Time for destination two on our Japan trip, Tokyo Disney Resort! Tokyo Disney is known by many as one of the best Disney parks in the world and after having finally been there myself, I agree! (I have been to 4 of the 6 parks around the world.) We spent 3 days (plus an evening) and 3 nights at the resort so we could pack as much in as possible. It still wasn't enough to see and do everything but we got to experience all of our must-dos. Be sure to check out my Tokyo Disney Resort trip planning guide if you haven't already!
As mentioned in my Tokyo recap, I will be going through each day of the trip sharing where we went, what we ate and where we stayed! This post will be slightly different because technically we were at Disney the whole time, ha ha. This is going to be a long post, so buckle up! Or just scroll down and look at the photos, ha ha.
Day 2 (Monday)
On Monday we spent the morning in Tokyo and made our way to Tokyo Disney a little after 3pm where we checked in to our first hotel of the visit and then headed into Tokyo Disneyland to check off a few items from our list! Before heading back to our room we took a monorail ride to our hotel for the next night to grab our Vacation Package documents so we wouldn't have to do that first thing in the morning.
Where We Stayed
For our first night we at the Tokyo Disneyland Hotel. The hotel itself is gorgeous, it felt like the Grand Floridian but magnified. I really enjoyed finding all the different artwork around the hotel as well. We had a view of the garden but some rooms have views of Tokyo Disneyland park which is literally steps away from the hotel entrance. I wish we had more time to fully explore the Disneyland Hotel but we got a great taste!
We stayed in a Beauty and the Beast themed room which I was very excited about. I had obviously seen photos of the room before we arrived but seeing it in person was still a surprise. The detail in every corner of the room was perfection. I wished we weren't going to the park for a few hours so we could truly soak it in, but with just 3 days we wanted to squeeze as much park time in as possible. We did enjoy some downtime in the fancy sitting area, and I woke up at 4am the next morning and couldn't go back to sleep so I was soaking the magic in. I think we got lucky with a larger room size because we were in the tower of the building so that was nice too.
Next time (if there is one) I'll want to stay in a Cinderella room and maybe plan a few more hours at the hotel since we won't have "first time" jitters of not being able to do everything we want.
I also had my best quick breakfast here. It was a chocolate croissant from the hotel's convenience store and it was AMAZING. I kept trying to find it at other convenience stores across Japan with no luck. So so sad.
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| This is the view of our room from the hallway window! |
What We Did
We walked in to Tokyo Disneyland around 5pm and used an Early Evening Passport so we didn't have to buy a full day ticket. The day we went the ticket allowed us to enter as early as 3pm because it was a holiday, but on weeknights the entry time is 5pm.
Our first order of business was walking down their Main Street toward Cinderella Castle! What's cool about Tokyo Disney's Main Street, which is called World Bazaar, is it is fully covered, this makes it a great place to hide if it rains and it's slightly warmer than being out in the elements!
Their castle is a replica of Walt Disney World's, so head to Tokyo if you miss the pre-50th anniversary color scheme of the castle. The area around the castle is a lot more open with lots of foliage and places to sit (and wait for parades.) You can also walk through the castle as part of Cinderella's Fairy Tale Hall attraction. Sadly we didn't get to experience this because it went down the next day just before we were going to go in.
After saying hello to the castle we made our way over to The Haunted Mansion Holiday Nightmare at 5:25! It was the last day being open so this was the catalyst for me wanting to head to the park for a few hours this evening. I had just done Disneyland California's Holiday overlay in October but Christian didn't go on that trip with me so this was his first time seeing it!
Next up we walked to Fantasyland so I could get the souvenir I was most excited about - a Winnie the Pooh popcorn bucket! Then it was time for dinner so we went to La Taverne de Gaston. See below for more details on both.
We sat for a while before finding a spot to sit for the Tokyo Disneyland Electrical Parade. And yes, I said sit. In Tokyo everyone sits for the parades and it is lovely! The woman in front of us offered me one of her padded seats for the parade which I gladly accepted because the ground was COLD. We got our own the following day as one of the free gifts included in our Vacation Package. I was never able to see the parade at Disney World so I was excited to finally see a version of it! It was so fun, I loved seeing all the characters featured. It will be fun to see the new Disney Starlight: Dream the Night Away parade that's opening at Disney World this year and compare the two.
Our last stop before leaving the park was House of Greetings so I could get some stamps to mail postcards to myself and my friend Kristen! I wrote out a couple postcards from our hotel room before we headed the the park. As I mentioned in my planning post, there's a special monthly park stamp when postcards are mailed from within the resort.
Before heading back to Tokyo Disneyland Hotel we took the monorail over to Fantasy Springs Hotel to pick up our Vacation Package documents. Since we weren't checking in until the following day we had to wait outside the hotel for a Cast Member to request our envelope to be brought out to us. Only guests staying at the hotel are allowed inside. Envelope acquired we took the monorail back to Tokyo Disneyland station and instead of heading into the park went the opposite way to the hotel. We had left the park at 8pm and were back at the hotel by 8:30 so it didn't take too long to get all that done.
