nadroJ
CF Legend
So last weekend I hopped on a Eurostar over to Paris to visit AJ working at Disneyland and to get me some Parisian creds!
My journey started at 5am when I got up to get ready for my vile 7.30am Eurostar <//3 After grabbing an overpriced sausage muffin from a little cafe in St.Pancras I was seated and ready to go! I'm always shocked at how quickly the train seems to get from A-B, it's brilliant, if only it weren't so overpriced =[
I met AJ at Gare du Nord and we hopped on le Metro to Les Sablons to Jardin D'Acclimatation! We were careful not to touch anything on the French Underground system as as everybody knows France is a disgustingly filthy place, didn't want to catch the French plague. Seriously, everybody/everything stinks, I don't understand how people aren't bothered by it? Whatever, we arrived at Les Sablons and walked down a dusty footpath towards the little park.
Jardin D'Acclimatation is a very quaint little place. You pay 3euros to get into the park and from there you're free to walk around and look at the animals (there's loads of caged pigeons, farm animals, bunnies and then a random **** bear! Lol!), get on the cute little train, play fair games or go on some rides. So we went to the ticket booth to get tix for the creds, but there's no information as to how many tickets each cred is so you just kind of have to guess. Turned out we needed 4 tickets each to get our credits which worked out to about a tenner, not too bad for a pay per attraction style thing. Anyway, on to the creds!
Tacot Express
The creds here aren't the kind where you feel ashamed to be riding, but at the same time they don't look to be anything spectacular. The first cred we did was Tacot Express which was themed to driving through some trees or something. I did appreciate the effort to beautify things though, just added to the cuteness of the park. Anyway, we were going around this power coaster enjoying the silliness of what we were doing when all of a sudden the thing turned violent and took a plunge into the TUNNEL OF DEATH! What the ****? It was all so pleasant then that! It certainly took us by surprise and had us pissing ourselves laughing throughout the second circuit XD
Papillons d'Alice
I believe this is one of the only custom spinning wild mouse things I've ever been on. It's really downsized and a lot less violent than the usual layout but again, very pleasant and fun. The theming is pretty, very basic RCT style with some hedges and pretty flowers and things placed around. It doesn't spin much, but there are some fun little dips and drops to keep you entertained.
Dragon
The Dragon can be found over by the Japanese garden and again, is very nicely themed with generic Japanese style roofing and greenery. The front of the coaster train is an unnecessarily large Dragon head which for some reason we found hilarious. Nothing really to report here, pretty standard kiddie coaster that happens to look quite nice.
We didn't hang around for much longer in Jardin, but I have to say it wasn't what I was expecting at all. I was thinking this was going to be coasters bunged down on concrete but it is actually a well maintained, nicely themed and pleasant park to be in.
After Jardin we hopped back on the Metro towards Marne le Valley, Disneyland Parc. We were just going in for the afternoon to chill and watch the shows/parades which was a good thing because the park was rammed. Pretty much everything we would have wanted to go on had an hour plus queue so I was grateful to just sit around eating and soaking up the atmosphere. AJ had to go in the staff entrance so I walked down Main Street USA to meet him by the castle by myself, which was an odd experience. We watched the party train, Disney Magic on Parade, got food, went on the Storyboat Ride, the train and Phantom Manor before taking up seats in the main hub again to watch Fantillusion and Dreams, which is still as spectacular as it was back at Easter. Had a fun afternoon at Disneyland and it was nice to be able to chill out in the park without worrying about getting on rides and having enough time to do stuff!
The next day we were up early to head into Paris to catch our 8.45am coach to Parc Asterix! Little did we know that France still lives in the dark ages so on Sunday everything runs on a gross timetable so not only were we running late on our train from Disney, but when we got into Paris, the connecting line we needed didn't open until 10am. Bum. Plan B, we got the train to Charles de Gaulle and paid 6euros to get the Asterix shuttle from there. To be honest, it was so much easier to do it that way and seeing as there were shuttles running every half hour all day there wasn't as much pressure to get there on time, I'd definitely recommend it!
