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Reach for the stars It's up to you how far you′ll go {Tokyo Disney}

Wednesday, February 25, 2026

Next stop on my tour de Asia was Tokyo and visiting the Tokyo Disney Parks for my third time!

After taking off from Hong Kong, it was roughly a 5 hour flight to Tokyo.

I landed in Tokyo around 7pm and took and Uber to my hotel in Tokyo Bay. The ride took about 2 hours, and I had a lot to do before my day at Disney the next day.

I was staying at La’gent by myself that evening. Thankfully, the hotel staff checked me in in English and were very helpful. They even showed me the drink reception room. And the room had its quirks, but was fine for the evening except for the pillow, which was weirdly like a beanbag and the most uncomfortable pillow I’ve ever slept on. The bathroom also made me laugh because the shower was not like a stall, it was a room.

I took the 12 minute walk to 7-Eleven to find some dinner and ended up with some Japanese fried chicken, a curry bun (which was almost like a sugar doughnut filled with cocoa itchibanya sweet curry) and of course, a vanilla coolish, even though it was cold.

(above: these are all hot drinks)

I also stopped by a supermarket on my walk back just to check it out. It was a whopping 34° outside and a very chilly walk.

The next morning, I was up extremely early to take the hotel shuttle bus over to Tokyo Disney Sea aka one of my favorite places on Earth.For breakfast I had brought just add water oatmeal cups, but I also tried the 7-11 maple syrup and butter pancakes. The syrup was more of a jelly inside and there was soo much butter but it reminded me a cold McDonalds pancake so it was pretty good still.

I dropped my luggage at the hotel front desk for the day and waited in line for the very popular 6:35am bus to the turnstiles of the park.

The park would not open until 9am it was 33 degrees out, so time to get comfortable and wait. I was two hours early, and physically could not have been any earlier unless I took a taxi, and the lines for admission were still long!

Security line for the park opened 30 min early, and the park turnstiles 15 minutes early. This is super handy, especially when the hike to Fantasy Springs is like a 15 minute walk to rope drop all the new stuff in this area. They finally let me in, and I began my tour de Tokyo Disney Sea fast walking allll the way to the back of the park to get to Fantasy Springs.

We finally made it.

My plan was to ride Rapunzels Lantern Festival first because it didn't have a single rider line, and it was only a 5 minute wait, so it paid off.

It was so beautiful and I cried the entire time. It was a lovely boat ride through some of the major points of her story was beautiful music and the most incredible animatronics ever.

I ran to single rider Frozen next and I was beginning to wonder how many times I’d be crying today. I will never look at other boat rides the same. This one the animatronics were also incredibly magical and one of a kind, and everything was larger than life scale.

While walking around Frozen area I saw Anna and Elsa saying hello to everyone. In Tokyo, you don’t wait in the line to meet the characters you stand in a huddle and the character will call you over. I gave them a wave, but I didn’t physically meet them sadly.

My next iconic ride was the best ride ever, Sinbads Voyage to go visit Chandu! The music on this ride is by Alan Menken and it’s incredibly catchy and the best song ever. Mike and I literally sing this song to each other probably monthly.

There were so many snacks to choose from at Disney Sea, and the hardest part with being a solar traveler is having no one to share them with. I decided to skip lunch and instead just eat a ton of snacks during the day and it seemed to work. To start, I had my vanilla, strawberry, chocolate alien mochi, which is mandatory if you come here.

The fried pizza turnover from Lookout cookout was amazing too. It’s very helpful that Tokyo has sorted out their Disney app to be more useful and includes mobile ordering now.

I have had the Donald Ukiwah shrimp bun before, but I wanted to try it again with my new found love for shrimp. It wasn’t overly shrimpy and it was so nice and warm. It was like a great big hug.

I also had a classic gyoza bun, and it was also good. Tokyo has a way of delivering every food item to match your expectations at the perfect temperature and appearance.

I got the Rapunzel magic milk tea from the Snuggle Duckling and knew it might be a gamble,but I really want to be able to go inside the snuggly duckling restaurant anyways. Also, it was really fun when I did actually go in because mother knows best was playing, but unfortunately, I really didn’t like the drink. It was kind of a weird combination of both watered down and overly artificial strawberry at the same time.

I also tried the apple tea soda which is famous here and I thought it was delicious. It tasted like carbonated apple juice.Churros and popcorn also a big Tokyo thing and known for their unique flavors. I had the strawberry crème brûlée churro and it was also a little artificially strawberry, but the cream on the inside helped tone it down a little.

The white chocolate popcorn was the only flavor I tried of popcorn on this trip because the smell was calling me. For how strong the smell was the flavor was quite subtle, but very good. Crazy how all this food sounds like a lot but in the end it all totaled to $25 USD!

Something to be prepared for in this park is that there is no Wi-Fi almost anywhere. There is also no spoken English. 99% of the rides are in full Japanese so you never really know what the storyline actually is. The cast members also only speak Japanese, but were very accommodating to me using a lot of body language and gesturing. You also just learn to look around and follow the crowd. It also gets more and more crowded every time I come here. This day almost every line was 200 minutes.

Peter Pan ride in Fantasy Springs is one of the best rides, but it was closed all morning so I was trying to stay in the area to see if it would reopen. Of course, the second I walked away it did reopen around noon, so I had to hustle back from the front of the park almost like I was rope dripping again to get to it. I got in a single rider line. When you single rider often, you miss all the cute stuff in the queue, but this time they actually let you watch the pre-show, and the cutest thing I noticed in the line was tiny little feet prints in the walkway

This 3-D attraction reminded me of Spider Man at Universal, but up the ante by a LOT.

