Rapport de Voyage: A WDW Local Goes to DLP (Also London and Efteling) UPDATED Day 1 Complete 12/22

[OhioStateBuckeye]

It has been an age since I've done a trip report. My last one was about moving to Orlando. Beyond that is was even longer since I've done an actual trip planning/trip reporting write up.

I'd like to try my hand at reports again, if only to keep track of my planning and excitement.

This is me and Brian. I have lots of prior trip reports in my signature if you'd like to get to know us better. To sum us up we are both major Star Wars and Disney fans. We live about 15 minutes from Disney parks in Florida (I4 permitting).


We have our dog, Sirius. He is getting older (hence the need for reading glasses).




So back to the trip. In late November of this year, so as to take advantage of the Thanksgiving holiday work PTO, we are headed to Europe for almost two weeks.

I've been to Germany and Austria before, and Brian has never been to Europe at all. So this is all pretty uncharted territory for us.

Originally, we were going to take the westbound Disney transatlantic cruise that left from Dover, England for our big trip. It wasn't during a very convenient time of the year, however, and we eventually decided to scrap the cruise portion, expand the days in London and tack on Disneyland Paris!

Then things escalated, as things tend to do when I am involved. We started to watch European theme park youtube videos and decided to tack a day at Efteling theme park onto the trip.

After many ways of trying to work our schedule we came up with the following timetable:

Sun Nov 20 depart Pitt and fly to Amsterdam with a layover at Philly
Mon Nov 21 arrive Efteling, check into hotel, have dinner and early night
Tue Nov 22 day at Efteling, leave late for flight to London Heathrow. Get rental car from airport, find cheap hotel near Heathrow.
Wed Nov 23 Sunrise Stonehenge, Bath for the Roman Bath and spend the night in Bourton on the Water.
Thursday Nov 24 Bourton on the Water, Diddly Squat Farm, return car and check into London hotel.
Fri Nov 25 British Museum, West End show
Sat Nov 26 day of sightseeing around city
Sun Nov 27 later start Harry Potter WB Studio Tour
Mon Nov 28 Leave by train for Paris, check into DLP hotel
Tues Nov 29 DLP
Wed Nov 30 DLP
Thurs Dec 1 DLP
Fri Dec 2 depart Paris airport for home


Even though we live in Orlando, we are leaving from my parents place in Pittsburgh. They will be watching Sirius while we are gone.

We have already purchased our plane tickets and have moved onto solidifying the above schedule. I'll go a little more in depth into each location/day as I post more below.

 

[Micca]

First in! Looking forward to more

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

Breaking down the Efteling days. From what I can gather it's a theme park that is heavily based off fairy tales. So lots of forest creatures, dragons/fairies things like that. They will also be decorated for Christmas while we are there.



Here is how Efteling describes the park on their site:

In the Netherlands, Efteling is often called the ‘Keeper of fairytales’. After all, many fairytales come together in Efteling. The Fairytale Forest is the heart of Efteling; it is the place where fairytales have been coming alive for almost 65 years. In 1952 Efteling started with ten fairytales, and in the meantime there are 29 already! For all new developments in Efteling Theme Park Resort the enchanting core always remains the starting point. Fairytales, sagas, legends and stories continue to form the basis for the attractions.

If you want to see some of the attractions:

https://www.efteling.com/en/park/attractions

Mon Nov 21 arrive Efteling, check into hotel, have dinner and early night
Tue Nov 22 day at Efteling, leave late for flight to London Heathrow.

Our flight gets into Amsterdam at 10:55 am. I'm hopeful we can be outta the airport and on our way around noon if everything is on time. Supposedly we can just hop on a train at the airport and then there is one short bus transfer to get us to Efteling. Luckily Efteling caters to a lot of British tourists so they have an English language version of their website.

The rest of the day will be spent relaxing at Efteling's signature hotel, maybe having an early dinner at the hotel and going to bed early. There is also the chance we might go into the park for an hour or two.

I ended up booking the hotel just this past weekend. Our one night stay comes with breakfast for Tuesday included, and two days' theme park tickets and the hotel is a 5 minute walk from the park and also has early entry.

Here is the hotel:



We just got a very basic room, even though this hotel does have themed rooms. The themes weren't quite enough to tempt me at a 150 euro upcharge.



Maybe next time, Flying Dutchman or Cinderella suites:





The room also features an exclusive Efteling boardgame, which they advertise heavily and I am very curious about.

