davkata
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Jan 20, 2014
- Messages
- 455
Just back from a 5 day trip. We arrived on Presidents day, landing at 2:30 and were at DHS by 5. We had 3 headliner FP+ booked there (lucky enough to have gotten in on the no-tiers glitch when it occurred, although purely by luck as I was actually just trying to change a time and was able to book TSMM in addition to RnRC when I did that, later saw on these boards what had happened!) Anyway, we rode 3 headliners, had dinner and saw Fantasmic on our first day/night, off to a great start!
Our touring plan each day was to hit the EMH morning park and ride the headliners/top rides or ones we wanted with little to no wait times and this worked very well, especially at EP and AK. MK was a bit more busy but we still did a lot with little to no waits and utilized the late hours there as they were open until 1 am two of our days, so we would go from 10-11/11:30 when lines were short. We would leave each EMH am park by noon for a mid day pool/rest. Returning to another park later in the day where we used our FP+ each afternoon/evening. Every night we would evaluate how much we accomplished and decide if we wanted to change any plans on MDE. Sometimes we booked a meal we hadn't already planned on other times we changed some FP+ around. One day we cancelled all FP+ at MK as we had done everything we wanted and decide on DHS instead. FP+ on the fly was great and worked well for us. Sometimes a preferred time wasn't available, but we worked around it easily.
We only had 2 glitches neither of which was a huge deal as it all worked out in the end. The first was as we were leaving Indiana Jones show at DHS, DD realized she didn't have her magic band. Suddenly a problem as we have a FP+ waiting for us in 10 mins!! We retraced steps and it was nowhere to be found. We are pretty sure it got caught on the door of a trash can and must have popped off and gone in when she threw out her ice cream trash. We go to the closest CM who directs us to guest services which he tells us is out front at entrance or over by TOT. We head to TOT as we were supposed to be going on RnRC anyway. Can't find guest services, but find a CM at FP+ kiosk who gives us 2 paper passes for DD's remaining rides for that day. Phew!! On to RnRC and TOT for our schedule FP+ times! Stop at Guest Services when done for night and they check lost and found and no luck. They issue us a card for DD as we are now going to Epcot for Illuminations via the boat. Back at hotel that night they give her what DD calls the "dreaded gray band", not the nice blue one that had her name in it. LOL!
Our only other glitch was our last day at DHS when the FP+ and magic bands were down. This basically ended up with a posted 45 min. standby wait (at RD!!) at TSMM actually being 90 mins and us missing a FP+ window, but they honored the later FP+ as we had tried to change it while stuck in line and the MDE system also crashed at that point. (There is another thread about all of this)
Bottom line for us was we were able to do everything we wanted with little to no wait times except for the problem I already mentioned at DHS our last day. We actually liked the new FP+ system as it enabled us to do EMH with no waits in one park in the morning and use our 3 FP+ later in the day at another park. This plan gave us a nice mid day pool/rest time. We also liked not having to go to a ride/kiosk to pull the FP and return when they told you to. I am a planner so this worked especially well for me!
It can only get better if they do away with the tiers and allow FP+ choices at multiple parks. It would also be great if they had a better backup plan for when the FP and Magic Band system crashes as in what happened to us at DHS.
Our touring plan each day was to hit the EMH morning park and ride the headliners/top rides or ones we wanted with little to no wait times and this worked very well, especially at EP and AK. MK was a bit more busy but we still did a lot with little to no waits and utilized the late hours there as they were open until 1 am two of our days, so we would go from 10-11/11:30 when lines were short. We would leave each EMH am park by noon for a mid day pool/rest. Returning to another park later in the day where we used our FP+ each afternoon/evening. Every night we would evaluate how much we accomplished and decide if we wanted to change any plans on MDE. Sometimes we booked a meal we hadn't already planned on other times we changed some FP+ around. One day we cancelled all FP+ at MK as we had done everything we wanted and decide on DHS instead. FP+ on the fly was great and worked well for us. Sometimes a preferred time wasn't available, but we worked around it easily.
We only had 2 glitches neither of which was a huge deal as it all worked out in the end. The first was as we were leaving Indiana Jones show at DHS, DD realized she didn't have her magic band. Suddenly a problem as we have a FP+ waiting for us in 10 mins!! We retraced steps and it was nowhere to be found. We are pretty sure it got caught on the door of a trash can and must have popped off and gone in when she threw out her ice cream trash. We go to the closest CM who directs us to guest services which he tells us is out front at entrance or over by TOT. We head to TOT as we were supposed to be going on RnRC anyway. Can't find guest services, but find a CM at FP+ kiosk who gives us 2 paper passes for DD's remaining rides for that day. Phew!! On to RnRC and TOT for our schedule FP+ times! Stop at Guest Services when done for night and they check lost and found and no luck. They issue us a card for DD as we are now going to Epcot for Illuminations via the boat. Back at hotel that night they give her what DD calls the "dreaded gray band", not the nice blue one that had her name in it. LOL!
Our only other glitch was our last day at DHS when the FP+ and magic bands were down. This basically ended up with a posted 45 min. standby wait (at RD!!) at TSMM actually being 90 mins and us missing a FP+ window, but they honored the later FP+ as we had tried to change it while stuck in line and the MDE system also crashed at that point. (There is another thread about all of this)
Bottom line for us was we were able to do everything we wanted with little to no wait times except for the problem I already mentioned at DHS our last day. We actually liked the new FP+ system as it enabled us to do EMH with no waits in one park in the morning and use our 3 FP+ later in the day at another park. This plan gave us a nice mid day pool/rest time. We also liked not having to go to a ride/kiosk to pull the FP and return when they told you to. I am a planner so this worked especially well for me!
It can only get better if they do away with the tiers and allow FP+ choices at multiple parks. It would also be great if they had a better backup plan for when the FP and Magic Band system crashes as in what happened to us at DHS.
