@Nick6300 thank you for posting the Mousehacking link. I had never seen this before, and it was really helpful to read through. I'm so grateful for everyone's responses on this thread. It's great to get a variety of perspectives.
We have been to WDW many times, but never during spring break. Our trip this year falls at the end of March/beginning of April and I'm really trying to figure out the best approach to address spring break crowds. The Mousehackers link makes it sound like tons of awesome FPs are available after the first three FPs are used. Is this really the case? We are a family of 4, so I get that it's easier to snag FPs for smaller groups.
Am I correct in assuming it's easier to pick up 4th and 5th FPs for the more popular rides at MK because there are more rides, and maybe less likely to pick up headliner 4th and 5th FPs at the other parks?
End of March early April can definitely see some crowds, not as intense as Christmas/New Years, but more than most other times of the yr. We actually thought about a trip around Easter, as recently as a week or so ago, only because we’re getting some time off, but decided to go in Sept this yr. we love the flower garden fest, prefer it durung end of April, early May, away from Easter/spring break.. but that’s not when we were going to have time off. EP will be especially busy on Tue’s (EMH late) and wknds. And we’d prob avoid tue at EP and wed at MK. Park hopping from emh early parks around lunch to wherever park had emh the day before or perceived low crowd park.
While there are less crowded days where we obtain 10-15 FPs at MK, even then I don’t expect to obtain a Mine Train as a 4th, it does happen, as throwaways only, but generally we’re going for thunder if avail., since we may not been there yet, and settling for buzz or pooh for 4th/5th if we’re right there and can get right on and select another after we tap. But yes, with the volume of FP selections, MK is the park where we always aim for booking 9-11 or as early as possible. Typically with 7D, Pan, Space.
AK, our FPs are dictated by how early we were able to get FoP. But we also RD FoP, and being the first ones on, we’re first on Safari, Kali, Everest, and don’t really care about getting several 2nd tiers. FoP FP were all prebooked, and while we usually get random same day FoP, we don’t expect it.
we avoid EP am’s because of the tiering, unless we have a before park opens breakfast, like last Dec. we have tried burning 2nd tier FPs there and also booking one tier 1 and then two FPs at 2nd park after tapping. I don’t have as much experience aiming for 4th FP for something like TT, because I typically only want to do it once (RD), and have no issues with single rider. Same with FEA... I only want to go once as a checkmark. Soarin would typically still be avail for 4th, but because the wait times have come done there, more people aim for FEA (would generally be all prebooked), then TT, then Soarin. We’ve never really had issues using RD and the tier 1 FP to get to all 3 fine.
HS, however, pretty common to score RnR, ToT, TSM as your 4th and beyond. While I’ve picked up thrown away Slinky Dog same day, they’re all prebooked, and typically expecting to grab one of the other 3 popular rides. The weakness for us at HS is that we sometimes prioritize riding TSM 3-4x in a row in the am over grabbing more FPs. Still seeking my first 400,000.