indoshakespeare
Reach out and find your Happily Ever After
- Joined
- Jun 7, 2011
Hello, I finally found time to write my trip report of my recent visit to Hong Kong Disneyland. We're from Indonesia and we're lucky to have a Disney resort in Hong Kong because we do not require a visa to go to Hong Kong. It's also the closest Disney Resort to us so we would like to call this our "home" Disneyland although that title probably still belongs to Tokyo Disneyland. As you can see from my signature, we visited Tokyo Disney Resort the most.
On this trip, the participants are me, my wife, my DD (6 years), my DS (2 years) and my parents although they flew to Japan on the 27th (like I said.. we all love Japan so much that we go there again and again and again). We spent 3 nights in Hong Kong Island (Causeway Bay) prior to staying in Disneyland Hotel. On the morning of the 26th, we hired a car to take us from Park Lane hotel to Disneyland Hotel. I wanted to try the Explorer's Lodge but I got outvoted so DLH it is. I had checked in online so I could use the express lane to get my park tickets and Priority Admission Pass (we got 6 for our 2 days stay because I booked the Sea View room).
We took the shuttle to the park and arrived just before 11 AM. We went straight to It's a Small World, which is my parents' favorite ride. It was a walk on even though park had opened for 1 hour by this time. In fact, we rode it twice, both times were walk-ons. After the second ride, we headed to lunch at Clopin's Festival of Food, which was a counter service serving Cantonese food. I took the time to take Pooh Fastpasses, which was one of two attractions that had Fastpasses. It looks like they're going the paid FP route with the Priority Admission Pass. Most thrill rides here had a Priority Lane but no FP machines. We rode Pooh after lunch, which had a 20 minutes wait. I'm glad we had the FPs because I wanted to cover as many rides as possible while my parents were there.
After Pooh, we covered the three expansion areas starting with Toy Story Land. I went the wrong way and headed to Adventureland when we could've gone straight to TSL from Fantasyland. That did give us to see the Moana stage show which was much better than I expected. In TSL, DD wanted to ride Slinky Dog so I rode with her while the others explore the area. Queue time was 20 minutes posted but only 10 actual. It was actually faster than I expected and there was an actual thrill factor there. We skipped RC Racer and Parachute Drop and went straight to Mystic Point. The last time I was here, Mystic Point wasn't open yet so It was my first time riding Mystic Manor. We used the first of the PA passes (Posted wait time was 30 minutes). That ride was great! It's refreshing to see ride with original storylines because most new rides are IP-based. I hope to see more rides with Society of Explorers stories. DD was scared though and closed her eyes from the Medusa scene till the end. After that, we explored both Mystic Point and Grizzly Gulch. The Grizzly Gulch band sang "Zip a Dee Doo Dah" so at least there's an element of Splash Mountain here. Only me, my wife and my dad rode Big Grizzly Mountain because my mom and DD don't ride coasters (I want to get her started on 7DMT when we go to Shanghai). This ride rivals Paris' for the best version of BTM but I give a slight edge to Paris. It's a clear second though.
After that we took a break and sat on the curb in Main Street for the 4 o'clock parade. Flights of Fantasy share the same theme song as WDW's Festival of Fantasy with slightly different lyrics but we all thought the parade was too short and not enough floats. The Princess float was my favorite!
Then we all went shopping while I went to Tomorrowland to pick up Space Mountain FPs. Only me and my dad ended up riding it though. Posted wait time was 30 minutes so the FPs were useful. DD wanted to ride Orbitron (20 minute wait) while the rest went to Plaza Inn to get a table for dinner. In HKDL, Plaza Inn is a table service serving Hong Kong food. It's a Maxim restaurant, who own several popular restaurants in Hong Kong. After dinner, we didn't feel like waiting for the night parade so we went back to the hotel while my parents left us to stay at the airport hotel because they needed to catch an early flight to Japan. I ordered the Princess decoration for the room which I thought was a waste of money because the "decoration" was only this:
My thought on the first day: we went to Tokyo Disneyland on the same date exactly one year before (12/26/2017) and the crowd level was night and day. Every e-ticket ride in Tokyo Disneyland was 2 hours long and FPs ran out by noon. By contrast, the longest queue in HKDL on 12/26/2018 was 40 minutes (Dumbo and Parachute Drop). FPs for Pooh and Space Mountain had not run out when we had dinner. We had plenty of spaces to watch the parade and queues for food at quick service were very short. We thoroughly enjoyed HKDL more than we did TDL in 2017 (also because It's a Small World was under refurbishment in TDL at that time). Now that I think about it, was TDR Vacation Package available in 2017? the FPs from that package would have been very helpful
Stay tune for day 2. Did we make rope drop? With a 10 AM opening time, it should be no problem right? Well....
