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[title]Disneyland® Paris is full of surprises. After we'd taken 300 or so photos of the Sleeping Beauty castle, it was time to discover new pleasures we didn't already know about.
Shrink to the size of a rodent
That's how we started our day at Walt Disney Studios® Park, on the 4D ride ‘Ratatouille: The Adventure’. We stepped aboard our rat cars and helped Chef Rémy and his pals get up to mischief in their Parisian restaurant (how apt), with surprises for all the senses around every corner. Mysteriously, the ride has no track; the cars just know where they're going. We had to go on it again. Two more times...
Take centre stage with Aerosmith
After we'd returned to regular size, we wandered over to find the punningly titled Rock 'n' Roller Coaster starring Aerosmith. After being launched out of the station at 57 mph, Steven Tyler and the gang’s legendary riffs rumbled through our ears as we zoomed past a stadium’s worth of flashing lights and effects. It left us weak at the knees.
Get a new hairstyle
Who knew that nestled among the toy stores and cake shops of the Disneyland Park’s Main Street, USA was a real-life barber shop? We found it when we took a detour through a gaslamp-lit arcade, and I thought I might as well get a trim. When life gives you lemons... put the lemons aside and get a haircut.
See an action movie – live!
After a late lunch we strolled casually over to Moteurs... Actions! Stunt show spectacular. A nice, relaxing sit-down show would be just the ticket, right? Well, our lunch stayed down, but the adrenaline kept pumping. Explosions, car chases, gunfights – it was like being on the set of an action movie and discovering the secrets of the most epic Hollywood stunts.
Drink award-winning Disney cocktails
After that action-packed day, we needed to chill out. So we wandered back to Disney's Hotel New York and headed straight for the bar. We were tipped off that Christophe, an award-winning mixologist, was on shift at the New York City Bar, so we asked him to mix us up a couple of Manhattans. Calm, relaxing and sophisticated.
Relax with a massage
On day two we fancied a break from all the excitement, and inside the plush Disneyland Hotel we found the Celestia Spa. No safety belts, no screams, no energy required. If your idea of relaxation is a bit more active, there are three nine-hole golf courses at Golf Disneyland and tennis courts at Disney’s Davy Crockett Ranch, but for us, a 50-minute ‘couples massage’ was what we needed before heading back through the turnstiles.
Set sail with a pirate crew
Feeling thoroughly relaxed and fighting fit, I thought I'd see how I compared to Disneyland’s wild boys. Mighty beards, leather boots, garish accessories – for a minute I thought we’d bumped into some lost hipsters from east London, but happily this was actually Pirates of the Caribbean, an epic river cruise.
Tour the galaxies
Finally, we took the ultimate nostalgia trip. The ‘Star Wars’-themed motion simulator Star Tours takes riders on an intergalactic voyage to the planet Endor, accompanied by robotic pilot Rex. However, the tour, er, doesn’t go quite to plan and soon our shuttle is hurtling around the Death Star. It’s the closest thing I’ll ever get to flying an X-Wing. For the safety of the universe, that’s probably a good thing.
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