Character Locations

This is the third part in the character prioritization series. Check out the Magic Kingdom edition here and the Hollywood Studios edition here. The Magic Kingdom edition provides a little color about what you’re looking at below as well if you haven’t read over the previous articles. Basically, the point of this article is to identify where the various characters are located and create a plan to minimize waits as much as possible. While even the “lowest priority” characters will have afternoon waits of 10 to 15 minutes, it simply isn’t possible to meet every character in the morning when waits will generally be shortest. Because of that, we need to identify the characters that will have the longest afternoon waits and visit them first. Then we can move on to the “less popular” characters later in the morning or whenever we can expect their waits to be shortest.

Overall Strategy: In Future World, there is really only one main priority – the Character Spot. You’ll want to visit first thing in the morning or after 7:30pm if possible. Otherwise, you can expect 30 to 60 minute waits. In World Showcase, you’ll find the two longest lines at Belle/Beast in France and Aladdin/Jasmine in Morocco. Because the characters around World Showcase first appear throughout the late morning and early afternoon, you should be able to arrive at most of the characters just as they are scheduled to appear to find the shortest waits.

Let’s take a look at what we’re dealing with.

Character Spot – Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, Donald, Pluto in Their Classic Outfits

Priority: Highest

Location:

Character Spot is located in Future World to the right of Fountainview Cafe and the Fountain. As you enter from the main entrance, you’ll come across this area after passing Spaceship Earth.

The queue is through this door with the posted wait time on the right.

Usual Meet Times:

• 8:50am – Close

The Character Spot does not operate during morning Extra Magic Hour, but it does run through the entirety of evening Extra Magic Hours.

Process:

First, you’ll enter through the doors and enter the main waiting area:

On the plus side, the queue is air-conditioned and organized. Once you make it to the front of the queue, you’ll proceed to the first meet and greet area featuring Mickey Mouse. Once you meet him, you’ll move on to the next four characters individually. You may find a wait of one or two minutes in between characters as the previous group finishes up, but once you make it through the main queue. you’ll be meeting one character after the next without additional formal queues.

Interaction: Average. None of the characters talk, but they do their best to interact playfully. The characters don’t necessarily rush the interaction, but wait times are longer here than just about any other Meet and Greet, causing most meets to be on the short side of things.

Wait Times: Because of the limited capacity and popularity of this Meet and Greet, wait times are often 30+ minutes from 10am – 7pm and can hit 45 to 60 minutes when crowds are heavier.

Best Times to Meet: The best time to meet is first thing in the morning at or before 9am. While the conventional wisdom is to head straight to Soarin’, that attraction has a much higher capacity and offers FASTPASS. Like most Meet and Greets, the Character Spot has a capacity of one person/group per character and doesn’t offer FASTPASS. If you visit Character Spot first and move through in ten or fifteen minutes, you’ll still be in great position to ride Soarin’ with a short wait and collect FASTPASSes with a return time that’s about an hour in the future. The second best time to meet is after 8pm. By that time, most people will move on to World Showcase for dinner, shopping, and IllumiNations, leaving Future World relatively empty. Plan to head over after 8pm if you don’t visit first thing in the morning.

Other Meet Locations:

These characters are all over the place. For a detailed list, check each character in the Magic Kingdom Prioritization. The list would be 50 or 60 deep if copy/pasted here.

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The following would not have been possible without the help of Kenny and KennyThe Pirate.com.  If you’d like to see the following character schedules in a more organized, printable form, check out the Hollywood Studios character list here and a Master List of all of the character locations here.

This is the second part in the character prioritization series.  Check out the Magic Kingdom edition here.  It provides a little color about what you’re looking at below as well.  Basically, the point of this article is to identify where the various characters are located and create a plan to minimize waits as much as possible.  While even the “lowest priority” characters will have afternoon waits of 10 to 15 minutes, it simply isn’t possible to meet every character in the morning when waits will generally be shortest.  Because of that, we need to identify the characters that will have the longest afternoon waits and visit them first.  Then we can move on to the “less popular” characters later in the morning or whenever we can expect their waits to be shortest.

Luckily, it’s much easier to meet the characters in the Studios because there are fewer of them and only two major priorities exist.  Let’s have a look at who we can expect to see:

Overall Strategy: The two key character meets are Phineas/Ferb and Buzz Lightyear/Woody.  These are your two morning priorities.  Try to visit both before 10am and then move on to the Sorcerer’s Hat Meet and Greets.  You can also visit either of these two sets of characters in the afternoon by arriving just before they are scheduled to appear after a lengthy break.  I like to save the Animation Courtyard/Building characters for the early evening.  If you head over to Sorcerer Mickey, The Incredibles, Winnie the Pooh, and the Disney Jr. characters around 5pm, you should find much shorter lines than the afternoon.

