Hi all,
I find DISboards to be a great resource, so I thought I'd try to put down a few thoughts from our recent trip WITH our two year old.
It was our first trip with our daughter, so it was a very different visit this time around. We spent a total of five days at TDR - three at Disneyland and two at DisneySea. We had originally planned to only spend four days there, but added an impromptu extra day at the very end of our time in Japan.
General thoughts:
- the heat in July is no joke. Being from Queensland, Australia, I thought we'd have some idea of the heat, but it was next level. Easily 30+ degrees from 8am to 8pm. And the humidity, some days 80%+, makes it all the worse. Take any and all measures to beat the heat! We ended up retreating back to our hotel in the middle of the day for multiple reasons, including to avoid the heat.
- surprisingly, both parks opened 30 minutes early every day we visited. BUT the rides we looked at did NOT open until 9am. As such, first thing the ride times actually balloon out quite a bit. I think the Pooh ride may have started running before 9am, but I'm not sure as I didn't check the time. Monsters Inc did not start running until 9am and it was quite the long wait as we were standing in line from around 8:30am. We wouldn't have gotten in line (with a toddler) if we'd known the ride wouldn't actually start moving until 9am.
- the wait times for meeting Mickey, Minnie, etc drop dramatically (by about half) in the lead up to the parades. So, that's a great time to squeeze in some meet and greets if you've already seen the parades or prioritise the meet and greets over the parades.
- the end of the parade route in Toon Town is a good spot to view the parades without huge crowds. You only see one "side" of the floats, but the characters are always looking in your direction, so there's pros and cons.
- it may have been chance, but the ONLY times we were successful at the show lotteries was coincidentally right after we purchased paid Fast Passes / Premier Access tickets. I don't know whether the app would be set up to "reward" those who purchase paid Fast Passes with show tickets.
- there seemed to be a LOT of characters at the front of each of the parks throughout the day. One day, on returning to DisneySea after a break we saw Goofy, Pluto, Chip, Dale, Clarice, Daisy and Donald! Another day, at Disneyland, in main street and out the front there was Cinderella, Peter Pan, Uncle Scrooge and Belle, immediately followed by Pooh, Tigger and two cats from Aristocats (not Marie). We ordinarily never visited these areas except for when entering and leaving the parks, so we were surprised and our daughter was ecstatic at seeing so many characters in such quick succession. The cast members would not confirm which characters may appear or when.
- photos with the roaming characters continues to befuddle me as there doesn't seem to be any "organisation" or "order" at all. But, our daughter did seem to always get some form of character interaction (e.g. wave or high five), even if it wasn't a photo. I think they made a special effort to "engage" with any children if possible.
- the free Fast Passes / Priority Passes were only operating on the very last day we visited. With our daughter, we weren't able to fully maximise our use of the Priority Passes, but it seemed to work well. They did seem to go quickly and from very vague memory they didn't seem quite as efficient as they used to be (i.e. you were merged with the standby line earlier or more standby line people seemed to go through). But, I could simply be misremembering how efficient the old Fast Passes used to be.
- the popcorn bucket was more than worth the price given the convenience of snacking anywhere and anytime. Our toddler ate a LOT of popcorn between "meals". The only downside is that your preferred flavour may only be in a single location - there were some long treks across the parks to get plain / salt popcorn refills!
- we just did the quick service places and typically shared our meals with our daughter as opposed to getting a kids meal. They were always happy to give us an extra plate / bowl and cutlery for her. Sometimes they'd even give us a cute "bib" for her (although she didn't like wearing them).
- I couldn't figure out how the free "stickers" worked, so I ended up (politely) asking for some as our daughter loves stickers. I think she was only pre-emptively offered stickers once or twice? I think the issue is that she wanted to keep the stickers for her "sticker book" instead of wearing them? We saw people / kids covered in stickers, but it may be a case of "the more you wear, the more you get offered"?
