Here Now & Just Back WDW Reopening Experiences Including Park Hopping

[NJlauren]

Has anyone noticed this sweater in the WDW stores?

HM themed.

View attachment 696278

Not yet, but I’ll keep my eye out tomorrow

 

[scrappinginontario]

Not yet, but I’ll keep my eye out tomorrow

Thanks!

 

[cheshiregoofy22]

Here now and confirm the 47 minute past the hour lightning lane drop, at least for Remy. We were refreshing religiously while at HS, knowing we were headed to EPCOT in the early evening….I remembered reading someone’s advice about a drop at 47 minute mark, and at 2:47 BINGO! 3:00 - 4:00 pm showed up for the five of us! Problem was we were back in our hotel room taking a break from the heat so getting from the GF to EPCOT in time proved a little difficult. We left the hotel via monorail at 3:30 PM (rousing resting young adults….) and at 4:19 PM stopped at the great folks at the blue umbrella in France knowing we were four minutes overdue…not a problem at all to get it remedied and off we went to ride! Many thanks to the poster who clued in on that magical drop!! Amazing!

 

[brockash]

Anyone that stayed at the YC/BC in the last couple of weeks, can you tell me how the morning busses were to MK and AK? We are planning on getting to the busses 45 min prior to the early morning extra 1/2 hour. Did you have to wait for multiple busses?

We caught the MK bus 2 weeks ago today from YC and the first bus arrived around 715-720 for a 9am regular (830 emh) opening. All that were at the bus stop.got a seat. We then picked up from BC.

 

[itf]

Epcot today and our final first day at the main parks. Booked Remy for 8:30 the joined the VQ for guardians which gave a 6pm return so will probably pay for a morning slot. Update : we got a 10:50 guardians.

Plan to hit frozen after we tap into Remy then hope for test track still being available but realistically will need to mop that up another day.

We got our frozen LL for lunchtime and did standby for soarin and figment.

We timed out on genie so grabbed mission space for when we’re done with our Guadians ILL

We’re not staying for Harmonious so it’ll be a short day.

Quick note - the salt & vinegars fries in the fry flight are terrible! Way too much salt and absolutely no vinegar. The other two are good though.

This was the last of our “ride” days - we’ve now done all four parks and hit most rides we wanted. Only test track and tower of terror we didn’t do of the big hitters and we will mop them up later.

Genie plus has worked in all the parks - too well in some cases! ILL have also worked, making things pretty much a walk on for those big ticket rides. We will re buy for seven dwarves as it was our six year old’s favourite and probably just one for me to re ride guardians as I liked that a lot.

Our second visits to each park will be shows / mop up missed rides and fireworks / harmonious and we plan to stack those for afternoon spending the morning at the resort.

Staying off site hasn’t caused us any significant problems. We got all four paid lightning lanes with no hassle, although Rise would have been nice earlier it was hardly a deal breaker. Our biggest challenge is when we want to do park > resort > park as we don’t have a car so are at the mercy of lyft and Uber.

Controversial opinion : I enjoyed MMRR more than Rise at DHS.

 

[vinotinto]

Epcot today and our final first day at the main parks. Booked Remy for 8:30 the joined the VQ for guardians which gave a 6pm return so will probably pay for a morning slot.

Plan to hit frozen after we tap into Remy then hope for test track still being available but realistically will need to mop that up another day.

Question, were you able to see available return times for all G+ rides/attractions at 7am or did you have to click on each individual ride/attraction?

 

[itf]

Question, were you able to see available return times for all G+ rides/attractions at 7am or did you have to click on each individual ride/attraction?

You have to click them for the first 20 mins or so. We were always going to take the first Remy but yeah. By being bang on the second at 7 we’re always getting the first or second boarding time.

 

[vinotinto]

You have to click them for the first 20 mins or so. We were always going to take the first Remy but yeah. By being bang on the second at 7 we’re always getting the first or second boarding time.

great! Did you upgrade to the new app version this morning, or are you on the previous version?

