Looking at the park pass availability calendars for July (2nd week), HS is sold out for most days so I’m wondering how the crowds will impact our park day. We have a reservation for one of those days.
For our park day, Early Entry is the obvious way to go, but do I need Genie+ on top of that to get the most out of the park on those “sold out” days on top of EE? We’re a family of 6 with young kids in tow; also worth noting that we have 2 full days scheduled for HS with at least one hopping day (to HS) planned as well.
This is a bit of loaded question. To get the MOST, as in most rides done? Then, yes. But do you NEED G+? By no means. Especially with two days.
It also depends on what you are looking to experience. HS isn’t just about rides. There are things to see and do that G+ doesn’t help you with. Exploring SWGE and TSL, for example. Building a droid at the Droid Depot. Shows to see, which having G+ doesn’t help much at all. That kind of thing. G+ could actually be a detractor from fully enjoying each moment because you become a slave to your phone and what is offered when. So while you may technically get more done with G+, you may also have more trouble focusing on the moment.
Sometimes if you go ahead and click through to make a park pass you will still get in even though the calendar says full.
This has been reported a lot.
I hadn’t thought about the entertainment factor, not that Genie wouldn’t help much with that. Thanks for the reminder.
When I was thinking about getting the most of the day, for me that means avoiding a 90 minute line up not necessarly getting the most rides possible. I want it to be enjoyable and not stressful - so for me, zig zagging across a park doesn’t hold much appeal.
You still may have to zig zag with Genie+ because of what LL reservations you can get when. But I am one of those who will pay anything to avoid a line. By the end of the day I feel miserable like my feet hurt more from standing still than walking back and forth across the park. So I always get these things. I’m the red devil donald and @ryan1 is the little angel goofy on your Mickey shoulder.
Check out BG1 (search for it) if you do decide to get G+. I used it with great success and it tells you when the additional drops are. So for example, I went for Remy and ILL for GotG at Epcot at 7am and we RD’d Test Track and Mission Space. Then I was able to get LL’s immediately for SE, Nemo and LwtL. But guess what, now Frozen was sold out for the day. But BG1 told me there was a 12:47pm drop so during our lunch I was able to get a 1:15pm Frozen. That can allow you to get one for all the hard to get ones that sell out in DHS too.
So you don’t have to search: New Genie+ LL Guardians BG1 Link! - La Cava Del Chat - TouringPlans Discussion Forums
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If you are planning that many days at HS, then no, you don’t need G+. We spent the equivalent of 1 1/2 days at HS and did everything we wanted and then some without G+ We rope dropped ROTR and SDD 2 different days and the longest line we did was 45 minutes. You can kind of split the park for 2 different rope drops and evenings. When we rope dropped SDD, we did TSM, ToT, and RnC afterwards. After RotR, you can do MFSR. MMRR we did twice, once in the evening and once in the AM after it opened (it was down until about 10:30am).
Indiana Jones was not quite open yet when we went, but that is a good one to see in the afternoon if you are not taking a break. There is a lot to see without getting on rides the whole time.
Ha! That’s hilarious.
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I went last June and spent 2 days in DHS before LL was available and we were able to split the park easily. I went in August and everything was walk on (seriously 14 min for SDD standby at 5pm). Went in Jan this year, still fairly easy to do things but we only had one day so we used G+ and got everything with either RD or LL except RnRC which waited 50 minutes or something like that. But I went this June and it was much much much more crowded than any of those other times I went in the last year. So yes, I agree over 2 days you don’t need G+ if you’re willing to RD take breaks and come back but pre-Indy crowds are not like crowds now.
Summer crowds are worse, but you can still plan your way around. I went on days where park passes were “sold out”. It was very crowded, more crowded than predicted and I read complaints about it on these boards. Part of the problem pre Indy and pre- other entertainment/most characters was that there were actually less places for the crowds to go outside of attraction lines.
I just don’t agree that G+ is an absolute necessity to doing the parks, especially if you have more than one day to tour the park. I have a family of 5. The cost of doing G+ for a larger group adds up fast.
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Park passes being unavailable doesn’t mean the park is at max capacity. The thinking is that Disney uses park passes as a staffing planning tool, and thus the capacity is not a fixed number.
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