Shanghai Disney

Visiting Shanghai Disney is, so far, the only thing I’ve been looking forward to on my enforced vacation. It is guaranteed to be something new and different. And I’ve never been to a Disney park outside the US.

Due to the pandemic, Disney has put in some new rules and procedures. The main one being that you have to register to visit the park after buying your ticket. It was just a quick form and I had another magical, green QR code. Yay!

Getting to the park took about an hour on metro as my hotel and the park were almost at different ends of the subway system. But, I only had to change trains once. Less chance for me to get lost! I just lost a few hairs getting on a very full train. Luckily, there are still many more on my head.

After arriving at the park, I figured out what the Disney website didn’t say. If you don’t have Shanghai’s green health QR code, Chinese phone number, or Alipay, there may be a delay in being allowed to go to the entrance gates. Thankfully, there was a nice security guard who helped me fill out another form for yet another QR code. It only took two tries and about a half hour to fill in the form correctly, once we had figured out how to fill it in (Yay for not speaking the same language!). A quick photo of my latest QR code and I was allowed to go to the entry gates.

And that was also the last time today that I had any personal space. I lost count of how many times people bumped into me, stepped on me, or hit me with their bags because, in general, Chinese people have different personal space expectations than Americans. While none of it was malicious, it did get very annoying very quickly.

Shanghai Disney, overall, isn’t a small theme park. However, there aren’t that many rides, attractions, or shows. If you’ve ever been to Disney World, it is a little better than Animal Kingdom. There’s a lot of walking between the few things to do.

There are only 4 major, or at least what I would consider major, rides – Soarin’, Tron, Seven Dwarves Mine Train, and Rex’s Racer. The lack of rides might be why 3 of these 4 rides had hour long waits all day, even with the limited number of people allowed into the park. There were also a bunch of kiddie rides and spinning rides, all of which I didn’t go on.

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There was an interesting ‘ride’ that I didn’t go on, but wanted to. They had an ‘adventure course’ type attraction where you had to put on a climbing harness and go through some obstacles and unstable bridges and, I think, even climb a wall. It was not something you usually see at a theme park, but I didn’t go on it because it had a long line when I went by and I was too tired to go back at the end of the day.

Eventually, there comes a time when visiting any theme park when you have to break down and spend way too much money on some food. I am limited to only being able to spend the cash I have on me and I was trying to save some for the other expenses I know I have coming (apartment, cell phone, etc.). I got a Minnie pretzel for 30 yuan (around $4.50US). It didn’t really taste like a pretzel, more like bread with the occasional grain of salt. It was good, though, just not a pretzel.

After lunch, it was time to continue my trip around the park. And it was also when I went on most of the rides and looked in a few shops. Most of the merchandise wasn’t all that interesting or different – it was a lot of the keychains, clothes, plushies, and other things that you’d expect from Disney, just branded with Shanghai Disney’s logo.

They had the decorations up for Chinese New Year. So, there were lots of red and oxen. One of the things I was most looking forward to was their Marvel area. However, it was mostly just a room with Ironman’s suits and more merchandise.

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Overall, I enjoyed my trip to Shanghai Disneyland. I don’t think I would want to go back again. At least not until they added more rides. I also don’t think I would want to pay much more than the 399 yuan ($62US) I did for my ticket. There just isn’t that much at the park to justify paying a lot for it.