Birthdays at Disneyland Paris
Created | Updated Jul 14, 2013
They say it's the most magical place in the world, so what better location for a child's birthday?
I've been to Disneyland Paris (DLP) several times. I once treated my son and daughter to a stay in the park's jewel of hotels, the Disneyland Hotel, a massive pink wedding cake edifice right on Main Street. That was at Hallowe'en, and the Park had made certain areas extra spooky, my daughter had a frightful makeover complete with backcombed hair, and I bought myself a cobwebbed witches hat. Another time we stayed in the more wallet-friendly Hotel Cheyenne, and enjoyed its cowboy Wild West theme.
The most memorable day was spent back in 1999, the day after the solar eclipse which passed over the south of England and into France. We'd rented a gite just south of Paris for a week, and had scouted out a good eclipse spotting car park, where we met up with my rocket-scientist cousin and his family. Sadly, we were clouded out right on the point of totality. So it was nice to have Jemima's 6th birthday the next day at Disney to cheer us all up. It turned out to be a huge family get together - me and my 2, cousin and his crew of 4, my parents who were in Paris for their wedding anniversary and took a day trip to the Park to join us, and my aunt and uncle who were caravanning nearby. A grand total of 11 all crowded around a table that I'd booked in Cafe Mickey. I'd also reserved a birthday cake, which was paraded out crowned with sparklers with much aplomb by a procession of the characters. They all spent plenty of time at our table interacting with everyone - even my mother fell in love with Pluto!
Most memorable, did I say? Well, until now. My most recent trip was to celebrate another birthday, this time of my step-son. I like to research trips well in advance, and I found the DLP forum on Trip Advisor to be an excellent resource. Thanks to them, I knew to call into Guest Relations at City Hall and ask for a birthday badge. This can be seen by many of the characters and gives them the opportunity to interact and wish special greetings. I'd read about this, and told my stepson that we would do this. He was most excited by the prospect, and talked of little else in the weeks before the trip! I wondered if I'd over-promised, but reassured myself that I'd been able to get Jedward to sing him Happy Birthday last year - how hard could it be to meet Mickey Mouse?
I was most impressed with the staff in Guest Relations. Ina looked after us like royalty - she produced the much anticipated birthday sticker, and then handed a phone to C to hear a special birthday message from Mr M Mouse himself. She also organised a green card for visitors with mobility problems, and booked us a table in Cafe Mickey, informing us of the times that the characters would appear.
No sooner had we stepped outside of City Hall than we saw Goofy, who posed in some suitablly zany shapes for us all. We procured a time slot to meet an unspecified Princess in the special Pavilion - she turned out to be Cinderella. She wrote a special Happy Birthday message in our autograph book, and C kissed her hand most gallantly and elegantly.
And then, the big one - could we meet Mickey? We went to the theatre where he was appearing, and using the green card were ushered into a special waiting room, done up to look like a dressing room backstage, with Mickey's costumes and props from some of his movies. And then, we were beckoned behind a screen, and there was the mouse himself! He gave C special birthday hugs, and refused to accept my husband's reluctance to be photographed, insisting that we all got into the shot together, for what turned out to be a fabulous family portrait.
After all that excitement and autograph-hunting and photograph-posing, we were glad of the opportunity to sit down. I was reminded of Jemima's birthday 14 years ago as we went to good ole Cafe Mickey for dinner. No cake this time, but the characters do still come out one by one, and spend plenty of time at each table interacting with all the diners. The food here is pretty tasty - expensive, which is par for the course (haha) at Disney, but it's worth every cent to see the delight on the faces of everyone, from the youngest wide-eyed child up to grumpy sourpusses like my husband.
