Cloe Colton
Registered
- Joined
- Mar 6, 2018
Ummmm this IS AMAZING!!!!!!
I hope so too! I think for the Pooh and Friends, you also meet each one individually (like they are in a certain pathway that you do in sequence).It will be so cool to go to Hong Kong during Halloween time! I'm so jealous and I love those outfits that Pooh and friends are wearing. Hope the lines aren't too long so you can meet lots of characters!
It sounds like you need to convince DH to do something fun for your next anniversary!I totally agree with sticking with DCL! I would love to do Alaska someday!
Hong Kong sounds super fun! I hope to do the Asian parks someday!
I KNOW! I think it was a photo of that last fall that solidified my desire to do Hong Kong! Otherwise I was going to stick to Tokyo/Japan. I can't wait to see it in person!Ummmm this IS AMAZING!!!!!!
I really am excited to see it!Hong Kong Looks amazing! Can't wait to hear more about your plans!
Are you guys planning on all parks or just a couple?
We went to Shanghai Disney and Tokyo Disney last November and used the Mr. Orange car service to get from the airport to the Toy Story hotel. Super easy, the driver spoke English and they were on time!I need to start writing up my plans for my Asia trip as its about 3.5 months away! I'll give an update on NYE later (but basically got everything we wanted; I just don't know what I want yet for the January dates).
I decided rather than post about all the hotels, then all the plans, I would break up each part of my trip!
Part 1: Shanghai
Hotel: I knew I wanted to stay on-site, which led to 2 options: The Shanghai Disneyland Hotel and the Toy Story Hotel. Toy Story is the value option, so about ½ the cost of the SDLH, but it just didn’t impress me from photos and people’s reviews. So I’m going with the SDLH; I went ahead and got the cheapest room rather than splurging for a view - just didn't seem worth it to me!
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Tickets: I plan to get a 2-day ticket, but I won’t buy it until I arrive in Shanghai. As part of the hotel booking, you get an extra fastpass per day (you schedule it with the concierge). But I’ve heard of many issues when people buy the tickets in advance, so to avoid any of that hassle I will just buy from the concierge directly. Tickets are relatively inexpensive there, and I’m doing the parks on weekdays, so it will be only $107 for the tickets.
Previously they offered a 6-month pass, which came with some discounts (hotel, dining, merchandise), and I considered getting it, but after doing the math, it barely came out ahead and would cause even more hassle. Now they have the annual pass which was more expensive and definitely wouldn’t come out ahead anyways. I think if you are considering a longer trip, it could be a consideration though because it is nowhere near the cost of the WDW/Disneyland APs.
Dining: This isn’t as complicated as WDW, as there are only a few restaurants which had advance reservations and most of those are in Disneytown, which don’t interest me as much. The only one I plan to visit is Lumiere’s Kitchen at the SDLH. It’s a buffet, but has the cutest desserts! I am thinking my arrival day dinner will be the best idea. And I’ve heard you can either walk-up or schedule a reservation with the concierge when you arrive.
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The only in-park sit-down restaurant is Royal Banquet Hall, which I believe is in the castle. Though the menu didn’t interest me, and with only 2 days in the park, I don’t want to take that much time out of my day for a sit-down meal. Also, I’ve heard Westerners can get really fawned over by the wait service – normally that would be fine with me, but when I’m a solo diner, I don’t really like the extra attention!
So, mostly quick service for me. I haven’t figured out exactly which places and when, but I think these are my biggest ones:
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- Wandering Moon Restaurant – Chinese food
- Pinocchio Village Kitchen – Asian foods plus pizza – the Peking duck pizza is especially intriguing to me as I liked that option when it used to be offered at California Pizza Kitchen.
- Barbossa’s Bounty – Grill and BBQ by Pirates of the Caribbean
- Tangled Tree Tavern – Rapunzel themed, with roast chicken, etc.
