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Episode 312: Tokyo Disney Resort Trip Report
706 Plays6 days ago
On This Episode
The guys welcome longtime listener Kerry to share her recent trip report from Tokyo Disney Resort. Kerry talks about using DVC points to book a stay at the Tokyo Disneyland Hotel and how the experience compares to stateside Disney hotels. She gives a detailed overview of both parks, including tips for navigating Tokyo DisneySea and the benefits of “Happy Entry” for hotel guests. Highlights include Fantasy Springs at DisneySea, with new attractions themed to Frozen, Peter Pan, and Tangled, and the impressive Beauty and the Beast ride at Tokyo Disneyland. The group also discusses the cultural differences in the parks, from food options to merchandise, and Kerry shares her thoughts on crowd strategies, Premier Access, and the local obsession with Duffy and Friends.
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Transcript
Introduction to Welcome Home Podcast
00:00:06
Speaker
This is Skipper Albert A. Wall, the voice of the jungle, broadcasting on the DVC to all voice unknown. If you're within the sound of my voice, you're listening to Welcome Home Podcast on the DVC.
00:00:25
Speaker
Music Music
00:00:30
Speaker
Hello and welcome
Episode 312 Sponsorship & Host Introduction
00:00:31
Speaker
home. This episode of Welcome Home is brought to you by DVC Resale Market. Thank you for joining us on episode 312 of Welcome Home, a Disney Parks and Vacation Club podcast. I'm Tom, here with Trevor. How's it going, Trevor? Hey, pretty good. How's your weekend been so far, Tom?
00:00:44
Speaker
I'm not going to talk about another Carowind trip. That would feel excessive. yeah but we we I was secretly wondering, but
Tom's Carowinds Experience
00:00:52
Speaker
yeah. I figured, I mean, if you're going another weekend, that's great. But yeah, we don't need to talk about it again.
00:00:58
Speaker
i We did. It's funny, though, because so we went with my sister. and because My sister you know doesn't get to do these things a lot. you know a lot and she was She's a big rollercoaster person, and so she wanted to go on some rollercoasters.
00:01:10
Speaker
They have one there that like launches you. like and We were trying to figure out actually how they do this, and but they basically... it like It's a fairly slow coaster. only goes like 45 miles per hour. It's called Copperhead Strike. And basically, it hangs you upside down, basically, through the first loop and through all the inversions. It kind of just gives you momentary hanging upside down time. Sounds like a Velozicoaster. Yeah, but I was just watching it. I'm like, hmm. I was like, there's got to be like some they're like weighing them before beforehand because you have to have perfect speed in order to pull off what they do with this ride.
00:01:45
Speaker
um But anyway, yeah, so it was good. We we had a fun day again. But um yeah, no, it's it's all as well. Anyway, let's Okay, so so I guess we're not going to talk about
Trevor Introduces Carrie
00:01:54
Speaker
carowinds again. We actually have more far more interesting things to talk about. Not to say carowind stuff is not interesting. How dare you, Trevor?
00:02:01
Speaker
But we do have a special guest with us today. Yes. so i you or yeah actually you know I'll introduce Carrie. Carrie is one of our listeners who we actually hung out with her for a day in Disney World back in 2022 when we did the meetup.
00:02:18
Speaker
Carrie is here to tell us about
Carrie's Tokyo Disney Planning
00:02:20
Speaker
some other stuff. So thanks for joining us, Carrie. Sure. First time, long time listener, first time caller. ah yeah we we were We were chatting before the before the episode started here that Carrie is one of the few people that can vouch for the fact that I've been on Space Mountain because Carrie rode Space Mountain with me.
00:02:36
Speaker
yeah She was with us and yeah in the ride. Yeah, I want to saw it live. and see That's right. And i I absolutely did not pay Carrie off for this for this for this confirmation. So ah but but Carrie's but Carrie, you listen a long time you've been a longtime listener. and And we're excited to have you on to to talk about your trip to ah to Tokyo.
00:02:55
Speaker
Yep. I am excited to share share it with you guys. Yes. So tell us all about it. Let's let's hear about it. Sure. So I beginning. Well, I was there a couple of weeks ago. i actually started planning it probably almost a year ago.
00:03:09
Speaker
um just kind of had this spark that I was i was going to go. i wanted to go. And i try to go to Disney like every six months. So it kind of it fit in good with my pattern. My husband's okay with not going to Disney every six months.
00:03:24
Speaker
And my kids are grown up, so i don't have to worry about leaving anyone behind that wishes they were with me. so um So I actually went with a friend and it's very different because when you're used to going to Disneyland in California or Disney in Orlando, you know, you know, it's like, I know it like the back of my hand.
Booking & Hotel Experiences in Tokyo
00:03:43
Speaker
I don't have to do a lot of planning. Like I might be looking to see if there's anything special happening or if there's anything I haven't seen yet that I want to make sure to fit into that trip.
00:03:52
Speaker
But this, it was like, i was, I felt like I was back in college. I was studying. i was looking up articles online. I was listening to podcasts. It was like it just by osmosis, I was just trying to absorb all this information about Tokyo Disney.
00:04:09
Speaker
Well, it's different too, because it's just like a whole cultural difference, right? Because it's like, right you know, you you're talking about different language being spoken there, different, you know, cultural customs and things. It's just a whole different can of worms, right? Yes, it is very different.
00:04:23
Speaker
And um so what I did was I used my membership, I used our DVC points to book our hotel at Tokyo Disneyland. And I had read that it was four months before the date that you should call.
00:04:36
Speaker
But then I actually called DVC and asked them questions about it because I wanted to have everything ready because I had heard sometimes you can't get in or, you know, I didn't know how hard it would be to get a room with the points.
00:04:48
Speaker
So I called in and kind of prepared myself and knew exactly what I had to do. And then it was actually three months out. So then we were checking in on June 16th. So on March 16th, first thing at nine o'clock in the morning,
00:05:01
Speaker
I called DBC and um told them what hotel I wanted to stay at. We stayed at Tokyo Disneyland hotel and i was able to get a room and it was so easy. i didn't have to try to navigate the, the Tokyo Disneyland website.
00:05:20
Speaker
And I know I see sometimes people ask like, is it worth using your points or should you, you know, use cash, maybe rent your points and use cash. And, I would say for me, it was so much easier to just book it through DVC and use the points.
00:05:35
Speaker
If you don't mind me asking how many points was it per night? It was two. Well, it it was i didn't have an a per night breakdown, but for the five nights that we were there, it was 285 points. okay and Which I didn't feel that was that bad.
00:05:49
Speaker
Sure. Yeah. i mean, because it's a it's not a actual DVC resort. Right. So, yeah, it's yeah. Yeah. I get that. Right. And the room was awesome. I mean, the hotel, if you can see, I can send you guys pictures if you want to put them online. Yeah, I was just pulling up pictures, actually. The lobby looks incredible. The hotel is beautiful. It's right across the street from Tokyo Disneyland.
00:06:09
Speaker
um And the room was unbelievable. So we had stayed for like four nights in Asakusa, Japan. And we were just in like this one room room.
Food & Convenience at Tokyo Disney
00:06:21
Speaker
you know, with like a bed on the floor and, you know, for like the first four nights when we walked into Tokyo Disneyland hotel, we felt like we were walking into this five-star hotel. I mean, it was beautiful. It was so nice.
00:06:35
Speaker
it definitely is giving me Grand Flaherty and vibes. at it Yeah. Yeah. It was really nice. Um, the only, the drawback was just that at like you're used to in the States, you're used to have the hotels having kind of like a food court type place.
00:06:50
Speaker
where you can kind of go in and get things la carte. And they just didn't, they didn't really have that there. It was only restaurants. Right. So there's no like quick service. nowhere where you can go grab a quick snack. It's just kind of like write to sit down dinner or yeah know or nothing. and So, so what did you do in that case? If like, ah were you just going to the restaurants or were you finding other places? No, there was but like a little convenience store. Like they all have the little markets.
00:07:15
Speaker
And so in the markets, they had, you know, they had like ramen you could get and take back to the room and they had like a hot pot. So you could like if you needed to boil water in the room. um And then but they also had sandwiches and roll ups. And it got to a point because we were eating a lot of different foods while we were there. Like I was like you know what I miss? Just a sandwich. And they did have those there. So it was nice to be able to like get something a little more familiar And then they had, you know, they had like ice cream and snacks and some like toiletries type things, but it's all Japanese.
00:07:50
Speaker
So, ah you know, unless it's obvious, you're getting out your Google translator to figure out what something is. So that was interesting. Sorry, this market, that this wasn't like a Disney run thing. It was just like store? No, it was in the hotel. It was in the hotel. Oh, okay.
