Here Now & Just Back - A Place To Share Your Recent Experiences

[CinderellaDream]

Yeah, we wondered about that - didn’t think it was happening, and the CMs we talked to didn’t mention it. Hoping someone will come along and let us know if the Kiss Goodnight is indeed happening nowadays - we’ll be back at MK tomorrow night and might want to watch! Or make sure we leave before those large crowds do

The kiss goodnight did not happen when we were there on May 28. I was excited when I saw people waiting and thought our family might get to see it for the first time. We waited a long time and then finally asked a cast member who told us it was not happening.

 

[GeorgiaHoo]

Except we had FP+ pre-pandemic to eliminate those long waits. There is a "tipping point" coming where guest satisfaction will drop to a point where they need to open more shows, increase ride and dining capacity, reinstitute FP+, or all three. I'm hoping for all three.

I will not be happy to stand in ANY line that is 70 minutes. NEVER have I done that in my 11 years of WDW vacations. On average it is 10-25.

Dan

I'm with you on the lines. I'll just stay at the resort pool.

 

[Dicentras]

Anyone who has been to DAK lately, I'm curious what the line for Lion King looks like now - Is it still waits of over an hour like when it first reopened?

 

[NotTheBatesMotel]

Except we had FP+ pre-pandemic to eliminate those long waits. There is a "tipping point" coming where guest satisfaction will drop to a point where they need to open more shows, increase ride and dining capacity, reinstitute FP+, or all three. I'm hoping for all three.

I will not be happy to stand in ANY line that is 70 minutes. NEVER have I done that in my 11 years of WDW vacations. On average it is 10-25.

Dan

Oh, I'm in agreement. I’d never wait in a 70 minute line. My son isn’t able to handle much more than 15 or 20 minutes. More needs to reopen since they're increasing capacity.

 

[kylenne]

Yeah, we wondered about that - didn’t think it was happening, and the CMs we talked to didn’t mention it. Hoping someone will come along and let us know if the Kiss Goodnight is indeed happening nowadays - we’ll be back at MK tomorrow night and might want to watch! Or make sure we leave before those large crowds do

FWIW I was super late leaving MK on 5/30 because I had a late ADR at CRT, and they were not doing the Kiss Goodnight.

 

[clm10308]

Anyone who has been to DAK lately, I'm curious what the line for Lion King looks like now - Is it still waits of over an hour like when it first reopened?

Yesterday for the first show at 10:30, I noticed one person sitting alone near the entrance around 9:00. I came back about 9:30 and I was the third group in the pre-line roped off area. As I was waiting more groups gradually joined. About 9:45 we were allowed in the actual line. At about 10:00 seating inside the theater began. The theater did not fill up quickly. Groups were still being seated almost until 10:30. When the show let out, I saw that there were some people waiting in line for the next show, but the line did not appear full.

 

[robinb]

Except we had FP+ pre-pandemic to eliminate those long waits. There is a "tipping point" coming where guest satisfaction will drop to a point where they need to open more shows, increase ride and dining capacity, reinstitute FP+, or all three. I'm hoping for all three.

I will not be happy to stand in ANY line that is 70 minutes. NEVER have I done that in my 11 years of WDW vacations. On average it is 10-25.

Dan

FP+ only shorted your wait for a few rides and then rest had stand-by lines that were even longer because of FP+. I literally walked onto many rides last month that I would have had to wait for when FP+ was implemented because people missed out getting FP+ for the E-Ticket rides and ended up setting up FPs for 2nd and even 3rd tier rides.

 

[kylenne]

Except we had FP+ pre-pandemic to eliminate those long waits. There is a "tipping point" coming where guest satisfaction will drop to a point where they need to open more shows, increase ride and dining capacity, reinstitute FP+, or all three. I'm hoping for all three.

I will not be happy to stand in ANY line that is 70 minutes. NEVER have I done that in my 11 years of WDW vacations. On average it is 10-25.

