We’ve all either been at WDW or been on the app and seen the line for 7DMT being 90 minutes or more. I was listening to a podcast recently and it really made me appreciate just how ridiculous it is to stand in such a line — think what else you could achieve at WDW in the same amount of time.
But where is the line on long lines? For me, it’s about 30 minutes. When I’m putting together my touring plans, that’s my limit.
The one exception I can understand is FOP. It really is that good it’s worth it. But I can’t think of any other attraction at WDW that’s worth 90 minutes of queuing time.
I would say that I am happy to wait an hour for certain attractions. I know that going to WDW/DL comes with waiting in line, and if I have to wait an hour to ride an E-Ticket attraction, then thats what I will have to do. I will say that for 7DMT that my limit would be 30-45min, but my wife might say 60-75min, its really dependent on your travelling party.
If I saw FOP at 110min though, better believe I would be standing in that line. Though the 90min would be ideal.
Other attractions worth a plus 30min wait from me are:
Splash Mountain
Big Thunder Mountain
Space Mountain
Expedition Everest
Haunted Mansion
Pirates of the Caribbean
I think 30 minutes is my limit as well. I don’t trust the posted wait times for the last hour of any park, so unless you see a long line, jump in, because the wait is usually half of what’s posted. Aside from the new rides at Animal Kingdom and Hollywood Studios, we have done everything a hundred times or more, so I don’t feel guilty skipping a ride. It’s those long wait times that gets us to try the things that we typically would avoid.
For me, it depends on the purpose of the trip. We have DL AP. Some days, we’ll go just to check some rides (Guardians of the Galaxy Halloween edition, for example) and I am totally fine waiting 1-2hours.
If it’s a ride everyone really wants to do, I don’t mind waiting 1hour. But most if the time, 45 minutes is where I draw the line.
My tolerance for longer wait times goes up the busier a park is. So, while 30 minutes might be an upper limit for me during most trips, since we go during off times usually, I also know that on days that are very crowded, that 30 minute wait might be an amazingly SHORT wait. In such cases, I might be willing to wait an hour instead for the same exact ride.
And, of course, the ride itself matters. I’m more willing to wait longer for a really great ride, or a ride that simply has low rider capacity even if the ride itself isn’t as nice. For whatever reason, we’ll wait longer for the Astro Orbiter, even though it is a basic ride, simply because it has a low rider capacity and it is still cool to be up so high, and take the elevator up, etc. I’m willing to wait longer for Space Mountain, if necessary. But I’m not willing to wait long for Dumbo, etc.
Now, for example, when I go to Cedar Point, I’m totally willing to wait 2 hours to ride Millennium Force. But if Top Thrill Dragster is more than 30 minutes, I’ll pass. This is because, well, there is no better roller coaster than Millennium Force, the rush it gives is amazing and totally worth the wait. But TTD is just fun and worth a go if the wait is short.
But if you are a Liner you know that waiting in lines does NOT have to be an accepted part of the experience! With few exceptions, there is no waiting necessary (and even then its arguably not necessary if you know what you’re doing).
20 minutes cap for most rides and attractions under most circumstances.
Now, I PLAN to wait as long as necessary for FOP standby on my fly-by trip in 29 days. But that is INTENTIONAL. Otherwise I know that, with enough planning and effort ahead of time, I could even ride that as an offsite guest with less than 30 minute wait if I couldn’t secure FPP.
I don’t ascribe to the idea that the waiting is part of it or that you have to accept it more if it’s busier. I believe in a good touring plan and the knowledge of how to work the FPP fourth-and-beyond system to make every ride a veritable walk-on. And no, I don’t think this means having your face buried in your phone all day either.
Legitimate curiosity here…but are you just shifting the wait time to being OUTSIDE of the queue, then? If you use the FPP system to get on your rides, and wait for those times, what are you doing to fill the time before that next FPP time? Presumably something. Either in another queue line, or NOT in a queue line at all, but waiting nonetheless.
From your description, however, you make it sound as though you show up and go from ride to ride without waiting (much) at all. If so, I’d like to understand this magic!
For my first three: I set the first ride time so that I am riding in the last minutes of the windoe, the second so that I ride before or after a show/meal/parade/other diversion, and the last so that I can do that right after either I ride the second or finish the show/meal/parade/other diversion.
If I can’t do that I modify to bring the ride time up more immediately.
For fourth and subsequent I modify/refresh until the ride time is essentially immediately
We did a total of 9 Fourth-and-beyond FPP one day at MK on what felt like a crushingly busy day. We had things we wanted to do but no firmnTP that day. We decided to see where the FPP took us - and after tapping in we (ahem, I) grabbed the next one and the next one and the next one… everything we did that day was effectively a walk-on.
Okay. So that’s what I was getting at though. You are waiting. But you are waiting by doing something else. But for us, most of the time, the rides are more important than the shows or parade, etc.
Were you able to get back-to-back ride times? And did that not force you to have to walk/back track through the park a lot? If not back-to-back, what was the average wait time before the next FPP was available? 10 minutes later? 20 minutes?
I’m not doubting your method, just trying to understand it.
The exception is FOP. One could argue that by arriving an hour before rope drop you are waiting. I’ll give you that. But I’m using my literal FREE time to wait so that I don’t have to use my paid park time to do so - so that while all the people who don’t know how to work it wait and I walk on the rides in the rest of AK for a while.
Yes. This is true. I’ve thought about that. In another thread, someone was mentioning that in order to avoid the wait on something (maybe it was FOP) they would arrive extremely early for RD. This means that they ultimately DID wait…but I also realized, as you mentioned, that you are using wait time that wouldn’t otherwise be used in the parks anyhow. This is why we have always been the type to try to arrive at any amusement park as early as we can muster.
Good enough. For us, I only do shows/parades/etc that we want to do. I never do something we wouldn’t normally do just to fill time - because you’re right: that’s just waiting in disguise.
Right now, with my kids, our limit is about 20 minutes or so. We waited 15 minutes for Rapunzel and Tiana in April and that was our longest wait I think (outside of the Starbucks line at MCO. Haha!). Even at 15 minutes, DD4 was getting antsy. DH and DD7 got in line for the Speedway on an EMH morning and the line wasn’t really moving, so they bailed after 10 minutes or so.
We had great luck modifying in April. We could get almost every FP modified so that we were able to ride immediately or close to immediately. If we couldn’t, for us, it’s much easier to sit with a dole whip and people watch for a half hour as we wait for our Pirate’s FP, than to wait in line for 30 minutes.
I have two impatient tweens and a dh who haven’t been to Disney. My madness is driven by not waiting in lines longer than 30 minutes. I booked EMM so we could check off 3 rides plus ride them multiple times and have breakfast! I’ve been playing with my touring plans like crazy trying to figure out the best rides and times to get FP for. I’m about done, but FP day is not until September. Wish me luck!