The hotel has a sit down dinner or a bar. The website also advertises that you can schedule a sit down restaurant for dinner in the park after it closes. I'm pretty sure we'll grab an early dinner at the hotel our arrival night and pass out, but you never know. We will have park tickets for that day and we might be tempted to go in for an hour or two. They only have park hours posted through September, as of right now the closing times range from 6-10 pm. I'm guessing we'll be going at more of a down time and the park will most likely close around 6 pm.

So our plans for the first night are up in the air. The second day, however, we plan to be up early for our complimentary hotel breakfast and then to hit the park during our early open hour for hotel guests. Right now, the limited calendar I can see has the park opening steadily at 10 am.

The hotel even has this cute pool:



We still need to see when the last bus/train leave for the airport. If they aren't scheduled late enough in the day for us we might have to look into a car service or European uber (have not started that research yet, assume they do have one).

Anyway, this is where we stand with this portion of the trip. We got an early booking discount and went ahead and got our hotel night. I was rewarded for booking with this somewhat creepy banner:



I feel somewhat done with planning for Efteling at this time. All we can do is wait until the hour calendar for our dates is released and until train/bus schedules are updated closer to the trip.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Sirius is very studious in his elder age I see.

How did I not know you've been to Austria?? That is so cool

Efteling theme park sounds darling and that hotel is very deceiving on the outside because inside is so cute. I love the different themes you can do.

I didn't realize how jam packed your trip is but I'm so excited to hear the planning and how it goes. We need oodles of pictures

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

First in! Looking forward to more

At least I'm second

 

[Woodview]

First of all a good Plan but there are a few things to tweek & redo

You Will take a bit more than an hour to get through arrivals & DOWN Stairs to Train Station

You will / may have a 10 min walk to Passport Check & join the Non EU line

Then a long walk to Baggage claim . once you have your luggage & through Exit it is a 3 min walk to

Train station ( Downstairs ).

On arrival at the nearest train station you will have to take a bus. ( As far as I know ) to The Efteling.

There is a wonderful Water Light show & Fireworks at Closing time ... DO not miss it

You really should try and ADD ANOTHER day at the Efteling

Why .. You say you have to get back to the Airport .. ( This Will be longer than you think )

On arrival at Airport you have to go Up stairs for Boarding check in , then long walk to Security &
then Passport check .. & then WALK to departure gate for London ## This could be 10 min walk #

AND Try a Visit To Parc ASTRIX near Paris rather than 3 days At Disney

 

[Karin1984]

Sirius is very studious in his elder age I see.

How did I not know you've been to Austria?? That is so cool

Efteling theme park sounds darling and that hotel is very deceiving on the outside because inside is so cute. I love the different themes you can do.

I didn't realize how jam packed your trip is but I'm so excited to hear the planning and how it goes. We need oodles of pictures

Efteling is definitely worth a visit. They say that Walt Disney has visited it, but more likely he just knew about it and used it as inspiration for Disneyland.

I've stayed in the Hans Christian Andersen Suite last year. It was so cute. It had little display cases with a pea, for Princess and the Pea. An empty coat hanger for The Emporer's New Clothes, an egg for The Ugly Duckling.

@OhioStateBuckeye if still there, go visit the theater show, Caro, it's 10 euro for hotel guests and I thought it is one of the best shows in any themepark. There is hardly any dialogue, and most is in English 'Italian' or 'Spanish' etc.
The theater is on the opposite side of the hotel. After the show, the park is probably closed and they let you walk through a completely deserted themepark on your way to the hotel. I took some pictures of the 'castle' (Symbolica) at night, and then the lights and the music stopped. Scary!

Many rides in Efteling have some sort of description in English. Newer rides more than the old ones. The one where you want to look up the background for is: Villa Volta.
The pre-show is fully in Dutch and it's quite the story. I have been with a non-Dutch speaking friend once, and without me explaining what the pre-show was about, she wouldn't have understand what was going on.
At the show Raveleijn you should be able to get a headset with English speaking audio. You might want to eat at Ravelijn restaurant.

If you have any specific questions about Efteling, do not hesitate to ask!

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

Wow first of all, can I say how excited I am that people who know Efteling are commenting?! I am very excited to hear anymore advice you two have.

Sirius is very studious in his elder age I see.

How did I not know you've been to Austria?? That is so cool

Efteling theme park sounds darling and that hotel is very deceiving on the outside because inside is so cute. I love the different themes you can do.

I didn't realize how jam packed your trip is but I'm so excited to hear the planning and how it goes. We need oodles of pictures

Yeah, it seemed like a lot of the cost of a trip to Europe is getting there, so we wanted to stay for a while. It also helped that I get two days of holiday for Thanksgiving, so that saves on PTO.

