Harry Potter Crowd Report Thread...

[nmartin]

I am not sure why anyone waits in the stand by line for FJ. It's not like you can interact with the other people on the ride. If you do single rider, you can talk to the people you're with until the first one gets on the ride. I don't know,90 minutes in stand by vs. 20 minutes in single rider

How does the single line work?

 

[TraceyL]

I am not sure why anyone waits in the stand by line for FJ. It's not like you can interact with the other people on the ride. If you do single rider, you can talk to the people you're with until the first one gets on the ride. I don't know,90 minutes in stand by vs. 20 minutes in single rider

Some of us have children and wouldn't want them to be left alone before/after riding

 

[A Mickeyfan]

I believe you miss most of the experience of being in Hogwarts if you go in the single rider line. You also won't be able to have your group photo if all rode single rider.

Seeing from posters tag line, they live in Orlando and chances are, they don't want a pic. I know I go often and don't purchase pic's at all. When you go on "vacation" that is a different story, but when you can go as often as you like, it isn't the same "memory".. if you get what I am trying to say. Don't get me wrong, we take pic's, just don't purchase them from being on a ride.

 

[A Mickeyfan]

I am not sure why anyone waits in the stand by line for FJ. It's not like you can interact with the other people on the ride. If you do single rider, you can talk to the people you're with until the first one gets on the ride. I don't know,90 minutes in stand by vs. 20 minutes in single rider

If a ride has a singles only line, we head for it. My kids are grown and I don't have to worry about them as much. I will say that once when Spidy broke down, my 17 DD was stuck inside of the ride for some time. I was just loading and all they did was have our car step out, my niece was 2 cars ahead so they had them walk off and over to the ramp area.. but my DD was all the way in there..

 

[torinsmom]

Yea when you're on the ride you can't even really see the person beside you. If they all went to single rider, then I would just go to standby.

True. I just can't wait 90 minutes for anything unless it involves money, LOL

I believe you miss most of the experience of being in Hogwarts if you go in the single rider line. You also won't be able to have your group photo if all rode single rider.

Didn't know they took a photo. Where do they do that? I thought I saw most of the castle, the big room with all the talking pictures etc. What else was there?

How does the single line work?

They fill in spots that the standby line doesn't use. If there are 4 seats in each vehicle and you have a party of three, they will fill in with a single rider. I can't remember if there were 3 or 4 seats in FJ, but the single rider line was moving fairly steadily.

Some of us have children and wouldn't want them to be left alone before/after riding

When DS was younger and when we took my 9 year old nephew, one adult went first, then the kids went, then a second adult. That way the kids were only "alone" on the actual ride. I know some are not comfortable with that, but we were.

Seeing from posters tag line, they live in Orlando and chances are, they don't want a pic. I know I go often and don't purchase pic's at all. When you go on "vacation" that is a different story, but when you can go as often as you like, it isn't the same "memory".. if you get what I am trying to say. Don't get me wrong, we take pic's, just don't purchase them from being on a ride.

Don't I WISH! I am from North Carolina and just survived a 12 hour trip yesterday(should have been 10, but there was major traffic and thunderstorms). We were on "vacation", but I don't think I have ever purchased a ride picture.

Marsha

 

[Orlando313]

Yea, I live about 30 mins from the park, and honestly, I didn't even know they took an on ride photo until after I got off the ride! If we had been riding with my parents, we would have waited in the standby, but it was just my sister and I and my parents were waiting on us so we were trying to get through a little quicker. We typically never use single rider though.

But yea, if it's a whole family, standby would be more fun.

 

[TraceyL]

When DS was younger and when we took my 9 year old nephew, one adult went first, then the kids went, then a second adult. That way the kids were only "alone" on the actual ride. I know some are not comfortable with that, but we were.


Marsha

Not so easy when there is only one adult .....

 

[torinsmom]

Not so easy when there is only one adult .....

Yep, I am a single mom, so been there, done that. I have gone first before with my DS. I figured he was safer with a CM right there and me waiting at the end of the ride. I have also teamed up with another single parent in line before to deal with it. Since DS was 12, I have just let him go first.

