Ok, so when I left off we had just been ushered through the Haunted Mansion and were a bit upset. That was just the calm before the storm. The MSEP is going on so I know we have to go around to get out, as it is headed to Frontierland and we won't be able to cross over. So, the plan is to go up the path behind the Liberty Square funnel cake place and go through the castle and around the hub to beat the crowds before the parade is over.
So, on the prior days when they have that pathway closed they have it roped off. Now, it's a little after 10pm, which is closing, so you'd think they'd have it roped off. Nope. We almost made it to the top when we were stopped by a lady and told the park was closed. I told her yeah, we want to exit through the castle so we can beat the crowds. She says we have to go back and wait for the parade to finish. I inform her that the other night I went the same way when exiting and we don't want to wait for the parade. It was a losing battle and now I am steaming mad. You guys have no idea how upset I am at this point. We stand by the funnel cake place waiting on the parade and at this point I'm telling my wife that we are NEVER coming back. I was furious.
On the way out, I wanted to stop at Town Hall and speak with a manager about their horrible crowd control and lack of common sense, such as locking in people who DON'T want to see the parade, but the line was about 10 people outside of the building. So apparently I wasn't the only one with issues. The line for the monorail was ridiculous at this point so we just waited for the ferry. By the time we boarded the ferry I was done with Disney. This is the first trip where I didn't even look back at the castle, Main Street, or the main entrance. As a matter of fact, I didn't look back the whole time. Even when we reached the TTC we headed to the car and left.
Now, this was
supposed to be the last day, but a few days earlier my wife talked me into doing a Halloween Horror Night. So, we would be checking out on Friday, the 27th and heading back to Rodeway before hitting up Universal.
Day 13 - September 27th
Ok, so we slept in, which felt great. Packed up and then we let the kids get some swimming in. After the swimming we filled up our mugs and headed down the road back to Rodeway. We headed out to Wal-Mart for some last minute items and then headed to Universal for Halloween Horror Nights.
WARNING::
IXIE DUST SNORTERS MAY WANT TO AVOID THIS SECTION!!!
IF YOU ARE SENSITIVE TO CRITICISM OF DISNEY AND/OR PRAISE FOR UNIVERSAL THEN PLEASE HIDE YOUR CHILDREN AND WOMEN AND COVER YOUR EYES!!! THIS IS NOT FOR THE FEINT OF HEART!!!
Still with me?
Ok then. Let me start off by saying that Halloween Horror Nights is AWESOME. Basically, HHN takes MNSSHP, balls it up into a round wad and then punts it out of the stadium.
Seriously. Between two MNSSHP parties we got 5 bags of clearance aisle candy, soaked in rain, no character pictures and spent hours waiting for a partial parade. At HHN we got 8 awesome haunted houses, walkers throughout most of the park and we still got to ride most of the rides. People were drinking all over the place yet I never had trouble with people bumping into me, or any of the other things that happen at WDW.
Now allow me to vent all of the issues that we had on this trip. Again, if you're squeamish with Disney criticism then you might not want to look.
WDW ISSUES
Pirates ride- Fog scene and Mermaids not working all day on 9/26.
Pirates CMs- One girl just waved her hand and said "go on" while barely looking at us, another CM didn't even tell us which way to go at the FP+ merge because he was busy chewing his gum, another girl was working the little operation booth at the loading dock with NOBODY working the "how many in your party" spot right before it. She kind of got rude about us being over the "line" at the "how many" part but I'm sure she was feeling overworked and I don't blame her. How in the hell can you not have enough staffing for your rides? You've got someone working the FP+ merge, which might see about 5 people every 10 minutes instead of at the loading area.
Haunted Mansion- The queue has been turned into a cattle section, with FP+ sitting there empty while they accordion people in the queue. They want you to "fill in all of the empty spaces" just so you can squeeze your party back together 50 feet away. This leads to line cutting and MANY people getting separated from their party. This is a huge headache to families and I can see this leading to many issues with smaller children. I will say that there were a few times when they were at least smart enough to open the middle gate to allow people to skip the interactive part, but it wasn't open often enough.
