Klayfish
DIS Veteran
- Joined
- May 19, 2016
- Messages
- 8,747
Just getting back into the swing of "normal life", so don't have a ton of time to write a long review. But we were in WDW for Thanksgiving week. We stay offsite and pack our own food, so our perspective may be different than most. But I'll bullet point a few things of note.
First and foremost - we had a wonderful time. We always do.
CMs are awesome, awesome, awesome. They always are, and this was no exception. We only encounter them in the parking lots and parks, not in hotels or restaurants, but all we encountered were in the holiday spirit. Some more than others, but not a single one was rude, nasty or otherwise unpleasant.
The major holidays are far busier than "normal" times, so you have to have that mindset. During our summer trips, we get on ride after ride after ride, using all FP+ because I can get nearly any ride at nearly any time. This isn't really true during the holidays. I can get FP+ (more on that later), but nowhere near like I can in the summer, so you have to have realistic expectations. It was very crowded, but nothing insane. The only truly "insane" crowds we encountered were in the hub at MK near HEA time...but that's to be expected.
If you drive and park in the parking lots, I can't recommend the tall flag trick enough. We have a 5' pool noodle mounted on a car flag that we stick in our window and it makes it insanely easy to find our car. I can't tell you how many comments we got every time we parked. People would say "wow, what an awesome idea". Sure, you can put your row number in your phone, but doing this just makes it that much easier. No having to remember exactly how far down the row you are, etc... We can spot the car from the tram and don't even have to pay much attention, we just walk right to it.
Rides...yeah, it was much harder to get 4th, 5th, etc...FP+ than it is during summer. No doubt about it. But with persistence (lots of refreshing), I got plenty of FP+ same day, often only minutes in advance. Examples include: SM, BTMRR, Navi, Splash, ToT, TSMM, EE, Safari, Tomorrowland Speedway, etc...
As I mentioned in another thread, we did FEA as a walk on. It was Black Friday (I think) and we got in line at 10:00am. Waited 46 minutes. Easy.
TSMM is still a walk on ride if you show up 10 minutes before park closing. Literally we walked straight on. We also literally walked straight on Splash Mountain while HEA was going on. We also walked straight on Safari in AK late at night.
Had a fantastic time and can't wait to head back down in a few weeks for Xmas!!!!
First and foremost - we had a wonderful time. We always do.
CMs are awesome, awesome, awesome. They always are, and this was no exception. We only encounter them in the parking lots and parks, not in hotels or restaurants, but all we encountered were in the holiday spirit. Some more than others, but not a single one was rude, nasty or otherwise unpleasant.
The major holidays are far busier than "normal" times, so you have to have that mindset. During our summer trips, we get on ride after ride after ride, using all FP+ because I can get nearly any ride at nearly any time. This isn't really true during the holidays. I can get FP+ (more on that later), but nowhere near like I can in the summer, so you have to have realistic expectations. It was very crowded, but nothing insane. The only truly "insane" crowds we encountered were in the hub at MK near HEA time...but that's to be expected.
If you drive and park in the parking lots, I can't recommend the tall flag trick enough. We have a 5' pool noodle mounted on a car flag that we stick in our window and it makes it insanely easy to find our car. I can't tell you how many comments we got every time we parked. People would say "wow, what an awesome idea". Sure, you can put your row number in your phone, but doing this just makes it that much easier. No having to remember exactly how far down the row you are, etc... We can spot the car from the tram and don't even have to pay much attention, we just walk right to it.
Rides...yeah, it was much harder to get 4th, 5th, etc...FP+ than it is during summer. No doubt about it. But with persistence (lots of refreshing), I got plenty of FP+ same day, often only minutes in advance. Examples include: SM, BTMRR, Navi, Splash, ToT, TSMM, EE, Safari, Tomorrowland Speedway, etc...
As I mentioned in another thread, we did FEA as a walk on. It was Black Friday (I think) and we got in line at 10:00am. Waited 46 minutes. Easy.
TSMM is still a walk on ride if you show up 10 minutes before park closing. Literally we walked straight on. We also literally walked straight on Splash Mountain while HEA was going on. We also walked straight on Safari in AK late at night.
Had a fantastic time and can't wait to head back down in a few weeks for Xmas!!!!