The last attraction I had left in Fantasy Springs was the Tinker Bell buggy ride. As soon as opened Peter Pan from its delay, it spread some people out. Tinkerbell wait was only an hour, so I jumped in line for my first official real wait of this park. This cue is adorable as you shrink down to the size of a fairy and prance through the garden. It’s a good thing. The queue feels like part of the attraction because the ride itself is extremely short, but you are fully immersed in the sights, sounds, and even smells of Tinker Bell and her friends homes.

By about 1 PM, I’ve done almost everything that I had already come to do so it was just about riding some rides I’ve done before. I started with Aquatopia because the line was shorter. This ride never cease make me laugh. It will have you asking who’s driving this thing and why are we spinning so much.

I also rode 20,000 leagues under the sea, because the wait time was just under an hour when everything else was still so high. This is similar to Disney Worlds Peter Pan but you’re in a closed car making it feel like you’re underwater.

The show is at Tokyo Disney see you have to play a lottery in order to win entry. You only get one chance at one time per day and if you don’t get it sometimes they’re standby but today there was not. I did not win any lottery to the shows here but I was holding out luck for the Disneyland shows anyway. The only thing about missing shows is there is no sitting time and my feet were killing me. I took a little break on the Venetian gondolas which was a good idea since there were benches in the cue.

I did see some shows in the harbor during the day though. Duffy and friends came for a visit to say hello to everyone on their boat during the daytime. It was Duffys 20th anniversary so there was all kinds of party decor for him and friends everywhere.

In the evening, though, this was a whole 'nother spectacular event. Believe, the Sea of Dreams is like this parks Fantasmic. It’s a boat show on the water with lights and characters, but a million times more magical. I literally can’t even explain how incredible this show was so you’re gonna need to watch it on YouTube. The Aladdin, Rapunzel, Ariel medley was the best part.

There was quite a few rides I didn’t make it on today that are classics because you just had to pick your priorities on this busy day. I was sad to not make it onto Journey to the Center of the Earth and Tower of Terror, but I got to be here at all and that was all that mattered.

Even my favorite Little Mermaid show was down, but I did pop into the Mermaid land for a visit.

Me and my new bestie Baymax had a wonderful day at my favorite place on Earth, and I was ready for the next park tomorrow.

I checked out of La’gent Hotel and drug my bags across the street to the Disney Celebration Wish Hotel, where I’d be sharing a room the next two nights with 3 other girls from work.

Saturday morning was Disneyland day. Meredith, Taylor, and I got up early to take the 6:50am hotel shuttle to arrive at Disney at 7:15am. We had happy entry for staying at a Disney property hotel, which means we got to enter the park 15 minutes early.

Even the lines were insanely long for early entry, but alas, we made it to Disneyland!

The flood gates opened at 8:45am and we rushed to Beauty and the Beasts new attraction, where we still had to wait 20 minutes.

The castle alone was breath taking. It made me feel like I stepped right out of the movie into the story. The preshow before the attraction literally made my jaw drop. The animatronics were so life like. The attraction was really one of a kind though and this story always makes me mushy inside.

Small World with Groot taking over might have actually taken the cake for my favorite ride of the day though!

Next we did some little wins while they were still lower wait times like Rodger Rabbits Cartoon Spin, Haunted Mansion, Peter Pan and Pinocchio. All of these were almost identical to their counterparts in stateside.

Winnie the Pooh is such an iconic ride here, and it did not disappoint. It was crazy how high the heat was cranked on it though, but the ride was still just as fun.

Another iconic new ride is Happy Ride with Baymax! This is similar Mators truck ride at Disneyland which is so funny because that ride was always a low 15 min wait and Baymax was never under 100 minutes.

We found the wait times weren’t super accurate though, and usually the lines were roughly shorter than what was posted. The cast members operating this ride dance along to the original Baymax themed music and lights, made it extra kawaii.

I actually had more meals today instead of just snacks. We tried the croque misour from Gaston’s Tavern and it was an incredibly good, cheesy ham sandwich.

Churro and popcorn flavors today were more since I was with two other people so I got to try a lot more. I tried to caramel apple churro which was very, very apple-y almost like Apple Jacks. I also tried cheese popcorn and the Neapolitan popcorn. These were both more gourmet style pop instead of regular light popcorn.

For lunch had the Baymax burger which was loaded with a meat paddy AND teriyaki chicken with an onion mayo. It was a bit much with the chicken but I liked it overall. It came with Fanta golden cider, which tasted like pear soda and I really loved.

It was Baymax overload day because for dinner I had the Baymax curry. It was the most adorable food I have ever seen, it made it impossible to want to eat, especially his little head!! It was beef stroganoff on one side and chicken curry on the other, and I thought it was good. It came with Fanta Melon soda which was incredible and refreshing.

I finally won the lottery for a show, and it was the only one I cared to see anyways. Mickeys Magical Music World was incredible. The costumes, the sets, the music were all next level. I wish we were allowed photos and videos inside to share how amazing this was because words don’t do it justice.

I also saw 2 parades. The daytime parade was Harmony in Color and it was such a good parade. It was very long and featured several scripted intermission periods to allow people to cross the streets. People in Japan also sit for the duration of the parade, which, after walking 20,000+ steps every day, I didn’t mind.

There was also a Minnie Mouse parade, but we missed it.

The night electrical parade is also a classic favorite. It’s so twinkly and sparkly and just majestic.

Instead of finishing the evening with fireworks, we kicked off the start of dark with fireworks at 6pm! It was weird to me to do them before night parade and not to close out the evening, but they were stunning still.

I also ran into my good friend Rapunzel at this point! I had watched some of the character interactions but I didn’t have a whole lot of time to meet many.