 

[itf]

great! Did you upgrade to the new app version this morning, or are you on the previous version?

On the latest iOS I updated all my apps earlier. Only thing I’ve seen different is park reservations now seem to be shown individually not grouped

 

[Elsaspiritanimal]

Has anyone noticed this sweater in the WDW stores?

HM themed.

View attachment 696278

Yes I saw it in Disney Springs last week - World of Disney and Marketplace both had it.

 

[scrappinginontario]

Yes I saw it in Disney Springs last week - World of Disney and Marketplace both had it.

Thank you!!

 

[SkyGuy]

Has anyone noticed this sweater in the WDW stores?

HM themed.

View attachment 696278

Two weeks ago we saw it in the clothing store that’s attached to the Co-Op at Disney Springs. Not sure of the name of that store, but it’s the one after you walk through pathway between the pet items and The Dress Shop.

 

[jods]

Just got back yesterday. Spent sat- sun at the BWI and then Thursday night- yesterday at Universal. Bought genie + and loved it. Was able to get Remy, TT and frozen with the 12:47, 2:47 amd 4:47 drops. We didn't get an early start anywhere lol. Was able to get a 7am and 6pm GOTG. I bought it on our last day because we wanted a specific time since we were heading to Universal and had CM at 12:25. My kids loved it. We got lucky at AK that a quick rain storm turned our kali into an anytime and we were able to rebook it so we rode twice. Aldo had an anytime from my safari because it went down. That was a pleasant surprise as I was going to cancel it and make it later. Since it turned to an anytime I was able to immediately book it for the time I wanted. We went to the Halloween party the night before so couldn't get my kids out the door. At epcot I snagged Remy, tt, frozen, LWTL, mission space and spaceship earth. We had 2 days of rides there but only did Remy first night. Could have did it the next day but no one wanted it. At HS, got MMRR, MFSR, star tours, and toy story. We did MFSR 2x as we had toy story go anytime. Bought rise. We didn't use it at MK as we rode everything we wanted at the party. We were planning to go back the night we did AK for extended hours but we were exhausted. I used refresh a bit and would book our next as soon as tapped in. I used @DisneyFive trip reports as a guide. So thank you for a successful trip! The LL were very fast and it was definitely worth purchasing. We also ate at the qs BBQ place in epcot and it was delicious. Did mobile ordering there and the qs at Pandora. We used it at Boardwalk Deli as well. Mobile ordering is so easy and convenient.

 

[parasail_of_congress]

We just returned from eight-night trip, Aug. 13-21, staying at Boardwalk Villa Studio on a DVC point rental with five (two adults, three kids ages 11, 9 and 7). We had an eight-day ticket and visited each park twice (HS on the last day and had to leave midday to catch a plane). We didn’t use G+ or ILL and accomplished everything we wanted to do - most things multiple times. Here’s a quick breakdown per day:

Sun 14 - MK
Rope drop was packed, and we rode all three mountains and HM before 11. Crowds thinned by evening - we rode Big Thunder and Splash twice apiece around fireworks time.

Mon 15 - AK
Slept in a little because of the late-night at MK. Rode Everest twice, then Kali. Rode Everest, Navi and FOP at the end of the day.

Tue 16 - HS
Rise went down right when we got in line at 7:50. Instead we rode Toy Story Mania, then ToT, RnRc, then back to Slinky. We rode Rise midday and RR and Smuggler’s later in the day. Waits were the longest at HS compared to other parks on both days we were there.

Wed 17 - EP
Rope drop was smooth, with Remi, Frozen and TT, then Guardians from the virtual queue. Toured the countries during the day then hit the rest of the rides in the late afternoon when they were all practically walk-ons (including Soarin’). Rode Remi once more at park close.

Thu 18 - AK
Started later again with the late night at EP. Everest was down but back up after we did Kali and Jungle Trek, so we rode Everest twice. Rode Everest twice again later in the day with single rider, then back to Navi and FOP and left the park around 7.