00:08:03
Speaker
Yeah. Okay. Got it. So, yeah. So kind of like when you go to the other Disney resorts, how they always have like that market where you can go in and get frozen pizza and soda and that type of stuff. Yeah. So we did a couple nights.
00:08:14
Speaker
um I think there were two nights we came back after from the resorts and just stopped in there and grabbed something and took it back to our room. Cool. All right. yeah um so So but besides that, or okay, so so um I guess you said you were staying at the Tokyo Disneyland Hotel.
Early Entry & Cultural Observations
00:08:33
Speaker
Yes.
00:08:33
Speaker
um Were you within walking distance of Tokyo Disneyland or how is yeah the transportation situation getting? So Tokyo Disneyland is directly across from the hotel.
00:08:44
Speaker
um So we just, the day we went to Tokyo Disneyland, we just walked out, walked across. And if you're staying at the hotel, you get something called happy entry. And basically, you you can get in 15 minutes early.
00:09:01
Speaker
okay get in So there's a special entrance for people staying at the hotel. And another thing that's different about the Tokyo Disney Resorts is that it's visited by a lot of locals go there. that mean, it it really is kind of targeted toward the locals. The tickets are $58 a day. Oh, wow.
00:09:19
Speaker
ah day So we went to three days of the park for less than it cost to go to one day for the park at Disney World. Yeah, that's great. And um so, and I had heard in the in the podcast that I had listened to that you need, that you, it was highly recommended that you get to the gate two hours before the park opens if you don't have happy entry.
00:09:42
Speaker
so so So that 15 minutes is really is actually a huge benefit. Like 15 minutes sounds silly, but 15 minutes actually is a decent benefit considering how busy it gets. Because as soon as you get in, you can start buying Premier Access, Disney Premier Access, which is like their lightning lane.
00:10:01
Speaker
And you can start getting they have this other ticket called 40th Anniversary Pass, which is kind of like a fast pass. and And you cannot get those until you are you have to be in the park and logged into the Tokyo Disney Resort app.
00:10:15
Speaker
yeah So the locals get there two hours before because it's but when they open the doors, they open at nine o'clock. And when they open the doors, then you want to be one of the first people into the park because it takes a while. I think the one day we were not going to do two hours.
00:10:35
Speaker
I think the first day we went to Tokyo DisneySea, we got there maybe an hour and a half before it opened. 94 degrees, sunny, standing outside, waiting to get into this park. and all the locals have umbrellas for shade.
00:10:51
Speaker
They have long sleeves. You know, they're not like Americans where we're trying to, like, get as much sun on our skin as possible. You know, they are, like, covered up. But they've got these, ah it's just this sea of umbrellas. I think I have a picture I can send you to that just shows you the crowd standing there waiting two hours before the park opens.
00:11:10
Speaker
Wow.
Ride Experiences & Premier Passes
00:11:11
Speaker
And I think the day we got there an hour and a half, we probably ended up getting into the park at about 9.30. Wow. Because it took a while to get in. So it opened at 9?
00:11:21
Speaker
Yeah. Okay. Yeah. So then as soon as you get in, you have to try to get on the app. And then it's like, you need to make sure too, I think because we had been there already for, you know, like half like four or five days, my credit card company knew I was there.
00:11:35
Speaker
So I didn't have any issues because you have to like charge your premier pass to your credit card. and And I heard on a lot of the podcast people having issues with their credit card getting declined.
00:11:47
Speaker
But I made sure that I let every card I own know that I was going to be in Japan, whether whether they said you had to or not, because I didn't want to. have to deal with that once I got in through the gates. That makes sense.
00:11:59
Speaker
Yeah. So that's why like the 15 minutes makes a huge difference because you get in the door and you can start reserving. You can only reserve one premier access pass at a time and you can only get one 40th anniversary pass at a time.
00:12:14
Speaker
And then there's certain rides that you can get either of them for. And then there's certain shows too that you can get the premier access pass for as well. And those passes, so for the Premier Access Pass, was between 1,500 to 2,500 yen per person.
00:12:32
Speaker
So that was about $13 to about $21. dollars and So even then, you know, if you think about it, like how much you pay for Lightning Lane.
00:12:44
Speaker
Yeah, it's about the same. Yeah, like my friend and I, we were just like, you know what? <unk> whatever we decide we want to pay for, we're just going to pay for it because it's been so cheap to get into the park to begin with.
00:12:56
Speaker
um So we definitely took advantage of that. And at Tokyo DisneySea, when you go in, that was it was a little rougher there because we had no context for the layout of the park. and you only and you know they don't give out the paper maps anymore, so you really are only you only have your phone You know, and you're trying to look at this map of this whole park on your phone.
00:13:22
Speaker
And I always struggle with that. i get that. And, you know, so we were just kind of trying to get our bearings. And a year ago at Tokyo DisneySea, they opened Fantasy Springs.
00:13:35
Speaker
was like the newest part that they added on. And I know there was a lot in the news about that. Frozen and Peter Pan. It's really cool. Yeah. It's really cool stuff there. Right. So and that's where so the there's four rides in that section and three of them are the Disney Premier Access pass.
00:13:52
Speaker
okay And under strong recommendations to not do the Premier Access pass for Anna and Elsa's Frozen journey. I didn't because someone said that you'll miss the whole pre-show area and that that was like a really good part of the ride, that you didn't want to miss that.
00:14:10
Speaker
So the first day we went, we didn't do premiere pass for that, and lines were usually two to three hours. So we went on that ride the second day that we went to Tokyo DisneySea.
00:14:21
Speaker
So we went to Tokyo DisneySea on Tuesday. Wednesday, we went to Tokyo Disneyland, and then Thursday, we went to Tokyo DisneySea. um And so it was nice the second day because we kind of had a better we had a lay of the land.
00:14:34
Speaker
We kind of had a better idea where things were after kind of like traipsing around there. And it's a big park. You know, it's it's kind of like you didn't want to be going from Mexico to Canada three times, you know, in a day. you kind of So you kind of wanted to try to figure out where things were so you weren't crossing the park.
00:14:52
Speaker
And when you buy the Premier Access Pass or the 40th anniversary pass, you pick a time. So you kind of have to try to gauge like where you think you might be you know so that you you aren't like you know dragging yourself across the park multiple times.
00:15:07
Speaker
So the first one that we did was Rapunzel's Lantern Festival in Fantasy Springs. And that was really neat. And you definitely do see a difference in the animatronics. When you go on the Frozen ride in Epcot, everyone talks about kind of the projection faces that they do.
00:15:26
Speaker
Yeah. on those you know and they don't they don't do that at all in japan and they they look awesome ah mean the faces look really good that was a really neat ride and it ends with this really beautiful scene where you're like in the water and all the lanterns are around you but it so sure Oh, really? It's like, yeah, that ride is so short. Yeah, because I've seen videos of it, but didn't realize it was that short. Would you compare to Navi River Journey short? Yeah. Yeah, it might even be shorter than that.
00:16:00
Speaker
Oh, wow. And it's just like, you know, you're you're going through and it's like, you know, that the lantern scene is the well, I knew that the lantern scene was the last scene. And when we got, I'm like, are we here already?
00:16:12
Speaker
This, this is going to be thirty over, you know, and it was over. yeah So, you know, so it was, it was nice, but it was too short. Okay. And then, um, the other ride we went on and that day, then once, as soon as you get like scan your premier pass, you can buy another premier pass.
00:16:29
Speaker
So then while we were doing that, I bought Peter Pan's Neverland Adventure. So there's the Peter Pan's Neverland Adventure in Fantasy Springs, and they still have the Peter Pan's flight at Disneyland.
00:16:42
Speaker
So they have both. so Yeah. yeah And the Peter Pan's Neverland Adventure is a lot of screens. It's animatronics, but it's screens. And the boat holds, like the ship holds like nine people.
00:16:55
Speaker
so it's like a Pirates of the Caribbean kind of Kind of, but you're still, right. It looks like a bigger ship. You know, it looks like a pirate ship. And then you're like, there's like three rows that you sit in and then you go in and it's, it's kind of like the um Peter Pan's flight on steroids.
00:17:13
Speaker
ah um It was really neat, but I actually got a little motion sickness on that one. yeah i i learned about screens the hard way universal i know what you're talking about yeah yeah screens sound good but they're not it's like as you get older your equilibrium just doesn't recover as quickly and yeah yeah um so so it was neat but i just didn't enjoy it as much and my friend who did not get motion sickness said she thought it was okay too so it wasn't just it wasn't just that and then um
00:17:45
Speaker
The other ride we went on in that section that day was Tinkerbell's Busy Buggies. And basically you are shrunken down to Tinkerbell size and you're helping her deliver packages around Neverland.
