Working at Disneyland Paris - Day 18 (Jan 2nd) - Leaving... but not before a last visit to the park
So today was my last day. I woke up after a reasonable lie-in until 10am or something. Then, got ready and went to reception to get a mop as we had to clean the apartment as it was a disgraceful. There were none. They said I should have thought about it earlier. Well tough because you can't really clean much of the floor without a mop. I did my best without that and cleaned my room and the bathroom and kitchen. With the help of Francesca too. Thank you!!
The me and Jamie went backstage. However technically I was no longer a cast member and my contract had finished. I explained this at the entrance booth saying I needed to go to "service paie" to fill in my navigo reimbursement forms. The guard said ok but be quick.
Yes! I was in. And it was easy! I went to fill in the forms and posted them through the box. Then I went to have breakfast and bought a croissant and a sandwich for the Eurostar journey as they were much cheaper here than on the train.
Jamie hadn't managed to go to the discounted cast member shop and I fancied going to buy something small. In the end the something small turned out to be a Pixar ornament with the luxo jr lamp, finding nemo, the incredible and many more characters. But there was a gaping hole where one of the characters was missing. For this it was reduced from €75 to €20. I then got another 5 euros off for some reason which I didn't argue with, so 15 euros total - to cover up the hole I've just put a vinylmation on top and it looks great at a 60 euro discount! Now I had to carry this around all day :/ I felt like I was being watched at this point as I had said that I was only going to pop in for two minutes.
We arrived back at Imaginations and walked over to Disneyland Park and walked to near the Haunted Mansion (it's sooo quick through backstage!) Lots of characters were going out ahead of us so we had to use the opportunity and both me and Jamie got a photo with Dale from Chip and Dale as you can see on the left. There were a few other characters there too including Goofy and Chip, maybe a few more. My first character pic, aren't they so cute! Glad to have got one before I left despite being there for over two weeks! Shame Mickey was always working when I was too...
That was it though...me and Jamie were going to meet with the others for lunch at 13h45. We walked down Main Street possibly for the last time in a very long time, walked through a few shops I'd never noticed - such as Main Street Motors and the one by the pushchair rentals on the left when leaving the park. We walked under the train station looked back seeing the Magical Moments sign for the first time this trip (we never go in the park through here) and out we went!
We went over to the Disney Village and of course my bags were checked by security as I didn't have my Cast Member ID to let me through quickly. We met up with Francesca and Katy and we were meant to go to Billy Bobs but it was closed so we opted for Earl of Sandwich instead and used Jamie's CM discount of 25% so I got a sandwich and dessert for around 7 euros which wasn't too bad. After that we went and took loads of photos together in front of the Panoramagique balloon as some last minute memories.
Then considering all the others worked at Buffalo Bill's I saw backstage on both sides of Disney Village including at the Wild West Show which was an interesting experience seeing it all empty like that. The horses stables reeked of course.
Me and Francesca then went back to the house as she said that she wouldn't be missing any of Disney. Back at the flat we did some last minute cleaning and I ran to reception to meet Eilidh and found about 5 girls and about 20 suitcases waiting for me. I felt guilty now. I gave in my key and the bedding and they said they didn't need to inspect the apartment. Waste of time cleaning it then!! Almost made me late as well for my train.
I grabbed my bags and I told the girls to go for the bus and get it even if I wasn't there, while I did last minute reception-y things. I ran to the bus stop and saw that it was just leaving so I assumed they had got on.
But no. Alison had asked them to wait, so Rosie, Alison and Eilidh were waiting for me and the others at reception weren't going just yet. We got the bus at 17:04...bear in mind our Eurostar was at 18:02 so we were cutting it short. We got to the station and the queue was huge...next time we're doing the secret lift trick to skip some of it. Once checked in, we went through security and got on the train with a whole 18 minutes left to spare. We got settled and ALison was in the same carriage.
I was meant to write my 3000 word essay [I wrote 500] but obviously procrastination got the better of me as I decided to talk to the girl next to me so I met another Alison though who I will never refer to as Alison Chang or AC for short. I asked her if she worked at DLP and turns out she had - at The Tower of Terror shop which sounded like fun. In the summer she worked at Harrods in London which was cool too. Turned out she already knew Eilidh which was a strange coincidence. At least I'm even more sociable now I guess...yay! [Silver lining and all that]
Me, Eilidh and AC went to the buffet car and I got a tropicana and had my sandwich I'd bought earlier. 2h40m went by so quickly when you're chatting away. Me and the new Alison swapped Facebooks.
At St. Pancras we regrouped and went through Immigration/ Passport Control, the man asked if we had worked at DLP, me and Eilidh said yes. He said "I bet it was hell on Earth!" Eilidh says "Yes!, I say "Not really!" Hmm turns out she didn't have as good a time as I thought she was having.
