When we did our DisneyWorld trip for his 3rd birthday we did all the parks except for Hollywood Studios. This time around, with the opening of Star Wars themed Galaxy's Edge, it was our main event. We bought 3 day tickets and planned day 1 for Magic Kingdom and Day 2 for Hollywood Studios leaving Day 3 open to whatever we felt like (ended up being Epcot).
So this Disney trip did not go nearly as smoothly as our last one! Differences: um, I no longer have an only child and therefore have significantly less time and energy to obsess over planning. Therefore it didn't exactly go off without a hitch.
The first day we headed to Magic Kingdom bright and early. My parents were under the weather so it was just my little gang. I did not get the memo that the Disney Marathon would be causing a major quagmire with parking and actually getting into the park.
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| We had to park and then get in line to get on a bus which took 20 minutes to get us to a point that it would have taken 2 minutes to walk to just to ride the monorail to get to the park. Phew. |
We left the house at 7 and got into the park at 8:30 where we discovered the marathon had pushed back opening by an hour. True story.
My Disney-hating husband was about ready to divorce me over this oversight. But whatever- Juliet took a nap in the carrier and the boys raced to Seven Dwarves Mine Train as soon as the ropes dropped, walking right onto the ride. We also cashed in on rider swap, which means if you have a baby or child unable or unwilling to ride, you can get a pass for the secondary parent to skip the line and get to ride it later. The left-out parent can get up to 2 additional passes so Forest always got to ride twice. Finally he saw some value in having a little sister!
Because of all the rigamarole (more organized Disney freaks knew to avoid Magic Kingdom that morning) we ended up having the park mostly to ourselves for a few hours and walked on to most rides. Juliet did great at catnapping when she could and there were plenty of quiet tucked away areas where I could nurse her in relative privacy. Splash Mountain was closed for refurbishment so that area was our go to for nursing and napping for the day.
(just keep walking, just keep walking)
All the Disney parks also have baby rooms with private nursing rooms but they are generally at the front of the park so I usually opted just to find a bench tucked behind a bathroom and had no issues at Magic Kingdom.
We rode everything we wanted to until the park started to get more crowded after lunch time. We enjoyed our last fastpasses at Thunder Mountain (F's favorite of the day) and decided to quit while we were ahead and headed home to rest before the main even- Hollywood Studios- the next morning.
So about Hollywood Studios... Not a fan. Y'all, it turns out Forest is not the only Star Wars nerd in the galaxy and lots of people are into this stuff. We read tips that the initial Galaxy's Edge crowds would die down after the marathon weekend and it was projected to have LOW crowds. Which is why we planned our entire trip home around going to Disney this week and also let Forest miss a week of school to experience this with his cousins. Spoiler alert: everyone else must have read the same tips because it was crazy packed and the lines were obnoxiously long.
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| Forest posing for a picture with a Tie fighter while Jon and Juliet wait in a 2 hour long line to ride Millennium Falcon: Smuggler's Run |
Not only that, but we were advised to show up at the park by 7 AM to have any sort of shot at riding Rise of the Resistance. You have to activate your ticket by entering the park and then sign up for a boarding group using your My Disney Experience App ASAP. We got into the park by 7:05 and still only got a guaranteed boarding group (112) by the skin of our teeth!!!! (They only guarantee through group 116 or so).
My nephews and parents got into early 120s groups. So whatever, huge sigh of relief that that was done.
Generally if you are at a Disney Park at opening then you can pretty much walk onto any rides or have relatively short lines for the first hour. Um, nope! All the major attractions were 1.5-2 hour lines right away and stayed that way most of the day. My normal rule is 'I don't wait in a line longer than 35 minutes' and use fast passes and early morning time to ride all the high demand rides. This strategy does not currently work at Hollywood Studios. You can only get one fastpass for Tier 1 rides (includes all Toy Story rides) and there ARE NO FASTPASSES for Star Wars rides. It's basically a socialist country and there are no loopholes. (Except for Rider Swap and single rider which we capitalized on when possible.)
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| Doesn't Jonathan look so excited to be here in this moment? PS. I got us matching Disney Star Wars T-shirts, convinced my husband to actually wear his and then didn't even get a single photo. Like, what's the point? Now we have to go back... |
We had a large group this day- My sister and her 4 boys, our family of 4 and my parents. From the get-go we rushed to Millennium Falcon and proceeded to wait in line for ****2 hours***. AT 7 AM!!!!! Because of rider swap and the fact that we had babies, my sister and I both got 3 extra passes apiece while Jonathan (bless his heart for not divorcing me on the spot) waited in the line with my sister's two oldest boys and Forest. At least the three kids that waited in line got to turn around a ride again with my sister and I and her 6 year old (who was scared to ride but then was easily convinced when his brothers and cousin told him how awesome it was) with the rider swap perk. My parents both went into the single rider line and went through relatively quickly.
