Anyone do a VIP private tour since the parks reopened?

[holden]

Wondering if anyone has done the VIP private tour since parks opened. We are considering it for an upcoming trip. I thought perhaps it could help us maintain social distancing since the guide can take us through the FP line , etc.

 

[TiggerBouncy]

Are they doing them? I assumed they were not.

 

[holden]

Are they doing them? I assumed they were not.

I thought I saw somewhere they were back on in August.

 

[karma459]

All the tours on MDE show as "schedule unavailable", so I would assume none of them are available at this point.

 

[yulilin3]

VIP services are open, i have seen many in thre parks already. Sorry, too poor to partake

 

[joyjoy]

Yes, we saw some tours happening last week.

 

[Dave006]

Just to add to @yulilin3 post above Disney Private VIP Tours is currently accepting reservations. Please note that reservations are subject to availability.

Dave

 

[Elle :)]

Not to thread jack but are the other tours available now too (like the ultimate day of thrills tour)?

 

[holden]

Not to thread jack but are the other tours available now too (like the ultimate day of thrills tour)?

No worries about thread jacking. I wonder if they wouldn't reinstate these because they are groups of unrelated people. We did the Ultimate Day of Thrills tour a while back. I can't remember exactly how many were in our group but I'd say it was around 25 or so.

 

[yulilin3]

Not to thread jack but are the other tours available now too (like the ultimate day of thrills tour)?

https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/events-tours/you can filter by date you're traveling or call 407 939 7758

 

[TiggerBouncy]

I know it costs a lot. Do you get to go on any ride you want? Or is it a list of rides? Do you wait in the normal lines or do they have special lines? Can you do them at any park or just one? How much do you cover in 7 hours (Does that get you on pretty much every ride? Do you run out of things to do?) Give me the good, bad and the ugly please? I am seriously considering splurging for it on one of my trips. Just 2 people.

Also, does anyone know if they are doing them currently? How long in advance do you generally need to book?

 

[twinmom13]

They are doing them now. You do get to go on any ride you want, as many times as you want, although I think there may be a limit with RotR. You go through the FP line most of the time, although a few rides have special entrances -- Haunted Mansion, for example, has a cool back entrance. You do not skip to the front of the line, you wait just like you would with FP. If you go now while there is no FP, the wait is minimal. Normally, you can go to as many of the parks as you want and time allows, but I do not know if that is still the case with no hopping. If you change parks, the tour guide drives you and you go in/out back ways, cutting down on travel time. When we did it, we stayed in MK and gave the tour guide a list of rides we wanted to ride. It was not every ride in the park, but it was most of them. We only did one show. The tour guide took our list and planned out the best approach, and we got through everything on the list in 7 hours. You definitely do not run out of things to do, unless there are a lot of things you don't want to do or you pay for extra time. If they are doing fireworks when you go, you can plan the tour to end when the fireworks begin and the tour guide will leave you in special VIP seating for the fireworks.

Some people say the tour guides are walking FastPasses, which can be the case depending on the tour guide and how much you engage with them, but our guide tried to give us interesting facts and tips and really enhance the experience. They say they can pick you up at your resort to start the tour, but I highly recommend meeting them at the park so that you are not wasting tour time with travel. I also recommend eating a big meal before you begin and not taking a big meal break during the tour.

It is expensive, and for that reason we probably will not do it again, but I am glad we did it once. It was nice to get to ride a lot of rides without a lot of waiting. It was also nice to not have to plan or make decisions -- we left that up to the tour guide.

 

[fancymouse]

You can go on any rides as many times as you want. On most rides you use the FP lane, but there are some you use special entrances (Haunted Mansion and Dinosaur are the ones I remember). RotR is not guaranteed though. You still have to get a boarding pass. After that I’m sure you go through the FP lane, but they won’t promise you access. You can also park hop within the 7 hours and I’m pretty sure that’s happening even with Covid (even though others aren’t allowed).

On one special family trip my parents generously paid for us to do a VIP tour at each park. We never ran out of things to do, but we also had a sit down lunch at each park. I think AK would be difficult to fill if you just wanted attractions. Epcot is also not really worth it because there are so few attractions with lines. HS has just the right amount of stuff to do, but we wouldn’t have been able to do everything at MK (but we did everything we wanted). We also did a tour once where we just did every “big” ride at MK, AK, and HS. Doing this you miss some of the magic of the parks as you go in back entrances and it was just really efficient, but it was a great way to check all the boxes. It took pressure off the rest of our time.

