Marathon Weekend 2020

[rteetz]

Really? The one on Main Street? I met one of Mickey’s friends when I was there last week (but we did not do the meet and greet).

Yes last May he stopped talking. It was a budget cut thing and it was hard on the CMs. The talking heads are very heavy.

 

[flav]

SAFD:
Tuesday: Flying and checking-in then we will introduce Disney to my uncle who never been. MK first then monorail to Epcot. So late afternoon FP: Frozen, Pixar shorts and Nemo.
Wednesday: Rope drop HS and SWGE. Late morning FP: TSMM, Indiana Jones and Beauty n Beast. Then, for some of us, Expo, T-Rex at Disney Spring and possibly night shows at MK.
Thursday: Run 5k then FP: BTMRR, Haunted Mansion, 7DMT around a Be Our Guest lunch. We canceled Oga Cantina ADR because we did it in Disneyland and it is enough.
Friday: Run 10k, free time, maybe Typhoon Lagoon for me. Late afternoon FP: FoP, Lion King and Safari. See the tree at night.
Saturday: Run the Half, rest, early afternoon FP: Spaceship Earth, Soarin, Figment. If enough energy see Epcot Forever with the rest of the family.
Sunday: Run the Full, rest, float in the pool and mid-afternoon meet with the others. FP: Jungle Cruise, Pirates, Peter Pan. Celebration dinner currently planned is Storybook at AP.
Monday: Say bye to some. DATW for a while. Maybe Blizzard Beach. Late afternoon FP: Little Mermaid, SDD, Frozen Sing-Along. Late dinner at SciFi Diner was added today because of fried pickles craving.

ETA: Doing the FP planning made me realize how much we did in three days in Disneyland last summer. The plus of WDW is really the other things to do besides attractions.

 

[Abbie485]

How much time should we plan on being at the expo to pickup our packets and shop? We arrive pretty early Friday, and plan on dropping our bags at our resort and going immediately to the expo. We are planning on going to a park that afternoon/evening, I am just not sure what time to make our fast passes for that day. We can make our selections tomorrow morning, so yeah I know, super last minute...

 

[JulieODC]

Made my FP this morning - pretty happy overall. Didn’t get Slinky for Saturday - but planning to rope drop and hoping it won’t be bad!

 

[SheHulk]

I made my FP this morning but only have a 1-day ticket for Monday! Got Slinky right under the wire before we have to leave for the airport. That was really the only thing I wanted so it was easy Looking forward to seeing SWGE and have a reservation at Oga's that day too.

 

[lahobbs4]

Made FP+ Saturday and feel fine about it. I don't have too many must-dos anymore so I chose what was best for our friends coming with us (who have only been 3 times).

Add me to the list of hating the HS tiers! And if I get there at rope drop (5K morning), do I try to get in the Galaxy's Edge queue once I scan to get in the park? Or can I do it before? (this whole process has thrown me, for some reason!)

 

[lhermiston]

How much time should we plan on being at the expo to pickup our packets and shop? We arrive pretty early Friday, and plan on dropping our bags at our resort and going immediately to the expo. We are planning on going to a park that afternoon/evening, I am just not sure what time to make our fast passes for that day. We can make our selections tomorrow morning, so yeah I know, super last minute...

Depends on how much shopping you want to do and how long the lines are. I was in and out of the expo in about 20 minutes this year, but I didn't do any shopping. I heard the merch lines moved pretty quickly this year. Others could weigh in more accurately on that.

 

[Barca33Runner]

How much time should we plan on being at the expo to pickup our packets and shop? We arrive pretty early Friday, and plan on dropping our bags at our resort and going immediately to the expo. We are planning on going to a park that afternoon/evening, I am just not sure what time to make our fast passes for that day. We can make our selections tomorrow morning, so yeah I know, super last minute...

In my experience Friday is not usually a packed day at the expo. Wednesday is usually the worst, but it wasn’t bad at all last year after they expanded the area being used into multiple buildings. As long as things are laid out similarly to last year I’d say you can be in and out as quickly as your shopping habits allow.