Where We Ate
Honey Popcorn Cart - Winnie the Pooh Bucket
Tokyo Disney is known for their amazing popcorn buckets and even though I wanted multiples I only had room for one and Pooh was my choice. He came with honey popcorn that smelled better than it tasted. He was $16.67 and if you look on eBay they are at least $35, most over $50. Crazy!!
La Taverne de Gaston
Just across the street from the popcorn cart is Gaston's Tavern. It was just about 6pm when we walked in to order our dinner. Christian got the Croque-Monsieur for ¥920 and I ordered the Assorted Plate for ¥1,280. It came with Ratatouille & Potato Gratin, Pretzel Dog, Bone-in Fried Herbed Chicken. Christian had the ratatouille & gratin and I ate the rest. Our total was $14.11, not bad!
Day 3 (Tuesday)
This was the first day of our Tokyo Disney Vacation Package. We went to Tokyo Disneyland at 8:30am for Happy Entry and stayed until just about 6 (the park closed at 9.) The jet lag got to us and we just didn't have it in us to stay longer so we did miss the evening show, Reach for the Stars. A little disappointing but we needed the rest for two more full Disney days.
What We Did
We checked out and left our room just before 8 and went down to drop off our bags so they could be transported to our next hotel and then grabbed breakfast from the hotel convenience store. At 8:15 we walked across the street to enter the park and wait for Happy Entry at 8:30! There was a pretty big crowd ahead of us, but not as big as the crowd of non-hotel guests who had to wait until 8:45 to enter. We scanned in to the park at 8:37am and grabbed our first 40th Anniversary Priority Pass (I forgot what we got, but that's okay, ha ha.) I'm going to put what time we did everything so you can see how much we got done and when.
We took a few minutes to take some photos in front of Cinderella Castle (8:44am) with barely anyone in the photos. A stark contrast to Magic Kingdom where it's still pretty full of people first thing in the morning. The day we went they were debuting a brand new parade at 10am so people were already holding their spots along the parade route.
After that we headed to Westernland to ride Big Thunder Mountain Railroad (8:55am), we walked right on and got front row - woohoo! For those that don't know, it's called a "walk on" when you basically walk through the queue and don't have to wait in the line to ride a ride. Then we walked to Fantasyland and walked on to Peter Pan's Flight (9:03am) and Snow White's Adventures (9:08am.) We took a little stroll around Fantasyland and spotted a couple of the mice from Cinderella before riding Pinocchio's Daring Journey (9:18am.)
Then it was time for the part of the day I was most excited for - riding Enchanted Tale of Beauty and the Beast with one of our Attraction Tickets (aka skip the line!) Our time was scheduled for any time between 9:30-10:30am, we got there at 9:25 and waited a few minutes before hopping in the Priority Access Entrance. By this point the normal line already had a 100 minute wait! We got in line right at 9:30 and only waited a few minutes in a waiting room before experiencing the first of the in-line entertainment, which was a retelling of the beginning of Beauty and the Beast up until Belle meets the Beast. Then you continue on in the line with some scenes to keep you entertained before you get to the actual ride. By the time we got into our teacup it was 9:53am, so we did do some waiting but there were things to watch and see while doing so. The ride is just over 7 minutes long so it's definitely worth a wait. This was one of the most beautiful rides I have been on and I still can't get over one particular scene where the Beast transforms back into a Prince. It was insane! We were off the ride at 10:03am and it was off to the next stop!
We passed by the Happy Ride with Baymax and I took a photo with the ride sign because I wore a super cute Baymax Christmas sweater Christian gave me for Christmas in 2023! Then we went into Treasure Comet, a gift shop with some Baymax and Stitch merchandise and I spotted some things I wanted but we decided to go back later in the day so we wouldn't have to carry a shopping bag all day. Then it was time for an early lunch at 10:20.
We finished eating around 10:50 and it was time to use our 40th Anniversary Priority Pass for Monsters, Inc. Ride & Go Seek! We walked into the line at 10:55 and were waiting for our vehicle at 10:58. By 11:04 we were off! It was a pretty cute ride, similar to the one at California Adventure but there were a lot more elements and you could use flashlights to make monsters and different effects appear.
Once we got off the ride we headed into a gift shop to pick up our vacation package gift with our Original Goods vouchers. I chose the plush blanket in a cute suitcase bag and Christian got the portable cushion. We had picked up our Shoulder Bags (to hold tickets, etc.) earlier in the morning.
Our next 40th Anniversary Pass was for Star Tours! This one the Priority Pass didn't really help much, we merged with the main line pretty quickly so we waited a while for this. It took about 15 minutes before we were seated in our row for the ride. Still not a long wait, but when you're trying to pack a lot in every minute counts! The ride is the same as in the US but in Japanese, which was fun. Another little Easter Egg for us was in the pre-show safety video. In the US versions they do the video in English and then the droid resets itself and does it again in Spanish. Here it started in Japanese and then switched to English, which we found very amusing. They also had hitchhiking droids in the line! Sadly my photo came out horrible.
