So… I’m headed to the world in a couple of weeks with just my husband, and after reading the reports from lots of people I’m thinking we should try some DAH. Here’s what the schedule would look like:
Wed:
arrive at MCO 4pm
AK DAH 8-11pm
Thurs:
AK (with earliest FPP at 9:50am-10:50am- FOP)
5:15pm Artist Point (I will probably try and move this to more like 6, so we can go straight to MK)
MK DAH 8-11pm
Fri:
MK KTTK tour at 10am
all FPP after that
5:35pm BOG
Sat:
HS (I have SDD FPP for that morning)
Sun:
9am Amorette’s Cake decorating
Epcot after that
5pm fly outta MCO
I just don’t know if I should pull the trigger on both DAH’s. We are always ready to hit the ground running when we arrive in Orlando, which makes me think that the AK DAH would be perfect that night. We are flying from AZ, so our bio clocks would be pre-programmed for late nights and less rope dropping. BUT we are religious rope droppers, and I’m nervous and excited at the same time about being DAH people instead of RD people for one trip. With that in mind, maybe I should add the HS DAH on Saturday evening and then we wouldn’t need to rope drop any park. This is a short trip for us, so maybe it’s a good plan to not try and mess with the bio-clocks.
We’ve never done DAH, but we have done EMM, and loved it. It sounds like they are similar except:
TONS more rides available at DAH
Darkness and lights at DAH
No meals at DAH…just popcorn, Mickey bars and drinks.
We are AP holders, which means we could get into the parks before the 7pm DAH start, and it also means we do get a small discount on the DAH tickets. AND there are only 2 of us, which makes a huge difference cost-wise.
As I type this I’m realizing it sounds like I’m trying to talk myself into it. What would you guys do?
I also worry about having an expensive event just a few hours after your arrival. If you flight is on time, you will make it to AK DAH with no issue, entering the park by 7 with time to spare. But what if your flight is delayed? I don’t like added travel stress. But other than that, I don’t see a problem with multiple DAH. Maybe add DAH at HS instead and then just do AK with your FOP FPP.
Yea - have to agree with that. We did MNSSHP a couple years ago on travel day and although we had plenty of time to spare after arrival, you never know. Plus I was not thinking and we planned an early morning the next day…will NEVER do that again…after late night…later morning
Me too! Love SDD. Hoping to get multiple rides on it this next trip. Although being a family of 6 I’m not willing (or able) to drop $$$$ for DAH but our trip is 10 days so hopefully we can make it work.
We did EMM at HS several months ago, and rode SDD lots and lots. We were with a group of about 10 people, and each time we rode it we lost a person or two. At the end it was basically just me and my brother, and we would’ve kept riding but we felt bad about not being with the other peeps. I think we rode it about 6 or 7 times. AWESOME!! And less expensive than DAH.
Yeah, I’m keeping an eye on that. If we do the DAH at MK on Thursday evening I’ll bail on the 8am BOG breakfast on Friday for sure. That’s part of why the Saturday DAH at HS is questionable…we have the cake decorating experience at Amorettes at 9am on Sunday, and I worked so hard to get that reservation…there’s no way I’m cancelling that one. Then again we would just need to arrive at DS just before 9…not like at the park where we would want to be way earlier for a reservation. Hmmmmmm…
I am sure you are younger than me and if it’s 2 adults, you could probably do DAH HS and then cake decorating the next morning…plus cake decorating is last day so you can sleep on the plane (assuming you are flying)
Yeah, and I was just thinking that we wouldn’t HAVE to stay until the end of DAH, but then again why wouldn’t you??
I believe the open rides during HS DAH are:
RnRC
SDD
TSMM
ST
HTT
ASS
Of these, I think we could do SDD til the cows come home, but my DH doesn’t do HTT and I can’t do more than one of RnRC, TSMM or ST. So maybe that’s not a necessary DAH for us… unless there are more things open than I realize…
This is literally what I did in December. It was awesome.
Eh? What’s the point of this? You will have had plenty of FOP action the night before. And you’ll be tired.
Are you trying to kill yourselves?
Duh. Obviously you should.
I’ve done all three DAHs. AK was awesome, as previously billed. HS was awesome. MK was good.
AK is awesome because you get to ride FOP as often as you’ve got the stamina for with virtually no wait. And everything else with zero wait.
HS is awesome because you get to ride SDD over and over and over again with only a short wait and TSL is stunning at night. Plus everything else has zero wait.
MK is fine. You get a lot done. But it’s almost all stuff you’ve done before and it’s mostly stuff that’s not that hard to do anyway.
That’s pretty funny because MK was the one I was feeling the most sure about doing! I just figured we are spending 5 hours of our MK day in the KTTK tour, and it would be awesome to do so many rides so quickly the night before… now you are making me doubt everything.
Even HS, which I had just mentally written off. I mean, SDD is AMAZING…but the other 5 rides open are just “meh” for us. That’s actually not totally accurate…my husband loves TSMM and ST, but they both make me nauseated, so they are one-offs for me.
And I was thinking that doing the AK headliners at night would be so fun. Like I said before, we are religious rope droppers, and we often don’t stay at the parks later than like 5, which means I haven’t seen much of the parks after the lights come on. I’ll bet the view from EE is kinda great with all the lights.
Another real bonus for me of DAH AK was being able to walk through the FOP standby line. I’ve never done it before because I’ve always had an FPP.
Three points. One: you get to ride SDD over and over again. Two: at night, when it’s super-beautiful. Three: I wasn’t that bothered about the other rides, but it’s nice to do them all once with zero wait.
Sure, I got a lot done that night. But there was no new experience for me. I’ve been at MK late at night (MNSSHP). If I could have done 7DMT over and over again with minimal wait then maybe . . .
I know!! It was in your report that I learned about the cool stuff in the standby line. And now I really want to see it! And the thought of being able to walk right on over and over again…sigh.
I think you said it was a 30 min wait at first, but it eventually dropped to like 7 min?? That’s practically walk-on for that ride, and I would gladly do that over and over and over again. Truth be told, I was kinda angry at my family after we rode 7dmt 3 times at EMM and they wanted to bail. Or maybe it was hangry… either way…
Yeah. Super helpful. I’m an idiot for buying the AP. I should’ve just planned on doing all the paid events. Course then I wouldn’t have the AP discount…
Okay, I think you have me talked into AK, and the fact that it was awesome even on the arrival day kinda seals the deal. If we end up not wanting to go back to AK the next day, we could always go to DS and do The Void…dh is a massive Star Wars fan.
And I think I have myself convinced on the MK DAH.
HS is still up in the air. It is on our last night, so potentially if we found out that AK was actually an 11/10 for us, I could still buy HS if it’s not sold out 4 days prior. I’ll have to keep an eye on the HS DAH events for the next week or 2 to see if they are selling out.
BTW, @profmatt, it was your report specifically that made me blow up the reservation finder for an ADR at Artist Point. It looks so awesome! I LOVE the theming at BOG, and your report makes it look like Artist Point rivals BOG. I’m so happy to have snagged an ADR, even after failed attempts 4-5 times cause I wasn’t the first one to click on the link. Woohoo!!