 

[scrapcreator]

Here is our off-site report from Thursday June 24th. We arrived in the parking structure around 7:45 am(King Kong 107), got into the park and were directed to the left (off site people) through the Marvel Comics area. By 8:07 am we were in line, right across from the pizza place in Jurassic Park. From our shady place in line, we could see the covered queue for FJ. Just before 8:30 am the line started moving and we were soon in! Straight to FJ, the standby line said 30 min - we were actually hurried through the castle. We were off the ride just after 9 am.

The longest wait was for the wand shop and butterbeer (about 45 min. each). By the time we finished lunch at Three Broomsticks at 12:30 pm, it was seriously wall-to-wall people. We left the area and came back in around 7:30 pm. when it was less crowded. However, FJ was down and the wait was 90 min.

My suggestion is go early, travel light, bring lots of $$ and patience for standing in long lines.

Jeanne

 

[IzzyB]

Didn't know they took a photo. Where do they do that? I thought I saw most of the castle, the big room with all the talking pictures etc. What else was there?

You always want to wait in the normal FJ line once, after that do single rider. You missed a TON of stuff in the castle. There is Dumbledore's office, Defense against dark arts room, and a bunch of other stuff. The line is well worth the 90 minute wait, because a huge portion of it you are looking at all the cool stuff. I went in there when FJ was not even open because I was so excited to see all the stuff in there and it was well worth it.

So for all those going, please go in the normal line once and actually the wait times are normally not as long as posted for FJ and the line moves pretty quickly you won't even notice the time going by.

BTW, this is coming from someone who lives in Orlando and lives on single rider lines when going to the parks. So if I am saying go in standby once, then you should probably listen.

 

[Planogirl]

Here is our off-site report from Thursday June 24th. We arrived in the parking structure around 7:45 am(King Kong 107), got into the park and were directed to the left (off site people) through the Marvel Comics area. By 8:07 am we were in line, right across from the pizza place in Jurassic Park. From our shady place in line, we could see the covered queue for FJ. Just before 8:30 am the line started moving and we were soon in! Straight to FJ, the standby line said 30 min - we were actually hurried through the castle. We were off the ride just after 9 am.

The longest wait was for the wand shop and butterbeer (about 45 min. each). By the time we finished lunch at Three Broomsticks at 12:30 pm, it was seriously wall-to-wall people. We left the area and came back in around 7:30 pm. when it was less crowded. However, FJ was down and the wait was 90 min.

My suggestion is go early, travel light, bring lots of $$ and patience for standing in long lines.

Jeanne

This is my plan so far. Thanks for confirming it!

 

[Dicecatt]

First day onsite!

We checked out of Boardwalk this morning after an EMH at Magic Kingdom last night (ugh, crowds). Got to Royal Pacific to check in and were in IOA by 11:30. The crowds were thick by Harry Potter and I am not certain how long the line was, but it was long...we saw quite a lot of people waiting. We ate at Mythos with only a 10 minute wait. We rode several things with little to no waits with our FOTL room keys. It was HOT today. Then we left when our room was ready and since we were soaked to the bone after Dudley and Bilge Rat Barges we cleaned up, and then we took short naps.

We headed back to IOA around 5:30, and there was no wait for the land itself. It is very cool...very very cool, actually. Lines for Olivanders, Butterbeer and honeydukes were quite long, we never made it into a shop. We rode Hippogriff and Dragon Challenge with no wait. Forbidden Journey was 75 minutes, but single rider was 5-15 or so we were told, but then the ride went down. We left the line (I have very little line tolerance) and went back later, and waited in the single rider line, from start of line to end of ride it was 30 minutes, and that was around 7:30 PM. One woman that was supposed to ride in my vehicle wouldn't fit and had to leave after the bar wouldn't go down, I felt really bad for her, she waited all that time only to not ride.

The ride itself is awesome...but...I did feel motion sickness. The effects are quite amazing and impressive, though, and I am quite glad I did it.