00:17:59
Speaker
And it was super cute. it was It was a very cute ride. um The animatronics on there were really, um really well done. And um it was just a really detailed, very well done ride.
00:18:13
Speaker
Definitely not a thriller, but it was it was fun. What type of, like, was it, sorry, when you're describing it, envisioning like a Ratatouille or Mickey's Runaway Railway, like a truckless ride thing? No, it's kind of more like a dark ride or, you know, more like the dark rides, like um almost kind of like Pooh's, you know Winnie the Pooh at Disney World at Magic Kingdom.
00:18:36
Speaker
But you're in a buggy and part of it is outside, Like most of it, you're actually outside. You're on the track and you're just riding through this ride and you're making different stops to like, like you're delivering packages for her. Yeah. I was going to say kind of like Alice in Wonderland then where like it goes in and out of the building.
00:18:53
Speaker
Yeah. Probably like that. Yeah. Like I don't know Disneyland as well. I've only been there a couple of times. So yeah, you'll definitely have to, you'll, you'll probably see some of the, or be able to explain maybe some of the ah similarities. Cause some of them I did think were more like California.
00:19:08
Speaker
Hmm. Okay. Okay. And then when we did go on, the then the second day we went, we did go on Anna and ahnna and Elsa's frozen journey. And we drew the line at waiting three hours.
00:19:22
Speaker
So like, I think the one time we saw it was just under like two hours. We're like, all right, we'll get in line. And it was so hot and sunny every day we were there. And i just, I said, they missed such an opportunity in frozen land.
00:19:38
Speaker
that they could have had frozen treats available like every 50 feet. and they Constantly. You're standing in this huge line. Yeah. I mean, they could have been selling water. They could have been selling frozen stuff. Like at one point, I left my friend in the line and went to see if I could find something close enough, and I couldn't find anything. And I'm like, you're kidding me. We're in frozen land, and we can't get an ice cream.
00:20:01
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah, lots of frozen treats. But it is very well-themed. It's like you're in Arendelle and there's icebergs. It looks like there's icebergs. And um and that ride is probably the most popular ride there right now. With good reason, though, right? i mean Right, it's right. yeah And it is it's like um if you think of it's just a very elaborate version of the frozen ride in Norway. It's like three times the size and length.
00:20:31
Speaker
It's just, it's very well done. um And it was, it was worth it to wait. Like, again, I wouldn't wait three hours, but when you go in, you're actually going through their castle. So you're going through different rooms of the castle.
00:20:46
Speaker
And that's what I guess the person that I had listened to on this other podcast felt was worth waiting in line for. So going it was, it was neat, but I like, I don't think I would have really missed out if we had bought a premier pass for it. But They do sell out, too. So there's a chance that we might not have been able to get it.
00:21:05
Speaker
Because I know the first day we were there, you couldn't even get it. It was gone by the time we got into the park. So but that was I do have a question for you. ah Because you were saying, like, you know, you wouldn't wait three hours for that ride. Something I've understood about Tokyo Disney is that while the lines can be very long, it the actual wait times are usually never that long when when you were there did you ever did you ever end up in a situation where you're in like an hour plus long ride or were they all relatively sorry queue but not ride but yeah the longest we waited was for a ride was we did get in line for um journey to the center of the earth which is like it's it's this really awesome it's this weird roller coaster like ride where you're going to the center of the earth it's based on you know jules verne
00:21:54
Speaker
That ride we did wait a little longer for. We probably waited over an hour for that one. And then um Indiana Jones, we they have um Temple of the Crystal Skull yeah they're at toki Tokyo DisneySea as well.
00:22:11
Speaker
And the first time we went on it, that's like the only ride that has single rider. And it felt like we were waiting forever in the single rider line. We're like, these people have too many even numbered parties.
00:22:22
Speaker
We're not utilized. How dare I know that? But yeah i mean but we like when we first walked in, we were cruising past a lot of people. And I'm sure we still got on faster than if we would have gotten in the end of the line.
00:22:36
Speaker
um And we actually rode. That's the only ride we did twice. We did it both days we were there. And the second day, I used the 40th anniversary pass to ride it. So then we didn't have to we didn't have to wait I know i know you said you haven't been to Disneyland a lot, but how would you compare the Indiana Jones ride between Disneyland and Tokyo Disney? Disneyland isn't um Kingdom of the Crystal Skull, though, is it? Yeah, it's Temple of the Forbidden Eye.
00:23:05
Speaker
Okay. I know that there are different rides, but it looks like it's the type of ride vehicle. yeah it's Yeah, it's the dinosaur ride vehicle. Yeah, like how the ride works is the same as far as scenery.
00:23:18
Speaker
I think it's a little different. Okay. Like the theming is a little different. But yeah, we liked that one. That's why we ended up going on that one twice. We probably would have gone on Journey to the Center of the Earth again, too, but we just didn't want to wait in line.
00:23:31
Speaker
Yeah, I've heard the animatronic at the end of that, because that's basically it's it's the same test track like kind of system, but ah that that the animatronic at the end of it is nuts. Yeah, yeah. It was it just got weirder and weirder.
00:23:42
Speaker
i feel like that In a good way, though. Yeah, yeah. Because you were getting deeper and deeper into the center of the Earth. And so things were getting very. subterranean that's an interesting way to describe it but makes sense yeah but yeah it's like you know you like at first you're kind of seeing stuff like oh okay yeah and then it's like it starts getting a little weirder and weirder yeah and then at the end yeah but we liked that we thought that one was pretty good too um and and that was nice because it was like kind of all indoors and underground so it was a cooler you weren't standing out in the sun um and that's like the part
00:24:17
Speaker
where you like for the rides when the line's a little longer, that's when you're kind of stuck out in the sun. um And I think they could maybe do a little bit better job with shade. And like I said, just having stuff available.
00:24:28
Speaker
The days we were at Disney Sea, I said to my friend, I said, it's so ironic that we're like dying. they're making They're making announcements about making sure to get in the shade and drink water.
00:24:42
Speaker
It really wasn't that easy to find water. And you're surrounded by it. I said to my friend, i like I said, it's like that quote, water, water everywhere and not a drop to drink. I'm like, I'm like, that's just what I kept thinking of the whole time.
00:24:56
Speaker
Another ride that they have there is Aquatopia, which is instead of Autotopia, you're on these boats and there it's a trackless ride, but you can see like these, like almost like these paint marks on the, you know, under the water.
00:25:11
Speaker
So it's like it kind of ran. It's there must be a randomizer that takes you through. So like it's never the same. And there's two different sides to the ride. um And the other side, there was like a tunnel that it looked like the boat, like the the I shouldn't even it wasn't even really a boat. It's just a vehicle took you through. And we wanted to do that. So we did go on that ride twice, too, because we wanted to try to go through that tunnel. But our random track did not take us that way.
00:25:37
Speaker
And we read that on in the summer. there's a like an alternate version that they can use where you actually get wet i i saw that on because i'm on their site as we're talking here and they said like uh they they said they have a version yeah what is it it says autotopia uh get soaked version yeah we wish july 2nd to the yeah fifteenth i don't know why they were waiting till july 2nd because it was hot i mean it's like and that's another thing it's like you're so close to the water and you're not getting wet It's like you wanted you know he's like you wanted to get wet and you just didn't. It's can I fall out of my ride? Yeah, it was a little bit torture with all the water being around in your soul. And it's, you know, so you're trying to find water and like a lot of the booths you'd go up to they're more concerned about the flavored popcorn than they are about water, selling bottled water.
00:26:24
Speaker
that makes sense. So, yeah, but that was, that was fun. Um, and then we also in that section, so the sections are all based on like different waterfronts.
Cultural & Language Differences
00:26:35
Speaker
So like, um,
00:26:36
Speaker
Port Discovery was kind of more generic. That's where Aquatopia was. And then there also um was Nemo and Friends Sea Rider. And that was very cute. You go in and it's like you're getting shrunken down and you're you're going into this submarine that's shaped like Nemo.
00:26:53
Speaker
And that's also screens. But I was okay that day because I had my patch on. So I was, that day I was fine. But, and that one I did not, I mean, that one was fine. I was a little worried when I realized it was just kind of a motion simulator, but it was good.
00:27:06
Speaker
was very cute. And one of the things that stood out on that ride was that, you know how on a lot of the rides at Disney you go in and it's like a recorded message or something that gets you ready for the ride.
