concerned about my 2 different parks/day strategy.

[Lisa_Loves_Disney]

I haven't been to WDW since they rolled out the FP+. Before this, I had always planned my days as: be there for rope drop at one park, ride 3 or 4 rides, go back to the hotel for lunch & a nap, and go back out to a different park for dinner and more rides. It was never a problem with the old FP system, I could get on every ride I wanted (morning & night). Now I'm a little uneasy about doing 2 different parks a day because I booked my 3 FP+ selections for the park we'll be at in the morning, and had just hoped I'd be able to get to make a couple more at the second park when we go around dinner time. I didn't realize that once you use your first 3 you can only select another (one at a time) from a kiosk in THAT specific park. Now I'm 2 weeks out and I have all of the dinner res' that I wanted, so I don't want to move our itinerary around.

How has it worked for other people using this strategy? For example will I be able to get a FP for RnR at DHS if I don't get to the park until 5pm to make the selection? or since the new system has rolled out, do you try to do the same park both morning and night?

 

[mom2rtk]

You would have to be really lucky to find FPs for RnR after 5.

 

[Lisa_Loves_Disney]

You would have to be really lucky to find FPs for RnR after 5.

so are more people shifting towards cutting out afternoon breaks and just staying at one park all day? I'm confident enough to not make an FP's for AK if I go at rope drop. I think I could ride the 2 or 3 rides I want without FP's, so I could save my selections for the second park. but there's a day I'm going to MK in the morning and I have the sought after 8am crystal palace res and I'm going to DHS at night for Fantasmic, so I used my FP's for MK. I can't really switch the parks around..any suggestions?

 

[UnderTheRialto]

so are more people shifting towards cutting out afternoon breaks and just staying at one park all day? I'm confident enough to not make an FP's for AK if I go at rope drop. I think I could ride the 2 or 3 rides I want without FP's, so I could save my selections for the second park. but there's a day I'm going to MK in the morning and I have the sought after 8am crystal palace res and I'm going to DHS at night for Fantasmic, so I used my FP's for MK. I can't really switch the parks around..any suggestions?

I have been to WDW many many times since FP+ and don't ever get a fourth FP. In your specific situation, I would do standby or single rider for RnR. It's not any different than what you'd do with legacy FP other than now you have the option of using them for your evening park if you want to instead of the morning park.

 

[Spunky946]

You could make your fast passes for the second park.

 

[mom2rtk]

so are more people shifting towards cutting out afternoon breaks and just staying at one park all day? I'm confident enough to not make an FP's for AK if I go at rope drop. I think I could ride the 2 or 3 rides I want without FP's, so I could save my selections for the second park. but there's a day I'm going to MK in the morning and I have the sought after 8am crystal palace res and I'm going to DHS at night for Fantasmic, so I used my FP's for MK. I can't really switch the parks around..any suggestions?

We don't hop, so I'm not the best judge of what people do. From what I hear though, a fair number schedules their FPs for the second park of the day.

I'm not a big fan of single rider but that might be an option for you at RnR, although at times that line can be long too.

If you're just adults going, maybe hope for a shorter line late at night?

How long are you staying in the MK and what day of the week are you going? If it's on a day they are doing MVMCP, I'd consider letting the FPs there go (because those are lower crowd days) and schedule at DHS that night. The down side of course is that the FPs are DHS are tiered so you'll only get a couple worth anything.

 

[pens4821]

I'm not a Disney vet but I highly doubt you will get headliner fps in the evening (or even afternoon). However, I would just go with the plan you have and have a great time. I would still go to different parks, just lower expectations. You'll just have to go the old fashioned route and stand in a headliner line for around an hour (give or take).

I would do as much as I could in the morning park and pick a couple must dos at the night park. Anything over that is a plus.

We are going in February and my plan right now is for a few evenings just head to a park and ride a ride or two and enjoy the atmosphere.

 

[minnie mum]

We rarely park hop. We use our FPs for late morning and right after lunch, then get our 4th FP for the late afternoon or early evening before leaving for our afternoon break. However, what I have read from those who do park hop is that they rope drop the first park and hit their high priority rides using standby lines while they are at their shortest, in the first couple of hours in the morning. They book their FPs for the second park which they enter later in the afternoon. Hoping to get a FP for any headliner at a kiosk in late afternoon is pretty futile. Usually the only FPs left at that time of day are for attractions that don't need FPs anyway.