We arrived at Asterix at 9.30am and joined the mob of people queuing to get in. Luckily they were letting people into the entrance hub thing to wait until the park opened, so that was good. I had my tickets printed from the Asterix site itself with barcodes on and everything, so was a bit annoyed to be sent over to guest services after making it through the queue to the turnstiles. We went over and the woman took out tickets with barcodes on and exchanged them for a hand written slip of paper saying '2 billets' on it, which she then signed. Really confused, but whatever, we joined the back of the mob again and were inside the park for ten to ten.
Tonnerre de Zeus
Once the rope dropped we frogmarched over towards Zeus and pretty much walked straight on. The first drop is insane! Floater airtime all the way down and the rest of the ride is rough but not too much so with random pops of airtime and constant maintenance of speed. Was really impressed with my first coaster of the day at Parc Asterix.
After this we backtracked towards Vol D'Icare, stopping off at the little onion boat ride on the way, which was amusing with little statues of mincy ponies and cupids and stuff.
Vol D'Icare
I reckon we queued about 25 mins for this ride. It was a weird little thing, you sit in a one-in-front-of-the-other formation and if you're sat behind then there's pretty much nothing to hold onto and you're left feeling really exposed. It's an OK little coaster, doesn't really do anything and just sort of glides down the track.
We headed over to Goudrix next, but not before stopping at a little shop to get some food and practice our French. Food in French parks seems to consist of cheese and ham baguettes and that's essentially it. At this stall we found Paprika popcorn, so bought some of that and joined the back of what looked to be a gross queue for Goudrix. The popcorn was **** weird, it was REALLY salty, didn't taste of Paprika and made AJ's lips turn red. We spent the queue watching the ride in horror and people's head were hurtled violently around the track. Urgh. Anyway, the queue was an hour but it went really quickly and before we knew it we were on.
Goudrix
I was genuinely scared as we ascended the lift hill. I knew this was going to hurt and I was not wrong, the thing tried to decapitate me. The thing is, if it weren't for the pain it would have been a good ride. It has an interesting and unique layout but the agony just ruins it. I was so relieved when we pulled into the brakes. Stupid thing.
We knew it was going to be a vile queue, considering how busy the park was, but we decided to bite the bullet and head over to Oz'Iris. Before we even got into the Egyptian area we were met with what appeared to be the back of the Oz'Iris queue. Bum. I looked around and saw a sign for single rides, so we headed over to that queue, only the find it closed. Weird. We headed back through the exit and waited at the station, only for all of the ride-ops to ignore us. I said 'Single Riders?' to which the ride-op replied 'non, fermé.' Whyyyyyy. The park was absolutely rammed, the queue was massive and yet every single train that went around had at least 3 empty seats. One had 7 empty seats. What's the point in building a separate single rides queue if you're not going to use it? Urgh. Anyway, we decided to get the kiddie cred out of the way whilst we were there.
Ronde des Rondins
This was a standard Tivoli Zierer, but will always stand out in my mind as the one that I queued 45 minutes for. That is all.
Before joining the back of the grotesque Oz queue we got some Ben and Jerry's to help ease the pain. We then began was turned out to be an hour and 45 minute queue, and boy did it feel like it. It just went on and on and on. Not fun. There were also lots of queue jumpers, but luckily there was quite a good security team manning the queue so most of the jumpers were kicked out. Once you get inside the queue the theming is quite good, I wish I could understand some of the jokes on the walls though, it seems like they put a lot of effort in.
Oz'Iris
After the vile wait we were finally on, yay! And what a ride! We chose the back seats and from here the first drop is spectacular and the remaining ride is really impressive. The coaster takes the layout at an exceptional pace and provides excellent feelings of acceleration, airtime, hangtime and whatever else you can think of. Such a 'full package' coaster. The 'underwater' dive is really fun and the hidden zero-g is probably my favourite coaster element of all time. Really impressive and made the wait a little less painful.
