The Bounds Do Tokyo Disney - Day 4

[willowpondarabians]

I started reading your trip report during my lunch yesterday and now have been checking the boards hourly to see when you are posting your next report day. So here it is, the beginning of my work shift and I just have to pause to read your newest report. Please don't tell my boss! I have always said when I win the lottery, I was going to take my family on a mega trip to all the Disney theme parks all over the world. But it looks like Tokyo Disney will be my first spot when that happens. Or when I can get one of my kids to marry into a rich family (ha-ha!). I just can't thank-you enough for sharing all your experiences and including photos. I just sit and stare at the pictures and imagine myself being there. Thank-you for making my work day much more enjoyable! Can't wait for your next report!

[Katzateer]

Thanks so much for sharing your trip with us. I am sure this is as close as a lot of us will ever get to this park and I am really enjoying your reports and pictures.

Great job!!

[Melanie]

The Bounds Do Tokyo Disney

Cast of Characters -

Melanie (37) - that's me
James (37) - that's hubby
Josh (8) - oldest, loves Donald and thrill rides
Ryan (7) - youngest, loves Stitch and Goofy, lovin' the thrill rides now

Day Four:

It’s Wednesday, our second day at Disneyland. The boys were more than ready to get back for some thrills. As much as we all loved DisneySea, of course classic Disney is still a big draw.

Like I mentioned before, dining reservations are not accepted until the day of. In our little bit of research, we had decided we wanted to do the Lilo & Friends Luau show at the Polynesian Terrace in Adventureland. If you’ve been reading my reports, you know my youngest is a huge Stitch fan. I read suggestions to go to the restaurant as soon as possible to secure a reservation, so Ryan and I headed over there as soon as we got in the gates. In the meantime, James and Josh went to Pooh for FPs, since that was a must-do for today.

Ryan and I were too late, as the lunch shows filled up very quickly! They also do dinner shows with Mickey, Minnie and Chip ‘n Dale that were still available, but I decided to discuss it with James first. It was a lot of money and I wanted everyone to be happy. We decided on a plan to try and get the Stitch lunch for the next day, so everyone was content.

We hadn't been able to do Splash Mountain the other day because of the crowds, so we did standby first thing this morning. Yes, it was freezing and we were doing Splash. Ryan didn’t like the drop last year at WDW, but was sure he would love it now. He’d been practicing his screaming for the big drop for weeks.

The Critter Country area is really cute and cozy, as it only consists of Splash and the Beaver Bros. Canoes. I like how close you can get to the drop – much closer than either WDW or Disneyland California, so those waiting for family could get a great shot.

I can’t remember exactly how long we waited, probably around 30 minutes. It’s a cute queue, similar to the others. Ryan wanted to ride with his dad (seems to be a pattern on the thrill rides he’s trying out for the first time) and they got the front while Josh and I sat in the second seat. Everyone loved it and amazingly enough, everyone but myself got wet. So there, Carol! I’m thinking that since James was in front of me, he caught it all on the drop.

Just as we were getting to the unloading area, the ride broke. This time they made announcements numerous times in both Japanese and English (‘Brer Bear and Brer Fox are causing some kind of commotion downstream, but we’ll be on our way soon….’), but after watching the CMs literally running around for 15 minutes, they finally unloaded us where we were. Our boat was at a weird position in a turn, so we had to walk across a little plank to get off. Again, we got super FPs. This time it was so worth it since we had gotten an entire ride on Splash. Bad thing was, after the wait, no pictures were available. I was totally bummed since that was the one on-ride picture we wanted. We’d be back!

After our Splash adventure, our hungry stomachs happily jumped at the chance to munch on a Churro down in the cute seating area by the exit of the ride. In the other parks, the area around Splash is always so bustling and busy, but things here were calm and relaxing. Maybe it was just the time of day. Oh, and probably because the ride was down.

Mmmmmm, churros! We had seen some interesting churro flavors over the past few days, but here they were selling maple flavored, which sounded good. And they were! We also found a popcorn cart with just the bucket Ryan had been waiting for the past two days – Chip ‘n Dale. He was sure mom’s friends would love that he picked that particular one. I can’t remember what kind of popcorn he initially got here, but Josh got a refill as well. It was nice to have to snack on throughout the day. We never got sick of the popcorn.

Heading back through Fantasyland on our way to do Pooh with our FPs, we saw Peter and Wendy out again. Since Ryan hadn’t gotten their signatures the other day, he wanted to see them again. Sure enough Peter remembered us, and even though it was time for them to go yet again, he made sure Wendy signed and posed for a picture before they had to leave.

