I’m booked for the paid Early Morning Magic in Toy Story Land at Hollywood Studios that runs from 7:30am to 9am. The park opens at 9am and I know that the rope drop crowds will swarm over to Toy Story Land. I’d like to leave Toy Story Land a bit early and get over to Rock 'n Roller Coaster to be one of the first in line there. My question is when I should leave Toy Story Land to be one of the first in line over at Rock 'n Roller Coaster? Is the regular rope drop usually at 8:45am? 9am? I assume that I should start over early so I don’t have to fight the crowds marching to Toy Story Land for opening. Also, when do the rides usually start running? If they drop the rope at 8:45am, do the rides start running as soon as people get there - or do they wait until 9am to actually start loading?
Thanks for your help!
Honestly, unless its a high CL day, you’ll be fine getting there any time before 915. In my experience it doesnt start to accrue a wait until 930/10 depending on CL even if they open the ride a few minutes early.
I have read two schools of thought on the matter:
https://www.easywdw.com/easy/blog/review-toy-story-land-early-morning-magic-at-disneys-hollywood-studios/
Read both and see what fits your touring style. I am thinking I am going to follow the first one.
Thanks, the first one does sound like a good approach to me as well.
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Not sure when you are going (hopefully you haven’t already and this can be useful), But I will give you my update from EMM yesterday. It changed a little from when I went in February. I guess it is more in line with rope dropping the actual event, but I thought it would be helpful.
We arrived via resort bus from Coronado at 6:40. Made our way to the tapstiles and were the 3rd family in our line. Note, the bathrooms right up near the park entrance are now not accessible, so hit the ones by the buses if you need it (my 10 yr old did).
They opened the tapstiles and let us in around 6:55. I went to line up for access to the land while wife and boys went to get some pastries and juice at Backlot Express. The line-up had changed. In February the very much “single-file” line was formed in front of the Chinese Theater. Yesterday there was a glob formed in front of the arches to Animation courtyard. Being the second person to arrive there I was told the entrance would be through the main large arch. As the other guests came, it became apparent that all arches would be used. However, they did stagger the release of the arches so that the cast members in front of each archway remained in line. There was no advantage gained by being in the left archway. They began walking us back at 7:20, maybe a couple minutes after I was not looking at watch at that moment.
Our plan was to hit TSM first, so we stayed to the left as the march to the land was happening. Most people headed toward Slinky Dog. We were the first in line for Mania.
After Mania we went to Slinky Dog and waited in line for 17 minutes. Then the 10 yr old finally had to use the bathroom for sure, so we had to head that way.
while we were over there we walked onto Saucers, then returned for 3 more rides on Slinky Dog before the Wave came, they were just coming up over the bridge to SDD as we were getting off the train. We missed one more ride by that much. That was at 8:48 by my watch.
We had no need to visit the characters this time, but the line for Jessie and Woody was not bad as we were walking by, so that would have been when we stopped to see them. Buzz looked like we had a pretty significant line as we were walking by. The Stand-by line for Slinky was all the way back to Animation Courtyard as we were leaving.