Phineas and Ferb – Classic Outfits

Priority: Highest

Location:

Unfortunately, the Phineas and Ferb Meet and Greet is similar to the Rapunzel Meet and Greet in that it’s difficult to explain where it is.  Hopefully you know where at least one of those arrows is pointing to.  Basically, it’s located straight across from the exit to Muppet Vision 3D and next door to Mama Melrose’s Ristorante Italiano in the Streets of America.  If you were to exit Lights, Motors, Action! Extreme Stunt Show and continue walking straight along the rightmost path through the Streets of America, you would arrive right here at Phineas and Ferb.  From Toy Story Mania, you would take a right after exiting the attraction (or a left while looking at the entrance) and walk toward the Backlot area.  Continue walking down that path past Backlot Tour and towards Studio Catering Company.  Continue walking straight and take a left when you arrive at Herbie’s Drive In/The entrance to Lights, Motots, Action! Extreme Stunt Show.  You’ll pass the Premier Theater and Cars Meet on your right and then arrive at Phineas and Ferb.  Hopefully that makes sense.

Pardon the old map, but their location is circled above.

Usual Meet Times:

• 9:30am to 2:30pm continuously – Theoretically they can start meeting at regular open if the Studios is expected to be extremely crowded.
• 3:10pm to 7:30pm continuously – The Times Guide will usually say 7pm, but the characters should continue appearing through 7:30pm.  If the Studios is closing at 7pm, the characters will stop appearing at 7pm.

If Hollywood Studios is expected to be much busier, the start/end time of their meet can be extended.  Over Christmas week, Phineas and Ferb met from 8am – 10pm.

Process: This Meet and Greet functions like most with a couple of exceptions.

You’ll begin by getting in line here next to the Meet and Greet.

In this area out in front of the characters, the “director” will entertain guests with antics and audience participation.  This isn’t going on throughout the entire Meet and Greet, but short shows occur throughout the day.

A DJ will spin tunes in this adjacent building.

If you arrive for the start of either of their sets, the director will announce the characters and Phineas and Ferb will come out dancing.

From there, you simply wait for your turn for a picture.

Interaction: Okay.  It’s a shame they don’t talk, but they do their best to communicate.

Wait Times: Afternoon wait times are often in the 25 to 40 minute range.  The area where they’re located doesn’t get a lot of foot traffic other than from the Muppet Vision 3D exit.  That show unleashes several hundred people on the area about three times per hour.  Each time that happens, the line is extended by five to fifteen minutes.  However, not a ton of people ordinarily enter the Phineas and Ferb line after exiting Muppet Vision.  It’s not usually as bad as it might seem considering the number of people pouring from Muppet Vision.

Best Times to Meet: Arriving by 9:25am for the 9:30am set or 3pm for the 3:10pm are your best bets.  In the morning, that should give you enough time to collect FASTPASSes for Toy Story Midway Mania and ride Toy Story before heading over.  If Hollywood Studios lets guests through the turnstiles prior to 9am, you may also be able to meet Buzz Lightyear and Woody in Pixar Place (discussed below) before getting in line for Phineas and Ferb.

Your second best choice is arriving before the characters appear at 3:10pm.  Disney does not ordinarily open the queue until right before the characters arrive, so you’ll need to hang out at the entrance to the queue until it’s opened.  That’s the only downside to the 3:10pm meet.  The good news is that few people get in line or wait around if characters aren’t present.  With the 40 minute break from 2:30pm to 3:10pm, there won’t be any residual guests from the prior meet.  Keep in mind that you most likely wouldn’t be able to see the 3pm Parade and make it over to the line in time to beat the rush.

Otherwise, I recommend visiting in the final hour that they appear.  Most nights, you can arrive around 6:40pm to find much shorter lines than the afternoon.  However, that can also run into Fantasmic if you’re interested in seeing that show.  Try to avoid 11am – 2:30pm when lines are longest.

Other Meet Locations: This is the only location that Phineas and Ferb ordinarily meet guests.

1. Mickey’s Very Merry Christmas Party 2011 – Phineas and Ferb met in Buzz Lightyear’s location in Tomorrowland.  They wore the same outfits with scarfs over them.  Lines were generally 15 to 25 minutes.

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This is the first version of this post.  Please post a comment if you need further clarification about something.  Unless it’s really stupid, I’m sure other people have the same question.  Sometimes I don’t communicate things as well as I would like.

The following would not have been possible without help from Kenny and his website, KennyThePirate.com.  Here, you’ll find detailed lists of characters, locations, and meeting times organized into neat little charts that are more easily printable.  You can find his Magic Kingdom character list here and his Master List of characters here.

There are a lot of wild cards in the world of Walt Disney World characters.  As you read over the following, you’ll probably find yourself saying, “NO THAT’S NOT WHAT HAPPENED WHEN I WAS THERE” and you may very well be right.  Lines can jump in length with just a few extra groups of people.  A group of ten people taking pictures in every conceivable configuration can push a wait for Daisy Duck that would ordinarily be 5 or 10 minutes to 15 or 20 minutes.  By some stroke of fortune, someone has inevitably arrived at Prince Eric and Ariel to find only a few people in line smack dab in the middle of the afternoon.  “Anything is possible.”    By having the following knowledge, you’ll be able to prepare the best possible plan and truly roll with the punches as Rapunzel throws them at you.  You’ll know which characters have the longest waits, where they meet guests, when they meet, which characters are available elsewhere with much shorter (or longer) waits, what the characters are wearing, and much more.

