Shanghai Disneyland

Way back in the planning stages for The Trip™ Thomas said he’d really like to go to Shanghai Disneyland. The April 7th date was close to his birthday, so we figured we’d make it a birthday event and let him drive the agenda for the day. After all, it’s the boys’ trip too.

After deciding that was what we were going to do on our first day in Shanghai we were then faced with a bunch of things to figure out: could we just get off the ship in Shanghai and do our own thing? Would we need a particular type of visa? How would we get to Disneyland? How would we pay for things? When could we reserve tickets? The rules for visas in China are ever-changing, and it was very difficult to get a straight answer to the visa question. For a long time we thought we would need to be part of an “organized tour group” to take advantage of the “transit visa” that is easier to get than a formal tourist visa. Ultimately that turned out to not be the case, but we did not really know that for sure until very close to April 7th.

Shanghai Disneyland wasn’t super helpful either. For Anaheim Disneyland you can make reservations months in advance. For Shanghai you cannot make reservations more than a month in advance and the park hours remain unclear until a few days ahead. But we managed to get our tickets for the appropriate day and eventually found out the park would be open from 8:30 AM to 9:30 PM.

Our plan was to get off the ship as soon as we could and be there at opening time. That plan was foiled by ship clearance taking until about 8:15. At that point we did get off and had no trouble with immigration. We’d installed the AliPay app on our phones, and it includes the Didi ride-sharing facility within it. So we were able to summon a car to take us out to Disneyland. It was about a 35-minute ride. From the dropoff point it was a good 20-minute walk to the main gate. The park is huge, and much more spread out than Anaheim.

Entrance was accomplished by scanning our passports. Once in we felt like we’d accomplished something given all the variables and uncertainties. Thomas’s first order of business was to ride Tron, which is a ride we don’t have in Anaheim. You get a good launch on the ride and zoom around the track on a “light cycle.” It was fun, although a bit shorter than I expected.

Other highlights were the Pirates of the Caribbean ride, which is dramatically different from Anaheim and really well done, the Zootopia ride, and the “challenge trails.” These last are basically an obstacle course that you complete while harnessed into a support system in case you fall.

Overall we had a great time. The park is big, spacious, beautiful, and of course clean. People were friendly and enough English spoken to get us along. As is true everywhere a smile and a thumbs up will get you pretty far. The food was a bit challenging as it was really meat-heavy. We did not eat terribly well, but that was fine. We walked a ton, did the rides we wanted to do -- nothing we wanted to ride was closed or broke down! -- and thoroughly enjoyed ourselves.Read more