Lines were still awful for the shops. Jill bought her daughter a wand at the cart outside of the castle, and we bought pumpkin juice at a cart, it was surprisingly good.

We will go in the morning this week to get into the shops, and to try butterbeer, because I refuse to wait for half an hour to buy a beverage. I will post about the morning experience for onsite guests when we do it.

Monday night we'll be doing another evening (we are at a conference and there is a sort of VIP night) so I'll post again and let you know what that looked like as well! But from what I saw, evening is the way to go with no wait to at least get in the land.

 

[MadeToLove]

My experience from this week:

We were on-site guests. Got to turnstiles at 6:30 every morning, were let into IOA at 7:00, made the mad dash to Lost Continent (power walking, as no running allowed). And lined up to get into WWoHP (line started at bridge from Seuss to Lost.

Every morning was different, some mornings we were led bit by bit toward WWoHP and let in at 8am, some days, led straight there as early as 7:20. It all depended on if they were ready or not.

If you take advantage of this early entry, I recommend this to beat the biggest crowds: Olivanders first. The line for Olivanders was 1 hour long within 30-45 minutes. FJ second, you can ride several times before the lines get longish. Single riders line is great for a second or thrid time round if you are adults or older kids.

Then shopping. Filches is easiest first thing in the morning, but a lot of the stuff in there can be found at the Universal stores at Port of Entry and City Walk if you miss it (Except the death eater, Voldemort, Azkaban stuff that looked so good in various videos). The other stores too are managable in the morning. They've set up several carts in the alleys on the way to FJ and behind the Owlry where you can get a lot of the stuff in Dervish and Banges. Even if there is a line to get into a store, it moves faster in the mornings.

Save Hippogriff and Dragons for last as they are still walk on till about noon.

You can start to line up for Three Broomsticks lunch early, and sit in the mostly shaded areas to do it.

If you are off site, get there early!!!! That's all I have to say, cause those lines by mid afternoon were all the way to Hulk each day I was there.

The other option is go after 8pm when things lighten up a bit. You still won't get anywhere near Olivanders at night (they closed the line at 9pm when I was there, and were still getting thru those guest at 11pm from what I heard from a TM)

 

[mariks714]

This may be a stupid question...but was there a long wait for the restrooms with Moaning Myrtle talking? Just wondering if there was a crowd/line just to go inside the Moaning Myrtle restrooms, because I'd like to hear her speaking in the loo!

 

[MadeToLove]

This may be a stupid question...but was there a long wait for the restrooms with Moaning Myrtle talking? Just wondering if there was a crowd/line just to go inside the Moaning Myrtle restrooms, because I'd like to hear her speaking in the loo!

I was there each morning, and never had a long line for the bathrooms at WWoHP. No idea about afternoon crowds and lines.

I will say that it's hard to hear Myrtle when it's crowded because of the noise of the hand dryers, but when it's practically empty, she's a riot.

 

[mom2monkiesx3]

I have a very quick status from my Sun-Thurs (20th-24th) trip. IF IT RAINS HEAD STRAIGHT FOR HP! We walked right into the place Sunday Evening during a light sprinkle. They had closed the rides due to lightening and as everyone left we wondered the shops. We happened to be standing right there when they opened FJ back up and was lead through the castle at a fast pace (would have enjoyed a slower pace) We did a child swap with my youngest and rode. My DD (8) hated the ride. We thought it was OK and enjoyed the theming of the world itself and the castle to be the "ride" not to miss about the entire Harry Potter experience. After we rode and word got out that they had reopened FJ got crazy and the wait times jumped to 120min QUICK...The line for olivanders never thinned out even in the rain, I assume this is because they kept running the show???!?? I don't know and I didn't ask. My kids enjoyed getting straight on Dragons over and over and over again with no wait...we rode Hippogriffs ride twice and then left that part of the park...(DD got the puppet owl and a stuffed hippogriff) The rest of the trip we were continually directed towards "lines" that wrapped all around IOA for "Harry Potter" and were able to laugh and say "NO WAY!"

We were VERY lucky but just in case you are turned away for rain and you don't actually melt when you get a little wet...stick around IOA it'll pay off!

