The Magic is Back - Share your Experience! Superthread

[evilmommie]

.

 

[GBRforWDW]

Virtual queues has added Indiana Jones:



can get there from the My Queues link under the Star Wars ATAT picture or by clicking the 3 lines in lower right and clicking Virtual Queues, then a join Boarding Group. Same as you would for joining RotR.

 

[dieumeye]

So, after doing the death march to and from the parking structure twice yesterday, I am wondering...

Can we get back to the structure via Downtown Disney and the pedestrian bridge that had opened prior to the pandemic? That walk seems much faster and more pleasant than walking the tram route, but we didn't want to go all the way to the end of DtD only to find out they closed off that pathway back.

Anyone know for sure?

Yes, you can walk thru DtD, exit between former ESPN & Rainforest Cafe buildings, and take the bridge to the structure. I did it last Saturday.

One change: the plaza at the structure is blocked off coming from the bridge (no escalators down), so if you are parked on the M&F side, you need to take the Pixar elevators to the appropriate level and walk over to M&F that way. For example I was parked on the red Mickey level, so I took the Pixar elevator to the red Lighting McQueen level.

 

[mom2rtk]

if my (3/4 vaccinated) family is sitting a table outdoors and the nearest table is at least 10 feet away, why can't we take off the masks? It's SO much overkill. Again, I know this isn't Disney's rule, but at WDW they at least have the mask relaxation stations, so people can just sit for awhile and sip some water or whatever.

Meanwhile my fully vaccinated family (for over a month now) can't even visit. I guess all of us should expect some craziness to the rules.

 

[GBRforWDW]

That seems overly complicated. If they have a standby still available, what's the point of a virtual queue? Is this the new FastPass system? And if they decide to turn it off, how do people know or do we just have to keep checking the app throughout the day?

Hypothetical questions I'm thinking out loud, not asking you specifically!

More info on how the standby line will be used for Indiana Jones.


sounds like they’ll turn it on when needed. Then use it until all groups are called that were distributed.

Guessing anyone in line when they turn it on will be allowed to stay in line. As the line starts getting too long, they’ll probably turn on the VQ and let guests approaching know to use the app.

 

[DLgal]

Meanwhile my fully vaccinated family (for over a month now) can't even visit. I guess all of us should expect some craziness to the rules.

Well, I've been living with these rules for a year now, so I'm completely over them, but man was it rough having to be so restricted on the drinking water, especially. I am a huge water drinker and so are my kids and I felt so dehydrated by the end of the day. It wasn't even a warm day either!

 

[cruisehopeful]

So, to sum up, it was a mixed bag, but I'm remembering more of the things that annoyed me than the things that were fun, and that's a hard pill to swallow. I've been to the parks SO many times and just wanted to get back, and it just felt like one big headache created from lots of little headaches. I didn't really have high expectations. I thought I was prepared. I suppose in hindsight, my expectations were too high.

Whenever I have gone to a first of anything there, it's been a cluster. That's why I am in no hurry to go right now. I expected it to have to work out a lot of kinks. I supposed the CMs are having their own issues, but some of the stuff you posted was pretty rude and I can't see myself paying $150/day for that type of service. They need to direct their anger at whoever/whatever they are angry about and not displace it people who are just not aware that you have to remove your glasses or that you can't rest your foot on a fence.

Well, I've been living with these rules for a year now, so I'm completely over them, but man was it rough having to be so restricted on the drinking water, especially. I am a huge water drinker and so are my kids and I felt so dehydrated by the end of the day. It wasn't even a warm day either!

We drink water all day every day. If we don't stay hydrated, everything else goes awry. We get hungry, tired, pain, grumpy..... I think it is set up that people can sit down and drink water whenever they want, though. We'd be having lots of sit and drink water breaks. At any rate, I'm really glad we haven't gone back, yet.

 

[dieumeye]

Okay, I'm going to try to condense my thoughts some and give a review. It wasn't all bad, so I don't want anyone to get that impression. My kids had a blast, and it was a very enjoyable way to spend Mother's day. It just left me feeling like things could be a LOT better.

