When the Party’s Over (Disneyland Paris 2019-Day 5)

July 6

We got up later than expected, and even let the baby sleep longer in order to get everything packed. We didn’t buy that much stuff so it wasn’t a difficult process (and besides, Rasa is a wiz when it comes to packing). Finally, we had to wake up Monki and headed out to have our last breakfast. I sent the girls ahead while I put the bags into the left luggage – this way we could go to the park and not have to worry about our stuff. Even though there wasn’t a lot of people in line, for some reason they figured they could get the line to go faster if they had two people taking bags, so I handed my stuff off, got a claim check for each article I left, including the suitcase, Rasa and Monki’s backpacks, and our coats. Four in total.

Then I went to meet the girls for breakfast. Again, nothing special. Honestly, if we were paying €19 per person on a daily basis, I wouldn’t be happy. But since it was all included, we took what we wanted and it was fine (we even filled up Monki’s juice bottles several times with fresh apple juice).

On the way to the park, as soon as we left the wooded trail and joined up with the folks coming from the Newport Bay Club (one of the fancy shmancy hotels), a guy stopped us and gave me four hotel-issued fast passes, good for any ride. I thanked him and Showed Rasa. She noticed that he had been checking us out and it wasn’t until he saw our interactions with Monki that he decided to give us the passes. Interesting. But also, not that I believe in these things, but a few days earlier we had given away a pair of fast passes and the universe had returned the favor.

On the edge of Disney Village was a Rain Forest Cafe, done up on the outside with giant mushrooms and a cage containing an animatronic alligator, which people had taken to throwing money on, some of it landing in its mouth. On one of our trips past it, Monki had wanted to see what all the people were looking at and I explained it was a “money eating alligator.” So now, every time we went by, she wanted to see the “money eating alligator.” I’m afraid if she ever sees an alligator in real life, she’ll want to throw money at it.

Moving on, Monki decided she wanted to do Parachute Drop again so we went to the Studios. There were a lot of people around, so Rasa went into “Schumacher” mode, zipping through the crowds. It was hard to keep up since she would find a small gap and exploit it to move forward, but as soon as she was through, it would close, leaving me stranded well behind her. I was doing my best just to follow her with my eyes so I wouldn’t completely lose her.

Rounding a corner, though, we noticed that Les Tapis Volants – Flying Carpets Over Agrabah®, was open for the first time since we’d been there, so we went to that first. We thought about using the fast passes but the guy working the front of the line suggested not to, explaining that the wait was only 15-minutes. Okay, sure, we took him at his word. But of course, technical problems. When we were pretty much the next group to go on, the ride was stopped and, in two languages, we were asked to be patient. Rasa suggested that as long as we had the Fast Passes, I should go and ride The Twilight Zone Tower of Terror and meet up with them at the Parachutes. Naturally, as soon as I left, the ride resumed and they were able to get on and have an okay go of it (evidently, someone else was sitting i the front and controlling the up and down so it wasn’t 100% fun).

The Tower, however, was fun! It’s a scary ride for sure, but I could handle it. As soon as I got off, though, I got a text from Rasa (which had been sent while I was inside the queue and out of contact) that they were already in line for the Parachutes and could I get ice cream. Since the temperatures were still unbearable, she had promised Monki a cup of Ben & Jerry’s Cookie Dough (which was not only the most prevalent cart ice cream not in a cone or on a stick, but also where the bulk of our discretionary spending went). I decided to change it up a little bit, though, and while yes, I got the ice cream, I also got a blue slushy and met them in line. Monki had seen the blue slushies around and had been curious so I figured this was our last day, what the hell. When I showed it to her, she was excited at first and tried it enthusiastically. Didn’t take long, however, before it seemed like she was just drinking it because it was cold and then not even that could save it, as it melted into a blue, liquid goo. But hey, at least we tried!

Our final time on the ride and not only was Rasa getting more comfortable with the heights, but Monki kept her hands in the air almost the entire time. By the time we were back on the ground it was already after noon and we had to be back at the hotel by 1:20pm to catch our shuttle. There was one quick stop I had to make, to pick up a mug for Rasa (which was green, again, something new for her since she hates the color) and then it was time for Schumacher mode to get us out of the park and back to the hotel in time to get our bags and catch the bus back to the airport. Everything would have been perfect – except they brought out the wrong suitcase.

I’d handed over my four claim checks and one by one, the pieces came out – our jackets, Monki’s Minnie Mouse back pack and Rasa’s regular one, and then a suitcase which wasn’t ours. Nope, it belonged to the guy who had been ahead of me in line, I know because I had overheard him saying he was Italian and I had glanced at the bag. And yet, this bag matched our claim check. It took explaining that it wasn’t our bag to three different people and opening the bag to show I knew what was inside before they let me leave with it. With our proper bags in tow, we had just enough time to repack everything before the shuttle showed up and we were off, back to de Gaulle.

This time, the shuttle to the airport was a bit quicker, but again, the start and stop and the heat still left Monki feeling poorly. She didn’t get sick this time, but it was close. We found our check in area and got into a horrendously long line. Seemed that there was some sort of security issue (welcome to Charles de Gaulle Airport) but, as we soon found out, the issue was only with EasyJet and since we were on Air Baltic, we were in the clear and could easily bypass it all.

This put us in front of the check in counter about an hour before we could actually check in so we waited. Rasa thought some food would do us all good…but the nearest place for a quick bite (again McDonald’s) was in a different part of the terminal (we were in 2D, food was 2A) so I headed out, having to go down stairs, outside, across the car rental lots, back inside, up stairs before I found the place. But I did, and I returned victorious.

We ate, got in line and got checked in (our bag had only increased in weight about 2kg, still well under our 20kg limit) and went through security. Turns out that with a baby, you can bring in a full bottle of water, but not 150ml of liquid sunscreen. Who knew?We got to the gate, (got Monki a Ginormous Chupa Chup at duty free) and even figured outr the gate change (which was far more confusing than it sounds). Finally, after sitting on the plane for an extra 20 minutes, we made it into the air and headed home.

The flight itself wasn’t hard. Monki didn’t sleep, though, so Rasa took advantage of the colored grease pencils we had brought with us to paint a cat’s nose and whiskers onto Monki, who then meowed the rest of the flight.

Our bag came through unscathed and we made it out to our waiting car, just as droplets of rain started coming down. Rasa drove home, stopping at our only 24 hour grocery store to make sure we had food for the next day’s breakfast.

Before we went to bed, we were unpacked and ready to face the world again. It was a great trip, a great way to celebrate our upcoming birthdays and a fun family holiday. Can’t wait for the next one, I just don’t think it’ll be at Disneyland Paris again for a while. There’s a big world out there, we want to explore more of it.