00:27:19
Speaker
These are all done live. There are past members and they are enthusiastic and they are palm And they are like, you know, we didn't know what they were saying, but they were like telling you about the ride and they were excited about it. And they were getting you excited about it, even though we didn't know what they were saying.
00:27:37
Speaker
um So so there's there's nothing in English at all. Like you don't hear any English? No, very little. Some of the recorded announcements, they'll be in English and Japanese. and I don't know if there were any other languages, um but the names of the rides are all in English.
00:27:54
Speaker
So like the signs for the rides are in English. And every once in a while, you'd hear a random English word thrown in there. And we'd be kind of like, well, why was that word English?
00:28:04
Speaker
but the rest But the rest wasn't. um So that was kind of interesting. um The one thing we went on, think that was at at Tokyo Disneyland. When we went on this, there was a stitch ride. It was the stitch encounter.
00:28:19
Speaker
And I was thinking it was going to be like the old dark ride. But it was, um I had read about it, so I knew it wasn't. but it was like Turtle Talk with Crush, but it was Stitch. Oh, really? so we Yeah, so we walked up to that, and the cast members actually stopped us and said, this is all in Japanese. Just so you know, this whole thing is in Japanese. And we were like... It's in English, though. Yeah, ah in broken English.
00:28:43
Speaker
And we were like, That's okay. We'll go anyway. You know, so we go in and it was like laugh lore, like Monsters Inc. Laugh lore where they're kind of like, you know, they pick people in the audience and they'd show them on the screen and then Stitch would say something.
00:28:56
Speaker
so that whole entire thing was in Japanese. They were laughing hysterically. We had no idea. like We were laughing because everyone else was laughing and it was cute, but we really had no idea but what was going on or what was being said.
00:29:12
Speaker
we're like, well, they warned us. they They also have a Tiki room with a Stitch in Yes, that's at Disneyland, too. We did that. um Stitch has supposedly crash landed in front of the Tiki room and taken it over. That was I liked that. i was um I've seen the Tiki room many, many times over the years, and it was refreshing to have something a little different in there. um And it was much better than when just um ah yaago yeah yeah go and um zazu took it yes took it over yeah much better than that that was well this was good that's good and now that the new movie is the the highest grossing movie in the world uh it's it's i mean for 2025 i'm that's i'm sure that's that's helpful for the attraction too i'm sure that's making it even more popular well and the japanese love their characters they love their plushies
00:30:02
Speaker
Like they come, they're fully loaded when they come to the parks. They've got see-through backpacks that their plushies are looking out at you from. They wear them around their waist. They were, even the guys carry around all their plushies. Like, you know, which animal is, or which character is the favorite of like anyone, that just about anyone there. Wow.
00:30:23
Speaker
Like the, even the guys were sparkling um ears. And um we also saw a lot of people wearing, Mickey Mouse shaped sunglasses.
00:30:34
Speaker
And that's that's all. the like if you Like my friend forgot her sunglasses and she had to buy some and they told us that they had them in the gift shop on the way to the park. And we stopped in there. Well, all they had were Mickey Mouse shaped sunglasses. and So my friend's like, well, I'm not getting those.
00:30:48
Speaker
And then when we were at the park and she decided she really needed some, she got them. it shows I would have just said, okay, this is what I'm wearing. yeah And that's like what everyone was wearing were these Mickey Mouse shaped sunglasses. And I just saw something. It looks like they're going to have them at Disney World.
00:31:05
Speaker
I thought I saw something online. I have seen the glasses you're talking about. yeah So yeah yeah, they are making their way over here. Yep. So they are the hot ticket. And just like the plushies too, because I know you were talking about that on last week's episode about um you know how they're bringing a lot of the Japanese...
00:31:22
Speaker
yeah um stuffed animals to the parks. That's because people like eat them up in Japan. i mean, if and they'll have them like in every size, if someone likes Donald Duck, they'll have like every size plushie of Donald Duck.
00:31:37
Speaker
I'm sure there's quite a black market for some of that stuff too. And like eBay and stuff, I bet. And Disney's finally realizing it's like, oh, well there's a black market for this. There's demand for it. we should just start selling it.
00:31:47
Speaker
yeah you know Yeah. I'm surprised they didn't do it sooner. And then at Tokyo Disney, it's just not as like Mickey Mouse centric as like, you know, Mickey and Friends centric. It's more Duffy. And Duffy is Mickey Mouse's stuffed animal.
00:32:03
Speaker
um And it's Duffy and Friends is really like the big character more so there. And you see a lot of that at Tokyo DisneySea. um So, yeah, that that tracks with what we've talked about on the show. Yeah, people people love Duffy. But yeah you saw it firsthand then that it would like it's not just a thing or it's not – it sounds like it's like, oh, yeah, they they have a Duffy store, but you're you're saying like Duffy is like the main feature. Oh, yeah, yeah. Duffy and his friends.
00:32:35
Speaker
Yes. And, again, people wearing every single character on their backpack or on their belt or just – Yeah, someone we saw someone carrying like this Duffy that was almost as big as them. And we're like, why would you want to carry that? you carry that?
00:32:50
Speaker
Especially when it's 94 degrees. Wait, wait. so So it's not that they were buying them and carrying them around. that people were No, they bring them from home. Yes. Oh, my gosh. That's interesting.
00:33:01
Speaker
Yeah. that's That's dedication right there. Yeah. but um But just to go over like a couple other quick things at Tokyo DisneySea, the Tower of Terror, we went on there.
00:33:13
Speaker
It's a different story. The building does not look, the building is very um fancy. It doesn't look like all beat up like the Twilight Zone Tower of Terror. And of course, the one at Disneyland is now Guardians the Galaxy.
00:33:27
Speaker
But the story here is that it was an explorer that was like a you know a rich explorer that yeah found some kind of like idol or something that cursed him. And he disappeared in the in this mansion.
00:33:42
Speaker
Yeah, I heard it's it's tied back to the... Sea, right? Sea, yeah. Society of Explorers and Adventurers. so So, yeah. yeah Yeah, I mean, i didn't i didn't that wasn't like really obvious, I don't think.
00:33:56
Speaker
But yeah. I also believe that the character in that is based on Joe Rohde. Oh, yeah, that could be. Yeah, I'm pretty sure that the character that you're talking, like the Explorer that is featured there is is actually, if you look at it, Joe Rohde, it might, it's it's either that one or one of the other Tower of Tarres. But if you if if you look that up, it looks like. From what I remember, i could see that.
00:34:17
Speaker
Yeah. yeah Like I didn't, ah it didn't jump out at me when we were there, but yeah. But it was still interesting. and like you And you do have like different sequences where you go up and you drop, you go up and you drop. You don't go all necessarily all the way up to the top and drop down.
00:34:32
Speaker
But it is just, you know, you're not like pulled into the scene or anything, but you're just, you do stop at some like rooms where you see things happening. And then, but you're just going up and down a couple times.
00:34:43
Speaker
That makes sense. Yep. And then Toy Story Mania, basically the same, but in Japanese. And then you walk through Woody's mouth to go into, so that was cool.
00:34:54
Speaker
But luckily you don't really need to know Japanese to understand. Right, right. And that's like shoot at stuff, right you know. Right, right. And then um they had this roller coaster there called Raging Spirits.
00:35:05
Speaker
it was It was okay. The big deal was that it had an upside down loop. Which Disney never does. Yeah. yeah so And that was just kind of in this lost river delta area with the Indiana Jones.
00:35:18
Speaker
um And then they had this in the Arabian Coast section. They had Sinbad's storybook voyage. It's basically like it's a small world, but it's the story of Sinbad. And it's very well done.
00:35:30
Speaker
if you didn't know it was there, you could easily walk right past it. Really? no It's not really obvious. Like you, you have to be looking for it. And it was really, it was, it was pretty well done. That was interesting.
00:35:42
Speaker
Um, I don't know if, you know, like I remember watching old Sinbad movies and knowing a little bit about, you know, Sinbad, but, um, but that's basically what it was. And,
00:35:52
Speaker
but was Now, was was it in, you said like the majority of the rides were all, um or like announcements and stuff were all in Japanese. was but So like Sinbad, was that all in Japanese? or like how it was There was like a song that was sung through the whole thing.
00:36:10
Speaker
And that might have been in English. The song might have been in English. um There wasn't like any narration or anything going on there. You just kind of got the story from riding the ride.
00:36:22
Speaker
um And then the other section there was the mermaid lagoon and it was this underground section and it was all little mermaid themed. And the best part about it was it was air conditioned so and down there. And it's like a lot of some of the rides that they have, like like jumping jellyfish. Do they have jumping jellyfish at California adventure or yeah, there was that ride in there. And there were some, so there were some rides inside that were more for like younger kids.
