Is the Dumbo interactive queue worth it?

[starryagain]

I have a 3.5 year old and we are going in early May. My main concern is how crowded is the area / is there ample space for them to play? I mainly was finding reviews for when it first opened in 2012 and it appeared to be scarcely used at that time. I was curious what the crowd situation was there these days.

 

[Hannahinwonderland]

I've never seen it really full. People only wait in there for a short time. It looks like a lot of fun and I think your 3.5 your old would probably love it!

 

[bball15fan]

I don't feel like it gets too crowded. It's not too big of a space but I feel like for little kids it's good to play around and let loose.

 

[ngm]

We went there on a 9/10 day in the middle of a day that was hotter than the surface of the sun, so I would have expected a nice, cool, indoor play area would have been packed. It definitely wasn't. The kids loved it, and we loved sitting in coolness!

 

[starryagain]

awesome, thanks for the feedback. We will definitely check it out. Our daughter loves those sorts of spaces!

 

[Bluegrrl]

Yes and no. For my 3yr old, it's impossible to get him out of it! He loves it!

But, there are lots of rougher older kids, and lots of kids have minimal adult supervision, making it more likely for him to get pushed or run over. And the germs! Bring sanitizer, b/c my boy got a cold after being there.

I am by no means a helicopter mom, but I really don't like to see him run over and pushed by kids and seeing parents who don't care on bit about how their kids behave. Or maybe we are spoiled by our local play place which takes kids 0 to 6 yrs. and the kids are more supervised by parents.

 

[PurpleKomodo]

My DS loved playing in there, but I was a little frustrated that it did not seem to be operating as intended. The line for Dumbo when we entered was maybe 20 minutes. The cast member asked if we wanted to play or wait in line and we said we wanted to play so she gave us a pager and off we went. She told us to bring the pager back when we were ready to get in line. I let DS play for awhile assuming that the pager would go off when it was close to our turn since this area had been advertised as play as you wait. I went and asked the CM about it and she said we could play as long as we wanted and then get in the 20 minute line. So instead of play as you wait, it was play and then wait. It was fine since the line was not too bad, but it could have been frustrating if the line had grown while we were playing.

 

[starryagain]

My DS loved playing in there, but I was a little frustrated that it did not seem to be operating as intended. The line for Dumbo when we entered was maybe 20 minutes. The cast member asked if we wanted to play or wait in line and we said we wanted to play so she gave us a pager and off we went. She told us to bring the pager back when we were ready to get in line. I let DS play for awhile assuming that the pager would go off when it was close to our turn since this area had been advertised as play as you wait. I went and asked the CM about it and she said we could play as long as we wanted and then get in the 20 minute line. So instead of play as you wait, it was play and then wait. It was fine since the line was not too bad, but it could have been frustrating if the line had grown while we were playing.

Good to know! I also thought it was play as you wait. This could impact when we choose to go. Maybe we'll go on the ride early in the morning and come back later to play!

 

[abinormal]

We practically had to drag my kids out of it.

 

[msmama]

My DS loved playing in there, but I was a little frustrated that it did not seem to be operating as intended. The line for Dumbo when we entered was maybe 20 minutes. The cast member asked if we wanted to play or wait in line and we said we wanted to play so she gave us a pager and off we went. She told us to bring the pager back when we were ready to get in line. I let DS play for awhile assuming that the pager would go off when it was close to our turn since this area had been advertised as play as you wait. I went and asked the CM about it and she said we could play as long as we wanted and then get in the 20 minute line. So instead of play as you wait, it was play and then wait. It was fine since the line was not too bad, but it could have been frustrating if the line had grown while we were playing.

I've never seen it like that. I've always been given the pager and then paged when it's our turn to get in line (and have only ever had to wait maybe 2 rounds of Dumbo's and most of that time was getting set up for the next round).

However, last time we were there, our pager died without me noticing. So after about 25 minutes of playing (and seeing many people come in, play, and get paged), I finally went up and asked only to find out that the batteries had apparently died!!

 

[pens4821]

We were there in 2014 and my 5 year old nephew loved the play area. For us, the pager went off, then we got in a short line.

 

[Dismama2boys]

Yes and no. For my 3yr old, it's impossible to get him out of it! He loves it!

But, there are lots of rougher older kids, and lots of kids have minimal adult supervision, making it more likely for him to get pushed or run over. And the germs! Bring sanitizer, b/c my boy got a cold after being there.

I am by no means a helicopter mom, but I really don't like to see him run over and pushed by kids and seeing parents who don't care on bit about how their kids behave. Or maybe we are spoiled by our local play place which takes kids 0 to 6 yrs. and the kids are more supervised by parents.

All of this. It was too crazy for my little guy.

 

[okilydokily]

My DS loved playing in there, but I was a little frustrated that it did not seem to be operating as intended. The line for Dumbo when we entered was maybe 20 minutes. The cast member asked if we wanted to play or wait in line and we said we wanted to play so she gave us a pager and off we went. She told us to bring the pager back when we were ready to get in line. I let DS play for awhile assuming that the pager would go off when it was close to our turn since this area had been advertised as play as you wait. I went and asked the CM about it and she said we could play as long as we wanted and then get in the 20 minute line. So instead of play as you wait, it was play and then wait. It was fine since the line was not too bad, but it could have been frustrating if the line had grown while we were playing.

They do have it play then wait if the line gets long enough. Sometimes you have to wait to get into the play area. The you have to leave when the pager goes off, otherwise they don't have the pagers go off because parents get frustrated if there wasn't enough time to play. So if a shorter line, they just keep track of how many people are in the area with the pager. A lot of people leave without even taking the ride, just go in to play and cool off.

It wasn't too long ago that the first thing you did was run to Dumbo to take it and people would post strategies to get on the ride. Now, it is underused and never all that long of a line. I wonder if that is how TSMM and Soarin will get once they are expanded. Sometimes, a lot of things are popular simply for being popular and that creates higher demand. If there was much less of a line for Soarin on a regular basis, people wouldn't rush and if there was no urgency to get on, I bet some people wouldn't even take it, but do now because it is what you have to do. I guess we will see once it opens back up.

 

[pbb322]

We were just there with my 3.5 year old. She apparently remembered it from 6 months ago and all morning on our first day she kept begging to go to the "playground". I could not figure out what she was talking about, until I finally remembered Dumbo. We went over there and could barely drag her out. I would not let her go higher than where the two slides are though, too many big kids being rough - even though it was not nearly as crowded as it was when we were there in June. She begged so much we went back 3 days later during extra morning magic hours and stayed about 20 minutes even though there was almost no wait for the line. PS - she also got REALLY upset when I used a FP+ for Winnie the Pooh instead of letting her go through that interactive queue that she also remembered from our June trip, but the line was 45 minutes and it was hot outside.

 

[sdomino11]

We've been there in early May during the last two years. The play area was never crowded and we were paged when it was our turn to get in the last bit of the line.

 

[Baptist]

It's a perfect play area for a 3.5 year old. Don't miss out!

 

[seashoreCM]

... she also got REALLY upset when I used a FP+ for Winnie the Pooh instead of letting her go through that interactive queue that she also remembered from our June trip, but the line was 45 minutes and it was hot outside.

After riding using your fastpass, go back to the interactive queue. When she is done with that, you all take the chicken exit.

 

[mshanson3121]

I'm not familiar with this, what is the play area like?