Is Disneyland Paris Right for You?
“I hated Disneyland Paris. The park was awful and people were rude…” Comments like this are not uncommon from guests who have visited, and been disappointed by, Disneyland Paris. If our reader reaction is any indication, it’s the most divisive Disney park on the planet. It’s certainly not a place for everyone, and in this post I’ll highlight who is likely to love it–and who is not.
I’ll be up front: I love Disneyland Paris, and it confounds me a bit that other Disney fans do not feel the same way about it that I do. With that said, I realize different fans have different backgrounds, expectations, and touring preferences. Some people focus on attractions, others focus on atmosphere, others still focus on dining, and so on.
There are any number of ways to enjoy a Disney park, and my intent here is not to make a value judgment about individual interests and vacation priorities. Rather, I hope this post will shed some light on which touring styles are most conducive to enjoying Disneyland Paris…
In some ways, Disneyland Paris has more in common with Epcot or Tokyo DisneySea than it does the other castle parks. Like those, it is the ultimate “ambiance park.” A place best enjoyed with a slow stroll, sipped like a fine French wine. If I had to pick a park to visit without doing any attractions, Disneyland Paris would be my #2 choice, after Tokyo DisneySea.
If you love roaming World Showcase in Epcot, just exploring the hidden corners, shops, and meticulous details, there’s a strong possibility that Disneyland Paris is for you. Disneyland Paris has a treasure trove of brilliant design work, and even after numerous visits, I still stumble upon new things each trip. It’s such a satisfying park to explore.
If you’re the type who collects coffee table books about Walt Disney Imagineering or the design and architecture of the parks, Disneyland Paris is absolutely for you.
One of the great things about today’s social media era is that many high-profile current and former Imagineers have accounts where they share old photos and anecdotes. I follow a number of these accounts, and the park for which many of these celebrated Imagineers still have an intense passion is Disneyland Paris. Eddie Sotto put it best when he said that Disneyland Paris is “the park designed by WDI Disney fans…for Disney fans.”
April 12. What a day. Thanks for all the kind words. DLP is the park designed by WDI Disney fans…for Disney fans. Congrats to all, enjoy! pic.twitter.com/nZn6N6XCPs
– Eddie Sotto (@boss_angeles) April 12, 2017
While other parks were also no doubt designed by Disney fans within Imagineering, there are a couple of critical differences with Disneyland Paris. First, most of the original design remains. In a sense, other parks are victims of their own success: as the parks became more popular, new ideas were injected that strayed from their “pure” ambition.
Elsewhere, these additions were made with the goal of appealing to a more mainstream audience. Attractions like Soarin’ and Frozen Ever After are crowd-pleasers that play well with casual guests, but when viewed through the prism of the park’s objective and core thematic principles, they make less sense.
Ironically enough, the same financial struggles that have hampered the growth of Disneyland Paris over the years have also ensured that it has (largely) remained pure in theme. Outside of Discoveryland, there are few additions to Disneyland Paris that have hampered its design and thematic integrity.
Second, the team behind the park’s original buildout featured an all-star lineup of Imagineers, who had a good deal of creative latitude. The result with Disneyland Paris is a park that feels like it contains some great ‘blue sky’ ambitions that often get cut from other projects.
At least in part because the lavish design and ambition of Disneyland Paris caused it to go over budget, subsequent parks (save the OLC-funded Tokyo DisneySea) were built in a more “restrained” sense. Animal Kingdom at its opening is a good example. It has the similar thematic purity and ambition, but Disney hedged its bets by building that park on a smaller scale and expanding it over time.
Disneyland Paris feels like the culmination of castle parks before it, with lessons learned from Disneyland and Magic Kingdom, and applied to something new. Its ambition is uncanny, and it’s a true treat to get lost in, exploring its many details…if that’s the kind of Disney park experience you’re after.
If the idea of spending an entire day in a theme park without doing any attractions sounds miserable to you, perhaps Disneyland Paris is not for you. For me, this isn’t some vague hypothetical that is unfathomable in practice. I could be satisfied wandering a park all day taking photos, soaking up the experience, and taking in the details. In fact, I’ve done it and really enjoy it.
I understand that for many fans, the primary draw of the parks is attractions. I think this is a fair perspective; after all, the parks wouldn’t exist without attractions (no one is waiting in like 90 minutes to stare at some details). For many people, a Disney trip is in large part judged by how many attractions were experienced.
If your primary objective is riding the rides, Disneyland Paris might not be for you. This is not to say it doesn’t have any good attractions (it has the best versions of Big Thunder Mountain Railroad and Pirates of the Caribbean, plus great options in Fantasyland, Phantom Manor, etc.), but I think it’s fair to say Disneyland, Magic Kingdom, and Tokyo Disneyland all have much more robust attraction lineups. Paris is about on par with Shanghai Disneyland or Hong Kong Disneyland in terms of attractions (probably a bit ahead of both).
