My wife and I were discussing our Universal Days for our upcoming May 2020. (For those not in the know, this trip will be 6 days at WDW and 3 days at Universal, with the Universal days interspersed, not consecutive.)
Anyhow, the question relates to how to handle Hagrid. Here was our thinking. Wonder if anyone has any thoughts (pluses/minuses/alternatives)
We will be doing one of our three days primarily focused on Harry Potter. So, our thinking is to arrive at IOA and head straight to Forbidden Journey with the assumption that most people will be rope-dropping Hagrid, making the FJ line shorter. Then, after that, we take the train over to Diagon Alley and do Gringott’s. At this point, we would walk around, taking in the sights, etc. Eventually, we hop back on the train back to Hogsmeade, do whatever we want there and end up in line for Hagrids.
The question is, at this point, is the cut off time for Hagrid fairly consistent now? (Or, hopefully by May.) I know they close the ride ealier in the day. So what time would we need to get in line?
Also, what is the queue line for Hagrid’s like? Is it out in the sun? Mostly shade? Mostly inside?
It’s not consistent at all at the moment, but hopefully it will be by May! I’m not sure about the line as we did it at RD and walked straight through to the final room, it was difficult to gauge.
I wish I could offer advice, but I have yet to go myself and it seems like it’s been all over the board for people who have gone. I’ll be going in early December and I’m hoping that there is a little more predictability by that point. I can report back after that!
I think it’s still pretty inconsistent. There is single rider, though and my friend who recently visited said it was 35 minutes when standby was 3 hours.
Hopefully by next May they will have fixed Hagrid’s enough that at least its closing time is consistent, but right now it isn’t. Right now opening time, closing time, wether SR is opened and mid day closings have all been pretty random (I wonder if during summer they masked some middle of the day downtime as weather closures).
Can you wait until April to plan for this or is there any decision that needs to made before?
What a silly question to ask on a forum dedicated to making plans. It isn’t about whether it matters now or not! It is about making a plan that we can then modify/alter 15 more times before we leave! The joy is in the journey. You know.
It can technically wait until morning of May 12, which is our first planned day to be at Universal. But in the personality tests, I’m definitely a “settled and decided” kind of guy, but also one who can “run with the punches”.
I started plans for this trip (and our subsequent December 2020 trip) well over a year ago!
Since I couldn’t really make plans about SWGE before it opened, I made plans on how I would make plans “On September 10th, 8am I will check X,Y,Z websites, answer questions A,B,C and finalize TPs”. It worked
We would all hope by the time your trip gets here it will be running more consistently. If your trip was now I would say get there early and get right in line for Hagrid while it’s still cooler out. Then go experience everything else.
But since your trip isn’t for a while hopefully it will be running smoothly by then. If it is running well both it and FJ are capacity monsters. So either one would be fine to do first. Or grab breakfast at three broomsticks.
“On September 10th, 8am I will check X,Y,Z websites, answer questions A,B,C and finalize TPs”. It worked