Since it was past 11:30 - 11:47 to be exact - that meant we could use our next Attraction Ticket for The Happy Ride with Baymax (got on at 11:52)! This ride is basically Alien Swirling Saucers in Hollywood Studios but Big Hero 6 themed. The only difference is this ride is VERY popular. The line gets extremely long and there are diehard fans of the ride. It plays a few different songs and there are dances for each one that Cast Members do on the sidelines. While we were there we saw a man (not an employee) dancing to every single song and hyping everyone up. He was there every time we walked by the ride that day. It was hard not to smile while riding because everyone is singing and happy. We took a snack break after this.
Once snacks were had we found a last minute spot for the 1pm parade - Harmony in Color. We had an okay view with the castle but unfortunately we had someone and her child not abiding by the "stay seated" rule even after Cast Members asked them to sit firmly on their behinds. So my view was obstructed quite a bit. Annoying, but what can ya do! The parade was really fun with lots of "rare" characters and colorful floats!
We had positioned ourselves near the entrance to Adventureland so after the parade we hopped to it and speed walked to Pirates of the Caribbean and experienced another walk-on. Got in line at 1:31 and by the time we made it to the end of the queue we got right into a boat at 1:35! After Pirates we walked through Adventureland and on to Jungle Cruise for you guessed it, a walk-on! We walked into the line at 1:53 and were on a boat at 1:55, this would be unheard of at Magic Kingdom because Jungle Cruise is very popular. We had no idea what our Skipper was saying but he was VERY animated and excited about all his jokes, ha ha.
At about 2:05-ish we got off the ride and made our way to The Enchanted Tiki Room: Stitch Presents "Aloha E Komo Mai!" As we were waiting for the show to start a Cast Member came up to us and offered some translation devices for the experience. Because it is scripted they have the full script in English (and I assume other languages) on a small screened device. This was very helpful for understanding what was happening. It was fun seeing a different version of the classic Tiki Room. I'm not a huge Lilo & Stitch fan but I do think Stitch himself is adorable.
Once the show was over off we went to find some more adventures! We walked past King Louie and Baloo taking some photos with guests, they were very swarmed so I didn't wait for my own photo.We headed out of Adventureland and back toward the center of the park and the castle. Eventually we made our way to the Castle Carrousel and waited a few minutes to hop on a couple horses!
Since we were in Fantasyland we took a walk past It's a Small World which was currently closed because they were re-theming it as It's a Small World with Groot. We noticed a crowd hanging around and I assumed it was because it was almost 3pm and they might do something special with the clock every hour. We hung back a little and then realized that they were opening the ride for a soft opening (it officially opened the next day.) We were a little too slow to react so a line formed fairly quickly and we decided not to wait in it, but knowing we didn't make it to park close I wish we would have waited. Oh well!
Next we went into the Pooh Corner gift shop and then stopped for a quick snack in the area before using one of our Attraction Tickets to ride Pooh's Hunny Hunt! Thanks to the priority lane we skipped a fairly long line. This is another one of the more popular rides in the park and I definitely see why, it has a similar storyline to the Walt Disney World ride but the technology is much more advanced. Fun fact: they were both created at the same time by Disney Imagineers but Tokyo Disney gave them a bigger budget, hence the better tech! I will say, I do prefer some of the Florida pieces better, specifically the Winnie the Pooh at the end in the tree. In Tokyo, Pooh is furry but in Florida he looks more plasticy and animated, which I prefer. He just looks cuter.
After some fun with Pooh Bear we walked over to ToonTown to see what it was like and grab a snack! We didn't want to do any of the rides or walk through the houses here so we just enjoyed a break, the views and our snack. Post-snack we walked a little more around ToonTown before doing some shopping at The Village Shoppes and Treasure Comet where I bought an adorable Baymax plate and paid for a big bag so we could put our blanket and portable cushion in there as well. At this point (4:20) we attempted to do the castle walkthrough but it was closed - darn!!
Because we couldn't do the castle we decided to pop into Mickey's PhilharMagic for some 3D musical fun! The waiting area had some displays with props from various movies like Aladdin, Peter Pan and Beauty & the Beast. The show was the same as in the US but in Japanese, which I enjoyed!
After that we checked on Cinderella's Fairy Tale Hall again but it was still closed so we decided to take some more photos around the castle and the special decor for the Vanellope event. It was just about 5pm so I decided it was time to do some shopping, or at least look around for things I might want. There were some sweaters and a hoodie I liked as well as a cute Meeko keychain but I decided to just buy a pin in case there was more I liked at DisneySea. The pin selection in Tokyo is weirdly small, I really had to hunt for them. I did read that they used to have Pin Trading and more pins back in the day but people got a little too into it so they stopped selling as much.
At 5:30 we sat with a view in front of the castle and decided what we wanted to do next. By 5:45 we decided that we were too jet lagged and out feet hurt too much to walk around the park any more. We figured it was best to make our way over to Fantasy Springs hotel to check in and have a nice, relaxing evening. We caught some Princesses on our way out so I grabbed some cute videos before we hopped on the monorail.
By 6:20 we were checked in and headed up to our room! After dropping our bags off we headed back downstairs to go to the convenience store to grab some food. We went to bed just after 8:30 and unfortunately I woke up at 3am, ha ha. I took a video out the hotel room window and then I went to lie back down until around 5:30.