I was really excited to get to Pooh's Hunny Hunt , but the boys just didn’t seem to understand. I’m not a big Pooh fan or anything, but I had heard how incredible this ride was supposed to be. I don’t even think Josh rode Pooh last year at WDW, as he just wasn’t interested. Even with our FPs, we had a wait of about 10 minutes or so. I know someone mentioned in one of my previous reports that the outside queue area looked kinda dead and unkept in my pictures, but I didn’t get that idea at all. I thought it represented the 100 Acre Wood very well. Maybe the colors in my pics aren’t as bright as things actually were.

The inside queue had us winding around very large Pooh storybook pages until we reached the loading area. Coming into the loading area, things seemed familiar, but that’s where the familiarity would end. This isn’t your Fantasyland dark ride of old. I hope I can explain it well.

The ride vehicles are super cute, and larger than other Fantasyland rides. You pull out of the station like normal, but you quickly realize you aren’t on a track, or at least one you can see. James’ reaction was “whoa – we aren’t on a track!” Uh, I tried to tell you! In the first room, your vehicle and two others break off from others and pause here, pulling up (side by side) to a screen to watch a short video with Christopher Robin and Pooh. Then you take off on your adventure into the Hundred Acre Wood. The cars spin and go here and there and you really don’t know where you are going to go next. It’s way cool! You bounce with Tigger and then at one point you are in a huge room (which I believe is supposed to represent Pooh’s dream) where your hunny pot rotates and spins (but not Tea Cup like) and pulls up to various scenes throughout. I remember being in front of a cannon that goes off, and then suddenly you pass Woozles riding around in their own hunny pot. Where did they come from? It’s just too cute!

To prove how cool it really was, Josh (my almost 9 year old boy – not your typical Pooh audience) loved it and couldn’t stop talking about it. The bouncing with Tigger was his favorite part. Unfortunately, we didn’t get a chance to do it again. FPs are usually gone by midday, and the standby was always just too long. Next trip!

We headed next back to Tomorrowland, and the boys went to the Grand Circuit Raceway (again, the line was fairly short) and I went to grab Buzz FPs, which had a return time of much later that evening. Another fun turn on the speedway for my boys. Next we thought we’d give MicroAdventure a try, which we all know as Honey, I Shrunk the Audience. Not sure why they thought to change the name. Since we scared the daylights out of the boys on their first trip to WDW in ’02 with It’s Tough to be a Bug, we’ve kind of steered clear of 3D shows. So this was a new show for them, and it had been years since James and I had seen it. The pre-show area had English subtitles, and in the back row of the theater, English and Chinese translation was available via headphones. We were getting the original audio, but the audio in the theater was so loud, it was a little difficult to hear what was coming out of my headphones. Ryan decided to sit criss-cross applesauce in his chair since I had warned him about the mice. We all enjoyed it!

In the same building as MicroAdventure was Tomorrowland Terrace, where we then ate lunch. They have cute Mickey-shaped cheeseburgers, which were actually very good! We were happy to snag a seat indoors here, because with how chilly it was, we didn’t want to sit outside like we had the other day at Pizza Port.

From there, we headed back through Fantasyland on the way to Westernland. We decided to use our super FPs from our Splash breakdown on Big Thunder, which was a great idea with the “super” standy wait times we were encoutering! Oh, Ryan is really into the fast rides now and he and Josh even rode together! We are making all kinds of progress on this trip, but at the same time, it’s bittersweet our boys are growing up so very fast.

[Melanie]

At the exit of the ride, we run into western Chip ‘n Dale. Jane is right – Chip ‘n Dale are gods at Tokyo Disneyland. They were by far the most represented characters all over the parks, in all kinds of outfits. The Japanese just love them, and can you blame 'em?

We could get more FPs now since it had been two hours since getting our Buzz FPs, so we picked up more for Big Thunder before heading to Fantasyland.

The first few days of our trip, Snow White’s Adventures was down for refurbishment, so we were glad to get to ride on our third day in the parks. We played a fun game while waiting in the surprisingly short queue of which Dwarf vehicle we would get. For some reason, there seemed to be a lot of Sleepy’s and Sneezy’s, but I think we ended up with Doc. This ride is similar to it’s WDW and Disneyland counterparts, although no sleeping Snow White and Prince at the end.

