Last year this time, The FireMarshall asked what I wanted for my 50th Birthday. Epic Party – Epic Trip. I planned the party – it was EPIC and the trip was for me and a friend to go to Paris for the Inaugural Disney Paris Half Marathon. Not to be outdone, I also had to participate in the first Chateaux to Castle Challenge (which meant I had to do a Disney Half Marathon in the states before Paris – I did the Star Wars Half Marathon).
We had a Grand Epic Time.
Disney Paris, in its entirety, including the two parks, Disney Village (their version of Downtown Disney) and the hotels immediately surrounding the parks could probably all fit inside of Magic Kingdom. Despite the size, the parks were packed and the lines just as long for the rides – of which we rode none. Just walking through the park taking pictures, seeing the characters, pin trading (or, in our case, buying) and people watching was just fine.
The only disappointment was that they ran out of the unique race pins by 10am of the second day the Expo/Packet pickup which meant they either didn’t have enough for each participant or they let people buy several of them before allowing registered racers the opportunity to get. Now they are on sale on Ebay for $650. No sir! Although I know someone will pay that. HUMPH. There were a few glitches that were probably only noticeable to regular runDisney participants – small expo with not enough gear/variety, not enough big screens in corral to see what is happening at start and poor sound system and not enough porta-potties near the corrals. Otherwise, both the 5k and Half Marathon were fun & scenic. Lot of photo ops!
The Inaugural Race Party was nice, but they were not prepared for the number of people that paid for it as evidenced by the long lines and long wait to get food. The Wild West Buffalo Bill Show – I was pleasantly surprised by my amusement. The show was actually pretty good and entertaining. We were on the Green Team and our Cowboy sucked.
After the Half Marathon on Sunday, we hobbled back to the
Suffice it to say, we came, we ran, ran some more and had the time of our lives.
Of course, I put a little video together from the two races. Enjoy!