That being said, the guides are AMAZING and they will make anything special. They’ll do anything you want. If you want to ride Space Mountain 20 times- done. They’ll go as slow or as fast as you want. Besides just getting access to lines, at shows you get reserved seating. My brother was picked for the Indiana Jones show as a volunteer and afterward we got to meet the actors with our guide.

The rate is normally $450-700+ an hour (depending on the season) and you’d just have to call to see about availability. I doubt they are filling up right now, but maybe they aren’t fully staffed either. Honestly though, if they aren’t charging on the lower end of that range I wouldn’t recommend spending the money right now. There are just too many things that aren’t open and you won’t get special access to. Tours during normal, busy, pre-covid times are totally worth it. Tours now are incredibly expensive for a lesser experience.

Also- if you choose to wait you should look into the semi-VIP tours (when they come back). When it was just my husband and me visiting we did these several times. They are a pre-set list of rides with a small group (maybe 20 people). It’s the same VIP guides and same awesome service, but for a fraction of the cost. We loved them and, again, we would do like 1 or 2 of them and it freed up the rest of our days to go at a slower pace and so other things.

 

[eburg]

Wanted to bump this back up and see if anyone has done a tour yet. If no fast pass what happens? Do you still get to go on first or do you ha e to wait in line?

 

[holden]

We haven't taken a tour, but I am booking one in a couple of weeks for December.

 

[fancymouse]

Wanted to bump this back up and see if anyone has done a tour yet. If no fast pass what happens? Do you still get to go on first or do you ha e to wait in line?

VIP tours are still using FP lanes. Just like Rider Swap snd DAS. Pretty sure there is also park hopping as I saw a conversation recently where someone on instagram had posted pictures at multiple parks in a day and someone asked how that was possible. Several people responded that VIP tours were allowing hopping. That was all third person though, so calling VIP services would be the best way to confirm that.

 

[eburg]

So I called VIP and they said yes still using the FP and special entrances for rides. You must have a reservation to the first park. You can stay at the park you finish at but if you leave you can only go back to the park you started at.

 

[scili]

We did the private VIP tour in August and had an amazing time. We did park hop and had the choice of ending our tour either at the park we started off at or our hotel.

Tour availability is limited. Our guide told us that they were only doing 15 private VIP tours a day since only 15 cast member guides were available/called back. I am not sure if that is still the case.

We were able to do unlimited rides in all 3 parks we went to, using the FP and special entrances. One thing that we did that worked out well was to start at Hollywood Studios. The tour guide made sure that our MagicBands were properly scanned, and then when we were at another park at 2 pm, we tried for Rise of the Resistance virtual queue. We got a boarding group that boarded within an hour after our tour ended, which was perfect. The tour guide kept monitoring the progress of the boarding groups, which was great. Since RoTR usually takes us around 45-50 minutes from start to finish, we didn’t want to use our tour time to do the ride.

The safety measures made us feel safe. One of the many things we liked about the tour was that they did the temperature screening and baggage screening at a special site. We got picked up from our hotel, the Swan, got driven across the street for the special screening, went to a special part backstage at Tower of Terror to get our MagicBands scanned, and then entered the park through the backstage entrance near RnR. While in the van, the row right behind the driver was blocked off in order to ensure proper distancing.

There were some noticeable adjustments to the tour, such as the tour being attraction only focused and no water bottles or snacks given.

 

[Tracey868]

what was the current price for VIP??

 

[TiggerBouncy]

what was the current price for VIP??

I called them a few days ago - I am going in Late Oct. They said Oct 22-23 was $650. 24-25th was $550 and 26th-27th was $425 (per hour, minimum 7 hours) [Edited to correct the quoted cost I was given] .

I am going to wait until our next trip I think. There are a lot of restrictions right now. They won't eat with you. They won't ride with you. There are no character meets and greets (of course since there are not any). They aren't really doing shows and of course fireworks. So, really it's just ride fastpasses, and they won't do RotR since there is no fastpass lane for them. It seems like it's not worth the cost to me aright now and I prefer to wait until more of the experiences are open.