How "good" is an 8:45am Crystal Palace with a 9am park opening?

[Childs1stTime2Disney]

I just got an 845 Crystal Palace with a 9am park opening. Is that good, in regards to getting down Main St before crowds come in? Or is that a bad time regarding getting a jump on crowds for rides and attractions, etc? I hope I am expressing my thoughts clearly enough!!

My DD doesnt LOVE Winnie the Pooh, but I hear so much about how nice it is to be at the Crystal Palace and before park opening. So how good is it in regards to this with an 845 ressie?

 

[gabzee]

I just got an 845 Crystal Palace with a 9am park opening. Is that good, in regards to getting down Main St before crowds come in? Or is that a bad time regarding getting a jump on crowds for rides and attractions, etc? I hope I am expressing my thoughts clearly enough!!

My DD doesnt LOVE Winnie the Pooh, but I hear so much about how nice it is to be at the Crystal Palace and before park opening. So how good is it in regards to this with an 845 ressie?

If the park doesn't open until 9am and there are no EMH that morning than there wouldn't be crowds inside the park yet. Since your ADR is before park opening they would let you in early. If you had an 8am ADR sometimes you will make rope drop and other times you won't. If you wanted to be able to grab a fastpass before breakfast you could always try to make an ADR for 9:20ish. However, even if you changed the time of your ADR you would still be spending basically the same time there.

 

[Childs1stTime2Disney]

If you had an 8am ADR sometimes you will make rope drop and other times you won't. If you wanted to be able to grab a fastpass before breakfast you could always try to make an ADR for 9:20ish. However, even if you changed the time of your ADR you would still be spending basically the same time there.

I am totally confused by this, I am so sorry! If my ressie is 845, once we are done with breakfast, wont the park be open? Can't my DH run at 9am to get a fastpass while we eat?

I am just confused why you would say if you had an 8am adr that you might sometimes make rope drop? Please forgive me for not understanding!!

 

[gabzee]

I am totally confused by this, I am so sorry! If my ressie is 845, once we are done with breakfast, wont the park be open? Can't my DH run at 9am to get a fastpass while we eat?

I am just confused why you would say if you had an 8am adr that you might sometimes make rope drop? Please forgive me for not understanding!!

No worries! With an ADR at 8:45, the park will be open when you are done with breakfast. I assumed that you would want to eat together without anyone running to get fastpasses during the meal. If it is your DDs first character meal (i don't know if it is or isnt) I wouldnt want to miss that to get a fastpass. Your DH could go get fastpasses but for us personally it wouldn't be worth it. We would rather sit down, relax, and a nice meal together and then go have fun at the park but that is just our preference.

You will not always be done with your meal in 1 hour or they may not seat you right at your ADR time. Also, you may have to wait longer for the characters to get to your table. Therefore, even with an 8am ADR you are not guaranteed to get out of CP by 9am in order to make rope drop.

I'm sorry if I wasn't clear. If you still have questions let me know!

 

[catne]

If your intention is to get ahead of the crowds, an 8:45 reservation is no good at all. First, you may or may not get seated on time, but even if you are seated right at 8:45, it will take at least 45-60 minutes to eat & visit with all the characters. So the earliest you will get out of the restaurant would be 9:30-9:45...but possibly as late as 10:00 AM.

By the time you get done eating & get to the rides, at 10:00 AM there will be lines at all of Fantasyland, as well as at the "Mountains".

Your husband maybe could leave & go get a set of Fastpasses, but he would miss most of the meal time doing that.

If you really want the advantage of being inside the park & having breakfast early, try for one of the 8:05 or 8:10 reservations...at those seatings, you can eat & see all the characters quickly, because they do not fill all of the tables right away, so the characters get around the restaurant very quickly. We've been there when the characters made it around twice to all tables by 8:45 (they never fill all the tables at once, because that would swamp the waitstaff and the kitchen...they could not fill all the drink orders and keep the food refilled if the entire restaurant was ordering/getting buffet food all at once. So they stagger the seating, filling additional tables with each seating time.) So those earliest seatings they won't even have 1/4 of the restaurant filled. You can eat & be out before 9:00 to position yourselves at the rope within the park (they have ropes across the hub paths to Adventureland/Frontierland and also over at the path to Tomorrowland. You can walk through the castle, but there's a rope at the entrance to Fantasyland too. They don't actually let you roam around the park before 9:00, but you do get at the head of the pack when the ropes do drop if you're done eating by 8:50 or 8:55.

