Disneyland Paris for a few hours - with fast passes

[StationeryOrdering]

I have an opportunity to take DD (8) to Disneyland Paris just for a day trip from France for the day soon.

I reckon we will probably have about 5 hours there, arriving late morning. A friend is giving us some fast passes.

I'm looking for some advice about how fast passes work - do I need to buy a separate ticket as well? Do you need one fast pass per ride?

And also, if you only had 5 hours there - where would you go? Which rides/attractions would you recommend for an 8 yo?

Top tip, go when it is raining. Did this last summer and without fast passes longest q was 20 minutes. Chatting to the dutch couple next to us, the previous year in the sun their shortest q was 45 mins and the longest 2.5 hours!

The Indiana jones coaster was good, not too extreme , buzz lightyear shooting ride was brill. my DS's (8) did not enjoy space mountain DD (10) loved it...I felt pretty sick. The Star Wars ride (star tours) hasn't changed since I was a child so really outdated.

You will need park tickets as well as the fastpasses. They're available from www.disneylandparis.co.uk or places like attractionticketsdirect. They vary in price depending on when you go - wherever you buy them from should give you the option to choose the date and will sell you the right ones.

I'm not sure what type of fastpasses your friend means; I'd say they're probably VIP fastpasses which you should be able to use as many times as you like. Not all the rides use fastpass though.

You could probably steer clear of Fantasyland with an 8 year old, if you only have a few hours. Big Thunder Mountain and Phantom Manor will probably go down very well. Crush's coaster is great but the queue is generally long and there's no fastpass; there's a single rider queue but I don't know if you'd do that with an 8 year old. Ratatouille is brilliant and has fastpass (and if you're happy to use the single rider queue, it's never longer than 5 minutes). The Stitch Live show is a good opportunity to sit down for 20 minutes as well as being funny!

Space Mountain is closed till the summer.

Get a programme on the way under the train station on the way in; it'll show you the parade times, which are a good opporunity to cram in rides because everyone's on Main Street.

That's really helpful both thank you. No idea what sort of fast passes they are at the moment. Won't find out until the day begins Wr go, and sadly we don't have the option of choosing a rainy day, we are restricted to a certain day we are in the area.

So do I need to buy the park tickets ahead? I'm slightly nervous about this as I don't know what sort of fast passes they are until the day before.

What is a single rider queue? Does this mean I couldn't ride with DD?

Buy the park tickets ahead as they are more expensive on the day. You can get fast passes for some rides in the park anyway, although I think you can only use one at a time. Not all rides use the fast pass system. If you go to dlpguide.com it will tell you which ones do and dont.

Your friend probably has free fast passes from a previous stay that she didn't get a chance to use, these won't be for a specific ride, you should be able to use them at whatever ride does fastpass.

Thanks will buy tickets ahead, is it worth buying for 2 parks if we only have 5 hrs?

No. We were there for two days and only went in the main disney park.

I would probably just concentrate on the Disney park and do the Studios at another time, look at average queue times on the dlrp site and try and plan what rides you will go to in advance, take a sandwich/snack in with you so you don't waste time queuing for food(there's a shop at the train station or the Earl of Sandwich and others in the Disney Village).

I'd say yes to the 2 parks, some of the best (imo) rides are in the Studios park: Rock'n'Rollercoaster, Tower of Terror, RC Racer, Crush's Coaster. The Animagique show is really good too, if you can see it (there are park schedules as you go in that tell you the times of the shows).

I'd say yes to the 2 parks because some of the best rides (I'll) are in the Studios: Rock'n'Rollercoaster, Tower of Terror, Crush's Coaster and RC Racer. I'd reccommend the first 2 for sure, the other 2 are great but can have really long queues. If you have time, see the Animagique show (park schedules are everywhere to tell you the times of the shows), it's great fun.
In Disneyland park, I recommend Thunder Mountain, Indiana Jones, Pirates of the Caribbean, Star Tours and Buzz Lightyear. The queues for Buzz and Thunder Mountain are usually the longest, and Star Tours can get very long at times.
The parade at 5:30pm is great, if you are still there to see it.
There's an app you can download, just called Disneyland Paris, which has a park map and park info, and gives you up-to-date queue lengths as they're updated through the day. I use it every time I go and it makes life so much easier, rather than going to the other side of the park and finding the queue is too long for a ride.
I'd also recommend bringing lunch (sandwiches and snacks) as the fast food places can have VERY long (30mins+) queues and that would definitely eat into your park time.

Woops, ignore my half a post at the top.

I would disagree and say no to the two parks there is no way you can manage both in 5 hours. I would stick to the main park and maybe have a look at a map and guide before hand and have an idea of where you want to head to.

We've taken the dc to DLP twice - and if they had to chose which park to go to if they just had a few hours there, I reckon they'd probably go for the Studio as their first choice…. It's not to say that there weren't lots of things in the main bit that they enjoyed - but on balance with limited time, most of their favourites were in the studio section.

Thanks for all the advice! It's fab.

I've downloaded the app and DD is deciding which rides she likes the look of. We have a bit of a long list atm! Big Thunder Mountain, Phantom Tower, Pinocchio, Indiana Jones, Pirates of the Caribbean and its a Small a World are on her list. I've said we won't be stopping and queueing for food as there's not enough time and we will get some baguettes to take in with us.

Just got to work out what time we can leave Paris to allow max time there! And whether to pay ahead for one park or two. As much as we'd like to see the Stitch live show (DD a big Stitch fan) I'm not sure it's worth the extra if that's all we'd have time for.

.....I think we have to go to the main park as she wants to see Sleeping Beauty's castle.

Yes, the main park is Disney. Just seeing the characters and the princesses is great.

The awkward thing with the shows if you're on a schedule is that they alternate in French and English. It can be quite a challenge to catch them if you don't have much time.
There are a lot of planned closures, it's a small world closes soon until December. Pinnochio is closed now and big thunder mountain is closing at some point too. The trip advisor forum will have a link to the calendar of closures, there's a mine of info over there.
The summer 'season' starts June 1st and is frozen themed with a mini frozen parade a couple of times a day, a sing-along show and a few other bits (no meet & greet).

I've checked the date we are going re closures and it looks OK. Thanks for the advice re shows, I am thinking we will knock the studios on the head and just go for the main park.

The stitch show is not that great, nor is the phantom manor. Others you mention are worth it, Peter pan is better than pinochio