My Best Tip and A Special Thanks...

[speedyf]

First...a special thanks to my friends here on the DIS. I have learned a wealth of information about WDW in my 2 years here and continue to learn more each day.

The biggest tip I found on these boards is that a Fastpass does not expire at the end of the window listed on the ticket. For example...if your fast pass is from 10am to 11am....you can still use it anytime after 11am on that same day. I know there was a debate about this already....but, let me tell you about my day at MK.

We started early...we were there 15 minutes before park opening. When the rope dropped....I immediately went to Space Mountain for a Fastpass while my wife and mom brought our DS5 to Dumbo. We proceeded to ride other rides in the area (small world, peter pan, snow white) with little or no wait.

When my window was open for my next fastpass (around 10am)...I got a FP for Splash Mountain. We did a few other attractions in the area and I was able to pick up a FP for Big Thunder Mountain before lunch at 11:45am.

After lunch...I picked up a FP for Jungle Cruise. We did the Presidents and Country Bear Jamboree since we had just eaten and it was raining a bit.

On the way out of the park....I grabbed a FP for Buzz at around 2:30pm.

We left the park and went to our room for a 3:00pm to 5:30pm rest.....

We returned at 6pm to the park and did Buzz...and grabbed another FP for Buzz for later....then, the mountain tri-fecta. Space...over to Toon Town for a train ride to Frontierland....Big Thunder, then Splash. Then, we went over to Jungle Cruise.....then, back to Buzz on the way out....

I was basically holding 5 FP's for 5 different attractions by about 3:30pm...we used them all that evening with no problems.

Another story....

On our final day....we ate lunch at the Garden Grill at 11:15am in the Land @ Epcot. Before lunch, I went down and got a FP for Soarin'. The FP was from 2:15pm to 3:15pm.

When we returned at 3pm....we walked by everyone in the stand by line and we were only about 10 people away from the entrance gate. A man in the stand-by line asked me if it was raining outside. I told him "yes". He said..."we've been in here for 4 hours now...between Living w/the Land and waiting for this ride for almost 3 hours..."

WOW! 3 hours?...I felt bad because we just walked up and they let us on the ride before he got in. We had about a 5 minute wait...ouch!

Moral of the story....get there early and use those FP machines!

Thanks Again!
Speed

 

[missypie]

I think if you "get in the groove" and always have a fast pass going - getting a new fast pass as soon as the window opens - you can pretty much skate around the parks with no waits. We did that and I admit that I felt a bit guilty at times, looking at all the folks waiting in long lines.

 

[7thdwarf/dopey]

First...a special thanks to my friends here on the DIS. I have learned a wealth of information about WDW in my 2 years here and continue to learn more each day.

The biggest tip I found on these boards is that a Fastpass does not expire at the end of the window listed on the ticket. For example...if your fast pass is from 10am to 11am....you can still use it anytime after 11am on that same day. I know there was a debate about this already....but, let me tell you about my day at MK.

We started early...we were there 15 minutes before park opening. When the rope dropped....I immediately went to Space Mountain for a Fastpass while my wife and mom brought our DS5 to Dumbo. We proceeded to ride other rides in the area (small world, peter pan, snow white) with little or no wait.

When my window was open for my next fastpass (around 10am)...I got a FP for Splash Mountain. We did a few other attractions in the area and I was able to pick up a FP for Big Thunder Mountain before lunch at 11:45am.

After lunch...I picked up a FP for Jungle Cruise. We did the Presidents and Country Bear Jamboree since we had just eaten and it was raining a bit.

On the way out of the park....I grabbed a FP for Buzz at around 2:30pm.

We left the park and went to our room for a 3:00pm to 5:30pm rest.....

We returned at 6pm to the park and did Buzz...and grabbed another FP for Buzz for later....then, the mountain tri-fecta. Space...over to Toon Town for a train ride to Frontierland....Big Thunder, then Splash. Then, we went over to Jungle Cruise.....then, back to Buzz on the way out....

I was basically holding 5 FP's for 5 different attractions by about 3:30pm...we used them all that evening with no problems.

Another story....

