My daughter and her boyfriend are regular travellers with myself and my husband to Florida, but they have recently returned from their first ever holiday alone, which was a two night stay at the Santa Fe booked through a travel agent at a cost of £600 including a two day park ticket.
They travelled with Eurostar changing at Lille and neither of them can speak French. The journey was without incident but on their arrival at the hotel their room was not ready. This was surprising as it was 10.00pm approx. The receptionist had only the most basic grasp of English, and so couldn't explain why. However they were offered a complimentary drink which offset the difficulty. They were then given the key to a room at the very end of the hotel which seemed to be a disabled room, and which they said had a view of a gigantic boulder and was really awful. It also reeked of smoke and they had specifically requested a non smoking room. They were too tired to return to reception, plus they felt that the language barrier would have been a problem.
They went to the Disney Village ( or whatever it's called ) for a meal, and they proclaimed the atmosphere wonderful, and the food good.
The following day they decided to walk to the theme park and here is where there is a very real cautionary tale. They assumed that they were on Disney property throughout, and so when they were approached right outside the park by what appeared to be an official photographer they readily agreed to a souvenir photo. However immediately he had taken it he pressed an envelope in their hands with some Polaroid's inside them, and became extremely aggressive demanding the equivalent of £20. They tried to resist, but became too scared and gave him the money and hurried away. Needless to say the quality of the photos is dreadful. All unsuspecting tourists should be warned if he is allowed to remain so near to the parks.
After that they spent a very memorable day and particularly enjoyed Space Mountain so different to Orlando, and John enjoyed Indiana Jones although my daughter said that it was rather too turbulent for her. Later that evening they exited the park and had a wonderful meal at The Rainforest Cafe.
The following day they headed for the new Studios. People should be advised here that there are no lockers as such inside the park. If you have want to deposit spare clothes etc there is a cloak room type place, but it is outside the park. My daughter ended up trying to exit the park as soon as she had entered after finding this out, and found herself ' swimming against a tide of people.' This park is still very much in its infancy, and their seem to be unresolved as yet teething problems. In the animation tour they could not hear their English translation. On the backlot tour even with a fastpass it took 45mins to reach the front of the line. Now I'm not sure what they meant here,but apparently the translation for other then French nationalities is done by TV screen, and some trams are reserved for set nationalities, but the English and the French the too largest park visitors are all together. Consequently many trams were leaving virtually empty whilst all the English and French were waiting for ages. Either that or their loading system is wrong. Anyway finally my daughter and her boyfriend were seated, and almost straight away the TV screens ceased to work! At the end of the ride people were complaining very angrily, but as the cm's again spoke virtually no English they were just rudely told to leave the ride. A later explanation given to them at guest services by an English CM is that the TV's have technical difficulties in the very hot weather!!
They thought that the Stunt Show was absolutely tremendous, but that the explosions were massive and so anyone who doesn't like extremely loud noises may have a problem.
All in all they didn't really enjoy their day at this park as much as expected, because in my daughters opinion it has opened too soon, and with too little to do. By 5.30 the park was virtually empty and had no atmosphere whatsoever. Presumably this will be different in the height of the Summer, however with larger crowds the wait times may cause frustration.
All in all they spent a total of £800 over the two days, and did feel that despite the hiccups they had enjoyed themselves. They bought some lovely souvenirs which are totally different to anything available in Florida. Eeyore slippers for example. They felt that the choice was actually better than Orlando and reasonably priced.
This is a copy of a mini report sent to Simon. Hope it's not too boring. Carolyn
They travelled with Eurostar changing at Lille and neither of them can speak French. The journey was without incident but on their arrival at the hotel their room was not ready. This was surprising as it was 10.00pm approx. The receptionist had only the most basic grasp of English, and so couldn't explain why. However they were offered a complimentary drink which offset the difficulty. They were then given the key to a room at the very end of the hotel which seemed to be a disabled room, and which they said had a view of a gigantic boulder and was really awful. It also reeked of smoke and they had specifically requested a non smoking room. They were too tired to return to reception, plus they felt that the language barrier would have been a problem.
They went to the Disney Village ( or whatever it's called ) for a meal, and they proclaimed the atmosphere wonderful, and the food good.
The following day they decided to walk to the theme park and here is where there is a very real cautionary tale. They assumed that they were on Disney property throughout, and so when they were approached right outside the park by what appeared to be an official photographer they readily agreed to a souvenir photo. However immediately he had taken it he pressed an envelope in their hands with some Polaroid's inside them, and became extremely aggressive demanding the equivalent of £20. They tried to resist, but became too scared and gave him the money and hurried away. Needless to say the quality of the photos is dreadful. All unsuspecting tourists should be warned if he is allowed to remain so near to the parks.
After that they spent a very memorable day and particularly enjoyed Space Mountain so different to Orlando, and John enjoyed Indiana Jones although my daughter said that it was rather too turbulent for her. Later that evening they exited the park and had a wonderful meal at The Rainforest Cafe.
The following day they headed for the new Studios. People should be advised here that there are no lockers as such inside the park. If you have want to deposit spare clothes etc there is a cloak room type place, but it is outside the park. My daughter ended up trying to exit the park as soon as she had entered after finding this out, and found herself ' swimming against a tide of people.' This park is still very much in its infancy, and their seem to be unresolved as yet teething problems. In the animation tour they could not hear their English translation. On the backlot tour even with a fastpass it took 45mins to reach the front of the line. Now I'm not sure what they meant here,but apparently the translation for other then French nationalities is done by TV screen, and some trams are reserved for set nationalities, but the English and the French the too largest park visitors are all together. Consequently many trams were leaving virtually empty whilst all the English and French were waiting for ages. Either that or their loading system is wrong. Anyway finally my daughter and her boyfriend were seated, and almost straight away the TV screens ceased to work! At the end of the ride people were complaining very angrily, but as the cm's again spoke virtually no English they were just rudely told to leave the ride. A later explanation given to them at guest services by an English CM is that the TV's have technical difficulties in the very hot weather!!
They thought that the Stunt Show was absolutely tremendous, but that the explosions were massive and so anyone who doesn't like extremely loud noises may have a problem.
All in all they didn't really enjoy their day at this park as much as expected, because in my daughters opinion it has opened too soon, and with too little to do. By 5.30 the park was virtually empty and had no atmosphere whatsoever. Presumably this will be different in the height of the Summer, however with larger crowds the wait times may cause frustration.
All in all they spent a total of £800 over the two days, and did feel that despite the hiccups they had enjoyed themselves. They bought some lovely souvenirs which are totally different to anything available in Florida. Eeyore slippers for example. They felt that the choice was actually better than Orlando and reasonably priced.
This is a copy of a mini report sent to Simon. Hope it's not too boring. Carolyn