EDIT: Ride reports - what *our* toddler liked and disliked:
NB: We don't have any local theme parks which are comparable to Disneyland. Our theme parks are small and lack any immersive theming. In particular, there's no "dark rides" (i.e. rides where you can't see exactly what is going to happen).
Our toddler liked:
- Teacups
- Carousel
- Dumbo (her favourite ride)
- Peter Pan (this is an inexplicable inclusion as she generally didn't like any of the dark rides)
- It's a Small World
- steam train
- paddle steamer
- exploring Tom Sawyer's Island (NB: the treehouse was closed)
- Toy Story Mania
- Scuttle's Scooters (her second favourite ride)
- the three "inside" rides in Ariel's grotto
- Sindbad (NB: Jasmine's flying carpets was closed, otherwise I think she would have enjoyed that)
- double storey carousel
- electric railway / tram
Our toddler tolerated:
- Splash Mountain, but refused to do it a second time
- Snow White (enough to ride it twice)
- Pinocchio
- Gadget's Go Coaster
- Roger Rabbit ride
- Jungle Cruise
Our toddler did not like:
- Aquatopia (NB: the "extra splash / water" was running and we got absolutely soaked which really upset her)
- Finding Nemo submarine
- Flounder's Flying rollercoaster (she loved it for the first half, but then got upset)
- Beauty and the Beast (the Beast scared her with all his roaring)
- Pooh's Hunny Hunt (I think it was the room with the elephants which scared her, she was enjoying it before then)
- Monsters Inc (I think she was scared by "Roz", but I'm not sure. She has seen and enjoyed the movie and loves Boo) (NB: Buzz was closed)
- Pirates (the initial drop unsettled her)
Our toddler refused to go on:
- Haunted Mansion (even though she enjoys the book we have about this ride)
- Baymax (which is fine, as we saved money not needing Premier Access. I'm not sure what she found off-putting - it may have been the crowds)
- 20,000 Leagues submarine
She enjoyed all the shows we saw. But, particularly enjoyed Big Band Beat and the inside one in the Beauty and the Beast area. The show in the "open" area in Tomorrowland seemed to bore her after a while. The heat could have been a contributing factor.
EDIT: A couple more thoughts:
- although to my understanding TDR technically bans all outside food, this was not enforced during the security screening. This may have been because we were entering with a small child. This can be contrasted with Universal who were very strict about enforcing their "no outside food" rule, even going so far as to require us to open and show them the contents of the popcorn bucket we had purchased at USJ upon entry / re-entry.
- the Duffy plush appeared to be in the middle of a price increase - some were 4,000 yen and others were 4,400 yen. I could have sworn that Olu Mel was 4,000 in one shop, but 4,400 yen in another. If you're purchasing a Duffy and friends plush, perhaps "shop around" and check the ticket price to see if you can find one priced at 4,000 yen.
EDIT: Things we'd do differently:
- buy and pack a travel / portable potty. Our toddler was toilet trained. We hadn't had an accident in at least a month (except overnight). But, she was immediately afraid of the automatic toilets in Japan because of the noise they made when she sat on them. We made an emergency trip to an IKEA to buy a potty for in the hotel room, but there wasn't much we could do when "out and about" all day. That ultimately led to full regression to toileting in her nappy and we had to buy nappies and wipes. I'm not sure for certain, but if we'd had a travel / portable potty that we could have used when away from the hotel, that may have helped things. It would have been good to at least have had that option. We did eventually get to a hotel where you could unplug it at the wall and make it a "dumb" toilet, but by that time she was firmly afraid of any Japanese toilet. If I had our time again, I also would have tried to show her Japanese toilets on YouTube before we arrived so that she would have some idea what to expect - I didn't even consider how she might react to the automatic toilets.
- take it really easy on the first day at the parks. Disneyland is heads and shoulders above any local theme parks on so many levels - crowds, theming, stuff to see and do, etc. I think our daughter found it all way too overwhelming on our first couple of days in the parks. We tried to see and do too much and really needed to ease her into it a bit more. That typed, there's still so much we didn't have time to do (and many things we wanted to do again), so it's a difficult balance.