From a rides-only perspective, Disneyland Paris is a 1-day park and Walt Disney Studios Park is also a 1-day park. Ironically, from a design and detail perspective, I’d say Disneyland Paris is a 3-day park and Walt Disney Studios Park is a 30 minutes park. WDSP is the polar opposite of Disneyland Paris. For those of you used to spending 7-days at Walt Disney World doing attractions nonstop, Disneyland Paris may leave you wanting.
Additionally, if food is an integral part of your Disney experience, and you find yourself combing the internet looking for new snacks to try or menu changes at restaurants at resort hotels, Disneyland Paris might not be for you. Not only does Disneyland Paris serve the worst food of any Disney resort in the world, but it also lacks counter service menu variety and there’s not much going on in the way of crave-worthy snacks.
This is not to say you cannot put together a respectable dining itinerary at Disneyland Paris that has some exceptional meals in it, you’re just going to have to work harder at it. You’re also going to have limited choices on the counter service front in that itinerary.
The plus side, though, is that (like the rest of the park), Disneyland Paris has the best themed restaurants anywhere. Walt’s – An American Restaurant alone is like a visit to Club 33 (except with better history and open to the general public). Suffice to say, on your first 3-4 day trip to Disneyland Paris, you can having a fun culinary experience, but once you’re on trip 2 or 3, you’ve pretty much depleted all of the good options and will be returning to old favorites.
Finally, if you want an experience that includes a lot of cheery “have a magical day!” interactions, Disneyland Paris might not be for you. French culture is dramatically different than United States’ culture. This is something I’ve written about with regard to Disneyland Paris multiple times, so I apologize if you’ve already read it once or seven times, but it bears emphasizing since it’s such a common complaint from Americans who have culture shock upon visiting Disneyland Paris.
French ideas of service are different than those in the U.S. A good example of this is at restaurants, where servers take a much more subdued approach, and are far more hands off. For many Americans, this is perceived as the server “shunning” them, and is construed as poor service.
For the French, this is part of the culture. I’m hardly an expert on France, but the ‘cafe culture’ is evident throughout the country. People go to restaurants to become engrossed in conversation, and any intrusion, including an assertive server, is an impediment to that (you’ll also see far fewer people playing on their phones in France’s restaurants).
In other words, what you might perceive as rude is through the prism of your culture. Part of international travel is necessarily temporarily becoming immersed in another culture.
Beyond service in restaurants, there’s the general demeanor of Cast Members. Part of this is an extension of French culture. Another part is that for most Cast Members, working at Disneyland Paris is just another job. Disney is not part of the cultural fabric in France like it is in Anaheim, where there’s still a reverence towards Walt Disney or in Orlando, a place to which many people relocate to fulfill dreams of working for Disney.
This is not to say that there are no exceptional Cast Members at Disneyland Paris. To the contrary, we’ve encountered so many great Cast Members there who go above and beyond. Like the other parks, some go the extra mile to make an indelible impression on guests. Many others do not, instead going about their jobs in a workmanlike manner, competently getting their work done. Parisians are also not big on feigned enthusiasm, so those throwaway “have a magical day” platitudes are almost unheard of at Disneyland Paris.
Hopefully this helped you determine whether Disneyland Paris is for you. If you’re still on the fence, I say go! The one thing not mentioned above is proximity to Paris, which is one of the greatest cities in the world. Any trip to Disneyland Paris should include as much or more time in Paris proper, and there is no shortage of incredible experiences to be had in the city. To be honest, this is why I never feel guilty about recommending a trip to Disneyland Paris. I think reasonable minds may differ on Disneyland Paris, but if you do not like Paris as a city, that’s on you.
For the basics of planning a visit to Disneyland Paris, check out our Disneyland Paris Trip Planning Guide. Want to see more photos or read about Disneyland Paris in agonizing detail? Check out our Disneyland Paris 20th Anniversary Trip Report or our Disneyland Paris 25th Anniversary Trip Recap!
YOUR THOUGHTS…
If you’ve visited Disneyland Paris, what’s your take on who it’ll appeal to most? Did you enjoy your visit, or would you rather stick to other Disney Parks? Anything with which you disagree in this post? Any questions? Hearing your feedback about your experiences is both interesting to us and helpful to other readers, so please share your thoughts or questions below in the comments!
Malheureusement, il y a souvent des grèves de transport en France. DLP reste une destination de rêves pour moi petite française. Je n’ai pas la chance de faire d’autres parcs Disney. Après, je tiens à signaler que les parcs sont en France mais se sont des parcs Européens. C’est un mélange de langues et de cultures, oui oui oui. C’est peut être pour cela que nos parcs vous paraissent embêtant. Je les aime je les adore, même si le parcs Studio a besoin de nouveautés car il est très pauvre en attractions et en quartiers.
