Only One Day - Will My Plan Succeed?

[jhaig]

We were originally going to do a three night trip to DL Aug 5-7 but now our plans have changed and we can only do DL for one day.

To preface this : this will be our first DL trip and we are WDW vets. Our plan is to hit the highlights and do the things we can’t do in Florida (and of course, do things like Pirates which are supposed to be better at DL!).

First, we plan on doing DL on either Fri 8/2 or Mon 8/5 when DCA has early entry. We will want to spend much more time at DL so we figure that would be the best option. Touring Plans has the Friday crowd level at 6 and Monday at 8. How accurate are these predictions and if we are at the park before rope drop, will it even matter that much?

Using Max Pass, here is my DL plan:

8am - enter then ride in order: Matterhorn, Space Mtn, Buzz, Nemo Subs, get a Max Pass for Big Thunder

9am ish - Alice, Mr Toad, Pinocchio, Small World , then use Big Thunder Max Pass

10am - Pirates, Haunted Mansion, Pooh, then do Indy with single rider ( me only)

At this point I would want to get a Max Pass for RSR, but I wasn’t sure what the best option would be for riding RSR.

Grab a lunch (any counter service recommendations?)then go over to DCA

12N - Incredicoaster (single rider, me only) , Toy Story Mania, Silly Swings, Pixar Wheel, Monsters Inc, Little Mermaid.

I guess a worst case scenario at this point would be to do RSR in standby or single rider.

Rest of the time would be adding Max Passes where we can, re-riding our favorites, then maybe betting in line for RSR before closing.

Does this plan have a chance of working and what would be the best way to get RSR if we are doing DL first?

 

[Skyegirl1999]

You’re going to use Maxpass way more than you have listed. The moment you enter the park, you’ll pull a FP. Depending on how crowded it is and how much you care about walking a lot, you could almost certainly do Matterhorn, BTMR, and Space Mountain by FP, then book a FP for RSR (which will be for afternoon, probably, by then). Then you can just book whatever FPs you want after that. What I’d probably do is book Space or Matterhorn as the first FP and use it the moment you can (you can even scan in 5 minutes early), and then do Fantasyland rides around that. I’d book Space if I was there early enough to get an early return time; if not, I’d do Matterhorn and then book Space 3rd so I don’t tie up my FP pulling for 90 minutes right away. Keep in mind that BTMR isn’t really that far from Fantasyland, and so it’s not a hike to pop over and do that one if the timing works out...

Anyway, I’d do Fantasyland before Tomorrowland because those rides never calm down and don’t have FP.

But yeah, you can probably accomplish what you’ve listed there, just maybe not in that order.

 

[Skyegirl1999]

Also, you can book RSR from DL with Maxpass, so it doesn’t matter at all that you’re there first.

Also, crowd calendars are terrible; don’t trust them at all. I’d probably go Friday?

Absolutely be there as early as humanly possible. Being in the park in advance of rope drop is always a good strategy, but particularly with Maxpass because you’ll get the earliest return time for something like Space that way.

 

[limace]

You don't have GOTG-I wouldn't miss that one. I would make sure to add Grizzly River Run, and Storybook Land Canal Boats and/or Casey Jr Circus train-those are all completely unique to DL and the latter two are such unique examples of Walt's touches in the park. I'd make sure to ride the railroad all the way around, too!. If you need to skip anything, I'd skip things that are identical or close to it at WDW-Toy Story, for instance. And I'd make sure to ride the other rides in Carsland-Mater looks simple but it's very fun

 

[Skyegirl1999]

You don't have GOTG-I wouldn't miss that one. I would make sure to add Grizzly River Run, and Storybook Land Canal Boats and/or Casey Jr Circus train-those are all completely unique to DL and the latter two are such unique examples of Walt's touches in the park. I'd make sure to ride the railroad all the way around, too!. If you need to skip anything, I'd skip things that are identical or close to it at WDW-Toy Story, for instance. And I'd make sure to ride the other rides in Carsland-Mater looks simple but it's very fun

Casey Jr or Storybook (they go through the same area, so you just need to do one), and riding the railroad all the way around are both great ideas! The railroad can be such a nice relaxing break.

You didn’t mention entertainment, but I’d probably plan to do Paint the Night and World of Color over at DCA, too, by the way...

 

[jhaig]

You don't have GOTG-I wouldn't miss that one. I would make sure to add Grizzly River Run, and Storybook Land Canal Boats and/or Casey Jr Circus train-those are all completely unique to DL and the latter two are such unique examples of Walt's touches in the park. I'd make sure to ride the railroad all the way around, too!. If you need to skip anything, I'd skip things that are identical or close to it at WDW-Toy Story, for instance. And I'd make sure to ride the other rides in Carsland-Mater looks simple but it's very fun

I may go GOTG on my own as well. My girls are not into dropping or turning upside down

I figure we’re going to be there from 8am to close so there should be enough time to do everything.

 

[SOCALMouseMommy]

I would avoid Monday. Mondays are always busy. I’d actually choose Saturday if you can because three levels of annual pass holders will be blocked.

