Rope Drop Strategy for Offsite

[proud_canadian]

We will be staying offsite so won't get extra magic hours and are not planning Genie+ (going end of August).

What is the best place to go first at each park? Is it best to head to the biggest ticket rides like Peter Pan or Seven Dwarves (MK), Pandora (AK), Rise (HS), Remy (Epcot), or is there a better strategy to hit those later in the day since they will already have queues from early entry?

Thoughts?

 

[SquashBanana]

We will be staying offsite so won't get extra magic hours and are not planning Genie+ (going end of August).

What is the best place to go first at each park? Is it best to head to the biggest ticket rides like Peter Pan or Seven Dwarves (MK), Pandora (AK), Rise (HS), Remy (Epcot), or is there a better strategy to hit those later in the day since they will already have queues from early entry?

Thoughts?

If you do not have early entry, then all of the major rides will have considerable waits by the time you enter the park at 9:00.

These are viable rope drop options based off my experiences the last couple of weeks.

AK - Anywhere but FOP (or sometimes Navi River if 9 am open) I personally like to start with Navi River journey if it is an 8:00 am open, then head to Safari then work my way clockwise around the park. Everest and dinosaur will probably have a wait by the time you get to them, but not as bad as Safari and Navi River will be at the same point in the day.

HS - Tower of terror, Rock'n Roller Coaster, millennium falcon, Toy Story mania, and usually Mickey and Minnie's runaway railway depending on where you are headed next.

MK - Haunted Mansion, Big thunder mountain, Jungle Cruise. Avoid Tomorrowland unless you are going on a lower tier ride (i.e. buzz, astro orbiter)

EP - this is the tricky one. If you're interested in meet and greets, we walked straight to Anna and Elsa and waited maybe 10 minutes. You could ride Frozen, but it will probably have a 30-40 minute wait. Anything in future world will be a walk-on (except test track when it reopens and guardians if and when it goes to a standby line)

You have options depending on what your preferences are for the day. This is just what worked for my experience.

 

[TotoGogo]

Can you walk on rise of the resistance in HS?

 

[SquashBanana]

Can you walk on rise of the resistance in HS?

The only two ways are arriving an hour before early entry or buying an ILL. Waits have been dropping in the 30-45 minute range late in the evening.

 

[Tom_E_D]

The only two ways are arriving an hour before early entry or buying an ILL. Waits have been dropping in the 30-45 minute range late in the evening.

Arriving an hour before early entry doesn't help if, like OP, you're not eligible for early entry. (I realize you weren't replying to OP, but the theme of the thread involves those staying offsite.)

 

[proud_canadian]

Are all rides open for early magic hours? Or only the headliners? Trying to plan what rides to go to first, and if there are some ride that were not open yet and open at normal park opening those might be a good place to go first.

 

[Tom_E_D]

Are all rides open for early magic hours? Or only the headliners? Trying to plan what rides to go to first, and if there are some ride that were not open yet and open at normal park opening those might be a good place to go first.

Not all attractions are open, especially at MK where only Tomorrowland and Fantasyland open early. There is a list in Post 1 of this thread: https://www.disboards.com/threads/everything-early-theme-park-entry-etpe-please-read-post-1.3855945/

I can't swear as to how accurate it is, but I believe the moderators do update things in that thread.

 

[elvispursley]

There are You Tube videos that have strategies for this very question

 

[scrappinginontario]

Not all attractions are open, especially at MK where only Tomorrowland and Fantasyland open early. There is a list in Post 1 of this thread: https://www.disboards.com/threads/everything-early-theme-park-entry-etpe-please-read-post-1.3855945/

I can't swear as to how accurate it is, but I believe the moderators do update things in that thread.

To the best of my knowledge, the info in post one is still accurate.

 

[neverlandsky]

If not Genie+/LLMP save headliners for dinner time. No one talks about this, if a ride goes down be in the area of ride down, it's how we rode the Haunted Mansion 3 times in Disneyland CA just days before Halloween. Probably why it's going VQ only now.

Our plan always has been non-headliners at RD and then hop into headliners around dinner time and before close. Personally, don't like to waste time for 1 headliner ride at rope drop when we can get in 4-5 rides and some over again.

 

[Juventus]

I was offsite in february and was first in line for offsite guests with normal 8am opening. Made it to FoP pre-show in 40 minutes. Walked on to EE single rider line after, then did Dinosaur and was off by 9:30. I'd say it's worth doing the headline first because afterwards u are waiting for safari instead of FoP if you didn't go to FoP first.
I went to safari first once and it was a mistake as it opened 30 minutes after normal park opening: and when I got there there was 10 minutes or so worth of early entry guests there (probably from FoP). So I got safari around 8:40, the same time as I did FoP.

Oh, and ignore the posted wait time.