Buying MK Tickets on the gate - will we get on any rides?!

[sharon190980]

Hi,

We're visiting Orlando 10th-18th Sept and planning on paying Magic Kingdom a visit with our 2 year old. We've not done Disney for years but now we have our little girl we thought we'd give it another go.

We are buying a 1 day ticket on the gate. Not sure what day yet but I've seen the craziness that is prebooking fast passes weeks and weeks before. So my question is... will be actually be able to ride anything once in there or are the lines full of people with fast passes? We don't want to be spending a fortune on tickets if it will be a waste of a day.

Thanks in advance x

[scoobydooby]

Why don't you order in advance then you can book three fast passes? Even if you don't you will be able to ride stuff if you get there an hour before rope drop.

[loldis]

It really depends what rides you want to go on, and how long you're willing to wait. My favourite ride is still Dumbo, and you pretty much never need a FP for that. Same for quite a few of the kiddie rides, you should rarely have to wait more than half an hour for each.

Exception on the kiddie ride front would be Peter Pan. You're either going to have to rope drop that one, or buy the tickets in advance so you can book some FPs. If you know which day fits your schedule already, I'd go with that approach.

ETA: Another one to FP would be meeting the princesses or talking Mickey, if that's something that would appeal to your daughter. Long queues at both of those meets.

[Goosey74]

Hi there. We returned three days ago from Florida. We didn't have Disney tickets this year but decided a couple of days before we left to go to MK for our last full day. We got up early and bought 4 tickets online direct from Disney, so it would be quicker than doing it at the gate (well the TTC). We took our magic bands with us from last year and the MDE app linked our tickets straight away to the bands, so we could book fastpasses. If you don't have bands it sends you an email with a coloured barcode. If blue you can go straight to turnstile at MK entrance. It yellow, you need to call at booths at the TTC. There were plenty of staff to help at the TTC. Was totally worth it. We arrived at 8.45 and left at 9.30 pm after the fireworks. Try to go on a day when there are no Extra Magic hours as more likely to get fast passes. Get there early and queue for must/popular rides straight away. 😊 You might need to show photo ID and credit card you book on at the gate. Hope that helps.

[loopyloo33]

I only bought my tickets a week before we left and didnt get around to booking any fast passes before we left

We went to magic kingdom yesterday, booked 3 fast passes on saturday night for big thunder mountain railroad, haunted mansion and pirates of the caribbean. We then booked 1 at a time for Philharmagic, dumbo and met tinkerbell and went in the standby line for its a small world. Considering we were only there from 12pm - 6pm i think we got loads done without months of planning.

[flittle89]

We purchased 2 single day, magic kingdom tickets in 2015, middle of may.
Got in for rope drop, stayed till 1am, made the most of the cost.
Did loads of rides, then at about 2pm booked our first fastpass, we ended up getting 3 fastpasses that day, Jungle cruise, Haunted mansion and space mountain, all of them were less than a hour wait from getting the fastpass to riding.

Getting fastpasses isn't the be all and end all. Most people only do it to arrange their time better! You'll still get onto the same amount of rides (give or take a few)

[sharon190980]

Thanks for all of your replies! We didn't really want to book tickets before we go as we don't know which day fits in best for us yet but I'll check out EMH days, etc and we can book our tickets direct the night before so we can be fully organised! xx

[stan_the_man]

September is usually a quiet time so you should be able to do a majority of the rides, plus once you have your ticket you can link it to MDE on the day and try and get a few FPs as you're walking round the park.

[Nimbus]

Yes, you'll be able to get on most of the rides. All of them if you don't mind a bit of queuing at some of the popular rides.

[Elise79]

MK is probably the easiest park to do without any planning.

It has lots of FP rides so you can easily pick up 3 FP on the day and probably more once you have used them.