I frequently had to choose between things that DH and I wanted to do and things that were mainly for DS (2.5).
Welcome to having a little kid.
My son is 11 and nearly as tall as me and these are not issues we have anymore. Whew.
Any tips on balancing it out?
Use Rider Switch. Seriously, rock that privilege while you have it. DS got tall, FAST, and we ran out of that privilege earlier than another family might have. Despite what the website says, Rider Switch is for kids too short to ride, so while that is the case, USE IT.
We did not want to take over an hour out of park and family time if we took turns, and neither of us felt right about riding it, when the other one who also loved it did not.
I would just strongly and sweetly and kindly, wanting you to have a great time, urge you to get over that. It's still a family vacation if parents ride things separately. You can't really talk to each other on a ride anyway, so what's the fun? DH and I got to ride together on Space Mtn at
Disneyland when DS was either 1 or 2, and it seemed so much more thrilling in advance than it was. I'm not going to turn my head to look at someone while on a coaster, especially not a fellow grownup, so what difference did it make that we were on it together? Plus, you get different experiences, you might meet different people in line or while having fun with the kid, etc...that gives you new and varied things to discuss.
Maybe we could create a separate forum for FP+ complaints and keep this one for advice and ideas.
Though this one did bring up the idea and advice to *use Rider Switch*.
And I believe that they only started enforcing end times as a preparation for FP+.
Very obviously so.
I think the OP was pretty clear about the topic of the thread.
:
As for why it's worse specifically for families, I think a PP explained part of the family-specific issues rather well:
I still can't figure out how the OP thinks it or what the evidence is...
I can't imagine this is what Walt would have wanted for his parks...
Right. He just wanted your family's financial status to tell you what rides you could go on. E tickets cost more, and you got fewer of them in a booklet, than the other rides, after all.
However, it still stinks to have to ride alone on a family vacation.
Like with the other poster, try to get over that feeling. Your trip will open up so much more once you realize that it's OK to have different interests or different needs right now.
OP I agree it is harder for families now. We tried planning a WDW vacation but ended up switching to DL. We have a preschooler who isn't tall enough/ and wasn't sure on certain rides and teens who like thrill rides. Add on top of that 2 kids on the spectrum, they couldn't tell you what kind of day they're going to have sensory wise 60 days in advance
and it was too stressful. The reality is under the old system, we could and did get more than 3 FP so everyone could pick a ride that day based on what they want to do and how they were feeling. Now, we have to decide between which kids get to pick a ride and hope that they still feel that way when we get there and tell the other kids sorry your rides are SB which of course will be long lines.
Worse yet the inflexibility makes it harder for kids that are different as one day my DS might be wanting thrill rides and another day calmer rides based on his sensory needs. How in the world could anyone predict those days 60 days in advance.
As for advice, DL was great and has the old paper FP system.
Wouldn't the
DAS help you greatly with this?
We were just at DL. You aren't hearing me say this. Officially I'm anti-FP+. But FP legacy was HORRIBLE. Especially at a high-crowd time like 1.5 weeks ago. We couldn't get up in time for rope drop and the return times were so late. So we wandered. A LOT. Because we couldn't handle a long line, not with those crowds and those horrendous line-cutters that I've never seen so many of in my life. So we wandered. While waiting the time out until we could get another FP. Legacy isn't the fabulous thing we all want to remember it as being. I particularly liked going for the FP on Space Mountain at around noon or 1 and seeing that it would be a return time after 9pm. That was awesome. Loved that. Ha ha ha ha.
I just really don't believe the average guest has any clue what a touring plan is.
Oh I disagree now. WDW tells us to plan. They have us make the MBs, do the FP+ arrangements, etc. They have the calendar-based interface that lets us put our plans in there and notes and such. They are doing a tremendous job at letting us know we have to plan.
I have a few friends who are first-timers to WDW, or first in a long time, and they weren't even told they needed to plan by me or other people, but they all planned and did it PERFECTLY.
You can definitely change a FP to a different attraction at any time, even if you missed your original FP window, and you can do it for some or all of your party. We do it all the time!
You're assuming there will be something to change it to, of course. I'm thinking you haven't gotten the message that there are no times left for that attraction, and no other attractions left for that time.
Ah, good times, good times....
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