Is anyone else a little irritated that Park Hopper is needed to see all the HP stuff

[agavegirl1]

Last trip to Orlando in 2010 was 6 days at the Motherland with 4 at the Darkside. This trip is 9 days at the Motherland (with a day trip to Busch Gardens), 2 days at Sea World (partner hotel) and 4 nights (5 days) at the Darkside. I'm using Orlando Flex Pass Plus so if WDW gets boring or I actually accomplish more than I anticipate there, I can buzz over to Sea World or US/IOA for extra park time.

My reason for adding time to WDW this time was the reported crowd levels for October. I fear I will get less done in a day. Also I will do a car rental for 48 hours in order to visit Busch Gardens and a maybe a few local attractions if I do get the same amount done in the usual 6 days.

I expect my trips will be closer to 5 days Motherland and 8 or 9 days elsewhere since there is nothing new to consider at Disney.

I don't do Disney only trips anymore. Not since my US/IOA only trip in 2004 (yes, before Potter) so for me the need for hoppers for HE is irrelevant. I can see how those for whom US/IOA was a one day Potter fix would feel this is an imposition. But, it is genius on the part of Comcast to get more of the Disney dollar while providing a serious value for that dollar.

 

[huey duey & luey]

Our vacation style is basically the same, but we like to leave feeling like we enjoyed everything a few times over. At UO we stay onsite for 6-10 days. We like to wander back and forth from enjoying the resort, the parks, and Citywalk multiple times in one day. Like you we don't spend 12 hours in the park in one day, but we might go to IOA for 3 hours in the morning and then go to UF for 2 hours at night. We don't really plan it out, we just do what we feel like.

I guess we don't view UO as a quick one or two day stop. We view it as a vacation destination. Not quite to the extent of WDW, but I wouldn't feel like I enjoyed it if we didnt spend at least 4 days there.

we have 5 full days and are staying at the HRH, our plan is to get the 3 park unlimited ticket. Hoping even with the opening of Diagon Alley we are able to see everything and still enjoy some downtime

 

[mrsbicewdw]

They did take down the carnival games and fill that area with trees to make it look like part of the Forbidden Forest. It would be awfully weird to have Diagon Alley right beside Hogsmeade but the forbidden forest and the station fit quite well.

I agree. I couldn't go see the new little forest area last time I was there as they had it blocked off. But I did notice it was gone (the games). Fingers crossed for a forbidden forest ride one day...

 

[Rip]

It doesn't irritate me so to speak, but I do feel they did it specifically with monetary gain in mind. I worked there in WWoHP when it first opened and the talk then was to tear down all of the surrounding area where there is basically nothing but a crappy restaurant and carnival games and convert it to more HP. But doing it in US generates more profit b/c you have to park hop to see it in one day and/or ride the train. And as a rabid HP fandom member I would pay double what they charge anyway. And they know that. Lol.

But I never parkhop at Disney. I like to spend a full day in each park. I have parkhopped at universal several times though because you can see both parks in one day and do almost every attraction. Universal is a place I go to ride rides and just rush through (other than HP of course) but Disney is an experience for me.

It serves 2 purposes: 1 - increased revenue, particularly since they were going to shut down Jaws anyway and they had to replace it with something, and 2 - evening out the crowds. Can you even imagine how much like a can of sardines IOA would be if everything HP was located there?

 

[trinaaron]

I applaud Universal for the interesting looking new HP areas. We will do a day there to see these later this year. It does sort of irritate me, though, that to do all the HP stuff, instead of just spending $96 for the day, I'll be spending somewhere around $135 for the one day park hopper. Am I the only one or is anyone else irritated by this?

Actually, it's a brilliant marketing move on their part because there are probably lots of people like me who just want to do one day and even if they are a little irritated to have to pay extra to see all the HP stuff, like me they will probably do it, giving Universal in a sense a 40% premium for many one day visitors. It will I think get them to see a return on their investment pretty quickly, and I realize it's certainly their prerogative to do this.

I don't mind that DA is in a different park at all. But the Hogwarts Express situation does seem a little shady to me. If I buy a ticket for Islands of Adventure, it should mean that I have the ability to experience all that Islands of Adventure has to offer. Same with Universal Studios. If it was simply billed as transportation then no harm no foul. But it is being touted as a major attraction and they are telling us that a certain subset of visitors will not be able to ride it because they didn't pay enough money. That seems kind of icky.

