Four Parks: One Day: My Plan!
Alright! You’ve been given about a week to think it over. Just how would you be able to navigate through the four Walt Disney World theme parks under the parameters I set?
It takes some thought; some planning; and probably a little luck.
I’ve put some thought into this and I’m ready to share my thoughts with you.
StrategyThere are so many things to consider for this particular challenge that it made sense to me to sit down and put together some strategy or think about certain aspects of this challenge.Here is what I came up with:
First, if possible, I would try and pull this stunt off on a day that offers both an Extra Magic Hour Evening Hour Morning in one park and an Extra Magic Hour Evening in another park. If both occur on the same day then potentially I am looking at an extra four hours of touring time to complete my park touring requirements. Every minute counts so the strategy here is to look for a way to get more time.
If there are no days with this combination of both an EMH Morning and EMH Evening then I would look for a day in which either EPCOT or Magic Kingdom has an Extra Magic Hour Evening and focus on that day. The Preference here would be the Magic Kingdom because Spectromagic and Wishes would play a big part of my plan but either park will work.
My thoughts are that it would be wise to use a combination of both a rental car and Disney Transportation to go from one park to another…you’ll understand how when you read my plan later on.
The more in your travel party the slower you move so my plan says try this with no more than three other friends. If I go beyond four in my travel party then there is a greater chance that there may be times when the party will need to wait to get on certain attractions…not to mention getting around in a car. So to maximize my potential for success, I’m doing this solo or with just one other person.
I plan to stretch out my eating plans. I’m thinking that I will eat at my resort before going to my first park. This breakfast has to hold me for a long time. I want a lot behind me before I stop to eat lunch. Preferably I want to eat lunch towards the end of my time in park number two and dinner in park number four.My Attraction StrategyBefore I go into my detailed plan let me discuss my thoughts on how to attack the attraction portion of this plan.
Here are my thoughts:
For the attractions I will focus on will be those which I feel move guests in and out of the attraction as quickly as possible. So, I will be looking to ride any attraction that is a constant loading attraction, that is, one that has ride vehicles that never stop.
Proximity of certain attractions to each other will also play a key role in making the most of my time in the parks. Travel time between parks is important but so is travcel time between attractions.
Now here’s an interesting thought. FastPass may be more of an enemy in this challenge than an ally. Sure early in the morning it may help but come afternoon the FP distribution times usually run four to as many as six hours out. So it may be better to wait 440 minutes in stand-by as opposed to waiting four hours to make use of a FastPass.
Diversions. I will make good use of diversions. By diversions I mean parades or fireworks, anything that draws crowds away from attractions. You’d be surprised as to how much you can do in a theme park during either of these events.
The PlanI'm not sure if there is any type of barometer that can be used to determine what is the best way to do this little challenge. We all have our favorite parks and favorite attractions so we all have different takes on what would work well for an approach to accomplish this feat.
For me, my thought is to try not to necessarily do this as fast as I can and do so in some commando mode but to try and do it without running from park to park and attraction to attraction.
So after much thought, here is what I came up with for doing four parks in one day:
The day I've chosen to do this challenge is Thursday, July 3, 2008 because on that day Disney's Animal Kingdom, my first park of the day, will be offerring Extra Magic Morning Hours and that evening The Magic Kingdom will be hosting Extra MagicEvening Hours.
So this means that the turnstiles will be open for me at 8 A.M. at DAK and that attractions at MK will be open to me until 1 A.M. Sure it may be hot and may be crowded but this 17 hours window offers me the best chance to do this challenge.
I will get up as early as possible so I can be at the Animal Kingdom turnstiles around 7:30 or so. This means either eating an early and quick meal at one of my resort's eateries or having something in my room.
My preference is to have a little breakfast snack in the room.
Park 1 - Disney's Animal Kingdom
It's 7:30 and I am already at the turnstiles. When I get into the park I walk over to Expedition Everest and grab a FastPass.
I then go to Kali River Rapids. Why? Well everyone else is doing the Safari or Everest so I can get my first attraction out of the way real fast. My guess is that I can be out of Kali River Rapids by 8:45. One attraction down.
TIme to use my Expedition Everest FastPass. Most likely my FastPass distribution time is probably for sometime between 9 and 10 A.M. No problem. If I go on Everest somewhere between 9:00 and 9:30 I will be off the attrraction no later than 9:45. Two attractions down.
At this point my guess is that my best choice would be Dinosaur. It is one of those attractions which some people do not like because it's loud, rough, and frightening to some. That translates into a short queue. It's also not that long of a walk from Everest to Dinosaur.If I can get into Dinosaur somewhere in the vicinity of 10:00 to 10:15 then I could very well find myself leaving Disney's Animal Kingdom around 11:00, if not sooner. One park down.
Since I got to the park early I may not need to wait for the traim to take me to the parking lot and my rental car. I may be parked close enough to the park entrance to walk to the car...another reason why I arrived to the park so early.
My next park in this challenge is Disney's Hollywood Studios.
