Here Now & Just Back WDW Reopening Experiences Including Park Hopping

[cakebaker]

We absolutely loved our stay at the boardwalk. You are correct though, very little with regards to food at the actual boardwalk area. I did have that Italian sub a couple of times from the bakery and it was very good. We mainly ate at the parks (we had park hoppers so that helped). We also did kimonos at the Swan for sushi. That was very very good


If I recall correctly, you ate all QS this trip correct? We very much enjoyed our food this vacation, trying a number of new locations in the process. However we had a TS every day, typically for lunch (so that our evenings were flexible).


-Dan

Yes, we were all QS, but in the past we've found it to be very good. We don't do a lot of TS on any trip, but do usually do a couple, not this time.

The snacks were excellent, the QS meals not so much. We really noticed the lack of variety in the menus.

 

[DisneyFive]

Yes, we were all QS, but in the past we've found it to be very good. We don't do a lot of TS on any trip, but do usually do a couple, not this time.

The snacks were excellent, the QS meals not so much. We really noticed the lack of variety in the menus.

I agree that Magic Kingdom is the worst for QS right now. Fortunately we were able to eat at Captain Cook‘s at the Poly or other resort locations for QS during our MK days.

 

[teawar]

Yes, we were all QS, but in the past we've found it to be very good. We don't do a lot of TS on any trip, but do usually do a couple, not this time.

The snacks were excellent, the QS meals not so much. We really noticed the lack of variety in the menus.

We went over to Yacht Club/beach club for most of our QS while staying at the boardwalk.

 

[cakebaker]

I agree that Magic Kingdom is the worst for QS right now. Fortunately we were able to eat at Captain Cook‘s at the Poly or other resort locations for QS during our MK days.

One of these days we're going to eat at CC's at the Poly. We just rarely carve out the time to visit other resorts besides our own.

 

[bbn1122]

Why would anyone ever expect to ride together in a single rider line? That is the whole point of the line.

Past trips we would usually used Single Rider, after riding the ride and really wanting to do it again but with out waiting too long. Many times 2 of our party of 5 would ride together. So, it’s not unusual to ride with someone from your party.

My crew is planning to take advantage of Single Rider in a few weeks, we are all adults and will be spending enough time together for a week, that we don’t have to be next to each other on every ride. Lol!!

 

[luv2cheer92]

Past trips we would usually used Single Rider, after riding the ride and really wanting to do it again but with out waiting too long. Many times 2 of our party of 5 would ride together. So, it’s not unusual to ride with someone from your party.

My crew is planning to take advantage of Single Rider in a few weeks, we are all adults and will be spending enough time together for a week, that we don’t have to be next to each other on every ride. Lol!!

Of course it may happen, especially on TT based on the seating arrangement. But nobody should ever expect it, that's what is crazy to me.

 

[bbn1122]

Of course it may happen, especially on TT based on the seating arrangement. But nobody should ever expect it, that's what is crazy to me.

gotcha!

 

[dachsie]

One of these days we're going to eat at CC's at the Poly. We just rarely carve out the time to visit other resorts besides our own.

How is your grandson doing?

 

[cakebaker]

How is your grandson doing?

Some better, the nausea seems to be gone, but we're still fighting the fever he has as well as the cough. He got tested first thing this morning, as did the rest of us. We should have the results sometime later today . Thanks for asking.

 

[disny_luvr]

I didn’t post yesterday, but we went to Epcot and had a great time! We rode everything except for Test Track and Mission Space. Since we are entering through the International Gateway, we decided to head to Frozen first and were on and off by 11:00. If coming from the IG I’d recommend going to Frozen at rope drop. Also, we have been finding the wait times way more accurate on the Lines app.

Last night we walked around World Showcase and ate way too much! There wasn’t a food we didn’t like. Our favorites were the chicken teriyaki buns and chicken dumplings. We also loved everything at the Germany booth.

Weather has been awesome. It’s been cooler (by August standards) than I expected.

ETA - I asked if we could sit in section B, row 1 for Soarin’ and our request was honored. I had read earlier that you couldn’t request seats/rows, but we haven’t found that to be the case.
A boy in front of me on Space asked for the front row, and his request was honored, too.

 

[disny_luvr]

We are currently back at the BC after spending the morning at the MK. We got to the BC bus stop at 7:20 and the bus only arrived a little before 8:00. There was a family that said they had been waiting since 6:50. This morning was our first snafu with the busses, and actually our only setback yet this trip. We got to MK after opening, but still rode Space, Buzz, Pooh, Big Thunder, Haunted Mansion, IASW, Pirates, and watched the Enchanted Tiki Room, plus we got cinnamon rolls from Gastons all before noon. We even saw two different calvacades. We ate at LTT for lunch and it was delicious! We waited about 10 minutes for a bus back to the BC. The weather was really nice again today. It rained this morning and was cloudy so that helped keep the temps down.

