How to best maximize a 2 day experience?

[bariww]

My fam and I just rescheduled our Christmas WDW trip for late Jan and are adding a few extra days so we can add UO to the itinerary. We're going to do UO on 2 of the weekdays (1/25-1/29) to avoid the weekend crowds, and buy Express Passes for both days. We'll be staying at WDW so obvi no EE. Will 2 days be enough time for us to really see and do a lot? What can we do to maximize our park experience? Does it make more sense to do single park tickets or park to park? Think we'll have time to ride some of the big stuff more than once (get the unlimited pass) or will we be really strapped just to get to everything one time? I have one very big HP fan and both kids are thrill ride lovers. Help!

 

[CAPSLOCK]

You have 4 people, and 2 are kids? Look into one night at one of the Universal hotels with free express passes - it would be express included on check in and check out day, so likely cheaper for the one night than buying 8 express passes individually.

On the other hand, I doubt you would really need express passes at that time - maybe you could do 1 day with express as a splurge if you are buying it separately, and you could buy it for the 2nd day if you feel you'd need it. Or plan other options during the busier times of the day (check out Potter areas, watch shows, ride Hagrids). Lines on weekdays early Nov were short enough for most rides. Weekends are another story.

With 2 days, with even 1 day express, you should be able to accomplish pretty much everything.

 

[bariww]

You have 4 people, and 2 are kids? Look into one night at one of the Universal hotels with free express passes - it would be express included on check in and check out day, so likely cheaper for the one night than buying 8 express passes individually.

On the other hand, I doubt you would really need express passes at that time - maybe you could do 1 day with express as a splurge if you are buying it separately, and you could buy it for the 2nd day if you feel you'd need it. Or plan other options during the busier times of the day (check out Potter areas, watch shows, ride Hagrids). Lines on weekdays early Nov were short enough for most rides. Weekends are another story.

With 2 days, with even 1 day express, you should be able to accomplish pretty much everything.

Thank you for suggestions and yes, we're 2 adults and 2 kids! Do you have any sense for how crowds generally are late in Feb? Specifically the 22nd - 26th? I'm not sure my normal go-to crowd calendars are any help because of Covid and I've never planned a UO trip and am flailing a bit. Hotel prices and Express Pass prices are higher late Feb vs late Jan, but IDK if that's any indication of crowds or not. Regarding staying at a UO hotel, that's an interesting idea if the $'s make sense. Would we have to go to the hotel 1st for anything on check-in day? We'd have to stay checked in at WDW and would just need a backpack with pj's and clothes for day 2, so if we could go straight to the park and put the backpack in a locker it'd be great. It'd certainly make it easier than driving back and forth to WDW!

 

[CAPSLOCK]

If the prices are higher, Universal anticipates it being busier. 1. Late Jan is practically as low crowds as they get, so almost anything else will be more expensive. 2. As long as you avoid President's Day weekend, you should be good in late Feb. Went in 2018 and the week leading up to President's Day was very busy but the week of was better. Weather = great.

You will need to check into the hotel for your room key cards, which double as the express passes. You can check in early in the morning and leave your overnight bag at luggage services if the room isn't ready.

Look at AP rates also. It can be cheaper to upgrade one ticket to an AP and book a lower price hotel room.

 

[Tormania]

We just did a 3-day (2-night) stay at UO on the front-end of our WDW trip. We were at UO on Wed/Thur/Fri Thanksgiving week. We stayed at RPR for 2 nights to get the early access AND the unlimited Express Passes. Our arrival night we stayed at a cheaper hotel nearby then woke up early to go "check-in" to RPR at 6:30am on Wed morning so we could take advantage of the early access which started at 7am for the days of our trip. For our group the ONLY way we were able to ride Hagrid's was to go early and get in line first thing, waits were around 45 minutes by 7:45am but it wasn't long before the virtual queue was used and we were never able to snag a 2nd spot later in the day. (Of course it wasn't till later I found our the actual distribution times for that so that might explain why we never saw anything). Express Pass made almost every ride a nearly walk-on experience for the majority of our trip. We had back-to-back walk-ons for Gringotts and Hulk, I'd saw our longest Express Pass wait of our 3 day experience was maybe 30 minutes and that was only once for Kong (bad timing) and once for the Hogwarts Express back over to IOA during dinner rush timeframe.

All in all our trip to UO was fabulous, a great experience!! Great weather, crowds were manageable considering it was Thanksgiving, was glad we went.