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| The two hour line let us get a very good look at all the cool details in Galaxy's Edge. |
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| there she is! |
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| more fun in line |
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| in getting low light pics of 4 boys, someone is always blurry.. |
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| post ride buzz- Andrew was a gunner on our mission. |
Yes, the ride is awesome! But 2 hours? Sheesh. While they waited for 2 hours, my mom, sister and I signed the younger ones up for Jedi Training, hit up Starbucks for Hollywood Studio mugs, and I tried to find a quiet space to nurse Juliet. It was not as easy as Magic Kingdom, that's for sure. There are very few benches and even fewer nooks and crannies to offer privacy.
Later in the day I tried the baby room located in the customer service office but the two nursing rooms were already occupied. I just nursed her in the changing room but people kept coming in and out and leaving the door WIDE OPEN so I was flashing everyone whilst getting earfuls of disgruntled Disney Guests laying into the customer service team about not getting to ride Rise of the Resistance. It was a mess! Disney was giving away tickets to come back another day or Park Hopper tickets to go to another park. We only had this one day with all the cousins so we were committed to making it work!
After Millennium Falcon, my dad took the boys to ride Star Tours before heading back to Galaxy's Edge to make their custom droids. After that, they did their Jedi Training and made their own light sabers. PS. I was mighty proud of Forest for getting up on stage to battle Darth Vader. He has no fear of the dark side but has a pretty mean case of stage fright.
Jonathan decided to leave the park with Juliet at this point (around 3pm) and I assured him I'd be back to the condo around 6. Alas, this was not to be....
The Rise of the Resistance staff estimated our group would be called in the late afternoon. I figured this meant 4. Since Jon left, I had one extra spot using his ticket and figured we'd use 2 year old Elijah as a ploy to ride the ride using rider swap for the rest of my nephews if their group wasn't called before then. We headed over to Slinky Dog to get ice cream and wait an hour for the boys to ride with Pops and then did a round of rider swap for that as well. While they were on round 2 our boarding group came up so we dashed over to Galaxy's Edge(4:30).
There was so much confusion about the rider swap that it took *20 extra minutes* and by that time my sister's boys group came up anyway so we got the rider swap for her and headed into the ride...just to be told we'd be in line for about AN HOUR. Like, what's even the point of a boarding group?? And we were lucky!
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| You can't really tell but that mass of people is the line outside the entrance to the ride. Once you got inside the ride you had about another hour of waiting to do. |
By the time we got out of the ride at 6 pm the line was estimated to be 2.5 hours! With a boarding group!
Needless to say, I did not get home in time to nurse Juliet before bed, and apparently she gave Jonathan a really hard time about it...My sister didn't get to even ride the ride because by the time we were done it was getting dark and they needed to drive another 2 hours to get home.
BUUUUUUT, this was everyone's favorite ride of the day. Cost-benefit wise I didn't think it was worth it, but the boys constantly exclaiming 'This is so awesome!' during the experience helped to ease the blow.
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| "This is. SO. AWESOME." |
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| Making them happy makes me happy. I couldn't give a flip about Star Wars (shhh...don't tell Forest). |
So it was a hassle, and had I known what a hot mess it would have ended up being, we wouldn't have gone. But we did it and we did all the things! We will not be going back anytime soon. Hopefully by the time Juliet is old enough to go back (5 years??) Star Wars mania won't be at such a fever pitch and we'll be able to experience Galaxy's Edge again in a more relaxed manner.
LSU dominating Clemson that night really helped to refresh our spirits!
But the long day followed by a late night made us decide to take a day off of Disney. The next day we just packed and organized and hung out at the resort.
For the last day we decided to do Epcot because it's always the least pressurized park and we needed to restore our faith in Disney a bit.
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| our only family photo of the trip |
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| Just us and Pops for Epcot. The park didn't even open until 10 which made for a much more relaxed rope drop experience. We hit up Frozen Ever After (Juliet slept the whole time) and then enjoyed coffee and donuts the size of our heads. Off to a much better start! |
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| Figment |
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| Nemo |
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| shaved ice in Japan |
We easily rode all the rides we wanted to, headed to the World Showcase for lunch, and left after 1 pm to spend the rest of the day packing as we prepared to leave for Bangkok the next day.
As we've gotten home and planned our next two vacations, Jonathan commented that somebody must have body-snatched me because I'm all adventuresome now. (By adventuresome he means booking luxury resorts in Bali but adding in a few excursions vs just lounging poolside all day.) I told him after doing Thailand---Louisiana---Gulf coast, Florida---Disneyworld---Thailand with a 5 month old I feel like I can pretty much do anything. Next up- Phuket (without Jonathan--he has a work trip) and then BALI!!!!
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I found this Youtube video that was very accurate. Its from Disneyland but gives you an idea of the craziness of trying to ride Rise of Resistance:
"It was awesome" was the consensus of the grandsons. Worth it but wow (applies to Hollywood) Epcot was a nice day with some good Indian food. Thanks Laine for memorializing here
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