Back to ToonTown and a ride on Roger Rabbit’s Car Toon Spin. None of my boys had ever ridden it at Disneyland, and James is a huge Jessica Rabbit fan. On the way over, we see our ice cream cart, and run into Daisy and the Big Bad Wolf. We were happy to find Daisy, as she seems to often elude us when at WDW. We waited about 30 minutes to ride Roger Rabbit, and I was lucky enough to ride with Ryan (who loves to spin). As soon as we hit the ‘slick spot’, he had us spinning and spinning. I so wanted to be up with James and Josh who were staying as stationary as possible in the car in front of us.

We couldn’t visit ToonTown without a whirl on Gadget’s Go Coaster. James sat this one out, and the boys and I waited another 20 minutes or so for our ride. I enjoy waiting in this queue with such cute scenery nearby. We walked down a bit into Tomorrowland and the boys and I went on Star Tours again while James did some shopping. We also had a fill-up of the popcorn buckets there in Tomorrowland, with more yummy caramel-flavored.

It sure seems like we are criss-crossing the park a lot, but it just didn’t seem like it took us all that long to get from one side of the park to the other. I don’t know the exact difference in square footage of all the parks, but Tokyo Disneyland just didn’t seem as big as Disneyland California or the Magic Kingdom in Florida. So we go back into Fantasyland and take another boat ride with the dolls and then Josh and I go on Pinocchio’s Daring Journey again while James and Ryan go off to do a little more wandering around and shopping. We agree to meet back up in Adventureland.

After the ride, we can again pick up more FPs, and luckily there are still some available for Splash Mountain. I really wanted to get that on-ride picture. We’re now holding FPs for three different attractions. We hang around Cinderella Castle a bit on our way to Adventureland, and take pics of Snow White’s Grotto. I could have sworn this was only at Disneyland in California. Oh well.

When we got to Adventureland, we see Stitch, for the first time this trip, hanging out by the Polynesian Terrace– but Ryan wasn’t anywhere around. Josh and I searched and searched until we finally see them coming from the direction of World Bazaar. We grab him and have some great quality time with Experiment 626. Ryan was very happy! James and Josh wanted to just sit and rest awhile, so Ryan and I enjoyed another ride on the Jungle Cruise. After that, we knocked out some souvenir shopping and even came across this interesting toilet seat cover.

Passing back through World Bazaar on our way for our Buzz FPs, we grab a quick dinner of hot dogs at the Refreshment Corner, sponsored by Coca-Cola, of course! Mmmmm - love a good hotdog! After our battle with Zurg, we did some more shopping/browsing at the Confectionary. I have to admit that I was a little upset at there not being any fresh candy offered at the resort. No candy/caramel apples, no fudge, no peanut brittle, nothing. They like cookies, the shortbread type, and they sell tons of them in a variety of packaging. Almost the entire Confectionary was full of cookies, with the occasional package of chocolate or caramel throughout. I did like that you paid for your purchases at the Sugarman Bank though. Very cute!

We were really looking forward to our next rides of Big Thunder and Splash Mountain. It was dark now, and these rides are so great at night. FastPass is definitely the way to go here! Our runaway train ride was great fun, they we tried our luck at the shooting gallery. The boys got some help from Dad, and Josh seems to be improving. On our way to Splash, we checked out Grandma Sara’s Kitchen, Critter Country’s adorably themed restaurant. Wish they had one of these at the North American parks.

Our trip to the briar patch was a success (again, FPs saved us), and we got a great picture out of it. Yay! We were seated in the back, which meant we only got a teeny bit wet. Good thing on this chilly night! It’s funny, because on a cold day like this in the States, there would never be huge waits like there are in Tokyo for rides such as Splash.

Surprisingly, right next door, the wait for the Haunted Mansion was only 13 minutes at that point, so before calling it a day, we visited the 999 Happy Haunts. On the way out of the park, we took in the beautiful 'Lights of Romance' display around Cinderella Gardens. As beautiful as those statues are during the day, they are gorgeous at night with the special lighting. The colors would change periodically and the whole area was just breathtaking. It fit in very well with the cold weather. I felt a bit like I was in a winter wonderland.

Exiting World Bazaar into the entry plaza, I glance up and see Walt’s window. I reflect on how it was all started with this wonderful man and a mouse. What an influence it all has on my life, and I hope I’m passing this on to my boys.

After another uneventful monorail trip back to the hotel and a visit to the lounge, we were again in bed fairly early. We had really accomplished a lot this day!


Next Up: An early lunch with Stitch and another great day at DisneySea

[Mufasa]

Pooh's Hunny Hunt truly is an E-ticket level attraction- it was easy for the Oriental Land Company to approve the E-ticket level budget for the attraction knowing that it would appeal as much to adults as it would kids.