Where We Ate
Looking Glass Gifts - Tokyo Disneyland Hotel
We headed to the hotel's convenience store just before 8am to grab a quick breakfast before our Happy Entry to Tokyo Disneyland at 8:30am. We ate our food with a view of the hotel and Tokyo Disneyland Station. I had the most delicious chocolate croissant Christian had a Tuna, Onion Mayo sandwich, which was his favorite "conbini" sandwich of the trip. We shared a Tropicana Orange Blend drink that became a daily buy for us the whole trip. So good. Cost? $9.67
Center Street Coffeehouse - World Bazaar
Earlier in the morning I grabbed us a very early lunch reservation at Center Street Coffeehouse because they have a meal that I desperately wanted, especially because of my choice of attire. So at 10:20am we headed to World Bazaar (their Main Street) and sat down for lunch. I had the Baymax Plate (¥1880) which is Beef Stroganoff & Chicken Curry with Rice, Fried Potato-Mochi, Broccoli and Marinated Vegetables. Christian had the Combination Plate (¥2,280) - Meat Patty and Cheese, Vegetables, Fried Prawn and Tartar Sauce, Sausage, Omelet over Rice. Our total came to $26.82.
Tomorrowland Terrace - Tomorrowland
This is basically Tokyo Disneyland's version of Cosmic Rays. We picked up Mickey Shaped chicken nuggets (¥400) and Sparkling Jelly Tea with Muscat & Kiwi (¥600). I wish I kept the cup but I didn't feel like cleaning it out and worrying about it getting other things sticky. We got the drink for free with the Beverage Ticket from our Vacation Package. The tickets gave us access to free drinks at any quick service restaurant for the three days of our package. The nuggets set us back a whopping $2.58, ha ha!
Village Pastry - Fantasyland
Before we rode Pooh's Hunny Hunt we stopped at Village Pastry for a chocolate orange Tipo Torta (¥500) that came in a fun It's a Small World with Groot sleeve! It was pretty tasty, we could see why it's a popular snack in the park.
Toontone Treats - ToonTown
This is a cute little food truck that serves seasonal treats. While we were there it was Chip 'n Dale Buns (Tomato Chicken & Sweet Potato flavor) for ¥750! The packaging and treats at Tokyo Disney are next level. How adorable are the Chip and Dale butts, ha ha. I made sure to keep the little package they came in too. Both of these were tasty but if I had to pick I preferred the Sweet Potato! These came to $4.84 after currency conversion.
Huey, Dewey and Louie's Good Time Cafe - ToonTown
While we were in ToonTown we also stopped at Donald's nephew's cafe because it was one of the spots selling the Mickey Macaron (¥600!) We also used our beverage tickets for a soda (¥360) and Lemon Cheese Cake Drink (¥700.) The drink was a special for the Disney Pal-Palooza Vanellope's Sweet Pop World event. I'm not a cheesecake fan so this was for Christian to enjoy. The cost of the macaron was $6.04.
Joyful Springs - Fantasy Springs Hotel
Before turning in for the night we went to the hotel's convenience store to grab some snacky foods for dinner. We each got an onigiri, Christian got another tuna mayo sandwich and I grabbed a cucumber salad. We also got a couple pastries and Tropicana orange blend juice. It cost us $9.55 for everything! We enjoyed our picnic meal at our little table by the window of our room with a view of Tokyo DisneySea.
Where We Stayed
For the next two nights we stayed in a superior alcove room at Tokyo DisneySea Fantasy Springs Hotel - Fantasy Chateau. After our day at Tokyo Disneyland we headed to our room for an early evening of relaxation. This hotel just opened in June 2024 along with the newly themed land of the same name in Tokyo DisneySea and it is just GORGEOUS. I fell in love with the beautiful wisteria light fixtures that adorned the Grand Paradis Lounge. Everything felt so grand and special. The hallways leading to the rooms had beautiful artwork featuring Disney Princesses and our room had a mural of Rapunzel in the alcove.
Our room overlooked a special spring in the Rose Court that showcased Belle, Beast, Cogsworth, Lumiere, Mrs. Potts, Chip and the Wardrobe! We also had a view of the park but there wasn't too much to see except the tops of some mountains in the park and landscaping.
The Fantasy Chateau side of the hotel also has a large restaurant where we enjoyed two buffet breakfasts as part of our Vacation Package. You can also have lunch and dinner there but we opted to eat in the park instead.
The resort is directly connected to the Fantasy Springs section of the park so we were able to enter the park right there and enjoy all the beautiful springs and finding what characters were "hidden" within. Most were obvious but some characters were trying to be sneaky! One of the springs directly in front of the hotel is one of my favorite characters - Sorcerer's Apprentice Mickey!
More photos of the hotel at the end, there are too many! Ha ha.
Day 4 (Wednesday)
As I mentioned at the end of my Tuesday recap, I did not get much sleep that night. My phone said I got 3 hours and 46 minutes of sleep from 9pm to 3am. I did stay in bed until 5:30/6-ish but it wasn't very restful. But we had a busy day ahead so it was time to rally and make it through! Luckily the adrenaline kept me going.