Today is our third full day, and everything has been truly awesome so far! If you are coming soon, don’t worry about some of the negativity you may have read about. CMs have been awesome, everything is clean (no dirty bathrooms or overflowing trash cans), and lines are not bad at all.

 

[alexiskimberly]

We are currently back at the BC after spending the morning at the MK. We got to the BC bus stop at 7:20 and the bus only arrived a little before 8:00. There was a family that said they had been waiting since 6:50. This morning was our first snafu with the busses, and actually our only setback yet this trip. We got to MK after opening, but still rode Space, Buzz, Pooh, Big Thunder, Haunted Mansion, IASW, Pirates, and watched the Enchanted Tiki Room, plus we got cinnamon rolls from Gastons all before noon. We even saw two different calvacades. We ate at LTT for lunch and it was delicious! We waited about 10 minutes for a bus back to the BC. The weather was really nice again today. It rained this morning and was cloudy so that helped keep the temps down.

Today is our third full day, and everything has been truly awesome so far! If you are coming soon, don’t worry about some of the negativity you may have read about. CMs have been awesome, everything is clean (no dirty bathrooms or overflowing trash cans), and lines are not bad at all.

Woo this is such great news! I wonder if maybe the crowds are going down a bit given everything that is going on? Either way, makes me super excited for my upcoming trip, so thank you for sharing!

 

[disny_luvr]

Woo this is such great news! I wonder if maybe the crowds are going down a bit given everything that is going on? Either way, makes me super excited for my upcoming trip, so thank you for sharing!

That could be. It’s hard to tell. I think it’s a combo of masks required, cases rising, and schools going back. I don’t know, but we aren’t complaining!

 

[DefnotDLav]

The BC may have more to offer, but between the 5 of us, we pretty much covered ordering a lot of what they offer and seriously, none of it was good. Avoid the mac n cheese at all costs- it was so dry it was crispy and hard. And all of it was cold, nm it took 2 trips down to the marketplace to get the order right.

I have no good things to say about the food at WDW right now outside of the Food and Wine festival. My guess is, had I wanted to deal with it, I would've asked for refunds on at least half the things we attempted te eat on our trip with my basic requirement only being that it's edible. Because of a lot of it just wasn't. We threw more away than we ate.

Yeah the food at Disney has been sub par for sometime, IMO, outside of a few locations.

More people should demand refunds, perhaps they'd up their game.

 

[DefnotDLav]

We are currently back at the BC after spending the morning at the MK. We got to the BC bus stop at 7:20 and the bus only arrived a little before 8:00. There was a family that said they had been waiting since 6:50. This morning was our first snafu with the busses, and actually our only setback yet this trip. We got to MK after opening, but still rode Space, Buzz, Pooh, Big Thunder, Haunted Mansion, IASW, Pirates, and watched the Enchanted Tiki Room, plus we got cinnamon rolls from Gastons all before noon. We even saw two different calvacades. We ate at LTT for lunch and it was delicious! We waited about 10 minutes for a bus back to the BC. The weather was really nice again today. It rained this morning and was cloudy so that helped keep the temps down.

Today is our third full day, and everything has been truly awesome so far! If you are coming soon, don’t worry about some of the negativity you may have read about. CMs have been awesome, everything is clean (no dirty bathrooms or overflowing trash cans), and lines are not bad at all.

That sounds like a great morning! I would have 0 complaints with that.

 

[sjrec]

Today was our first park day and we went to HS. We got there a little after opening at 9 and got right in line for MMRR. We waited for about 45 minutes. Then went to TSM and waited about 30 minutes. With a 2 year old that was about all we could do before we needed a break. Not having fastpass is frustrating. Parks are packed. And wearing masks on the friendship boats from the BW area is not pleasant. So far it’s been a rough time. We’ll take a nice long break at the resort and try HS this evening.

ETA: The BW food options are abysmal.

We really enjoyed our evening in HS-again, times posted were inflated. And we really enjoyed dinner at the ABC Commissary-but they close at 7:00. We put our order in at 6:45 and practically had the restaurant to ourselves.

