Park planning advice?

[suebeelin]

Hello- hoping for some advice. Now that the system has changed (no FP’s, no AP’s, park reservations), I am at a loss. Any advice would be so very much appreciated!

1. We are planning 13 park days… how do we handle the tickets? No more AP’s…
2. Park reservations- which days should I go to MK/HS/AK now that there’s no fast passes? How hard is it to get on the traditionally hard to get rides?
3. Epcot at night- is it always available? Will the food n wine festival make it really hard to get in? We are planning our trip during fall frenzy, and don’t know whether to make a park ressie at Epcot
4. MK at night- is there availability there as well? We are split staying btwn BWV and BLT, so we used to hit the walkable parks at night. Is this still possible?
Any insight much appreciated. I’m very frustrated right now, and hope that our upcoming trip will not be pleasant (and I can’t plan as nauseum with the Fp’s no longer happening)

 

[drusba]

Some of the specifics to your question may have varying answers. But as far as the ability to actually do a park reservation and go to a park, what I have seen generally is: (a) all parks are usually available for reservation 3-months out and many times even close to 2-months out. The one that has generally filled for reservations the quickest thus far is Studios. That could change in the future and possibly will change starting late Sep and after as MK becomes the home of the 50th celebration and thus may fill before other parks. As far as order in which parks fill. thus far Studios have led as the first to fill, followed by MK, and then AK, and finally Epcot which has tended to be open the longest for a reservation.

The current rule is that you can reserve only one park per day before arrival. Park hopping is potentially allowed with a park hopper ticket, but a hop can be attempted only 2 P.M or after on any given day, unless Disney makes it earlier for the particular day. You do not make a reservation to do the hop and your attempt can possibly fail when you try it on any given day due to park capacity limitations.

My sense is that to assure being able to reserve one park on a day you may want it, safety dictates making your park reservations (and thus buying all needed tickets) by no later than 3-months out, although at times it can wait longer than that, even to two months out, but that can be risky for at least Studios and possibly MK, and for fall frenzy time possibly Epcot. Moreover, to be extra safe, you may even want to get all tickets even four months or more out for this year's fall periods, as I am guessing there may be some risk of the need to reserve further out for MK and its 50th celebration. In fact, MK is already filled for Oct 1, a little more than 4 months from now, but that is a unique day for likely extremely high demand since it is the opening date of the 50th MK anniversary celebration.

You should definitely reserve the park you want for any dinner reservations or nighttime activities as the one to reserve in advance for that day. In other words, assume when making advance park and restaurant reservations that you may not be able to park hop to another chosen park on any particular day, Once you purchase tickets and make park reservations, you will be able to go to the selected park any time of day and still get in. The chance of being rejected applies only to park hopping to a park not originally reserved for the day. My personal sense is that you should simply plan on one park per day and buy multiple day park tickets accordingly, rather than paying the extra for the park hopper ability during this time when park capacity can be defined as far fewer in the park than what it would be in non-covid times.

Currently annual passes are not for sale and nothing has been indicated as to when that will change. There are exceptions. One can continue to renew any annual pass one already has. Also, if you had an annual pass for 2020 and took the option to get a partial refund offered at the time, you can currently buy a new annual pass.

 

[DisneyRegulars]

We were just there last week, and one thing that we found frustrating was that we couldn’t park hop after 2pm unless we went to our reserved park first. So let’s say we reserved Magic Kingdom, never actually went to magic kingdom, and then wanted to go to Animal Kingdom at 4pm, you would get yelled at at the entrance to AK because you weren’t technically “hopping”. We found ourselves more than once having to walk into a park and right back out just so we could go to a park we actually wanted to go to. It turns out planning 3 months in advance I wasn’t very good at predicting where I wanted to be.

We did find that at rope drop we could ride a few rides before things got too long for us to wait (30 min). But at night, after 5 pm was when we did most of our riding. It took us three mornings at HS to ride all the headliners we wanted to ride. You have to sign up for Rise of the Resistance at 7:00am which is kind of a pain, but at least you can do it from your hotel.

 

[RanDIZ]

Not a fan of wasting travel time park hopping so I think with 13 days in the parks, you probably have each park covered enough to not need to hop if you planned on it. Also, HS is the quickest reservation to fill up. AK is the least. With 13 days, I guess I’d hit MK 4x and the others 3x. I’d also rope drop each park at least twice.

 

[808blessing]

HS, MK, AK, EP is how they get filled up based on my observations. I think AK has a smaller capacity than EP.

 

[Shellyred8]

Hello- hoping for some advice. Now that the system has changed (no FP’s, no AP’s, park reservations), I am at a loss. Any advice would be so very much appreciated!

1. We are planning 13 park days… how do we handle the tickets? No more AP’s…
2. Park reservations- which days should I go to MK/HS/AK now that there’s no fast passes? How hard is it to get on the traditionally hard to get rides?
3. Epcot at night- is it always available? Will the food n wine festival make it really hard to get in? We are planning our trip during fall frenzy, and don’t know whether to make a park ressie at Epcot
4. MK at night- is there availability there as well? We are split staying btwn BWV and BLT, so we used to hit the walkable parks at night. Is this still possible?
Any insight much appreciated. I’m very frustrated right now, and hope that our upcoming trip will not be pleasant (and I can’t plan as nauseum with the Fp’s no longer happening)

One thing to keep in mind: You can only buy up to a 10-day park ticket right now.

Since you are doing a split stay, I would book your HS/EP days while you are at BWV and MK/AK days while you are at BLT. This will keep your bus riding to a minimum.

Up to this point, I haven't heard of anyone being turned away from any park they are hopping to due to capacity issues, but I'm not privy to every person's experiences.

 

[suebeelin]

One thing to keep in mind: You can only buy up to a 10-day park ticket right now.

Since you are doing a split stay, I would book your HS/EP days while you are at BWV and MK/AK days while you are at BLT. This will keep your bus riding to a minimum.

Up to this point, I haven't heard of anyone being turned away from any park they are hopping to due to capacity issues, but I'm not privy to every person's experiences.

thank you! So wondering- how can I go all 13 days?

 

[NoTime42]

thank you! So wondering- how can I go all 13 days?

Either a 10 day park hopper + and visit the water park 3 days.
Or buy a 10 day and 3 day ticket. (Unless there’s a combo of 6+7 that’s cheaper)

 

[Ms.Minnie]

We are doing a 14 day stay in Jan 2022. I just made my park reservations, I have 3 MK, 3 HS, 1 AK and 7 E. I hope I made the correct decision with my park choices. I picked more E because of the dinning options there. I don't plan on being in a park everyday but I didn't want to NOT have a park to go to just in case. I think that is part of what's wrong with this system being a permanent thing. People will make a reservation to a park and not go which may cause another guest to not be able to get in that park.

Good luck with your planning, it seems to get harder and harder every year.