Thanks to all of the reports here; they were a HUGE help in planning our trip! This will be a long post, but I want to give back to the thread that helped me so much!
Our trip was May 9-15, stayed at the Yacht Club. We are annual passholders (not locals) who renewed our APs. Since we go at least once per year, we were not concerned with rope drop or maximizing rides. We wanted this trip to be relaxing after a stressful year. Full disclosure: We are fully vaccinated which made our comfort level for this trip very high. We also visited in September 2020 (we drove from Ohio for that trip), and this trip definitely had a more positive atmosphere. We were there when masks were still required outside. The first day of the change was our departure day and we left for the airport at 5 am, so we had no experience with the changed rules (although it’s a welcome change). I won’t list day-by-day details, but I organized my thoughts into the positives and negatives from the trip. Happy to answer any questions!
Positives:
1. Social distancing in lines: Even though this is being reduced to 3 feet, it’s SO nice not having others right on your heels!
2. Social distancing on transportation: Some will disagree with this and I know it won’t last forever, but we loved not having to stand on the busses literally face-to-face with others. It was nice to have some space.
3. Mobile order: Loved this! We placed our lunch orders early so that we had our pick of times. Recommend doing this if you want to eat at peak times. Also loved the CMs guarding the doors so only those with orders ready could enter the seating areas. I can’t tell you how many times in the past we walked around with trays of food looking for a table. This was such an efficient way to run the CS restaurants and much less stressful for guests.
4. Table service to go: We only did this once and it was for breakfast, but loved this! Since the QS menus are so limited right now, it was nice to have a TS option for carry out. We saw lots of guests taking advantage of this at the resort.
5. Pool hours: Stormalong Bay and the leisure pools had long hours, which was nice since the parks did not.
6. CMs: Almost all CMs that we interacted with were great and were working REALLY hard!
7. Good mask compliance: Again, we were there before the outdoor mask mandate was lifted. It was HARD to walk around with masks outside in 93 degrees! We saw pretty good compliance both outdoors and indoors during our trip. Witnessed a few guests push back with CMs when asked to pull up masks (indoors), but nothing out of control.
8. Character cavalcades: Saw them in all 4 parks during our visit. Loved these!
9. New park entrance security: So much easier on both guests and security CMs. Quickly learned to remove umbrellas, glasses cases, and external batteries from bags and hold out in front of you when walking through the scanners.
10. Entertainment in Epcot: Really enjoyed the Voices of Liberty and Mariachi Cobre performances in Epcot. We stayed for multiple sets. Live entertainment is something we’ve really missed and hope they bring more of it back!
11. Bus times in the
MDE App: Convenient and accurate.
12. Friendly guests: For the most part, other guests we interacted with were friendly and happy to be there. The atmosphere was positive and a welcome change from our last pandemic trip back in the early fall.