 

[Lisa_Loves_Disney]

We don't hop, so I'm not the best judge of what people do. From what I hear though, a fair number schedules their FPs for the second park of the day.

I'm not a big fan of single rider but that might be an option for you at RnR, although at times that line can be long too.

If you're just adults going, maybe hope for a shorter line late at night?

How long are you staying in the MK and what day of the week are you going? If it's on a day they are doing MVMCP, I'd consider letting the FPs there go (because those are lower crowd days) and schedule at DHS that night. The down side of course is that the FPs are DHS are tiered so you'll only get a couple worth anything.

yes just two adults, so luckily we're not trying to ride Peter Pan or Seven Dwarfs which I've seen insane wait times for. yes, going to MK in the morning of a MVMCP, a Sunday. I currently have at least one FP+ for every ride I want in AK, MK, and DHS, I was just hoping to get in a couple at night before I realized you have to schedule at that specific park. I didn't make any for Epcot because I'm going two evenings. Is there a poor chance I'd be able to get a FP for Test Track around 3pm day of?

 

[mom2rtk]

I'm not a Disney vet but I highly doubt you will get headliner fps in the evening (or even afternoon). However, I would just go with the plan you have and have a great time. I would still go to different parks, just lower expectations. You'll just have to go the old fashioned route and stand in a headliner line for around an hour (give or take).

I would do as much as I could in the morning park and pick a couple must dos at the night park. Anything over that is a plus.

We are going in February and my plan right now is for a few evenings just head to a park and ride a ride or two and enjoy the atmosphere.

That's certainly one of the coping strategies some recommend.

 

[mom2rtk]

yes just two adults, so luckily we're not trying to ride Peter Pan or Seven Dwarfs which I've seen insane wait times for. yes, going to MK in the morning of a MVMCP, a Sunday. I currently have at least one FP+ for every ride I want in AK, MK, and DHS, I was just hoping to get in a couple at night before I realized you have to schedule at that specific park. I didn't make any for Epcot because I'm going two evenings. Is there a poor chance I'd be able to get a FP for Test Track around 3pm day of?

Test Track is unlikely to find late in the day. It does have single rider, but once again, it's unfortunate to be riding so much separately.

I'd seriously consider ditching the MK FPs and schedule later at DHS. A Sunday morning with a party that night should provide good touring early in the day.

 

[pens4821]

That's certainly one of the coping strategies some recommend.

I know it sounds hard, but it's truly the best advice. We went in January of 2014 for the first time in near 10 years and had such high expectations. The trip didn't go as planned, and it caused us much annoyance. So we are going in with much lower expectations this time hoping to have more fun (not saying we didn't have fun last time, just wanted to do more and things to go differently). It'll be a little different for you because we had a 5 year old with us. He wasn't into as much as we thought and he had more fun in the pool than being in the parks (but he did love the parks too).

 

[alliecat523]

Definitely do Test Track in the Single Rider line. While it's never a guarantee, 9 times out of 10 we are in the same car.

 

[scrapquitler]

I haven't been to WDW since they rolled out the FP+. Before this, I had always planned my days as: be there for rope drop at one park, ride 3 or 4 rides, go back to the hotel for lunch & a nap, and go back out to a different park for dinner and more rides. It was never a problem with the old FP system, I could get on every ride I wanted (morning & night). Now I'm a little uneasy about doing 2 different parks a day because I booked my 3 FP+ selections for the park we'll be at in the morning, and had just hoped I'd be able to get to make a couple more at the second park when we go around dinner time. I didn't realize that once you use your first 3 you can only select another (one at a time) from a kiosk in THAT specific park. Now I'm 2 weeks out and I have all of the dinner res' that I wanted, so I don't want to move our itinerary around.

How has it worked for other people using this strategy? For example will I be able to get a FP for RnR at DHS if I don't get to the park until 5pm to make the selection? or since the new system has rolled out, do you try to do the same park both morning and night?

For a two park day, my strategy would be to ride popular rides in the first park ASAP in the morning, then go have my break at the room, and use my FP+ later in the day at the second park.

If you want to use FP+ in one park in the morning, you CAN use additional FP+ booked one at a time in the second park later in the day, but there's no guarantee of availablity, especially for the most popular rides.

