Just back(6/26-7/2)...a little sad

[SaintsManiac]

I agree, that is a total trip-killer!!!! Did you tell your DD this? I would definitely remind her that Parents Pay for Disney, and Kids Don't Get to Pick What They're Not Riding. Unless of course it's a medical issue or 150% guarantee she will barf on everyone.

But "I don't wanna go on _______________.. that's BOOOOOORING!" uh no. *DJ record scratch* Say bye-bye to the Disney vacation! Someone in your party will always consider x attraction boring/awful/too much/too little. You cannot plan like that! There must be compromise! If Kid #1 wants to go on Mad Tea Party, then Kid#1 has to put up with Winnie-the-Pooh - especially if there aren't enough adults to cater to the small people to escort them all over the place.

Right?!?!?!?! Like I want to ride Small World 10 times for my own pleasure? You bet I will because DD7 wants to, but she'll wait her little butt while DH and I ride RnR

 

[tinkerbellandeeyor]

No one is talking about putting a child on a ride that scares them. They are talking about kids cranking up the old whine machine due to a boring ride

Gotcha

 

[cvjpirate]

I was just @ WDW for July 2nd and 3rd, last min trip, stayed on site and booked no FastPasses in advance. I was able to ride all rides I wanted to with either under an our wait or using FastPasses, this includes the two rides in Pandora (standby wait). I found I was able to get FastPasses day of for all 2nd tier rides without issue, most of the time I would book a FastPass, use it, then pick another one when I was in line waiting to go on the ride.

 

[marcyleecorgan]

I kinda disagree with this and I am lucky my mom does to if a ride is going to terrify the rider no matter what the age it is not a magical trip for anyone

Terrorizing and causing trauma fall under "medical".

Example 1) Your child has a hysterical irrational fear of T-Rexes ; do you force him on Dinosaur? Heck no.
Example 2) Your child whiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiines that IASM "is for babies". Sorry, no, you can ride with your family and be quiet for 10 minutes, OR you can stay at home and be baby-sat by Aunt Gladys who will FORCE you to eat sauerkraut for lunch every day.

 

[DaniMoon]

Thanks for the response. How accurate was that app?

We found it pretty accurate. The only time we had a big discrepancy was for Pirates -- it showed an estimated wait of 6 minutes (15 mins posted) and it was more like 15-20 mins. But when we got to Pirates and saw the line, we knew it wouldn't be 6 minutes.

 

[epcotty]

One of the problems with stand by line backups at WDW is that some of the CMs are clueless on how to manage the lines to keep them moving and keep the stand by wait times lower.

For example, my son and I rode PotC standby. When we entered the line, it was a 25 minute wait, but jumped up to 45 minutes after we were in line. The stand by line would move, then stall for 10 minutes. It did that repeatedly.

When we got up to the junction of the stand by and FP lines, the CM on duty there would not let folks in the stand by line go even when no one with FPs was coming. After waiting about 5 minutes, I started counting how many people with FPs she would let go. I counted over 270 people with FPs before she let anyone in stand by move into the queue for the boats!

Wow, ridiculous. I've also noticed that happening a couple times (although definitely not that bad). I've seen them not let standby people ahead even when noone with FP is coming unless it's been a few minutes since someone with FP came sometimes. They really need to stop doing that, it's just frustrating for people who didn't FP the attraction

 

[momof2n2]

Hey OP - I just want to pipe in that you are not alone. Our family misses the "olden days" and dislike FP+ immensely for all the reasons you cite, and more.
We are now on the 4-5 year plan. Unfortunately, the "gaming" options are changing so quickly, it's going to require way more energy than I can muster up to do it more frequently than that.

And I agree with PP who noted that each family has to deem what they feel is a satisfying ROI. We've figured ours out.

And it IS sad to see something you once enjoyed no longer the same. I get it.

 

[fractalpotato]

I can't see paying $100/day to be guaranteed to ride 3 things with less than an hour wait. I found it difficult to predict what we would want to ride when 2 days in advance--can't imagine figuring it out months in advance.

At MK I did get FP for Buzz and Speedway in the am, couldn't get Thunder Mountain until 7:45. Speedway and TM were my girls' must dos. We tried for SDMT at rope drop and did it but it ate 90 min of our morning, causing us to miss and need to reschedule the Speedway FP--for 6:30 pm. In the morning we also walked into Ariel w 15 min posted wait and it took 45 min to get on-again due to complete standby stoppage. So SDMT and Ariel ate up nearly 3 hours.

I'm sorry but I have to say something here. You first lament about $100/day with 3 guaranteed rides which is more than you ever got before FP+ in the same price range (such as in 2013), and then you say you can't predict what rides you want two days, or two months out.

Except you then listed all of your must-dos that you burned several hours on. You're really telling me you couldn't predict your family favorites, which are also pretty popular, as good FP+ picks ahead of time? I'm just not buying that. Yes picking the times ahead is a little annoying but the trade off is not needing to rush to the parks early. In this case you were using comp tickets from several years ago with no advance FP+ booking, which is not a fair critique of the system, and even then, you managed to do your must-dos. I've done the olden days and I've done DL/CA with paper FPs (and had a blast) and the new system is just fine for me and several other people. I'm sorry you had a bad experience but the parks have changed, your strategy should change with them, or if you find another park caters to you better, than go for it, have a blast there, and if/when you're ready Disney will be waiting and armed with a little knowledge I'm sure you can do even better than before.

Matt