The last 'big' coaster we had to do was the bobsled themed to cavemen or something. Like all of the rides in the park, the queue was spilling out of the entrance so once again we got some food to take our minds off of it, this time hot dogs in baguettes which were bloody amazing. This was another gross queue which seemed to take forever. The sign said 30 minutes but it took more like 50 =[.
Trace du Hourra
I was a little bit nervous going up the lift-hill, the thing is huge! However, the rest of the ride is fairly standard bobsled stuff, vibraty bums and slowly meandering down a hill whilst changing direction every now and then. Meh, it was fun enough and well themed so that added a little something to the coaster.
Walking through the crowded park we walked past loads of water rides and other attractions that were really well themed and looked fun. It really sucked, I would have loved to have gone on everything but the queues were so ridiculous that we only really had time for the coasters. Last but not least was the kiddie cred, SOS Numerobis, which is really well hidden away. We walked through a kiddie play area and found ourselved in a Viking village where we met Asterix and Obelix, who were having a character meet n greet session next to the bogs, magical.
SOS Numerobis
Luckily for us because the ride is so well hidden we managed to only queue about 10 minutes for this, thank god. I think I would have killed myself if I'd had to queue an hour for this XD Fun little kiddie coaster in a nice wooded setting. The end.
It was now about quarter to 5, our coach left at half 6 so we decided to get in the queue for a ride we'd wanted to do earlier, Transdemonium. We didn't know what it was, but heard there was a Mad House in the park so assumed it was that. Wrong. It was a mental ghost train/cred thing that was really **** up. It was amazing, I'm so glad we found time for it!
And that was our last ride. On our way out we went and checked out the tat, which as I suspected didn't have much park specific stuff but more Asterix character related stuff. I bought a pin badge, yay! We then got on the coach back to Paris and I got on the Eurostar home.
My journey started at 5am when I got up to get ready for my vile 7.30am Eurostar <//3 After grabbing an overpriced sausage muffin from a little cafe in St.Pancras I was seated and ready to go! I'm always shocked at how quickly the train seems to get from A-B, it's brilliant, if only it weren't so overpriced =[
I met AJ at Gare du Nord and we hopped on le Metro to Les Sablons to Jardin D'Acclimatation! We were careful not to touch anything on the French Underground system as as everybody knows France is a disgustingly filthy place, didn't want to catch the French plague. Seriously, everybody/everything stinks, I don't understand how people aren't bothered by it? Whatever, we arrived at Les Sablons and walked down a dusty footpath towards the little park.
Jardin D'Acclimatation is a very quaint little place. You pay 3euros to get into the park and from there you're free to walk around and look at the animals (there's loads of caged pigeons, farm animals, bunnies and then a random **** bear! Lol!), get on the cute little train, play fair games or go on some rides. So we went to the ticket booth to get tix for the creds, but there's no information as to how many tickets each cred is so you just kind of have to guess. Turned out we needed 4 tickets each to get our credits which worked out to about a tenner, not too bad for a pay per attraction style thing. Anyway, on to the creds!
Tacot Express
The creds here aren't the kind where you feel ashamed to be riding, but at the same time they don't look to be anything spectacular. The first cred we did was Tacot Express which was themed to driving through some trees or something. I did appreciate the effort to beautify things though, just added to the cuteness of the park. Anyway, we were going around this power coaster enjoying the silliness of what we were doing when all of a sudden the thing turned violent and took a plunge into the TUNNEL OF DEATH! What the ****? It was all so pleasant then that! It certainly took us by surprise and had us pissing ourselves laughing throughout the second circuit XD
Papillons d'Alice
I believe this is one of the only custom spinning wild mouse things I've ever been on. It's really downsized and a lot less violent than the usual layout but again, very pleasant and fun. The theming is pretty, very basic RCT style with some hedges and pretty flowers and things placed around. It doesn't spin much, but there are some fun little dips and drops to keep you entertained.
