Welcome to Disneyland Paris

The first day in Disneyland Paris started with some good old fashioned exploring. After checking into the Disneyland Hotel, we dropped the luggage in the room, rinsed off the recycled plane air, and put on our mouse ears. Cue adventure time…

I’m not sure why they changed the script from the Disneyland classic: “Here you leave today and enter the world of yesterday, tomorrow, and fantasy.” But, hey – you do you, DLP. I’m not gonna hate.

DLP’s Town Square and Main Street are very much like Disney World. So much space! I think they’ve really learned from their mistakes at Disneyland, where the Main Street sidewalks are made for ants and their baby ant strollers. Regular sized humans need not apply.

They also have these cleverly placed walkways throughout the park, so that parades down Main Street don’t cut off all traffic in and out of different lands. Now that is some real magic.

And you know what’s EVEN MORE MAGICAL!? This Dapper Dan barbershop that was ACTUALLY FULL OF PEOPLE GETTING THEIR BEARDS TRIMMED. Major freakout.

Anyway. *Collects self*.

We had lunch reservations at Walt’s, this hybrid kind-of-Carthay-Circle-kind-of-Club-33 restaurant along Main Street. We had some time to spare beforehand, so we wandered the shops and took in the all the cute French touches and idiosyncrasies.

Lesson one: DONUTS. Why don’t we have these!? Oh, right. We have the older, wiser, big brother to the donut – BEIGNETS!!! (Said in the YOUAREGETTINGACAR Oprah voice, obviously.)

Lesson two: The rest of the sweets at Disneyland Paris kind of suck. Sorry, but WHERE are the frosted Mickey-shaped cookies and Mickey apples and marshmallows and cake pops?! None to be seen; so sad. Don’t even get me started on the nonexistent Dole Whips.

Lesson three: Disneyland Paris merch game is strong. No surprises there. I wanted to buy everything. No surprises there, either.

Lesson four: The castle is so much more STUNNING in person. It’s absolutely my favorite castle of all the Disneylands I’ve been to so far. (Only three, but shhhhh.)

Lesson five and onward will have to continue tomorrow. This kid’s getting sleepy (and *spoiler alert!* it’s another full day of University of Copenhagen orientation tomorrow).

xx