We had our Orlando trip and have been back for like a week and a half, but we were exhausted and had to jump back in to busy life and 5 kids, so I forgot I never reported here! Our park days were March 6th-10th (Sat-Weds) and we did HS Saturday the 6th, and MK on Tuesday the 9th. We got all our tickets from
UT and had a buy 2-get 2 ticket for Universal, so we hit Universal the last few hours of Saturday, the second half of Sunday (we were recovering from our 35k steps day on Saturday), Monday, and Wednesday.
We stayed at the Doubletree across the street from Universal. We used Lyft to get to and from the airport, and to Disney. (And, sometimes, to Universal, because we're old and sometimes it was wasted walking, haha!) The Disney Character Outlet by Universal is a-ma-zing. We had to wait like 1.5 hours Sunday morning for our turn to shop, but I spent over $200 because so much was so cheap. (and bought nothing in the parks, haha!) Like 1/3 of that was on Minnie ears and hats that were $4-6 instead of $30 a pop.
Saturday morning my alarm was set for 6:45 AM (that's 4:45 AZ time, haha) and my fingers were ready for the 7AM ROTR game of chance and skill. I've had plenty of practice, with four rides under my belt (3 DLR days, one HS ride in Oct) and we scored BG 2. My husband was pretty excited. He loves that one! We took a Lyft to the Swan and Dolphin. The walk from there was super easy, and I found it less stressful than getting dropped off at the Speedway like last time. (Just because I was turned around and didn't even know which way to jaywalk!) We got in the security line about 7:55 for a "9 AM" opening, and didn't feel like we were too far back in line. We were let through security starting at 8:14, and even with a pause to exchange our vouchers for plastic tickets before we went through the turnstiles, we were heading down toward the Hollywood Tower of Terror at 8:18 AM. That was my husband's favorite ride in California Adventure, and he has missed it since they rethemed it. I had been watching wait times, and it's been consistently at 45-75 minutes all day, so we decided it was our priority, in case he wanted to ride it twice. We did TOT, the RRC and Slinky Dog all within the first hour. Though crowds picked up significantly after that, it wasn't a bad day there, from other wait times I had been watching on weekends, probably because it was supposed to rain all afternoon, but luckily only rained for 5-10 minutes lightly, and drizzled on and off after that. We did ROTR, the cool Walt Disney movie, Mickey and Minnie's, TSMM, saw a few cavalcades, and hung out in the relaxation area before getting a same day reservation at Mama Melrose's Ristorante Italiano about 2:30 PM (lunchtime for our biological clocks). We also just spent a lot of time just looking at all the theming and details, and checking everything out, since DH had never been there. After "lunch" we did Mickey and Minnie's again, and the Swirling Saucers ride, but then realized there wasn't anything else we wanted to do badly enough to wait in 20-45 min line for. We had gotten up really early, and we were tired! Millennium Falcon we can do anytime at DLR (once it opens again) and we had ridden everything else. So just before 5 PM we headed out to the rideshare area and took a Lyft back to our hotel! (That night about 7:30 we were feeling refreshed though, and we decided to run up to Universal for the last 2 hours of park time, since we had 4 days. We were so glad we did! Because of the rain threat, I'm guessing, it was the least crowded time we had there all week!)
We took a Lyft Tuesday morning about 7:45 for a 9 AM opening at the Magic Kingdom. Our drive from Universal to Disney was usually about 15-20 minutes. We were in a decent line (almost to the little underpass) by the rideshare drop off by 8:08 AM and didn't have to wait to go into parking. They started letting people through about 8:15. The buses weren't running, so we took the monorail over and were walking down Main Street by 8:31. I wasn't sure we wanted to wait in the line for 7DMT right away when we could hit a few other important (to my husband) things with little wait. But I didn't realize there would be less open on a weekday before official opening than there was on a Saturday the last time I went. But maybe that was my imagination. I felt like everything was pretty much open at HS. We went on Peter Pan twice (so fun to have walk and then nearly walk on when it's always mobbed first at DLR) and the Carousel in between. I loved carousels, but the wait for that one has been consistently high, and I'm not willing to wait more than 10 minutes. We didn't have to wait at all at like 8:40.
We had a really great day, and did those three rides, IASW, HM, and POTC by 10:30. We were hungry and grabbed a snack at Pecos Bill's at 11 then DH and I split up for a while and I got lucky enough to walk onto Splash, which had just opened, followed by BTMR. Had some popcorn and a Grey Stuff cupcake, and checked out the a/c relaxation station. (Stromboli? The big circus tent) It was honestly kind of dreary and sad in there. I don't know why. We had a 2:00 reservation at the Skipper Canteen, then we did the Jungle Cruise, the Little Mermaid, and finally decided to wait in the 7DMT line. It would have only been about 15 minutes, but it broke down or something for about 15 minutes. (Are they still doing cleaning cycles?) My husband was underwhelmed with that one after such a wait! (And after riding Universal rides for the last 2 days...) We did the Carousel of Progress (so fun!) and then split up again and I walked onto the Teacups, Dumbo, and the Barnstormer, followed by a quick dinner in Tomorrowland and then Space Mountain. We met up again to walk onto The Little Mermaid again, then rode Winnie the Pooh. We had different closing priorities, so I got in line for 7DMT ones more time and he went to ride POTC one more time.
We don't worry a lot about others' mask compliance, but I tried to pay attention to report back. I thought it was pretty good. Like 98-99% from what I saw, and people who weren't wearing them properly were usually spoken to. We do worry about distancing, but mostly because my husband's anxiety already makes lines a bit much for him sometimes, and when he also had to wear a mask, (he also struggles with that, but has gotten much better at dealing with it the last few months) he definitely needed people to stay out of his personal space. That part wasn't so good. People are really bad at following the markers sometimes, and some think very linearly about 6 feet behind the people -just- in front of you, not side to side. Like they don't understand why there are complete rows with no markers that you're just supposed to walk through. That being said, it was a Tuesday, and it wasn't too bad crowd-wise. The lines were better than many days I had been watching on the app, and much better than Universal's. Universal -felt- more crowded, and I would say about the same level of mask compliance and people understanding/following distancing. But the Disney CM's were much more pleasant at correcting people and helping them follow guidelines than Universal. We had several experiences there where I felt kind of resentful and icky about it, and it was just a case of us not knowing there were slightly different guidelines, or needing direction. (We were also using Universal's policy that you can wear cotton gloves on each ride instead of the mandatory sanitizer, and we were doing that, mostly due to my husband's sensitive skin that breaks out with some sanitizers, and I wore them in solidarity, and because I had giant globs of sanitizer-that's-not-mine all day). Most team members understood, but a few made a stink until they talked to their lead. Universal's team members were across the board more "authoritarian" instead of "authoritative" and it gave us a bad taste in our mouth sometimes. But you guys, Hagrid's is the coolest ride I've ever been on, including all the Disney ones. We rode it at least 9 times over 2 full days and 2 half days in the Universal parks...
Sorry, that was super long. I'm not good at reporting when it's not a full trip report, apparently! If anyone has questions, let me know!
