This post, written by Lawson Montgomery ’18, to recount his weekend visit to Disneyland Paris:
The excitement for Disneyland Paris brought out my inner child as I had not been to such a park since I was about 5. For breakfast, we decided to eat chocolate cereal and drink some juice to help fuel us for the trip to Chessy, France, where Disneyland Paris is located. We left the house as a group of four: myself, Joshua (a Swedish exchange student who lives at the house), Vincent (my St. Do host student), and his sister Mary Alice. We strolled down the street to the local train station to make our way to the massive La Défense station. We had a 45 minute trip on a double-decker train to Chessy. We talked about life in our three countries and how our lives differ and how they are similar.
Once we arrived at Disneyland Paris, it felt like I was a part of a great migration as almost the entire train departed once we arrived at the park. Once through the gates, we were greeted with an amazing pink structure that could have passed as the park’s castle; however, this building only held the ticket office. Once we scanned our tickets, then the real fun began. As we walked down Main Street U.S.A. towards Sleeping Beauty’s pink castle, which was the park’s true castle, we saw ice cream stores, hot dogs that were a foot in length, and many other foreign tourists like us.
Our first attraction was Big Thunder Mountain which was a great ride and was worth the 80 minute wait. Our next choice of ride, Phantom Manor, did not meet our expectations for a haunted house. We then returned back to Main Street U.S.A. and took a break to eat and let our bodies rest. We then walked under the grand castle of Sleeping Beauty and then decided to ride Mad Hatter’s Tea Cups. We had a lot of fun on this ride. Eventually, we decided that it was best to return home and rest before a party later that night. We rode back on the metro and tried to solve riddles the entire ride home. Once we returned home, we listened to music and discussed the day. Finally, we left for the party close to the school, and we spent the evening eating pizza, chips, and soda with the others who had gone to Disney that day.
