What I Learned From Taking My Two-Year-Old to Disneyland Paris (And It Wasn’t Really About Disney)

When I was 5, my mum made my dreams come true. My childhood dream list only consisted of really important and very realistic things of course: England winning the World Cup, waking up to everything I’d circled in fluorescent gel pen in the Argos catalogue that I would not dare to ask for out loud, becoming the sixth member of the Spice Girls, and of course, going to Disney. But not just any Disney: Walt Disney World in Florida. The original home of magic and wonder, advertised on TV at every break, back when we all actually used to watch TV together.

Image: Steven Beyer

So, when my mum told me that those TV ads would become a reality, and I’d be seeing the spires of Cinderella’s Castle and meeting the Mickey Mouse, the Mickiest of all Mice, I did what anyone that age would do. I cried. This was more than a ‘holiday’ to me. I knew how much she must have saved as a nursing student and a single parent to make that happen. 

Fast-forward 28 years, and I’m passing the same magic my mum gave me on to my 2-year old son, at the closer-to-home branch of Disneyland Paris. Before anyone starts with the whole ‘he won’t even remember it’ critique, children under three enter Disneyland Paris free of charge, and in an ongoing cost of living crisis, I’ll take what I can get. The main characters have evolved, but Disney knows just as well as it did in the 90s how to make a child’s world feel enchanting. There’s Moana and Coco and Inside Out, all big favourites of mine. Everything is spellbinding and all-colourful, and imagination has no bounds. 

Still, a small part of me wondered if choosing to take him on what happened to be our fifth wedding anniversary was actually a terrible idea, with us inevitably leaving overstimulated, regret etched slowly into our frown lines over the course of a very exhausting day.

Image: Toni Pomar

As anyone who has taken a toddler to Disneyland Paris will know, the magic comes with a few logistical challenges. Firstly, we had to be there by 11am to catch the Disney Stars on Parade — the only time we got to see Mickey as the meet-and-greet virtual queue was full — and then stay all the way until 10.30pm for the (very spectacular) Disney Tales of Magic firework show. It was 33 degrees, so hot that some of the rides had to close early, and we ran out of nappies (still can’t believe I miscalculated that one). Overstimulated got a massive tick next to it. Still, there were no frown lines and certainly zero regret. For a two-year-old, there are plenty of gentle rides at Disneyland Paris, from Peter Pan’s Flight to Dumbo the Flying Elephant, Le Carrousel de Lancelot and the Alice’s Curious Labyrinth.

So what did I learn? Of course there’s the whole ‘seeing through his eyes’ bit. His eyes lit up when Mickey Mouse waved to him, and once he got over the bangs, the light from the fireworks bursting then falling behind Sleeping Beauty’s castle scattered in the reflection of his eyes, which were fixated on the display in awe as he sat on his dad’s shoulders. Even if he doesn’t remember, the fireworks mirrored in those dark brown eyes will forever live in my memory. 

But also, I think of my mum. I think of how 28 years later that same image of me sat on Uncle Trevor’s shoulders watching the show at Cinderella Castle must be somewhere in her head too. I had always thought I was remembering my childhood when I thought about that trip, but now I realise I was also remembering my mum, that she too was a child once, mostly because beyond the details and the fun-filled Disney itinerary, I was taken aback by the childlike wonder our visit inspired in us as parents. Suddenly, I’m jumping and waving at some very hot soul dressed as Woody from Toy Story. Suddenly, I’m queuing 25 minutes just to get on ‘It’s A Small World’, a 3-minute boat ride through a cave of animatronic dolls dressed in cultural attire from around the world. Suddenly, I’m 5 again. Just as suddenly, I’m my mum, who enjoyed Disney World every bit as much as I did at 5. I find licence to let my inner child free, just as she did. Something she probably wasn’t afforded to do much growing up. 

I’ve often tried to pinpoint exactly when it is that the magic of childhood leaves us. When do those glasses of never-ending optimism get traded in for realism (and then inevitably, for reading glasses)? When do we put childish things away? I think I became a realist far too early, understanding just how terrible a place the world could be from a young age. But still, there are pockets of magic in my childhood that keep my eye for wonder and curiosity alive. This trip with my mum and Uncle Trevor is one of them, and so is my Grandma taking me on a sleeper train from London to Venice (which is Disneyland for grown-ups as far as I’m concerned). 

Perhaps that is why travel has always functioned in a much more complex way for me than simply the “escapism” it is often reduced to. It’s not necessarily an escape from reality, but rather, a way of remembering how we used to look at reality before the curtains were pulled back. We travel somewhere that isn’t ours, we wake up somewhere unfamiliar, we eat things we’ve never eaten, hear languages we don’t understand, look at buildings that have been standing for hundreds of years before we were born. Awe and wonder lead us to temporarily become children again. Everything is worth looking at and everything feels possible. In that sense, adults can find many Disneylands scattered all over the world.

What my mum gave me all those years ago in Florida was this way of seeing, and hopefully I’ve given my son a way of seeing too. He won’t remember the rides, but I will remember his face when he saw Mickey Mouse, and, one day, he might take his own child somewhere that makes them feel the same way. He’ll watch their face light up and, he’ll understand what I understand now, that somewhere, in my mum’s mind, I am still five years old, sitting on Uncle Trevor’s shoulders beneath Cinderella’s Castle, watching fireworks explode across the Orlando sky, and somewhere in mine, he is still sitting on his dad’s shoulders beneath Sleeping Beauty Castle. For a moment, he’ll be a child again. 

At 5, my mum really did make my dreams come true. She gave me a window of time to exist as a child in the most magical way. It taught me to keep close to me some of those childish qualities we’re told to put away, so they are easily whipped out when I need to see the magic all around me. Now, I find and even create my own Disneylands wherever I go.