Day6 - Tokyo Disney

Disney Day 2 - going to Tokyo Disney.

This is Tokyo's version of the Magic Kingdom.  Many of the rides found in the US Disneyland or Florida Magic Kingdom can be found here - Space Mountain, Pirates of the Caribbean, Haunted Mansion, Splash Mountain - the usual list.  The park is just arranged a bit different, and there's no Main Street USA.  Instead, there's a World Bazaar - a covered shopping and eatery area that is larger than Main Street.  That leads you into the park.

According to the Tokyo Disney crowd calendar, this was supposed to be a low attendance day, and with rain moving through it was probably keeping more people away.   This is a good thing for the tourist.  It's easier to get around and get on the attractions you want.  The bad side - things can be closed for maintenance.

In this case, three attractions were closed today (as we later found out) - Jungle Cruise, Big Thunder Mountain Railroad, and It's a Small World.  The last one, usually not a big dissapointment - but I was looking forward to the opportunity to hear that annoying "It's a small world after all" song repeatedly in Japanese.

So, right in the gate we went left, thinking we would just head out to the Haunted Mansion.  As we did, the first attraction we passed was Pirates of the Carribbean, sporting a 5 minute wait time on the sign.  One Disney rule - don't pass up a short line for an attraction.

We went in, and true to form the line was short and within a few minutes we were on a boat, heading to the "Caribbean".

The talking skull you see at the begining of the ride did it's thing in Japanese.  The video of this skull is here.

So, this version of Pirates is almost the same as the ones in the US.  Captain Jack Sparrow has been integrated into the ride, however the Japanese did not remove the pirates chasing the women in circles.  PC hasn't quite got to Japan yet.

After that, we made our way to the Haunted Mansion.  The Fast Pass machines were not working yet, as the line was only 20 minutes.  We stood in that line, and about 19 minutes later we were entering the attraction.

This version of Mansion was definitely different than the US counterparts.  This version has a heavy Tim Burton influence, and being this park was starting to ramp up for the holidays, they seemed to fuse Halloween and Christmas into the decor simultaneously.

We weren't going to be Disney Commando's today - our plan was just to get around the park, and experience the ambience.  We were slowing down a bit, so we found one of the only shops in the park that sold hot coffee, and settled down for a danish and coffee, while under cover and watching people.  Good timing, as the first rain of the day started to come through.

And, it was good to see that the "Happiest Place on Earth" had some universal similarities with the US.  We watched as a toddler was having a meltdown -  crying and screaming for some reason.  And, we watched the embarrassed parents try and cope with this kid.  They eventually just walked away from him, and the kid followed - still crying, and trying to get whatever amount of attention he though he could eak out of this performance.

It was only 11am.  Still kinda early.  Those parents were going to have a long day.

Once recharged, we started to walk around Tomorrowland and got into the line for Star Tours.

Oh, wait.  There WASN'T a line.  Here's were the line would normally be.

However, once we got to the top of the ramp and read the warnings, we both decided to skip this one.  I didn't need another back injury, and we though a jerky 3D ride right after coffee and danishes wasn't a good idea.

So, we continued around the park, and headed to "It's a Small World".  That's when we found out it was closed for renovations.  No huge loss.

Our consolation prize was going on the large riverboat.

I also decided to take advantage of the single-rider skip system they had set up for Splash Mountain.  Huge time saver, as Donna didn't really want to go on it anyway.  I was able to go down the FastPass line by indicating to the cast member that I wished to be a single rider.  They allowed me in, and it let me pass the 50 minute stand-by line.  At the bottom, I got in a que with another person, and within a few minutes I was on the ride.

We then got lunch, a Pizza and Salad thing at a counter restaurant.  We also went onto the Disney Railroad.

We wandered around Westernland for awhile longer, and started to head for the Jungle Cruise - only to discover it was closed for renovations.

As we headed toward the exit gate, we passed "Pirates", and saw the line was still at 5 minutes.  Sticking with the Disney rule of never passing up a short line, we did it again.   So, Pirates was our first and last ride of the Disney Tokyo experience.

If you have to go to Disney, I would really recommend a low-attendance day.  I know not all people can pull it off (with school and work committments), however it was a real joy to get around the park.  There were crowds and lines (some line were in the 60 to 90 minute range), but very manageable.  On heavy attendance days, I can't even imagine trying to deal with this park.  The very long lines for everything and people everywhere would make it a very bad experience.  I don't like crowds.  Today, we never had a problem getting on a ride, or finding a seat, or getting food.

We left the park around 3:30 pm - partly because we were done with Disney, and partially because we wanted to try to beat the Tokyo rush hour a bit.

We didn't.  The trains were already crowded.

Back in the Shinjuku area, we had a light dinner at Matusya - our favorite cheap-eat place.  We also went to the local JR office to activate our JR Rail Passes, and get reservations on the Shinkansen (Bullet Train) for Hiroshima on Friday.  We found the office and activated them without any problem.

Done for today - Tomorrow, a tour of Tokyo Police Department.