The drop off point for buses was still a fair distance from the entrance and it was raining heavily as we walked to the gate. 30 minutes we stood with a quite small crowd waiting for the gates to open. In Florida the gates quite often open earlier than published but here in Japan they are a stickler for rules so it was bang on 9am that the first people were let in. For some reason Disney are still celebrating Easter. People were wishing us a Happy Easter as we walked in, which we couldn’t quite get our heads around.
Then despite the rain it all started to work out for us. As Karen came out of the toilet, Space Mountain opened and we were almost the first on. We really enjoyed it as it seemed different to the other ones we had done. We then walked back to Winnie the Pooh just as that opened as well and walked straight on. This was a terrific ride and one we hadn't done before. It had me laughing out loud for much of it, especially the Tigger room where everything bounced including the trackless cars we were on. It was very well done.
Some of the rides were somewhat different in Japanese. We went on Jungle Cruise and really had little idea what they were saying but everyone else on the board thought it to be hilarious. The Tiki Rooms (as taken over by Stitch or ’Stitchy’ as they called him) was also interesting with nothing in English. Fortunately Country Bear Jamboree had a couple of English songs for us to tap along with. They performed a special Vacation show which we had never seen before.
There were many interesting things we observed today. Firstly despite the rain how polite and well mannered all the other guests were. We also reckon that about a third of the other guests were schoolchildren. They were round in groups and there was never and shouting or pushing or shoving. They were all in their school uniforms and looked very smart. The only personalisation was their choice of trainers. They also seem to be buying up anything and everything Disney related as they all seemed to have loads of bags of goodies from the shops. We couldn't work out why there were so many school children there though.
As for the Disney staff who did seem to be mainly young girls, well they were amazing. Their faces must ache as they have a constant large smile on their face whatever they are doing. Even the ones positioned in the pouring rain to point the way or in some cases just wave. There were also so many of them. The number of attendants operating a ride was a bit extreme but it did mean the loading and unloading was very efficient. We never knew what they were telling us but got the gist of it. They were unfailingly helpful and polite. Every time we seemed to have to speak to someone they wanted to know where we were from, and they were so excited when we told them. Many then said they hoped one day to visit London. The funniest was in one shop when we told the lad serving us ‘England’ he replied with ‘ah - Harry Kane’. We said not our team and he wanted to know who was and said that he knew of Norwich which pleased us.
My other annoyance today apart from the rain was that for such a technologically advanced country, the lack of Wifi in Disney was disappointing but that maybe as Neil suggested that everyone here is now using 5G.
However this was a really good, tiring but wet day and we had a really good time.