- we stayed at four different hotels - never again (with a toddler). The transfer / travel days were difficult days for everyone, especially our daughter who did not appreciate having to spend so much time in the pram as we navigated the labyrinth of endless elevators in train, subway and shinkansen stations. I know it happens in every country, but the number of times we were stuck in long lines for the elevator behind people without prams, luggage or any visible need for using the elevator over the escalator was countless.
- research and use the luggage transfer services. I briefly looked into this before going, but decided that it has always been easy enough getting around with luggage as two (childless) adults and couldn't imagine that adding a pram would increase the difficultly too much - spoiler alert - it did! Trying to get onto a shinkansen with two suitcases, a folded pram and two backpacks while my husband wrangled our daughter and a backpack was not fun. It also would have been great to use the luggage transfer service for airport days (or I would have looked for hotels with airport bus transfers).
- pack as light as possible on "day trips" (IF using public transport). The number of times we'd get to our desired exit at a train station only to find no elevator and have to either backtrack or carry the pram up stairs was numerous and not fun in the heat. Our daughter still needed her daily nap, so ditching the pram wasn't an option, but carrying only the bare essentials and buying snacks and water from a convenience store as and when needed was something I really needed to implement a lot sooner.
- check and double check planned routes for "big" days, especially transfer / travel days. On the day we flew out we spent so much time trying to find a particular subway line in a major train station - going up and down numerous lifts, etc. We thought we knew where we needed to go, but for some reason, this subway line wasn't included on the major signs. I *think* it was like a "subset" of another line, so the "main" line was on the signs, but not this "subordinate" line? I really wish we'd spent the time the day before (when we were in the station) double checking where we needed to go without lugging all our bags with us!
As always, overall it was excellent. The parks are beautifully maintained. The cast members on the whole are doing their absolute best to ensure you have a great time.
I'm happy to answer any questions.
We also visited Universal Studios in Osaka for four days and spent one day at Legoland in Nagoya if anyone has any questions about those parks.
I find DISboards to be a great resource, so I thought I'd try to put down a few thoughts from our recent trip WITH our two year old.
It was our first trip with our daughter, so it was a very different visit this time around. We spent a total of five days at TDR - three at Disneyland and two at DisneySea. We had originally planned to only spend four days there, but added an impromptu extra day at the very end of our time in Japan.
General thoughts:
- the heat in July is no joke. Being from Queensland, Australia, I thought we'd have some idea of the heat, but it was next level. Easily 30+ degrees from 8am to 8pm. And the humidity, some days 80%+, makes it all the worse. Take any and all measures to beat the heat! We ended up retreating back to our hotel in the middle of the day for multiple reasons, including to avoid the heat.
- surprisingly, both parks opened 30 minutes early every day we visited. BUT the rides we looked at did NOT open until 9am. As such, first thing the ride times actually balloon out quite a bit. I think the Pooh ride may have started running before 9am, but I'm not sure as I didn't check the time. Monsters Inc did not start running until 9am and it was quite the long wait as we were standing in line from around 8:30am. We wouldn't have gotten in line (with a toddler) if we'd known the ride wouldn't actually start moving until 9am.
- the wait times for meeting Mickey, Minnie, etc drop dramatically (by about half) in the lead up to the parades. So, that's a great time to squeeze in some meet and greets if you've already seen the parades or prioritise the meet and greets over the parades.
- the end of the parade route in Toon Town is a good spot to view the parades without huge crowds. You only see one "side" of the floats, but the characters are always looking in your direction, so there's pros and cons.
- it may have been chance, but the ONLY times we were successful at the show lotteries was coincidentally right after we purchased paid Fast Passes / Premier Access tickets. I don't know whether the app would be set up to "reward" those who purchase paid Fast Passes with show tickets.