Where We Went
We were up bright and early but didn't leave the room until 7-ish because we had breakfast at the hotel restaurant before Happy Entry at 8:15am. Before breakfast we explored some of the outside areas of the hotel. We were in the park by 8:20 and I know we got a 40th Anniversary Priority pass for 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea from 10-11.
Our first order of business was walking straight to Anna & Elsa's Frozen Journey! Our vacation package came with a special Fantasy Springs Magic ticket that allowed us to use the priority lane for 3 of the 4 rides in the land an unlimited number of times. We were also able to go on the 4th ride without having a standby pass, which was still required at the time. I explained it more in my planning post, but basically when Fantasy Springs was first opened you had to have a Standby Pass (free) or Priority Pass (paid) for a ride to even enter the area, or a restaurant mobile order. While we were there they started allowing anyone to enter but you still had to have a pass to ride any of the rides. When we got in line for the Frozen ride we got a wristband that we had to show any time we wanted to get in line for a ride.
This new land is SUPER popular and even with standby passes the lines were very long, so it was nice to be able to skip most of the lines and ride more than once. We got in line for Frozen at 8:25am and got in our boat at 8:26am. I looooved this ride! There were so many cool moments and visual effects, it was super well done. It's another longer ride, clocking in at a little over 6 minutes, so the wait seems worth it versus a ride that's only 90 seconds long.
After Frozen we went into the regular line for Fairy Tinker Bell’s Busy Buggies, this ride does not have a priority access line so we had to "wait" in the regular line, but since it was still Happy Entry we walked right on at 8:41am. A great perk of staying at the Fantasy Springs Hotel is that you literally enter the park in Fantasy Springs. For guests at other hotels they have to walk all the way from the front of the park to get to Fantasy Springs so you have a pretty large head start for the rides.
Next up was Peter Pan’s Never Land Adventure! My video for this ride ended up being almost 11 minutes long because I started to record us walking through the (empty) line at 8:47 and we walked right into a pre-show so I kept recording, and after that we got right into a ride vehicle. This was Christian's favorite ride in Fantasy Springs. It was a lot of fun full of 3D screens mixed with a practical sets.
We took a quick walk on to Captain Hook's ship (9am) before walking to Rapunzel's Lantern Festival! We were on the ride at 9:10am and I was in Disney heaven. The ride is so gorgeous and full of things to look at. I'm still not sure which I like more, this or Frozen, but scene-wise the Lantern scene in this was my favorite ride moment. Rapunzel's Lantern Festival is about 5 minutes long.
Now that we had done all the rides once we walked around the area a little more and took it all in. Arendelle was by far our favorite area, the colors of the buildings and all the detail was incredible. By this point it was 9:20-ish and the area was starting to fill up but we were still able to snag some photos without many people in them. At 9:28 it was time for a drink break!
After our short rest we left Fantasy Springs to go explore the rest of the park. Tokyo DisneySea is HUUUUGE. It felt like a mix between Universal and Disney because of the theming. There is less animated Disney-inspired areas here than at Disneyland so it feels different. This is many people's favorite park and we definitely agreed. There was so much to do and see and it was so immersive, it really felt like you were in different worlds.
I had booked a 10am entry time for the Galleria Disney store in the Mediterranean Harbor area because I wanted to get some Duffy the Disney Bear merchandise and the store sometimes requires you to have a standby pass to enter because of it's popularity. I wanted to buy a big stuffed animal but Christian talked me into a smaller hand puppet, ha ha. Save some money and luggage space. After we bought him I went to look for a foldable tote bag that my friend Kristen and I wanted but couldn't find it in the couple stores we checked. I did find some cute knit bags but didn't buy one (yet...) I did get our stamps to mail postcards from DisneySea so that was checked off my to-do list.
Once our postcards were mailed it was time to head to Mysterious Island to ride 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea (10:37am!) The entrance to the line is super cool so we already had high expectations just from that. We boarded one of Captain Nemo's submarines and went on an undersea search for Atlantis. The ride vehicle was pretty small so if you're claustrophobic it might be a problem, but the ride was really fun and we enjoyed it! It was basically 3D windows with some movement.
On our way back to Fantasy Springs we walked through the Arabian Coast land and popped into The Magic Lamp Theater for a show at 10:55. We didn't really know what we were in for but the Disney website says "The "greatest magician in the world," Shaban, presents his first solo performance without his partner, the popular Genie. So what happened to him? Find out as you take in this magical performance!" It was quite the wild ride, since it was all in Japanese we didn't know what was going on but we caught a few words, ha ha.
After the show we decided to ride Sinbad's Storybook Voyage (11:30,) which is similar to Small World in that it is a boat ride with a song and cute little figures. I loved Chandu, Sinbad's tiger. And the song was very catchy! We really enjoyed this ride and I definitely recommend it.
Then it was time to really get back to Fantasy Springs because we did a mobile order for lunch. Of course we stopped to take some pretty photos and videos of the fountains and rock work at the entrance to the land. We still had a few minutes to spare so we stopped back by the hotel to see the Sorcerer Mickey fountain too!
