It’s Golden Week in Japan, which is a string of national holidays that throws everything into unpredictable chaos. Is this shop open or closed? Who knows! Will this restaurant be crowded or empty? Who’s to say?
For the rest of my life, my birthday will fall within Golden Week, so it’ll always be a weird time to go to the Tokyo parks. You don’t really know until about 30 minutes into the day before you know if the park is going to be crowded or chill. The entrance area will always feel crowded. Today? It was empty.
These kinds of days are rare. It’s really common to see 2–3 hour wait times for the most popular attractions. But today? Tower of Terror sat at 10–15 minutes all day. I zig-zagged from Tower of Terror, to Soaring, to 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea.
My number one snack at DisneySea is the Gyoza Dog, a long Chinese bun with sausage inside. Truly delightful. A+, big fan. I got a gin-orange cocktail with it, which was lovely. Since I was already in the area, I went to Journey to the Center of the Earth also. Only 25 minutes. I can’t believe it. Headed up to the Lost River Delta for Indiana Jones Adventure, one of only two attractions at DisneySea with a single-rider line. I used the “Fastpass” queue. On a normal day, the Fastpass queue might be quicker, but I actually think the single-rider queue would’ve been quicker today.
After, I was craving a spicy smoked chicken leg. The line for that is usually 30-40 people deep. Today, only 3. Got a mango tapioca tea to go with. Then Raging Spirits, a chai-spiced sugar churro (the best churro flavor yet??), and a tiramisu ice cream sandwich. I’m more attraction-focused than food-focused but today’s different.
I hadn’t got a birthday sticker yet, and here’s a little secret for you: Find the cast member with 10 pen colors in their pocket. Lots of cast members can write you a birthday sticker, but the ones with all the pens are excited about it. Then, SeaRider, and Tower of Terror again.
This pisco-cranberry cocktail was so good. I’ll absolutely get this again. Took the Electric Railway up to Port Discovery for Indy again.
Then 20,000 Leagues ,strong. Walked over toward Soaring (105 minutes, no thank you) only to get the best popcorn flavor: black pepper (0 minutes). I love to see it.
This amaretto latte cocktail was nothing short of ideal. I wanted 3 more immediately after I finished this one. But there were still other things I had on my little Food & Wine checklist.
Like this chocolate-cherry Coca-Cola brandy cocktail. I could drink this all day. Super easy. Put chocolate in cola more! It’s good! The fried chicken leg with buffalo sauce was a bit much. It wasn’t bad, but it was significantly larger than what I want for this sort of thing.
Tower of Terror again. Journey to the Center of the Earth twice more. It was just that kind of day.
The last cocktail I had was inspired by Mermaid Lagoon. It was a rum-based cocktail, which—on paper—is more my jam. Some pineapple sat in the bottom, marshmallowy sorts of things on top, with some shaved coconut. It was pleasant. I wish there was more of a coconut cream situation going on in there though.
After the piña colada wannabe, I went to one of my favorite spots the park, the AquaSphere. It’s kinda a shame this is the entry plaza, because if it were more centrally located in the park, I would probably spend more time here. The music in this space is indelible. There are day and night versions, from Japanese composer Isao Tomita. Before I left, I just sat in the plaza, watching the world turn.
On a map, Japan seems so far from America. (It is.) But seeing the distance at this scale made me realize just how far away I really am.
Bonus photo of Space Mountain construction.
