The family all came over to France for Christmas this year and we had a really good time. One of the advantages of having gites is that there was no shortage of accomodation for everybody.
We drove down on the 27th Dec and it cost about 60€ in fuel and 49€ in tolls. It took just over 4 hours each way from Dinan to Disneyland Resort Paris. We used the Michelin route planner but I think if we did the trip again we would circle Paris using a more outer ring road rather than go closer to the center. We had to make quite a few road changes etc. on what was a very busy and complicated road system. I would guess that there is a greater potential for hold-ups closer to Paris.
Whilst we where at Disneyland we stayed in the My Travel Explorers hotel just on the outskirts of the resort. The hotel was fine, it was clean and tidy, it had a swimming pool and a play area for the kids and a shuttle bus to ferry us from the hotel to the Parcs every 15 mins. It was only a 5 minute trip on the bus.
There are dozens of web sites about Disneyland describing everything from 'It's a small world' with lyrics to the different types of candy floss available. From our point of view we tended to make comparisons with Disneyland, Florida (which we visited about 10 years ago before kids) and Disneyland, Paris (with a 6 and 4 year old). We had a great time at both, but Paris is definitely colder, wetter (it snowed one morning!) and much busier and not quite as manicured as Florida. It may be a function of fading memory and lower parc occupancy, but we thought that 'queue mangement' was better in Florida. Queues seemed to flow better and they had TV's and 'pre-shows' in the queue to take your mind off the delay.
Would we go again ? Yes, BUT, in low season. According to a Disneyland employee we spoke to, it was busier during our stay (27th Dec – 30th Dec) than during the Summer holidays. The previous week (the week before Christmas day), the park was much quieter.
For a few Disneyland tips see here, here and here and this well orchestrated amusing queue avoidance scheme.
Our roofers arrived a week early, which I'm very pleased about. They have been at it for a couple days and finished both the lucarnes now except the ridge tiles. Each slate tile is attached to the battens with a stainless steel 'double' hook. One end hooks over the batten and the other end clips under the bottom edge of the tile. All the gullies and rain channels are done in zinc flashing, same as the guttering and down pipes. Everything gets soldered up on site to fit.
Sometimes I wish I was left-handed. Left handed people apparently better at spacial visualisation, i.e. imaging things in 3-D. Having a set of plans is all very well but trying to image the turning, twisting space under an invisible staircase in which to build walls for a toilet and washroom is very difficult.
Removed the shuttering to reveal my magnificent concrete pillar. A thing of beauty. Well they say beauty is in the eye of the beholder.