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When you book offsite, if not at one of the "Disney affiliated" hotels, it's my understanding that you can't book your FP+ as early as onsite guests. For anyone who has been in this category, does this tend to impact your trip much? I mean, do you still get FP booked for everything you wanted, or do you end up missing out?....................
No, it doesn't impact our trips as much. We either do a throwaway room or we adjust by doing rope drop, riding certain attractions before close (FOP) or look for FP+ during the days we're in the parks. A good understanding of what rides and attractions are popular and the best time of day to ride them is key. I see a lot of people get hung on getting FP and worry about having a good time if you don't get the ones your want or the times you want. Many, many people visit WDW every day without FP. Some of my family members are DVC and they NEVER get FP ahead of time. I don't understand it, but they would rather play each day by ear!
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As for FP's- that's honestly my only concern with staying offsite. I am now looking into booking a throwaway room (check out the comment a few replies above this one! I had never heard of it before!) I would just do it for one night, and then you have access to booking FP's early! I am so excited about this because it will get us our magic bands as well as free parking the day of check-in and check-out.
You also get to use EMH for two days, which can be helpful in strategizing. If you pick your AK day on an EMH morning, you can get into the park a full hour before the general public.
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Now the 60 day window can be helpful, but you still might not be able to book what you want with a throwaway room. For onsite stays, the window opens up for the whole stay at the 60 day mark, so people with a week onsite are booking the other days at 60+1, 60+2, 60+3, 60+4, 60+5 and 60+6. Many people report difficulty getting the headliners until the 3rd, 4th, or even 5th day of their onsite stay. You will probably have better availability at 60 days than at 30, but you still might not be able to get, say FoP even for your second day (60+1) because everyone onsite who booked a longer stay that started before you had a head start booking FP for that day.
A lot of this depends on the time of year. We frequently go in May and I've not had difficulty getting FOP for either my 60 day or 60+1, they are usually times in late afternoon. We've also had success getting same day FP for FOP (3 times on 3 different trips) so that also can happen. And riding FOP at the end of the evening is another successful strategy that we've used. I'm using FOP and the main example here because it is the most sought after ride currently. SWGE is still a wild card and we don't know how that will work once it's open. There are currently no FP for SWGE!
At 30 days (normal offsite FP booking window) I've been able to get 7DMT, PP, Soarin, RnRC, ToT, and some other harder to get rides that I can't remember off the top of my head. NRJ has popped up a lot on the same day I've been in AK. A lot of times these are for times later in the day, but then you can rope drop...say MK.... ride a lot of the attractions in the first hour or so and then use FP later in the afternoon.
Hmmm...I guess I didn't read enough information. They aren't allowing the rolling 60 day FP's anymore? So if I do one night at the campsite I can get FP's for those 2 days but then wait 30 days for the rest...I guess I will have to deal with that
It's still worth it because it saves us 2 days of parking fees and gets us our magic bands (which I am getting either way!).
Let's say I don't do that...how hard is it to get Flight of Passage FP's 30 days out? I know we can keep dropping and booking FP's until our trip, is there any good app or website to help with that? I am sure I've heard of one before...but maybe I just keep checking the Disney app/website.
Since Disney changed the rolling window, some people have booked a throwaway for every-other day, which gives you 60 FP for your entire trip length. You would just have to log on
MDE every-other day to book your FP for two days. The cost of a campsite is about $100, so adding three throwaways (every-other day) to your budget could be around $300. But, if you're already staying offisite you can save thousands and have some wiggle room for the extra money. You'll also get free parking for your check in and check out days, so if you do an every-other day throwaway you are getting free parking for the entire week. I'm putting this out there as another option.
$300 approx. Three throwaway campsites, booked every-other day
-$150 parking for 6 days in parks (free with campsite)
-$60 approx. cost of 4 Magic Bands (not incl. tax, free with campsite, can get up to 10 MB)
= $90 plus whatever you consider the "value" of 60 day FP and EMH.
I have not seen FOP at 30 days out, but I have seen several same day FP for it. You need to refresh MDE quite a bit to get one, if there are any available. One morning last September we got up at 6 am to rope drop AK and on a whim I checked MDE and got FP for later that morning!
There's so much pressure to try to get everything in, ride every ride, see every show and get the most out of your vacation, however it's impossible to see and do everything in one trip. The reality is that WDW is enormous and there are so many things to see and do that you won't feel bed if you can't do everything. Pick a few priorities and see what you can do to make those happen.