 

[jhaig]

I would avoid Monday. Mondays are always busy. I’d actually choose Saturday if you can because three levels of annual pass holders will be blocked.

I always thought summer weekends in general were to be avoided if at all possible.

 

[Malcon10t]

I always thought summer weekends in general were to be avoided if at all possible.

Not at Disneyland. With the majority of APs blocked, Saturdays are quite nice usually.

You are putting in too much planning for rides. Know the areas you want to hit, but don't do the "Between 9and 10 we will ride these..." All it takes is Matterhorn not coming up on time then to screw your plans up. Max Pass will have more available and you should be hitting what is available. If you pull a BTMRR FP at 8am, it will likely be for 805a. As soon as you scan thru, pull Matterhorn, which likely will be ready by the end of your ride. It really is a different set up than WDW.

 

[Wahlee]

With only one day, I would highly recommend getting a subscription for RideMax. You plug in the rides you want to hit, and it gives you a customized plan to minimize your waiting. You'd need to do two plans with your estimated time of jumping to DCA, as they don't support single plans for park hopping, but I think it'd be extremely helpful for you.

 

[Geemo]

We were originally going to do a three night trip to DL Aug 5-7 but now our plans have changed and we can only do DL for one day.

To preface this : this will be our first DL trip and we are WDW vets. Our plan is to hit the highlights and do the things we can’t do in Florida (and of course, do things like Pirates which are supposed to be better at DL!).

First, we plan on doing DL on either Fri 8/2 or Mon 8/5 when DCA has early entry. We will want to spend much more time at DL so we figure that would be the best option. Touring Plans has the Friday crowd level at 6 and Monday at 8. How accurate are these predictions and if we are at the park before rope drop, will it even matter that much?

Using Max Pass, here is my DL plan:

8am - enter then ride in order: Matterhorn, Space Mtn, Buzz, Nemo Subs, get a Max Pass for Big Thunder

9am ish - Alice, Mr Toad, Pinocchio, Small World , then use Big Thunder Max Pass

10am - Pirates, Haunted Mansion, Pooh, then do Indy with single rider ( me only)

At this point I would want to get a Max Pass for RSR, but I wasn’t sure what the best option would be for riding RSR.

Grab a lunch (any counter service recommendations?)then go over to DCA

12N - Incredicoaster (single rider, me only) , Toy Story Mania, Silly Swings, Pixar Wheel, Monsters Inc, Little Mermaid.

I guess a worst case scenario at this point would be to do RSR in standby or single rider.

Rest of the time would be adding Max Passes where we can, re-riding our favorites, then maybe betting in line for RSR before closing.

Does this plan have a chance of working and what would be the best way to get RSR if we are doing DL first?

Here's a link to a thread about MP from Dec 2017.
Post #2 by "lcp9" has a nice strategy of how you can really book MP rides back to back.
https://www.disboards.com/threads/need-lots-of-help-at-the-parks-friday-12-9.3651754/#post-58550567

Have fun!!
Geemo

 

[jhaig]

You are putting in too much planning for rides. Know the areas you want to hit, but don't do the "Between 9and 10 we will ride these..." All it takes is Matterhorn not coming up on time then to screw your plans up. Max Pass will have more available and you should be hitting what is available. If you pull a BTMRR FP at 8am, it will likely be for 805a. As soon as you scan thru, pull Matterhorn, which likely will be ready by the end of your ride. It really is a different set up than WDW.

I’m so used to having to plan everything so far in advance that I’m having trouble wrapping my head around not having to do so much.

 

[MrInfinity]

You can pull off most things at Disneyland and California Adventure in a day... But not as fast as you've got there. You've got the 13 biggest DL rides in 3 hours. Tomorrowland in Disneyland is so much more crowded than in Florida. The walkways get super packed like shoulder to shoulder. It's not the wide open space you're used to. Finding Nemo is like 15 minutes of actual ride time and that's not considering the rather slow moving line. Most likely you're going to show up at 8 to the Matterhorn and they'll still be testing it. Say it gets running by 8:20, you'll be lucky to be out of there by 8:30, could be even later. Rather than 8 to 11 for Disneyland, I'd give 8 to 1. Then get lunch, head to California for the afternoon with a FastPass that you set up earlier as soon as you judge that it's a good evening return time for RSR. Silly Swings and the Ferris Wheel are more really slow (and pretty hot, uncomfortable) lines that don't have FastPass. Allow some time.

Also add Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters to your DCA list! It's one of the most fun and unique rides there.

 

[jhaig]

You can pull off most things at Disneyland and California Adventure in a day... But not as fast as you've got there. You've got the 13 biggest DL rides in 3 hours. Tomorrowland in Disneyland is so much more crowded than in Florida. The walkways get super packed like shoulder to shoulder. It's not the wide open space you're used to. Finding Nemo is like 15 minutes of actual ride time and that's not considering the rather slow moving line. Most likely you're going to show up at 8 to the Matterhorn and they'll still be testing it. Say it gets running by 8:20, you'll be lucky to be out of there by 8:30, could be even later. Rather than 8 to 11 for Disneyland, I'd give 8 to 1. Then get lunch, head to California for the afternoon with a FastPass that you set up earlier as soon as you judge that it's a good evening return time for RSR. Silly Swings and the Ferris Wheel are more really slow (and pretty hot, uncomfortable) lines that don't have FastPass. Allow some time.

