I am so incredibly excited that this morning I was able to book a VIP tour for our fall break trip! This has been on our dream list for a while. I’ve been searching the forums and looking for people’s experiences, but I would love to hear from anyone! The CM told me Tron and RotR are included, but both are limited to one ride each at this time. We’re going to have the guide meet us in MK in the morning with plans to hop to HS when we’re done (it’s a MNSSHP day, so no HEA). My TPs are telling me we should have no problem doing everything we want on our Epcot and AK days, so I figured we just focus on those 2 parks. We’ll be 4 adults with 5 kids, ranging age 3-11.
I’m currently working on compiling our list of goal attractions to hit. I know tipping the guide is part of the deal, but I have no idea how much is customary?? Anything else we should know that I’m not thinking of? Feel free to PM me, too, if you’re more comfortable.
Be prepared for standing in regular lighting lane queues, even with a guide. They can skip select queues but it’s dependent on a bunch of factors and NEVER a guarantee.
Make sure if you want fireworks viewing you notate it NOW.
They can’t get you into sit down restaurants. BUT, you can place mobile orders at QS and they can pick them up for you.
The snack vans usually end at 5pm, and they are at: Studios, Epcot and Magic Kingdom. If you have dietary restrictions please inform VIP services before, although it’s a complete 50/50 on if they will have anything. (I’ve had it go both ways)
The best part of a vip tour is the backstage transportation. It’s a lot of why we keep booking them and I use that as a way to do some things in a time crunch we might not be able to do otherwise.
They cannot skip any meet and greet lines UNLESS it’s a lighting lane meet and greet. (Which is a super bummer IMO!)
I think Guardians is also one ride on tour. I caution with using a tour for Rise of the Resistance, as the two times we’ve gotten stuck while on a vip tour? We were THE LAST guests to be evacuated, and the park ops was a bit snarky about it. It eats up a lot of time. (Over an hour both times….so that’s an expensive evac!!)
I will say every tour guide does thing differently and so your experience could be way different than one you read about online. Some of the FB groups and bloggers have posted stuff that may or may not happen on tour so the expectations get high. Of course with the cost? Expectations should be high. Sadly this is an area where I’ve always felt disney fails to truly deliver. (But I’m a glutton and we keep going back for more!)
I’ve lost track of how many tours we’ve taken, but it’s a long day and can be interesting depending on who’s on tour with you. Taking @sanstitre_has_left_the_building is always stressful as he has exceedingly unrealistic expectations.
(sorry we are properly brutal to each other and I’m a tad salty this morning, so I’m poking the bear. Oops)
Thanks for the tips! That’s a really good point about Rise. Riding it this trip is definitely a priority for us, as the other family with us didn’t get to ride it on their trip last year. But, my youngest is too short for it, so I might be sitting it out anyway. We may consider just doing an ILL for it on one of our other days… I purposely scheduled the tour early in our week so we’ll have plenty of opportunity to go back and do anything we missed.
Have a list of what you’d like to accomplish for the tour guide when you meet and note what is really important and what would be nice to get to if you have time. Listen to your tour guide on suggestions on what to do when. You probably have a decent idea, but they have been living this for a long time and will have more experience on what rain will do to your priority rides or how Rise of Resistance will come back from being down.
The tour guides can grab you drinks/snacks in the parks as well. They will likely offer, but if you’re getting thirsty, ask. It’s a great time, but it can be very fast paced and exhausting, so taking some time to grab drinks or lunch can be key rest points that are needed even if you hate thinking about lost ride time…
We typically target the long wait rides. Mostly headliners, but a Peter Pan can be ideal as well to avoid the never-ending queue.
Following along and so thankful for this thread. We are trying to book one for the week before Thanksgiving, but we are at the Four Seasons, so our booking window is at exactly 60 days out. We may not get one, but I have been brainstorming on what to request. I wanted to end with Fantasmic at DHS to get the good seats without waiting. I have been dreaming of a VIP tour for years!
Presuming Fantasmic! starts at 9, book a tour starting at 2PM and they can drop you off at the VIP area as your tour ends. We have done that for fireworks at MK and it works out well - I’m presuming it would be a similar procedure for Fantasmic!
A 2PM start also means you can eat a big lunch on your own and then either eat dinner after your tour, or grab a fast quick service meal mid-tour depending. With remote ordering, the time lost for QS isn’t too bad.
Presuming you mean the week prior to Thanksgiving week, I’d presume you’ll be OK. If you mean right before Turkey Day, you might have issues, but my friend who is Club 33 (and thus books a lot of tours) has seldom run into unavailable days and even when he has they have been able to grab another day on the trip without issue.
Oh - forgot to add - when you book make sure to tell them you plan on doing VIP seating at Fantasmic! after to be 100% sure they can do that for you. I presume it is not an issue but that is something you want to have planned up front.
Yes, it is for the week before. We tried to do this in 2021, but they sold out before we could. I believe at that time it was more of a staffing issue than anything else. I am the lead planner for our group of ten, and these people probably think I am insane. I sent them a detailed outline of the rides most people may want to ride, along with options for starting/ending/stopping to eat, etc. But it has been a bucket list item of mine for close to ten years, so I have been making notes!
Thank you for this advice. This is why I love this forum! I will make sure to tell them. Fingers crossed!!
Hopefully it works out great for you! We went that week in 2021 and had an AMAZING trip. I did a trip report here with lots of pics. Also, there’s no phone queue for booking - I was worried I would need to call early and sit on hold, but the system just automatically tells you to call back at 9AM Eastern and disconnects. I was answered promptly at 9 with no holding.
For those that have done the tour, what did you typically give as a tip? I am planning to book one for the first time in November, and was curious on the amount that is customary. My plan was to tip one hour so $700. There will be no small kids, and 2 teens and 4 adults. I am planning to do Epcot for GOTG, Test Track, and then head to HS for Rise, Slinky, Tower, Rock and Roll, and then to MK for Tron. I have no idea if this is a viable plan for 8 hours. I might bump it to 9 to be ‘safe’.
UPDATE - You were right! I was able to book our tour today for November 16th! We are meeting our guide in MK at 2, ending at DHS at 9 for Fantasmic! I am beyond excited to knock this experience off my bucket list!
I hope your experience is better than the tour I took with friends last weekend. Let’s just say, I don’t know where some of these guides come from, but wowww. I felt so bad because half the guests had never been on a VIP tour and it was not the premium experience one would think it would be!
We had a replacement guide within 45 minutes. The replacement was fantastic, but it sure did leave a rotten taste in my mouth at the cost involved! We shall see what happens on my follow up next week.
Disney needs to step up their game. Universal is so much better at the VIP Tour game.
And it’s better priced especially considering you can do the group option and meals included but not part of the tour hours. The last one we did had a breakfast and lunch stop and they didn’t take that time out of the 7 hours or whatever the tour was so it was more like 8 hours or something.
Did you complain and get the replacement? That’s nuts! How did you know they were bad? I’ve never been on a VIP tour so I may not even know to ask for a replacement. I’m so sorry you had to even deal with that, especially for the cost!
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