So, I'll break it down into the main parts:

Arrival/Departure via Mickey and Friends Structure: No way to sugar coat this. The parking/lack of tram situation is AWFUL. We arrived just after 8:30am and the line of cars waiting to enter extended well into the flyover ramp. By the time we got to the booth, they were just waving cars through by handing them "no charge" parking receipts. I think they were probably trying to get a hold of the backup on the surface streets. I was happy to get free parking, because there is no nice way to talk about having to go through the maze of health screening/security check only to come back out the other side to walk the tram route. At least we didn't pay $25 (this time) for that kind of treatment. We clocked it at a mile walk, from the time we stepped off the escalators until we arrived at the entry gate. Having to do that twice was a real buzzkill. There was nothing nice to say about it. It felt like a death march. I would MUCH prefer walking through DtD via the pedestrian bridge connected to the structure, as I used to do that walk in the past and it felt nowhere near as punishing. Maybe because it's a more interesting/scenic walk? I don't know, but it was kind of messed up to see people in wheelchairs, one little girl using a push walker, while her parents pushed the sister in a wheelchair, etc. I could not stop thinking "there is no good reason to make people do this." It honestly felt like a punishment.

Disney, stop being cheap. Open the trams. Run them half full if you must, run them back to back so there are never backups of people. Just do it! (The survey specifically asked about the arrival/departure experience and they wanted specific feedback, so I let them have it)

Entry/Park Hopping: Initial entry was quick and pretty easy. No ID check, no need to scan QR code. However, when park hopping, we had a kind of grouchy CM who barked at my autistic son "take off your glasses" (he wears prescription glasses, as does his brother). He was kind of taken aback and turned away to check with me and she literally yelled at him "Hold on! I need to take your photo, take off your hat and glasses." So, that was not the greatest. My son felt like he did something wrong. The rest of us just automatically took off our glasses. I guess with the masks, they need to see people's eyes for the photos, but she could have been nicer about it. He is just a kid.

*To add, I witnessed a CM absolutely flip out and scream at a teenage girl in Frontierland. She had her back to the fence post and had one foot propped up on the bottom log of the fence, and this CM literally ran over from the entrance to Big Thunder to yell "you need to keep both feet on the ground at all times!" I mean, it was excessive and completely unnecessary. She was just looking at her phone and just sort of lifted up her foot behind her to rest it on the bottom of the fence. It's not like she was scaling it. She was probably like 17 or so, not a kid. That guy needed to chill. Goodness.

DAS: So, our youngest uses a DAS, so we figured we should probably get one, not knowing how everything would go with ride waits. We headed straight to Guest Relations, to find shuttered doors and a sign with a QR code to scan for an appointment "later in the day." Um, we needed help at the beginning of the day. "Later" for a DAS doesn't exactly work. There was ONE CM standing outside, so I asked her how we can get a DAS and she wordlessly pointed to the sign. I said, "yeah, I saw that, what does it mean." She said "we are helping guests in the tour garden outdoors and you can scan to make an appointment to come back later when it's your turn." So, I asked, "well, how long from now is later?" She said, "Probably a couple hours. You will get a notification when it's your turn. So, I said, "that's not really going to work for us, so I guess we will just skip it." She THEN said, "well, you can also stop at any of our GR kiosks throughout the park and they can set you up with a DAS there." REALLY? She couldn't have said that first? If they can do that at the kiosks (they usually don't set up an initial DAS at those), why didn't she just direct me straight there? And if setting up a DAS can be done so easily, why are there not a few GR CMs standing outside with their iPhones ready to help people? We got the DAS at the kiosk on Main Street, and got a return time for Millenium Falcon, which already had a posted 45 min wait.

Rides/Wait times: NOT ONE ride had an overinflated wait time. Every single ride we got in line for was easily double the posted wait. My kids had chosen Big Thunder as their first ride. Nope. Broken down. Option 2 was Autopia. 5 minute wait posted. Actual, 18 minutes. They had one lane open (this was already 10:30am) and had literally 14 cars on the track. We had to wait through like 4 cycles to get on and then our family got separated when we got to the end and they stopped our car and held us while 2 CMs drove 7 more cars onto the track. The same 2 CMs would drive a car up to the loading area, run back, jump in another car, drive back, and repeat. I texted my husband to go ahead to Star Tours with our youngest, since we were held up on that track for almost 10 minutes.

We waited almost 40 minutes to ride Small World (posted time was 15). We waited 20 for Big Thunder (posted 10). We got in a line for the Silly Swings that said 10 minutes and then the CM told us it would be "at least 30 minutes." So, we got out of that line as it was almost 5:30 by that point and we still wanted to do Soarin. When we got to Soarin (with our DAS return, thank goodness), the posted wait time was 50 minutes. Just before we went in, they made an announcement that "due to technical difficulties, the wait time would now be 100 minutes." This was 6pm at this point. About half the people in line walked out. We got to head in and ride. I suppose either one theater went down or they purposely took it offline to knock down the line. It seemed like suspect timing and by the time we walked in, they had blocked off the left side path with garbage cans. There was no CM there to direct us to the right side, but it was clear which way to go. Basically, we used the DAS for Millenium Falcon, Snow White (which had a posted 45 min wait as well), Toy Story Midway Mania, RSR, and Soarin. The last three rides had posted waits of 80 min (RSR), 50 min (TSMM) and 100 min (Soarin). We did standby for Autopia, Small World, Teacups, Mater's, Luigi's, Pixar Pal Around, and Goofy's Sky School. We ran out of time and missed Peter Pan, Splash Mountain, Little Mermaid, and the Silly Symphony Swings. Those had been the "must dos." But, we ran out of time because of...