Dragon
The Dragon can be found over by the Japanese garden and again, is very nicely themed with generic Japanese style roofing and greenery. The front of the coaster train is an unnecessarily large Dragon head which for some reason we found hilarious. Nothing really to report here, pretty standard kiddie coaster that happens to look quite nice.
We didn't hang around for much longer in Jardin, but I have to say it wasn't what I was expecting at all. I was thinking this was going to be coasters bunged down on concrete but it is actually a well maintained, nicely themed and pleasant park to be in.
After Jardin we hopped back on the Metro towards Marne le Valley, Disneyland Parc. We were just going in for the afternoon to chill and watch the shows/parades which was a good thing because the park was rammed. Pretty much everything we would have wanted to go on had an hour plus queue so I was grateful to just sit around eating and soaking up the atmosphere. AJ had to go in the staff entrance so I walked down Main Street USA to meet him by the castle by myself, which was an odd experience. We watched the party train, Disney Magic on Parade, got food, went on the Storyboat Ride, the train and Phantom Manor before taking up seats in the main hub again to watch Fantillusion and Dreams, which is still as spectacular as it was back at Easter. Had a fun afternoon at Disneyland and it was nice to be able to chill out in the park without worrying about getting on rides and having enough time to do stuff!
The next day we were up early to head into Paris to catch our 8.45am coach to Parc Asterix! Little did we know that France still lives in the dark ages so on Sunday everything runs on a gross timetable so not only were we running late on our train from Disney, but when we got into Paris, the connecting line we needed didn't open until 10am. Bum. Plan B, we got the train to Charles de Gaulle and paid 6euros to get the Asterix shuttle from there. To be honest, it was so much easier to do it that way and seeing as there were shuttles running every half hour all day there wasn't as much pressure to get there on time, I'd definitely recommend it!
We arrived at Asterix at 9.30am and joined the mob of people queuing to get in. Luckily they were letting people into the entrance hub thing to wait until the park opened, so that was good. I had my tickets printed from the Asterix site itself with barcodes on and everything, so was a bit annoyed to be sent over to guest services after making it through the queue to the turnstiles. We went over and the woman took out tickets with barcodes on and exchanged them for a hand written slip of paper saying '2 billets' on it, which she then signed. Really confused, but whatever, we joined the back of the mob again and were inside the park for ten to ten.
Tonnerre de Zeus
Once the rope dropped we frogmarched over towards Zeus and pretty much walked straight on. The first drop is insane! Floater airtime all the way down and the rest of the ride is rough but not too much so with random pops of airtime and constant maintenance of speed. Was really impressed with my first coaster of the day at Parc Asterix.
After this we backtracked towards Vol D'Icare, stopping off at the little onion boat ride on the way, which was amusing with little statues of mincy ponies and cupids and stuff.
Vol D'Icare
I reckon we queued about 25 mins for this ride. It was a weird little thing, you sit in a one-in-front-of-the-other formation and if you're sat behind then there's pretty much nothing to hold onto and you're left feeling really exposed. It's an OK little coaster, doesn't really do anything and just sort of glides down the track.
We headed over to Goudrix next, but not before stopping at a little shop to get some food and practice our French. Food in French parks seems to consist of cheese and ham baguettes and that's essentially it. At this stall we found Paprika popcorn, so bought some of that and joined the back of what looked to be a gross queue for Goudrix. The popcorn was **** weird, it was REALLY salty, didn't taste of Paprika and made AJ's lips turn red. We spent the queue watching the ride in horror and people's head were hurtled violently around the track. Urgh. Anyway, the queue was an hour but it went really quickly and before we knew it we were on.
