Another early morning start! Can’t wait to get to England in a few weeks time, where we will be staying with family, and get some nice sleep-ins for awhile!
Our lovely host Anne dropped us off at the Epernay train station, where we had problems printing our ticket we had bought online. The credit card I had purchased them with didn’t work in the automatic ticket machine, and our train arrived before we could get to the one-man-operated ticket booth. I managed to talk to the conductor in what little french I knew, and we managed to get on board without our tickets which was a sigh of relief.
30 minute train ride back to Paris, we arrived into Gare de l’est, the same station we had left from. After our previous encounter with the Paris taxi’s we decided to try the bus service. After awhile we worked out there was a bus that went direct from Gare de l’est to Gare de Lyon, which was only a short distance from our hotel.
A half hour journey across Paris we arrived at Gare de Lyon. One can only imagine how much the taxi would have cost us, upward of NZD$70. And for the price of NZD$2 each we did the same journey!
We walked to our hotel, which I had read about a few months ago as being an amazing hotel for photographers and design folk. The hotel is called The Color Hotel, and everything is plain white, with bright colours scattered throughout. Every room is the same, but a different colour of the spectrum is used. Usually NZD$310 a night, we managed to get it cheaper online before we left for around NZD$140 which was a great score.
Asides from being an awesome hotel, it’s close proximity to Gare de Lyon was the main draw card. After ditching our bags, we walked back to the the station before catching a train to Disneyland Paris! It was a nice change from looking at amazing scenery and soaking up history, to just being a big kid!
We had tickets to both the Disneyland & Walt Disney Studios Parks, so we headed to the latter first, and did everything there that we wanted to do. The highlight of this park would have to be the Hollywood Hotel Tower, you’re seated in an old lift, with a single car seatbelt across your lap. Before you know it your lift is at the top of a tower looking out across Disneyland before plummeting to earth faster than gravity. It’s not so much the ride that scares you, but more the single seat belt holding you in place. Here’s Emma right after we took the plunge.
The Finding Nemo Turtle Ride was also heaps of fun! A rollercoaster through the dark with the carriage rotating 360 degrees at the same time.
We crossed over to the main Disneyland park, which was very similar to L.A.’s Disneyland which I have visited many times previously. With the obvious difference that all the characters and videos are played in French with English subtitles. The highlight in this park would be tough to narrow down to just one, but given we did Space Mountain twice, if I had to choose one, it would be it.
If you asked Emma what her highlight was it would probably be… let the photos do the talking.
We decided to go on a Wednesday as we thought the park numbers would be low, meaning short queue times. Which we were spot on with, and also Tuesday being a public holiday, it was even quieter again! Which meant more fun, and less waiting!
Here’s the view from the back of Disneyland from the Mad Hatters Tea Party.
We headed to an all you can eat buffet dinner on the Main Street, which was great value. We sure got our moneys worth!
9pm and we’re on the train back to Paris (Gare de Lyon) and a quick walk back to our hotel before catching up on 2 days without internet. We have a 7am train to catch in the morning, so am up till 2am to make myself tired (and I have that much catching up to do) so I will sleep on the train, at least that’s the hope.
Tomorrow we’re on a 6hr train to Nice, where we are staying one night, and heading to Monte Carlo for the afternoon – excited!