I’m not planning on getting FPs for those since I’ll be offsite, so I just plan to do Standby. But sometimes the RD wait times are as long or longer as the wait times for the rides later in the day. So it means playing around with TPs not utilizing a FP. Often times, the waits for the headliners are shorter around or shortly after dinner time or just before closing time than at RD.
I don’t mind waiting if I can make up the time in other lines. I’m used to waiting 60+ minutes for rides at other amusement parks. Of course, I’m not sure Peter Pan’s Flight falls into that category!
I should add that I’m more interested in lowering OVERALL wait times for the day, not wait time for any given ride. Sometimes you can “nickel and dime” wait times to save a lot more time if you don’t RD a headliner than even the time a RD might save you.
RDing the headliners is not my idea of vacation or fun. We have to get up earlier than we normally would on a workday (and we live on the west coast, so our bodies are three hours behind for a couple of days when we are on the east coast). And you stand in line for more than an hour to RD. Is that really any different than doing SB?
I’m going to look at the wait predictions for dinner time, later in the day, and maybe parade and fireworks time. Closing doesn’t work for us when we need to RD the next morning and one day is MVMCP. I have read on lines that people arrive at AK at 7:30 and get off of FOP at 9:10ish. That’s like waiting 70 minutes.
If they could change the queue up, I think that would help. I LOVE what they did to pooh bear line. It makes the line more tolerable. Even if I don’t play, I can watch kids play, and they are happy. This makes a longer line so much better.
Yes! Exactly. If you are waiting an hour outside the park to RD, then you are waiting an hour. Add that hour to total wait time for the day!
But we typically arrive for RD at almost exactly when the park opens. So, we aren’t ahead of the RD crowd who was there early, but we don’t have that extra wait time outside the park. Instead, though, while all those people go for the headliners (and still end up with SOME kind of wait), my plan is to hit the NON headliners. They should be walk-ons. We can get through several minor rides this way with little to no wait.
So then, if we later have to wait that 60 minutes for the headliner, we’ve already saved far more wait time than everyone else. All those folks who waited the hour before RD plus the 15 minutes for the headliner now have to wait in the longer (albeit relatively short) lines for the lesser rides. But I’m sure the total wait time for those adds up to MORE than what they had hoped to save, all said.
That’s my theory, at least.
So, ABSOLUTELY do RD (arriving at RD time, not earlier), but then RD the lesser rides everyone else is skipping!
Sure, I’ll have to wait 82 minutes for SDD. So be it.
I do not RD. I FP the absolute long lines and am fine with 15-25 min waits. I can do 1 or 2 60+ lines but that’s it. And I think about the queue’s when doing that, which one’s I would rather wait in.
Your theory is interesting, but I think I would rather wait 10 minutes for each of 8 attractions than 80 minutes for one attraction with 7 other walk-ons.
Well, in that case, you’re talking about a wash in terms of waits. So it really doesn’t matter much. I think if the one 80 minute ride was, for example, MFSR, I’d prefer the 80 minute wait and 7 other walk-ons. But if the 80 minute wait was for PPF, I’d prefer the opposite!
So I did a version of this last year - it was just me and my (then) 2 year old daughter. We RD’d EPCOT and MK. At Epcot, we really only wanted/needed to do FEA and the Elsa/Anna Meet & Greet. While FEA is one of the Tier 1s, it was clear everyone RD’ing was headed for TT or MS. We waited zero time.
Next day at MK, we RD’d Dumbo, IASW, Ariel, UTS, the Carousel, etc. We finished our morning Touring Plan probably an hour to an hour and a half before the TP said we would by doing those attractions first thing. Granted, she was too small for SM or 7DMT, so I didn’t need to fit those in elsewhere, but I can tell you that the non headliners were all walk ons for sure. (We still used FPP for PPF though!)
We arrived about a half hour before and used a similar strategy. A lot of Fantasyland before lunch. We had FPP for SDD so we did AS2 walk-on while the rest of TSL was chaos. The. We did TSM with a 10 minute wait. It was great.
I have tried to RD PPF at Disneyland multiple times and unless you are among the very first people in the park, it is always a 30+ minute wait. And guess how long the wait is at almost all times the rest of the day? About 30 minutes!
So I’ve realized that @ryan1’s strategy is best for me. Don’t RD a ride that accumulates a line extremely fast, especially if you aren’t among the first in the park (and personally, I also count the time waiting before park opening, so I don’t count that as a beneficial strategy).
TL;DR - get FPP for popular attractions and RD (arrive right at/before opening) less popular ones.