Having a trackless ride vehicle allows us to do a lot with the show- where now every guest in every ride vehicle gets to experience that "front-row" sensation of interacting with all of the different show elements and also allows us to find a way to increase the capacity for the ride. Thinking back on the project it was a real nightmare to figure out just how to choreograph the movement and timing of all the vehicles in the ride within that space.

A lot has been written about the ride vehicles but that's only one small element of what makes Pooh a great attraction- it really is about the story and the details. No matter what, the one thing that kids wanted more than anything else was to bounce with Tigger and we wrestled for a while with how to pull off the effect but I think in the end it's a really magical effect (your hunny pot and the entire room is bouncing around as opposed to just an undulating track).

I really enjoy the Pooh dream sequence portion myself- it's fun to see a separate ride vehicle twirling around in the room with it's own passengers of Heffalumps and Woozles (including a small Heffalump who's wearing a pair of Mickey ears and has a camera in hand which is a detail you should try and spot next time).

Pooh's Hunny Hunt is so popular at Tokyo Disneyland that in addition to ridiculous standby waits- you can sometimes wait up to an hour just to grab a fastpass. (yes, a wait of an hour just to get through the line grab a fastpass from one of the machines!)

And the success of Pooh has been credited by the Japanese media in sparking an interest at least in and around Tokyo for Honey flavored foods (in response to the special Pooh's Hunny flavored popcorn they introduced at the park when the attraction opened).

They're almost as popular as those Gyoza dogs they sell over in Tokyo DisneySea.

Oh and 3 days of trip reports from Tokyo and not one mention yet of Duffy the Disney Bear?

[Melanie]

Oh and 3 days of trip reports from Tokyo and not one mention yet of Duffy the Disney Bear?

I didn't take a pic of him until day 5, so I'll mention him then.

Thanks for all the details about Pooh.

[dlpmikki]

Another amazing day. It is hardly surprising that words are failing us, your readers, with such incredible tales and pictures

[Christine]

That Pooh ride sounds fantastic! So are there fireworks every night? I remember you saw them from your hotel the first night you arrived, but can't recall you having watched them in the park yet?

[faline]

Melanie, another wonderful day for you and your family! Your details and pics have me wishing very much that I could see these things in person!

[pdrlkr]

Thanks for the report!

[TiggeRia]

Your trip reports and pictures are simply amazing! Thank you so much for sharing with us!

[Bethis26fan]

Thanks for sharing. I love reading your reports as well. I know I'll never get to go there so I'll enjoy reading and looking at your pictures.

[NotaGeek]

I absolutely LOVE your trip reports. And, I am really craving some honey flavored popcorn!

[2Epcot]

Another wonderful report Melanie. Thanks also to the additional information from Mufasa.

[ChipnDaleGal]

First things first... please tell Ryan that I do most heartily approve of his popcorn bucket choice! I am sure it was worth waiting for!

And before I forget - I love your family photo from Splash! Certain proof of Ryan's transformation - his hands both high in the air!!

The Pooh ride sounds amazing, and it was so much fun to read about another great day for the Bounds Clan in Tokyo Disneyland. Thanks again for including us, Mel.

[Carol]

I nearly spit out my coffee seeing that toilet seat. I guess those munks really are popular over there.

Absolutely wonderful report, Mel. I don't want them to end!

From your teaser line it sounds like you succeeded in obtaining the Stitch breakfast reservation. I cannot wait to hear about it.

Thanks for taking us along with you and the boys.

[offwego]

thank you so much another great great report and pics!!

[Melanie]

So are there fireworks every night?

You know, we never did see them in the park, and I'm not sure if what we saw that night from our room was from Disneyland or DisneySea.

[Mufasa]

The current fireworks show is "Disney Magic in the Sky" and during busier times is run nightly and is designed so it can be viewed from both parks with the same soundtrack played around the resort.

There were experiments with running an alternate soundtrack in DisneySea and different effects during the show like eruptions from Mt. Prometheus.

The show is similar to the older Fantasy in the Sky style Fireworks that played at WDW. I prefer the much older Tokyo fireworks productions but there are limitations over what can be done at the park because of it's location and proximity to the rest of Tokyo (similar to the noise restrictions in and around Anaheim and why they don't offer nightly fireworks except in peak seasons)

Usually in the peak summer season the Tokyo resort always introduces special entertainment programs with fireworks like Blazing Rhythms that only ran for a couple months but was very popular.

I certainly expect a major production in 2008 to celebrate Tokyo Disneyland's 25th anniversary.

[KylesMom]

Stunning - I mean, Amazing - uh, I really mean SPECTACULAR - you've really left me speechless, Mel. What another fabulous day, complete with pictures to prove it!!!