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Ride Access Pass and Disabled Access - 2024 Discussion

Efteling's is all in app now.

Hell they were telling people who hadn't organised it prior to visiting to just go onto the app and apply then and there. Which amused me.

Was very busy so unsurprisingly the RAP queues were too for the big attractions. Such is life especially when how they tend to limit the amount of RAP users on each ride considerably.

Would be interesting to see if there's a number of Efteling RAP users ranting about overuse.
 
Benzin said:
Would be interesting to see if there's a number of Efteling RAP users ranting about overuse.
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There was, to the point it made the news, which I posted about in here a while back and they subsequently made the system digital.

But it still requires no verification so it’s kind of silly. Culture currently seems different in Europe in terms of RAP but I’m sure our approach will soon infect everywhere.

Like you say, Efteling RAP is more about physical access than reduced waiting times so it’s less appealing to those who might abuse it or those who might need it for that type of access. We found the short constantly moving queues were mostly well themed and much preferable to waiting in a concrete room for an unspecified time.
 
It's just currently difficult for us to wait with a 2 year old who doesn't understand the concept of it yet. She's a nightmare for waiting at any point atm, even for the cycle before us to finish.

Having to wait for a certain car/boat probably does put some off. Though on Tuesday (the quieter day) we were pretty much straight on most things.
 
Very niche knowledge request but does anyone have a good recollection of the toilets at Disneyland Paris?

We’ve always had trouble taking my son into public bathrooms, primarily due to the hand dryers. It’s now got to the point where he’s figured out that if he doesn’t drink all day he can wait till he gets home. Whilst I’m envious of this bladder control it’s going to prove problematic on a trip like this where we’d hope to spend longer in the park than our usual 4-5 hours. Typically now he will get upset and want to leave rather than deal with it onsite.

Our two European excursions this year went very well on this front as both Efteling and Plopsaland had no hand dryers so wondering if DLP follow this European trend? Or perhaps even have some dedicated facilities seeing as they have a good reputation for accessibility? Do the hotels have some quiet lesser used facilities if not?

We have a portable toilet the size of a fold up chair but naturally I’d prefer not to have to lug that around all day.
 
Bowser said:
Very niche knowledge request but does anyone have a good recollection of the toilets at Disneyland Paris?

We’ve always had trouble taking my son into public bathrooms, primarily due to the hand dryers. It’s now got to the point where he’s figured out that if he doesn’t drink all day he can wait till he gets home. Whilst I’m envious of this bladder control it’s going to prove problematic on a trip like this where we’d hope to spend longer in the park than our usual 4-5 hours. Typically now he will get upset and want to leave rather than deal with it onsite.

Our two European excursions this year went very well on this front as both Efteling and Plopsaland had no hand dryers so wondering if DLP follow this European trend? Or perhaps even have some dedicated facilities seeing as they have a good reputation for accessibility? Do the hotels have some quiet lesser used facilities if not?

We have a portable toilet the size of a fold up chair but naturally I’d prefer not to have to lug that around all day.
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All DLP toilets have hand dryers, many (and all refurbished) moving on to Dyson V-Blades.
 
Benzin said:
Have you tried those Loop style earplugs for him? Mrs uses them from time to time and seem to do a decent job at reducing noise.
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He wears ear defenders most of the time when we are out but the hand dryers are too much even then. They seem the best option as he can take them on and off himself. The vast majority of rides he's allowed to keep them on too (so far).

Did try in ear things for swimming in the past but he'd just pull them out before we even got to the water.

Found this absolutely incredible 60 page booklet DLP have made for guests with ASD, really impressive. Sadly the one thing it doesn't answer is my toilet question (though it does state all toilets have disabled cubicles within).


Do have a friend visiting a few weeks before we go so might have to badger them for some toilet reconnaissance.
 
I see the RAP fun and games for 2025 has already started. Already multiple weekends for the start of the season at parks completely sold out. Now looking to book RAP slots for an Easter trip to AT 3 months in advance.
 
