My family (8 adults and 2 children) will be in WDW Jan. 29, 2020- Feb. 3, 2020. We are renting DVC points and doing a split stay. Jan. 29-30 at AKL- Kidani. Jan. 30- Feb. 3 BLT. I’d really like us to be able to do FOP, but since we are at AKL for the first part of our trip, I have us going to AK on Jan. 30, or what is also known as day 61 when it comes to FP reservations. I’ve been checking thedibb and it does not look so good for getting any FOP FPs at day 61. Should I just try to get a very small number and then use FP4me for the remainder? If I can’t get the remaining FPs, will RS be an option? The kids will be 2yo and 4yo, so it’s a legit RS situation but not sure how that is working these days with FOP and FPs. Do we attempt to RD FOP? Is it always insane, even in late January? We would be using the bus from AK, and we’d get on the first one but I don’t know what position that would put us in. Or do we just hope for the best for same day drops? Or do I get really crazy and switch my stay so that we do our last night at AKL instead and make our AK day 64. Any advice or past experience would very helpful and appreciated.
If FOP is a dealbreaker for you, I would look for those FPP for whatever day you can get them, then switch your AK day to then. The bus ride from Kidani is shorter than BLT, but that’s a difference of 15 minutes. Maybe less? Rope dropping FOP, especially with little ones, would be super-stressful for me. Everybody heads to FOP, it’s a horde (an orderly horde, but the wait time went to 45 mins almost immediately). And the 2yo probably won’t be able to ride it, unless they are exceptionally tall? I definitely wouldn’t switch my hotel days though, especially if you’re renting points. That would get complicated. And I don’t recall seeing any drops for FOP during the day, but I wasn’t really looking for them either.
Just my 2 cents. Personally, i wanted to love FOP, I really did, but my motion-susceptible brain couldn’t handle it AT ALL, so I kept my eyes closed the entire time. I wouldn’t have been happy if I’d waited in line for an hour, just to close my eyes for five minutes…
I would at least look into swapping your resort locations and doing AK last. If there’s too much cost or trouble involved, then RD.
You might find it is better NOT to RD FOP at all, and instead plan to do FOP around dinner time or later.
Definitely play around with it in your touring plan, but when I fiddled with it, you can get some of the lowest standby waits if you do it LATER in the day, rather than having to waste a LOT of time and stress trying to RD first thing. (By waste time, I mean that you end up having to get to the park so early that when you add that time to the time you’ll end up waiting for the ride, it will be a LOT longer than just the time for standby later in the day without the stress!)
It would be better for your overall plan for the day to use Rope Drop to do all the “lesser” rides which will have virtually no wait while everyone else is rushing to do FOP. And you can do this without getting there extremely early to be at the front of the RD line.
We went this past April 25 - May 1 and were able to easily get FOP on day 60+1 and 60+5 for 6 people. Easy peasy. It all depends on the time of year and your ninja skills at the computer. Based on the time of year you’re going, I think you’ll be ok at 60+1
Were your FPs for decent times? I wasn’t planning on staying at AK until 9:00 PM…
Thank you all for your awesome suggestions and feedback. I will update.
At 60+1 it was at 4:15 and at 60+5 it was at 12:25