Also add Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters to your DCA list! It's one of the most fun and unique rides there.

That’s good to know. I was hoping to get a good amount done within the first hour or two then do the rest somewhat casually and use the Max Pass as much as possible.

 

[shooting4life]

If your family is fine with single rider I would try and do more of that for space mountain and MH and focus fp on rides without single rider like btmr

 

[jhaig]

If your family is fine with single rider I would try and do more of that for space mountain and MH and focus fp on rides without single rider like btmr

I plan on using single rider for Indy and the Incredicoaster for sure.

 

[jhaig]

You can pull off most things at Disneyland and California Adventure in a day... But not as fast as you've got there. You've got the 13 biggest DL rides in 3 hours. Tomorrowland in Disneyland is so much more crowded than in Florida. The walkways get super packed like shoulder to shoulder. It's not the wide open space you're used to. Finding Nemo is like 15 minutes of actual ride time and that's not considering the rather slow moving line. Most likely you're going to show up at 8 to the Matterhorn and they'll still be testing it. Say it gets running by 8:20, you'll be lucky to be out of there by 8:30, could be even later. Rather than 8 to 11 for Disneyland, I'd give 8 to 1. Then get lunch, head to California for the afternoon with a FastPass that you set up earlier as soon as you judge that it's a good evening return time for RSR. Silly Swings and the Ferris Wheel are more really slow (and pretty hot, uncomfortable) lines that don't have FastPass. Allow some time.

Also add Luigi's Rollickin' Roadsters to your DCA list! It's one of the most fun and unique rides there.

So would you say it’s a good bet that Matterhorn is not going to be up and running at rope drop? Would it be a better option to do either Space Mtn or Nemo and get a FP for Matterhorn?

 

[twodogs]

Sometimes SM isn’t up either at park opening. Check the app in the morning as you scan in.

Make constant use of MP. It will save lots of time. You can stack FPs like you used to be able to do,with FP- at WDW but it’s even better since you don’t physically go to the rides, your booking window is shorter, and you can book for either park from either park.

Biggest thing is to really watch RSR return times. They run out of FPs completely for the day by midday. You can get an idea by checking FP return times on the app for a few days prior to your trip and you’ll see the return times getting really late very early in the day. Don’t want to miss it. I wouldn’t do single rider for RSR if it’s your first time riding as it’s so fun to ride with your family!

FPs for TSM were also going really quickly last week when we were there. I’d get a FP for that too. Standby can get really long.

 

[Katiebird]

If you want to ride fantasyland rides, I would do that first thing in the morning (except for Peter Pan). Those will be very light first thing, but the lines get significantly longer later. If those are important, you're better off spending the first hour on those.

Space mountain usually has a single rider line through the exit, use that if it's available. My daughter and I rode it seven times today, less than a 10 minute wait each time (except for the last time when someone had a medical emergency and we got stuck in a hallway for a while but that was clearly an anomaly).

Buzz rarely seems to have a return time more than 10-20 minutes out. There is no reason to ride that one early.

 

[Skyegirl1999]

So would you say it’s a good bet that Matterhorn is not going to be up and running at rope drop? Would it be a better option to do either Space Mtn or Nemo and get a FP for Matterhorn?

Any of the rides have the potential to be down at rope drop. Sometimes the first three rides we walk to are all down; more often, everything's up and running. It just depends.

I would very seriously start in Fantasyland. Rides that have FP should not be your rope drop priority. I'd go to Alice first, personally. You also want to use FP for every ride that you can (possible exceptions for HM, Buzz, Small World).

PPs are correct that your timing is off by quite a bit, but again, you likely can accomplish all of these rides... just not in the order and time frame you have listed. Like, I would expect Pirates and Haunted Mansion would take at least an hour to accomplish on their own because they're both long rides, and you're usually going to wait at least 20-30 minutes for them by mid-morning. You have to be flexible and work with what's available that day. A ton will depend on how crowded the parks are (at that time of year, weather matters a LOT more than historical data), whether any headliners go down for long periods of time, etc... unpredictable factors.

As an example, if a ride IS down at rope drop, then those FPs will disappear much more quickly in the morning than you'd anticipate. So I can tell you that if you book Matterhorn using Maxpass at 8:30, it's probably going to have a return time of 9:15 at the latest... except, if Matterhorn was down at 8, then maybe FPs will already be later than that, you know? It's good to have a loose game plan, but you can't really lock in timing for stuff (I don't care what any website promises).

I suspect that RSR FPs may last longer once Incredicoaster shows up, but maybe not. We VERY consistently begin days at DL and use FP for at least three rides there (usually Space, Star Tours - which is similar time-wise to Matterhorn, and BTMR), and then we book RSR, finish up what we want to do at DL, and head over to DCA. We often end up riding RSR mid-afternoon in that scenario...

Anyway, priorities are good, loose plan is good, complete understanding and usage of Maxpass is KEY, and then you'll have a great time! But minute-by-minute plans are just going to frustrate you, most likely.