Fri 19 - MK
Early closing, so we got there at the tail end of early morning hours and rode Mine Train. Outside of Splash around noon with a 30-minute wait, we didn’t wait longer than 15 minutes on any ride the entire day.

Sat 20 - EP
Mostly followed the same path as our first day, except we did single rider at TT and rode twice. We went back to the hotel for a couple of hours midday and came back to ride the smaller rides, most multiple times.

Sun 21 - HS
Rise first was a 20-minute wait, then Smuggler’s and Runaway. We skipped Slinky and Toy Story altogether but hit RnRc in the single-rider line (which was still 35 minutes).

A few random thoughts about our trip, plans, waits, etc.:

1. I understand why people want to skip the lines with G+ and ILL, and it’s true that we visited during a time period that is traditionally not busy, but unless you cannot arrive early and/or are staying offsite and/or aren’t staying full days, I just can’t see the justification for paying even more for this service. It could have been useful for us the first HS day, but spending the extra time booking time slots and being tied to certain rides and certain times did not seem to be worth the $75 a day it would have cost us. I really got a kick out of “racing” people in the Lightning Lane in the afternoon/evening when so many rides were virtually walk-on rides anyway.

2. Posted wait times in the middle of the day were pretty accurate across the board (within 5-10 percent). As expected, posted wait times were erratic during ride downtimes and most mornings. The two lines we waited in near closing - Remy and FOP - were within 5-10 minutes of the posted wait time.

3. Likewise, Touring Plans expected wait times were reasonably accurate midday, but not that useful in the morning or evening. The most egregious example was a 120-minute expected wait time for Rise that turned out to be 20 minutes. I think the combination of not completely knowing park attendance and how many people are buying G+, not to mention the downtime and weather bumps, really hampers TP’s ability to be more accurate. Having said that, TP’s historical data was certainly useful at scheduling rides at certain times of the day, and all their rope drop recommendations were spot on.

4. The weather was really cooperative, but also I tried to plan for inside rides in the afternoon/evening where possible. An obvious example of this is riding Soarin’ later in the day, which seems like a no-brainer with hardly any waits. We missed about 30 minutes of rain by riding that, Land and watching Awesome Planet.

5. Besides the rides and shows, my kids really enjoyed the Kidcot country hunt in EP, the Wilderness booklet in AK and the pirate game in MK. And given the hectic nature of a Disney trip, the Animation Experience at AK was a great place to relax and learn how to draw. The paper towel roll I brought along worked perfectly for transporting the drawings back home.

6. We bought Memory Maker, and even though we did zero character pictures, we think it was worth the price. I’ll have to total the number of pictures we actually took, but the kids really enjoyed the magic shots, as well as the various photo booths scattered across the properties.

7. Ninety-five percent of the CM’s we encountered were amazing and doing everything they could to keep the lines moving and the mouse house churning. The focus on ensuring that nearly all seats are full and keeping track of all the different lines is under-appreciated.

8. The Disney bus service to and from Boardwalk worked well. The only minor issue was a 20-minute delay from a posted time for early morning hours on the Friday MK day. There were so many people waiting that when the AK bus arrived, the driver called for an additional bus, which arrived as the MK bus we boarded pulled away.

9. We took the Sunshine Flyer to and from the hotel, and the service was great!

10. I would definitely stay at Boardwalk again, just for the location. The pools were great, although the main pool was packed most of the time we were there. The quiet pool was a great place to chill.

If you have any specific questions about ride lines, times, etc., I jotted down everything we did in order, but didn’t want to write more volumes, so feel free to ask away!