00:36:49
Speaker
And then there was like a, there was like a cafeteria style place to eat there. but so it So it sounds like they're toontown kind of area then. Yeah. But it was underground and air conditioned, which was like a big selling point for us. The key. It sounds great. We actually saw like parents sleeping at booths while kids were like,
00:37:09
Speaker
on the fault in that section. And then the so thing that we went to, there was a show called, um, believe sea of dreams. It's their nighttime show that they do on the main Harbor. There's like the Mediterranean Harbor and they do this, like it's, it's kind of like, uh, um, but with lights, you know, there's floats and they have all these lights and they're all like scenes from different Disney movies. That was, that was really neat.
00:37:35
Speaker
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Speaker
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Speaker
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00:38:26
Speaker
And then at Tokyo Disneyland, um The nice thing about that was that it's laid out pretty much the same as Magic Kingdom. So we were, you know, it was very easy to get our bearings there.
00:38:39
Speaker
And um I'm seeing that here. like I'm just looking at the maps on the website. Yeah. yeah Tokyo DisneySea seems very like jumbled together, whereas Disneyland is Disneyland. It follows it follows the model the model, the basic model. So you can kind of like figure out and it was easier to kind of get your bearings on, you know, where you needed to go.
00:39:01
Speaker
um And that they we did use our um we bought the Disney premiere access pass for the Beauty and the Beast ride, which is very, very well done.
00:39:14
Speaker
Oh, yeah. but You basically start out. You're standing like at the staircase and they show that there's a stained glass window and they kind of show you or tell you the same story that they tell you at the beginning of the Beauty and the Beast movie, how he became the beast.
00:39:28
Speaker
And then you go on and you you get into like a tea, you're in like this giant teacup and it's trackless and you go through and like you go through the scene of, um, be our guest and like food is showing up on the table. It's very well done. You're kind of like going around the table as different foods are showing up and they're singing the song.
00:39:49
Speaker
That was in English. Um, and then you went through different scenes of the movie. And then at the end, Where, you know, at the end of the Beauty and the Beast, where she saves his life, um it's like, it's magic. You don't even know, you can't even tell how they do it. It's the Beast is there in the final scene.
00:40:09
Speaker
And right in front of your eyes, he like spins or whatever and turns back into the prince. And you really can't tell. You don't know how they do it. It's one of those effects. Yeah. I've seen videos, but I'm sure in person it's even greater. Yeah. yeah That was really neat. So that was that was really that was a highlight.
00:40:27
Speaker
And um Splash Mountain there is clat is the classic Splash Mountain. so got Oh, i guess I guess it is still yeah the only one that is not Tiana's now, isn't it?
00:40:40
Speaker
So that was kind of nice. I mean, I just went on Tiana's, I think, last year for the first time. But that was night it was kind of fun to go on the the original Splash Mountain again. Yeah. um Was Sorry, was it...
Ride Comparisons: Tokyo vs. California
00:40:51
Speaker
um So the the Disneyland and Disney World Splash Mountain were a little bit different, where, like, Disney World had the side-by-side log, and Disneyland, you were sitting in a single row. what what Which one was it We were side-by-side.
00:41:04
Speaker
Okay, so it's like Disney World. All right. Yeah, yeah. So, yeah, so that was fun. um In Adventureland Pirates of the Caribbean, I had read was kind of more similar to the California version, which I love.
00:41:18
Speaker
Except it didn't go into like almost like a roller coaster type thing at the end. Like I remember the California one doing. um But it seemed like there was a lot more scenery at the beginning.
00:41:33
Speaker
And maybe this is how the California one is. Before you go down the drop into like the cannon fire. Yeah, there there's two sections in California that are like there's two drops. So there's the first drop and then you get into like a cave section that's way longer than Disney World. yeah And then, yeah, it kind of trend it starts to transition through like pirate ship and then you do the second drop. So, yeah, yeah, that's kind of that's how this was.
00:41:59
Speaker
And the pirates are still chasing the women in this one. They haven't. Oh, wow. They haven't changed anything around. They just haven't updated anything. And it did feel like you were closer to the pirates, like on this ride. I felt like you were closer to the scenery, that there wasn't as much space between the boat and the what was happening.
00:42:20
Speaker
So it's it's just like a more compact I think so, yeah it it felt like yeah. It felt like you were in that more in the action. Interesting. Yeah. Yeah. And then the Jungle Cruise was very interesting because that was all in Japanese. was going to say, how was that? And it was hilarious, the captain that we had.
00:42:39
Speaker
um ah you know, she seemed funny. We didn't know for sure. People were laughing. But it was like just interesting as we went through the different scenes. And you kind of knew what she was saying, you know, like, you know, but the scenes were a little bit different, too.
00:42:54
Speaker
And the part where you go in through like the cavern was different. was um there were a little more special effects going on in there than i think what there is at magic kingdom but i took video of her a couple times just because the way like she just seemed so like hyper and like when she was talking and like you know doing her spiel um but yeah everyone on the boat was laughing except us and we need to we weren't in on the jokes she could have been talking about us the whole time we wouldn't have known um
00:43:25
Speaker
but And everyone was very nice, and every cast member. I mean, really just about anywhere in Japan. Like, everyone is so happy to serve you and help you. um it was you know so it's like it's not like a big shock when you're at Disney, but it's even more so you know at the at the parks.
00:43:43
Speaker
Big Thunder Mountain was closed. um We didn't go in Western. They call it Western Land. We didn't really even go to that area because Big Thunder Mountain was closed. um And I guess they still have the classic Country Bear Jamboree.
00:43:56
Speaker
show there but i was never a big fan of it to begin with so we did not go to that one um and then fantasyland it's a small world we were lucky to be there while it was featuring groot so right now they have this short yeah ive heard about that yeah they've got yeah and the marvel characters throughout interesting so groot is throughout like all throughout different groups and he's one of my favorites so you know i was like I should have gone on it a second time because I was too worried about taking pictures of Groot the first time. and
00:44:27
Speaker
And then like the other characters would join him on some. So like the Hulk is in there. um Thor was in there. Captain America. um Star Lord was in there.
00:44:39
Speaker
And then another thing they do in that um small world that I thought was a very, very interesting that I know they don't do at Magic Kingdom is they have the different Disney characters that They actually have them in the different countries.
00:44:54
Speaker
so it's not just the dolls. Yeah, like Stitches in Hawaii. Right. They actually have, like, the characters. So, like, even when Groot's not there, they still have all these Disney characters in there. Okay, nice. So I really, liked that. I thought that was really neat. I don't know if they would ever do that. You know, I don't know how often they refurb.
00:45:12
Speaker
briefer feel people would get upset i was gonna say i think so oh yeah i feel like anytime they change i mean because when they made those changes and it just said and disneyland trevor to to yeah small world like people got better upset yeah i don't know i really i liked it like i said someone who's been going on it's a small world for 50 years now i like i appreciate the this those touch the different touches they still have snow white's adventures there the dark ride And i gary I remember, yeah, I remember going on that like when I was a kid and when we went on it this time, it's like it just seemed to end so abruptly. Like all of a sudden you're like going through this scene and there's the the queen is or the the evil queen is trying to push the rock down and the like dwarfs are trying to keep it from coming down.
00:46:01
Speaker
And then the ride's over. yep That is exactly. And I was like, maybe my eyes were closed when I went on the time before. No, that is the Disneyland, that the old Disneyland experience for that ride. Yes. Yeah. I mean, like all of sudden, like, that's it. We don't know who wins. We don't know. Like, you know.
00:46:19
Speaker
yeah it It sounds like a lot of the rides are very like. Yeah. they They copied what was at Disneyland and they're kind of like stuck at a point in time. Yeah. Of what they did at Disneyland. Yeah.
00:46:32
Speaker
And they did have Pinocchio's duringing ju Daring Journey, but it's just a dark ride. I know it's like a boat ride in California. No, no, no. Is it a boat ride? No, I'm thinking of Alice in Wonderland is the boat ride.
00:46:44
Speaker
Or youre there there is the, oh, what is it? Oh, Storybook Garden. Yeah, Storybook Garden. Yes, okay. Because it it goes through Monstro's mouth. Okay, that's what made me think of that. Okay. yeah Yeah. Yeah, there there is still the... Pinocchio's Daring Journey. Yeah, this was the dark ride and you rode through that. That was okay.
00:47:02
Speaker
Peter Pan's Flight. How long do you think we waited to go on that? 45 minutes. It feels like a trick question. 20 minutes. Nice. I have never waited 20 minutes for Peter Pan's flight.