Magic Kingdom is where you’ll find the largest assortment of characters in Walt Disney World.  It’s also the only location to meet several characters, including Rapunzel and Tinker Bell.  Let’s take a look at who we can expect to find.  I’ve ordered them from “highest priority” to “lowest priority” based on expected wait times later in the day.  The reality is that most characters will have the shortest lines in the early morning and the longest lines in the afternoon and early evening.  Unfortunately, it’s only possible to visit one or two characters first thing in the morning.  We’ll want to visit the characters with the longest afternoon waits first thing in the morning or whenever else is best.  In some cases, the standby waits can hit 60 or more minutes in the afternoon.

If you are looking for a specific character, try the “find” box on your browser.  Hitting “CTRL” in the lower left hand corner of your keyboard along with the “F” key should bring up the dialogue box.  I’m sure however you do it on a Mac is way simpler and more awesome, but I don’t want to hear about it.

Rapunzel – Pink Dress, Long Hair

Priority: Highest

Location: Rapunzel is located in Fairytale Garden in Fantasyland.  It’s located across from Bay 3 of Cosmic Ray’s Starlight Cafe.  The easiest way to get there is to walk up Main Street and take the right path once you arrive at Cinderella Castle.  This is the Path that walks along the right side of the Castle, not the path with the bridge that takes you over to Tomorrowland.  The following picture illustrates this.  Rapunzel will be located on the left before you arrive at Cheshire Cafe and Mad Tea Party.  From Fantasyland, you’ll find her by passing the Many Adventures of Winnie the Pooh on your way to Tomorrowland and taking a right once you arrive at Mad Tea Party.  Rapunzel will be on the right side down that walkway.

Usual Meet Times:

• 9:15am – 2:30pm with intermittent breaks
• 3:30pm – 7:15pm with intermittent breaks

Rapunzel begins meeting guests at 9:15am, regardless of when Magic Kingdom opens.  That means her first appearance will be 9:15am when Magic Kingdom opens at 8am or when Magic Kingdom hosts morning Extra Magic Hour.  The Times Guide usually says her last meet is 5:45pm, but she normally entertains her last group from 6:45pm to 7:15pm.  Disney lists shorter hours because wait times can be so long.  They don’t want you to expect to show up at 6:40pm and meet her.

Process: Ordinarily, you will first get in line in the external line as pictured above.  When it’s your turn, you’ll enter the main garden area where Rapunzel meets.  The kids will have the opportunity to color a picture on the large table that sits in the garden area while the group waits to meet Rapunzel.

Interaction: Excellent.  Rapunzel is extremely personable and spends quality time with every guest.

Wait Times: Rapunzel usually has the longest waits of any character at Walt Disney World.  However, it is not nearly as bad as it used to be when Flynn Rider met with her and they led a dance around the Garden.  Expect to wait 40 to 60 minutes in the afternoon.

The external line during a busy afternoon.

Best Times to Meet: The main problem with Rapunzel is that she doesn’t meet until 9:15am.  That means you’re looking at a 20-30 minute wait, even if you visit her first thing in the morning.  Assuming you get there at 9am and find yourself tenth in line, you’re still looking at a 15 minute wait before she appears and then another ten minutes to actually meet her.  The other problem is that the morning is also the best time to do everything else in Fantasyland and you’re potentially “wasting” the best 30 minutes of the day in the Rapunzel line.  Nonetheless, first thing in the morning remains the best time to guarantee a visit with a tolerable wait.  Otherwise, you’re looking at potentially a much longer wait in the hot sun later in the day.  Because she “officially” stops meeting at 5:45pm, the other best time to visit is after 6:15pm.  You can potentially meet her with a short wait if you can get in one of the last two meets.  However, this is a little risky because you could potentially miss out if there are too many people in line.  If Rapunzel is a “must do,” I recommend heading over there first thing in the morning.  Otherwise, head over between 6pm – 6:30pm. Because the last couple of meets aren’t advertised, fewer people will plan on visiting.

The good news is that you can potentially have one parent hold the spot for the kids either in the morning or later in the day.  It’s relatively easy to rejoin the group in the external line and the cast member will admit you into the Garden area if you explain your situation.

Other Meet Locations: Rapunzel only meets guests at Magic Kingdom at the Fairytale Garden under normal circumstances.

1. Mickey’s Not So Scary/Very Merry Christmas Parties 2011 – She met with Flynn Rider in Town Square Theater along with Snow White/Prince and Cinderella/Prince.  Wait times were 40-60 minutes long for most of the night.

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