Just how bad is it between christmas and New Years

[musketeer]

Thinking about making a trip between christmas and new years. I know it's crazy busy, but just what does that mean? Does it mean 3 hour waits for EVERYTHING? We have two 2 1/2 year olds, so we aren't doing any of the super headliner type rides. We'd be sticking to Winnie the Pooh, Spaceship Earth, Great Movie Ride, etc type attractions. We are usually only able to go when it's busy (summer or the few days leading up to christmas including christmas day itself). So how much worse is the time after christmas compared to the peak of the summer or the christmas day (or the few days before)?

I know New Years Eve is the busiest, so we'd be long gone before then.

We consider ourselves expert fastpass users too, if that helps.

Thanks

 

[devoy1701]

Thinking about making a trip between christmas and new years. I know it's crazy busy, but just what does that mean? Does it mean 3 hour waits for EVERYTHING? We have two 2 1/2 year olds, so we aren't doing any of the super headliner type rides. We'd be sticking to Winnie the Pooh, Spaceship Earth, Great Movie Ride, etc type attractions. We are usually only able to go when it's busy (summer or the few days leading up to christmas including christmas day itself). So how much worse is the time after christmas compared to the peak of the summer or the christmas day (or the few days before)?

I know New Years Eve is the busiest, so we'd be long gone before then.

We consider ourselves expert fastpass users too, if that helps.

Thanks

Lets put it this way.... If you stay for the fireworks in MK and you do try leaving immediately after...It will take you about an hour JUST to get from the Hub to the front gate...then another 60-90 minutes to get your transportation to wherever you are heading!

 

[musketeer]

Lets put it this way.... If you stay for the fireworks in MK and you do try leaving immediately after...It will take you about an hour JUST to get from the Hub to the front gate...then another 60-90 minutes to get your transportation to wherever you are heading!

Having 2 1/2 year olds, I wouldn't be doing that anyway. I'm more interested in the time between when the parks open until 7 to 8ish pm. I guess I should've specified that.

 

[rsoxguy]

WDW can be quite congested during the weeks you have mentioned. A Christmas Eve, Christmas Day,and New Years Day visit should elicit caution, yea, perhaps even fear within the hearts of the most diehard fans. The days surrounding those mentioned above are busy and congested, but certainly not beyond the realm of doable and fun. You can expect longer lines and tighter crowds, but, quite frankly, it's not that big of a deal. I have gone during the pre/post weeks of Christmas several times, and I have tentative plans to do so this coming December. I love WDW during the Holidays. Prepare yourself mentally for the crowds, go, and have fun. :xmas:

 

[diz4ever]

I know that i will never go again on that week, the lines are crazy for the rides, people start waiting for the parades 1 to 2 hrs before they start, which makes getting around rather challaging, the transportation system is packed. We went to Epcot on New Years eve, arrived at 8am only got to ride 2 rides the whole day, had to wait 2-1/2 hrs to eat lunch Electric Umbrella ,the fireworks were awsome but the lines for the buses were long,we waited for the crowds to thin before we headed out ,it still took us 3 hrs to get back to the room.

 

[musketeer]

I know that i will never go again on that week, the lines are crazy for the rides, people start waiting for the parades 1 to 2 hrs before they start, which makes getting around rather challaging, the transportation system is packed. We went to Epcot on New Years eve, arrived at 8am only got to ride 2 rides the whole day, had to wait 2-1/2 hrs to eat lunch Electric Umbrella ,the fireworks were awsome but the lines for the buses were long,we waited for the crowds to thin before we headed out ,it still took us 3 hrs to get back to the room.

I wouldn't be going on New Years Eve. I know that's the busiest day of the year. And we wouldn't be doing parades either. And we'd have our own transportation, except of course getting back to the transportation and ticket center. We'd still be staying at a disney resort though.

 

[Scuttle]

INSANE! I will never EVER go to WDW between x-mas and new years. We went Dec. 29 2009 and it was the craziest thing I have ever seen. It took us 30 minutes to walk from Tomorrowland to Frontierland. It was that nuts. One and done for us after that experience. One cast member told us there was 90,000 in the park that day and it was about to be phase 3 closing.

 

[diz4ever]

I noticed the long lines for the people paying to park their cars that week also. It must be a big thing for locals to do that time of year.

 

[Scuttle]

I noticed the long lines for the people paying to park their cars that week also. It must be a big thing for locals to do that time of year.

It is, my relatives would come down from chicago for x-mas every year and we would go. I knew a lot of people growing up that would have family come down for x-mas and they would go to WDW.

 

[GoochDSA]

Most rides that a 2 and a half old can ride are going to have waits. Long waits. Figure about 90 min waits for Pooh, 2 hour waits for Peter Pan's Flight, HM will be about an hour or so, SSE could be 45 mins or an hour, even TGMR will have a half hour wait or so. If you utilize FP's and AMEMH, it won't be awful but it is going to be congested. It will be worse than the peak of summer and will slowly get worse the closer to NYE you get.

We went from a day after Xmas until a few days after NYE back in 08-09 and it was deffinately a different experience. As long as you know it's the busiest week of the year, you know that no matter where you go your going to wait on a long line and you and your DH/DW pack a whole lot of patience, it shouldn't be too bad.

I will say our only real issue was that ME from resort to MCO cut it much too short for my comfort. They gave us the same amount of time on the busiest travel day of the year (1/4/09 which was a Sunday after NYE) as they do when you go the week after Easter, and the bus was about 20 mins late. We basically walked on the plane as it was about to leave. I had called ME the night before after we got our time and was assured we'd make it. I took the guy who I talked to's name and had the time I called... just incase.

 

[musketeer]

If you utilize FP's and AMEMH, it won't be awful but it is going to be congested.