- there seemed to be a LOT of characters at the front of each of the parks throughout the day. One day, on returning to DisneySea after a break we saw Goofy, Pluto, Chip, Dale, Clarice, Daisy and Donald! Another day, at Disneyland, in main street and out the front there was Cinderella, Peter Pan, Uncle Scrooge and Belle, immediately followed by Pooh, Tigger and two cats from Aristocats (not Marie). We ordinarily never visited these areas except for when entering and leaving the parks, so we were surprised and our daughter was ecstatic at seeing so many characters in such quick succession. The cast members would not confirm which characters may appear or when.
- photos with the roaming characters continues to befuddle me as there doesn't seem to be any "organisation" or "order" at all. But, our daughter did seem to always get some form of character interaction (e.g. wave or high five), even if it wasn't a photo. I think they made a special effort to "engage" with any children if possible.
- the free Fast Passes / Priority Passes were only operating on the very last day we visited. With our daughter, we weren't able to fully maximise our use of the Priority Passes, but it seemed to work well. They did seem to go quickly and from very vague memory they didn't seem quite as efficient as they used to be (i.e. you were merged with the standby line earlier or more standby line people seemed to go through). But, I could simply be misremembering how efficient the old Fast Passes used to be.
- the popcorn bucket was more than worth the price given the convenience of snacking anywhere and anytime. Our toddler ate a LOT of popcorn between "meals". The only downside is that your preferred flavour may only be in a single location - there were some long treks across the parks to get plain / salt popcorn refills!
- we just did the quick service places and typically shared our meals with our daughter as opposed to getting a kids meal. They were always happy to give us an extra plate / bowl and cutlery for her. Sometimes they'd even give us a cute "bib" for her (although she didn't like wearing them).
- I couldn't figure out how the free "stickers" worked, so I ended up (politely) asking for some as our daughter loves stickers. I think she was only pre-emptively offered stickers once or twice? I think the issue is that she wanted to keep the stickers for her "sticker book" instead of wearing them? We saw people / kids covered in stickers, but it may be a case of "the more you wear, the more you get offered"?
EDIT: Ride reports - what *our* toddler liked and disliked:
NB: We don't have any local theme parks which are comparable to Disneyland. Our theme parks are small and lack any immersive theming. In particular, there's no "dark rides" (i.e. rides where you can't see exactly what is going to happen).
Our toddler liked:
- Teacups
- Carousel
- Dumbo (her favourite ride)
- Peter Pan (this is an inexplicable inclusion as she generally didn't like any of the dark rides)
- It's a Small World
- steam train
- paddle steamer
- exploring Tom Sawyer's Island (NB: the treehouse was closed)
- Toy Story Mania
- Scuttle's Scooters (her second favourite ride)
- the three "inside" rides in Ariel's grotto
- Sindbad (NB: Jasmine's flying carpets was closed, otherwise I think she would have enjoyed that)
- double storey carousel
- electric railway / tram
Our toddler tolerated:
- Splash Mountain, but refused to do it a second time
- Snow White (enough to ride it twice)
- Pinocchio
- Gadget's Go Coaster
- Roger Rabbit ride
- Jungle Cruise
Our toddler did not like:
- Aquatopia (NB: the "extra splash / water" was running and we got absolutely soaked which really upset her)
- Finding Nemo submarine
- Flounder's Flying rollercoaster (she loved it for the first half, but then got upset)
- Beauty and the Beast (the Beast scared her with all his roaring)
- Pooh's Hunny Hunt (I think it was the room with the elephants which scared her, she was enjoying it before then)
- Monsters Inc (I think she was scared by "Roz", but I'm not sure. She has seen and enjoyed the movie and loves Boo) (NB: Buzz was closed)
- Pirates (the initial drop unsettled her)
Our toddler refused to go on:
- Haunted Mansion (even though she enjoys the book we have about this ride)
- Baymax (which is fine, as we saved money not needing Premier Access. I'm not sure what she found off-putting - it may have been the crowds)
- 20,000 Leagues submarine
She enjoyed all the shows we saw. But, particularly enjoyed Big Band Beat and the inside one in the Beauty and the Beast area. The show in the "open" area in Tomorrowland seemed to bore her after a while. The heat could have been a contributing factor.
