Addicted to Disney

The Ups and Downs of Disney with Friends

Addicted to Disney Season 1 Episode 8

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Greetings Listeners!! Gather 'round as we recount tales from the heart of Disneyland Paris, joined by our dear friends and fellow Disney enthusiasts, Rachel and Ian. With the walls of Hotel Santa Fe echoing our laughter, we embark on a stroll down memory lane, charting the course of our Disney history from its inception to today's modern marvels. It's an episode peppered with nostalgia, merriment, and the shared consensus that while one can venture into the magic of Disney alone, it's the shared experiences with friends that truly make the park come alive.

Buckle up for some hearty chuckles as we narrate our recent road trip shenanigans, complete with the indispensable sat-nav and its heroic diversion from the chaos of traffic. We then unfold the map to seamless group travel, highlighting the quintessential ingredients of the perfect Disney adventure - with Friends.

So, join Wayne & Caz with our first Podcast Guests,  Rachel, and Ian for an episode that's a veritable how-to guide for crafting the perfect Disney group adventure, brimming with practical tips, never-ending giggles, and a testament to the enduring joy of Disney camaraderie.

Caz and Wayne are Addicted to Disney, a podcast about the ups and downs of Disney trips, from Parts to Cruises we will try it all.

Caz collects Disney Ears, Characters and Loungefly bags. Wayne likes cameras.

Speaker 1:

What you mean. That one? Oh, he pressed the button.

Speaker 2:

He has pressed the button.

Speaker 1:

Why is it he never tells me when he's going to press the button? He?

Speaker 3:

never does that as well.

Speaker 2:

I'll let you.

Speaker 1:

Welcome back to the channel and welcome to Addicted to Disney Podcast. We are live. I would say live, but we are actually sitting in our room at the Hotel Santa Fe at Disneyland Paris and we are joined by Rachel and Ian. Say hi, guys, hi. Hi guys, Hi guys Now.

Speaker 4:

What about me?

Speaker 1:

Oh, and the other one. Of course, I'm Disney.

Speaker 4:

And Mr Disney is doing all the techies bit. So I need to apologise about the quality of the sound because we're in quite an echoey room and we've got some weird and wonderful microphones. We've got some very weird looks when we set everything up in the Santa Fe.

Speaker 1:

So we're here in the Hotel Santa Fe because we're going to talk about Disney with friends. So, ian and Rachel, welcome to the podcast. You're our first guest, I know.

Speaker 2:

Illustrious title first guest we like that we're honoured.

Speaker 3:

We like that honoured yes we're honoured.

Speaker 1:

You're more than honoured. So, guys, you're here with us at Disney. So what was your first trip to Disney? Like it was in 2019.

Speaker 2:

That was your first trip. Yes, you go first.

Speaker 3:

And it was for my birthday. We came in the Christmas season and we'd come for three days. Was it three days? And since then we've had the Disney bug.

Speaker 2:

You've been hooked.

Speaker 3:

Been hooked.

Speaker 2:

Literally my first trip here was when the park opened.

Speaker 1:

First year it opened, came in with the family and had an absolute blast has it changed much since 92?

Speaker 2:

the studio's changed a lot. The main park you could literally walk away 10 years, 15 years ago, walk back in the next day and it feels like it is the next day I say because I can't.

Speaker 1:

When I came in 92 some bits weren't here I know casey jr and that weren't here when I first came. The space mountain wasn't here when I first came, so the Space Mountain wasn't here when I first came. So yeah, the park has changed. So why do you like coming to Disney?

Speaker 2:

It's just a happy place. It's fun. Yeah, it's a place where you can just leave all your troubles at the door and just enjoy yourself. It is just good, clean, healthy, fun.

Speaker 3:

You'll be a big kid, basically.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, my feet don't enjoy it. Basically yeah, my feet don't enjoy it.

Speaker 1:

No, but the rest of me loves it. I don't think anyone's feet enjoy it.