We REALLY missed Maxpass. It was a real bummer not to be able to plan an efficient way of hitting our favorite rides. We did so much less than we usually do in an 8 hour day. I couldn't believe how quickly the day passed by and most of it was spent waiting for things.

Mobile Order/Eating: Fail. All around fail. I used to LOVE mobile ordering. I would tell everyone to use it. It used to be great. Now, it's ridiculous that it is the ONLY way to get food everywhere. We had to place 3 mobile orders early in the morning to get return windows before 2pm. We did a Ronto Wrap, a Pizza from Red Rose Tavern, and a Fried Chicken meal and kid's meal from Plaza Inn. All in, we spent more time waiting for our food to be ready than what was reasonable. The Ronto Wrap was the longest wait, ironically. You would think a stand that makes 2 items can be efficient. Nope. Hit that button and proceeded to wait 25 minutes for one ronto wrap. Waited almost that long for the pizza. Waited only 15 min for the chicken, but then the order came out wrong and I had to speak to 3 different CMs before I found one who knew what to do to help me. It was an easy fix, they forgot one side of mashed potatoes and gravy (I literally got a chicken leg by itself in a box for the kid's meal). I just needed that side. It was a process. They have no system in place to help people with order issues. The one CM basically admitted to me "sometimes they get so backed up that they don't really pay attention when filling the orders." Yikes.

My husband was looking forward to a beer in DCA. He tried to mobile order one from Sonoma Terrace while we were still in DL (had to get a head start if he actually wanted the beer anytime soon---as it was, the return window was an hour and a half later). He got a message TWICE that said he could only order the beer with an "adult meal." I was like, that's not right. So, I said try the Karl Strauss beer truck...it was "temporarily unable to take mobile orders." Okay, Flo's...."next return window 5:30-6:30 (it was 2pm). Went back into the Sonoma Terrace menu and it let him order 2 beers. Sigh. So, when it was finally time for him to pick it up, he decided he would also like a pretzel to go with his beer. So, when he went to pick up the beers, he asked if he could buy a pretzel. "Sorry, you have to mobile order it." There was literally no one else around. The pretzels were right there, and the CM had no way (NOT blaming him for this) to sell my husband a pretzel. So, my husband opened the app and tried to order the pretzel....and the return window was over and hour away. He was like "forget it, I guess." The CM obviously felt bad, and told him "go ahead and place the order, and I'll just fill it now." So, DH orders the pretzel, and then the app doesn't give him his discount. His AP and Legacy discount barcode are linked in his app, but it wouldn't work (it also didn't work at Red Rose Tavern, so I just placed that order for him and he picked it up). So, now we have to call and find out what is going on there. He did end up with the pretzel, and he said it was cold and dry. So, all that effort and the pretzel wasn't even good.

So, to sum up, it absolutely stinks that you cannot just get food spur of the moment, or just walk up and order a drink somewhere. It's problematic and they need to do something to fix that. A lot of the enjoyment for us at a day at the parks is just grabbing a snack or drink when the mood strikes. All that is out the window now. It felt like eating was a chore and something ELSE we had to actively plan ahead of time. I felt like the whole day we were operating around our mobile order pickup windows. I did not like that at all.

Safety measures/Impact:
Right off the bat, I am going to say the the Rise of the Resistance experience is absolutely ruined by the plexiglass panel. We were sat in the back row (for DH's first ride, as a huge Star Wars nut) and the only saving grace was he sat on the end so he could see to the side and kind of peer around the panel. Pretty much all I saw were the reflections of the various lights and effects. It was hideous and those panels need to GO. Now. They serve absolutely no purpose on a ride like that that moves all around a space.