Dan

Not to turn this into another FP+ debate but people who literally analyze wait times for a living (Len Testa, Josh from easywdw, etc) have shown over and over again that FP+ has a detrimental impact on standby waits. Like with math and everything. But even common sense bore that out, of course standby waits are going to be atrocious when every few minutes the standby line is halted to let a million people in the FP+ line through. FP+ worked only for people with FPs, and everyone else suffered--70 minutes is peanuts compared to what SDMT and FOP standby waits were looking like pre-closures, routinely hitting triple digits. Not to mention people staying offsite and local APs basically couldn't ride them unless they knew the advanced refresh tricks and got lucky with the drop times. I was queen of refresh and never waited more than 20 minutes for anything but that system was deeply flawed and totally unsustainable. Not to mention exhausting with the having to criss cross the parks back and forth, and feeling like I had my face stuck in my phone all day wasn't fun.

And not for nothing but I was in the parks for 7 days last week and I never waited more than 30 for an attraction. 30 only happened twice, most of my waits were in the 15-20 range, and I was not stood still the whole time in the hot sun. If you are waiting 70 minutes for anything in this current era of touring you either have horrendous luck with breakdowns or your touring strategy is flawed. Only FoTLK really requires that kind of time investment and that's due to the limited seating capacity and showtimes. Which will definitely improve with time.

Having actually experienced the parks without it now as an adult, I hope FP never comes back, but I know it will and when it does the same folk clamoring for its return right now will be hollering because it's going to be monetized like every other skip the line program at other theme parks. Then it will be all about how greedy Disney is. Tbh, everything will improve with time. They are bringing back the CP which will help with a lot of the staffing woes, and more and more reopenings are being announced. It will be fine. In the meantime this is a transitional period and folks who choose to go should bring their patient pants. But it is entirely possible to not wait in atrocious lines right now, I did it and so have many others. You just have to be smart and flexible about it.

 

[kylenne]

Yesterday for the first show at 10:30, I noticed one person sitting alone near the entrance around 9:00. I came back about 9:30 and I was the third group in the pre-line roped off area. As I was waiting more groups gradually joined. About 9:45 we were allowed in the actual line. At about 10:00 seating inside the theater began. The theater did not fill up quickly. Groups were still being seated almost until 10:30. When the show let out, I saw that there were some people waiting in line for the next show, but the line did not appear full.

Anecdotally I think the 10:30 show is probably the best one to catch. There are 2 more on the hour intervals after and then the next one isn't until 3:15 or so. I went to that one around 3ish and you definitely had to be queued up 60-70 minutes before hand. Probably because no opportunity in the early afternoon to see it, so more demand. My advice would be to try to catch one of those morning shows if you can.

 

[preemiemama]

Not to turn this into another FP+ debate but people who literally analyze wait times for a living (Len Testa, Josh from easywdw, etc) have shown over and over again that FP+ has a detrimental impact on standby waits. Like with math and everything. But even common sense bore that out, of course standby waits are going to be atrocious when every few minutes the standby line is halted to let a million people in the FP+ line through. FP+ worked only for people with FPs, and everyone else suffered--70 minutes is peanuts compared to what SDMT and FOP standby waits were looking like pre-closures, routinely hitting triple digits. Not to mention people staying offsite and local APs basically couldn't ride them unless they knew the advanced refresh tricks and got lucky with the drop times. I was queen of refresh and never waited more than 20 minutes for anything but that system was deeply flawed and totally unsustainable.

My best example of this is POC where pre-FP+ we could ride it 5-10 times in a row at park close as a walk on (our record was 25 times in one week) and after FP+ we always had a wait and couldn't get past 2-3 times in a row.

 

[wilkydelts]

The thing I have noticed most is the vast majority of people clamoring for FP+ to return have not even visited since it was shut off. It is all wild speculation with no first hand experience.