On this trip, the participants are me, my wife, my DD (6 years), my DS (2 years) and my parents although they flew to Japan on the 27th (like I said.. we all love Japan so much that we go there again and again and again). We spent 3 nights in Hong Kong Island (Causeway Bay) prior to staying in Disneyland Hotel. On the morning of the 26th, we hired a car to take us from Park Lane hotel to Disneyland Hotel. I wanted to try the Explorer's Lodge but I got outvoted so DLH it is. I had checked in online so I could use the express lane to get my park tickets and Priority Admission Pass (we got 6 for our 2 days stay because I booked the Sea View room).
We took the shuttle to the park and arrived just before 11 AM. We went straight to It's a Small World, which is my parents' favorite ride. It was a walk on even though park had opened for 1 hour by this time. In fact, we rode it twice, both times were walk-ons. After the second ride, we headed to lunch at Clopin's Festival of Food, which was a counter service serving Cantonese food. I took the time to take Pooh Fastpasses, which was one of two attractions that had Fastpasses. It looks like they're going the paid FP route with the Priority Admission Pass. Most thrill rides here had a Priority Lane but no FP machines. We rode Pooh after lunch, which had a 20 minutes wait. I'm glad we had the FPs because I wanted to cover as many rides as possible while my parents were there.
After Pooh, we covered the three expansion areas starting with Toy Story Land. I went the wrong way and headed to Adventureland when we could've gone straight to TSL from Fantasyland. That did give us to see the Moana stage show which was much better than I expected. In TSL, DD wanted to ride Slinky Dog so I rode with her while the others explore the area. Queue time was 20 minutes posted but only 10 actual. It was actually faster than I expected and there was an actual thrill factor there. We skipped RC Racer and Parachute Drop and went straight to Mystic Point. The last time I was here, Mystic Point wasn't open yet so It was my first time riding Mystic Manor. We used the first of the PA passes (Posted wait time was 30 minutes). That ride was great! It's refreshing to see ride with original storylines because most new rides are IP-based. I hope to see more rides with Society of Explorers stories. DD was scared though and closed her eyes from the Medusa scene till the end. After that, we explored both Mystic Point and Grizzly Gulch. The Grizzly Gulch band sang "Zip a Dee Doo Dah" so at least there's an element of Splash Mountain here. Only me, my wife and my dad rode Big Grizzly Mountain because my mom and DD don't ride coasters (I want to get her started on 7DMT when we go to Shanghai). This ride rivals Paris' for the best version of BTM but I give a slight edge to Paris. It's a clear second though.
After that we took a break and sat on the curb in Main Street for the 4 o'clock parade. Flights of Fantasy share the same theme song as WDW's Festival of Fantasy with slightly different lyrics but we all thought the parade was too short and not enough floats. The Princess float was my favorite!
Then we all went shopping while I went to Tomorrowland to pick up Space Mountain FPs. Only me and my dad ended up riding it though. Posted wait time was 30 minutes so the FPs were useful. DD wanted to ride Orbitron (20 minute wait) while the rest went to Plaza Inn to get a table for dinner. In HKDL, Plaza Inn is a table service serving Hong Kong food. It's a Maxim restaurant, who own several popular restaurants in Hong Kong. After dinner, we didn't feel like waiting for the night parade so we went back to the hotel while my parents left us to stay at the airport hotel because they needed to catch an early flight to Japan. I ordered the Princess decoration for the room which I thought was a waste of money because the "decoration" was only this:
My thought on the first day: we went to Tokyo Disneyland on the same date exactly one year before (12/26/2017) and the crowd level was night and day. Every e-ticket ride in Tokyo Disneyland was 2 hours long and FPs ran out by noon. By contrast, the longest queue in HKDL on 12/26/2018 was 40 minutes (Dumbo and Parachute Drop). FPs for Pooh and Space Mountain had not run out when we had dinner. We had plenty of spaces to watch the parade and queues for food at quick service were very short. We thoroughly enjoyed HKDL more than we did TDL in 2017 (also because It's a Small World was under refurbishment in TDL at that time). Now that I think about it, was TDR Vacation Package available in 2017? the FPs from that package would have been very helpful
Stay tune for day 2. Did we make rope drop? With a 10 AM opening time, it should be no problem right? Well....
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