Flight of Passage at rope drop - how it worked for us today!

[FindingMerida]

We had FPs earlier in our holiday but my 8 year old twins had last minute nerves and decided not to ride. However after seeing mine and MrFindingMerida's reactions as we came off (I couldn't speak for a good 5 mins!) my son decided he wanted to ride. On the last full day of our holiday

So, being optimistic I checked for FPs and the ghost of Walt Disney himself appeared and laughed hysterically at me
Plan B. RopeDrop Here's how it went.

Park opening this morning was at 9am. We arrived in the car park at 7.45am and parked in Dinosaur 32.

There was no real queue at bag check

so at 7.59 we joined the queue for the tapstiles. I reckon there were about 10 queues (plus the AP queue) each with 30 ish people ahead of us when we arrived

We joined a queue near the middle which was luckily in the shade as it was already roasting hot and humid.
At 8.17 they announced they would be allowing us into the park to "enjoy the Oasis" before park opening at 9am. At 8.21 we were through the tapstiles and walking quickly to Pandora on the left. They held us at the bridge, and we arrived there at 8.26am. This is what it looked like ahead of us

If you zoom in you can see the big steaming root thing!
And after 5 mins this was the crowd behind us

That's the Nomad Lounge on the left hand side.

At 8.38 they started the slow walk into Pandora. At this point stay on the right hand side for FOP although that's where most folk are heading it means you are not bottle necking when the path splits.
We officially walked under the Standby sign at 8.46am. We were obviously playing it cool at this point

Note that it is not even 9am and I'm already a sweaty mess
We basically then walked all through the queue and were in the preshow room at 9.09.

I can't tell you how good this ride is. I was literally breathless the first time and couldn't speak for ages afterwards. This time I actually got so emotional I wanted to have a small weep when I left. It's stunningly beautiful
But instead of embarrassing my son with tears, we headed to Satu'li Canteen for some well earned breakfast

At this point (9.25am) the ride was showing a 180min wait. Now, my personal wait limit for rides is 60mins at an absolute push for something I'm desperate to go on. I'd easily wait 90mins for this and would definitely consider 2 hours if it was my only chance to ride.
Do it. It's amazing

[deeley]

Thank u so much, we will do exactly this as couldn't get a fast pass! Glad you enjoyed it

[Mortimer Mouse]

Brilliant. Your enjoyment leaps off the 'page'!

It just goes to show that it's worth making the effort to get up early if you want to avoid long wait times.
Thanks for posting.

[andyhen]

great post

[Guest]

Loved this post !
Very glad we have a fastpass now

[smithlane]

Excellent post, this is exactly what we'll be doing as I couldn't get a FP even at 60 days!

[Hevfev]

Excellent-thanks for posting

[Rawhide]

No chance for Fast Passes for us as we are offsite, so we will do this if we can't use our Tusker House breakfast to get in ahead of the rope.

[disneytrio]

Excellent thanks for posting!

[bobobalde]

I am offsite but booked 1 night at Disney to get 60 day passes, magic bands, etc. I didn't manage to get as fast pass for FOP, but by sheer luck I am in the Disney Hotel on a Friday night, and the Animal Kingdom has EMH on the Saturday morning (8am to 9am, I am booked in at Tusker House at 9.30am). Do they let you on the rides during the EMH? What time do you think I should get to the entrance if the park opens at 8am? Sorry for all the questions but I have 2 kids who arent tall enough to ride it and I wouldn't want to make them wait in the queue for 2 hours, so this would probably be my one shot at getting on it.