Cant schedule FP for March 16

[Angel Ariel]

Yes, you answered my question. Second question: If she received everything via her personal email/home address then how do you know she received less information than you did?

Because we talked about it...we are best friends.

When I got the dumbo magnet, I mentioned it to her in a conversation where we were planning the trip. I can't remember exactly how it came up, but it did. She said she didn't receive the magnet, then I asked her what she had gotten from them. She answered.

This conversation prompted me to ask friend #2 what she had received from Disney as well, since the conversation with friend #1 made it clear we were getting much different communication.

 

[JanaDee]

yeah FP+ is easy peasy. that's the reason Mesaboy's thread earned thread of the year!

It's so easy, the thread is on part II, with over 2000 posts and almost 200,000 views.

 

[Angel Ariel]

In your opinion, how is showing up to WWOHP during an afternoon with no plans, different than showing up to New Fantasyland in the afternoon with no plans?

The major attraction in wwohp doesn't have an express pass option. So regardless of when you show up, you are waiting standby. because of how universal does their RS, entering a long line with an 8 month old didn't require dh and I to leave Dd with my parents while we waited for the ride. We all waited in line together, could all share taking care of Dd during that time, and we got to continue talking/enjoying our vacation all together.

Entering NFL in the afternoon, no planning, you aren't likely to find fp+ for sdmt. Not an issue in terms of just using standby (that's a wash with.universal), but Dd wouldn't be able to enter the line. So our party would have had to split to experience the major attraction. It isn't a huge difference, and I'm not claiming it is, but it was a difference we appreciated.

As I said, I wouldnt just show up to universal now. I'd do more planning for the,2 park experience. I was just responding to the idea that universal isn't a park you can just show up at. We did, you can...had a great time. I am *positive that people do this with Disney as well and *also* have a good time.

 

[SmithSmith]

Because we talked about it...we are best friends.

When I got the dumbo magnet, I mentioned it to her in a conversation where we were planning the trip. I can't remember exactly how it came up, but it did. She said she didn't receive the magnet, then I asked her what she had gotten from them. She answered.

This conversation prompted me to ask friend #2 what she had received from Disney as well, since the conversation with friend #1 made it clear we were getting much different communication.

I understand you are friends and you communicate with each other but can you really account for all her actions to say definitively what she did and did not receive from Disney? How do you know emails from Disney didn't just get dumped in her spam folder or if she threw out information packets thinking they were just advertisements?

 

[SmithSmith]

The major attraction in wwohp doesn't have an express pass option. So regardless of when you show up, you are waiting standby. because of how universal does their RS, entering a long line with an 8 month old didn't require dh and I to leave Dd with my parents while we waited for the ride. We all waited in line together, could all share taking care of Dd during that time, and we got to continue talking/enjoying our vacation all together.

Entering NFL in the afternoon, no planning, you aren't likely to find fp+ for sdmt. Not an issue in terms of just using standby (that's a wash with.universal), but Dd wouldn't be able to enter the line. So our party would have had to split to experience the major attraction. It isn't a huge difference, and I'm not claiming it is, but it was a difference we appreciated.

As I said, I wouldnt just show up to universal now. I'd do more planning for the,2 park experience. I was just responding to the idea that universal isn't a park you can just show up at. We did, you can...had a great time. I am *positive that people do this with Disney as well and *also* have a good time.

From the bolded below I got the impression that you were implying WDW required preplanning but Universal didn't require planning at all.

We just showed up to Universal and bought tickets in 2013 .

No research done at all, despite there being research done for the rest of the trip in which we were going to WDW. In general, we are a family that does do preplanning for vacations - not tons, but enough to do ADRs, parks/day..that kind of preplanning. And yet when it came to Universal, we did none of that at all, and had a great time..

 

[prudence64]

We showed up at universal IOA and bought tickets at the door and it was worst day of our vacation. Everything went wrong. Can't really blame it planning or lack of planning. Things happen.

 

[Angel Ariel]

We showed up at universal IOA and bought tickets at the door and it was worst day of our vacation. Everything went wrong. Can't really blame it planning or lack of planning. Things happen.

Yep, sometimes things just don't go well no matter how much planning you do. I'm sorry your day at IOA didn't go well

 

[Angel Ariel]

I understand you are friends and you communicate with each other but can you really account for all her actions to say definitively what she did and did not receive from Disney? How do you know emails from Disney didn't just get dumped in her spam folder or if she threw out information packets thinking they were just advertisements?

