Here Now & Just Back WDW Reopening Experiences Including Park Hopping

In Animal Kingdom today - rope dropped FOP from middle of bridge and then Navi River. First Dolphin bus put us behind some of the other droppers. Park is beautiful - not dirty at all and all our CM interactions have been positive.

Was disappointed the animatronic in Navi is not there. Just a video screen. Idk if that’s permanent or just down atm. Ride times got long on rides but it doesn’t seem as busy in walkways as 2017 was.

Genie+ was available for all rides all day long and didn’t advance past immediately except for Navi which was maybe 2 hours ahead. Translation: not many people are buying/using it in AK.

No tour groups that we saw. Other guests for the most part were not rude except for a few cases where they didn’t listen to CMs on rides and got shouted at by other guests - which is a change. In the past most people kept their heads down. Now it seems like there’s less patience for fools.

Satuli Canteen was awesome for lunch - except the Rainbow one with the tuna. We’re used to Poke Bros and found this one underwhelming with the blue noodles being tough and tasteless. It’s still the best value for quick service imo - the chocolate mousse desert was awesome! Mobile
Order was not working for some reason.

We ate dinner at Tusker House and it was barely a third full. Again way underutilized. Will be interesting if the dining plan bumps that up. I remember the dining plan not being worth it really unless you got it as an off-season perk. If it does fill up the TS restaurants Disney missed out for no reason - the restaurants being half full seems bad. Also not being open after dark is a bummer. I remember going right after Pandora opened and being there at night was the coolest. Having to leave before it’s dark seems like a big miss. That’s all for today!
 
saraheliz said:
My kids have been watching wait times on and off since we are going pretty soon and my oldest was watching today and was like "what is happening? where did all these people come from!?"
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It really was so nuts! We were comparing it to what we'd seen on our arrival day at MK (7/15). On that day the stroller parking by the carousel in Fantasyland wasn't even half full in the middle of the afternoon. What a difference a week makes.

We were in Epcot this morning/afternoon and it was much more manageable - room to breathe on walkways again and low wait times. Now we're sitting at the airport with a 2+ hour flight delay. Boo. But I'd rather be delayed going home than getting to WDW. For anyone who is curious, our 4 resorts were Contemporary, Yacht Club, AKV-Jambo, and BWV. I won't go on about them here, as I know this isn't the resorts board, but they were each special in their own way and we loved them all. I'm just proud we made a 4 way split work with two teens and a toddler!

Wishing magical stays to everyone still there or going soon!
 
Jfsag123 said:
It really was so nuts! We were comparing it to what we'd seen on our arrival day at MK (7/15). On that day the stroller parking by the carousel in Fantasyland wasn't even half full in the middle of the afternoon. What a difference a week makes.

We were in Epcot this morning/afternoon and it was much more manageable - room to breathe on walkways again and low wait times. Now we're sitting at the airport with a 2+ hour flight delay. Boo. But I'd rather be delayed going home than getting to WDW. For anyone who is curious, our 4 resorts were Contemporary, Yacht Club, AKV-Jambo, and BWV. I won't go on about them here, as I know this isn't the resorts board, but they were each special in their own way and we loved them all. I'm just proud we made a 4 way split work with two teens and a toddler!

Wishing magical stays to everyone still there or going soon!
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I checked the historical crowds on Touring Plans out of curiosity and OOF, Monday crowds really did just shoot up out of nowhere! From 4 and 5 level crowds on Sunday to 8/10 in MK and 9/10 in HS ... plus HS had 13% of its ride capacity down, yikes.
 
Jfsag123 said:
For anyone who is curious, our 4 resorts were Contemporary, Yacht Club, AKV-Jambo, and BWV. I won't go on about them here, as I know this isn't the resorts board, but they were each special in their own way and we loved them all. I'm just proud we made a 4 way split work with two teens and a toddler!

Wishing magical stays to everyone still there or going soon!
Click to expand...
Wow, a 4 way split! You're brave. Have never done more than a triple and most of the time doubles and don't even want those anymore.
 
Jfsag123 said:
It really was so nuts! We were comparing it to what we'd seen on our arrival day at MK (7/15). On that day the stroller parking by the carousel in Fantasyland wasn't even half full in the middle of the afternoon. What a difference a week makes.