00:47:16
Speaker
That doesn't exist at Disney World. Yeah. And that was pretty much the same. So it's it was interesting to me that they've got Peter Pan's flight and then they've got this other Peter Pan ride, you know, at the at Tokyo Disney Sea. But yeah, I'm sure that might might be part of it because now Peter Pan's flight doesn't seem like that big of a deal if you've been on the other Peter Pan ride.
00:47:37
Speaker
I feel like there is also people are prioritizing different IPs differently within Disney. Probably, yeah. because Because I feel like Peter Pan, and like you were even saying, like you know like Duffy was is like a whole phenomenon over there.
00:47:51
Speaker
I don't think Peter Pan holds quite as much weight over there as it does in the ah and North American parts. like Yeah, that could be too. um And then Pooh's Honey Hunt, which is like the Winnie the Pooh ride at um magic Magic Kingdom.
00:48:07
Speaker
But it's longer and it's trackless. Yeah. I've heard it's way better. Yes. You spend a lot more time in the scenery. You spend you have a lot more time to really look around and see things and like the Huffleumps or, error you know, that scene.
00:48:22
Speaker
It's a lot more going on in there, too. um So, yeah, it's it's it's definitely more to it. The Haunted Mansion was basically the same as which version Well, I think Magic and Kingdom. Magic Kingdom.
00:48:37
Speaker
But I didn't. So it has the staircase room and all that? Yes. like Well, maybe not. Or so, you know, the Escher room, right? where Yeah. Yeah. yeah I don't know what I don't remember seeing that.
00:48:48
Speaker
And I did not see the hat box goes there either. So either missed it or they don't have Yeah. I don't think they have it, but yeah, it sounds like it's probably closer to the Disneyland version then because maybe maybe yeah only Florida got the Escher staircase. Yep, that's right. Because now that you say that, yep, I didn't miss it. But once you mentioned I'm like, yeah, I did not see that.
00:49:10
Speaker
um They seemed to focus a lot less on the bride. You know how like in the, there's all the different scenes with the bride and like how her her husband's died. And they still had the hanging...
00:49:23
Speaker
body up above the stretching room at the end you know at or you know at the beginning at the beginning of the ride when you're in the stretching room they still have the body hanging at the end body is still there and i isn't it florida still there in florida for some reason i thought it was gone they talked about hanging out at disneyland but they haven't done that at disneyland yet I think at certain points it has disappeared for maintenance or whatever. Maintenance. Yeah. I mean. Yeah.
00:49:51
Speaker
Yeah. You got to maintain those hanging bodies. Right. Yeah. Yeah. From what I remember, I was there in May. It was still there. it's still there because I feel like I always look. And I feel like the last time I was there, I'm like, oh, yeah, they it out. I think it's more difficult to see than it used to be. Yeah. Maybe. Yeah. Maybe that's what they did. Yeah.
00:50:12
Speaker
Yeah. And then Tomorrowland, we did go. I have not gone on Star Tours forever. And my friend, you know, I said to my friend, do you want to go on Star Tours? And she's like, sure, let's go on it.
00:50:23
Speaker
So we went on it. And so um the version that we got was Andor. And we've I've never watched that before. My husband and I have since started watching it.
00:50:34
Speaker
And um so I recognized the character. And all the um locals that were on the ride with us went crazy when he showed up. really So he must be very popular in Japan. They were quite excited that that was the version that we were getting.
00:50:49
Speaker
That was in Japanese. um And they are rebuilding Space Mountain. the to i actually yeah i yeah I actually have a picture of them, like the built you know what it looks like.
00:51:00
Speaker
And so Buzz Lightyear is also closed right now. So I don't know if they're redoing that. because it's so you know I think they had to close it because they have that whole area closed off. And then we did the Monsters, Inc. ride and go seek where you go through and you have like a flashlight.
00:51:16
Speaker
And if you like flash, if you get your light on like the Monsters, Inc. logo, monsters would pop up. That's cool. They were like, hi yeah, that was cute. Is it like, or I guess kind of like um Buzz Lightyear, but you've got a flashlight. Yeah, you just have a flashlight and you just have to shine it on on their logo. Where anywhere you see a Monsters, Inc. logo, you shine it and then a monster pops up.
00:51:39
Speaker
Cool. or he would move or something. And then they also have there, the happy ride with Baymax. We did not go on this. Um, but it is the same ride as alien swirling saucers. Yeah. Yeah. Like alien swirling saucer or Tom or, um, Tomators. Yeah.
00:51:55
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. Junkyard jamber with rock, with rock music. Yeah. ah Okay. Yeah. make that So we didn't feel like we needed to go on that. Yeah. um yeah Okay. It is actually called the happy ride with Baymax. Yep. The happy ride with Baymax. That is so funny. But it is the exact same ride. Yeah. So we just stood there and watched it for a while, but we were like, okay, that's enough.
00:52:14
Speaker
And then in Tomorrowland, I did have the green alien Mochi. and You've probably seen that online. Oh, yeah. I've seen that. Yeah. I didn't really like It was kind of gross. That's fair.
00:52:27
Speaker
Yeah. The mochi was kind of thick, but it was cute. You know, and it was fun to take a picture with one like on the fork yeah before I ate it. yeah But yeah, because it's like a rice.
00:52:40
Speaker
Yeah. Rice gluten thing. It can be very chewy. So yeah, yeah that that's fair. Yeah. And the other thing at um at Disneyland is we ate at this Queen of Hearts banquet hall.
00:52:51
Speaker
and oh I've heard of this. that was That was one of the best places we ate. They had a swordfish meal there. And the it was a piece of swordfish, was i like something you get at a restaurant.
00:53:03
Speaker
And it was like 1600 yen. it was like $12. Yeah. so it was like twelve dollars You can't even get a burger for $12 at Disney. But swordfish is excellent. This was so good.
00:53:17
Speaker
And the the theming in there, like when I showed my family pictures, they thought it was a ride. And I said, no, this is just where we were. This is just where we ate lunch. It's a well-themed restaurant. Yes.
00:53:27
Speaker
And they're really trying to do damage control on the um the reputation of the Queen of Hearts. Because suddenly she's magnanimously inviting you into her for banquet hall for good food. That's very her. And then, um and the other thing that I, um that we did there too, that we bought the premier pass for was the Tokyo Disneyland electrical parade dream lights.
00:53:50
Speaker
And I wonder if this is the parade that's coming to the magic kingdom. i think, I think it's supposed to be different though. Right. Isn't it? Maybe similar though, because it's like, I feel like some of the stuff I've seen now, like preparing people for it to be at the magic kingdom is like the same float that started out or was in this show that we saw Tokyo Disneyland. So who is who is in this, or who do you remember in this parade? The Blue Fairy. The Blue, yeah, okay. Yeah. Yeah, the Blue Fairy is going to be kind of a big focal point. Yeah, the Blue Fairy. And that, so like I saw that and I was like, oh, I wonder if this is very similar, if not the same parade. But that was very, it was like the Electrical Light Parade.
00:54:32
Speaker
Very well done. But I assume because the the thing about the one in in Florida is that they're going to have like Coco and Moana and and like a lot of the newer shows. It sounds like they have like elements of it, but not they're not showcasing those.
00:54:50
Speaker
Right. The same characters. And it's it's hard to not like conflate the the one at the Magic Kingdom and the or the one at Tokyo Disneyland and the one at Tokyo DisneySea. Because the show on the harbor did have a lot of Coco and Moana and that stuff.
00:55:06
Speaker
And then this one was more like, I think it was like there was the pirate ship. There was Toy Story. um There was Ariel and Eric in the boat, you know, in the um Kiss the Girl scene.
00:55:17
Speaker
But for that, we were able to buy a premier pass and they have on the ground around the the route. They have numbers and letters. And so at a certain time, you have to go to this space. They clear everyone out that's in that space. And you have to show your premier pass.
00:55:35
Speaker
And that's you've got an assigned place where you can sit on the ground. You're sitting like or something. Yeah, we were we had like four-row seats. we had like But it was aunt sitting on the ground on these numbers.
00:55:47
Speaker
And everyone sat. People were very polite. Everyone could see. Everyone had good seats. Yeah. Yes, i've I've heard that is that they they don't people don't stand for the parades. Everybody sits down and yeah watches the parade. yeah And that was the same thing for the show that we saw at the um Tokyo Disney Sea. You had to sit.
00:56:07
Speaker
You couldn't, you know, if you were like in the front area, even though it was in the harbor, you know, like we were in an area that was a little more raised. So I think we could stand. And by then it was like standing was the last thing I wanted to do. But we were standing.