And wasn't the original idea that everyone could ride it, but you needed the park hopper to leave the station?

 

[damo]

I don't mind that DA is in a different park at all. But the Hogwarts Express situation does seem a little shady to me. If I buy a ticket for Islands of Adventure, it should mean that I have the ability to experience all that Islands of Adventure has to offer. Same with Universal Studios. If it was simply billed as transportation then no harm no foul. But it is being touted as a major attraction and they are telling us that a certain subset of visitors will not be able to ride it because they didn't pay enough money. That seems kind of icky.

And wasn't the original idea that everyone could ride it, but you needed the park hopper to leave the station?

Anything that we heard would have been speculation. I do think that if the capacity was higher, they would have been able to come up with a return ride type of scenario. But as it stands, it will be tough to accommodate enough people now.

 

[patster734]

Anything that we heard would have been speculation. I do think that if the capacity was higher, they would have been able to come up with a return ride type of scenario. But as it stands, it will be tough to accommodate enough people now.

Yea, that sounds like a nightmare scenario for single park ticket holders: Wait a couple hours (at least) to board the train to the other park, and then be forced to wait a couple more hours (probably more) to get on the train back.

I'd rather have the multi-park ticket so that when I disembark from HE, I'm not forced to wait a few more hours to get the ride back to my initial boarding spot.

 

[Minnie]

Yep this is irritating - nothing we can do about it though but decide if we are going to skip the attraction or spend they extra 40 per person for this ride.

 

[TaylorsDad]

When we don't get an Annual Pass, we always get park hoppers, which is kinda odd since I don't think we ever did more than one park a day even when staying an entire week unless to go to a shop to pick up something we forgot to buy. We just like to take our time to experience each one, although I agree they are so close its easy to just walk from one to the other. I get where this could upset those that just wanted to stop by visit Diagon Alley and leave. Although I cannot see wanting to just experience one attraction in one park unless visiting the other one the next day. It would feel to me like going to magic kingdom paying the high ticket price just to ride haunted mansion and then leaving.

 

[beaprn]

I am NOT happy that you are forced to buy a 2 park pass for 1 ride.

If you do the math and buy a 1 day pass for both parks is $144.84 on the Universal Orlando website. The one day 1 park pass is $102.24 so the cost of the Hogwarts train ride is $42.60. That is rather steep.

No one is forcing anyone to buy a two park passes but if you want to see both areas of Harry Potter you will need to. Or add a little more and get a two day/two park tickets that still works out to less than WDW and they do run the buy two day get 1day a lot. An attraction like this (spanning two parks) is a new concept that has never been done. Even if they allowed a special ticket just to ride the train it would probably end up costing about the same. You cannot visit two WDW parks without a park hopper so think of it like that.

 

[cgattis]

If you want to see all the Nemo stuff at Disney, you have to buy a hopper or both a ticket to Epcot and Animal Kingdom.....

And as far as having to ride the train both ways to experience it all, you have to ride Star Tours many times to see all the scenes.

We rarely ever use our hoppers at either parks, but we always suck up the cost (painful as it is) and get them "just in case."

 

[TaylorsDad]

If you want to see all the Nemo stuff at Disney, you have to buy a hopper or both a ticket to Epcot and Animal Kingdom.....

And as far as having to ride the train both ways to experience it all, you have to ride Star Tours many times to see all the scenes.

We rarely ever use our hoppers at either parks, but we always suck up the cost (painful as it is) and get them "just in case."

That is what we discovered at Disney as well. All those years of buying park hoppers and only actually hopping once or twice. Last WDW trip we did not get them and never missed them at all. We still get either the Annual Pass or park to park at Universal though, despite rarely using them. Everything is so close within walking distance that unlike WDW you don't feel like you are wasting so much precious time traveling back and forth from one park to another.

 

[Minnie]

If you want to see all the Nemo stuff at Disney, you have to buy a hopper or both a ticket to Epcot and Animal Kingdom....