I said bye to Eilidh and Alison Chang at the doors of the Eurostar and me and Ali (original) walked to the tube. I said bye at the barriers as we were going in separate directions...it's so strange because I'm likely to never see any of these people again and yet I feel we bonded so quickly and so well.
I'd love to meet all these wonderful people again one day and hopefully I will as I have such good memories that it's making me emotional just thinking about them. Now, it's back to real life. It really has been SO MUCH FUN. And I'd love to do it again. In fact I've already asked for details on how to go back. I really hope you've enjoyed reading the blog as much as I've genuinely loved writing it! If you have any questions post them below and I'll do my best to answer them on this page.
To see what I think Disney could improve for cast members click here...to read about my favourite moments click here.
So for now I'll leave you with this image and...À toute à l'heure!
The me and Jamie went backstage. However technically I was no longer a cast member and my contract had finished. I explained this at the entrance booth saying I needed to go to "service paie" to fill in my navigo reimbursement forms. The guard said ok but be quick.
Yes! I was in. And it was easy! I went to fill in the forms and posted them through the box. Then I went to have breakfast and bought a croissant and a sandwich for the Eurostar journey as they were much cheaper here than on the train.
Jamie hadn't managed to go to the discounted cast member shop and I fancied going to buy something small. In the end the something small turned out to be a Pixar ornament with the luxo jr lamp, finding nemo, the incredible and many more characters. But there was a gaping hole where one of the characters was missing. For this it was reduced from €75 to €20. I then got another 5 euros off for some reason which I didn't argue with, so 15 euros total - to cover up the hole I've just put a vinylmation on top and it looks great at a 60 euro discount! Now I had to carry this around all day :/ I felt like I was being watched at this point as I had said that I was only going to pop in for two minutes.
That was it though...me and Jamie were going to meet with the others for lunch at 13h45. We walked down Main Street possibly for the last time in a very long time, walked through a few shops I'd never noticed - such as Main Street Motors and the one by the pushchair rentals on the left when leaving the park. We walked under the train station looked back seeing the Magical Moments sign for the first time this trip (we never go in the park through here) and out we went!
Then considering all the others worked at Buffalo Bill's I saw backstage on both sides of Disney Village including at the Wild West Show which was an interesting experience seeing it all empty like that. The horses stables reeked of course.
Me and Francesca then went back to the house as she said that she wouldn't be missing any of Disney. Back at the flat we did some last minute cleaning and I ran to reception to meet Eilidh and found about 5 girls and about 20 suitcases waiting for me. I felt guilty now. I gave in my key and the bedding and they said they didn't need to inspect the apartment. Waste of time cleaning it then!! Almost made me late as well for my train.
I grabbed my bags and I told the girls to go for the bus and get it even if I wasn't there, while I did last minute reception-y things. I ran to the bus stop and saw that it was just leaving so I assumed they had got on.
But no. Alison had asked them to wait, so Rosie, Alison and Eilidh were waiting for me and the others at reception weren't going just yet. We got the bus at 17:04...bear in mind our Eurostar was at 18:02 so we were cutting it short. We got to the station and the queue was huge...next time we're doing the secret lift trick to skip some of it. Once checked in, we went through security and got on the train with a whole 18 minutes left to spare. We got settled and ALison was in the same carriage.
I was meant to write my 3000 word essay [I wrote 500] but obviously procrastination got the better of me as I decided to talk to the girl next to me so I met another Alison though who I will never refer to as Alison Chang or AC for short. I asked her if she worked at DLP and turns out she had - at The Tower of Terror shop which sounded like fun. In the summer she worked at Harrods in London which was cool too. Turned out she already knew Eilidh which was a strange coincidence. At least I'm even more sociable now I guess...yay! [Silver lining and all that]
Me, Eilidh and AC went to the buffet car and I got a tropicana and had my sandwich I'd bought earlier. 2h40m went by so quickly when you're chatting away. Me and the new Alison swapped Facebooks.
I said bye to Eilidh and Alison Chang at the doors of the Eurostar and me and Ali (original) walked to the tube. I said bye at the barriers as we were going in separate directions...it's so strange because I'm likely to never see any of these people again and yet I feel we bonded so quickly and so well.
I'd love to meet all these wonderful people again one day and hopefully I will as I have such good memories that it's making me emotional just thinking about them. Now, it's back to real life. It really has been SO MUCH FUN. And I'd love to do it again. In fact I've already asked for details on how to go back. I really hope you've enjoyed reading the blog as much as I've genuinely loved writing it! If you have any questions post them below and I'll do my best to answer them on this page.
To see what I think Disney could improve for cast members click here...to read about my favourite moments click here.
So for now I'll leave you with this image and...À toute à l'heure!
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