 

[Lady Hiss]

We just returned from eight-night trip, Aug. 13-21, staying at Boardwalk Villa Studio on a DVC point rental with five (two adults, three kids ages 11, 9 and 7). We had an eight-day ticket and visited each park twice (HS on the last day and had to leave midday to catch a plane). We didn’t use G+ or ILL and accomplished everything we wanted to do - most things multiple times. Here’s a quick breakdown per day:

Sun 14 - MK
Rope drop was packed, and we rode all three mountains and HM before 11. Crowds thinned by evening - we rode Big Thunder and Splash twice apiece around fireworks time.

Mon 15 - AK
Slept in a little because of the late-night at MK. Rode Everest twice, then Kali. Rode Everest, Navi and FOP at the end of the day.

Tue 16 - HS
Rise went down right when we got in line at 7:50. Instead we rode Toy Story Mania, then ToT, RnRc, then back to Slinky. We rode Rise midday and RR and Smuggler’s later in the day. Waits were the longest at HS compared to other parks on both days we were there.

Wed 17 - EP
Rope drop was smooth, with Remi, Frozen and TT, then Guardians from the virtual queue. Toured the countries during the day then hit the rest of the rides in the late afternoon when they were all practically walk-ons (including Soarin’). Rode Remi once more at park close.

Thu 18 - AK
Started later again with the late night at EP. Everest was down but back up after we did Kali and Jungle Trek, so we rode Everest twice. Rode Everest twice again later in the day with single rider, then back to Navi and FOP and left the park around 7.

Fri 19 - MK
Early closing, so we got there at the tail end of early morning hours and rode Mine Train. Outside of Splash around noon with a 30-minute wait, we didn’t wait longer than 15 minutes on any ride the entire day.

Sat 20 - EP
Mostly followed the same path as our first day, except we did single rider at TT and rode twice. We went back to the hotel for a couple of hours midday and came back to ride the smaller rides, most multiple times.

Sun 21 - HS
Rise first was a 20-minute wait, then Smuggler’s and Runaway. We skipped Slinky and Toy Story altogether but hit RnRc in the single-rider line (which was still 35 minutes).

A few random thoughts about our trip, plans, waits, etc.:

1. I understand why people want to skip the lines with G+ and ILL, and it’s true that we visited during a time period that is traditionally not busy, but unless you cannot arrive early and/or are staying offsite and/or aren’t staying full days, I just can’t see the justification for paying even more for this service. It could have been useful for us the first HS day, but spending the extra time booking time slots and being tied to certain rides and certain times did not seem to be worth the $75 a day it would have cost us. I really got a kick out of “racing” people in the Lightning Lane in the afternoon/evening when so many rides were virtually walk-on rides anyway.

2. Posted wait times in the middle of the day were pretty accurate across the board (within 5-10 percent). As expected, posted wait times were erratic during ride downtimes and most mornings. The two lines we waited in near closing - Remy and FOP - were within 5-10 minutes of the posted wait time.

3. Likewise, Touring Plans expected wait times were reasonably accurate midday, but not that useful in the morning or evening. The most egregious example was a 120-minute expected wait time for Rise that turned out to be 20 minutes. I think the combination of not completely knowing park attendance and how many people are buying G+, not to mention the downtime and weather bumps, really hampers TP’s ability to be more accurate. Having said that, TP’s historical data was certainly useful at scheduling rides at certain times of the day, and all their rope drop recommendations were spot on.

4. The weather was really cooperative, but also I tried to plan for inside rides in the afternoon/evening where possible. An obvious example of this is riding Soarin’ later in the day, which seems like a no-brainer with hardly any waits. We missed about 30 minutes of rain by riding that, Land and watching Awesome Planet.

5. Besides the rides and shows, my kids really enjoyed the Kidcot country hunt in EP, the Wilderness booklet in AK and the pirate game in MK. And given the hectic nature of a Disney trip, the Animation Experience at AK was a great place to relax and learn how to draw. The paper towel roll I brought along worked perfectly for transporting the drawings back home.

6. We bought Memory Maker, and even though we did zero character pictures, we think it was worth the price. I’ll have to total the number of pictures we actually took, but the kids really enjoyed the magic shots, as well as the various photo booths scattered across the properties.

