I wanted to separate this from my general trip report because this would have been super helpful to me in my trip planning this time around, so maybe it will help others. (This is based on our experience this week at Disney while staying at Boardwalk and frequenting the parks/other resorts via the Skyliner).
With such limited park hours lately, and even more so in upcoming months, I realized that the modes of transportations between hotels for dining reservations would be impacted as well. We stayed at the Boardwalk this week, which typically offers super easy access to a lot of transportation since you can walk to the Skyliner at the back of Epcot, walk through Epcot to the monorail, walk to HS for buses to any resort you need to go to, etc. Unfortunately, as I sat there all happy with my 9am Topolinos reservation, thinking I was filling time before HS opened at 10am (and Epcot opens at 11am), I realized “mother effer, I was planning to take the Skyliner from Epcot to Riviera for breakfast, but it won’t be running at 9!” Typically they say transportation runs to and from parks starting an hour before park opening, however the Skyliner hours as officially posted right now show the HS line opening at 9am and the Epcot line opening at 10:30am. Based on my experience today, these times are extremely accurate. We woke up and walked over to HS, figuring maybe we could get on that Skyliner a little before 9 and then walk from Caribbean Beach to Riviera, but they did not let anyone board the Skyliner at HS until after 9am. They wouldn’t even let anyone in the area near the Skyliner prior to 9am, regardless of breakfast reservations.
When we got to Caribbean Beach, we learned that we could show our Topolinos reservation and get on the Epcot Skyliner line immediately, even though it was not technically open until 10:30. So we rode that line at about 9:10 this morning with no issues. All we did was show our reservation information on my phone. I asked at the Riviera station if we could have ridden it from Epcot directly and they said yes, we would just show our reservation information. So basically it would appear that starting at least as early as 8 or 8:30am, if not earlier, even during these times with the super late park openings, you can access the Epcot Skyliner line with a breakfast reservation. This does NOT apply to the HS line, because there would be no reason anyone would need to use it for a breakfast reservation right now as far as I’m aware (at least they would not allow anyone to board AT HS, maybe you could board at Caribbean Beach and go to HS if you had a reservation in the park, if there are breakfast locations there …. are there?).
Additionally, when we were leaving Topolinos at about 10:15, there was a long line waiting for the Skyliner to Epcot from Riviera, which wasn’t open yet (still not 10:30). We foolishly waited in this line, although I asked at the station later and they said I again could have shown that we were staying at Boardwalk and had breakfast at Topolinos and were just taking the Skyliner back to our hotel, and we would have been allowed on before it opened at 10:30. So basically we should have gone around the line and up to the front. This feels like cheating, but we aren’t even going to Epcot, so why should we be waiting in a line for Epcot?!
Moral of the story: book those early Topolinos reservations freely if you are staying at Boardwalk, Yacht/Beach, Swan/Dolphin, Pop Century, or Art of Animation, because the Skyliner will take you there and back even though it is outside of the official operating hours. This is similar to my understanding of the monorail. I’m not totally sure about how the buses work for breakfast reservations, but I know they run at least an hour before park opening. This makes life SO much easier. We could have just walked quickly over to the back entrance of Epcot and taken the Skyliner directly to Riviera this morning at 9 instead of walking to HS, waiting for that Skyliner line to officially open, and then transferring at Caribbean Beach.
Update: I’ve heard from more people that the Epcot line has been open for breakfast reservations early over the past few weeks (September), specifically saying it opens for guests with breakfast reservations around 8:50 or 9am lately. Before that it may be running empty, so don’t quote me on the 8am opening time ! 8:50 opening is great for the Epcot line instead of the normal 10:30 opening time for guests going to Epcot. If the line opens at 8:50, you could be at Riviera easily before 9:05 for breakfast.
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