I do not understand this argument. If you want to see all the Nemo stuff at Disney you can purchase two 1 day park tickets and do each of these on different days. Same thing as the two sections of HP at Universal and IOA with one major difference in order to ride one attraction you must purchase a P2P ticket. It is what it is and we'll all have to make that decision individually but comparing this to Disney just does not make sense as this is a first of it's kind attraction.

 

[NotUrsula]

While we are venting, it stinks that the Power Pass blackout for US has been extended from June 14th to August 14th; essentially the entire summer if you are dealing with children in school. At the very least it would be helpful to sell the daily exception, the way that it is done at the California park. There, if you want to go on a blackout day you can pay $45 for that one day and go anyway.

FWIW, if you are not a Florida resident, the Preferred AP that will allow you to visit both parks while school is out is $295 pp, about $35 more than it is for Florida residents. The renewal for OOS passholders is $20 cheaper than a new pass, but very few of us renew, because it starts counting from the previous expiration date, not the date of first use. Unless you are just over the Georgia or Alabama border, it normally is worth more than $20 to buy a completely new pass so that the clock won't start ticking again until it is used.

Right now our inclination is NOT to renew the passes this fall. We will probably not visit as much as we have been for awhile, until the HP madness dies down a bit.

 

[macraven]

FWIW, if you are not a Florida resident, the Preferred AP that will allow you to visit both parks while school is out is $295 pp, about $35 more than it is for Florida residents. The renewal for OOS passholders is $20 cheaper than a new pass, but very few of us renew, because it starts counting from the previous expiration date, not the date of first use. Unless you are just over the Georgia or Alabama border, it normally is worth more than $20 to buy a completely new pass so that the clock won't start ticking again until it is used.

Right now our inclination is NOT to renew the passes this fall. We will probably not visit as much as we have been for awhile, until the HP madness dies down a bit.

i renewed my preferred ap May 1st for the base of $159.
brought it to $170.xx
i'm not a floridian.

if the price goes up in the future, not an issue for me.
after my next trip coming up, i wll have used it for park entrance 17 times this year.
and, it has great discounts for private tours and HHN tixs.

 

[DisUniversal]

While we are venting, it stinks that the Power Pass blackout for US has been extended from June 14th to August 14th; essentially the entire summer if you are dealing with children in school. At the very least it would be helpful to sell the daily exception, the way that it is done at the California park. There, if you want to go on a blackout day you can pay $45 for that one day and go anyway.

FWIW, if you are not a Florida resident, the Preferred AP that will allow you to visit both parks while school is out is $295 pp, about $35 more than it is for Florida residents. The renewal for OOS passholders is $20 cheaper than a new pass, but very few of us renew, because it starts counting from the previous expiration date, not the date of first use. Unless you are just over the Georgia or Alabama border, it normally is worth more than $20 to buy a completely new pass so that the clock won't start ticking again until it is used.

Right now our inclination is NOT to renew the passes this fall. We will probably not visit as much as we have been for awhile, until the HP madness dies down a bit.

It's nice that Universal at least lets you go to one park during the summer if you have a power pass. The blockout period for Disney seasonal passes (which cost double what a power pass does) starts a week earlier and applies to all four parks.

 

[CFioren317]

I never get the Disney park hoppers, but I usually go for at least 4 or 5 days so I see every park at least once.

Same with US this time. We are doing two days on an overnight stay and instead of hoppers, we are doing US one day and IoA the other day. I am not too interested in the HP stuff, but it would kinda stink that I can't do everything in both parks without a hassle.

This is a TOTALLY different scenario than "hopping" at WDW. There isn't a single ride at WDW where you MUST have hoppers. Unless I am mistaken, the new ride at HP can not be used unless you have hoppers, which I guess would stink if you really care. I guess to reconfigure your entire trip over one ride would be a hassle and waste of money when you can do two days at the parks and be content.

 

[Portugal1000]

I have paid £115 ($184) for a 14 day park to park Universal ticket which I think is excellent value. I will probably use it only on 5 days but that still works out £23 ($36 a day for both parks). The only problem is I am only staying at Universal hotel for one night so I am already thinking I might not get to ride the train as I think my son will want to use early entry for the main ride twice, me too really. Really couldn't wait 2 hours for a train. Did enough of that when I use to commute to and from the real London