Not doing any research to find out out how to correctly use the public transit system you intend to use in an unfamiliar city without getting fined €40 for insufficient fare is 100% one’s own fault. It’s absolutely not the fault of RATP or Disneyland.
Disney or whatever company runs Disneyland in Paris is a big enough company that they are partly responsible for the poor situation with the public transportation. It’s not like there wasn’t negociation to have a station built specifically for the park.
I ran into a similar issue. I’m used to a transit system where you can pay when you get off (Japan). I went from the place I was staying, into some downtown large station, and assumed wrongly, that if I needed to do something special there would be a gate before boarding the train to Disneyland. There wasn’t. I followed the signs and ended up on the correct train and given there was no barriers I assumed I could just pay the fee at the end like I can do in Japan. Once I arrived I was told no, there was a fine so nothing to do but pay a €40 fine at the end, or just get back on the train, ride back to downtown, pay the correct fee, and then come back. The fact that that’s a possibility shows the scam. The fact the Disneyland Paris, knows this is an issue and does nothing to help alleviate it even though they clearly have influence over that station shows their complicity.
This is entirely within the Park’s influence to try to correct and to call out as praying on tourists. They could easily tell you when you look up directions to the park “WARNING: You must buy your train tickets before you board the train to avoid a €40 fine”. A tourist is not going to have any idea of the way the system is rigged to fine them for doing nothing wrong. It will be their first time so they have zero knowledge of what they should do. They won’t even have the knowledge that they should be looking up the scam beforehand.
My experience of Paris Disneyland is both as someone that grew up near the original Disneyland and has probably be ~200 times, 2-3 times a year as a kid, 1-3 times a week as an annual passholder for a couple of years, plus other visits. I’ve also been to Tokyo Disneyland and Disney Sea 3-4 times each (living in Tokyo for many years). Further, I’m a game developer and one of the game designers on a project I worked on brought up this Disney idea of “weiners”. I don’t know where he read this but the basic idea was supposed to be, like dangling a weiner in front of a dog, that Disneyland was consciously designed so that at each point in the park you’re drawn in a certain direction by the vistas you see.
So, pre-California Adventure, from the parking lot you are drawn to the train station as it looms large and is the only thing visible from outside the park. Once you pass under the station and into the city hall square area you see main street with the castle at the other end drawing you toward it. When you get to the center of the park you’re drawn to Tomorrowland, the only direction that’s actually open, where you saw the Peoplemover and the Rocket Jets up in the sky drawing you in. The other 3 directions, Fantasyland, Frontierland, Adventureland, are all hidden by gates.
From tomorrowland you eventually make it to the submarine/monorail area and it’s clear there is only one direction to go, toward Fantasyland. That’s about the end of where you can make this claim of wieners, though maybe the path around the Rivers of America from Thunder Mountain area all the way to Bear Country can at least be considered a natural walk.
So, I get to Disneyland Paris, expecting a well designed park but what I found was it’s a mess. Standing in front of Space Mountain in Paris Disneyland there is ZERO sense of where to go next. In fact, I had to look at a map to even figure out there’s a path behind the Journey to the Top of the World cafe. That was also a huge disappointment, having seen the designs for it since Disney Paris was announced and it turns out it’s just a decoration for a restaurant.
Another disappointment was the fact the same ride is repeated 3 times throughout the 2 parks. That’s the Dumbo ride but it’s re-themed multiple times. Disneyland Anaheim now has that problem as well though only repeated twice. The current Rocket Jets and Dumbo are the same ride BUT that didn’t use to be true. When the Rocket Jets were 5 stories in the sky they were vastly more scary/thrilling than the same Dumbo ride at ground level. The same thing is true for “Big Shot” at the Stratosphere Hotel in Las Vegas. It’s a generic launch ride but at 1000ft in the sky the experience is vastly different than the same ride at ground level.
Yet another disappointment was, as you put it, the lack of attractions. There was a walk through maze which I just found like an “oh, we don’t want to spend any money, what’s the cheapest thing we can put here to fill up space”. Similarly the 20 Leagues Submarine turns out just to be a walk through “museum”.
All that said, Space Mountain Paris is arguably the best Space Mountain. As is Thunder Mountain though Thunder Mountain is basically the same concept as it is in Anaheim, Florida, and Tokyo where as Space Mountain is an entirely different ride. In the Hollywood park the Ratatouille ride is one of the best experiences for that type of ride I know of. I liked it more than the new Star Wars ride at Disneyland Anaheim I managed to get on 2 days before the park closed because of COVID in March 2020.
