We did the event on 1/23 and had a great time.
It was a little rough going for me because the night before I got very bad news from work and was on the phone with my boss and ended up waking up at 3:30am thinking about it and could not get back to sleep. 4 hours of sleep after a week of touring hard at Disney is pretty rough!
I booked a Lyft in advance for a 6:15-6:30 pickup the night before but ended up canceling it when I saw the bus was available at the Poly. We got on it at 6:11 I believe (enough time to cancel the Lyft since it hadn't been matched up) and I checked the app a few times - there were 3 buses that would have gotten us there in time for the event... we arrived about 6:20-something, there was another that arrived at 6:39 and then another when I checked later that would have gotten you there at 7:15 - later than most like but still doable. There was probably in between. Overall I would have to say that the need for alternate transportation if staying at a Disney resort is VASTLY overstated on this thread - we found the buses running consistently in the early morning both at VWL and at the Poly and I only took a Lyft once to AK for EMH because I was so unsure of the bus system and it seemed like we'd just missed one.
Anyway I was feeling pretty rough but we got there early, were near the front of the line, and they started letting people in at 6:49. We made our way to breakfast and I told my son we were going to be Hobbits today, with first breakfast and second breakfast. I think that was his favorite part of the whole event! He ate two bowls of cereal and a pile of pastries and I had a chocolate croissant and some of the honeyed yogurt with blueberries, strawberries mined from the fruit salad and some of the mixed nuts. It was a good way to start the day without eating too heavily and my kid spent a bit longer eating than I would have liked with seconds of everything for "first breakfast" but we ended up leaving breakfast and going into TSL around 7:20ish and people were in and things were up and running. SDD had a posted 10 minute wait and we went on it and were on the Woody and Jessie line by 7:33 and it took 13 minutes to get through the line that had formed (about 10-12 parties, it was hard to tell because parties are not always easily identifiable). By 7:46 we were done with the meet and greet and the line was about 3x as long for the remainder of the event. We did SDD 3 more times (total of 4), ASMx2 (kid actually enjoyed it) and TSM x2. We were NOT moving fast and that was all of the SDD I could take - we could have ridden it more but on 4 hours of sleep my stomach was not having it.
We rode TSM last and got on right before the RD crowds hit - got off of it at 9:05 and the line for SDD was clear down to the voyage of the little mermaid sign (I have a pic I can post later) and a 120 minute wait (it briefly said 140 minutes but went back to 120). It was insane!
We went straight to breakfast at that point having no real RD plans - it was the warmest day of the week and we were both toast (me in particular) so we planned to head back to enjoy the pool at the Poly. We got to breakfast around 9:15 and my stomach was still feeling off from the rides so I didn't eat that much really. I kind of wish we waited til later because by closer to 10 I was feeling fine and hungry, but a popcorn refill (that ended up being free because her register wouldn't open for change) did the trick.
The kid had chicken and donuts with no glaze and devoured the chicken and donuts. Neither of us liked the sweet potato tots. blech.
I got both the egg bowl and the shrimp and grits. The shrimp and grits were watery but tasty and I mined the 3 shrimp out of there with some grits with it and pitched the rest. The egg bowl was delicious and I wish I could have enjoyed more of it.
Afterward we went over to launch bay and my kid met BB-8 with a posted 20 minute wait but we were out and done in 8. We had a 10am ToT FP that we used and then we hit the road and spent the rest of the day at the pool where there was a dole whip swirl with coconut rum and tie dye tshirts made.
It is a great event - we had been to TSL the day before and it was packed wall to wall with people - even though we were able to manage seeing all 3 rides with the
DAS pass for SDD and grabbing ASM last minute, I could not believe how crowded it was... so it was really nice to do the rides without tripping over people. It is a mellow vibe without the stressy people and screaming kids and people who are not experienced at operating scooters trying to operate them in wall to wall crowds... there were a few scooters of course, but with room to move there wasn't that stress vibe that you get in crowded situations.
The food was good and I like the opportunity to have a light breakfast before, ride, and then the real breakfast - next time I would just give my stomach a half hour to settle after SDD a few times in a row... but second breakfast was the thing my kid was looking forward to most so he wasn't going to be put off of it to do something else first (I wish we did launch bay first but he was agitating for food). He also ate 3.5 mickey bars and a load of popcorn at DAH MK so I guess he is in that bottomless pit stage.
I have photos of a bunch of stuff and will update when I get home... we are having a lazy morning after DAH MK so I wanted to just post an update while I still remembered times.
