Disneyland questions for a newbie

I suggest a deep dive into the DLP website: https://www.disneylandparis.com/en-usd

As much as I am a huge Disney parks fan, and have visited the Paris parks twice, my biggest tip is to pre plan and research each park in advance, pack your patience, and expect that your credit card will get a work out.

Scottyd, I can't give you specifics on Disney Paris, but I'm going to suggest that you definitely join one of the hundreds of Disney social media groups that can tell you anything and everything about Disney; though all the info may spin your head. Congrats on your willingness to give your daughter her heart's desire. You'll love it all the more seeing it through her eyes. And really you just need to get over the fact that you hate to stand in lines. Even with the skip the line passes, they aren't for all of the rides. So just consider it memory making time spent with your family. Enjoy! And have a wonderful time in Paris.

And for anyone who comments that it's a waste of a day in Paris. It's your time. We live in So Cal; our now adult grown kids grew up going to Disneyland regularly, but when they were in Tokyo, they wanted to check it out; and they didn't regret it.

The DIS Boards helped me a lot when I was planning our first trip to DisneyWorld. Here's the forum for Disneyland Paris:
https://www.disboards.com/forums/disneyland-paris-trip-planning-community.77/

I just spent three days in August at Disneyland Paris with my 20 year old niece. She's a Disney freak, I am not. I had a fine enough time regardless, having not been to a Disney park in 40+ years. We stayed at the Disney Sequoia hotel, and took the RER train from Paris to Marne-la-vallée. It was a 10ish minute walk from the station to our hotel.

Here are some thoughts in no particular order:

There are advantages to staying at a Disneyland branded hotel, the biggest is you are a 15 minute or less walk to the front gates of both parks. Another advantage is you can get tickets (for both parks) as part of your hotel cost and those allow you to get in an hour before the main crowds ("Early Magic Hour"). I found it a affordable to book a package (hotel 2 nights and 3 day park tickets) but I didn't research whether it was cheaper another way. They use dynamic pricing based on demand, so my advice is to look at prices now and see how they fluctuate for a few dates that are open now. I purchased my hotel/tickets in February for an August visit and the prices definitely changed over time and went way up as the travel dates approached.

I'm guessing Bastille Day will be busier than usual because people will make it into a long weekend. That's not a reason to skip it, just a thing to think about. Also the new Frozen land will open in Spring 2026 so there could be increased demand for that new feature (there is a lot of construction going on there now). The two parks are very close together and smaller than the US versions, but it was a lot of walking for grownups, so I suspect it might be tiring for a 7 year old.

The Disneyland Paris app has all the things you need to know (you can download it now), including wait times which were accurate based on my experience. There are some rides that always have long waits (Crush's coaster, Big Thunder Mountain, Dumbo - all regularly 60-90 minute wait). Some rides have no fast pass but for those that did in hindsight I probably would have purchased them individually (when I went it was $16US per person for Big Thunder). You will have to research what rides you want to go on and whether buying a general fast pass would make sense for you. As you will be traveling in summer, you will have to wait in lines everywhere, including food (speaking of - pack your own snacks, the food was....not great).

If you want your daughter to see characters you will probably have to schedule them (and potentially pay, unless you can see them at your hotel). The characters don't really wander the parks like they do in the US and according to my niece to see any princesses up close you have to set that up ahead of time. As for shows and parades, the schedule comes out a couple months ahead so you'd have to wait to plan those.

I also suggest checking out some of the social media groups for Disneyland Paris - there's a "first timers" Facebook group that was moderately helpful to me (but also very annoying so I muted it after awhile) and I found a Reddit sub that offered great practical info as well. It's a whole thing I didn't know about and now maybe know more than I wanted to!

I've (reluctantly) been to DLP on several occasions when the kids were younger. I'd agree with the advice to stay at one of the Disney hotels for the ease of entry and to take advantage of the various benefits.

The biggest issue I found was wait times and what rides people were queuing for. One example is the Dumbo ride which is essentially a young child's ride based on the familiar airplane rides found in amusement parks all over and generally is a ride that is quite tame and uneventful however the queues for this ride are huge and many teens and adults queue for at least an hour to go on it. Compare it to the airplane ride at Parc Asterix which is the exact same ride but with planes instead of Dumbo and my kids were allowed to stay on it until they got bored as there was no-one else in the queue (I thoroughly recommend Parc Asterix as a companion visit to Disney). I think the park's smaller size means more people are vying for fewer rides which results in a lot of people queueing for rides that they generally wouldn't be interested in in a larger park that did not have such long queues for the "big ticket" rides.

We found ourselves repeatedly riding on It's A Small World as it was one of the few rides that can process large numbers of people effectively. The shows are much easier to get seats for so I would prioritise what rides you're interested in and then take advantage of the ease of snagging a seat at the shows.

BTW the food is awful so go with the lowest of expectations and hopefully you won't be too disappointed.

I also had not been to a Disney before 2024 when we took my then-six year-old.
The Disney app is helpful, though I'd suggest learning it in advance as opposed to what I did--download it and then ignore it until we showed up at the park. There are people who are really into Disney parks, including Paris', and by Googling you can find their posts. Very helpful! I will heartily recommend purchasing whatever skip-the-line passes are available. We did not do this either, and as a result went on almost zero rides. Wait times were interminable, and we saw children turning into little devils while stuck in lines.
We did catch the parade of Disney characters, which my daughter enjoyed a lot.
You mention visiting Copenhagen. If you have time Tivoli Gardens will be far more enjoyable than Disney--in my opinion. Wait times at Tivoli were comparatively short, I think the longest we waited in any line was thirty minutes and usually it was like 15 minutes or less. On Friday nights Tivoli has concerts, and all ages turn out. The acts we saw/heard were Danish, but still enjoyable to us who know nothing of the language. Plus, there is an appreciable range of restaurants, from hot dogs (fabulous in Copenhagen, by the way) to fine dining.

ScottyD,
You've been given good advice. Heed it. And by the way, NOBODY likes standing in lines. You are not alone in this. For the sake of your 7 year old, do what you can to "skip" them. If not, have something to distract her on a long wait (a book, videos on your phone, anecdotes from your childhood she will probably enjoy, songs to sing together...softly...).