For me, I went to Disneyland Paris by myself on like the 3rd week in September on a weekday in 2015. I got to the parks at 11am, walked both parks in 4 hours including riding everything I wanted to (Space Mountain, Thunder Mountain, Pirates of the Caribbean, Haunted Mansion, and the Ratatouille ride, and then was out of the parks at 3pm) so if you want
I don’t think that you can ride all the attractions in Disneyland Paris in just one day. Maybe in March, but for sure not in summer. I’ve stayed in the resort in June and in three days we barely completed a good 98% of the attractions (excluding Pirates of the Caribbean, Phantom Manor and Rock n’roller coaster which were closed, and Armageddon and the stunt show because we didn’t have the time).
With all the new attractions in Walt Disney studios I strongly suggest a 4 days stay in the resort
Tom thanks for the review. My wife and I are off to Paris and Venice as well as DLP in a few weeks and looking forward to it. From a point of perspective my first DL was HK and we loved it as it gave us the experience with out knowing what else is out there. Since that first visit we’ve now also been to Anaheim (twice) and most recently Orlando, then just last December back to HKDL. I should point out all these were with our children so this will be first DL experience without them.
What was most evident was how small HK is relative to Orlando particularly but the thing I dont like about Orlando is how spread out it is between the various parks – obviously in part due to the sizes of parks. Also and apologies to DL fans but there simply isnt a whole lot else to do in Orlando after the parks (not just DL but Universal, Legoland, Sea World etc).
So where does this leave me I actually think my favorite is Anaheim Why? Well its big enough to be a solid couple days but not overwhelmingly so. Best part from here in Aus its way closer than Orlando too. So hopefully we get a similar feel from DLP that is a balance between the first visit to DL in HK and not come away from it like we did Orlando and go wow that was huge but left me a little ho hum (though being a Star Wars fan a trip back to East Coast might be in order, and I know lots of you wont agree and thats fine too)
If any one has some hidden gems to find in DL would be interseted in knowing
Disneyland Paris is our dream destination for me and my wife especially for our 5th anniversary.we Love all your travel and posts
Tom–this article is wonderfully written. I am an occasional lurker on this blog and your writing is always insightful, articulate, and hits the right tone every time. Extra kudos for your takes on cultural differences and bridging the gap when it comes to addressing the more polarizing topics regarding certain Disney resorts.
I went to DLP for the first time with my 18 year old as her senior trip two years ago. It was for Thanksgiving and it was so magical. It was lightly snowing and the Christmas decorations were up! We only did a few rides (with NO LINES!!) and walked around taking it all in! This summer are are going back with the rest of the family. As Disney fanactics who frequent the US parks we are very excited! Although it will be after a few weeks of touring Western Europe as a treat to my youngest princess! Do little girls wear princess dresses like at WDW?
Love the blog!
Hi there, DLP local here, yes little girls wear princess dresses in DLP but less than in the US parks. Also a cultural thing, I think. There are several shops selling dresses but I think it is the same as you see in the US. There is a BBB make over in the Disneyland Hotel.
Have fun!
Karen
I was lucky enough to visit both WDW and DLP around 6 times each as a child/teenager – in my memory WDW was always so much better than DLP (probabaly due to Florida being a more ‘exotic’ destination when travelling from the UK). However when I’ve been back to WDW as a late 20-something I realised that a lot of the details I thought I remembered from Magic Kingdom weren’t actually there. So many of the memories of the different lands and attractions that stayed with me were from DLP – the details in Phantom Manor, the castle, Discoveryland and the whole area around big thunder mountain to name just a few. I think this shows just how beautifully designed this park is, it really does capture the magic from a thematic perspective. I’m planning a trip to go back to DLP later this year after a 12 year hiatus and I can’t wait!
Disneyland Paris was a dream destination for me because it was not an easy place to travel to financially. So last year I finally save up and made my long journey there and my woes began even before entering the park. I had pre purchased train tickets in the Paris city zones so I ended up forgetting that I i needed a different train ticket to go to DLP. When I got to the final station I was fined with €40! I was so shocked because logically I would imagine that I could just pay the difference in the ticket fee. It wasn’t not just me, there were at least a dozen other people that were in the same situation. The controllers knew this would happen and they were standing ready by the gate! There were about 6 of them waiting with mobile credit card machines. I felt so bad for this family of 4 that ended up paying €160! I understand that this is my fault for not being more thorough but I was just so freaking excited to go to DLP! I felt like there were tourist scams everywhere in Paris and even the RER was in on it! In the end the Ratatouille ride was meh and the most memorable ride for me was actually the Crush coaster. Sad to say I don’t think I’ll be going back to DLP even if I had the opportunity to go back to Paris.
Did you even actually go to Disneyland Parc? Because the only attraction examples you’ve given are from Disney Studio Paris, which is a sad shell of a pathetic park. Though, I would think Tower of Terror would stand out to you more than Crush’s Coaster.
The other issues you’ve given have nothing to do with Disneyland, so I wouldn’t use them as an example of why Disneyland Paris is a poor destination?