Goudrix
I was genuinely scared as we ascended the lift hill. I knew this was going to hurt and I was not wrong, the thing tried to decapitate me. The thing is, if it weren't for the pain it would have been a good ride. It has an interesting and unique layout but the agony just ruins it. I was so relieved when we pulled into the brakes. Stupid thing.
We knew it was going to be a vile queue, considering how busy the park was, but we decided to bite the bullet and head over to Oz'Iris. Before we even got into the Egyptian area we were met with what appeared to be the back of the Oz'Iris queue. Bum. I looked around and saw a sign for single rides, so we headed over to that queue, only the find it closed. Weird. We headed back through the exit and waited at the station, only for all of the ride-ops to ignore us. I said 'Single Riders?' to which the ride-op replied 'non, fermé.' Whyyyyyy. The park was absolutely rammed, the queue was massive and yet every single train that went around had at least 3 empty seats. One had 7 empty seats. What's the point in building a separate single rides queue if you're not going to use it? Urgh. Anyway, we decided to get the kiddie cred out of the way whilst we were there.
Ronde des Rondins
This was a standard Tivoli Zierer, but will always stand out in my mind as the one that I queued 45 minutes for. That is all.
Before joining the back of the grotesque Oz queue we got some Ben and Jerry's to help ease the pain. We then began was turned out to be an hour and 45 minute queue, and boy did it feel like it. It just went on and on and on. Not fun. There were also lots of queue jumpers, but luckily there was quite a good security team manning the queue so most of the jumpers were kicked out. Once you get inside the queue the theming is quite good, I wish I could understand some of the jokes on the walls though, it seems like they put a lot of effort in.
Oz'Iris
After the vile wait we were finally on, yay! And what a ride! We chose the back seats and from here the first drop is spectacular and the remaining ride is really impressive. The coaster takes the layout at an exceptional pace and provides excellent feelings of acceleration, airtime, hangtime and whatever else you can think of. Such a 'full package' coaster. The 'underwater' dive is really fun and the hidden zero-g is probably my favourite coaster element of all time. Really impressive and made the wait a little less painful.
The last 'big' coaster we had to do was the bobsled themed to cavemen or something. Like all of the rides in the park, the queue was spilling out of the entrance so once again we got some food to take our minds off of it, this time hot dogs in baguettes which were bloody amazing. This was another gross queue which seemed to take forever. The sign said 30 minutes but it took more like 50 =[.
Trace du Hourra
I was a little bit nervous going up the lift-hill, the thing is huge! However, the rest of the ride is fairly standard bobsled stuff, vibraty bums and slowly meandering down a hill whilst changing direction every now and then. Meh, it was fun enough and well themed so that added a little something to the coaster.
Walking through the crowded park we walked past loads of water rides and other attractions that were really well themed and looked fun. It really sucked, I would have loved to have gone on everything but the queues were so ridiculous that we only really had time for the coasters. Last but not least was the kiddie cred, SOS Numerobis, which is really well hidden away. We walked through a kiddie play area and found ourselved in a Viking village where we met Asterix and Obelix, who were having a character meet n greet session next to the bogs, magical.
SOS Numerobis
Luckily for us because the ride is so well hidden we managed to only queue about 10 minutes for this, thank god. I think I would have killed myself if I'd had to queue an hour for this XD Fun little kiddie coaster in a nice wooded setting. The end.
It was now about quarter to 5, our coach left at half 6 so we decided to get in the queue for a ride we'd wanted to do earlier, Transdemonium. We didn't know what it was, but heard there was a Mad House in the park so assumed it was that. Wrong. It was a mental ghost train/cred thing that was really **** up. It was amazing, I'm so glad we found time for it!
And that was our last ride. On our way out we went and checked out the tat, which as I suspected didn't have much park specific stuff but more Asterix character related stuff. I bought a pin badge, yay! We then got on the coach back to Paris and I got on the Eurostar home.
it was so easy to get there from Charles de Gaulle that I'll definitely be looking into it for next year.