Shanghai Disneyland!

Holey Moses I am sore!  No, I'm in pain...ouch!   And I'm going to do this again tomorrow and I have to get up early again.  So, I'm gonna throw some photos at you and maybe explain the day later (you know how I am about that...)

SURPRISE!  It's two days later and I am updating you.  So, I did eventually get on the trains going the right direction to get to Shanghai Disneyland and arrived right at opening.  Although the park officially opens at 8, you probably won't get in until 9 or later due to the lines and shoving and pushing...

As you can see, I did finally make it inside.  It was a lovely day...bright, sunny, and warm.  In retrospect, maybe a bit too sunny.  I'd pay for that later. 

Once you get through the gates, there is what looks like the Train Station in Disney World.  However...no train and no opening show.

Main Street looks pretty much the same, it's called Mickey Avenue here and is a little shorter.  And the signs are in a mix of English and Chinese.

However the castle is A LOT bigger.

A lot goes on inside this castle too.  Big walkways through it with Princess mosaics,  a crystal store, the Bibbity Bobbity Boutique (for wannabe princesses) and a banquet hall...more on that tomorrow.

I then just wandered through the park to figure out where everything was. There are currently 6 sections to this park, Gardens of Imagination, Fantasyland, Adventure Isle, Treasure Cove (entirely based on Pirates of the Caribbean), Tomorrowland, and Mickey Avenue.  They are *this* close to opening a seventh, Toy Story Land, but I was a little early for it.

I managed to spot Rapunzel's tower in Fantasyland...

I was thinking about having lunch here...never got to it though. 

I did spot a photo op with my favorite bear, Pooh, and the line was very short, so I got my photo on!

Treasure cove was what it would be like to base a theme park on the movie rather than basing the movie on a ride...

Kind of on the edge of Gardens of Imagination and Tomorrowland, there is a Marvel thing...not a ride, but some photo ops and props.. apparently, you can get your photo taken as Iron Man somewhere in here.  You could also take your photo with Captain America and/or Thor. 

I accidentally stumbled upon the parade...

Donald is driving the train, while Mickey waves to the other side of the crowd.

In China, Mulan gets her own float...and it was a pretty spectacular one. 

And of course there is the Toy Story float...because that section of the park opens very soon.

At the end is a float with a miscellaneous collection of unrelated characters...LOL.  It was getting near lunchtime, and I was looking for some actual Chinese food, so I ended up at The Wandering Moon restaurant.

I got the seafood noodles.  It was actually quite good, although I wasn't sure exactly what half of the stuff was that I was eating.  I found out later that the spikey looking bits are cross-cut squid.  

 I then continued to Tomorrowland.

This is the big dealio I was interested in, the Tron ride.  It's what they have here instead of Space Mountain, and the only ride I did go on in the entire park.  I intended to do most of my rides on my birthday, but we'll talk about that then...

Anyway Tron!  It was awesome!!  I thought it better than Space Mountain.  You got strapped into speeders and the ride was both inside with the cool lighting effects, but also went outside (so I did get a picture of that bit).  This is one of the few rides in this park with a Single Rider option that lets you skip part of the line if you are ok with not riding with your group.  As I have no group...this was perfect for me.  Only thing is, I didn't get any shots of the cool light effects.

For the rest of the day, I just wandered around.   I did start to feel a bit worn out, so I thought it was a good time for some ice cream...I went to Il Paperino.

I don't remember exactly what this was called, but I am absolutely sure there were the words "fruit" and "butter cake" involved.  The cake, I did find under the ice cream....the fruit was non-existent.  But this was a superfun sundae!

Tables were at a premium, you had to double up and I sat with a couple of young Chinese ladies who were chatting and playing with their cell phones.  A young guy asked to sit with us and exclaimed that he was thrilled to be able to have a conversation in English.  His name was Billy and he was from Canada. I soon discovered that he is a huge Disney fan and is visiting them all.  We soon entered a debate on Space Mountain versus Tron.  We parted ways as he wanted to run to catch the parade, which I had seen earlier. 

I wandered through the Gardens of Imagination area

I found the Alice in Wonderland maze which is actually along the edge of Fantasyland.   Based upon the Tim Burton version, not the original, obviously.

This is the Fantasia carousel, which has characters from the movie instead of boring old carousel horses.  

It was starting to get dark, and only about a half hour before the park closed, so I decided to get outta Dodge, to try to beat the crowds.  Got a t-shirt (hard to find in my size!) and a snow globe (which will not live at work). 

Headed past the Steamboat Willie statue and fountain at the entrance, which I had missed earlier, but looked much cooler at night anyway.

I did hit crowds in the Metro as many had the same idea that I did, but they thinned out as we got closer to downtown and I was able to get a seat.  I was beat and had another day of this ahead of me...

Oh and I got sunburnt...ouchies!