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12 hours straight at the Magic Kingdom with no midday hotel break today, and I think that’s our new record. 6 fast passes used with a seventh missed, eight character photos taken, saw the fireworks show and what Braks calls the “kiss goodnight” as we made and passed the extra magic hours. I think we rode almost everything but the water rides, but tomorrow we head home. A hell of a 41st birthday. 
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Jan 17, 2019 04:17
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| # ? May 25, 2024 18:07 |
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You folks had some awesome cooler temps the last few days. It’s my favorite time of the year to go to the parks.
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Jan 17, 2019 05:15
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Bottom Liner posted:You folks had some awesome cooler temps the last few days. It’s my favorite time of the year to go to the parks. You aren’t kidding. This is the coldest I’ve ever been at Disney and it was relatively nice. In November 2015, it was still 90+ degrees on a couple of days and was miserable. I wore a coat all day today and was pretty drat comfortable.
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Jan 17, 2019 05:18
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I love the weather so much this week. I've been at Pop Century for my birthday, and it's the best time to be on "vacation" here. Also I didn't know that Disney now offers you the chance to opt out of housekeeping for your room and get a gift card of a certain value based on how long you are staying. I got 40 bucks (which basically covered my in-room expenses minus a Tie-Dye cheesecake that I bought extra because when in rome...) Pretty neat, and it contributes to the green thing (as well as making it so I don't have to worry about putting out the do not disturb sign on the door)
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Jan 18, 2019 04:10
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Silly Burrito posted:This sums it up. Cheesy graphics, lots of loud explosions, and FAMILY FAMILY FAMILY. Tear out the Kong ride and turn the Kong queue into an extended haunted house and it'd be pretty great.
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Jan 18, 2019 07:54
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Last time I went to WDW was about 11 years ago, and the fast passes were in park only things. So, the deal now is that you essentially have to plan it all in advance via the app or what? Seems kinda like a buzzkill to plan out my day so much. How do the lines compare if I just want to slap a couple Fastpasses down and do the rest as I wander the parks? Also, how bad are we talking here with Disney Studios this year? We're going in 12 days and don't have park hoppers and planned for a full day at each park.
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Jan 18, 2019 17:48
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You’re going at a great time for crowd levels to be pretty low so you’ll be able to do basically everything.
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Jan 18, 2019 17:52
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I'd plan a couple of FastPasses just so you have something guaranteed to do but yeah, crowds shouldn't be so bad that you couldn't stand in a few standby lines. Disney Studios? I assume you mean Hollywood Studios. So if you want to do the two new rides, Slinky Dog Dash and Alien Swirling Saucers, you're going to have to stand in standby. You're not getting a FastPass for Slinky Dog at this point. You might get one for the Saucers. But if you go at rope drop, you can stand in a fairly short line for Slink. If not, you're looking at about an hour, hour and a half wait in standby which isn't that bad. I was there on Tuesday this week and Slink had a 60 min wait at one point. I've found that wait times are usually inflated, so I bet it was more like a 50-55 min wait. I've waited longer for Slink.
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Jan 18, 2019 18:20
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Yeah, Hollywood Studios. Woof. Literally just found out that my mother in law is backing out of watching our almost-2-year-old. This... changes plans considerably.
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Jan 18, 2019 18:31
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Gejimayu posted:Last time I went to WDW was about 11 years ago, and the fast passes were in park only things. So, the deal now is that you essentially have to plan it all in advance via the app or what? Seems kinda like a buzzkill to plan out my day so much. How do the lines compare if I just want to slap a couple Fastpasses down and do the rest as I wander the parks? Also, how bad are we talking here with Disney Studios this year? We're going in 12 days and don't have park hoppers and planned for a full day at each park. Oh man, we start planning WDW trips 12 to 15 months out. Room booked at 11 months, dining booked at 6 months, Fast Pass+ booked 60 days out. It's really not that bad, especially if you don't bother with sit down restaurant reservations. Hollywood Studios is still not a whole day park, but that's OK. There's tons to do. Toy Story Land is going to be nuts, but crowds shouldn't be bad this time of year. I would go early in the morning and try to do everything in Toy Story Land, then do the rest of it. Indiana Jones show is fun and will soak up some time. I could ramble for hours about WDW, Have fun
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Jan 18, 2019 19:09
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Even if you don’t book fastpasses in advance, always check throughout the day for fastpasses for rides you will be doing soon. There’s a good chance of getting lucky and finding a fastpass, which can mean a 5min wait instead of 45min, etc. People forget about this and end up waiting in lines for no reason.