- Breadtalk (Disney Springs, so most likely my arrival day) – Pastries and sandwiches
And of course snacks (so maybe I’ll end up cutting a QS for more snacks). I don’t know if they will have special Halloween food items, as they are still getting their Halloween offerings more established, but that could be cool to try! Also, I will have a list, but I know sometimes places are closed without much notice (I have experience with that from Disneyland Paris), so won’t get too obsessed with one particular location. Otherwise:
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- Snackin kraken – Pork Floss Bun
- Spiral Snacks – Potato gems with meat floss?!?
- Il Paperino – Donald waffles!
- Remy’s Patisserie – pastries
- Toy Box Café – Bubble waffles, also fun drinks in Toy Story cups!
So much food – only so much time!
Park Plans:
First crowds – I am cautiously hoping for them to not be too bad. If anything, Monday could be worse. But China has its Golden Week 3 weeks earlier (first week of October), so that is when they tend to take vacation. I hope that means they will all skip the rest of October!
Fastpasses – They use a variant of the MaxPass system there, and I’m well acquainted with it from Disneyland. They also have paid variants, either with a package of rides or per ride. Some rides don’t even offer regular FPs except for the paid version. I won’t be opposed to getting some of these if crowds are too bad, but I think I won’t need to!
Rides – I am a bit worried about ride breakdowns, so I have a priority list that I will try first. These include:
I haven’t done a general touring plan yet, but I will prioritize these and then work everything around them.
- Tron – Super excited for this one! I don’t know if I’ll fit on the bike seats but they have regular coaster seats in the back car if I can’t.
- Pirates of the Caribbean – Another must-do for me!
- Camp Discovery Trails – basically an obstacle course. I’m not 100% certain I’ll be able to do this – I don’t know if they have size restrictions, but I have my fingers crossed.
- Peter Pan’s Flight – I’ve heard it’s updated with moving animatronics.
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Shows – I’m pretty excited about some of the shows. Tarzan, Pirates stunt show, parade, Tai Chi with Character. I will need to fit these in. And anything outdoor I will try to plan to do early in case of weather issues. Some of these are in Mandarin, so I will just figure it out as I go!
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Characters – I’m not an insane character person, but there are some fun ones at Shanghai I wouldn’t mind meeting. First – anyone in Halloween special outfits. I won’t know about that though for a bit. I’d like to meet Mickey as he’s in a special outfit. And I think Gelatoni meets, which would be nice!
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Halloween – Based on last year it looks like they have a night parade/character cavalcade. Not on the scale of “Boo to you” but still something, so that will be cool. They also have ghost pirates invading Treasure Cove and a “trail of treats” scavenger hunt!
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Other stuff
Chloe mentioned about a Visa, so I thought I’d let people know my plans for that in case you didn’t read those comments (I think I got this info from a previous TR or from Disney Tourist Blog… can’t quite remember!). China is one of the countries that requires a visa in advance to enter – airlines won’t even let you fly if you don’t have a visa, since you won’t be allowed into the country. You would normally apply in advance at a Chinese Embassy near you and it costs money, but can last for 10 years (or the length of time for your passport). That is certainly helpful if you are going to travel to China multiple times or travel more within China.
An exception is the 72-hour Transit Visa. This applies to certain areas in China, particularly large cities and is a way China is trying to encourage tourism (a bunch of these places have extended it to 144 hours, which is basically 6 days). Rather than apply in advance, you apply once you arrive and you don’t have to pay a fee. Some caveats: you are limited only to that particular area of China. You can’t use this to arrive in Shanghai, then travel to Beijing within the 6-days. You also have to be transiting through the city. So you have to go Country A – Chinese City – Country B. And they look at the actual flights themselves, not the end destination (so you need to verify you aren’t accidentally connecting in the same city – I had looked at flights that went LAX – Taipei -Shanghai, but that would cause a conflict since I go Shanghai – Taipei – Hong Kong). I will have all my documentation with me – hotel reservation, flight reservations for arrival and departing flight, etc.