EDIT: A couple more thoughts:
- although to my understanding TDR technically bans all outside food, this was not enforced during the security screening. This may have been because we were entering with a small child. This can be contrasted with Universal who were very strict about enforcing their "no outside food" rule, even going so far as to require us to open and show them the contents of the popcorn bucket we had purchased at USJ upon entry / re-entry.
- the Duffy plush appeared to be in the middle of a price increase - some were 4,000 yen and others were 4,400 yen. I could have sworn that Olu Mel was 4,000 in one shop, but 4,400 yen in another. If you're purchasing a Duffy and friends plush, perhaps "shop around" and check the ticket price to see if you can find one priced at 4,000 yen.
EDIT: Things we'd do differently:
- buy and pack a travel / portable potty. Our toddler was toilet trained. We hadn't had an accident in at least a month (except overnight). But, she was immediately afraid of the automatic toilets in Japan because of the noise they made when she sat on them. We made an emergency trip to an IKEA to buy a potty for in the hotel room, but there wasn't much we could do when "out and about" all day. That ultimately led to full regression to toileting in her nappy and we had to buy nappies and wipes. I'm not sure for certain, but if we'd had a travel / portable potty that we could have used when away from the hotel, that may have helped things. It would have been good to at least have had that option. We did eventually get to a hotel where you could unplug it at the wall and make it a "dumb" toilet, but by that time she was firmly afraid of any Japanese toilet. If I had our time again, I also would have tried to show her Japanese toilets on YouTube before we arrived so that she would have some idea what to expect - I didn't even consider how she might react to the automatic toilets.
- take it really easy on the first day at the parks. Disneyland is heads and shoulders above any local theme parks on so many levels - crowds, theming, stuff to see and do, etc. I think our daughter found it all way too overwhelming on our first couple of days in the parks. We tried to see and do too much and really needed to ease her into it a bit more. That typed, there's still so much we didn't have time to do (and many things we wanted to do again), so it's a difficult balance.
- we stayed at four different hotels - never again (with a toddler). The transfer / travel days were difficult days for everyone, especially our daughter who did not appreciate having to spend so much time in the pram as we navigated the labyrinth of endless elevators in train, subway and shinkansen stations. I know it happens in every country, but the number of times we were stuck in long lines for the elevator behind people without prams, luggage or any visible need for using the elevator over the escalator was countless.
- research and use the luggage transfer services. I briefly looked into this before going, but decided that it has always been easy enough getting around with luggage as two (childless) adults and couldn't imagine that adding a pram would increase the difficultly too much - spoiler alert - it did! Trying to get onto a shinkansen with two suitcases, a folded pram and two backpacks while my husband wrangled our daughter and a backpack was not fun. It also would have been great to use the luggage transfer service for airport days (or I would have looked for hotels with airport bus transfers).
- pack as light as possible on "day trips" (IF using public transport). The number of times we'd get to our desired exit at a train station only to find no elevator and have to either backtrack or carry the pram up stairs was numerous and not fun in the heat. Our daughter still needed her daily nap, so ditching the pram wasn't an option, but carrying only the bare essentials and buying snacks and water from a convenience store as and when needed was something I really needed to implement a lot sooner.
- check and double check planned routes for "big" days, especially transfer / travel days. On the day we flew out we spent so much time trying to find a particular subway line in a major train station - going up and down numerous lifts, etc. We thought we knew where we needed to go, but for some reason, this subway line wasn't included on the major signs. I *think* it was like a "subset" of another line, so the "main" line was on the signs, but not this "subordinate" line? I really wish we'd spent the time the day before (when we were in the station) double checking where we needed to go without lugging all our bags with us!
As always, overall it was excellent. The parks are beautifully maintained. The cast members on the whole are doing their absolute best to ensure you have a great time.
I'm happy to answer any questions.
We also visited Universal Studios in Osaka for four days and spent one day at Legoland in Nagoya if anyone has any questions about those parks.
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