First of all a good Plan but there are a few things to tweek & redo

You Will take a bit more than an hour to get through arrivals & DOWN Stairs to Train Station

You will / may have a 10 min walk to Passport Check & join the Non EU line

Then a long walk to Baggage claim . once you have your luggage & through Exit it is a 3 min walk to

Train station ( Downstairs ).

On arrival at the nearest train station you will have to take a bus. ( As far as I know ) to The Efteling.

There is a wonderful Water Light show & Fireworks at Closing time ... DO not miss it

You really should try and ADD ANOTHER day at the Efteling

Why .. You say you have to get back to the Airport .. ( This Will be longer than you think )

On arrival at Airport you have to go Up stairs for Boarding check in , then long walk to Security &
then Passport check .. & then WALK to departure gate for London ## This could be 10 min walk #

AND Try a Visit To Parc ASTRIX near Paris rather than 3 days At Disney

I'm so excited you commented

I had read that we'll need to take the train and then a bus. But it's good to know the train station is downstairs in the airport? That's convenient.

I am anxiously waiting to see train/bus schedules once we get closer to the trip. It's a bit hard to exactly plan on timing without those. I don't think we can do a second whole day at Efteling, but depending on how tired we are that first night we could go into the park for an hour or two or watch the fireworks at closing. Speaking of that, I'm also excited for them to update their park hours so I can know exactly what we'll get to see and do.

It could also be that we end up adding a night to the hotel stay and leave early in the morning. Once again, this is mostly dependent on transportation schedules.

We are actually thinking of getting rid of one of the DLP days. I think this park will be a one visit and done for us, so we wanted to be sure we had enough time to see it. Do you think 2 days at DLP is enough to be satisfied and see everything?

Efteling is definitely worth a visit. They say that Walt Disney has visited it, but more likely he just knew about it and used it as inspiration for Disneyland.

I've stayed in the Hans Christian Andersen Suite last year. It was so cute. It had little display cases with a pea, for Princess and the Pea. An empty coat hanger for The Emporer's New Clothes, an egg for The Ugly Duckling.

@OhioStateBuckeye if still there, go visit the theater show, Caro, it's 10 euro for hotel guests and I thought it is one of the best shows in any themepark. There is hardly any dialogue, and most is in English 'Italian' or 'Spanish' etc.
The theater is on the opposite side of the hotel. After the show, the park is probably closed and they let you walk through a completely deserted themepark on your way to the hotel. I took some pictures of the 'castle' (Symbolica) at night, and then the lights and the music stopped. Scary!

Many rides in Efteling have some sort of description in English. Newer rides more than the old ones. The one where you want to look up the background for is: Villa Volta.
The pre-show is fully in Dutch and it's quite the story. I have been with a non-Dutch speaking friend once, and without me explaining what the pre-show was about.
At the show Raveleijn you should be able to get a headset with English speaking audio. You might want to eat at Ravelijn restaurant.

If you have any specific questions about Efteling, do not hesitate to ask!

Thank you for commenting!!

The suite sounds like so much fun. I'm a little sad that we didn't spring for one of the themed rooms, but gotta save a bit of money where we can on such a long trip.

I had seen Caro advertised on the website but I don't think the calendar is up to date, so wasn't sure if it would be playing during our dates. If it is available we will definitely try to go.

Thank you very much for your specific advice about which attractions to look up the story for before we go.

I definitely need some more advice from you. We know very little about the park, we watched a YouTube series on best European theme parks but I still feel like we know very little about it. I'm also hoping there might not be many crowds at the end of November. Have you ever been during Christmastime? Sounds like they might have decorations and lights up.

 

[Mackenzie Click-Mickelson]

Efteling is definitely worth a visit. They say that Walt Disney has visited it, but more likely he just knew about it and used it as inspiration for Disneyland.

If I ever make it to that part of Europe it would be quite a nice visit and the theming totally what I would be in for. It's something different from what many probably think of when visiting at least from a tourist's perspective. I can see how Walt could have used it for thinking for things at Disneyland

I've stayed in the Hans Christian Andersen Suite last year. It was so cute. It had little display cases with a pea, for Princess and the Pea. An empty coat hanger for The Emporer's New Clothes, an egg for The Ugly Duckling.

I looked up the suite and how cute! That sitting area is a nice touch too.

 

[dolewhipdreams]

So fun to see the planning process! I can't wait to see all the spectacularly creepy photos and stories from Efteling.

Then things escalated, as things tend to do when I am involved.