Once we finished lunch at 12:41 it was time for round 2 of the Fantasy Springs rides! We rode Anna & Elsa's Frozen Journey at 12:45 and walked over to Peter Pan's Never Land Adventure at 1pm to find it was broken down so we continued on to Rapunzel's Lantern Festival at 1:10pm. This time when we rode I hunted for all the "hidden" Pascals in the different scenes.
With round 2 complete we headed to the Lost River Delta to ride Raging Spirits (1:35!) We had a general skip the line attraction ticket to use on the ride. This was a super fun roller coaster with a loop, some smoke effects and fire! The ride would be going down for refurbishment the next day so our trip came at the perfect time. It would have been a shame if we couldn't ride.
We used our second and final attraction ticket of the day to skip the line at Indiana Jones Adventure: Temple of the Crystal Skull at 1:45! Though it has Crystal Skull in the name, it is not related to the movie at all, it actually opened in 2001. It's pretty similar to the ride at Disneyland with elements repeated.
Our next activity was walking through Port Discovery on our way to the American Waterfront. We were on the hunt for that bag I mentioned earlier that my friend and I wanted and the website said it was sold at Tower of Terror Memorabilia. I didn't see it on first glance so I asked at the register and they let me know it sold out! Noooo!! So instead I got my friend a mug with the same design and myself a tshirt with the park lands on the back. I also bought a Sorcerer Mickey hoodie I had seen the day before at Tokyo Disneyland.
Next we stopped at Water Front Park for a quick snack and happened upon a bunch of character photo opportunities. Some Duffy & Friends characters were out as well as the kittens from The Aristocats. Toulouse is my favorite so I waited to take a photo with him and got a cute video too. Of course Christian stopped recording too soon and missed a cute moment where he patted my hand and gave me a big hug. But we have a cute photo so that's all that really matters.
Our feet were pretty tired so we sat in that area for a little while and watched people interact with the characters. After we rested a bit we were off! We continued our counter-clockwise tour of the park and walked toward Mediterranean Harbor. This is where the main entrance to the park is and where people watch the nightly show, which unfortunately didn't run the 2 nights we were there. We planned to come back to this area the next day so we just walked through and were on our way to the Mysterious Island where we got a quick drink.
Port Discovery and Nemo & Friends SeaRider was next on our list! We waited about 20 minutes to ride (4:10) but it was a lot of fun! Basically, you're shrunk down to the size of a fish to explore the big blue with Nemo! It's a movie theater type ride with a big screen in front of you as well as additional portholes around the room. We thought it was super cute!
Now we headed back to Fantasy Springs for round 3! We started with Peter Pan (4:45) which was luckily back up and running! We liked being able to experience the rides more than once on the same day because we could look for new details and I was able to let myself watch most of the ride instead of getting photos and videos. I am a maniac when it comes to documenting our trips, I like to remember everything and that means videos and photos! I do try not to actively look at my phone while doing so, but sometimes I glance to make sure important things are in the shot. I also make sure my screen brightness is down all the way and I don't hold it up high, I HATE when people disturb others taking video so I try not to be annoying myself.
Then we took our third ride on Rapunzel's Lantern Festival at 5:03. It was starting to get darker out so we were able to enjoy the outside lantern effects more than we had in the morning. The more we rode it the more I was amazed by the beauty. You would think riding something 3 times in one day would be boring...nope!
We took a stroll through a lit up Arendelle (and spotted a hidden Mickey along the way) before hopping in line for Anne & Elsa's Frozen Journey again at 5:27! We were in the back of the boat this time so I was able to fully take in everything around us and get some better videos of my favorite scenes!
After disembarking from our boat we headed back to the Sorcerer Mickey fountain (5:37) and the area near our hotel so we could pop into the gift shop. Weirdly it's only accessible from inside the park, you can't get inside from the hotel. They were sold out of a bunch of things I wanted but I did get a Fantasy Springs pin and some "coronation" celebration chocolates in a pretty box! We headed back up to our room around 6pm for a short break and headed back into the park around 6:50 to get dinner.
Christian was starting to feel a little tired so we decided to do one more ride on Rapunzel at 7:20 and then call it a night and head back to the hotel. So our tally for the day was Frozen: 3, Rapunzel: 4 and Peter Pan: 2! Not bad!
I tried to stay up for a while longer to avoid waking up at 3am again. The last photo I took of the view out of or room was at 9:32pm so I assume I went to bed shortly after, ha ha!
Where We Ate
Fantasy Springs Restaurant - Fantasy Springs Hotel
We originally had breakfast booked at 8am because that was our only option when I bought the package but when I found out Happy Entry was at 8:15 we decided to ask and see if they could seat us earlier and they did! It is a buffet style breakfast and they had a mix of Japanese and Western style breakfast foods. We tried a bit of everything and it was all tasty! My favorite was actually a rice dish, I got seconds of that! The meal was included with our package but if you want to dine for breakfast the cost is ¥4200 per person.