I know it wont but I hope it never comes back because it means you truly can not be in two places at once thus making stand-by efficient.

 

[kylenne]

The thing I have noticed most is the vast majority of people clamoring for FP+ to return have not even visited since it was shut off. It is all wild speculation with no first hand experience.

I know it wont but I hope it never comes back because it means you truly can not be in two places at once thus making stand-by efficient.

The only thing I was truly worried about going into this trip was how I would cope with no FP+, knowing how hard I relied on refreshing to walk onto rides. Until last week I had not been to the parks without FP+ as an adult. My family trips when I was a kid, sure, but we did not see the crowds in the 80s and early 90s that we saw in 2019, pre-closures. And those were the days of every Disney + Swan/Dolphin resort guest gets into every park an hour early and can stay an hour after closing, every day. So it was a lot different. I never "got" people who hated FP+, until I went down last week. I was very pleasantly surprised by how smooth everything went. No way on my 2019 trips could I have ridden Soarin 3 times in 1 day waiting less than an hour combined, or Frozen at all midday, like I did this time. No stress (just get there early for rope drop) or luck or criss crossing parks involved. Just paying attention to wait times and the ebb and flow of the crowds.

I honestly think for a lot of people who are accustomed to relying on FP+ it's hard to wrap their heads around the notion that it's actually "solving" a problem of its own creation. For me it was eye opening to experience the parks without it. Obviously capacity and crowds were low, I don't dispute that. When I go back with my gf in October I will be curious to see if these strategies still work then with the 50th madness. I have a feeling also that by then they will be introducing whatever new FP+ system. But for those of us who tend to go a few times a year, it's a very interesting time to be in the parks.

 

[LeeLee'sMom]

The only thing I was truly worried about going into this trip was how I would cope with no FP+, knowing how hard I relied on refreshing to walk onto rides. Until last week I had not been to the parks without FP+ as an adult. My family trips when I was a kid, sure, but we did not see the crowds in the 80s and early 90s that we saw in 2019, pre-closures. And those were the days of every Disney + Swan/Dolphin resort guest gets into every park an hour early and can stay an hour after closing, every day. So it was a lot different. I never "got" people who hated FP+, until I went down last week. I was very pleasantly surprised by how smooth everything went. No way on my 2019 trips could I have ridden Soarin 3 times in 1 day waiting less than an hour combined, or Frozen at all midday, like I did this time. No stress (just get there early for rope drop) or luck or criss crossing parks involved. Just paying attention to wait times and the ebb and flow of the crowds.

I honestly think for a lot of people who are accustomed to relying on FP+ it's hard to wrap their heads around the notion that it's actually "solving" a problem of its own creation. For me it was eye opening to experience the parks without it. Obviously capacity and crowds were low, I don't dispute that. When I go back with my gf in October I will be curious to see if these strategies still work then with the 50th madness. I have a feeling also that by then they will be introducing whatever new FP+ system. But for those of us who tend to go a few times a year, it's a very interesting time to be in the parks.

Totally agree with your views w/o FP. It makes the waits much more tolerable and less having to constantly be on your phone and the zig zagging across the park. Felt our last trip was so much more relaxed and easy going, plus with the lines constantly moving the waits do not seem that long at all.

 

[kylenne]

with the lines constantly moving the waits do not seem that long at all.

I agree with this, and I can't co-sign it enough. 20 minutes of stop & go due to being halted for FP+ every few minutes feels a lot different than 20 minutes of constant movement.

 

[blistex]

The only thing I was truly worried about going into this trip was how I would cope with no FP+, knowing how hard I relied on refreshing to walk onto rides. Until last week I had not been to the parks without FP+ as an adult. My family trips when I was a kid, sure, but we did not see the crowds in the 80s and early 90s that we saw in 2019, pre-closures.