Buzz Lightyear- Man, does this thing need an overhaul. It literally broke down/stopped 3 times with us in line on the 24th. That's one instance, as in three times within about 10 minutes. We finally just left the queue along with about 25 other people. As a matter of fact, I think there might have been two times on the whole trip where we got in line and it didn't stop for whatever reason(not including disabled folks). And we're talking a bunch of times here people because we came away with about 14 or more Galatic Hero buttons. There were several cars that didn't spin, a few that had non working guns or guns that wouldn't turn.
CMs- I should have made this the first issue, but I'm just winging it. This trip was the WORST in regards to CM interaction that we've had in our 7 trips. I'd say that MAYBE half of all of the CMs we saw smiled at us. Less than that actually spoke or gave any acknowledgment. Worst of all was the group of 7 suits that we came across at Epcot. This was around 9:40am, so it was only my family and this group of suits within a 200 foot radius. Not only did they not say hello but they didn't even acknowledge us. They walked within 9 feet of us and not even a head nod. I will say that the CMs that we did have good interactions with were great!
Crowd Control- My God, where do I begin with this? How about Disney changes the goal of the Pirates scavenger hunt to find a member of management that has a few working brain cells. Seriously, they literally threw their plaids and CMs to the wolves for the nighttime events. That little Wishes fiasco was embarrassing to say the least. I was furious about trying to get to my family but it wasn't the CMs fault, it was the fault of management for not controlling the crowds. They placed those CMs and plaids about 1 every 200 feet from the hub to the plaza to try to control hundreds upon hundreds of people and I didn't see one stinking suit out there helping them.
I was so furious because it was just a recipe for disaster for people with small kids. The opportunity to have little ones trampled is front and center. Heck, I had someone ramming their stroller into my right leg while someone else was pushing against my backpack. I had to stop and turn around and tell them that doing such things would not get me to move any faster as there were hundreds of people in front of me.
The icing on the cake was being told I couldn't go through the castle to exit the park and instead had to stay until the parade was over against my wishes. I even told her I wanted to speak to a manager and she ignored my request and went back up the path.
Food pricing- Are you serious? Yes, I know you're paying for the location and not the food, but $135ish at Sci-Fi for 3 burgers and a steak? The fricking burgers were $16 a piece.
A PIECE. I realize it's their way of making up the free dining, but it can hurt the server because who honestly wants to tip someone $25 for bringing them some drinks(at a buffet)? Or CRT, where one plate of food and a drink or two costs $44. Ridiculous. If we go again we are NOT doing CRT.
That's about all I can think of for now so I'll finish here. There were good times had, no doubt, but it seems like every trip gets worse and worse on the Disney portion while the Universal part gets better and better. Heck, you can count the number of things that my son and I do at both Universal parks on both hands versus the dozens of things we do at WDW yet the employee interaction makes it more exciting and fun at Universal.
That really seems strange for me to say, because I'm a huge Disney fan and I grew up going to DL. However, you can't avoid the truth when it's right in front of you. Right now you have Universal putting in new rides and experiences while Disney gives us nearly empty FP+ lines while the queue lines get all jacked up. And that's another funny thing to me because Universal is owned by Comcast, and I absolutely
HATE Comcast. I dropped their cable service and I would drop their internet if it wasn't for limited providers in my area. They have HORRIBLE customer service yet they're putting money back INTO the parks in a way that guests can enjoy. Meanwhile, the little chicken scratch that Disney isn't giving to it's shareholders and CEO is being used for stuff like FP+.
I will admit, we did book the bounce back for next September. Partially out of nostalgia, partially in hope that it gets better next time and the rest because who knows if they'll still have Free Dining next year other than the BB. I think they will, although I'd rather go back at the end of November, which my wife agreed with. If I'm going to be miserable with higher than average crowds I'd at least like to not be suffering from a heat stroke on top of it.
I know one thing, we ARE going back to Universal next year for the Potter expansion AND another round of HHN, whether we actually follow through with the Disney portion depends on how we feel and how we think they're headed. Right now it's not looking good.
Thanks for coming along for the ride folks. I don't mean to be a downer, I just try to be realistic. I hope Disney rights the ship because I truly do love it. Thanks and have a great day!