On our final day....we ate lunch at the Garden Grill at 11:15am in the Land @ Epcot. Before lunch, I went down and got a FP for Soarin'. The FP was from 2:15pm to 3:15pm.

When we returned at 3pm....we walked by everyone in the stand by line and we were only about 10 people away from the entrance gate. A man in the stand-by line asked me if it was raining outside. I told him "yes". He said..."we've been in here for 4 hours now...between Living w/the Land and waiting for this ride for almost 3 hours..."

WOW! 3 hours?...I felt bad because we just walked up and they let us on the ride before he got in. We had about a 5 minute wait...ouch!

Moral of the story....get there early and use those FP machines!

Thanks Again!
Speed

Awesome Speedy.....sounds like you earned that name huh....

 

[Lindamary123]

Wow, thanks for the tip, that sounds like great stradegy. We will be following your lead next week!!!

 

[speedyf]

Besides the fastpass strategy of collecting FP's throughout the day and using them in the evening....another good tip is to be at the park at opening.

We used Tour Guide Mike's online service. I also had an Unofficial Guide from last year and a Passporter that I purchased new this year.

I cut out the passporter maps and laminated them for use in the parks. The passporter maps are so much better than the Disney maps because they list the actual attraction name on the map....compared to the Disney map that lists a number on the map...then, you have to go to the "key" to figure out which ride/restaurant you are looking for.

On the first day at Epcot....I tried to get my family there before the park opened...but, we arrived at about 9:30am. They just didn't believe that an extra half-hour could make a difference. Well...we went to Test Track first and the stand-by line was already out the door and past the overhanging canopy (about an hour wait). So, I had to grab a fastpass for that for 11:30am to 12:30am. I couldn't get a FP again until around 11:30am....and by that time Soarin' was up to 2:15pm in the afternoon. It just threw my whole plan off. I wanted to get there at opening and ride Test Track...get a FP for Soarin' for around 11'ish and move on from there.

My family learned that getting to the park 20 minutes before opening was important. We hit AK the next day and was there before park opening. We did everything we wanted to do by 4pm. This includes....Safari, Kali, Lion King, Tarzan, Dinosaur, Tough to Be A Bug, Pocahantas, Rafiki's Watch, Tyceratops Spin, Breakfastasaurus with Donald at 10:10am, pictures & autographs with Pooh, Tigger, Eeyore, Rafiki, and Stanley and Mickey's Jammin Jungle Parade to finish it off. No break on that day...but, an early return at around 5pm to our hotel. We had an hour from the park opening until our breakfast. We did Tyceratops Spin, Dinosaur twice, and Tough To Be A Bug, and I ran and got a FP for Kali in that time period. All of the rides were walk-ons with no waiting.

Of course, my Magic Kingdom day was highlighted earlier with the FP strategy and getting to the park early.

We did everything we wanted to do and most of the fun stuff twice by using the strategy of:

1. Get there before park opening.
2. Use Tour Guide Mike or Unofficial Guide's schedule of which days are best to visit which parks.
3. Use the Fastpasses and the knowledge that they don't expire until the end of the day to your advantage. You don't have to run across the park to try to make the deadline on your fastpass!

By the way...we stayed on-site, but never used the EMH morning or night. We are just not early risers...getting to the park at 8:40am was plenty early enough for us. That meant being at the bus stop for about 8:10am.

Speed

 

[llij]

Thanks for the great tips! Gotta love Fastpass!

 

[JamieW]

Thanks so much. I never knew that. And it makes so much sense.

 

[smfritz03]

So what you are saying is---get a fast pass---and when that time frame is up--grab another and do the rides again when you are back in that area???? So I can walk around--grab fast passes when my time frame is past and then later go back and do all the fast pass rides in the evening or whenever-as long as its in the same day? Why dont the CM's check the times?

 

[snappy]

They always check that the START of the window on your FP has already passed. I personally after 6 WDW trips since 2002 have never had one check the END of the window, but others have reported on this board that they were turned away if the END was past.

On my last trip another guest told me that he was refused, I think it was at MK, but we did not experience this. It was a weekend, and a bit crowded.
But we have been over Easter, Thanksgiving, Memorial Day and were never refused after the END of the window expired. I have even asked several park CM's and they said it does not matter if the END of the window has expired.

