I always dreamed of taking my children to Disneyland. I’d actually hoped to bring them to Disney World in Florida as I travel to the US more often than within the EU. Out of the blue, however, our friends told us they that they were going to visit Disneyland in Paris, as part an 11-day coach tour through Poland, the Czech Republic, Germany and finally Paris.
Now, I know what you’re thinking—who would spend all that time in a bus, when you could just fly and be there so much faster? Most of us probably view a bus as time consuming and boring. But if you want to see several countries, not just the major tourist attractions but also beautiful landscapes and scenery, it’s actually a good way to go. Renting a car would be another nice option to travel across Europe, but if you, as we did, want a bunch of your friends and their families to join you and travel together a 1.5-week bus tour is a better option as you don’t need to deal with all the logistics, hotel and excursion reservations, etc.
Instead, you get to enjoy an incredible time being with your family and friends. Also, a bus tour is less expensive as travel agencies have incredible hotel and excursion discounts. More information on coach tours is available in thousands travel agencies in Europe.
At the end of our first day we reached DinoZatorland in Poland. It was quite late when we got there which made the excursion even more exciting for our children: we walked around the park in growing darknesss, between horrifically growling and realistically moving dinosaurs. After visiting the dinosaur park our children could not stop talking about them the rest of the night. These creatures that walked the earth millions of years ago were so real for us.
The next day we reached Prague where we had a memorable excursion to the Old Town.
We also managed to squeeze in a visit to Prague’s giant Aqua Park. Our kids especially loved the wave pool.
After the Aqua Park we enjoyed a river boat trip on the Vltava River, where we had a long-anticipated dinner, having worked up voracious appetites at the Aqua Park.
Since our main destination was Disneyland we simply could not miss Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany. It is not only one of the most beautiful castles in the world, but it is said it have inspired Disneyland’s Sleeping Beauty castle. We were impatient to start getting familiar with Disneyland right away in Germany!
Tip: Since Neuschwanstein Castle is perched on a hill, be prepared for some hiking. Also, check the weather before you go so that you can actually see the lovely surrounding landscape and not have it obscured by mist or rain.
Next day at noon we reached Paris and enjoyed tours of the city by land and by river boat, on the Seine. We also had some free time to visit the Eiffel Tower by ourselves.
Tips: When you visit the Eiffel tower it has several entrances. Before getting in a long line, check the line length at the other entrances. Although you might choose to visit only the second floor, I recommend you go to the third floor as it has glass windows that protect you from the occasional strong winds—you can actually feel the tower sway a bit during very strong bouts. Allow about 2 hours for your entire visit. I would also recommend visiting the tower at night when you can have a beautiful view of the Paris city lights.
So finally we arrived at Disneyland Paris. There are so many rides and attractions, one day is simply not enough to visit all of them.
Tip: Use the Disneyland map that you can pick up at the entrance, which categorizes all the attractions and makes it easy to identify the ones best for your children. Some especially exciting rides are specially marked on the map but expect to wait in extremely long lines before you can enjoy them. In general, plan your trip to avoid weekends and European holidays. Don’t only check French holidays, as people from all over Europe take advantage of their local holidays to go to Disneyland.
The next day we had a trip to a park we knew much less about- Asterix Park (Parc Asterix) with thrilling rollercoasters!
Before you go on one of these fiendishly twisting rides, take into account that although the roller coaster looks perfect from far away, the ride is not for the faint-hearted, and, not to dampen your enthusiasm, but your spine may not be thanking you later for what it went through.
I didn’t know much the Parc Asterix before we went, so I was sort of not prepared for what it would be, and I had trouble navigating since all the signs were only in French. Surprisingly, my children didn’t even notice the language barrier and nothing could stop them from enjoying all the water rides.
I personally found Asterix Park even more interesting in terms of attractions and rides than Disneyland. It is definitely the perfect choice to go to in summertime.
Also, since both parks are located pretty close to each other, you can easily do both (although not in the same day) and decide for yourself which one is your favorite.
I was pretty skeptical at the beginning that the trip would be so exciting, taking into account the number of organizational issues the travel agency had to solve. I was also worried about my children spending long hours in the coach while traveling from one country to another. It turned out I had nothing to worry about—all the kids enjoyed not only the destinations, but also the time with each other on the bus, creating various games and contests to play with each other and watching cartoons together.
And the cost for all this, you may ask? 200 € per adult and 120 € per child, which included visas, all transportation, hotels (separate rooms for parents and kids), breakfasts and most dinners, except for Paris, and even most excursions. How they made money I’ve no idea, but we thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.
The trip was fantastically fun, for me as well as my family – it was as though Paris had made amends for that terrible night I spent there one year ago.
Photos: Ihor Yuvchenko, wrayckage, Axel-D, jeffwilcox, sho33y