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Jan 18, 2019 20:03
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Gejimayu posted:Yeah, Hollywood Studios. Woof. Literally just found out that my mother in law is backing out of watching our almost-2-year-old. This... changes plans considerably. If all of the sudden, the alternative and only solution is bringing the kid along in the parks, I feel for you. However, there is somewhat a solution, Parent Swap. https://disneyworld.disney.go.com/guest-services/rider-switch/ TL;DR is that basically both of you and the kid go in line, and once it comes time to board then one of you waits at the platform/off to the side with the kid and then the other parent rides the ride. Once they're done riding they'll grab the kid, and the parent who waited gets to ride. It isn't available for every ride, but it's available for most (if not all) the thrill rides the kid definitely wouldn't be allowed on. Edit: Hold on, my knowledge has become antiquated. They now do it through Magicband fastpass+ now. Infographic can explain better than I can. 
SomeJazzyRat fucked around with this message at 20:45 on Jan 18, 2019 |
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Jan 18, 2019 20:39
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Almost 2 might be harder but we took an almost 3 once and it was fine. Rider swap was super easy.
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Jan 18, 2019 23:46
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Gejimayu posted:Yeah, Hollywood Studios. Woof. Literally just found out that my mother in law is backing out of watching our almost-2-year-old. This... changes plans considerably. Have your spouse tearily ask their mom why she doesn't want to get to know her grandchild.
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Jan 19, 2019 01:27
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Nottherealaborn posted:Even if you don’t book fastpasses in advance, always check throughout the day for fastpasses for rides you will be doing soon. There’s a good chance of getting lucky and finding a fastpass, which can mean a 5min wait instead of 45min, etc. People forget about this and end up waiting in lines for no reason. This. And check back on the popular stuff too, you never know. I got a Slinky Dog fast pass in September because my friend was constantly refreshing the app while we were in Toy Story Land and we got lucky.
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Jan 19, 2019 01:40
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Kinda doing an impromptu Disney World trip here, so not much advance before Feb 8th weekend. What's the best way to try and lock in a decent non-Disney Springs restaurant reservation? Should I be checking daily to see if people dropout and slots open up? I saw a few posts above that I should be doing that for fastpass (which I'm assuming I'll need for the avatar ride). Should I just assume Le Cellier/California Grill-level of restaurants are going to be a complete no-go?
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Jan 19, 2019 17:00
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Check constantly throughout the day, be flexible with times. How many your booking for? I usually have no problem getting a reservation for 2 with a lot of diligence.
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Jan 19, 2019 18:33
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Touring Plans has a reservation finder available (you must register but it is Free). https://touringplans.com/walt-disney-world/reservation-finder I've used it a few times to get last minute California Grill reservations. Of course it only works if a time opens up and you can jump in and take it right away.
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Jan 19, 2019 21:32
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Thank you both!
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Jan 20, 2019 00:00
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loving gently caress I forgot my FP date. No Flight of Passage or Slinky Dog. Solid Edit: Are there AP discounts for Early Morning Magic or After Hours parties? Tim Whatley fucked around with this message at 16:50 on Jan 20, 2019 |
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Jan 20, 2019 16:33
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some good new mugs out on shop parks app, right after I got back too there is a really good belle one shaped like a stack of books. I'd put a link but I could only get it to come up in the app, not on the site. We ate at the new Artist's Point dining. The characters, waitstaff, and food presentation were great. The Evil Queen is there and she's very good. You're served your appetizers and deserts on a multi-tier platter where each platter is a leaf, it's pretty cool. The restaurant is themed as "the forest". There are led lights throughout the canopy that change colors and flash as different events occur throughout dinner. The "Hunter's Gift" at the end of dinner is some heart shaped chocolates and caramel popcorn but it's presented in an ornate box with dry ice inside. The waiter makes a show of it and it's quite neat. A downside was that I was told twice by the host and once by the waiter to "please enjoy my 60 minute dining experience" which I've never had them emphasize "enjoy your dinner but GET OUT" before. I think we went slightly long but it was plenty of time and they didn't rush us at the end. I also think that for the price I'm not sure I'd go back. The food was good but not worth what you're paying. Kind of like how Be Our Guest is now with the prix fixe menu. Dren fucked around with this message at 16:59 on Jan 20, 2019 |
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Jan 20, 2019 16:56
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Dren posted:I also think that for the price I'm not sure I'd go back. The food was good but not worth what you're paying. Kind of like how Be Our Guest is now with the prix fixe menu. I’ve just accepted the Disney food tax. We had a nice buffet lunch at the Crystal Palace, met Tigger/Pooh/Eeyore/Piglet, and then paid $115 for two of us with tax and tip and the AP discount. It was good, but the buffet would be worth the $15-20 range if it wasn’t at Disney. But, sometimes you just suck it up, pay it, and move on. Otherwise you’ll drive yourself nuts. In that vein, I understand why people like the Dining Plan. It’s just so simple to not look at prices and get whatever you want depending on which plan you have.