It seems confusing to me. If FP's don't expire after the window, why bother to include the end of the window at all?

 

[ralfrick]

Now this is a guy I could handle being with in the parks.


Cheers.

 

[caribear]

I have also used fastpasses after the window has expired, but I have seen CM's lecture people about them too. We were in the standby lane for BTMR and a guy in the fastpass lane was given the lecture about how his fastpass had already expired, but the CM would let him on just this one time. I really think it depends on the CM. I love saving the fastpasses for later, expecially when you go to the parks early and ride all the rides without fastpass...then you have a chance to ride them again later in the fastpass lane.

 

[Laurajean1014]

This thread fuels the fire for higher fast passes at higher end WDW resorts.

The more you pay, the more you play!

 

[lbgraves]

I agree that the tips on this board made our trip to WDW so much better last week. DH wanted to argue with me about the FPs but within 30 minutes of being in MGM he saw their benefit. The CM at IJs also told me that the FPs would be good for any show after the time on our ticket when I saw that the IJ show was the same time as the FP for the LCM show. We didn't have a problem with this at all at MGM or MK later in the week. The rain on Thursday made us change our plans so that the kids could see the entire Cinderellabration show so we would have missed out on a couple FP time frames.

 

[Kimberly815]

I did not realize that this was possible. . .but you can bet that I will be utilizing it on my next trip. Thanks.

 

[ciera321]

We did this several times on our May/June trip a couple of weeks ago. I didn't realize you could do it until we were caught in a terrible lightening and rain storm and ducked for cover for about 20 minutes, causing our fastpass for RNR to expire. We went on over to the fastpass line and I explained what happened and asked if they'd let us in anyway...The CM said sure, the time doesn't really expire and that we could do that on any ride. We really got a lot more rides done and since it came from a CM I didn't feel like I was doing something I shouldn't.

 

[snappy]

One thing to note, we sae the stunt car show and MGM week before last and were told that the fastpass was only for the show listed. One good thing about the stunt car FP was that it was not tied to FP's for other rides in the park, so didn't affact the ability to get another FP.

 

[jswalker1981]

When I have a choice, I try to get the fastpass with the quickest return time. This way, I am not stuck to one side of the park all day.

 

[kerri0616]

Speedy:

You're my hero. Just when I thought I knew everything about FP, you have shared wonderful knowledge. I wrote down your plan to use on our first MK day!

It has to be one of the greatest feelings in the 'world' to 'buzz' by those poor stand-by people and have little-to-no wait. And I don't feel guilty since FP is available to all!!

We're going in July (hello heat, hello crowds) and I think a logical game plan is the key. There's enough time built in your plan to do some snacking/shopping/people watching while we wait for a window to expire.

My thanks!
Kerri

 

[taximomfor4]

They always check that the START of the window on your FP has already passed. I personally after 6 WDW trips since 2002 have never had one check the END of the window, but others have reported on this board that they were turned away if the END was past.

On my last trip another guest told me that he was refused, I think it was at MK, but we did not experience this. It was a weekend, and a bit crowded.
But we have been over Easter, Thanksgiving, Memorial Day and were never refused after the END of the window expired. I have even asked several park CM's and they said it does not matter if the END of the window has expired.

It seems confusing to me. If FP's don't expire after the window, why bother to include the end of the window at all?

We were refused entry on 2 different rides (not even THRILLERS, mind you) at 2 different parks by 2 different CMs on 2 different days. BUT......one of the CMs that overheard us being refused winked and a few minutes later signalled us through...the cm that had refused us had gone elsewhere, don't know where. So it CAN happen, just probably not often.

 

[WEDWDW]

I think the "official" policy is to return to the FP attraction within the window;if not,why would they even put a window on the FP?I think it just depends on the CM in much the same way as some CMs ask to see an AP when checking-in using the AP rate and some don't.I personally always return within the window because I think that is the way they were designed to be used,but that is just me.I just wish Disney would either enforce the window or take the return time off of the FP altogether to avoid any confusion.