We were in Epcot this morning/afternoon and it was much more manageable - room to breathe on walkways again and low wait times. Now we're sitting at the airport with a 2+ hour flight delay. Boo. But I'd rather be delayed going home than getting to WDW. For anyone who is curious, our 4 resorts were Contemporary, Yacht Club, AKV-Jambo, and BWV. I won't go on about them here, as I know this isn't the resorts board, but they were each special in their own way and we loved them all. I'm just proud we made a 4 way split work with two teens and a toddler!

Wishing magical stays to everyone still there or going soon!
Click to expand...
We are here now at SSR, but have a 4 way in November. This from the girl who hates split stays! 😂

I went ahead and bought MK G+ for today even though we will only be there after dinner through EEH. I figured better safe than sorry.
 
eksmama01 said:
We are here now at SSR, but have a 4 way in November. This from the girl who hates split stays! 😂

I went ahead and bought MK G+ for today even though we will only be there after dinner through EEH. I figured better safe than sorry.
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We are also in MK today through EEH if you see the guy with the Abe Froman Sausage King of Chicago shirt
 
We have been here since Sunday and it is definetly busier now than earlier in the month. We were at MK and HS on Monday and at HS on Tuesday and the wait times both days were insane. It did not help that on both days rides were down at park opening and on Tuesday afternoon one of the elevators was down on ToT. We wanted to see Fantasmic! on Monday but it was too crowded so we left.

We will also be at MK tonight for EEH and I have a feeling it will be very crowded. We will be going to AK this afternoon so depending on the wait times and availability I just might purchase Genie to ride the rides we want without a long wait. We did purchase the ILL for Tron for tonight.

We have not seen any large tour groups. There have been several people with British and other european accents.
 
Princess Michele said:
We have been here since Sunday and it is definetly busier now than earlier in the month. We were at MK and HS on Monday and at HS on Tuesday and the wait times both days were insane. It did not help that on both days rides were down at park opening and on Tuesday afternoon one of the elevators was down on ToT. We wanted to see Fantasmic! on Monday but it was too crowded so we left.

We will also be at MK tonight for EEH and I have a feeling it will be very crowded. We will be going to AK this afternoon so depending on the wait times and availability I just might purchase Genie to ride the rides we want without a long wait. We did purchase the ILL for Tron for tonight.

We have not seen any large tour groups. There have been several people with British and other european accents.
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We were at MK last night, too. There were periods where we felt like it was busy and then others where it just seemed reasonable. The little bit of rain didn't run anyone off. We bought g+ and stacked for the evening and rode at least 6 rides, plus other walk ons.

We also have not encountered tour groups. We haven't even seen many large matching t-shirt groups either 😂

Heading to Topolino's in a few and then some sweltering scorching hours at EPCOT. I need my Japan fix!
 