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Jan 20, 2019 17:03
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Tim Whatley posted:loving gently caress I forgot my FP date. No Flight of Passage or Slinky Dog. Solid Yes. Not sure on early morning magic price, but after hours AP pays $95 instead of $125.
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Jan 20, 2019 17:23
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Nottherealaborn posted:Yes. Not sure on early morning magic price, but after hours AP pays $95 instead of $125. Word. I bought AK at night and MK at night. Gonna splurge for this one, and then I'll try my luck with Slinky Dog. The site is terrible today. It's not loading my friends to make fastpasses, then log out, log back in and it says none of us have tickets. Cool system Disney!
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Jan 20, 2019 17:35
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Hitting up Epcot. Security is trying to figure out procedures for someone who brought a gold hip flask with “KING” written on it.
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Jan 20, 2019 18:39
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The Disney app is so terrible. It crashes all the time, bugs out when it comes to displaying wait times and sucks my battery dry. I’m hopeful they update it or launch a better one.
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Jan 20, 2019 19:10
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VaultAggie posted:The Disney app is so terrible. It crashes all the time, bugs out when it comes to displaying wait times and sucks my battery dry. I’m hopeful they update it or launch a better one. Join the club, it's been awful for like 5+ years 
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Jan 20, 2019 20:27
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Silly Burrito posted:I’ve just accepted the Disney food tax. We had a nice buffet lunch at the Crystal Palace, met Tigger/Pooh/Eeyore/Piglet, and then paid $115 for two of us with tax and tip and the AP discount. It was good, but the buffet would be worth the $15-20 range if it wasn’t at Disney. But, sometimes you just suck it up, pay it, and move on. Otherwise you’ll drive yourself nuts. I accept it too just in a different way—I’m going to do less of it. I’d go back to Trattoria breakfast or the old Be Our Guest dinner from before prix fixe. But you’re right about the dining plan. If I’d prepaid I wouldn’t mind the cost as much.
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Jan 20, 2019 20:51
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VaultAggie posted:The Disney app is so terrible. It crashes all the time, bugs out when it comes to displaying wait times and sucks my battery dry. I’m hopeful they update it or launch a better one. Don’t hold your breath. It’s been bad forever. Also always bring a good size battery pack to recharge your phone. The park app is heavy on gps and murders your battery. I bring a 10,000 mah pack with me
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Jan 20, 2019 21:28
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Dren posted:We ate at the new Artist's Point dining. The characters, waitstaff, and food presentation were great. The Evil Queen is there and she's very good. You're served your appetizers and deserts on a multi-tier platter where each platter is a leaf, it's pretty cool. The restaurant is themed as "the forest". There are led lights throughout the canopy that change colors and flash as different events occur throughout dinner. The "Hunter's Gift" at the end of dinner is some heart shaped chocolates and caramel popcorn but it's presented in an ornate box with dry ice inside. The waiter makes a show of it and it's quite neat. A downside was that I was told twice by the host and once by the waiter to "please enjoy my 60 minute dining experience" which I've never had them emphasize "enjoy your dinner but GET OUT" before. I think we went slightly long but it was plenty of time and they didn't rush us at the end. I also think that for the price I'm not sure I'd go back. The food was good but not worth what you're paying. Kind of like how Be Our Guest is now with the prix fixe menu. Thanks for the review, way to go killing one of my favorite restaurants Disney.
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Jan 20, 2019 21:40
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skipdogg posted:Don’t hold your breath. It’s been bad forever. Also always bring a good size battery pack to recharge your phone. The park app is heavy on gps and murders your battery. I bring a 10,000 mah pack with me Yup, bring a decent size mobile charger. Mine is around the same size as this and is more than enough to last both my wife and me the whole day at Disney (and then some) whole regularly using the Disney app and taking pictures. Also, DO NOT bother with the battery exchange thing they have throughout the parks and resorts. It seems like a good idea except they are purposely small batteries to make the demand for their kiosks higher. For the same price as one of those, you can buy a much larger, more reliable battery online. With the size of a larger battery, you can recharge it overnight and not have to worry about exchanging at some kiosk that only exist at very specific places. I highly recommend Anker. You can find their products on Amazon.
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Jan 20, 2019 21:58
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Anker is entirely good except when they make me buy 5 other cords I already have to obtain one 4" cord.