Park 2 - Disney's Hollywood StudiosI chose this park second because it's really the only suitable "slot" for me today. It cannot serve as my fist park because the attractions aren't open until mid morning. It cannot be my third park because that would mean i would be in the smallest of the tfour theme parks in mid to late afternoon, and of course it cannot replace Magic Kingdom on this day because Magic Kingdom offers Extra Magic Hours in the evening and two diversions which will lower the queues for my trargeted attractions.
Let's assume that worse case scenario, I am going through the Studios turnstiles at 11 A.M.
IMy first stop is the SuperGreeter Board at the the corner of Hollywood Bvd. and Sunset Blvd. to check out the waiting times. The first bit of information is to determine which of the two attractions, Twilight Zone Tower of Terror and Rock 'N' Roller Coaster have less than an hour wait. The second important piece of information is to find out what the FastPass distribution times are for both of them.
I will grab a FastPass for the attraction with the longest queue and get in line for the other attraction. My guess is that the Fast Pass Distribution time will be somwhere between two and three hours out. So that tells me that in that time I should focus on doing two other attractions and eat lunch.
Let's assume Rock 'N' Rollercoaster has the longer line. I will then grab a FastPass for that attraction and get in line for the Tower. Now I'm guessing that if it;s around 11:30 or so that my FastPass will have a distribution time of somewhere between 1:30 and 2:30.
Let's say it's a 45 minute wait for the Tower. I emerge from that attraction somewhere around 12:30-12:45. I should be able to squeeze in attraction #2 before my RnRC FastPass time arrives.
I check the board again...what has shorter lines...Toy Story Mania...Star Tours...or TGMR? My guess is that it's Star Tours...Toy Story Mania is new and will be crowded...TGMR is always packed in the afternoon during the summer...and Star Tours is struggling with attendance compared to the other two attractions.
The assumption is that I arrive at Star TOurs around 1:00 and get on the attraction no less than 45 minutes later. I thus emerge from the attraction around 2:00 and head over to use my FP.
To be fair I must assume that it will still be at least a 15-20 minute wait even with my FP. I thus assume I'm walking out of the attraction sometime around 3 P.M.
I need to eat lunch so I stop off at Cantina Eddie's for some pizza and a drink to fulfill the lunch requirement before heading out the turnstiles sometime around 3:45 or so.
Park #2 is complete.
I drive to EPCOT.Park #3 - EPCOTWith luck I'm walking through the EPCOT turnstiles no later than 4:30.
I'm glad I stopped for a quick linch at the Studios. It's all attractions for this park.
For EPCOT I know two attractions I am defintely doing. One is Spaceship Earth and to fulfill my World Showcase obligations is the Gran Fiesta tour at the Meixco paviliion in World Showcase..
IOne again, first stop is the Supergreeter Board to get information on wait times..
Now here is where it gets tricky. It's late afternoon and probably not a good idea to look at FastPasses as they may have distribution times that go into early evening. I will still check but remember it's summer time with lots of crowds. The question whetehr I do Soarin' or Test Track.
Because of this I have decided on two of my targeted attractions...Spaeceship Earth because it is a constant loading attrractopn, El Rio del Tiempor for the same reason and Test Track because it is close to El Rio del Tiempo and I can make use of the single passenger line, you know for those who aren;t traveling with a party.head over to Test Track...is there a FP that can get me in within the next two hours? If not then I head to the River of time and do that.
Hopefully I'm out of the River of TIme by 4:45- 5:00.
I head to Test Track and hopefully am out of there by 6 P.M.
I stop off at the Electric Umbrella for a bite to eat...don;t want to spend too much time here...just enough to get some fuel.
I'm hoping I'm entering my SPaceship Ride Vehicle sometime before 7 P.M.,
Hopefully i'm walking out of the EPCOT Turnsti;es no later than 7:30 and heading to the monorial. That's right...need to save time so i am taking the monnorail to the TTCD and switching to the MK Express monorail.
Park 4 - The Magic KingdomIf I can get to the Magic Kingdom before 8 P.M. I'll be estatci.
The first thing I do is get my wristband for Extra Magic hours. No this should be easy.
My guess is that everyone is lining up for Spectromagic so I am going to take advantage of this first diversion and go over to the haunted ansion. I may be able to get in and out of that Attraction by 9 P.M.
Since Spectromagic begins at the front of the park I should be able to easily make it from Haunted Mansion to Pecos Bill;s for Dinner. I can enjoy a nice rest full dinner while everyone is watching the parade.
After dinner I will head out the back entrance to Pecos Bill;s and head over to the Pirates of the Caribbean while folks are sill enjoying SpectroMagic.
The quewu for Pirates should not be too bad. and i'm hoping I'm out of that attraction before 10:15.
Diversion number two is Wishes and while edveryone is watching wishes I will aunter over to Splash and Big RThunder and will ride whichever one i want or whichever one has the shorter queue.
When I step out of this last attractio it should be no later than 11 P.M. which gives me two hours of leeway.
And I'm Done.
