Just back from 9-day Trip

[OurLaughingPlace]

I really enjoyed reading your trip report. Thank you for taking the time to share with us

 

[Buffalo2Disney]

I'm glad you enjoyed your trip! Thanks for the detailed review.

I really enjoyed reading your trip report. Thank you for taking the time to share with us

Thank you guys for reading along! Hopefully it'll help people with some upcoming trips.

 

[Ava]

Thanks again for the reminder about moving up FP+ times! I read that tip somewhere on here before but had forgotten. I'm working on my touring plans for August and will have to keep that in mind. Especially in Epcot & DHS, it's a good way to get your 3 original FPs done early so you can try for a 4th for another tier 1 attraction.

 

[henry lutz]

Hello all. The wife and I just returned from another wonderful Disney World vacation, our 4th trip in the last 6 years. We went for our 2 year anniversary and stayed for 9 days, 4/30 - 5/8, at Pop Century.

It was another amazing vacation. There's nothing better than Disney, nothing. It's still magical and still well worth our money and we can not wait to go back. It really is sad to be home and back to reality. Here is a run down of some things that are generally talked about on the DisBoards from this trip.

MagicBands and FP+:

Both worked wonderfully, we never had a problem. Not once. With the magicbands charging worked every time, park entry worked every time, opening up our room worked every time.

FP+ was wonderful and my wife and I both love it more than the old system. There were days at the Magic Kingdom where we used our original 3 FP's we picked before leaving and then went to the FP kiosks and just continued to pick our 4th, 5th, 6th + fastpasses for the day. We hardly ever waited in line for anything. Even at 9PM at the Magic Kingdom one night, every attraction still had FP's available with times starting within 5 minutes of the actual time we were booking.

At Epcot, after using our first 3 FP's, I went to a kiosk around 12:45PM and both Soarin' and Test Track had available FP's.

We found the best strategy was to schedule your first 3 FP's starting around 11AM when crowds started to roll in. Every time after using our first FP, I loaded the App on my phone and selected to change the time of the next FP and there would almost always be a time to use our next FP within 10 to 30 minutes of the current time it was. Most days we were able to use our original 3 FP's within an hour and 15 minute window by changing the times of the FP's after the 1st was used. We would generally also use our FP's with the 5 minute early window they allow you to. So definitly use the App to change your times to a time closest to the current time so you are not waiting an hour in between each FP. It works!

Crowds / Wait Times / Weather:

Crowds were decent and generally higher than we have experienced in trips past. Wait times grew starting around 11AM when parks started to fill up. But with FP+ and being able to change times on the fly and using the kiosks to pick the 4th + FP's, we generally got done MORE on this trip, yes that's right MORE than previous trips.

ROPE DROP IS STILL YOUR FRIEND! All 9 days we woke up at 6:30AM, showered, had coffee, and were at the parks by 8:20AM. EVERY park had rope drop somewhere between 10-15 minutes before 9AM (we never did early EMH at any park on the trip). Sometimes they would hold you at attractions and not let you into the lines before 9AM evern though you were in the park. Other times they let you into the lines and we were generally out of our 1st attraction just after 9AM.

Once 11AM hit you could clearly see the waves of people entering the parks and wait times started to rise dramatically. We scheduled our 3 FP's to hit up rides during these busy times. We also found that the wait times posted outside the attractions were pretty close to the actual wait times when we waited stand-by.

Early May also had the BEST weather we ever experienced on any of our 4 trips. Every single day for 9 straight days had a high between 85-90 degrees, was sunny all day, barely a cloud in the sky, and we never experienced any rain drops, not even a single drop! It was the most absolute perfect weather. The humidity was still low so it felt great.

Parks / Construction:

The parks are still awesome. We love every single park. Animal Kingdom is our favorite park. Yes, there is a lot of construction going on at the parks and Downtown Disney. However is never really got in our way and we really didn't notice it all that much.

Downtown Disney definitely has the most noticeable construction, but still didn't bother us too much. Plan plenty of time for traveling there however on the weekends if you have a dinner reservation. It took us almost 40 minutes to get there on the bus from Pop.

One thing my wife and I both agreed on is that, in it's current state, Hollywood Studios is only worth a half-day. We managed to ride all the rides we wanted, and look around the different shops we wanted and it was barely after 11AM. With the current amount of rides they offer, we could never imagine spending a whole day there. Now, we didn't see any shows while we were there so that will add more time into your day but even if we did, by 2PM we would have done everything. Until they add in more attractions (which will be a LONG time with the time it takes them to build attractions) it's a half-day and our least favorite park. It needs work ASAP.

Other Notes:

- Pop Century is a great resort if you spend most of the day in the parks. We hit up rope drop every day and wouldn't come back to our room until around 11PM or Midnight. Perfect resort if your looking just for a place to sleep.

- The weekend we arrived there was a HUGE dance/cheer tourney going on at WWOS. The girls were staying at the All-Star resorts and Pop Century. They were EVERYWHERE, it was most noticeable at Pop in the food court. They were also everywhere in the parks. BUT they were also very well behaved and never caused a problem. Most of them checked out on Monday morning and Pop and he parks were wayyyy more empty the rest of the week.

- All bathrooms I went into were clean, very clean. And all CM's we encountered were very, very nice. Mostly all of them congratulated us on our anniversary and all were very happy to be there.

- Flower and Garden festival was nice, but we like Food & Wine better. However the BBQ food stand in the American Pavilion had AMAZING food!

- The new Magical Express video is a joke and just plain stupid. Please bring back the old one, just with updated information.

- Selfie sticks, wow, you look ridiculous using one and trust me everyone is making fun of you.


Overall it was one of the best trips we have had to Disney World. We are so sad to be home and are trying to figure out ways to get back ASAP. It's still the best vacation money can buy for us and we still love it and will continue to go back as much as we possibly can.

Feel free to ask any questions you may have, I would love to answer them all as best as I can.

Great post. We are returning in nov and wanted to ask how involved is the app for changing fastpasses
Waiting to download it until we ( my wife) gets the new I phone

 

[Buffalo2Disney]

Great post. We are returning in nov and wanted to ask how involved is the app for changing fastpasses
Waiting to download it until we ( my wife) gets the new I phone

The app is nice to have to change your fastpass times around once you have them booked.

You can change them up at a kiosk as well but it's much easier to do it on your phone using the app while in the park.

 

[Bugdozer]

We went in May last year and found the App a huge asset when it came to changing times. We also would move up our times as soon as we did a FP and 1 day in MK we ended up with 12 FPs. I was told by a CM that the most he had ever seen was 16 and said we knew what we were doing lol.

My only complaint with the kiosks were sadly the cast members. I found many to be somewhat rude, would not let me do it myself and treated me like I knew nothing which is probably because they deal all day with people who do know nothing. 1 day at the kiosk they had attraction i wanted but not the time. I told my friend we would just take it and try changing it on the app. The CM overheard and instantly jumped on me saying that was not possible and they all draw from the same pool of availability. Could not be bothered to argue so I said ok and left. Walked 25 feet away opened the app and changed the time for 10 minutes later instead of 2 hours later.... Also you don't have to keep the same attraction fp you made at the kiosk. Once you have picked your FP and leave kiosk not only may you possibly be able to change the time but you can also change the attraction depending on what is available.

 

[LENNON500]

Really enjoyable reading your post, thank you. We are using DME for the first time on Monday so I'm not sure what the video was earlier, but now I'll be sure to NOT watch the new one!