Hagrid's Coaster Queue Updates / Questions / Reviews

[gerryrobinson]

Did rope drop this morning and boy did we luck out. On the bus at 7:07. First at our turnstile at 7:26. They start by scanning the first family around 830. Then the dash to Seuss landing. Wasn't as bad as I expected but must walk fast if you don't want to get passed by a hundred people. Then the walk to the que. You still must walk quickly but it's more orderly. In the que just after 9 and off the ride at 9:17. Great ride. Best at Universal by far. The theming doesn't rival Disney in my opinion but the ride is smooth. Adults rode sidecar and kids rode bike. We'll try to ride again to experience other seat.

 

[osufeth24]

Single rider line not open at the moment

 

[andrniki]

My DH and DS just did Hagrid's. It's Thursday. The posted wait all day was 180 minutes. They went at 1:19 and finished the ride at 2:10! He said it was about a 45 minute wait. No delays, no weather issues. His comment "Best ride in the world!"

BTW the wait time now says 120 minutes.

 

[Lynne G]

Some one knew where the camera was:

 

[acarsme123]

So any tips/strategies for being able to get on Hagrid's in March for a spring break trip? We will be staying on-site, and I understand on-site guests get early access to Wizarding World.....but I also heard Hagrids doesn't open at park opening at this time. Does anyone anticipate this might change by then? Are they still having a lot of reliability issues with this ride?

 

[macraven]

I’m sure the ride will be operating smoothly 7 months from now for when you will be there

 

[TommyJK]

So any tips/strategies for being able to get on Hagrid's in March for a spring break trip? We will be staying on-site, and I understand on-site guests get early access to Wizarding World.....but I also heard Hagrids doesn't open at park opening at this time. Does anyone anticipate this might change by then? Are they still having a lot of reliability issues with this ride?

I'm going down at the same time.

Aside from what Mac has said, we also don't know this far our if IOA might have early entry next March (it does get it sometimes, it just hasn't had early entry in a while). Also we don't know by then if they might add EP for the ride (keeping fingers crossed).

So no sense in trying to plan a strategy for it now that far out.

 

[Lynne G]

Since the ride is so new, still, I doubt they will have early entry to Islands. And the castle ride was not given EP until I'd say 3 or 4 years later. There was also talk about making the ride some day, be a virtual pass, that you book via the app, like Fallon ride, and the Fast and Furious ride. Apart from weather stops, seems the stops for not working right, were less the causes for stopping while we were there last week. So, hoping 6 months later, any other kinks won't stop the ride.

We counted about 16 people for each train, with 2 trains sent out at a time. So, part of it is also, a slow loader.

 

[TommyJK]

Since the ride is so new, still, I doubt they will have early entry to Islands. And the castle ride was not given EP until I'd say 3 or 4 years later. There was also talk about making the ride some day, be a virtual pass, that you book via the app, like Fallon ride, and the Fast and Furious ride. Apart from weather stops, seems the stops for not working right, were less the causes for stopping while we were there last week. So, hoping 6 months later, any other kinks won't stop the ride.

Islands has had early entry many times in the past (even earlier this year). They stopped doing it more recently with the opening of Hagrids. I'm sure once the ride settles down a bit, they will eventually bring back early entry to Islands and alternate back and forth each month with USF like they have done before.

As for virtual line. That idea is dead. They were only considering it when the ride first opened as a way to cope with when the line went outside of the actual queue into Hogsmead so it wouldn't get over crowded. It never got to that point so they scrapped those plans.

As for EP, Yes Forbidden Journey took many years for EP, Gringotts in USF less so, and more recent big rides (like Kong) only took several months to open up EP. So while it is unknown when Hagrid's will get EP, most insiders are speculating it will happen more so after ride operations smooth out (and it's running all day consistently without any breakdowns) rather than years like the previous Potter rides. We'll just need to wait and see.

 

[Disxuni]

I want to say despite being a very popular ride right now, it seems that when things go according to plan, the wait time is traditionally less, or a little more than less than the predicted wait time (posted wait time is to compensate if there is a delay). Which I think it is interesting.

