Day 4 – DisneyLand, Tokyo

Today was dedicated to visiting Mickey Mouse & Co!

We arrived outside the gates at 7am, to sit at the beginning of the queue with other hardcore Disney fans and eat a Japanese convenience store brekky! However we soon discovered that the gates were opening at 9am that day (1hr later than usual). So I promptly took a Cheshire Cat nap while we waited.

Has anyone seen the way to Cinderella’s Castle?

After the mad rush of entry, we began our day experiencing the rides and attractions, which can easily be achieved in one day. This Park is most suited to younger Disney fans, specific Disney lovers and people who want a quiet, whimsical time at a theme park.

I enjoyed the more grown up rides (and the most popular ones) like Splash Mountain, Big Thunder Mountain, Star Wars Journey (5 Stars for amazing virtual reality!), Journey to Space Mountain, Pirates of the Caribbean (modelled on the original ride that inspired the franchise) and the Haunted Mansion (its was like taking a ride through Tim Burton’s mind)! But I also had a great time on the kid-friendly rides, mostly situated in FantasyLand like the Carousel, Peter Pan’s Flight, Snow White’s Adventures, the stand out was the always popular and enchanting Pooh’s Honey Pot ride.

All the audio used throughout the rides is in Japanese, which only becomes a problem for english speakers at the park cinemas, so we avoided sitting through a film screening we couldn’t understand!

I also enjoyed Tom Sawyer Island and I’d recommend boarding the Mark Twain Riverboat to cruise around the island on a paddleboat and also the Western River Railroad for train journey around the park.

Food – We ate an early lunch (to beat the crowd) at Queen of Hearts Banquet Hall inspired by Wonderland. This was themed to be like an English meal. The highlight snack for me was discovering soy sauce and butter flavoured popcorn (curry, caramel and salt where also available)! It is perfect for those whose’s flavour preference is umami and it was so addictive (I cannot confess to how many I had!). Because snacking on the go is taboo in Japan, you can purchase a popcorn carrier in assorted designs and carry it around for easy access – this respect for popcorn eating is something I plan to introduce to Australia.

Interestingly Alice in Wonderland and Winnie the Pooh are trending as the most popular Disney characters, based on merchandising, with Belle being the most favoured Disney Princess. Ariel, Pocahontas, Mulan, Merida and Jasmine hardly get a look in. Halloween celebrations had started already and it seems like a new marketing concept the Japanese are fully embracing.

DisneyLand is the place to pull out all your Disney costumes and wear them with pride. The done thing was to get matching costumes with your fellow park buddy, or purchase them in a merchandise store.

Lastly, stay for the 7:30pm Tokyo DisneyLand Electric Parade Dreamlights and 9:50pm Once Upon A Time, which is a fantastic light show of Disney stories that get projected onto Cinderella’s Castle in the centre of the park. There’s also fireworks in between these two performances and throughout the Once Upon a Time show.

After 15 hours at Disneyland and on my feet I was happy to return to my happiest place on earth; bed!

Park entry tickets – ideally purchased prior to entry (there’s a great Disney store in Shibuya, Tokyo where you can do this), otherwise you will need to queue up to purchase a ticket at the gate and then queue up again to enter the park.

A little ride strategy: Fast Pass Explained – We soon discovered the Fast Pass ride entry ticket option. This applies to selected rides (probably the most popular ones) and allocates a 1hr time period for jumping the queue  (i.e. 11:00am-12:00pm). You can collect a Fast Pass by scanning your park entry ticket at stations outside the specific rides. The catch is you can only have one Fast Pass at a time. So use the DisneyLand app to strategically plan which order rides to get Fast Passes for, as the times will alter depending on popularity.  Avoid rides that have Fast Pass hours that happen late in the day, when earlier times for other rides are available.

We mapped out the rides we wanted to prioritise and always picked the earliest Fast Pass time period available, so as not to lock out other rides options until say a 5:00pm-6:00pm time period.

Tomorrow, take two at Tsujiki Markets and then all aboard the Skinkansen to Hiroshima!