Strategies for short lines for the MK's most popular rides are more limited than ever for offsite visitors

[kathy884]

We just spent a day at the Magic Kingdom on Wednesday February 5th. We were staying at my nephew's house who lives in Orlando so were offsite visitors. We at the earliest time possible went online three days in advance to purchase lightening lanes to hopefully get some short lines for some of the most popular rides. For the multiple ride lightening lanes, Tiana's Bayou was already sold out. The single lightening lanes for Tron and 7DMT were also already sold out. We bought the multi park lightening lane anyway and booked Space Mountain. Other rides in that next tier were walk on per our touring plan from touringplans.com, so that's all we bothered to book. It sure seemed to be a lot of money to just get a lightening lane for one ride. Space Mountain, though, was broken down for our LL time and Disney then automatically changed us to have an anytime LL and we went back an rode that with a really short line being in the LL line when that was back up. It was nice to have the short line for that for DS as this is a must do for him. But Gosh I can't believe the amount of money I spent for just this.

Also, being offsite we no longer have the rope drop advantage since onsite visitors get to go in a 1/2 hour earlier, so rope dropping Tron or something like that really doesn't help much. The line is already quite long even in low season.

Now for Tiana at 7 a.m. day of visit we were able to get in a boarding group for the virtual queue, and that worked well. The line wasn't bad either. We decided to skip 7DMT as we don't think that is worth an hour wait. One in our party had never been on that, but it's one I'd only do if I could get an LL and all in our party agreed.

My son really wanted to do TRON and waited for that in an almost 90 minute line after fireworks (probably the worst time, but we were doing other things all day and were behind on our touring plan due to breakdowns and never got to that earlier). Also, we had a two hour break at the Polynesian for a birthday dinner at Ohana which was wonderful (expensive, but really fun and it's a nostalgic place for us). We experienced breakdowns for Space Mountain, Pirates, Winnie the Pooh, Tiki Birds and People Mover - got to do all but Winnie the Pooh, but still. I don't think I've seen this many breakdowns before on so many of the older rides. At least we could check status online. The rest of us weren't interested in TRON given the long line and did three other historical attractions instead while my son waited for that. We would have done TRON though if the line were under 30 minutes long or if we could have gotten an LL. That wasn't the case all day though even on a crowd level 4 day (reasonably quiet for Disney).

If you are going for nostalgia (That's what we were doing for the most part) being an offsite visitor slow season still works great as the old time rides and things like Dapper Dans, etc. are fun and didn't have much in the way of lines at all. If though you want to hit the most popular things and not have long lines, you almost need to be onsite, even in the off season.

I used to recommend offsite stays due to the great value of offsite timeshares (great amenities for low cost), but I think (and I get it - Disney is in the hotel business big time - needs incentives to fill the rooms and people should get some perks for the prices they are paying), I would have to recommend that for people who want to do the latest and greatest things with lower lines that they stay onsite (sad, but true).

 

[muppets3d]

You just need to have more willingess to wait in line. Magic Kingdom is the most visited theme park on the face of the earth, no matter when you go it's going to be busy and there will be a wait for pretty much anything. In general, I find paying for lightning lanes to be a waste of money because you can just rearrange your day a bit and ride most everything, especially this time of year.

 

[2minny]

I have such frustration with the Lightning Lanes - we just spent a week at the parks, staying on site at Boardwalk Villas. Our first four days were with littles, and we bought the Lightning lane Mult Pass, and although we got to get on some rides quickly - basically a walk on, while those without waited 60-75 minutes for 7 Dwarfs or Peter Pan - it just feels wrong. I was ok with fast passes years ago, because it was free and an opportunity for all. But paying for park entrance and then paying additional to get walk on rides, just seems wrong. PLUS, many of the top tier rides aren't available, or you can't book another until you use the one, and the first one could be later in the day. This lightning lane addition has really messed up the wait times too, we were talking to many that got in line for Peter Pan with a 45 minute wait time posted, but they didn't get on the ride for 75 minutes, because they let the Lightning Lane folks walk on, no wait at all. So you could sit in line and not move for 20 minutes while they let all lightning lane people keep walking on. Having just been there for a week and doing 4 days of Lightning Lane multi pass and 2 days without. I'd say (and it was super crowded with cheer groups), you almost have to buy the pass if you want to ride a good amount of rides, and not wait for 75 minute lines - which is just baffling to me. We got all the virtual queues each day that we wanted, and I do appreciate that Disney isn't charging for that. But goodness, so much nickel and diming the customers. Sorry for the rant, it's all just so fresh right now. We went in May before Lightning Lane Multi Pass and had a much better experience than this Feb trip.

 

[kathy884]

I hear what you are saying 1minnie. I didn't really want to buy the lightening lane pass I did, but I was already spending sooo much money for tickets that I almost felt compelled to get what I could to have a better experience, given that some in my party did want to do some of the bigger rides with the longer lines and that we were just doing one day.

 

[muppets3d]

I have such frustration with the Lightning Lanes - we just spent a week at the parks, staying on site at Boardwalk Villas. Our first four days were with littles, and we bought the Lightning lane Mult Pass, and although we got to get on some rides quickly - basically a walk on, while those without waited 60-75 minutes for 7 Dwarfs or Peter Pan - it just feels wrong. I was ok with fast passes years ago, because it was free and an opportunity for all. But paying for park entrance and then paying additional to get walk on rides, just seems wrong. PLUS, many of the top tier rides aren't available, or you can't book another until you use the one, and the first one could be later in the day. This lightning lane addition has really messed up the wait times too, we were talking to many that got in line for Peter Pan with a 45 minute wait time posted, but they didn't get on the ride for 75 minutes, because they let the Lightning Lane folks walk on, no wait at all. So you could sit in line and not move for 20 minutes while they let all lightning lane people keep walking on. Having just been there for a week and doing 4 days of Lightning Lane multi pass and 2 days without. I'd say (and it was super crowded with cheer groups), you almost have to buy the pass if you want to ride a good amount of rides, and not wait for 75 minute lines - which is just baffling to me. We got all the virtual queues each day that we wanted, and I do appreciate that Disney isn't charging for that. But goodness, so much nickel and diming the customers. Sorry for the rant, it's all just so fresh right now. We went in May before Lightning Lane Multi Pass and had a much better experience than this Feb trip.

If all lightning lanes did was make the wait 20 minutes instead of 45, nobody would pay for it. The only way to make it worth paying is to make it truly a skipped line.

I refuse to buy it. You don't need it unless you're only in the park for one day and it's a once in a lifetime type of trip.

 

[kathy884]

If all lightning lanes did was make the wait 20 minutes instead of 45, nobody would pay for it. The only way to make it worth paying is to make it truly a skipped line.

I refuse to buy it. You don't need it unless you're only in the park for one day and it's a once in a lifetime type of trip.

I get what you are saying. In our case we were just in the park for one day and for me, that that day is probably the last time I ever go to a Disney park, so I did want to make it the best experience I could. The last time I was in the MK was five years ago, but I don't see me going again five years from now, for example. As an offsite visitor, the multiride pass doesn't get you much and the single LL passes were not even available to buy.