I have only heard of 2 types of instances when this causes an issue. First, is departing the US – if you leave from a non-major airport the airport staff may not be familiar with the transit visa option; when you check-in they will ask to see a visa and may stop you from boarding the flight, which can be a big pain in the neck. I think I’ve been hearing less and less of this situation as more people get familiar with the transit visa. For me, I will be flying from LAX and don’t anticipate this issue. Second instance is arriving in Shanghai – some people have arrived for an 18-hour layover and have been denied entry, so they are stuck in the Shanghai airport for that time. Best remedy for that is to a) layover over 24-hours, and b) have a hotel booked. If you have both of those, then you are good to go!
Transportation: This issue is something I’m still trying to figure out. I will only be going Airport – Disneyland and back; I’m not going into the city. I have heard horror stories about fake cab drivers and getting lost and everything, so I already know to go direct to an official taxi stand and not to accept rides from people in the airport. But, I still am a bit wary. I am considering getting a private car service to pick me up directly. I still haven’t decided and any experience or advice people have would be appreciated!
So, here's my remaining To-Do list for the Shanghai Portion:
Coming up - Hong Kong Plans!
- Park Touring Plans
- Figure out Transportation
- Mobile Wifi Unit - So helpful in France!
- VPN - To try and avoid the Great Chinese Firewall.
- Get some money (my mom uses the bank and as long as you order ahead of time you can get cash - I will most likely use my credit card, but I want to make sure I have stuff for Taxi/small purchases, etc).
I know - I'm so excited about it! The castle is currently under tarps, but they started putting the princess spires (13 different ones) on this afternoon, so maybe by the time I arrive some of the scaffolding will be down?Everything about HKDL at Halloween looks incredible! I'm so excited for you to experience it all!
Nice!All parks!
I really loved the idea of the Explorer's Lodge from the start! There are 4 wings and each is themed to a different place - South America, Africa, Asia, Oceania.I had no idea what hotels HK Disney had, so when I saw the pics you posted of the Explorer's Hotel I was blown away! It looks like a tweaked version of AKL, and who doesn't absolutely love that resort? I hope it works out well for you.
Sid's backyard?! That's amazing. I imagine HK is going to set the bar pretty high for you with parks and Halloween festivities.
Cool - thanks for the tips! I'll definitely look into Mr. Orange, Express VPN. And yeah, you are right - just saving that time so I can do more exploring makes sense! I'll look at whether it makes more sense to get a set or individual ones for the rides!We went to Shanghai Disney and Tokyo Disney last November and used the Mr. Orange car service to get from the airport to the Toy Story hotel. Super easy, the driver spoke English and they were on time!
ETA: I used Express VPN (iPhone) and had no problems getting past the Great Firewall of China. I did have to turn it off to use the WiFi in the park, it sort of worked, but worked better without.
Also, I would totally recommend paying for the Fastpasses, even if it’s not crowded. We used it for everything, and it meant we didn’t have to do the running of the fastpasses for Soarin and Pirates. Our day was super light, but we liked having no wait vs even 20 minutes.
Yeah, you do have to pay for monorail! There’s some weird Japanese law about that (which is also why they don’t have a railroad with stops in the park). But at least it’s well maintained and cutely decorated!Japan is next on my list of places to visit and I will definitely plan to spend a few days at the parks at the end of that trip! Can't wait to read your report from this one, and how cool that you will catch the Halloween and Christmas festivities while you're there! Too bad about all the refurbs though. And I didn't realize the Disney hotels there were so expensive, yikes! Am I understanding right that you have to pay for the monorail? Also, that's odd that you can only park hop on the later days of a multi-day ticket.