 

[SimonSez]

Hello guys! I'm back again with day 2 of my trip, we went to Epcot My sister and I aren't ones for rope dropping so we took the Skyliner at 11 and was in the world showcase at 11:20. It was pretty empty in the park for the first hour or so, we got some pretty sweet pics throughout the world showcase. We got Joffrey's coffee and dole whips. This might be controversial but I think the watermelon dolewhip is better than the pineapple

Then we stumbled on test track at a 95-minute wait. We were in line for about 10 minutes until we saw the people behind us say they're going to single rider because there's no wait. So we did that and there was about a 10-minute wait tops. SO much better than waiting 90 minutes. However, note that the CMs are very strict about splitting apart single riders! We saw a lady make a bit of a scene trying to stay with her daughter even though they took the single rider line...My sister and I didn't care for riding together anyways lol. Then we did Mission space orange, which was about a 25-minute wait. Then spaceship earth, which was a 30-minute wait.

We got lunch at a few different booths but after a while lines were getting pretty long (~3:30 pm) for just about every Epcot booth, we decided to go back to the hotel for an hour and mentally prepare for a lot of drinks and food. Returned to Epcot around 5. When we returned lines were....pretty rough. Pretty much every booth in the world showcase had a line that was at least 20-30 minutes. Which is rough when a lot of the booths are food and wine so you don't particularly get a large portion. We still managed to have a few drinks and food but the lines were just so long for a lot of booths it was pretty disheartening. Crowds were also pretty large, I mean shoulder to shoulder in some places. However, we got a lot of amazing food. I never thought I'd have so many margaritas in my life (my sister and I split them so I swear we're not getting completely blasted at Epcot).

Honestly, lines for rides were a lot shorter than lines for food. We managed to ride the figment ride, Nemo, Soarin, and living with the land in a little over an hour. The longest line we stood in of the day was Frozen which would not budge from above a 40-minute wait. So we just decided to ride and it did take about 40 minutes but honestly Frozen might've been my favorite ride of the day! Overall it was a really fun day, however, the crowds seemed very large. If you're worried about that I'd tell you that yes they are just as bad as the look in people's pictures lol. However, my sister and I have a running saying that it is what you make of it. So even if things seem bad we'll just perform self-affirmations lol. "We ARE having fun. This IS a good time. We are ENJOYING this experience" even after our legs hurt or we stand in line for an hour.

Tomorrow is Animal Kingdom I actually have 2 reservations tomorrow so we'll see how that goes.

Single rider is great for TT

 

[SimonSez]

I would be worried about Lime Garage being 'full', and then redirecting me to orange, especially at night or on a weekend. It just always takes longer than you think when you are trying to get somewhere at WDW. I'd go an hour early with a car (instead of 1 and 1/2 hours for Disney transpo) and plan on shopping a little if I was early.

For Disney transportation, definitely hour and a half. There have been times when I've just made it using that rule. (If you are (for ex) at a monorail hotel going to another monorail hotel or MK you can adjust the time accordingly.) If a bus is involved there are no guarantees.

Good advice

 

[sjrec]

We absolutely loved our stay at the boardwalk. You are correct though, very little with regards to food at the actual boardwalk area. I did have that Italian sub a couple of times from the bakery and it was very good. We mainly ate at the parks (we had park hoppers so that helped). We also did kimonos at the Swan for sushi. That was very very good


If I recall correctly, you ate all QS this trip correct? We very much enjoyed our food this vacation, trying a number of new locations in the process. However we had a TS every day, typically for lunch (so that our evenings were flexible).

Today’s example is Kona Café at the Polynesian. Sadly we are leaving today though.
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-Dan

That looks wonderful!
Maybe we were just lucky, but we had some excellent meals (Narcoosees, Citricos, Raglan Road, HBD), some very good (SciFi, Trattoria al Forno)-we had appetizers and drinks one night at the Enchanted Rose and the bar in the Yacht Club. Another evening we had the cheese plate from the Marketplace with some leftover grapes and our own wine. We also shared the roast beef sandwich from there and was very good. With chips and grapes on a hot day it was plenty. The ABC Commissary was a nice surprise.

 

[Haley R]

Today was our first park day and we went to HS. We got there a little after opening at 9 and got right in line for MMRR. We waited for about 45 minutes. Then went to TSM and waited about 30 minutes. With a 2 year old that was about all we could do before we needed a break. Not having fastpass is frustrating. Parks are packed. And wearing masks on the friendship boats from the BW area is not pleasant. So far it’s been a rough time. We’ll take a nice long break at the resort and try HS this evening.

ETA: The BW food options are abysmal.

Oh no! We’re staying at BW next week for two nights. What’s open for food?