Speaker 2:

It's called a Disney shuffle, no you have to suffer for the enjoyment.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, there are means and ways of still moving your feet, that's for sure. But yeah, we're here with Disney, with Friends. So Disney trips on your own how did you find them?

Speaker 4:

They're amazing On our own. On your own, they're amazing, yeah, which means you've got to come up with a superb list.

Speaker 2:

I'm going to.

Speaker 4:

Disney trip with friends is, I suppose you have to do it.

Speaker 2:

They're making me say this. By the way, disney trips with friends is even better. No, it is, it's better on so many levels because you can share the enjoyment and just have fun with more people.

Speaker 1:

I totally agree it is. We come more people. I totally agree it is. We come. As you know, me and mr disney go to disney on our own quite a lot. But coming with people like you guys, it takes it to another level. It does it's more enjoyable. You get to share experiences, you get to enjoy stuff. You don't get pressured into doing stuff and they're stitched the energizer bunnies around. I think mr disney likes coming with friends don't you, mr?

Speaker 4:

Mr Disney, just apologise there for the tea drinking, that's just appeared.

Speaker 3:

It's good, good stuff.

Speaker 4:

Do I prefer doing it with friends?

Speaker 3:

That sounds so wrong. Do what I'm going to have to.

Speaker 4:

Don't worry, I am going to edit this afterwards. Do I like doing Disney trips with friends? Yeah, I do, and I think I prefer doing it with friends than doing it on our own, because it's almost a case of you have things to bounce around so you bounce off against each other. You, you can come up with silly jokes.

Speaker 1:

You can do the e or t-shirts I will point out at the moment, mr disney and ian do actually have matching eel T-shirts.

Speaker 2:

It's not much of a tale, but I'm sort of attached to it.

Speaker 1:

And there is a long history between why they've got matching T-shirts. Rachel can verify. I can confirm that we did a trip with these guys in October and all we had all trip was why is it always me, me?

Speaker 4:

I don't know what she's talking about.

Speaker 1:

I couldn't understand why it was both of us that time so we decided that, yep, they had to have metal t-shirts for this trip so now they are eeyore and eeyore yep, the eeyore club right, you're going in the park. For those of mr disney's, just put a pair of ears on.

Speaker 4:

No, I am not Stitch ears, Stitch ears Milo. He's been stitched up, I've been stitched up.

Speaker 1:

Yep. So what's your favourite part of coming with friends?

Speaker 2:

Leaving.

Speaker 1:

All right, see you later then. Bye, I'm leaving that bit in.

Speaker 2:

My favourite part about coming with friends is the banter and bouncing off each other and shared experiences, shared enjoyment. The rides are great, but the company is even better.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, yeah, I totally agree with you on that.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, that's what does it for us.

Speaker 3:

Not that I don't like gin does it? I'd say the company yeah.

Speaker 2:

It's having other people to experience fun with, share the experience with you, and of course there's going to be future plans yes

Speaker 3:

we already have future plans apparently.

Speaker 4:

So I've got to speak to the bank manager. You've just been told. Yeah, I've just been told. The question now and this is going to be an interesting one is what's the bad thing about going with friends?

Speaker 2:

that's a hard one to nail down because there aren't many negatives. One negative I suppose would be you're going to have to compromise. You know, if one person wants to go on, run wide and one person wants to go on the other, you're gonna have to work out what you're gonna do during the day so there is a little bit of deconflicting that way. Other than that, you know if they're friends and you get along with each other and you're gonna have a blast. There are few negatives, very few very, very.

Speaker 1:

There are very, very few negatives definitely outweigh yes definitely.

Speaker 4:

I think. For me it's a case of make sure they really are friends.

Speaker 2:

You'll soon find out, oh, you will.

Speaker 4:

Because either after the holiday you've either got really strong friends in life, or you'll be looking for some new friends. Very quickly, Absolutely yeah, they turned out to be less than friends.

Speaker 2:

But it is. I mean, when you're here as a group, there's an element of compromise. Yeah, because you can't all do everything you want to do when you want to do it.