The Snuggly Duckling - Fantasy Springs
We popped in to The Snuggly Duckling for a drink break just before 9:30. We wanted to see it before it got really full and also take advantage of our beverage tickets. Since we weren't ordering food and just getting our free drinks we were able to enter without a mobile order, walk right up to the pick-up area and select our drinks. Rapunzel's Milk Tea was the special drink here and it was ¥800, but free for us! We also got a Coke (¥360). We hung out in there for a little over 15 minutes enjoying our free drinks.
Royal Banquet of Arendelle - Fantasy Springs
We mobile ordered lunch at the Frozen restaurant for pickup at 12pm! The inside of this restaurant is breathtaking, it's like you walked right into the movie. So many beautiful portraits and paintings on the wall. I could have spent hours exploring. We got Arendelle's Royal Set (Beef) to share which has Smoked Salmon Salad, Potato Gratin, Beef Pot Pie, Bread, Olaf's Marshmallow-Chocolate Mousse, Choice of Soft Drink for ¥3,500. I also ordered the Almond Cake for ¥550 so I could get an adorable souvenir plate with my purchase for an additional ¥650. The food was just okay, but we kind of expected it to be lackluster because Tokyo Disney is not known for making great "international" style food, ha ha. We spent $30.33 here.
Food Truck (Blue) - American Waterfront
We headed to the blue Food Truck at Water Front Park around 2:45 for Christian to get a Crème Brûlée Churro for ¥600, or $3.87. I had a small bite but I wasn't super hungry.
Refrescos - Mysterious Island
Time to make some more good use out of our beverage tickets! We each got a hot chocolate (¥600 each) and they were soooo good! I wanted to get another right away but we decided to go back the next day for a second.
Lookout Cookout - Fantasy Springs
This is the final quick service restaurant in Fantasy Springs (not counting some smaller stands) that we had to check out. We each got a Lost Kids' Snack Box (Butter Curry Chicken) for ¥900 that had Chicken Tenders, Popover, Seaweed Fritter, Banana Chips, Shrimp Chips. We also ordered a Lookout Brownie (¥600,) and got our free drinks - soda (¥360) and Pixie Dust Soda in Kiwi flavor (¥750.) The chicken was just okay, and the brownie a little dry but overall we enjoyed this meal more than Arendelle. I really liked the kiwi soda. Our total here was only $15.49.
Day 5 (Thursday)
This was our final Tokyo Disney day and second day at DisneySea. We still had a lot to do so we were raring to go! Before heading to the park we checked out on our hotel room TV and left our luggage neatly packed so bell services could pick it up and take it down to the storage area for us to pick up later.
Where We Went
I was out of bed around 5:30 but probably woke up sooner and was scrolling my phone. Before heading down for breakfast I took a few photos with the pretty mural in our alcove. Our breakfast reservation was for 6:30 and we got back to the room at 7:15 for one last look before checking out. Happy Entry wasn't until 8:45am so we had time to spare.
We were in the park by 8:49 and grabbed a Standby Pass for Anna & Elsa's Frozen Adventure so we could go through the regular line. Our Magic pass was just for one day so this time we would have to experience the land like "normal" guests and get standby passes for the rides. We decided to just do Frozen so we could do more rides around the rest of the park.
Our Standby Pass was for 9:15 so we had a bit of time to kill before we were able to get in line. I used the opportunity to take photos and videos of all the springs, fountains and statues. Additionally we took some more photos of the empty-ish Arendelle section of Fantasy Springs before it got super crowded.
THEN we still had about 10 minutes so we walked through the Royal Banquet Hall to get more photos without people. I still can't get over the detail in here!
At 9:15 we headed over to the ride and walked through the normal line this time. It only took us 9 minutes to get to the ride and would have been quicker but basically everyone (including us) was taking it nice and slow to look at and take photos of all the details in line. This was now our 4th time doing the actual ride, tied with Rapunzel now! We also spotted a little nod do EPCOT in the line - a model of a Stave Church which is a replica of the one in EPCOT that houses an exhibit on Norse Mythology! I love a good Easter egg.
Next we walked through the Arabian Coast and Mermaid Lagoon lands to get to the Mysterious Island so we could use one of our Attraction Passes to ride Journey to the Center of the Earth at 9:52! This was one of the rides we were most looking forward to because it sounded so cool! Christian was a bit nervous because he doesn't like certain elements of roller coasters, but he enjoyed it! There is a "pre-show" where you go in an elevator to get to the next part of the line so we did have to wait about 6 more minutes before boarding our vessel at 10:06! The ride is insane! The beginning is a little slow as you're moving towards the center of the earth looking at cute aliens, then it takes a turn and off you go at high speed! After we got off Christian decided to buy a Priority Access pass so we could ride it again and he could fully enjoy it without the nerves. We'll be back later!
We made our way to Mediterranean Harbor next where I popped in to a few more stores looking for some of the merchandise still on my list. I asked about a pin I was looking for at the register and it was sold out. I was so sad because it was a New Years themed pin that perfectly fit the theme of our trip (luckily I found it on eBay after we got home for a reasonable price!) It's here that I bought my adorable Meeko keychain that I had seen at Disneyland for $15. He's one of my favorite Disney sidekicks and doesn't get enough love in the American parks so I have to have him! I immediately attached him to my crossbody bag where he remained for the rest of the trip, haha. I also bought the cute knit tote bag that I had seen the day before.
