How necessary is park hopping?

[off to neverland]

Help me out, please!

My brohter and sister in law will be with us for four days for our trip in May. We're looking at buying their tickets now, and the parkhoppiing feature will be an extra $30 a ticket.

When we've gone before, we usually do spend our mornings and evenings in different parks, but that's not to say I can't plan so that we are only in one park. My concern is that MGM and Animal Kingdom might be short days, and we might be disappointed to not be able to go to another park those days. Or not. Maybe we'll need the break.

We're staying at Beach Club, and I wonder how much we'll want to just walk into International Gateway for a snack or bite to eat at World Showcase.

Please give me some advice as to whether you think we would do okay with on park a day for four days, or would we regret not having Parkhoppers to pop into Epcot if we wanted.....

 

[RC Fan]

I personally would go with the Hopper for the sake of flexibility. If you get to a park and find it is too crowded, you can always leave and go to another park.

 

[NeedaVacation03]

I love having the option of knowing I can go to any park at any time during the day. Call me spoiled, but I just like the freedom that it offers.
Good Luck deciding.

Crystal

 

[justlikeeyore]

I believe you can always add this feature on later if you decide you want it

 

[missminniemouse]

We've always had annual passes and love that we have the ability to park hop as much as we want. We almost always spend part of the day in one park and end up in a different park. That being said, we've also been there quite a few times before and don't feel we need to "do it all and see it all" on any given day. We like the luxury of taking breaks between and mixing things up a bit.

 

[house_of_princesses]

For all the times I've been to WDW, I can't remember ever park hopping and I have AP's w/ all the hopper flexibility one needs. If you want a bite to eat, head to DTD. And as one poster said, you can most likely add that feature on later if you need to.

Have fun!

 

[amwhitaker]

Animal Kingdom closes early so we have always gone to one of the other parks afterwards. I agree that if one park is too crowded you can leave and go to another park.

 

[beattyfamily]

I personally cannot not live without it and will always make sure it's in my budget with the new MYW tickets. I just continue to buy my tickets as if they were not changed, except I don't do pluses.

 

[baggypants]

We don't hop much because of the time you have to spend going from one park to the other. I'm very curious, however, how do people know if one park is "too crowded" that another park is not going to be just as crowded, or more so, than the one they are leaving? I can't decide whether to get it this time either. We might want to split up the last day, but who knows?

 

[Disney Ella]

Since you are only going to be there for four days, I'd get a park hopper to get the most out of the trip. Now if it was a longer trip and you weren't rushing to see everything, I think the non park hoppers would be fine.

 

[missminniemouse]

Because we stay on Disney property when we go, we will take advantage of early entry a couple days and then leave that park since whichever park is open early always seems to be the busiest. We stay until 12 or 1pm and then head to a different park for the remainder of the day. It's always worked out pretty well for us.

 

[Debi]

I agree with everyone else so far; it's worth the extra money to purchase the hopper feature. The flexibility is definately worth it.

Have a magical vacation!

 

[polysisterchick]

I love having the option of knowing I can go to any park at any time during the day. Call me spoiled, but I just like the freedom that it offers.

Here here!

 

[sbdw]

We've always enjoyed going to one park in the morning, pooling it in the afternoon and then going to a different park for dinner. The flexibility is a great option to have.

 

[iwish81792]

We're going down in October for only (gasp) 4 days! And being the thrill seekers we are, we have decided to go to Universal and IoA. *sigh* I love love LOVE Disney (since the day I was born!!) but we neeeeed adrenaline rushes. We're strange like that. So that only leaves two days for Disney parks. Sad, I know. So the PH is needed! We're gonna hit MK. MGM, and EPCOT. MK and MGM are our main priorites, but we're gonna try to squeeze EPCOT in there somewhere....So I say, YES! Park hop! It may save you life......or at least your Disney experience,

 

[foxfire]

It's difficult for me to say what someone else should do but we always get hoppers. It's just nice having the flexibility to go to different parks on the same day whether it's a spur of the moment thing or something we've planned to do anyway. We could manage to get by without having hopper tickets but I don't really want to and can't imagine that we ever will.

 

[juliesue]

We don't hop much because of the time you have to spend going from one park to the other. I'm very curious, however, how do people know if one park is "too crowded" that another park is not going to be just as crowded, or more so, than the one they are leaving? I can't decide whether to get it this time either. We might want to split up the last day, but who knows?

There have been many times when we have "changed" parks because the one we are in is too crowded. Most of the time it is MK that is just crazy busy. When you can't even walk 2x2, it is just toooo crowded! Many times this is MK on Saturday.

We usually try Epcot or MGM on those days, and lo and behold, they are not that crowded. We will go back to MK on a weekday and the crowds are much more bearable.

 

[Parkhopper]

We ALWAYS get the Parkhopper option (see user name - LOL!)

Suzi

 

[TPCShauna]

We would NEVER, I repeat, NEVER go to a Disney park without Park Hopper tickets if that option is available.

DH gets bored easily so we like the flexibility of going wherever we want. Of course, it's just the two of us so it's easy for us to go when and where we want to with little to no hassle.

We live in CA so we go to DL. You have to park hop there or you will be insanely bored. There is also the thing that I have to visit Snow White's Wishing Well (Cinderella's at MK) first and last even if I'm not in that park the majority of the day. You must have PH for that.

Good luck with your trip!

 

[DISNEYFAN2828]

I stayed in the Boardwalk Villas and loved that I could walk to Epcot at night...you will love the "hopping" in that sense...

Have a great time!!