they are in California so that is a plus, but they also don't seem to be as well run. We found that although the parks stay open until eleven p.m. they begin to shut down many of the restaurants around eight and also seem to shut down some rides early as well. There were seven attractions shut down between the two parks for maintenance while we have been here. That amounts to about fifteen percent of the attractions. They have fun rides like Tower of Terror, Crush's Coaster and our two favorite coaster's, Thunder Mountain (a much better version of the one in Disneyland) and Aerosmith's Rockin' Rollercoaster. Blythe loved riding Thunder Mountain but unlike previous theme park trips has decided she won't ride coaster's that do loops any more. Boyd rode every ride but decided that the ghosts in the Tower of Terror were too much for his dreams to handle. He chose not to ride it with Erica and I a second time. We strongly encourage the kids to ride all the rides but to the point that the start to have lots of fear and anxiety we don't push any more. As Blythe and I waited outside the "coaster with loops" for Erica and and Boyd, I witnessed a mother scream and berate her sevenish year old boy who was crying hysterically to get out of line on the Rockin' Roller Coaster. I couldn't help but feel so bad for this kid who's mom seemed to lose touch with her ability to see her kid's fear. In that moment, all she thought about was dumping her son with a grandparent and issue a few more hurtful words to her son (and smoke a quick cigarette, which is allowed inside the park and is also a negative of this park) before getting back in line to ride it herself. I get it...I was very dissapointed to have to wait outside this fun ride too. These are the tough times of being a parent and we fail too at times, so I try not to judge. I'm sure she had to apoligize like we find ourselves doing regularly.
We found a park and pond on our last day here behind the hotel and spent the day hiking around it as the sun was shining and temperatures made it into the high fifties.
We have a little over a week left in Europe and are ready to be back on home soil to begin to journey home to San Diego by mid June. We have made our decision to pass on going to the Florida Keys when we get back and just begin our trip North after our first week of transition back to the RV. We are sure that we will have to perform some routine maintenance on the RV since it has been sitting for the past four months.
Peace and Love