00:56:19
Speaker
And um and that show was very, you know, a lot of light focused. And that was a really neat show, too. You know, I kind of wish that they would somehow enforce that in the the North American parts, parks that everybody sit down for shows like that, because I feel like it would be a lot.
00:56:35
Speaker
You can't tell Americans you can ever what I know. I know. But OK, just just let let me dream for a minute. hearing people i've seen canada yeah I think in you could get everybody to sit down. Yeah. Yeah.
00:56:49
Speaker
You know how many times I've seen a cast member ask a person to move or to do something during a parade and and people are like getting ready to fight them. Like i it's it's crazy. Oh, it's terrible. But, you know, listen, it i or and Or the moms that get the attitude right away because someone told them that they couldn't be in a certain area.
00:57:07
Speaker
I mean, listen, I'm a very mild-mannered person. I think everyone realizes that by now. And I've almost gotten adulterations with people the nighttime version shows. Because, you know, like, that people just get rude. And it's like, I mean, you know, you fill in a spot and then there's like, oh, well, I'm saving this spot. I'm like, for whom?
00:57:22
Speaker
Like, where where are they? Yeah. I mean, are they and then, you know, I think I've seen people eat eat entire meals, like bring a whole like meal over with them to from a quick service to, you know, and have and and, you know, sit in front of everybody. i Listen, I am also to the person that puts my daughter on my shoulders. But any time I put my daughter my shoulders, i always make sure there's nobody behind me that I'm right. I try to. be not And part of that is because everybody is standing. But if everybody sat down.
00:57:47
Speaker
It wouldn't be the the fighting for positions because one, everyone would be able to see because you're not worrying about like right people blocking your view. And two, once you're sitting down, like, you know, you don't want to lose your spot. So. Probably you need 100% compliance for it. I know. and i know that yeah i know. We couldn't even put our feet into the road.
00:58:08
Speaker
Like, even though we were sitting right at the curb, we had to keep our feet on the other side of the curb. Like we couldn't even like have our feet out passed on the road. when we were in our spots.
00:58:18
Speaker
But I just thought that was a really interesting concept. Yeah, that, you know, just so numbers on the ground and you find it and you sit there. Well, not exactly the same thing in Disneyland. We we had that one time when we did um a, we had a reserve spot for Paint the Night and we were actually sitting at the front but they were very clear about there was a line or a tape line on the on the floor and they were like, you cannot put your feet past this. No, you couldn't, right. They said like,
00:58:46
Speaker
Kids, you know, cross your legs or back up so that you're not sticking your feet out past them. So and again, it's it's a safety thing, right? You know, they don't want, you know, people tripping that are, you know, trying to write move the floats along and stuff. Right. So I mean, they weren't that close, but still, I respected the I respected the boundaries and kept my feet under my legs.
00:59:09
Speaker
The scary part was at the end of the parade, my friend and I needing to get up. We were just like, we need to make sure we can get up before we get trampled.
Unique Popcorn & Merchandise
00:59:18
Speaker
Because that's real, too, is that once you get down on the ground, you need to start thinking about how you're going get back up.
00:59:28
Speaker
So, yeah, other than that, the other big thing is you may have heard that they're very big into the flavored popcorn there. They have a place there called the Big Pop where they had like 20 different buckets, popcorn buckets that you could choose from.
00:59:43
Speaker
my goodness. And but the one I really liked was ah a Monsters, Inc. themed one and it had a bunch of doors on it that you could open up and there were characters like in the doors. But I ended up getting the Tokyo Disney Resort bucket because it had like a relief of the whole of the parks on the top, like a map.
01:00:01
Speaker
And I thought that would be more of like a memory of being at the park. um So, okay. the So it's not, I'm thinking of like the popcorn buckets where it's just like the the single like molded plastic. These actually had like shapes.
01:00:15
Speaker
Well, this yeah this one was actually like a oval. It was like oval shaped, but then the lid of it, it would like lift, you know, lift up. There was a hinge at the back, but on the top of the lid, it's got like a relief map.
01:00:26
Speaker
of like all the different rides and different parts of Tokyo Disneyland and Tokyo Disney sea. Cool. So, yeah, so that's why that is very neat. Yeah. So I liked that one. Cause I, so like I said, I can look at it and like kind of remember what, you know, the different things that we did.
01:00:41
Speaker
um And then they had like all throughout the parks, there's different flavors of popcorn um in the shop where we bought the popcorn buckets. They own, they had salted caramel popcorn, which is what I got because I'm a sucker for salted caramel.
01:00:55
Speaker
My friend got Neapolitan. They had Neapolitan. Neapolitan, wow. They had honey. Outside of Pooh's Honey Hunt, they had honey-flavored popcorn. We did buy just a regular thing of that.
01:01:06
Speaker
um And it was it was good. and then But there was like all these weird flavors. Were you adventurous at all? No. They had like a roast beef-flavored. I think my friend kind of wanted to try it, but I didn't want to, so we didn't get that. There was a garlic-shrimp-flavored popcorn.
01:01:23
Speaker
um I can kind of see that I've had like shrimp flavored chips from like Japan. So I can see where that works. Yep. There was curry. There was a curry flavor, popcorn, barbecue, popcorn.
01:01:37
Speaker
But again, it was like, you know, and then there's always a line at the popcorn stand. so yeah But yeah, so we just we went at the end of the day, we went and bought our popcorn buckets. And it's interesting. So my popcorn bucket that I bought was like twenty eight hundred yen, which was around.
01:01:52
Speaker
Like what they were, maybe some were a little more, which was about $19. Wow, okay. well okay Compared to what, $30, $40 here. And then the popcorn refills were like $4. Interesting. At any booth, you could get more popcorn.
01:02:07
Speaker
But then and they also sold tongs that looked like Mickey gloves for $6 that you could use to pick up your popcorn so your fingers don't get sticky. Wait, so they that's incredibly smart. Like that would. Because I had those tongues at home, but to have those in the park is kind of cool.
01:02:24
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. yeah So, yeah, that was pretty much it. I hope I didn't go on too long.
Carrie's Overall Impressions & Advice
01:02:30
Speaker
No, no, no. That that was great. We we appreciate the the detail and letting us.
01:02:35
Speaker
Well, like I said, every night I was taking notes on my little sheet that I printed out of all the rides and everything so that I would remember because it was a little bit of a fever dream. i do I do have a couple quick questions, though.
01:02:47
Speaker
So did you like Tokyo DisneySea more Tokyo Disneyland more? Probably Tokyo Disneyland because it's more okay it's more Disney. Like Tokyo DisneySea, it's very cool, but it was just, and maybe because it was just not as comfortable there.
01:03:03
Speaker
i can see that. yeah Because we were trying to find our way around. It is very neat. I mean, it's very different. But it's not as Disney forward. Like, you don't see as much Disney characters. And like I said, the focus is really Duffy and Friends. You don't see a lot of Mickey Mouse or any of that there.
01:03:18
Speaker
Okay, so how about a favorite favorite attraction between the two parks? um I really liked Journey to the Center of the Earth. I don't know why. Something about it just...
01:03:30
Speaker
It's a very popular attraction. I know it's well regarded. I was disappointed that 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea was closed because I heard a lot about that too. And I wanted to do that. And we did the railway. We did the Disney train all the way around the park. I thought of you, Tom.
01:03:44
Speaker
And that was weird because like at first there was no scenery. But then like you started seeing some of the scenery, which I think they have at, I don't know if they have it at both Magic Kingdom and Disneyland.
01:03:55
Speaker
But then all of a sudden, you know, you're seeing like Indians and you're seeing wildlife, you know, all the animatronic stuff. And then all of a sudden you turn a corner and there's dinosaurs. And I said to my friend, traveled back in time. Yeah. and Yeah, that makes sense. Yeah, that that that's Disneyland Railroad has that. Yeah. So, yeah. let's Let's do coolest or weirdest food item that you had while you were there.
01:04:20
Speaker
Okay. So we went to, one of the places we went to eat was this Tomorrowland Terrace, which again is just like, you know, when you walk into Magic Kingdom and you go to the right toward Tomorrowland, there's always that big mysterious, like,
01:04:33
Speaker
You know it's a restaurant, but it's not always open. It's like that's only for After Hours. Yeah, they have that there, too. hard Yeah, they have that. And that was open. And we went in, and i bought i got this burger.
01:04:45
Speaker
It was called um Duckling's Dream Burger. I'm like, okay, what how bad could it be, or what can you do to a burger? It had like a half-inch thick, what I thought was bologna on top of it. But it I guess it was ham.