 

[DavidNYC]

If you're going before vacation week when the crowds are lower and want to do rope drop, break and 2nd park - my suggestion would be to use the FP for the 2nd park if the 2nd park is anything other than Epcot. At Rope drop in most parks you can get a number of rides done in the first 2 hours and then find a few other things to do that will be low wait. I think Epcot doesn't have enough things to make FP worthwhile and would try to hit Soarin and TT at rope drop rather than make that a 2nd park. This way when you get to your 2nd park, you can ride a bunch of the headliners when you want. Of course, you have to look at what you want to do each day and what the schedules are like but in general, if you're hopping, I think that a good idea. Depeding on how many times you're visiting each park, another viable strategy would be use FP in a morning and do MK in the afternoon. If you're there before peak, there will be a significant number of rides you'll be able to get as 4th and more FP with relatively little wait. Maybe not all the mountains, but there will still be a good number to do.

No real "wrong" strategy here - depends on which rides and parks you want to do each day.

 

[Alesia]

In your situation, saving your fastpasses for the second park is a much better plan.

 

[maryj11]

yes just two adults, so luckily we're not trying to ride Peter Pan or Seven Dwarfs which I've seen insane wait times for. yes, going to MK in the morning of a MVMCP, a Sunday. I currently have at least one FP+ for every ride I want in AK, MK, and DHS, I was just hoping to get in a couple at night before I realized you have to schedule at that specific park. I didn't make any for Epcot because I'm going two evenings. Is there a poor chance I'd be able to get a FP for Test Track around 3pm day of?

I know we rode Test Track right before closing 2 times in a row with no FP. If you can hit the popular rides right before closing the lines drop off a lot. We got in line for TT about 8:50 , it did say 20 minute wait but walked right on and then when we went to get off they asked if we wanted to ride again. So yes we rode again without getting out of the car. Same thing at MK for Splash Mountain and Big Thunder. During the last parade lines dropped off . Wait times posted at that time are usually higher then what they actually are. We walked on Splash and Big Thunder. This was the third week in August. Crowd levels were about a 7 out of 10. Not sure how it would be with crowds are higher then that though. Another vacation memorial day week we rode Soarin at closing which was only about a 10 minute wait.

 

[wisblue]

To the OP, we have always been park hoppers, going back to the 1990's and the pre FP days.

In our experience, FP+ makes park hopping much better and allows us to raise our expectations. We go to one park at opening and do things with short lines and then use our FPs later in the day (usually at a different park).

To take maximum advantage of paper FP, you really had to spend all day in one park, both to be there to get FPs when your window opened and to use them when the return time came. If we went to a second park later in the day, the selection of FPs was pretty low (just as it is now with FP+). Now we can have FPs for 3 major attractions in that second park lined up at times we selected before we arrived.

We haven't had to lower our expectations at all because now we are able to do MORE in a day than we did before following the same touring approach.

 

[J'Adore Disney]

Make your Fast Passes for the 2nd park. I recently did Epcot and Magic Kingdom in 1 day. I got to Epcot at opening time, rode Mission Space, Test Track and Spaceship Earth without FP (wait time was under 40 minutes) We then walked around World Showcase, explored some of the F&WF booths, had a few drinks and headed back to the hotel (Yacht Club) around 2:00 p.m. for a shower - it was super hot! Around 4:00 or 5:00 p.m., we took the monorail to Magic Kingdom and used our Fast Passes to ride Pirates of the Caribbean, Big Thunder Mountain, and Haunted Mansion.

PS: I went on a Monday

 

[Alesia]

To the OP, we have always been park hoppers, going back to the 1990's and the pre FP days.

In our experience, FP+ makes park hopping much better and allows us to raise our expectations. We go to one park at opening and do things with short lines and then use our FPs later in the day (usually at a different park).

To take maximum advantage of paper FP, you really had to spend all day in one park, both to be there to get FPs when your window opened and to use them when the return time came. If we went to a second park later in the day, the selection of FPs was pretty low (just as it is now with FP+). Now we can have FPs for 3 major attractions in that second park lined up at times we selected before we arrived.

We haven't had to lower our expectations at all because now we are able to do MORE in a day than we did before following the same touring approach.

I agree. Park hopping is so much easier now than it was before FP+.