jcdeberry
Mouseketeer
- Joined
- Jun 7, 2016
- Messages
- 115
I have spent a week processing and am now ready to give my thoughts. My family spent 2 days at Universal and 5 days at WDW. We were at WDW the same time last year so I can compare the two.
1. I can safely say that we are Disney people. Even though we enjoyed ourselves at UO (The Royal Pacific Resort was wonderful and I love the Express pass and the fact the hotels are so close to the parks), the amount of 3D rides just made us feel yucky alot!
2. We stayed at the Coronado Springs Resort for the first time and we certainly enjoyed it. It is a beautiful resort and the Dig Site pool was fabulous (even though I prefer rooms that open to the inside). We ate at the Maya Grill one night and were very pleasantly surprised with the quality of the food and atmosphere.
3. The CMs were wonderful as always-this is where Disney shines above all others. We had a problem going to HS one evening. We waited for the bus for an hour (which normally would have been fine, but we missed my son's Jedi Training because of it) and when we got to the park, my 5 yo had lost his Magicband. We had to go to Guest Relations to straighten it out. It took quite a long time because of a problem with the park cards not responding. A big shout out to CM Harry at HS Guest Relations. He could tell I was on the verge of tears and was as sweet as he could be. He gave us 2 anytime FPs for all of us for the next 2 days. He also knew I was going to the SW Dessert Party and told me how wonderful it was. He said he does the SW tours and he thought it would be too much for my 5 yo, but the party was just right.
4. Crowds-It was definitely more crowded this year than last year. It was also extremely hot. But we kept cool by drinking tons of ice water from the QS places (the CMs even brought out ice water for us while waited for the parade to start! (another example of how great WDW customer service is) We also made sure we had good touring plans (those extra FPs helped) and we utilized the SDFP (before the changes) and 4th and 5th FPs. We either got there early so we didn't wait very long for a ride or we used FP-even for the shorter ride lines because saving 15-20 minutes each time is like gold!
5. Pandora-We did AK the second day Pandora opened. The park was scheduled to open at 8:00. We got there at 7:30 and was surprised that they opened the park at 7:00 instead. No problem. We hightailed it to N'avi River to ride standby at 30 minutes which was the longest we waited for any ride all week. Halfway through, my son had to go potty. So we excused ourselves through everyone and found the bathrooms. By then, the line was back to the bathrooms and the wait was 120 minutes! We rejoined my husband and daughter and really enjoyed the ride. We had a FP for FOP and it was stunning. The standby wait was 4.5 hours at 9:30am. I was sitting in seat 1 and got a little sick at the end, but it was still wonderful. We couldn't get back in at night because they had closed Pandora around 10:30 pm because it was full. Instead, we rode EE at night which was so great! It is a totally different ride at night and so glad we did it!
6. Final thoughts-The new rides, other than Pandora, that we rode were FEA, New Soarin (still love it even though the Eiffel Tower looked like a limp hot dog), Gran Fiesta Tour (why have I never been inside the Mexican pyramid before??? it was wonderful!!), Frozen Sing A-long (highly recommended-it was hilarious). Still love 7DMT (had PPO BOG reservations and it worked like a charm-rode it twice before heading to SM) and Splash! We also ate at O'hana for late breakfast and loved it. I wish all character meals brought food to your table. So much easier to enjoy.
1. I can safely say that we are Disney people. Even though we enjoyed ourselves at UO (The Royal Pacific Resort was wonderful and I love the Express pass and the fact the hotels are so close to the parks), the amount of 3D rides just made us feel yucky alot!
2. We stayed at the Coronado Springs Resort for the first time and we certainly enjoyed it. It is a beautiful resort and the Dig Site pool was fabulous (even though I prefer rooms that open to the inside). We ate at the Maya Grill one night and were very pleasantly surprised with the quality of the food and atmosphere.
3. The CMs were wonderful as always-this is where Disney shines above all others. We had a problem going to HS one evening. We waited for the bus for an hour (which normally would have been fine, but we missed my son's Jedi Training because of it) and when we got to the park, my 5 yo had lost his Magicband. We had to go to Guest Relations to straighten it out. It took quite a long time because of a problem with the park cards not responding. A big shout out to CM Harry at HS Guest Relations. He could tell I was on the verge of tears and was as sweet as he could be. He gave us 2 anytime FPs for all of us for the next 2 days. He also knew I was going to the SW Dessert Party and told me how wonderful it was. He said he does the SW tours and he thought it would be too much for my 5 yo, but the party was just right.
4. Crowds-It was definitely more crowded this year than last year. It was also extremely hot. But we kept cool by drinking tons of ice water from the QS places (the CMs even brought out ice water for us while waited for the parade to start! (another example of how great WDW customer service is) We also made sure we had good touring plans (those extra FPs helped) and we utilized the SDFP (before the changes) and 4th and 5th FPs. We either got there early so we didn't wait very long for a ride or we used FP-even for the shorter ride lines because saving 15-20 minutes each time is like gold!
5. Pandora-We did AK the second day Pandora opened. The park was scheduled to open at 8:00. We got there at 7:30 and was surprised that they opened the park at 7:00 instead. No problem. We hightailed it to N'avi River to ride standby at 30 minutes which was the longest we waited for any ride all week. Halfway through, my son had to go potty. So we excused ourselves through everyone and found the bathrooms. By then, the line was back to the bathrooms and the wait was 120 minutes! We rejoined my husband and daughter and really enjoyed the ride. We had a FP for FOP and it was stunning. The standby wait was 4.5 hours at 9:30am. I was sitting in seat 1 and got a little sick at the end, but it was still wonderful. We couldn't get back in at night because they had closed Pandora around 10:30 pm because it was full. Instead, we rode EE at night which was so great! It is a totally different ride at night and so glad we did it!
6. Final thoughts-The new rides, other than Pandora, that we rode were FEA, New Soarin (still love it even though the Eiffel Tower looked like a limp hot dog), Gran Fiesta Tour (why have I never been inside the Mexican pyramid before??? it was wonderful!!), Frozen Sing A-long (highly recommended-it was hilarious). Still love 7DMT (had PPO BOG reservations and it worked like a charm-rode it twice before heading to SM) and Splash! We also ate at O'hana for late breakfast and loved it. I wish all character meals brought food to your table. So much easier to enjoy.
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