Speaker 1:

You've got to work as a team, you've got to de-conflict, but that's part of the fun of it, you know. It's all about the shared experiences and also knowing each other's limits as well.

Speaker 2:

Absolutely, I'm respecting those limits. Yeah, you know. You know if someone is tired or not having, you know, a peak day, then you've just got to. You know, work yourself around that, but that you know it's. There are more positives than negatives with that, definitely.

Speaker 1:

And also we've done trips where it's gone. Ok, we're going to go and have a break. You guys stay in the park. We're not going to feel offended. There are people I know that do go with friends. If one person turns around and says, actually I need to go and have a rest, the rest of them sort of get whingy dynamics.

Speaker 2:

You know, if you're with good friends that understand each other, then no one's going to take offence to that sort of thing. Proper friends do understand, yeah yeah, and then they're the people you want to go again and again.

Speaker 1:

Definitely so. Would you come with us again?

Speaker 2:

Absolutely yeah.

Speaker 1:

It is definitely different. From my perspective it is a lot more fun because I do sometimes feel and I know Mr Disney Wayne doesn't realise I do sometimes feel that I'm here having fun in my bubble. I love Disney. If I had my life I'd come here every week. Don't think the bank account would let me do that.

Speaker 4:

That would be rather expensive yeah.

Speaker 1:

But I do sometimes feel that Mr Disney's here because I'm here At least, having someone like say, like, with Ian being here, he's got then someone else male company to talk to and they can banter on about anything from work to football, to the colour of the.

Speaker 4:

When is the last time I've ever spoken about football?

Speaker 1:

Okay, they can banter talk come up with ideas, techie stuff, man stuff.

Speaker 4:

Manly techie stuff. Yeah, manly techie stuff, man stuff manly techie stuff, yeah, manly techie stuff.

Speaker 1:

And then there's me and rach. Um, we just we go shopping together and then get called girlfriends. Yes, that, that's a story for another day.

Speaker 4:

That is a story for another day, but yeah, no, it's this is turning out to be a very misogynistic channel, isn't it? It is, yeah I will point out, ladies and gentlemen, that we're multicultural, we're multi-faith, we're yes, we don't really care what you are. So, yeah, if you're anybody, you can go shopping anyone. Someone like rachel and we tend to someone to have a banter.

Speaker 1:

We have a bit of fun with rachel's into the characters as much as me. It gives us the opportunity to have ian and wayne to be our photographers yep, even if they do nick my camera every now and then.

Speaker 4:

I say nothing.

Speaker 2:

I deny everything.

Speaker 1:

Don't worry, I'll be real. I'll be checking the footage later, but it's just nice, it's friendly and it's fun and obviously this time is also the first time we've driven, so there will be a video coming out on the channel of us actually driving for the first time.

Speaker 2:

Screaming while going round and round about it. Well, after your set now yes.

Speaker 4:

Oh yeah.

Speaker 1:

And having their support, as I call it the Parry-Dakar backup team. It was great.

Speaker 4:

It felt like the Parry-Dakar backup team.

Speaker 3:

I like that. The last stage, the Parry backup team yes, it was, I've been told.

Speaker 4:

I mean, when we do Disney normally, we normally come out on the Eurost for some strange reason, mainly because ian said it was a really good idea. Oh yeah, so we got the channel tunnel, drove over from calais and the first two, three hours of it wasn't too bad. French motorways are pretty good. We had a tap and go bleepy thing so we paid the tolls and then the last half an hour in sat nav had a fit and it was the parryakar through French back roads which were so narrow. In fact one road was so narrow, it was a one-way system, yeah, and we saw more of the back of Disney than the front.

Speaker 2:

But it's an interesting angle, isn't it? It's an interesting angle, it's an interesting angle to see, and it's like you can see the hotels.

Speaker 4:

Yes from the back.

Speaker 1:

And it's still 20 minutes drive. It's only four kilometres away, but it's 20 minutes by car. Yeah, but the sat-nav should go left when the hotels are in front of you. It's all part of the deception plan. It was a good journey. It was good for us.