7. Ninety-five percent of the CM’s we encountered were amazing and doing everything they could to keep the lines moving and the mouse house churning. The focus on ensuring that nearly all seats are full and keeping track of all the different lines is under-appreciated.

8. The Disney bus service to and from Boardwalk worked well. The only minor issue was a 20-minute delay from a posted time for early morning hours on the Friday MK day. There were so many people waiting that when the AK bus arrived, the driver called for an additional bus, which arrived as the MK bus we boarded pulled away.

9. We took the Sunshine Flyer to and from the hotel, and the service was great!

10. I would definitely stay at Boardwalk again, just for the location. The pools were great, although the main pool was packed most of the time we were there. The quiet pool was a great place to chill.

If you have any specific questions about ride lines, times, etc., I jotted down everything we did in order, but didn’t want to write more volumes, so feel free to ask away!

Glad your trip was a good one and thanks for the daily ride info. Just curious about the wait times for the various headliners - what was your tolerance as far as number of minutes you’d wait for a ride? What was the longest wait you experienced?

 

[HeiHei2018]

First day today. Arrived and parked car at hotel around 11:15. Bus to MK came immediately. We did the following on a Tuesday with MNSSHP at MK:
Caught 5 minutes of friendship faire as we entered
Dumbo walk on
Barnstormer walk on
Little Mermaid 5 min
Carousel walk on
It’s a Small World 15 min
Walked to haunted mansion, but wait had doubled, so bailed
Pirates 5 min
Tiki room (air conditioning!)
Meet Rapunzel LL, waited 5 min (posted wait had dropped to 20 min)
Haunted Mansion LL, waited 5 min
Ran into 3:00 parade and stopped to watch second half
Buzz LL
~3:30 Monorail to TTC, packed but made it on first train
Monorail to Epcot, not so packed
Spaceship Earth LL(was walk on, but LL saved us from walking through the long queue)
Rain began. Broke out the raincoats, ponchos, and flip flops.
Nemo LL (LL saved no time)
Turtle Talk LL (LL saved no time)
Downpour. Lightning was dangerously close. Ran to Land pavilion.
Soarin LL, 5 min
Living with Land walk on (had LL, but canceled instead of scanning)
Lightning had moved off, so splashed our way to Norway to make our LL
Frozen LL (booked at 10:30)
Meet Anna and Elsa, 10 min (Note that this closes at 6. We almost got snack first and would have been among the many sad people who missed it.)
Kringla bakery. Rain letting up.
Gran Fiesta walk on
Learned that Remys had opened, so went to France.
Crepes (Berry crepe was good. Tried two different savory ones. They were terrible.)
Remys (Anytime LL because it was down during our scheduled time)
Friendship boat back to hotel
Watched the first bit of the Epcot fireworks outside hotel
Collapsed in hotel room.
8.1 miles total, but it felt like a lot more. Everything is damp. Pondering doing three parks tomorrow, but might come to my senses and stick to two.

 

[Tina1]

