rope drop extra magic hours or regular opening-- FOP ?

Kim Gillihan

Kluvdisney
Joined
Feb 8, 2017
Long story short.. we don't have FP for FOP... Trying to figure out if need to do extra magic hours or can we rope drop normal day? Does it matter? I have read extra magic hours can be extra crazy??

Any advice appreciated...
 
The Rope Drop crowd for morning EMH will be smaller than the Rope Drop crowd for a non-EMH day.

Once the park opens to all, the EMH day will probably have larger crowds all day than a non-EMH day (I guess some call that "extra crazy"?).

However, the EMH hour itself is your best bet for shortest Rope Drop wait for FOP.
 
Long story short.. we don't have FP for FOP... Trying to figure out if need to do extra magic hours or can we rope drop normal day? Does it matter? I have read extra magic hours can be extra crazy??

Any advice appreciated...

Whichever one you choose, you still need to be AT the gates an hour before said rope drop. If you wait until just before the park opens, you'll still be looking at an hour wait. If you wait that hour BEFORE the park opens, you'll likely be on and off within 15 min of official opening time.
 
If you have park hoppers, do the EMH day and get out of Animal Kingdom after you for FOP and maybe two or three more things and head to another park where you've made your FP+ reservations. If you don't have hoppers and AK is your park for that day, I'd go on a non EMH day.
 


As mentioned whether you do EMH or not, arrive 45-60 minutes before the opening time. An EMH day will have a smaller crowd at first.
Your best option may be to do EMH RD at AK, do FoP and what you want. After 2 hours, when the park starts to get full, hop to a different park if you have Park Hoppers.
 
If you have park hoppers, do the EMH day and get out of Animal Kingdom after you for FOP and maybe two or three more things and head to another park where you've made your FP+ reservations. If you don't have hoppers and AK is your park for that day, I'd go on a non EMH day.
Yes! We do, great idea!!
 
As mentioned whether you do EMH or not, arrive 45-60 minutes before the opening time. An EMH day will have a smaller crowd at first.
Your best option may be to do EMH RD at AK, do FoP and what you want. After 2 hours, when the park starts to get full, hop to a different park if you have Park Hoppers.
Thanks!! sounds like a great plan
 


Piggybacking here - my plan is to use the EMH strategy in December but I would like to drive to the park since we're staying at Wilderness Lodge and I get free parking as an AP. Will the parking gates be open by say 6:45?
 
I would do it late at night.

I plan to avoid Pandora the day we RD AK. We will do FOP right before closing.
 
We rope dropped on 10/3 and by the time we got there the wait time was 75 minutes already -.-"
It is VERY difficult to avoid a long line for FoP
 
We are only doing 1 day in the parks, and my mother wants to see Happily Ever After that night, so rope dropping FoP is the only thing I can do. I got this info from a cast member re: parking lot hours:

The parking lot normally opens 30 minutes prior to Theme Park opening. If Disney's Animal Kingdom® Theme Park is hosting morning Extra Magic Hours from 8:00-9:00, then the parking lot will be open at about 7:30.

Has anyone who decided to drive in for EMH find this to be the case? I was hoping we could park around 6:45. Otherwise we have to take the bus from WL at 6:30.
 
We went on a non emh day since we stay off property. We were supposed to get there at 7:30 but didn't get there till 7:55 because we are always late. Got off the tram at 8:10 went through security and took potty break. At 8:15 they announced animal kingdom will be opening at 9am. We went ahead and got in line. The lines on the sides were long so we moved to a line near the middle that was short. They started going ahead and letting people in to go to FOP. I had heard they were opening the park 45 minutes early even on non emh for FOP and that's why we were getting there so early. We walked to Pandora and got in line for FOP which was past the queue entrance and around the corner. The line kept moving the whole time. When we got to the queue entrance it said wait time was 60 minutes but we just kept on moving. We were off the ride by 9:03. So even though the posted hours for AK might say 9am as of last week they are letting people in at 8:15-8:20.
 
We are only doing 1 day in the parks, and my mother wants to see Happily Ever After that night, so rope dropping FoP is the only thing I can do. I got this info from a cast member re: parking lot hours:

The parking lot normally opens 30 minutes prior to Theme Park opening. If Disney's Animal Kingdom® Theme Park is hosting morning Extra Magic Hours from 8:00-9:00, then the parking lot will be open at about 7:30.

Has anyone who decided to drive in for EMH find this to be the case? I was hoping we could park around 6:45. Otherwise we have to take the bus from WL at 6:30.
I don’t have direct experience, but the reports I’ve seen in the past are that the parking lot attendants may not show up until that 30minute mark, but the lot itself is open.

We drove last time on an EMH day but we weren’t trying to get to FOP so we weren’t super early. There were plenty of people parked there when we arrived, though, so I’m pretty sure the lot was open well before.
 

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