^big same

 

[Woodview]

Have a look at www.efteling.com/en

By the way we have being going to The Efteling for over 30 years

most times on day trips

Now flying into Amsterdam ( Twice this year again in August ) and renting a car

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

@Karin1984 and @Woodview (or any other lurkers who might have advice) do you two have any general advice on the train schedules and booking? It seems like that is our biggest hang up with planning right now. We're not sure if all the train schedules are even published this far in advance (our trip being end of November and 5 months away). It's hard to plan our exact days when we aren't sure when we'll be traveling.

As of right now we plan on taking the train from Amsterdam/Schiphol airport to and from Efteling (with the bus transfer). I was looking at the schedule on trainline and it looks like the latest train in the day from ’s-Hertogenbosch to Schiphol airport will leave from just around 17:58. So that wouldn't allow us to stay very late in the day on our departure date. Do you think we would be better off to just rent a car?

We might even take a train from Amsterdam to London instead of fly. Though according to Eurostar there are only two trains from Amsterdam to London and they both leave at inconvenient times (13:47 and 18:47). I'd prefer a much earlier or later train.

We will also travel from London to Disneyland Paris. What's frustrating is that we've been checking Eurostar, and we see only one train for Nov 28 Monday between London and DLP. It's 10:14-14:03. Does that seem right, that there is only one direct train each day between the locations? Or are all the schedules maybe not updated this far in advance?

I would very much appreciate any advice.

 

[Karin1984]

Which website are you using?
On Tuesday November 22nd the latest direct train from s Hertogenbosch to Schiphol is at 21.08, the trains after require a transfer. For domestic Dutch trains, https://www.ns.nl/en

Because of your very short stay, I would rent a car.

Yes, international trains between Amsterdam and London and Paris don't go very frequently. So 1 or 2 times a day for a direct train is possible.

If the website shows you at least one train, the schedule should be up to date. The route Amsterdam - London is new, so i do not expect more trains there. For London - Paris, you can also check trains to Paris Gare du Nord and take the Subway (RER) from there. The subway would require 1 transfer at the station Chatelet Les Halles.

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

While Efteling is by no means completely figured out, I will continue on with our days and the rough plan as it is now.....

Sun Nov 20 depart Pitt and fly to Amsterdam with a layover at Philly
Mon Nov 21 arrive Efteling, check into hotel, have dinner and early night
Tue Nov 22 day at Efteling, leave late for flight to London Heathrow. Get rental car from airport, find cheap hotel near Heathrow.
Wed Nov 23 Sunrise Stonehenge, Bath for the Roman Bath and spend the night in Bourton on the Water.
Thursday Nov 24 Bourton on the Water, Diddly Squat Farm, return car and check into London hotel.
Fri Nov 25 British Museum, West End show
Sat Nov 26 day of sightseeing around city
Sun Nov 27 later start Harry Potter WB Studio Tour
Mon Nov 28 Leave by train for Paris, check into DLP hotel
Tues Nov 29 DLP
Wed Nov 30 DLP
Thurs Dec 1 DLP
Fri Dec 2 depart Paris airport for home

At some point we will leave Efteling. We aren't sure whether it will be late in the day on Tuesday Nov 22 or if we will leave very early on Wednesday Nov 23.

The next part of the plan is to pick up a rental car from Heathrow airport when we arrive. If we arrive late at night on Tuesday we will find a cheap hotel near the airport to spend the night.

I had originally wanted to book a sunrise tour at Stongehenge, which lets you get inside the circle. And before everyone tells me, I am aware that Stonehenge will most likely be pretty lame. But I really like ancient history and I'd like to see it, so there we are.

I've been going off this website for booking, I hope it's the best one to book from:

https://bookings.english-heritage.o...95.1176558510.1655160777-553716662.1655160777

The problem is that no sunrise tours seem to be available for November at all. I'm not sure if they've all booked up or simply aren't offered at this time.

I know that independent tours are offering the Sunrise tour option if you book with them, however, I'm not interested in that. Most of them provide bus transportation from London and take up a whole day. I just want to do the Stonehenge Sunrise and go on our way since we'll have our own rental car.

After or before Stonehenge, depending on whether we can book a Sunrise Tour, we wanted to quickly check out the Salisbury cathedral and then head to Bath to look at the Roman Baths. I know we need to pre-book a time for the Baths and I'm keeping my eye on availability, which is still wide open for our date.

We watched a travel vlog on youtube that highly suggested having a bath bun. I have either Sally Luns or the Bath Bun Tea House on my list. I figure we can have lunch at either place before we see the Baths.

We most likely won't spend that much time in Bath, just long enough to eat and tour the Baths.

After that we're headed to Bourton-on-the-Water for a tiny taste of the Cotswolds. We booked a night at the Mouse Trap Inn.



The plan will be to have a late dinner here, and then spend the morning exploring the picturesque town.