Interesting, I have vivid memories as a kid in the early 90s waiting for over an hour in the hot hot Florida sun for Tower of Terror and Splash Mountain and Space Mountain and it is honestly one of the reasons I thought I hated WDW as an adult for a very long time until I went back and found out FP was a total game-changer. Watching along from home, I can see how removing it has been great during these lower capacity times, but I can't imagine touring without FP in heavy crowds. Even this week you can see the lines getting longer and longer if the wait times posted online and in Lines app are anything to go by; it would mean my family would not ride any of the headliners or bigger rides since young kids don't really have great patient pants and I'm not seeing those under 50 minutes at really any time of day.

BUT since I haven't experienced it I have really appreciated all the posts from you and others in this thread giving a better idea of what to expect and how to anticipate so I can avoid putting myself in an unpleasant-for-us situation!

 

[hereforthechurros]

The thing I have noticed most is the vast majority of people clamoring for FP+ to return have not even visited since it was shut off. It is all wild speculation with no first hand experience.

I know it wont but I hope it never comes back because it means you truly can not be in two places at once thus making stand-by efficient.

I've been five times since reopening and still welcome back FP. It's just how we prefer to tour. Disney obviously spent a lot of money/time to develop and implement FP because it was necessary as lines were insanely long for so long. Times have evolved so one could argue it doesn't work as it should anymore so I look forward to seeing what their new solution is as capacity grows. No FP only works right now because capacity is still low. That's changing by the day.

 

[kylenne]

Interesting, I have vivid memories as a kid in the early 90s waiting for over an hour in the hot hot Florida sun for Tower of Terror and Splash Mountain and Space Mountain and it is honestly one of the reasons I thought I hated WDW as an adult for a very long time until I went back and found out FP was a total game-changer. Watching along from home, I can see how removing it has been great during these lower capacity times, but I can't imagine touring without FP in heavy crowds. Even this week you can see the lines getting longer and longer if the wait times posted online and in Lines app are anything to go by; it would mean my family would not ride any of the headliners or bigger rides since young kids don't really have great patient pants and I'm not seeing those under 50 minutes at really any time of day.

BUT since I haven't experienced it I have really appreciated all the posts from you and others in this thread giving a better idea of what to expect and how to anticipate so I can avoid putting myself in an unpleasant-for-us situation!

My last childhood trip was just before Tower of Terror opened. We did not ever wait in lines like that because my mom wasn't having it, and even as a kid I was a crazy planner type that used to get the Birnbaum's guide every year with my allowance and mark it up with highlighter! Mom is retired military so thought nothing of rope drop and schedules. To this day it's why I prefer rope drop, midday resort break, go back at night touring. And that old school way of doing things is very good right now too!

 

[justreading]

Maybe we can move the fastpass debate to a different place?

 

[luv2cheer92]

FP+ only shorted your wait for a few rides and then rest had stand-by lines that were even longer because of FP+. I literally walked onto many rides last month that I would have had to wait for when FP+ was implemented because people missed out getting FP+ for the E-Ticket rides and ended up setting up FPs for 2nd and even 3rd tier rides.

I'm kind of indifferent on if I like not having FPs or not, but we never rode anything without one. We would just go right from one FP to the next, and were able to ride everything. Maybe the first ride or two in the morning would be stand by, but then FP after FP the rest of the day. So we never waited in those stand by lines.

 

[bdiddy]

FP+ only shorted your wait for a few rides and then rest had stand-by lines that were even longer because of FP+. I literally walked onto many rides last month that I would have had to wait for when FP+ was implemented because people missed out getting FP+ for the E-Ticket rides and ended up setting up FPs for 2nd and even 3rd tier rides.

These are my thoughts too. I’m actually excited to experience no FP. I keep going back to Peter Pan as an example.That was one we usually didn’t get a FP for and stand-by was always at least an hour, if not more. All the time. We always had a debate if we wanted to wait or not. And would sometimes try to get a FP once we used our other ones. But now when I check I have yet to see it over 30 min.