Bus transportation to and from the expo may be a bigger variable. We’ve had years where the buses are moving in and out quickly and years where they take considerably longer. Depending on luck and whether they are keeping the buses in perpetual motion or having them wait to fill to a certain level before getting on the road could impact timing if you are relying on Disney Transportation.

 

[Dis_Yoda]

Made FP+ Saturday and feel fine about it. I don't have too many must-dos anymore so I chose what was best for our friends coming with us (who have only been 3 times).

Add me to the list of hating the HS tiers! And if I get there at rope drop (5K morning), do I try to get in the Galaxy's Edge queue once I scan to get in the park? Or can I do it before? (this whole process has thrown me, for some reason!)

Yesterday, there was no queue at all for Galaxy's Edge at opening or even when we left at 11:30AM. It might not be on then either. We headed straight there at open and got straight on Smuggler's Run and walked into Oga's. We then were able to cut through the land after Toy Story on our way to Star Tours. It might be nothing to worry about!

 

[baxter24]

SAFD: In a surprise to no one, my Disney experience was giving me trouble. It couldn't seem to acknowledge that both my friend and I had purchased our tickets and were linked to the same account....even though they were. Finally got it working and was able to make some decent selections. Couldn't get Flight of Passage or Slinky Dog but I'll just keep checking back. Luckily my friend doesn't mind waiting for some attractions if that is our only option. Most pleased with our MK day after the marathon. I was able to get Mine Train, Big Thunder, and Space Mountain all in the afternoon. As long as I'm able to walk after Dopey, it should be a fun afternoon and evening there.

 

[Melissa Perez]

Is it just me or is there more promotion for Princess weekend than Marathon Weekend regarding merch? I am very motivated on my long, cold, dark runs by knowing what merch is going to be there and I am getting a little worried not seeing too much...

 

[disneydaydreamer33]

I have a split stay of partly on-site with just my husband and I, and then off-site with our friends that will be meeting us there. I made my fast passes yesterday, but wasn't able to get FOP. I'm hopeful I can find a random one for my AK day.

 

[camaker]

Is it just me or is there more promotion for Princess weekend than Marathon Weekend regarding merch? I am very motivated on my long, cold, dark runs by knowing what merch is going to be there and I am getting a little worried not seeing too much...

Merch previews usually don't come out until a couple of weeks before the event. There has always been pretty extensive merchandise options for Marathon Weekend, with it being RunDisney's flagship event. They just don't typically publish previews this far in advance.

 

[Tinkerbelle's Mom]

SAFD:

We are doing a split stay. For Dopey we are with friends who are all running Dopey so not too many plans have been made. Our focus are hang with them and then the runs. Im still debating on if I want to add on cheer squad for myself. I am leaning a bit away from it since I may be creative with my marathon viewing for them. Although we did snag a FP for Test Track since it closes on Monday.

The day after the Marathon we switch hotels and it will be just DD and I. So much easier to get FPs on these days. We did score a FOP one which saves us from having to be there right at rope drop. I figure the day or two after Dopey my DD will be a slow going.

We also got 7DMT, Peter Pan, Space, EE, Frozen, Slinky Dog (so sad on how they do FP at DHS), among a few others my DD picked out. Its our first time at Marathon weekend and staying for a few days after. It's my hope that the parks after the weekend is over aren't as busy as what we normally encounter. We'd like to take a meandering approach rather then the mad dash we usually do, lol.

 

[Sleepless Knight]

Made my fastpass reservations! But despite getting up at 4:00am to do so, I did not get a FOP pass. Is it worth the stand-by wait?

I would say yes for a 60-90 minute standby wait. It's a great attraction. I cannot say the same about Navi River Journey. The only reason my 60 minute standby wait for that was worthwhile is because I was fortunate enough to spend the entire 60 minutes talking with some fellow runners so that made the wait quite enjoyable.

Switched over to Riverside. Still probably going to end up at FQ at least once since as I realized no beignets at Riverside. May hop off the bus at FQ after the full get my beignets and then figure out how to get back to the hotel (maybe the bus)

I've seen people staying at POR get on the race bus at POFQ to head back to POR. You could also take the boat if you wanted to. And the beignets are available all day. I'm not at Port Orleans this race weekend, so no beignets for me. Womp womp.

o for this week's SAFD, what FP+ did you make, which are you excited about, anything you missed that you really wanted to get?