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Jan 20, 2019 22:03
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Anker packs are the way to go. I take pride in making sure all my stuff is super secure on rides and my most shameful moment a few trips ago was whipping one of the corners on Mine Train and hearing an enormous smash as I realized my Anker just flew out and probably shattered on the rocks. I went to lost and found later and an almost identical model was there but I didn't wanna be an rear end in a top hat and take it.
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Jan 20, 2019 22:35
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skipdogg posted:Don’t hold your breath. It’s been bad forever. Also always bring a good size battery pack to recharge your phone. The park app is heavy on gps and murders your battery. I bring a 10,000 mah pack with me It has been bad forever and recently has gotten worse. Maybe they’ll eventually make it so bad that they’ll have to fix it? I can’t believe they still don’t have an apple watch app. Last trip it crashed so much and took so long to load that I hardly touched it which was great because my battery didnt die and I didnt have to lug around a battery pack all day. The cruise line app works fine with one minor exception, the chat notifications sometimes take 20-30 minutes to appear. It’s not really their fault I don’t think, I believe that’s just an issue with iOS background refresh. Dren fucked around with this message at 22:52 on Jan 20, 2019 |
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Jan 20, 2019 22:49
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Yeah, it's looking like we'll have a 2 year old in tow. Anyone have general tips for that? We rented a house because there are like 8 of us. Is there any sort of daycare option at wdw if you arent staying on site?
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Jan 21, 2019 00:55
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Gejimayu posted:Yeah, it's looking like we'll have a 2 year old in tow. Anyone have general tips for that? We rented a house because there are like 8 of us. Is there any sort of daycare option at wdw if you arent staying on site? I took our 2 year old nephew around Hollywood for a day with my wife (it was mostly me, though). My only advice is to have a large supply of tootsie rolls, get soft serve, and see Fantasmic. He cried quite a lot, but one of the best things we did was take a nap near Disney Junior live, because there's constant traffic of characters coming in and out. Stormtroopers and Doc Mcstuffins and the like. You probably want to do other stuff and feed your child real food, though.
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Jan 21, 2019 01:10
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Is the kid closer to 2 or 3? People bring young kids all the time but you can’t expect to park warrior 12 hour days with them in tow. Well you can, but I don’t advise it.
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Jan 21, 2019 01:19
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Gejimayu posted:Yeah, it's looking like we'll have a 2 year old in tow. Anyone have general tips for that? We rented a house because there are like 8 of us. Is there any sort of daycare option at wdw if you arent staying on site? Take. Frequent. Breaks. Probably harder since you're not on site, but man if you drag around a cranky 2 year old who needs a nap so that you can maximize your fun, you are going to have a miserable time. Alternatively, rent a stroller and let the kid sleep.
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Jan 21, 2019 01:22
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Gejimayu posted:Yeah, it's looking like we'll have a 2 year old in tow. Anyone have general tips for that? We rented a house because there are like 8 of us. Is there any sort of daycare option at wdw if you arent staying on site? As others have said, bring/rent a stroller, and don’t be afraid to go home in the middle of the day for a nap. I can’t speak for you, but I preferred doing less time in the parks but with a happier kid (plus, the time away from the parks will also recharge *your* batteries and make the rest of the day that much more pleasant). If your rental house is far from the parks, this page suggests that you can chill in some of the closer resorts even if you are not a guest there. It’s not something I’ve ever done, so I don’t know how accurate the tip is. I also don’t like the suggestion that you can sleep during Spaceship Earth. 
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Jan 21, 2019 01:35
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| # ? May 25, 2024 18:07 |
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Firstly, a stroller is an absolute must. For the day plan there are two options. Stroller naps and doing a break during the day. That tip page Grundulum linked is pretty good for in park rest/nap ideas. However, I highly recommend that you rope drop whatever park you’re going to, leave at 11 am, then go back at 5 or 6 after a rest. Rope dropping will give you short lines so you can get more done, leaving for a break will make it actually a vacation, and when you go back you can do another ride and hit a night show. As for just being with a 2 year old at the park in general you don’t want to get in any line over 30 minutes and you should expect to get done like 40% of what you’d do if they weren’t there. You probably won’t hit all the big rides. Set your fastpasses up now if you haven’t already. Everything takes forever with a 2 year old and they will frequently need to eat, be changed, etc. Look up some spots where you can let them just run around for a while. Magic Kingdom has the Dumbo play tent, Animal Kingdom has the Boneyard thing which is great, Epcot has a play area between future world and test track, and I’m not sure about studios. If they get scared on the dark rides it could help to give them a little light to hold that they can turn on and point at their hand when they are scared because it’s too dark.
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Jan 21, 2019 02:31
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