TPick said:
I see the RAP fun and games for 2025 has already started. Already multiple weekends for the start of the season at parks completely sold out. Now looking to book RAP slots for an Easter trip to AT 3 months in advance.
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Yep and the fireworks weekend has already sold out as well.
 
Have they integrated the ticket booking system with the RAP booking system yet, or is it still the same as it was last year with RAP slots being released later than entry tickets?
 
Matt N said:
Have they integrated the ticket booking system with the RAP booking system yet, or is it still the same as it was last year with RAP slots being released later than entry tickets?
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Same as last year at the moment.

Thorpe Park fully booked first few weekends of the season too. Legoland has full availability and Chessington not released yet.
 
Bowser said:
Same as last year at the moment.

Thorpe Park fully booked first few weekends of the season too. Legoland has full availability and Chessington not released yet.
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That’s a crying shame.

Of all the tough to solve problems with the RAP system at Merlin parks, this seems like quite an easy one to fix that would make the system far less stressful to use. In my head, it seems quite simple to program the system to show RAP availability on each day when booking day tickets or MAP pre books. Or at very least, release the RAP slots and day tickets on the same day so that people can coordinate purchases.

I do sympathise with Merlin to an extent when it comes to RAP, as I think they’re in a tough situation with it, but I think this particular issue is a very easily solvable one and I’m surprised they haven’t attempted to solve it yet given the backlash they received last year.
 
First currently available Saturday is the 26th April.

Easter Sunday is still free.

Not a good start really.


Edit - Every After Dark date is booked up. Or they haven't released them yet. March looks awful when there's no midweek openings to spread everyone about.
 
Benzin said:
Not a good start really.
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Another reason we both won't and can't go this year. The southern parks are all 60-90 min away so it's viable for us to attend last minute when a cancellation comes in. We managed that fairly successfully in 2024 albeit at the cost of me obsessively monitoring the websites but that's my problem.

Alton Towers seems to suffer the most from both lack of availability of slots and complete inaccessibility without RAP. Other than increasingly scarce off peak days, the poor ride availability simply meant there weren't days when the major attractions didn't have 60+ minute queues. Whereas we've visited Legoland and Chessington on occasions in 2024 and not needed to always use RAP. Hopefully that improves at AT this year.

That's how a well run theme park should operate imo and why parks like Efteling and Paultons are so wonderful. It's ultimately the only viable solution to increasing RAP numbers imo. If you make the park functional in the first place, fewer people need (or desire) additional access.
 
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Efteling on Christmas & Boxing Day had some elements of Towers-esque RAP busyness (Dreamflight queue across the path, Carnaval Festival similar). Not a level of perfection by any means on the really busy days.

Also guess that given when I went Danse Macabre was constantly posting around a hour queue many RAP users were there.
 
Strangely Legoland has full availability for RAP this week.

It wasn't particularly busy in general and only a few cars in the disabled car park. Even SkyLion was walk on with RAP on our first ride, can't remember the last time i saw that.
 
I forgot that i'd previously booked a RAP slot for today. I went to cancel it and not only can you still not do so online but they've now removed live chat so the only way to cancel it would be to call them which is pretty unreasonable. Don't feel too bad as there are available slots today though weirdly all the slots for the rest of the week have gone!
 
Bowser said:
I forgot that i'd previously booked a RAP slot for today. I went to cancel it and not only can you still not do so online but they've now removed live chat so the only way to cancel it would be to call them which is pretty unreasonable. Don't feel too bad as there are available slots today though weirdly all the slots for the rest of the week have gone!
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And so it starts for another season :rolleyes:
 
TPick said:
And so it starts for another season :rolleyes:
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Normal service resumed today. The big rides were “fully booked” from the moment the site went online at 10am which was rather suspicious and had to spend half the day on my phone trying to get slots. Couldn’t get Dragon at all and gave up at 3pm. Sky Lion queue out the door.
 
Bowser said:
Normal service resumed today. The big rides were “fully booked” from the moment the site went online at 10am which was rather suspicious and had to spend half the day on my phone trying to get slots. Couldn’t get Dragon at all and gave up at 3pm. Sky Lion queue out the door.
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Far from ideal… and this is with capped RAP numbers
 
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