Got the ones I wanted, but I still don't know how much of this visit will be focused on Galaxy's Edge and Rise of the Resistance. Definitely trickier to get the usual FP+, but I attributed that to getting on the system 3 hours after it opened since I decided I valued sleep more than getting up at 4:00am west coast time.

I'm bummed about the new tiering system at HS though...

It's honestly terrible. Far too many really good to great attractions are on the top tier.

Tower of Terror (stupid HS tiering system!!!) I opted for Slinky Dog instead and am hoping to ride ToT at rope drop, if I can’t fit it in elsewhere. My standby limit is in the 20-30 min range depending on my mood and the attraction.

Tower of Terror can have reasonable standby waits so it's at least got that going for it.

I didn’t even think about this when I made my Tusker House reservation. If my friends don’t join me I’ll be solo. It’ll be a little weird. I still wanna go though. Hmmmm I’m gonna have to think about this one.

I've done many character meals solo. Since most of my trips are solo, I just have to live with it. For the most part, I've had attentive character handlers or restaurant wait staff who even hang by to make sure they're around when the character comes to my table. And if they're not, I've either had fellow guests volunteer or be willing to be take the photo.

I’ve done many of the races solo and always do meet and greets with the medals and have never felt awkward.

While I'm comfortable doing character meets solo, it is always far more interesting after a race with medal(s), especially in the parks. The characters often make a huge deal out of the medals. After Dopey, Mickey decided to count them all until he got overwhelmed by all of them, Goofy concluded that I was indeed goofy, Minnie decided to make the 10K medal kiss the marathon medal, Chip and Dale had great fun playing around with the spinner medals and showing them off to the photographers, Snow White asked if I had been skipping around the kingdom, and Dopey got very, very excited. Indeed, some of my favorite character moments have come when I was wearing race medals.

If you want character medals, but feel awkward about it, wear your race medal. It will help immensely.

it was hard on the CMs. The talking heads are very heavy.

As far as I'm concerned, this is the only good reason to end that meet and greet. Hearing Mickey talk was always pretty cool.

How much time should we plan on being at the expo to pickup our packets and shop?

Packet pick up is quick. Shopping and/or photo ops can be the real time consumer. In addition to the race merchandise, the vendor area may offer a lot of things, including last minute items you forgot to pack. Or in my case, I bought some self massage tools one year that really help me to this day from a vendor.

 

[BigEeyore]

The only FP I absolutely had to have was FoP and I couldn't get that until Sunday, so now I am rearranging my plans to accommodate it! I had planned on heading to MK after the marathon, but now I will hit AK for the afternoon and then go to MK. No SDD but that's fine - I am ok to miss that.
The ride I am most excited for doesn't have a FP - Rise of the Resistance! Unless we are lucky with moderate lines for it over the weekend, I will probably be rope dropping HS Monday morning to get it in. I am kind of hoping they bring back the 6 am magic hours but they probably won't.

 

[DopeyBadger]

Maybe as it gets closer we should create a list of everyone who is planning on rope dropping DHS (or any park for that matter) on a certain day. Might have some people to stand in line with then. As of now we're planning to rope drop DHS on Monday (1/13), and then possibly Tuesday (1/14) as well depending on how Monday goes. I'll be interested to see if there's any type of up tick after the new ride opens.

 

[Neon Cactus]

We're planning to rope drop DHS on Wednesday (1/15).

 

[Spikester]

I tried to get FP+ today for a resort stay starting Jan 8. It wasn’t available. Maybe because my annual pass expires on Jan 4th?

 

[Disneyslowrunner]

I have no idea about ADR’s. I enjoy going solo but have to admit that I get a little uncomfortable at the table service restaurants when I am alone. I need to get over it though so I can have some yummy food! Happy Sunday all!

I felt the same way, so I ended up doing my big dining experiences earlier when the restaurants were not very busy. I think that made me feel a lot more comfortable.