Atmosphere:
This is the big thing that is different. There is a distinct lack of atmosphere in the parks. They are too quiet. People aren't talking to each other (masks make that kind of hard). People aren't laughing and shouting. Lots of the rides that provide noise and kinetic movement are not operational- submarines, monorail, train (only one train running, so the whistles are sporadic). There is no live music (this is something they COULD be doing). I'm used to hearing the marching band, the Pearly band, the jazz band, and live bands playing at DCA. It was just so silent. The park music was on, but that was it. The character sightings were limited mostly to the train station and near Small World. Tomorrowland was literally dead. It looked closed. I felt almost like a Run Disney event, where you get to run through the park after hours but it's not really open all the way. So, you get to see the sights, but the park isn't "alive." That's the feeling I got. The cast members were fine, for the most part, but I wouldn't say that any of them seemed thrilled to be there. It was odd to see some with masks AND face shields. It was kind of off putting, to be honest. I didn't feel like it was uncrowded. To the contrary, I found it literally impossible to maintain 6ft of distance, as numerous signs remind you to all day. The charade needs to stop. Outside of designated queues with floor markers, people are not (and honestly CANNOT adequately distance). It is what it is, and it didn't bother me, but I can imagine some people are going to go to the parks expecting them to be empty and be in for a rude awakening when they are brushing arms with people passing by them all day long, every time they enter or exit a bathroom, at the exits of rides, etc. People will be in your space just like they were before.

Now, we were blessed with perfect park weather yesterday. It was overcast and in the mid 60s. The sun came out for only a few hours in the late afternoon. Maybe some of my perception is that it was so "blah" and gray all day. Disneyland just felt sad and gloomy to me. It wasn't all bright and shiny and colorful.

I just want the parks back to how they were, and I know that's never happening. I would settle for just the dining to return fully (it was tough finding food for everyone to eat due to said limited dining options, which is why we ended up with 3 separate mobile orders), the trams to run again, Maxpass to come back, and for the mask rules to be relaxed enough that we can take a sip of water while walking without breaking a rule. I would also like to see the return of rides and live entertainment that add some energy to the parks. There is no "safety" reason to not have live entertainment outdoors.

I feel like I spent so much time thinking about and making sure we were doing the right thing all day and that wasn't enjoyable. I hate how much time we spend waiting. Waiting for food orders. Waiting to park. Waiting in standby lines. Waiting to enter stores. Just waiting all day. We probably spent 1/2 of our day just waiting.

So, to sum up, it was a mixed bag, but I'm remembering more of the things that annoyed me than the things that were fun, and that's a hard pill to swallow. I've been to the parks SO many times and just wanted to get back, and it just felt like one big headache created from lots of little headaches. I didn't really have high expectations. I thought I was prepared. I suppose in hindsight, my expectations were too high.

I agree with a lot of what you said. I visited last Saturday and had a good time, but I was formerly a frequent visitor and this most recent visit was just a quick solo visit to check out the parks. So I didn’t really have expectations or plans. A few things from my experience:

Wait times: I didn’t ride much, but all wait times were under reported for me. Big Thunder was posted at 15 minutes, actually 20. Haunted Mansion was posted 20 minutes, actually 30 (although it would have been shorter if I’d taken the stairs, which I didn’t). And Snow White was posted at 25 minutes, actual wait 45 minutes!

MaxPass: yeah, I miss it.

Mobile Order: this is kind of a disaster. The original idea was to avoid a line and just use mobile order. But somehow you now need to wait 3 times! First, you need to wait for your return time - this could be right away or hours away. Second, when you arrive you click “I’m Here” and you need to wait until it says your order is ready - this used to be instant to a minute but I had a 15 minute wait for it to change over. Third, once your order is “ready” you are allowed to get IN LINE to pick it up - this line can be 20+ minutes. It took an hour to get my order of a Coke & Babybel cheese snack. This is not sustainable. I hope with more dining options opening, this gets better.

CMs: I only encountered friendly CMs. I’d say I even met some aggressively friendly CMs! I know there have been some complaints about CMs here and that is disappointing. But I had nothing but good experiences, so I hope this is getting worked out.

Like I said, my visit was just a quick solo visit, so I just rolled with it. If I was planning a once in a decade trip, I’d wait. I have a bigger family trip in June so I’m hoping a lot of these issues get worked out by then.

 

[mouschievous]

I love your mask!! Super cute.

Some character pics
View attachment 574354

DOPEY!!! He's my favorite. I got my first dog when I was 7. The puppies in his litter were all named after the dwarves and mine was Dopey. We changed his name to Samu (hungarian for Sam), but ever since then Dopey has held a special place in my heart. Thank you for sharing this photo.

 

[evilmommie]

.

 

[SOCALMouseMommy]

So, we left home at 8:22. It was almost 90 minutes later that we finally walked into Disneyland. What an ordeal! Parking took FOREVER (although we were pixie dusted with free parking), and that walk to the park is a slog, to put it mildly.