Speaker 4:

The problem was we could see the hotel on the right but the sat-nav was saying go left.

Speaker 1:

But no, it was good fun Having you guys there with us on our first drive down as our Paris-Dakar backup support team really helps.

Speaker 3:

We'll be a backup support team again.

Speaker 2:

Next time we might take the motorway for the last third of the way, In defence of my sat-nav. It redirected us because there was an accident on the motorway and there was traffic. And the only accidents we saw in the country lanes were the ones behind us as we were leaving, so it was not a problem.

Speaker 4:

I did get beeped once by some French driver who didn't like me cutting him.

Speaker 2:

No, that's a term of endearment in france. You know, if they beep you, that's a compliment. Right, yeah, just wave your blue passport at them right, does that count?

Speaker 4:

also, if they have a blue flashing light on the top of the car and they're beeping it, the blue flashing light means go faster, right, okay, yeah, I tried that coming up to disney for us with friends is such a different experience.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, we do have fun. Me and Wayne go on our own. We have a laugh, we joke. Having people like you guys to share it with is great, and I know we're talking about future plans of things we're going to do. From our experiences, we feel you're going to love it.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, as Ian silently sobs into his wallet.

Speaker 4:

So, to bring this to a reasonably reasonable, short, close Tips from each of us for going to Disney with friends. So, ian, give us a tip.

Speaker 2:

Tip number one talk to each other. Converse. You know everyone has their own needs, their desires, what they want to achieve that day. Talk together as a group, work it all out, because there has to be a little bit of compromise when you're in a group situation. Yeah, that's my top tip. Rachel, I'd say plan.

Speaker 3:

That's my top two. Rachel, I'd say plan, make sure you are wanting to do the same thing. If not, come to a compromise, yeah.

Speaker 1:

Communication is definitely key, especially if you're going to be travelling together. Yeah, especially if you're going by road, because if, for any reason, one of you wants to stop, you can then message the rest of the team to say, oh, I'm putting into this one, and then they're aware why you're stopping, because you don't want to cause panic Of course, that only works when you can spell the French names on the WhatsApp group. Hence why I took the photo of it.

Speaker 3:

We got to the right to end.

Speaker 4:

Although we did try and pull over to one that was actually closed. So, kaz, your top tip.

Speaker 1:

Top tip for going with friends is be prepared to compromise and understand that what you want to do, maybe they might not want to do, and vice versa, they might want to do something that you don't want to do, so you do have to compromise, yeah and that's not a bad thing.

Speaker 2:

No, that's a good thing because it means you can actually experience things you'd never do on your own anyway, because we all have the rides that we've never been on and you end up going on something new and thoroughly enjoying it and this trip.

Speaker 4:

At the moment, we are experiencing different things yeah, let's just not mention terror terror yet, because we haven't yet been on it. And lastly, my my top 10 tip it's not really a top 10 tip, because only four of us in here is link your bookings with disney, because then you get adjoining rooms and you get a door where you can go and shout at each other at 8 o'clock in the morning. Are you getting up? Yeah, and everyone goes. I'm so asleep.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, having an adjoining room is definitely a good idea.

Speaker 2:

Yeah that's good, that is handy. Yeah, it's more social, it might be.

Speaker 4:

It's a holiday, it's Disney but it as well, and that's something that I really like.

Speaker 1:

Okay, I think that's about it, really, unless you can think of anything else. That's the roundup of disney with friends. A bit of waffle, bit of fun, but you you know that we waffle on our podcast anyway, especially once mr disney's pressed the button. Um, if you like what we're doing, carry on listening. You can also find us on youtube and various other socials and we'll see you on the next one.

Speaker 3:

So it's goodbye from me it's goodbye from me it's goodbye from me and it's definitely goodbye for me.

Speaker 4:

So thanks for listening and, as kaz has said, you can find us on spotify, apple podcast, youtube and various other podcasting sites. So please, if you get a chance and you can do, please leave a review or give us a few stars. Thanks for listening. Don't forget, have fun and be safe.

Speaker 1:

Thanks for listening bye.

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