I will take a pause here and confirm: I know this is a lot. However, this is usually how we travel. We don't really travel to relax, we like to see and do a lot and have a pretty high energy level. *End Disclaimer.

I hope no one will judge us too harshly for this next stop on the itinerary, but after we have our fill of Bourton-on-the-Water we are heading to Diddly Squat Farm to check out the farm shop. If you aren't familiar, this is Jeremy Clarkson's farm. He was one of the long time hosts of Top Gear and later Grand Tour. Amazon Prime recently aired Clarkson's Farm, which was about his bumbling attempts to run his farm.

I'm picking this picture to represent the show. Jeremy was trying to help sheer his sheep and he's just been kicked in a rather hurtful place:



Anyway, it will probably be a pretty short stop unless we see something else in the town we'd like to check out.

At that point it will be time to head back in the direction of Heathrow to return the rental car and hopefully hop on a train to downtown London.

We don't have a hotel picked out yet, but that will be our destination.

But hopefully we'll be checked in and settled by dinner time on Thursday Nov 24. Which I just realized will be Thanksgiving for us Americans. I have had people suggest to us that we should try to find an ex pat bar/restaurant for dinner, but I'm not too worried about finding a place at the moment.

I didn't want to make too many plans for the evening beyond find somewhere to eat. We'll have had a long day and the following day will start our whirlwind tour of London.

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

Which website are you using?
On Tuesday November 22nd the latest direct train from s Hertogenbosch to Schiphol is at 21.08, the trains after require a transfer. For domestic Dutch trains, https://www.ns.nl/en

Because of your very short stay, I would rent a car.

Yes, international trains between Amsterdam and London and Paris don't go very frequently. So 1 or 2 times a day for a direct train is possible.

If the website shows you at least one train, the schedule should be up to date. The route Amsterdam - London is new, so i do not expect more trains there. For London - Paris, you can also check trains to Paris Gare du Nord and take the Subway (RER) from there. The subway would require 1 transfer at the station Chatelet Les Halles.

We've been looking at Eurostar's website and trainline. Thank you for the link for the Dutch trains!

It really does sound like we might be best to just rent a car for Efteling. We were excited about taking trains but it really sounds like a car would be most convenient.

I'll be sure to check London-Paris Gare du Nord and see if the times serve us better.

Thank you so much for your quick and great advice!

 

[Karin1984]

Taking a rental car might not save you nuch time, maybe 30 minutes, depending on your bus connection. As you do need to pick up your car, the time saved driving there might be just as long. It is more convenient, for sure.
On the other hand, after a transatlantic flight with a jetlag, the train might be more relaxed.

Pros and cons to both.

The train station is located under the airport, in the arrivals hall. All rental car companies are there as well.

How to buy a train ticket in the Netherlands:

 

[dachsie]

Have you considered only doing 2 days at DLP and maybe do one day iin Paris?

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

Have you considered only doing 2 days at DLP and maybe do one day iin Paris?

Funny you mention that, I think the days have definitely shifted one last time.

I know it doesn't make a lot of sense, Brian doesn't want to do just one day in Paris, he'd rather go when we have more time to stay there longer.

 

[OhioStateBuckeye]

I think we've settled on our final schedule. It was causing a lot of anxiety trying to figure out if we'd have enough time in Efteling and I was also worried about coordinating the train schedule. Instead, we'll solve that problem by just renting a car, then we can leave super early on Wednesday for the earliest flight to Heathrow and not have to worry about train times.

We also had a lot to see in London that was getting cut, so one day at DLP has been dropped in favor of another London day.

Sun Nov 20 depart Pitt
Mon Nov 21 arrive Efteling via Amsterdam airport, rent car, check into hotel, if we drive near/by any sights stop and check them out. Early bedtime.
Tue Nov 22 Efteling all day, spend another night at Efteling.
Wed Nov 23 Leave on earliest flight to Heathrow. Stonehenge, Bath and spend the night in Bath or Bourton on the Water.
Thursday Nov 24 Bourton on the Water, Diddly Squat Farm, return car and check into London hotel.
Fri Nov 25 British Museum, West End show
Sat Nov 26 day of sightseeing around city
Sun Nov 27 later start Harry Potter WB Studio Tour
Mon Nov 28 sightsee around the city, might focus on Greenwich area
Tues Nov 29 Leave by train for Paris, check into DLP hotel
Wed Nov 30 DLP
Thurs Dec 1 DLP
Fri Dec 2 depart Paris airport for home

 

[Karin1984]

Don't forget to breathe ;-) That's quite a full and intense schedule with a lot of impressions. Make sure you stop from time to time to process everything you see and do.