But you are going on a weekday, so it shouldn't be too bad. Weekends, you have to plan to arrive at the structure by 7:45 to have any hope of making it into the parks by 9.

Was it the line to enter the structure that took so long? Or security? Something else? I’m still trying to plan my strategy for our day next Tuesday. I very much want to be at the gate before park opening.

 

[DLgal]

Was it the line to enter the structure that took so long? Or security? Something else? I’m still trying to plan my strategy for our day next Tuesday. I very much want to be at the gate before park opening.

It was mostly waiting to enter the structure. That was a good 40 minutes.

 

[SOCALMouseMommy]

It was mostly waiting to enter the structure. That was a good 40 minutes.

OK, that makes up my mind, I'm definitely going to use alternative parking arrangements. I can't believe they won't open up the structure earlier and spread it out a bit. It is mind boggling!

 

[midnight star]

OK, that makes up my mind, I'm definitely going to use alternative parking arrangements. I can't believe they won't open up the structure earlier and spread it out a bit. It is mind boggling!

So I’ve seen some reports that they do open parking more than 30 minutes before park opening. It just varies. I would check alternative arrangements though to be safe since you want to be there right at 9am.

 

[audrey2580]

DAS: So, our youngest uses a DAS, so we figured we should probably get one, not knowing how everything would go with ride waits. We headed straight to Guest Relations, to find shuttered doors and a sign with a QR code to scan for an appointment "later in the day." Um, we needed help at the beginning of the day. "Later" for a DAS doesn't exactly work. There was ONE CM standing outside, so I asked her how we can get a DAS and she wordlessly pointed to the sign. I said, "yeah, I saw that, what does it mean." She said "we are helping guests in the tour garden outdoors and you can scan to make an appointment to come back later when it's your turn." So, I asked, "well, how long from now is later?" She said, "Probably a couple hours. You will get a notification when it's your turn. So, I said, "that's not really going to work for us, so I guess we will just skip it." She THEN said, "well, you can also stop at any of our GR kiosks throughout the park and they can set you up with a DAS there." REALLY? She couldn't have said that first? If they can do that at the kiosks (they usually don't set up an initial DAS at those), why didn't she just direct me straight there? And if setting up a DAS can be done so easily, why are there not a few GR CMs standing outside with their iPhones ready to help people? We got the DAS at the kiosk on Main Street, and got a return time for Millenium Falcon, which already had a posted 45 min wait.

Thanks for the detailed report. Just a heads up they have been setting up DAS from the GR kiosks since atleast 2018. That's when we started using it and were directed there from day 1.

 

[hlrubin507]

I would love feedback from anyone who walks in via Harbor (via the "hotel row" there) on how long the line to enter takes at various times...if the park opens at 9am, does it save you time to line up at 8am (or before), or is that wasted time in that if you wander over at 9 or 9:30 you get in that much quicker, not having waited for the turnstiles to open at 8:45 or whenever they are opening, and saved your line-waiting for the parks?

 

[MamaKC]

I would love feedback from anyone who walks in via Harbor (via the "hotel row" there) on how long the line to enter takes at various times...if the park opens at 9am, does it save you time to line up at 8am (or before), or is that wasted time in that if you wander over at 9 or 9:30 you get in that much quicker, not having waited for the turnstiles to open at 8:45 or whenever they are opening, and saved your line-waiting for the parks?

We went this past weekend. We walked via Harbor and got in line between 7:30-7:45. We were in the park by 8:30-8:45 all three days. We were able to get on Haunted Mansion before the park opened one morning and Soarin’ another. The first day I believe we did Indiana Jones first but they didn’t start until 9am that day.
The lines from Harbor got really long around 8. If you can go a bit earlier, closer to 7:30 it is very fast!! It was an easy process every morning.

 

[GBRforWDW]

Wow, so this Indiana Jones VQ confuses me. I missed when it became available, but they're calling all the groups at once? Or do they just have a few in a group?



Just went back and now it's 1 to 200. Hopefully someone here was able to access the queue and get a boarding pass!

 

[CO2CA]

Now it's up to 225. I wonder if they'll allow people to come back whenever so that we don't have to try to plan around it. That would be super helpful!

 

[GBRforWDW]

Now it's up to 225. I wonder if they'll allow people to come back whenever so that we don't have to try to plan around it. That would be super helpful!

Looks like the first 100 have expired, now groups 101 to 225. Hopefully the group sizes are very small to prevent the overflow they're trying to avoid with the VQ