DIS Contributors review meals and entertainment that they have paid for during their own vacations. They only utilize discounts and special offers if they are available to the general public, such as annual passholder discounts, Tables in Wonderland, or DVC membership discounts. They receive no additional compensation for dining experiences or events, so that they may give their honest opinions about price and value.
The Early Morning Magic in Toy Story Land comes at a premium price of $79 for adults and $69 for children ages 3-9 for just an hour and a half of exclusive time in the land, plus breakfast. With the sticker shock of this pricing, I didn’t even think of it as an option at first, but after hearing great reviews of it, I started to consider. In the end, we decided to do it since we would only be paying for 3 of the 5 of us, and my kids love Toy Story.
The grand total for the experience was $241.77 for me, my husband, a 4-year-old who could ride everything, a 2-year-old who could ride all but Slinky Dog Dash, and a 1-year-old who could only ride Toy Story Mania.
We arrived at the park a bit before 7 am in our car. The parking was close and easy, even with the construction going on. Check-in and security was relatively quick, and we were admitted into the park right away. As we walked down a mostly empty Hollywood Boulevard, we were directed to Backlot Express for breakfast. Since I had heard they sometimes let you into the land before 7:30, my 4-year-old and I went to wait to be admitted into the land while my husband took the younger two for breakfast.
They ended up not walking us back to Toy Story Land until exactly 7:30. It felt like an early version of rope drop with how many people were lined up and heading over to Slinky Dog Dash — not what I had in mind for premium pricing. However, my daughter and I were able to get on within 10-15 minutes. She ended up hating the ride, so we didn’t have to wait for it again — which was great since lines were about 30-minutes long during the event.
While we were waiting for Slinky Dog Dash, my husband took the other two kids to wait to meet Woody and Jessie. By the time we were off Slinky, we joined them in line and ended up waiting another 15 minutes until the kids could meet them. So, for two attractions we spent about 1/3 of our time already.
Next we headed to meet Buzz, who had no line. He took his time with the kids, and then we took a quick photo — with no wait — by the Toy Story Land sign.
After parking the strollers, we walked over to Toy Story Mania. We waited maybe five minutes for the ride and then went over to Alien Swirling Saucers after, since we were running out of time. We switched off riding it with the older two.
After completing all rides, we took a couple photos and started heading over to get out of Toy Story Land as the mass number of people were heading in.
After the park opened, we were able to meet Minnie and Mickey with a 5-10 minute wait and got into line for Olaf, but unfortunately the kids had to get out of line for the bathroom. After the bathroom break the line was up to 25 minutes, so we headed over to breakfast.
I had the Fried Chicken and Cinnamon-Sugar French Donut Bowl, which came with sweet potato barrels. It was basically chicken tenders with maple syrup. The donut was really good, but the sweet potato barrels — which were just sweet potato tots — got syrup on them from the chicken and weren’t great. My husband had the Shrimp and Southern Grits Bowl, which he said was really good, as well as the Breakfast Charcuterie Platter. He loved the smoked salmon on the platter.
The continental breakfast was pretty good as well. It had variety of yogurt with toppings, cereals, fruit, and pastries. We ordered one children’s chicken and donut bowl, and there was plenty for all three of my kids to eat between that, our meals, and the continental breakfast.
Everyone must have had the same idea — to get in some other rides with low waits before eating — because the area was packed. We ended up eating outside so we’d have room for all of us and the strollers. They closed down the continental breakfast promptly at 10 am and wouldn’t even let us back into the building at that time.
In total, we were able to ride Slinky Dog Dash once, Toy Story Mania once, Alien Swirling Saucers twice, meet Buzz, Woody, Jessie, Mickey and Minnie, and take some photos between 7-10. I expected to do at least a bit more and wondered if Disney oversold this event since it was a busier time of year. Also, we had to deal with parking and retrieving our strollers as well as other toddler tendencies that slowed us down a bit.
Overall, $242 is a lot of money for 90 minutes in a land that had 30-minute wait times for the main attraction, but for us it was worth it to do once so we could see the land without huge Spring Break crowds. Since my husband is a teacher we can only visit Walt Disney World in high crowd times, so this was our way of experiencing part of it with low crowds.
Would we do it again? Probably not. I would consider doing another park, but not Toy Story Land again for that price.
Sara is a Marketing Specialist by day, but her true passion is writing. She's been a freelance writer for 11 years and uses that side hustle money for traveling with her husband and three young children.
