We arrived in the port of Calais nice and early and set off South through France, it was snowing lightly when we docked and disembarked. The snow started to get heavier the further South we drove, in some parts there was only one lane useable where there would normally be two or three lanes.
As we had arrived before the official check-in time we found a space near the reception of Santa Fe hotel and went to see if we could at least get our park tickets, we had no expectation of getting our room yet. We left our bags in the car. There was barely any queue for checking in, we were given a form to fill in while we waited.
We hadn’t finished filling in the form before we were called up to the desk, this sadly is where the issues began. The person on reception was new, which we were happy with, everyone has to learn, and they were in no way the cause of the problem. The receptionist typed our details into the system they use and it came back saying they had no booking for us. I had it all printed out which proved we did. The guy went out to the back of reception, came back, and tried again. He agreed we had a booking but for some reason, their system wasn’t showing it. Back out to the back he went, he came back and said his colleague was going to have to manually enter the details but that they were dealing with someone important and couldn’t do it right away. There went the Disney magic, we apparently weren’t important. We were given a slip for 6 free keyrings and a room key card which had apparently been programmed for a one time use for access to a room for us to wait in. It wasn’t made clear if this would be our actual room or not. We drove around the resort trying to find a space near to the room we were sent to, which after a couple of drive rounds one became available.
We went into the block where the room was and went upstairs to the first floor where the room was. low and behold the key didn’t open the door to the room. So we walked back to reception, about half an hour had passed by now, unfortunately, we were told the issue still hadn’t been sorted and they had no idea how long it would take. We couldn’t get given park tickets or anything we were just advised to go back to the room and wait, and someone would phone us when it was sorted. The key was recut and we were sent on our way.
Thankfully this time the card worked in the door so we could get into the room. At this point, we decided to take our iPads to the room so we at least had something to entertain ourselves. We decided this must be our room for our stay as we had a welcome message on the television.
An hour and a half passed and we had heard nothing from reception so we decided to phone for an update, we were told the issue was fixed and to go to reception or guest services to collect our tickets. We walked over to the main building and went to guest services as reception had a queue. It took the lady on the desk a little while to find our details, she said she would cut our magic passes so they worked as room keys and went to send us on our way. At this Pointe asked to speak to someone senior as we were both feeling very much like the magic had gone. When the manager on duty came she listened to what we had to say and was very apologetic, she agreed that we had lost valuable time in the parks so wanted to in effect give us that time back. She asked us to stay put and went off. About 10 minutes later she was back with two Ultimate fast pass tickets for us for the next day, meaning we didn’t have to queue in the stand by lines for 9 rides for our first go on them. We thanked her and headed out the front of the hotel to get the bus to the parks.
We decided to go to Studios to hopefully see some of the Star Wars events going on there as it was both Star Wars and Frozen season. We queued up at the ticket gate and when it got to my tern I scanned my Magic Pass, it came up saying see attendant. The same thing happened for Beans. The gate cast member called someone over and they took our tickets and said they would be back soon. Nearly 20 minutes had passed before the gentleman returned apologising as our tickets had not been activated at reception.
We were both fairy peckish at this point and went to the first stand we could find which was a Star Wars food truck. I ordered the X-wing lemon meringue and Beans got the Stormtrooper cheese waffle, there was quite a wait for the cheese waffles so I went and watched part of one of the Star Wars shows taking place.
Once we had eaten we walked round the park to the Ratatouille ride, we went in as single rider as it only had a 10 minute wait whereas the standby line was 60 minutes. Once we came off we decided we weren’t really feeling it, we were starting to feel tired from the early morning too, so we decided to head back to our hotel room. We stopped in the main shop in Studios on the way back out where Beans brought a new jacket.
Having got back to the hotel we decided to unpack and relax for a while before going to La Cantina for dinner.
Thats it for now, TTFN Titch
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