01:05:00
Speaker
Okay. It was too much. I did not. That was weird. I did not like that. um That was probably the me the only thing I had that I really was like, no. What about your favorite that you actually liked, though? Well, the swordfish. I'm a big swordfish fan. And the fact that I got this decent swordfish meal at Disney, it was, you know, that was like, yes, yes. It was like the perfect combination.
01:05:24
Speaker
yeah I mean, that but that makes sense. That tracks right. Yeah. They did have food and wine festival going on there too, but it was like, it's only in a certain part of Tokyo Disney sea. And again, it was just too overwhelming. The nice thing about, and it's kind of like, it's not like an obvious locations. It's kind of spread out amongst the places that already exist.
01:05:44
Speaker
Okay. So I thought we would maybe do more with that, but we really didn't like every once in a while when we stopped to eat somewhere, they might have something that was on the food and wine menu, but it's not like Epcot where you're so familiar with where you are.
01:05:57
Speaker
that it's very easy to like go to the different food stands. That makes sense. Yeah, so that was too much for us. That was another layer that we couldn't add on at this time.
01:06:08
Speaker
All right. Trevor, do you have any? No, you asked all the questions I wanted to know. yeah but the food The food and i mean the rides were the ride differences were the the big things that I was curious about. so yeah but Thank you again for sharing all this. period It's ah a great rundown of how same and different Tokyo Disney is from the North American parks. Yeah. Well, yeah. And just having to do all the, all the research and the prep I did, like by the time we were like on our way there, I'm like, I can't read anything more.
01:06:41
Speaker
Like whatever I know now, whatever I've absorbed through podcasts and what I've read is what I know. And then, you know, we're going to have to go from there. And it was, it was good, but yeah, it was, it was a lot of work, but it was worth it. Like, and even when I go to the regular Disney parks, I,
01:06:57
Speaker
Like i I do plan, but it's like you you're so familiar. It's not nearly as stressful as probably someone going for the first time. i actually just one question did spark in my head as you were saying that.
01:07:10
Speaker
You know, with all the planning and everything you did, um you know, knowing that there is a language barrier that you said a lot of the stuff is in Japanese. Do you feel or how did you feel navigating the park? Do you felt that like you wish you had like more like you're using Google to Translate more?
01:07:26
Speaker
Or did you feel like it was set up well enough that you were able to navigate it without having to in depth know the language? Well, we probably, yeah, we probably had to ask more people at Tokyo DisneySea. And a lot of times we would ask anytime we saw a cast member, all we really said was the name of the attraction we were trying to get to which they're probably, they're familiar with.
01:07:46
Speaker
And they would just point us in the direction. It's like, if you had to ask anything more than that, it was kind of touch and go. Like, you know, like when we, um I was asking a question somewhere and someone had to go get their like Google Translate to try to like understand what I was asking.
Managing Language Barriers in Japan
01:08:01
Speaker
And I would say that I don't think people there know English as much as you're led to believe they do. Like you might ask someone, do you speak English? And they'll say a little. Well, it's hard to kind of rein yourself in then once you start talking to them.
01:08:13
Speaker
But they're like yeah probably understanding. And even if we had like learned some Japanese, like there were some words here and there. But it's like you still can't have a conversation.
01:08:24
Speaker
So you're really just kind of speaking some words to be. you know, polite or, you know, but for the most part, like, yeah, we were able to get around the money thing. We had the converter on our calculators on our phone. So anytime we're, we were always typing in like what the yen was and we were always pleasantly surprised at what it, you know, what it came to.
01:08:44
Speaker
Shirts were way less expensive. um You know, shirts were probably between 20 and $30 compared to what you pay for t-shirts at, you know, at Magic Kingdom. So, but yeah, I felt like,
01:08:57
Speaker
the language thing I was okay with. I just looked up just to see whether they had like plaids there, the VIP tours, and they do actually. Well, you can buy a whole, part like you can get a whole ah package.
01:09:09
Speaker
yeah So like some people, if that don't want to do the, don't want to have to worry about any, like research or figuring anything out, you can buy a whole package. I've heard they're quite expensive and hard to get, but yes you basically get like the premier access. And I don't know, know, I don't think you have a guide, but you basically have everything you need.
01:09:28
Speaker
to go on like all the rides that you would buy premier access for. They do, they do though have, they do have like a, they do have plaids, right? So they have the, the actual, the, the same kind of situation. yes I did think we did see some people yeah being led around, but although it does say the tour guide will conduct the door to the tour in Japanese, you're unable to communicate Japanese.
01:09:47
Speaker
Then participants must arrange their own interpreter to accompany them. Even, even at the hotel, like sometimes it's like some of the stuff, Like you could get like stuff that they were used to doing all the time, like selling us the park tickets, the park passes and everything was fine. But then if you had a question about something, if you tried to call down to guest services, as soon as you started speaking, they would say, oh, let me get someone who speaks English.
01:10:12
Speaker
And then they'd have someone that come on to speak English. Well, they spoke English, but they didn't know the answers. So then they would have to go to a person that knew the answers but didn't speak English. basically like So that was a little painful. You feel like you're asking a very simple question and it sounds like they're like talking for a long time. Yeah.
01:10:31
Speaker
Yeah. Yeah. so That's that's a challenge. Right. Yeah. But yeah, I mean, I felt like we were fine, you know, for the most for the most part. um I felt like we got ah yeah around fine, but definitely not as much English speaking as.
01:10:44
Speaker
it's it I was led to believe based on some of the stuff that I read and listened to. Okay, that that's good to know because, yeah, i like I said, I've talked to a few different people that have been to Tokyo Disney and it it it sounds like, yeah, there there is definitely a benefit to at least knowing certain phrases and stuff like that. But, yeah, it sounded – or I was also like you under the impression that Tokyo Disney was – I mean, it sounds like they are definitely a lot more um friendly to English speaking, but very yeah don't don't assume that you're having full conversations. There was a couple of times where my friend was like, Carrie, they said they spoke a little English.
01:11:20
Speaker
Because, you know and it's kind of like you start talking and they're just kind of looking at you and shaking their heads like, yeah. ah Yeah. But and even... at the hotel, like every time we got into the elevator and the doors would close, there'd be Mickey and friends speaking Japanese.
01:11:36
Speaker
Like, but we don't know what they were saying, you know, like if they were, but it was like the same phrase you heard all the time. um But yeah, I think it was, you know, like I said, they're so friendly and so helpful that if they, you know, they'll say that they don't speak very good English, but then some people were very helpful. We were able to talk to them and we always told them your English was very good. You were very helpful.
01:11:57
Speaker
um And they seem to, appreciate that. So yeah, that makes sense. Well, thanks again, Carrie, for giving us thanks her thanks for having me on and letting me, yeah but letting me recap my, my trip.
01:12:11
Speaker
Well, it was, it was definitely, it's not as, I don't think it's as hard to attain as you would think. I, ah you know, I think it's, it was very doable and I don't think, you know, again, because it was just me, you know, it it only costs half the price, but I just feel like we were able to do it very reasonably. That's good.
01:12:28
Speaker
Yeah, it sounds like it wasn't that bad. So, I mean, obviously it costs a lot to get you there, but right yeah but if you research everything, it sounds like it sounds like the the trip is very much doable. You just got to take the time to understand. It is a lot of time. And that's what some of the pot other podcasts I listened to where they talked about their trips. It was like you can either spend time or money. That's always the yeah so is the trade
01:12:54
Speaker
But yeah, definitely was ah an awesome experience. And I can see why people, you know, come back and right away are talking about wanting to go again. um Very clean and very Disney.
01:13:06
Speaker
Great. right. Trevor, you want to go ahead and wrap us
Listener Engagement & Podcast Support
01:13:09
Speaker
up? All right. So, ah yeah. So as usual for us, you know, if you have any questions or you want to share a trip report with us by email, you can reach us by email at welcomehomepodcast at gmail.com.
01:13:21
Speaker
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Speaker
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Speaker
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01:14:14
Speaker
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01:14:33
Speaker
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01:15:01
Speaker
episode. You can find us on Apple Podcasts, Amazon Music, TuneIn, Stitcher, Spotify, YouTube.
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Speaker
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01:15:34
Speaker
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01:15:59
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this is Skipper Albert A. Wall, the voice of the jungle, signing off from Welcome Home Podcast on the DVC. We'll do a huddle when we hit a chair.
01:16:12
Speaker
How she can cuddle is no man's affair. I looked around from pole to pole, found her in a sugar bowl. Look out, here comes my ball and chain.
01:16:23
Speaker
The ball and chain.