If you're looking for a Winnie the Pooh meal, why not schedule lunch at Crystal Palace...get to rope drop, watch the rope drop show outside the main entrance then get to Fantasyland to do all the favorites before the crowds back up those rides. A leisurely lunch after you've done all the fun stuff will be a welcome break in the day.

 

[OllieDannyandMe]

It doesn't sound like this 8:45 a.m. ADR time will give you the advantage you are hoping.

Breakfast takes about an hour, unless you intentionally rush. I have had an 8:10 ADR and not made rope drop, but most of the time I do. The one time that I did not make rope drop, it took them a while to seat me. And then, it took us a while to eat (and wait for all the characters) and pay our bill.

Obviously, with an 8:45 a.m. ADR, you will not make rope drop. If it is a busy season, the advantage of getting into the park early will be lost. If it is not a busy season, then it doesn't really matter. The breakfast is lovely.

At 8:45 a.m., you will still have the advantage of a beautiful walk down mainstreet with very few people. It is a nice photo opportunity.

I personally would not send my husband to go grab fast passes for everyone. It would be a hike to do it, and he would miss all of the joy of relaxing at breakfast. Plus, the characters are fun. Even if you child is not a Pooh fan, it is fun to see them.

 

[Childs1stTime2Disney]

Thank you all. I understand entirely now. I did not realize they also had ropes inside the park! It is our first time, first character meal (well, CRT is the day before). And it is not supposed to be busy season...so I am not sure how things will go. It WILL be the start of our 2nd full day at MK (well, actually we will be in MK a day and a night before this Crystal palace ressie day. So I may see before this ressie if we have done alot or too little, and can always cancel the ressie if it just seems we need the time more than the reservation to eat.

I understand now and will keep trying for an 810 or so.

 

[TiggerTrigger]

While I am a big fan of that first seating of the day at CP and love getting in the park just before 8a to have the place fairly empty...if you can't get one of the earliest adr slots, you might try for a late breakfast. i.e. try for a 10:30a so you can get in touring time in the park when crowds are at their lowest and then break for a late breakfast.

 

[brockash]

In my opinion an 8:45 CP reservation is only good, if the only thing you care about is getting pics on Main Street with less ppl.

Honestly, there's no way we'd take an 8:45 CP reservation. I would feel like we were wasting soooo much of the slow time. We always do CP for breakfast, but always an 8:05 reservation. I really don't think we'd take anything after 8:15.

If you can't find an earlier time, I'd probably try to do a late breakfast instead or really a lunch there. This way you can still do the rides during the slow time of the day.

 

[bumbershoot]

I am just confused why you would say if you had an 8am adr that you might sometimes make rope drop? Please forgive me for not understanding!!

Because you'll be inside the restaurant, eating, while rope drop happens and everyone rushes into the park. By the time you are done eating and meeting characters and enjoying yourself inside, it will be as though you got to the park around 10, which might be better than getting there at 11, it won't make any difference to know you were there before the park opened.


We did this accidentally. Made a reservation for well before park opening, and then they started changing hours around us during our trip. MK was the first day it impacted us; got there nice and early, only to find out the park was opening an hour earlier. So our "early" ADR meant absolutely nothing, and we lost any advantage.


I'd do the 10:30 thing if you can; get in, ride some rides, have some fun...then break for a later breakfast.

 

[Mickeygolf]

What is the earliest you can enter the MK with an early ADR? We have an 8:25 CP reservation and I'm wondering how early I can actually enter the park. It's been a long time since I've done a breakfast reservation.

Thanks.