How have the spontaneous vacationers adapted to FP+?

[Aurora]

Starting to plan our next vacation, which will be the first time using FP+. My mom and brother have already used it and didn't care for the need to plan everything out, every day, in advance.

We've always planned our theme park days in advance, but almost always changed plans in one way or another while on vacation. We'll either change a theme park day to a non-park day, vice versa, or change which park we visit on a particular day.

My question is, how has everyone else adapted to using FP+ if you were used to doing things spontaneously? How has it affected how you feel about planning a Disney World vacation?

I don't really mind making reservations for a few rides a day. We'll probably use our FP+s for later in the days rather than the mornings. I'm mostly wondering how it will affect our ability, or desirability, to change plans DURING the vacation.

Thoughts?

[yankeesfan123]

We did it for one day.

Showed up at rope drop, hit the E tickets that we didn't have a FP for, then had our 3 FP later in the day for a few mid-tier attractions.

Not the worst thing in the world.

[BigRedDad]

We don't plan too much. It is not a big deal if we miss a ride. We have been enough that there are no must-do rides. I won't wait more than 20 minutes for any ride there. We enjoy the other things that go on besides the main shows and rides. There are always street performers at all parks and other entertainment most people miss.

[azcavalier]

Basically here is how we've adapted:

1. Before, we would get to the park early and at opening would go hit the big rides (Soarin', TSMM, etc) and grab FPs for it either on the way in or out of the ride so we could ride it again later in the morning. Then, after we used that FP, we'd look at wait times and decided what needed a FP and what didn't.

2. Now, we have the FPs planned out, and we'll go hit the rides we definitely don't have FPs for, such as Test Track (since you can't get a FP to both Soarin' AND Test Track, due to the "tiers"). Sometimes we'll go to one park in the morning, do what we can, and then hit the 2nd park in the afternoon where we have FPs for the big E-ticket type rides that we otherwise wouldn't be able to ride without waiting forever.

So, in some ways it's nice to know I can still hit the big attractions later in the day without waiting. But it's also annoying to miss some rides because we've used our FPs on rides that turned out not to need them, and other favorites that never had long lines now do (SSE, Living with the Land, etc)

[Sylvia]

We don't plan too much. It is not a big deal if we miss a ride. We have been enough that there are no must-do rides. I won't wait more than 20 minutes for any ride there. We enjoy the other things that go on besides the main shows and rides. There are always street performers at all parks and other entertainment most people miss.

Nice to know we're not the only ones who think this way. We always have done .inimal planning and will always continue to do Disney our way. We always have great Disney vacations.

[DNS]

Our first several trips we planned things out. (Actually our first trip, we were clueless and wandered around likes idiots for 5 days.) But after we had done all of the big stuff we started taking our time and enjoying all the WDW has to offer, including non-park things. I have not liked having to plan dinners out in advance because it ties you down to one park - one area. I loved the days when you could just walk up and get a reservation for that day or even that time. I couldn't believe when I heard about the FP+ and being tied down even more. Thinking how much harder it will be now (like the dining plan was to getting dining reservations) to just walk up and get a fast pass, but I am trying very hard to look at the bright side to this. We have yet to manage to do TSM because the FP's are gone when we get there. This year will be our first year with the FP+, so I am just going to try to make the most of it and still keep a little spontaneity in our trip. We like half day park hops and since we already have to have dining reservations, maybe it won't be too bad. I have to say though, if I had my way, we would go back to a time when the walk up reservations were still possible. We loved just getting up and deciding what park we wanted to go to. Or if we wanted to hotel hop or not even go to the parks. I think those days are gone unless we want to eat burgers and pizza about ever meal.

[Ms. Mode]

I've found that it really takes some planning to get your ADRs 6 months in advance, then get your FP+ at 60 days to work in right...especially if you plan to PH.

However, when we went in November we left some days unplanned and one of those days we went to MK in the AM and rode every ride from Tomorrowland up to Fantasyland while everyone else was waiting in line for Seven Dwarfs Mine Ride.

[justice11]

we went in june to disney world, it was very caotic with my asperger grandson, we had to go to the ride and get his fast pass card signed and given a time, by then total meltdown because we couldn't get right on. so we decided, it had been years sice we went to universal) to go to universal studios. we went in november and it was wonderful, they gave us a card for Athens and no meltdowns, it was less crowded and the suite we had at the cababna bay resort was like a disney moderate for the value price. we fell in love with it. it was just so calm, and since we had 4 little kids, mu
y daughter and a new baby we needed calm, lol. and i am a disney freak but don't like all the new changes

[MNNHFLTX]

Well, I have reserved our Fastpasses for March, although I am not thrilled about it. But I was trying to help someone out at work who is going to be at a conference at Disney World (the convention center at Coronado Springs) in March and wanted advice. This person has never been to Disney World before and you could see her eyes start to glaze over as I went through Magic Bands, Fastpass+, MDE, etc. And believe me, I tried to simplify it as much as possible. I'm anxious to hear her impression when she comes back; hopefully there'll be some positives.