For example, a lot of people who reported to have waited 45 minutes, or even an hour, is a lot better than what I expected period, considering what I remember wait times were like when the other original Harry Potter rides first opened. Not only the 120 -180 minutes waits seemed to be the average for a long time, but they were genuinely that long (at least from my experience).

Of course, it was a whole new land, but I still think that considering how incredibly popular the ride is now, it's actually not that long of a wait in comparison. Once again, when things go according to plan.

 

[disneywithfive]

Must be a walk-on. Have not seen this short of a wait time yet.

 

[Disxuni]

Interesting... I wonder if they just opened, however that usually doesn't stop from it being longer than that. There is a little bit of "green" on the radar (barely) in Orlando.

 

[jnjusoioa]

Will be at the parks the week of November 18th, probably doing Universal/IOA on the 20th, not staying onsite, so was curious as to what people's recommendations are for being able to ride? I don't mind getting there early or anything but just can't afford to stay on site. So awesome to see the added the picture to this ride!!! Thank you in advance for any help.

 

[osufeth24]

Will be at the parks the week of November 18th, probably doing Universal/IOA on the 20th, not staying onsite, so was curious as to what people's recommendations are for being able to ride? I don't mind getting there early or anything but just can't afford to stay on site. So awesome to see the added the picture to this ride!!! Thank you in advance for any help.

Obviously always weather pending, but it seems the best route to go is around 12. Lines seem to be lower then. I had a 90 minute wait the first time when I got there around 1145. I went yesterday around 1030 and it was 2 hrs. By the time we were done though, the line was A LOT shorter than when we jumped in

 

[AuroraluvsPhillip]

So I decided yesterday to try an experiment. I have been following this thread since the beginning when the ride opened. I am going to be at Universal for a week in September. I have dedicated a page in my bullet journal to documenting the wait times for this ride every 1-2 hours every day to see if any patterns emerge. I am using both the official wait time on the Uni app, as well as the waits documented in the Touring Plans "Lines" app, which I have a paid subscription for. TP will state the posted wait times as well as "actual" or "expected" wait times. I also am trying to note if downtimes may be due to weather, based on either the Uni app or my own weather app's radar.
Today it appeared that dinner time was a good time to get in line. I imagine a lot of people leave the parks at that time. My family and I are not rope drop people, so I am particularly interested in looking for comparatively "slower" times during the day.
It's going to be interesting in Sept when the parks close earlier. I notice that IOA changed their closing time from 8 to 8:30pm on 9/21 and 9/22, Sat and Sun. Admittedly HHN will force many folks out of US and over to the other park, but I wonder if they expect larger crowds at IOA because of this ride as well.

 

[andrniki]

Interesting... I wonder if they just opened, however that usually doesn't stop from it being longer than that. There is a little bit of "green" on the radar (barely) in Orlando.

Yes, it had just stopped raining at at time.

 

[butterscotchcollins]

I’m so curious what crowds are going to look like next weekend during the opening of SWGE. Our Universal day is 8/30 so hoping some curious locals skip Hagrid in favor of Han >.>

 

[greg9x]

Couple data points... We rode the other day, when got there was in delay and not letting anyone in with posted 120 minute wait.... After about 10 minutes they opened and we went in, waited probably just over an hour.

Today we did single rider, again with posted 120 minute wait.. were on ride in about 20 minutes.

Guess single rider is not always available, but if it is, that's the way to go.

 

[andrniki]

Today my family wasn't going to attempt Hagrids because it was Saturday. But the posted wait was 90 minutes at around 2pm so they couldn't pass it up. They got off the ride 40 minutes later! No delays.

Have they figured out the kinks to Hagrids?

 

[gerryrobinson]

Been here since Wednesday. Rode twice. Once at rope drop (see post above) and once at 610pm with a posted wait time of 105 mins (lowest I have seen but others have seen 90 mins). Was off at 710 so 60 mins total. Looks like they are getting things figured out finally. Fingers crossed anyway for those coming in the future.