I'm usually pretty good on abbreviations, but AMEMH??? Extra Magic Hours maybe?????

 

[musketeer]

Most rides that a 2 and a half old can ride are going to have waits. Long waits. Figure about 90 min waits for Pooh, 2 hour waits for Peter Pan's Flight, HM will be about an hour or so, SSE could be 45 mins or an hour, even TGMR will have a half hour wait or so. If you utilize FP's and AMEMH, it won't be awful but it is going to be congested. It will be worse than the peak of summer and will slowly get worse the closer to NYE you get.

As I said before, we're expert fastpass users, so we'd never go near anything with that long of a wait without a fastpass. That was true even before kids. My wife and I went to Epcot a few years back (before kids) and our last day was on christmas day. Honestly, I didn't think it was that awful. We did our normal fastpass routine and got to do everything we wanted with minimal standing in line.

Then again last year, we were there with our kids (who were 1 1/2 at the time), and proper use of the fastpass system made it just fine.

BUT, this time is different, this is AFTER christmas. And so how do the few days before and including christmas compare to the 4ish or so days after. Again, stressing that I KNOW not to go on New Years Eve.

 

[disneygirl1]

I have personally never been during that we, but I have several friend's who decided to give it a try b/c they are teachers and had off from work that we. Put simply... They both said never again!

 

[nolatron]

My Wife and I went to WDW that week in 2007. I have never seen it as crowded in all the times we've been. It was the first time I saw this too:

While we still enjoyed ourselves, I doubt we'd ever go again that week.

 

[David]

A couple of years ago we had our first trip down that week, arriving Christmas evening and staying through the 2nd. I wish I were at my home PC to post a picture at the studios. It was literally shoulder to shoulder, body to body. And would I do that ever again?

You betcha. It's Disney, after all.

You probably would not do this with small kids, but we were able to take advance of the EMH which sometimes meant being at the bus stop at 6:30. But at least using those hours did provide us with the chance to do a lot of attractions before the masses arrived.

I would never recommend that week for a first time visitor, but if you go expecting and know there will be large, large crowds, that you will not be able to do everything you want to do, take your time to enjoy the decorations, you'll have a magical trip.

 

[njDizFan]

I made the trek out to WDW for that week in 2008/2009. And honestly I didn't find it much worse than peak summer times. since my wife is a teacher we can only go during peak times anyway. so it didn't seem much worse.

NYE was by far the worse and later in the day it was prety crazy. It took us over an hour to get from tomorrowland to CP.

But if you get there early you can still get quite a bit done.

 

[musketeer]

I made the trek out to WDW for that week in 2008/2009. And honestly I didn't find it much worse than peak summer times. since my wife is a teacher we can only go during peak times anyway. so it didn't seem much worse.

NYE was by far the worse and later in the day it was prety crazy. It took us over an hour to get from tomorrowland to CP.

But if you get there early you can still get quite a bit done.

I think this is the kind of response I was interested in. Someone who can only go during the busy times anyway. I've been there in late june, mid july, and mid august, and I found all of those times manageable. Knowing it's worse in the week of christmas, but how worse is what I'm trying to get at.

 

[SCB502]

We've gone several times at Christmas and it is pretty bad. I've seen the people mover have a 30 minute line and It's a Small World have a 90 minute wait. However the park could be open from 7 am to 3 am. We go in as soon as it opens and get a lot of stuff done. We leave by 10 am when it starts to become impossible to walk around. Then we go back in around 10 at night and stay til closing. I feel sorry for anyone in the parks from 10 am to 10 pm. There is also nowhere to go to get away from crowds, Downtown Disney, golf, everything is packed. All that said, best place on Earth for Christmas.

 

[GoochDSA]

I'm usually pretty good on abbreviations, but AMEMH??? Extra Magic Hours maybe?????

Yes. A.M. Extra Magic Hours. Most parks open an hour earlier that week anyway (MK will probably be open at 8AM that week to the general public opposed to 9AM that it is most other weeks). If you add an EMH to that and your in the parks at 7AM, which a PP mentioned can be tough with the little ones, you can get a ton done in much less time. It gives you a chance to spend the peak times of the day back at your resort relaxing to make up for the early mornings.

As I said before, we're expert fastpass users, so we'd never go near anything with that long of a wait without a fastpass. That was true even before kids. My wife and I went to Epcot a few years back (before kids) and our last day was on christmas day. Honestly, I didn't think it was that awful. We did our normal fastpass routine and got to do everything we wanted with minimal standing in line.

Then again last year, we were there with our kids (who were 1 1/2 at the time), and proper use of the fastpass system made it just fine.

BUT, this time is different, this is AFTER christmas. And so how do the few days before and including christmas compare to the 4ish or so days after. Again, stressing that I KNOW not to go on New Years Eve.

As I said in an earlier post, the closer it gets to NYE the busier it gets. While the few days into Christmas can be bad, the big holiday rush usually starts showing up after Christmas. It slowly builds from the few days before Christmas, with each day getting more and more crowded, until it peaks 12/31, then the crowd begins to fade. If you use your FP expertise and utilize those extra hours in the morning, you probably won't notice the parks to be too much worse than the peak summer season.

 

[njDizFan]

I think this is the kind of response I was interested in. Someone who can only go during the busy times anyway. I've been there in late june, mid july, and mid august, and I found all of those times manageable. Knowing it's worse in the week of christmas, but how worse is what I'm trying to get at.

Yes I have been in August and July as well as Spring Break, so I only know long waits.

Christmas week is busy, but like I said if you get there early you should have no problem getting on all the rides you normally would. By mid afternoon and evening things start to really slow down. so make some evening ADRs and enjoy the atmosphere and get a couple of FPs prior to dining.

Like the OPs said after wishes is a nightmare