We didn’t have to get up quite as early as we did for the Magic Kingdom because Hollywood Studios opened at 9am. This gave us time to eat breakfast at the hotel before heading into the park.
It was a cold morning and we brought our jackets with us to stay warm. It was not gonig to be shorts weather today.
Hollywood Studios
I had read in the blogs that in order to get onto the new Star Wars ride, Rise of the Resistance, you had to register in the virtual queue. It opened up at 7:00am and fills up within a few seconds. I had set my alarm for a few minutes before so I would be awake enough to sign up right as it became available.
Sitting on the couch with the boys on either side of me, we refreshed the app as 7:00am neared. At exactly 7:00 I was able to click the button to register. That brought me to a confirmation page which I made the mistake of quickly reading before accepting and finding otu that the queue was already full… a mere 15 seconds past 7:00!!!!!
I had no idea it would or could fill up so quickly, but this is Disney. I immediately set an alarm for a few minutes before 1:00pm where the second boarding group would open up and we’d get a second chance to get our reservation for the ride.
After breakfast we headed into the park and were a few cars back when they started to let cars through. After parking, we quickly gathered our stuff and went through the health check, security, and ticketing before walking as fast as we could to Toy Story Land and the Slinky Dog Dash ride. We knew that ride would get the longest the quickest and wanted to ride it first. The line was already longer than expected but it did move quickly due to the physical distancing in the ride.
Tomatico had not had a chance to ride it as Toy Story Land was not open during his trip so it was entirely new to him. He LOVED the ride!
Afterwards we quickly made our way to Toy Story Mania where I beat them again. I remained undefeated in that game as well, driving Tomatico nuts.
Star Wars Land
We had ridded two popular rides before the official opening time of the park so we felt pretty good. It was now time to venture into Star Wars Land for the first time. None of us had been there because it opened the week AFTER my youngest and I had last been there.
Walking into the land it felt real. As Tomatico said it felt old, but in the future, which is is exactly what Star Wars is supposed to feel like. We wandered around and found the line for the Millennium Falcon ride. The line said a 40 minute wait and we knew the wait would only get longer as the day went on so we decide to get it out of the way.
There was a lot to see while waiting in the line. The Millennium Falcon, of course was the highlight. It just looks so cool and they did a fantastic job with all the details, sounds, P/A announcements, etc.
The ride itself was a bit of a disappointment. It was hard to tell what was going on and what control you really had (if any). I would go so far as to call the ride a dud. I wouldn’t bother to do it again or recommend someone else do it. The line was more interesting than the ride.
Rockin’ Adventure
After that, we decided to go to the Aerosmith Rockin’ Roller Coaster. Tomatico had chickened out during our trip. He had been nervous about going upside down and decided not to do it at the last minute, but regretted not doing it after we had gotten back. My youngest had LOVED the ride and Tomatico was gathering his courage and wanted to try it this trip.
The line wasn’t too long and we eventually were on the ride waiting for it to go when… nothing. The other car ahead of us was long gone but our car (train?) wasn’t moving at all. The workers were suddenly huddling together and I knew something was wrong.
Technical Difficulties was all they would tell us before unloading the train and having us exit. They gave us a free FastPass to use on most rides, but not the most popular ones, of course. Tomatico was especially bummed because he had gotten all psyched up to go and then it didn’t happen.
We had to get out of the car to exit, but they added a fast pass to our tickets so we could come back when the ride was back online and skip most of the line.
We decided to go drown our sorrows with some strawberry smoothies from Joffrey’s outside the Tower of Terror ride next door. There was a line that didn’t move all that quickly but we eventually got our fix. After drinking the sugary goodnes we decided to go to the Cars ride next to the Aerosmith ride. The line ended up being too long but noticed the Aerosmith ride was open again so we used our Fastpass to get back on that ride.
We got into the final part of the ride waiting to get in the cars but they weren’t loading them… again. We heard PA announcements that they were effectively turning the ride on and off to try to see if that cleared whatever fault was happening. After about 10 minutes of that it seemed to clear it and they ran some empty cars through to make sure it was working. Three cars went through before the fault his again and the shut the ride down again. Poor Tomatico. We weren’t sure if we were going to be able to ride it or not!
By this time lunch was becoming a priority. We went to the Backlot Express and ordered using the app. It was a lot easier the second time since we knew the process from the day before.
After lunch we went to a new movie show with Mickey that we had not seen before. It was a cartoon of Mickey and Minnie going on vacation and the boys liked it a lot. At the end of the show my alarm went off to remind me to try to get a boarding group for Rise of the Resistance at 1:00. We found a quiet corner and frantically refreshed the screen. This time I didn’t stop to read the confirmation screen and this time we were in! We had a boarding group, but we didn’t know if it would be reached before the park closed. We were at least a couple hours away from being able to ride, but we at least had our place in line.
We also saw that the Aerosmith ride was operating again so maybe our luck was changing. We headed there in hopes of finally riding it again. We used the FastPass from the second failed attempt to ride and this time finally made it into a car. In fact, we got the front rows! My youngest went in the very front all by himself while Tomatico wanted me to ride it with him in the second row. He was nervous but excited.
He absolutely loved the ride and considered it his favorite. He wanted to ride again, but having used our fast pass already, the line was extremely long. The park was getting busy so we decided it was better to head back to the hotel to rest until it got closer to when we could ride the Rise of the Resistance ride.
Back at the Hotel
I was exhausted but the boys wanted to go swimming. I don’t know where they get the energy! My wife was already working by the pool so she was able to watch them while I relaxed.
I kept an eye on the boarding groups in the My Disney Experience app to gauge when we would need to go back to the park. They were progressing steadily and by about 3:30 I gathered the kids. Our youngest was a bit reluctant because he was having so much fun at the park but decided to go with us. He’s glad he did!
Back at the Park
When we arrived at the park we timed it just right. Our boarding group was called about the time we were going through security so we walked directly to the Rise of the Resistance entrance in Star Wars Land. We walked right in and had our tickets/bands scanned multiple times to make sure we weren’t cheating and getting in when we weren’t supposed to. There was still a pretty long line to get to the actual ride, but it was worth it.
The first part of the ride starts off kind of slowly. We get a pep talk from a hologram that we’re part of the resistance and then put into a ship that gets captured. We’re taken prisoners and escorted off the ship and into some “cells” before rebels break us out and load us onto troop transport pods. This is where the fun part of the ride starts. The pod drives around the floor of the star destroyer and gets fired on. There are countless amazing effects that are surprisingly realistic. The ride was unique and it really felt like you were on a Star Destroyer. We all loved it and were happy we were able to get onto it.
After that we made our way to Toy Story Mania for the boys to have another chance to dethrone me and end by winning streak. They failed 🙂
We then went to the new Mickey and Minnie Runaway Railway ride. The line was a lot shorter than it had been earlier in the day and I wanted to see what it was all about. The ride car was similar to the Rise of the Resistance, though the content and theme of the ride was totally different and much less intense. The ride was neat but the boys weren’t very impressed after just having done the Rise of the Resistance.
Dinner Time
My wife had made plans for us for dinner so we had to get back to the hotel before it got too late. She had found a Venezuelan restaurant not far from the hotel and wanted to try it out.
It was a pretty popular spot when we arrived but we were able to get a table. The food was really good. I had a steak and my wife and Tomatico had more traditional Venezuelean food. Tomatico particularly enjoyed the fried cheese balls!
After dinner we headed home. The next day all four of us would be going to Epcot so we had to do some prep and rest up. Epcot is a huge park and we’d be doing a lot of walking.
Tomatico Travels 
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