First day today. Arrived and parked car at hotel around 11:15. Bus to MK came immediately. We did the following on a Tuesday with MNSSHP at MK:
Caught 5 minutes of friendship faire as we entered
Dumbo walk on
Barnstormer walk on
Little Mermaid 5 min
Carousel walk on
It’s a Small World 15 min
Walked to haunted mansion, but wait had doubled, so bailed
Pirates 5 min
Tiki room (air conditioning!)
Meet Rapunzel LL, waited 5 min (posted wait had dropped to 20 min)
Haunted Mansion LL, waited 5 min
Ran into 3:00 parade and stopped to watch second half
Buzz LL
~3:30 Monorail to TTC, packed but made it on first train
Monorail to Epcot, not so packed
Spaceship Earth LL(was walk on, but LL saved us from walking through the long queue)
Rain began. Broke out the raincoats, ponchos, and flip flops.
Nemo LL (LL saved no time)
Turtle Talk LL (LL saved no time)
Downpour. Lightning was dangerously close. Ran to Land pavilion.
Soarin LL, 5 min
Living with Land walk on (had LL, but canceled instead of scanning)
Lightning had moved off, so splashed our way to Norway to make our LL
Frozen LL (booked at 10:30)
Meet Anna and Elsa, 10 min (Note that this closes at 6. We almost got snack first and would have been among the many sad people who missed it.)
Kringla bakery. Rain letting up.
Gran Fiesta walk on
Learned that Remys had opened, so went to France.
Crepes (Berry crepe was good. Tried two different savory ones. They were terrible.)
Remys (Anytime LL because it was down during our scheduled time)
Friendship boat back to hotel
Watched the first bit of the Epcot fireworks outside hotel
Collapsed in hotel room.
8.1 miles total, but it felt like a lot more. Everything is damp. Pondering doing three parks tomorrow, but might come to my senses and stick to two.

Thank you for the report I loved it

 

[itf]

Not really sure what to do today. We were always planning a resort morning then fireworks at MK later but that forecast doesn’t look good. I’ve started stacking LLs but not sure we will go. Same really tomorrow for Harmonious, plan was AM typhoon then over to Epcot for rides and harmonious.

Then I’ve got not so scary Friday and H2O on Saturday which both look like probable washouts.

 

[itf]

Ok so in the end we took a totally different tactic to our previous days and spent the day at the hotel and booked late LLs.

So we have : meet M&M, jungle cruise, splash, meet Cinderella and we hope to grab BTMR at 5, giving us five lightning lanes and the fireworks.

A little pixie dust this evening. We had an LL for Cinderella and my daughter spotted her favourite (Rapunzel) was in the other side which we didn’t have an LL for. The cast member let her do both as LL.

 

[parasail_of_congress]

Glad your trip was a good one and thanks for the daily ride info. Just curious about the wait times for the various headliners - what was your tolerance as far as number of minutes you’d wait for a ride? What was the longest wait you experienced?

The maximum time I had allocated to ride any ride was an hour, and that was reserved for Rise (waited an hour once and 20 minutes at rope drop the second) and FOP (waited 50 minutes once and 40 the other, both near the end of the day). Unfortunately we had to wait nearly an hour for Slinky and MMRR. I would put those in the 45-minute group with Remi, TT and maybe Cosmic Rewind when it goes to standby. But now that my kids like the TT single-rider line, they are spoiled with no wait, haha.

At MK, I don’t think there’s anything worth more than a 30-minute wait. Once we waited 35 for Splash, but everything else was under 30 (during two days, we rode Splash four times, Space four times, Thunder six and Mine Train once).

Everest and Soarin’ are two of our favorites, but I’m not sure we’d wait more than 20 minutes for either. I think once we hit 25 with Everest out of the five times we rode it. We rode Soarin’ four times, and it was a walk-on every time (in the evening).

The other longest wait we had was RnRc in the single-rider line - just slightly over 30 minutes. We all like that ride as well, although it sure would be nice if it were longer!

For what it’s worth, I think G+ and ILL are working reasonably well, and I don’t necessarily mind them existing for people who really want to pay more for that service. I just hope that the price is high enough that Disney makes what they want AND that a lot more people don’t buy into it. If that occurs, prices for everything (tickets, G+, you name it) will go up quicker and/or the percentage of LL riders will be even more overwhelming than it is right now. LL riders back up when rides are down, so if you don’t catch the ride right when it goes back up, you are really stuck behind a lot of guests.

Here's a good example - late afternoon at MMRR, the posted wait time was 45, estimated wait was I think 38 and our total wait was nearly 60. The problem was that the ride had been down roughly an hour just before we arrived, so I suspect there was a backlog of G+ going through the line. I estimate that they were running the lines around 90/10 G+/standby for the 20 minutes I could see the meetup.