I know it’s crazy but we only have one day and my kids (ages 11-19) would like to get in as many headliners as possible. Any suggestions on Park order and which fastpasses we should schedule in advance? It’s a 5 on the crowd calendar with early morning hours for Epcot which we are not eligible for. Any suggestions are appreciated - thanks!
My first suggestion is to tone down your expectations. Personally, I think, given a single day, I’d rather spend that day in maybe two parks and miss out on a few things than to rush from park to park to park to park, eating up valuable time in transit, and feeling stress to get it all in.
So, I’d first decide WHICH headliners are MOST important to you (and your kids) and prioritize which TWO parks have the most of those. If you manage to get through both parks with more time, THEN consider hopping to a third park. But I just can’t honestly believe you’d really get a chance to experience the magic of WDW if you try to hit all four parks. (Not that it CAN’T be done.) Disney just really isn’t the place for it, in my mind. That’s better for doing at pure amusement parks like a Six Flags, etc.
Just one guy’s opinion.
Thanks - I totally agree and frankly would prefer one day in each park , but just can’t do it this time - we are willing to be at any park before RD (thinking AK to try FoP).
We have done four parks in one day, but it was just for the fun of it and not because we needed to. What we did was RD the first park; we made FPPs for the second park. Once we used those we scheduled SD FPPs for third park and then the fourth park. It worked well. It would make sense to have the fourth park be the one that’s open the latest.
The most I’ve done in one day was three; I did EMH RD at EP, hopped to AK for an early afternoon big Liner meet, and then decided to hop to MK (which was open until midnight that night) when AK closed at 7:00. But this was before the FPP system was in place, so there wasn’t a lot of pre-planning; I just got my paper FPs as I went. I think the FPP system works well for one park in a day, and perhaps even better for 2 parks in a day, but really makes 3 or 4 parks in a day much more challenging to plan - especially if you’re trying to do all “headliners”
Not based on “experience”, but I think your idea of starting at AK to get FOP done first thing is wise. Then go straight to KS as a standby and then go to EE and use the single rider line. Go through Dinoland, and if the SB line at Dinosaur is reasonable, hit it on your way out.
If one park is open later than any of the others, save that one for last, if they all close at the same time the order is kind of your call. MK has the most attractions, so you might have better luck finding “additional” FPPs there than at the other two, so I might save that for last. also, if you don’t want to see the fireworks, that’s a good time to find shorter SB lines.
As for advance FPP selections, MK kind of gives you the “biggest bang for your buck” as there are no tiers; you could get FPPs for the “three mountains”. At the other two parks you could only get 1 tier 1 in advance. AT EP you could get an FPP for Soarin or FEA and try the single rider line at TT (and use your other two at SE and MS). AT DHS, the 3 TSL rides are tier 1, and everything else is tier 2. Choose between SDD and TSM for your tier 1 and ToT and RnRC as your tier 2 choices. ST typically has reasonable SB lines.
I think the real challenge for you will be FPP availability. As you are not eligible for EMH, that implies you are staying off-site and will only be able to make FPPs at 30 days vice 60, so availability may be scarce for some attractions. Also, as you will be doing all 4 parks, you will only have 3-4 hours at each park, so you will have to get all 3 FPPs to fit into a specific 3-4 hour time frame. FPP availability with these constraints may become the determining factor as to which park order you choose; I would probably choose my FPP park as number 2 on my list, giving me the possible option for additional FPPs at parks 3 and 4.
In closing, I will echo what others have said; I think picking two parks and spending half a day at each would ultimately be more enjoyable and will probably result in more total number of rides for the day. I think most people who do all four parks in a single day do it “to have done it” and have a relatively low expectation on the number of rides that they will be able to do. If I ever decided to pre-plan a 4-park day, it would be on my “fifth day” after I had a full day at each of the other parks…
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How are you getting from park to park (and through security for each)? Have that plan, too. If it’s uber, see if you can estimate your wait times. If it’s the bus, make sure you take the ride into account. Or are you driving? That’s parking and walking, keep the TTC for MK in mind.
I’ve done 3 parks and had a similar to @dreamer. EMM was actually available that day at MK, so we started there and were able to do 7DMT, PP and WTP with EMM, then hit Splash and BTMRR. We scheduled our next FPPs for HS which was our second park where we did RnRRC, TOT and ST (this was before TSL opened). On our way to Epcot via boat, I was able to score a TT FP and then got one for Soarin. We stood in standby for FEA. And by then we were exhausted!
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We have done four parks in one day, and it is a lot of walking. Start at the park where you definitely want to ride major headliners. The second park have fast passes. For us the third park was Epcot because the headliners we like were easy to get same day FPP for (Soarin/Character meet). Then the final park for us was MK, it was open later than the other parks. Also the bonus there is that you may actually get FPP since there are so many attractions with FPP.
If you only have one day at DW, I would suggest you look at dropping a park if you run into time issues. We have driven to HS and AK, then walked to EP and taken the monorail to MK. But it could take an hour (or more) to travel park to park. Just be flexible with your plan.
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