It was now time for our 11am Attraction Ticket for Soaring: Fantastic Flight! The line for this ride was really cool and we loved the pre-show. It mixed projections in the room with practical effects and was very fun! Sadly the ride was the exact same as the one at EPCOT with one exception - the end scene was Tokyo DisneySea instead of EPCOT! We did appreciate that small change! They also had another small element from the pre-show woven throughout. We waited about 15 minutes to ride once we got in line and we were off by 11:34am!
Then we walked back to Journey to the Center of the Earth for our second ride! We got off around 11:55 and decided it was time for lunch so we headed to Mermaid Lagoon and inside Ariel's underwater kingdom! A lot of this land is inside a building made to look like you're underwater. It's mostly kid rides so we didn't do any of those but we walked around, went into The Sleepy Whale Shoppe and had lunch.
After lunch we walked back through the Arabian Coast and I bought a cute Chandu the tiger pin at the Agrabah Marketplace. Then we used another Attraction Ticket to ride Indiana Jones again at 1:30! I made friends with the guy sitting in our row and he kept chatting with me during the ride, ha ha. He and his girlfriend came from China (she works at Disney in Shanghai) and it was their first day in the park.
We made our way back to Fantasy Springs and got a couple sodas at The Snuggly Duckling. Christian was really feeling tired so we ended up sitting there for almost 2 hours to try and recharge. We sat in a room with a lot of paintings inspired by the ones Rapunzel created in her tower. We had dinner reservations at 5:10 so we headed to Mediterranean Harbor and the center of the park.
Once we were super full from dinner it was time to head to our next hotel. So sad! We finished our meal around 6:25 and slowly walked back to the Fantasy Springs area of the park so we could leave through our hotel's special gate. I made sure to get a bunch of pictures of the park all lit up and say our last goodbyes.
We got back to Fantasy Springs Hotel around 7, picked up our bags and took an Uber to our hotel in Tokyo. We could have taken the monorail to the train station and then transferred a couple times but we decided to pay the price and relax. Within 45 minutes we were checked in to our room for the next 3 nights.
There was still a lot we didn't get done, but 3 full Disney days is hard work so I knew we wouldn't have time for everything. I wanted to go to the huge Bon Voyage store by the train station too but we never went back to the station, ha ha. We'll just have to go back *wink wink*
Where We Ate
Fantasy Springs Restaurant - Fantasy Springs Hotel
Our breakfast on this day was at 6:30am right when they opened so we got to experience their opening ceremony where Cast Members welcome everyone for a delicious meal and fun day ahead. Since we already ate here once we knew exactly which foods we wanted to get and left the restaurant around 7am.
Pepper Popcorn Cart - in front of Soaring
Our Vacation Package came with a free souvenir popcorn case and any flavor popcorn we wanted. After the honey wasn't for us we thought the pepper flavor might be good. We waited about 10 minutes in line and got our popcorn around 10:25. Sadly it was not very good so we disposed of it pretty quickly and just walked around with our empty popcorn case, ha ha. At least it was free! Somehow I didn't take a picture of the popcorn cart or our popcorn...whoops!
Sebastian's Calypso Kitchen - Mermaid Lagoon
This was a fun surprise of a dining location that we weren't expecting to eat at but I'm glad we did. We got there just about 12:15 and Christian had a Sausage & Meat Sauce Pizza (¥950,) it was one of his favorite meals of the trip. I got Pop'n Shrimp (¥400) and French Fries (¥280) to share. We used our beverage tickets for a Coke and Sparkling Jelly Drink (Orange & Lemon) that would have cost ¥700. Everything was $10.52!
The Snuggly Duckling - Fantasy Springs
We got a couple sodas at The Snuggly Duckling, mostly so we could sit down and enjoy some warmth for a while. But we were also in need of refreshment too, ha ha. Might as well take advantage of our free drinks!
Magellan's - Mediterranean Harbor
This was the only reservation we made prior to our trip because I didn't want to "waste" too much time at sit-down restaurants. Since we had two days at DisneySea I decided that was the park we could afford to lose some time in. Luckily it has one of the most popular restaurants in both parks and I was able to snag a very hard to get reservation there! We both got the Magellan course for ¥10,000 each. Our total for this meal was $129.07, more on par with American Disney restaurant prices but still cheaper than the Signature restaurants.
While we were there it was a prix fixe menu but now it looks like you can choose your own courses and its only ¥8000. But it was fun for us to not know what we were getting, felt fancier, ha ha. Our meal consisted of Lightly Roasted Berkshire Pork with Duck Rillettes, Cheese and Nuts Terrine
Pan-Fried Sea Bream and Scallop in Broth, Grilled Beef Loin with Madeira Sauce served with Almond Dukkah, Bread, Cremet d'Anjou, Mignardises and Coffee or Tea. Christian got to eat both of the Cremet d'Anjou because I don't like cheese and that's one of the main ingredients in it, ha ha.
Where We Stayed
We left Disney and checked in for 3 nights at Hotel Sunroute Plaza Shinjuku.
Stay tuned for our next location - Lake Kawaguchiko!
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