Just a quick trip report from yesterday at DCA, just me and my 10yo daughter, no G+ or LL used.
We got off the 5 around 8am, and I think it took us almost a full hour to park, get through security, and get through the gate. Our priorities were Soarin and Incredicoaster, so we did those first, minimal wait for both. Then we tried RSR, but after waiting in the hot sun with no shade, my daughter decided it wasn't worth the 1.5 hours wait. So we got churros instead! We did Mater's and Luigis. Then we shared a chicken strip meal from Flo's, since I wanted the gingerbread shake too. After getting a mini-lunch, it was definitely feeling warmer. So we did the Animation Academy and visited Beast's library. We also did a not so terrible job drawing a dancing/jumping stick figure for the spinny things. We did Philharmagic after that so I could sit in some air conditioning. Then, because I love my daughter, we did Grizzly River Run. I hate rides like this, but she wanted to do it. Of course, I got soaked, and she just got wet lol. After that, we ran around the Redwood creek trail, then we sat in the sun in the WOC viewing area. We had afternoon reservations for LLL, so we waited for our table to be ready and tried to dry off as much as possible. After our late lunch, we did Little Mermaid, jellyfish (where we had great view of folks being escorted off a broken Incredicoaster), zephyr, and caught the end of Viva Navidad. Then we wandered back through Pixar Pier. We 'won' a Luna star, $5 seems like a very reasonable price for an in-park plush. We ate some popcorn and watched the lights on the Pal Around, which neither of us wanted to ride, but its pretty to look at. Then we did Little Mermaid again, because why not! We did Mike and Sully, then Soarin again. At that point we were both getting tired. We grabbed some Starbucks and called it a night. I think it was around 8:30-9pm when we left.
It was definitely a crowded day. Our longest wait was an hour for GRR, our shortest was our first ride on Soarin for 10 minutes. Posted wait times were generally accurate within 10 minutes. The CMs are doing a new thing where they announce that the wait time has gone up. I've never heard them do that before, but I don't go to that parks that often so maybe its not a new thing? Anyway, it seems a little weird to make an announcement that your wait time is now 5 minutes longer when the posted wait times aren't super accurate to begin with. The cynic in me thinks they're doing it to encourage purchasing of G+, since the two rides where I heard this announcement had LL. But maybe they get complaints from guests if they wait longer than the posted time.
We got off the 5 around 8am, and I think it took us almost a full hour to park, get through security, and get through the gate. Our priorities were Soarin and Incredicoaster, so we did those first, minimal wait for both. Then we tried RSR, but after waiting in the hot sun with no shade, my daughter decided it wasn't worth the 1.5 hours wait. So we got churros instead! We did Mater's and Luigis. Then we shared a chicken strip meal from Flo's, since I wanted the gingerbread shake too. After getting a mini-lunch, it was definitely feeling warmer. So we did the Animation Academy and visited Beast's library. We also did a not so terrible job drawing a dancing/jumping stick figure for the spinny things. We did Philharmagic after that so I could sit in some air conditioning. Then, because I love my daughter, we did Grizzly River Run. I hate rides like this, but she wanted to do it. Of course, I got soaked, and she just got wet lol. After that, we ran around the Redwood creek trail, then we sat in the sun in the WOC viewing area. We had afternoon reservations for LLL, so we waited for our table to be ready and tried to dry off as much as possible. After our late lunch, we did Little Mermaid, jellyfish (where we had great view of folks being escorted off a broken Incredicoaster), zephyr, and caught the end of Viva Navidad. Then we wandered back through Pixar Pier. We 'won' a Luna star, $5 seems like a very reasonable price for an in-park plush. We ate some popcorn and watched the lights on the Pal Around, which neither of us wanted to ride, but its pretty to look at. Then we did Little Mermaid again, because why not! We did Mike and Sully, then Soarin again. At that point we were both getting tired. We grabbed some Starbucks and called it a night. I think it was around 8:30-9pm when we left.
It was definitely a crowded day. Our longest wait was an hour for GRR, our shortest was our first ride on Soarin for 10 minutes. Posted wait times were generally accurate within 10 minutes. The CMs are doing a new thing where they announce that the wait time has gone up. I've never heard them do that before, but I don't go to that parks that often so maybe its not a new thing? Anyway, it seems a little weird to make an announcement that your wait time is now 5 minutes longer when the posted wait times aren't super accurate to begin with. The cynic in me thinks they're doing it to encourage purchasing of G+, since the two rides where I heard this announcement had LL. But maybe they get complaints from guests if they wait longer than the posted time.