BTW don't stand at the cart to get butterbeer...go inside the pub...maybe this was due to rain but we were served REALLY quickly when the outside cart was still a 30-45min wait. We actually did not enjoy the butterbeer enough to get more then the 2 keeper cups and one regular cup. I DID however enjoy the pumpkin juice and wish I would have picked up a few to bring home

We could have even eaten at the pub but decided to head to bubba gumps instead

I will say thanks to both Harry potter and our Express Pass access we were able to enjoy all the other rides in IOA and US in less than 10min waits....actually our longest wait was for the train in Dr. Suess land...go figure..?!?!?!

 

[muffyn]

My experience from this week:

We were on-site guests. Got to turnstiles at 6:30 every morning, were let into IOA at 7:00, made the mad dash to Lost Continent (power walking, as no running allowed). And lined up to get into WWoHP (line started at bridge from Seuss to Lost.)

(man what time did you have to wake up??)

question.. isn't regular park opening at 9 am? & isn't regular time they let in resort guests an hour earlier,, like 8 am?
but people line up at 6:30???? & they let people in at 7 am? soooooooo you then stand in line at bridge to be let into WWoHP at 8 am?
(so that is an extra hour to wit in line,, does it really save any time than waiting till 7:30 to enter park?)
when they let you in to wwohp, are ALL areas open? shops/food/ rides?

if you suggest purchasing items, for those that do NOT have a resort to send them back to ( we would be using our 2nd day on our key to go) are there lockers nearby to put items? ( what would be the largest size items to fit?)

oh,, & is there more than ONE line to enter wwohp?? someone else said their line was over by jurrasic park.

I am wondering what will happen in the fall when they drop hours, if it will get busier & harder to get in later on.

 

[MadeToLove]

(man what time did you have to wake up??)

question.. isn't regular park opening at 9 am? & isn't regular time they let in resort guests an hour earlier,, like 8 am?
but people line up at 6:30???? & they let people in at 7 am? soooooooo you then stand in line at bridge to be let into WWoHP at 8 am?
(so that is an extra hour to wit in line,, does it really save any time than waiting till 7:30 to enter park?)
when they let you in to wwohp, are ALL areas open? shops/food/ rides?

if you suggest purchasing items, for those that do NOT have a resort to send them back to ( we would be using our 2nd day on our key to go) are there lockers nearby to put items? ( what would be the largest size items to fit?)

oh,, & is there more than ONE line to enter wwohp?? someone else said their line was over by jurrasic park.

I am wondering what will happen in the fall when they drop hours, if it will get busier & harder to get in later on.

We got up at 6:00am and walked from RPR (didn't do breakfast, just granola bars and water). Boats don't leave till 7:00-7:30 by the way.

Yes, all areas of WWoHP were open whenever they let us in (they let Virgin package holders in about 30min-1hour ahead of us by the way)

It's worth going early if you want to avoid crowds and long lines in the park.

The only lockers are the ride lockers with limited free time on them. They aren't huge but deep and we could fit most things in there (not brooms or quaffles). But you can have your packages sent to the front of the park to a store near the exit to be picked up later in the day. Worked great for us.

The line by Jurassic Park is for guests without hotel passes, or those who waited until after 9:00am to get there. (Because once they let in the general public, it doesn't matter if you are onsite or not, only if you have breakfast ressies will they let you in after 9:00am

 

[Albytaps]

The line by Jurassic Park is for guests without hotel passes, or those who waited until after 9:00am to get there. (Because once they let in the general public, it doesn't matter if you are onsite or not, only if you have breakfast ressies will they let you in after 9:00am

That's good to know, thanks!

 

[mariks714]

I was there each morning, and never had a long line for the bathrooms at WWoHP. No idea about afternoon crowds and lines.

I will say that it's hard to hear Myrtle when it's crowded because of the noise of the hand dryers, but when it's practically empty, she's a riot.

Thanks so much for the info! I was wondering because Moaning Myrtle is one of my fave HP characters and I didn't want to miss out on that! Thank goodness the lines to use the loo aren't long!