Good morning! We arrived on Monday after a 16.5 hour drive. Stayed at a Holiday Inn. On Tuesday we packed our car up, reservations at Poly next 2 nights, and headed to MK. Through the tapstiles by 8:10 (later than we wanted, but it was what it was. First mistake (that I have literally made like 10 times) was forgetting BTM wasn’t over for early entry. By the time we figured that out the line was over the bridge to Tomorrowland. Decided to hit PP first. Took 11 mins to get on. By that time it was 8:42 and decided not to chance ISW, and instead headed to the barrier to Frontierland to hit BTM. We were maybe 15 people back and it one of the first trains. Re ride and then headed to HM. It was about 15 mins, but the ride had 3 decent stoppages. Fortunately we had our first Genie+ for JC and hit that. Lines were starting to build pretty substantially at that point. Grabbed a Genie+ for Aladdin, then stopped for a snack, and then used Genie+ for Mad Tea Party. Grabbed a Genie+ for Speedway. Finished and grabbed Genie+ for ISW. Grabbed some Lefous brew, cupcake, and sticky bun and then hit Voyage of LM and Dumbo with Genie+. Hit Philharmagic. It was completely full at 2 pm and our family was all seperated. I don’t remember the last time that happened for me. These were pretty much instant grabs, so no wait time in between other than getting snacks. Did modify times a couple times. Got called for Tron (group 83, originally 5:55, but called at like 3:30). We did head over before we got called because we had nothing to do but while we were in the queue our group was actually called. Wait time was an hour for Tron. It’s a nice ride! While on Tron I obsessively tried to move my Soace Mountain Genie+ reservation. It took about 40 mins but eventually I was able to move it up so that I could go right from Tron to Space. We did Barnstormer in G+ last. Line was soooo long. We wanted to hit Laugh Floor but it was closed. We were pretty done at that point and headed back to Poly. Yesterday we did MK again as we leave for BC today and wanted to take advantage of monorai/boat. We were at the tapstiles at 7:40 and decently far back as they didn’t let anyone through until 7:45. We power walked to get to the rope for SDMT, and we there were maybe 10 rows of ppl in front of us. We were successful in getting on SDMT. I didn’t time it though, so not sure how long. Wasn’t bad though! We went to Astro after because the line didn’t look too bad and it was maybe a 5-10 min wait at 9. We then went to PeopleMover and it broke down when we got to the top, seemed to be lots of ride issues. It came back after about 10-15 mins. We had another Tron, group 38. Our time moved up about 1.5 hours. Wait was again about 1 hour. Got a milkshake after, why not? After we did some shopping. Had some more snacks and headed back to Poly. No Genie+ this day. Plan was to hit EEH. It stormed for a couple hours and rained, nothing terrible, but enough to shut rides down. We got to EEH at maybe 11:20 (watched USWNT game). Was okay with that because figured it would help with clearing out park anyways. Decided to do Aladdin first to continue to allow clearing of guests. It was walk ok and our ride was not full. Headed to BTM next. Said 15. It was 30 mins by the time we were off the ride (27 mins to get on). Skipped HM because it said 25 and by this time it was after midnight and kids wanted to do Soace and SDMT and I figured we would be close. Got to Space at 12:15 ish. Said 15 mins. We were off if 18, so that was pretty close. Decided to go to SDMT, but stopped at Pooh as it was essentially walk on and we hadn’t done it yet. Got to SDMT at 12:45 and posted 50. This was the only inflated time post of our trip thus far and was 25mins from start to head. Main Street was packed on our way out at 1:15. Monorail was full but didn’t have to wait for train. We come in the summer all the time. The parks felt VERY full. Wait times were long. Glad for G+ as MK would have not been manageable without it. Captain Cooks at Poly stopped taking mobile orders as they were swamped as well, overall pretty good first two days. Our experience with EEH was not great and I would rather just rope drop and G+. We were asleep by 2, which means today we might go to a water park but maybe nothing other than pool and switch hotels. CM’s have been nice, no issues there. Enjoyed all our food! Guests have been great, although line jumping is starting to irritate me. A lot of guests cutting in front because their party was already there (for EEH at BTM two teens bypassed the whole line of ppl waiting to scan in…). I did go off on one family at Tron for skipping past everyone and shoving their way to the front after the one room. They let us go in front of them, I was probably a little over. The Dad had gotten behind us and I was not about letting him through. One thing I love about Disney is the procedures for filling in space and watching them push in front irritated me, in reality I think they were just excited and I probably was a little over the top. Anyways summary it was very full! Sorry for the Uber long post!
 
EPCOT busy today in the rain with F&W starting. Definitely not crazy busy, though. Lines were 60+ with Soarin' at 80. 100% humidity drains you, but thankfully no sun.

Beat the pending storm (that didn't hit) and got the Skyliner back to RIV. They announced it may be closing.

Quiet drive to POFQ for...