The protests have definitely caused a lot of uncertainty. I don’t plan on going into the city, which is where the worst of it is. There was a citywide strike recently which included some Disney CMs. So about half the park got closed down due to lack of workers. Also there have been sit-ins at the airport, but security tries to whisk international passengers away from that.Not sure how I missed it at first, but I just saw your post about Hong Kong DL plans! That seems like a cool park and it will be nice to have the low crowds compared to SDL and TDL. The Halloween stuff looks really cool too! Any concerns about the recent political unrest and protests there?
Such amazing timing! And so efficient to be able to see both in the same trip.Hence, HalloXmas!
Sounds like a good excuse to make sure you go backI certainly hope it’s not a once in a lifetime experience for me, and I’m already all booked, so I’ll just deal with it.
Right? The MiraCosta looks incredible but goodness gracious it's pricey.Maybe one day if I decide to totally splurge, but not this trip.
Ha that's awesome!and somehow got a discount from Priceline for renting a car, even though the car rental was in February, in Florida. Guess their system doesn’t seem to recognize those things! I’m not complaining though.
Super clever to ask about that. I'm sure that will make moving around so much easier.but I think I’m going to stick to Sheraton, because I contacted the hotel and they agreed to hold my larger suitcase for the week I’ll be travelling elsewhere!)
Hey you'll be in TDL on my birthday!Monday, Oct 28 – Tokyo Disneyland (2-day ticket)
Again- great planning.By that time I should have seen/done everything I wanted, so I can focus on just Christmas entertainment.
This is one of the major reasons I can't WAIT to go. I'll be living vicariously through your food plans and photos.because Tokyo Disney is legit food craziness!
Maitarou Taro, Mr. Maitarou Taro, and I live at the Sheraton Tokyo Bay
Daaang that's intense. Is their Soarin' exactly like the ones in the states?Soaring just opened and it runs out in 15 minutes! Toy Story Mania is another one that runs out very quickly. Luckily, I won’t be aiming for either of those since I have versions of them close by!
Yeah, you do have to pay for monorail! There’s some weird Japanese law about that (which is also why they don’t have a railroad with stops in the park). But at least it’s well maintained and cutely decorated!
The protests have definitely caused a lot of uncertainty. I don’t plan on going into the city, which is where the worst of it is. There was a citywide strike recently which included some Disney CMs. So about half the park got closed down due to lack of workers. Also there have been sit-ins at the airport, but security tries to whisk international passengers away from that.
Yeah, Disney Tourist Blog did it the last 2 years and it just seemed like a great opportunity!Such amazing timing! And so efficient to be able to see both in the same trip.
Definitely!Sounds like a good excuse to make sure you go back
I know! Way too much! One day though...Right? The MiraCosta looks incredible but goodness gracious it's pricey.
Absolutely easier! I'll just be able to take my carry-on down to Kyoto and Tokyo with me, so I don't need to trudge my large suitcases everywhere!Super clever to ask about that. I'm sure that will make moving around so much easier.
Haha!Hey you'll be in TDL on my birthday!
Mostly. The video is mostly the same, but they do Tokyo instead of Paris, and end at DisneySea. But the queue is all supposed to be a medieval flight museum and the preshow is cool. I just don't think I want to fight those crowds!Daaang that's intense. Is their Soarin' exactly like the ones in the states?
Yeah, definitely! It's right across the street from the Monorail station too! And half the rooms have views of the theme parks (the other have views of the ocean).I didn't realize there was a Sheraton right there, my Dad actually gets a discount at the Marriott Bonvoy properties.., I may need to bump up my plan to visit Tokyo Disney sooner rather than later!
Yeah, I'l keeping an eye on it! It is worrisome. I still have over 2 months, and I think after the airport shutdown happened and got them even more worldwide press, the police are going to be even stricter and trying to shut it all down.I just saw that all flights were cancelled today due to the strikes taking over the airport. Definitely something to keep a close eye on.
I can probably get keychains of things! Though that's almost worse since you can look, just not eat!Can you get two of everything and ship some back? It all looks so fun! I have seen the Green Alien Mochi before and I wish they had them here.