Because I trust what my closest friend told me. She is not a person who just tosses mail in the trash without opening it - especially when it comes from a destination where she knows she is taking a trip. So I am 100% confident in saying she did not receive a magnet. Others in this thread have said they didn't receive a magnet as well. Did they just throw it out without opening as well?

As for e-mail, I don't *know* for sure that they didn't go to her spam folder. As in I don't have screenshots or proof to show you.I know that she told me she was not receiving the same e-mails I did. I didn't specifically say "hey did you check your spam folder" - because she's a tech savvy woman, who if I know her at all (and, well, she is my best friend), checked that as well when we were having this discussion.

Bottom line is that I trust what she told me when we had this discussion. And really, why isn't that enough? Especially on a board where it all pretty much comes down to having to trust that the anonymous person on the other side of the computer is being sincere and truthful? I'm not saying Disney was wrong or bad or anything - just that it *seems* not everyone receives the same communication.

 

[Angel Ariel]

From the bolded below I got the impression that you were implying WDW required preplanning but Universal didn't require planning at all.

Then you missed the parts in both of my posts about Universal that also said I would *not* do this at Universal now, that Universal does require preplanning for us now. I was just sharing an experience where we did not preplan, and yet still had a great time. That trip was 2 years ago. I don't expect anything anywhere to stay static over 2 years.

 

[SmithSmith]

Bottom line is that I trust what she told me when we had this discussion. And really, why isn't that enough? Especially on a board where it all pretty much comes down to having to trust that the anonymous person on the other side of the computer is being sincere and truthful? I'm not saying Disney was wrong or bad or anything - just that it *seems* not everyone receives the same communication.

I'm not asking for proof. I just wanted to know how you could say for sure what they did or did not receive. I believe you. It's just that I don't know my friends mail/email habits, so it just struck me as odd that someone would know that...

 

[Angel Ariel]

I'm not asking for proof. I just wanted to know how you could say for sure what they did or did not receive. I believe you. It's just that I don't know my friends mail/email habits, so it just struck me as odd that someone would know that...

I know that my friend is a planner, just like I am. In some ways, she is moreso than I am. I know my friend is tech savvy enough to think of checking the spam folder when we talked about what emails we were getting from Disney.

Is it stuff we would regularly talk about? Nope. But then, we had never taken a vacation together before either. I think you find out things you might not have known otherwise when you start taking trips together.

 

[Laketravis]

In the interest of fair and balanced reporting, i am compelled to state that we showed up at USO for the first time over New Years week without a plan and had a great time.

That is all.

 

[SmithSmith]

Then you missed the parts in both of my posts about Universal that also said I would *not* do this at Universal now, that Universal does require preplanning for us now. I was just sharing an experience where we did not preplan, and yet still had a great time. That trip was 2 years ago. I don't expect anything anywhere to stay static over 2 years.

No, I didn't miss that. I didn't think it was relevant because I was speaking about your actual park experience, not hypothetical future visits. You said your trip to WWOHP didn't require any preplanning and yet you still had a great time, but you preplanned the WDW portion of the trip. It sounded to me like you were comparing the experiences. That a great time could be had at Uni without planning, but in order to do the same at WDW then one must plan. If that wasn't your intent then you shouldn't have brought up WDW at all.

 

[Angel Ariel]

I was responding to someone who compared Universal to WDW, saying that Universal also required planning. I responded to that assertion with how we found that not to be the case *on our trip*. That while we did pre-plan WDW as the poster I was responding to was saying, that we did *not* plan Universal at all and that it did work out. That, for our trip, we did not find preplanning Universal to be a requirement the way the poster was suggesting. I also said somewhere along the line that I'm sure there are also those who tour Disney the same way and also have a great time.

To be very clear, I was not speaking in generalities that pre-planning on the whole is not required for WWoHP, just the *we* did not find it necessary for that particular trip.

 

[Angel Ariel]

It should also be.noted that preplanning for Disney meant a much different thing in march 2013 than it does now. Legacy was in effect, fp+ was not. Any preplanning I'm referring to for Disney was merely park/day and ADRs. Not a lot of preplanning there either (as I've said on other threads, we have never done ride by ride touring plans before...not for wdw or universal).

 

[Cormoran]

In the interest of fair and balanced reporting, i am compelled to state that we showed up at USO for the first time over New Years week without a plan and had a great time.

That is all.

Based on your Universal experience last month, how much planning do you think I need to do for my trip in April?