20230727_133645.jpg

FYI on the GF overflow parking:
20230727_132306.jpg
 
shm_helene said:
Good morning! We arrived on Monday after a 16.5 hour drive. Stayed at a Holiday Inn. On Tuesday we packed our car up, reservations at Poly next 2 nights, and headed to MK. Through the tapstiles by 8:10 (later than we wanted, but it was what it was. First mistake (that I have literally made like 10 times) was forgetting BTM wasn’t over for early entry. By the time we figured that out the line was over the bridge to Tomorrowland. Decided to hit PP first. Took 11 mins to get on. By that time it was 8:42 and decided not to chance ISW, and instead headed to the barrier to Frontierland to hit BTM. We were maybe 15 people back and it one of the first trains. Re ride and then headed to HM. It was about 15 mins, but the ride had 3 decent stoppages. Fortunately we had our first Genie+ for JC and hit that. Lines were starting to build pretty substantially at that point. Grabbed a Genie+ for Aladdin, then stopped for a snack, and then used Genie+ for Mad Tea Party. Grabbed a Genie+ for Speedway. Finished and grabbed Genie+ for ISW. Grabbed some Lefous brew, cupcake, and sticky bun and then hit Voyage of LM and Dumbo with Genie+. Hit Philharmagic. It was completely full at 2 pm and our family was all seperated. I don’t remember the last time that happened for me. These were pretty much instant grabs, so no wait time in between other than getting snacks. Did modify times a couple times. Got called for Tron (group 83, originally 5:55, but called at like 3:30). We did head over before we got called because we had nothing to do but while we were in the queue our group was actually called. Wait time was an hour for Tron. It’s a nice ride! While on Tron I obsessively tried to move my Soace Mountain Genie+ reservation. It took about 40 mins but eventually I was able to move it up so that I could go right from Tron to Space. We did Barnstormer in G+ last. Line was soooo long. We wanted to hit Laugh Floor but it was closed. We were pretty done at that point and headed back to Poly. Yesterday we did MK again as we leave for BC today and wanted to take advantage of monorai/boat. We were at the tapstiles at 7:40 and decently far back as they didn’t let anyone through until 7:45. We power walked to get to the rope for SDMT, and we there were maybe 10 rows of ppl in front of us. We were successful in getting on SDMT. I didn’t time it though, so not sure how long. Wasn’t bad though! We went to Astro after because the line didn’t look too bad and it was maybe a 5-10 min wait at 9. We then went to PeopleMover and it broke down when we got to the top, seemed to be lots of ride issues. It came back after about 10-15 mins. We had another Tron, group 38. Our time moved up about 1.5 hours. Wait was again about 1 hour. Got a milkshake after, why not? After we did some shopping. Had some more snacks and headed back to Poly. No Genie+ this day. Plan was to hit EEH. It stormed for a couple hours and rained, nothing terrible, but enough to shut rides down. We got to EEH at maybe 11:20 (watched USWNT game). Was okay with that because figured it would help with clearing out park anyways. Decided to do Aladdin first to continue to allow clearing of guests. It was walk ok and our ride was not full. Headed to BTM next. Said 15. It was 30 mins by the time we were off the ride (27 mins to get on). Skipped HM because it said 25 and by this time it was after midnight and kids wanted to do Soace and SDMT and I figured we would be close. Got to Space at 12:15 ish. Said 15 mins. We were off if 18, so that was pretty close. Decided to go to SDMT, but stopped at Pooh as it was essentially walk on and we hadn’t done it yet. Got to SDMT at 12:45 and posted 50. This was the only inflated time post of our trip thus far and was 25mins from start to head. Main Street was packed on our way out at 1:15. Monorail was full but didn’t have to wait for train. We come in the summer all the time. The parks felt VERY full. Wait times were long. Glad for G+ as MK would have not been manageable without it. Captain Cooks at Poly stopped taking mobile orders as they were swamped as well, overall pretty good first two days. Our experience with EEH was not great and I would rather just rope drop and G+.
Click to expand...

EEH have gotten so much busier!! My last 2 experiences with EEH have been similar, just not worth the extra effort, and yet I keep setting my arrivals for Wed afternoon so I can do them. I’m going at the end of August and hope they’ll be quieter, but honestly, at this point, I’m starting to think it’s better to be there for a paid AH and cut out some dining or a resort day.
 
2vets said:
EEH have gotten so much busier!! My last 2 experiences with EEH have been similar, just not worth the extra effort, and yet I keep setting my arrivals for Wed afternoon so I can do them. I’m going at the end of August and hope they’ll be quieter, but honestly, at this point, I’m starting to think it’s better to be there for a paid AH and cut out some dining or a resort day.
Click to expand...
Probably because it’s so murderously hot out during the day. I know our approach in July was to avoid the parks completely during the day on EEH days and take advantage of the no-sun time!
 
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